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Grind-out fights, unconscious heroes, and retreat
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<blockquote data-quote="redrick" data-source="post: 6618331" data-attributes="member: 6777696"><p>Yeah, I didn't mean coup-de-grace in a mechanical sense. It just writes out more nicely than "attack the unconscious character with advantage and an automatic critical on a hit, thereby causing that character to fail two death saves."</p><p></p><p>I guess the point of my post was that monsters <em>killing</em> PCs makes sense a lot more often than we give it credit when we play under the "gentleman's agreement" that monsters, generally, will attack conscious PCs before unconscious ones. Goblins aren't brilliant, but they have a decent sense of self-preservation, and will certainly kill or try to kill a downed PC if it has a better chance of saving their skin than attacking a conscious PC. If there's one thing that's pretty much guaranteed to get a goblin killed, it's standing between a healthy PC and a downed PC in need of healing.</p><p></p><p>Now, in practice, it still plays out with different enemies taking different approaches. Some might take the opportunity of a downed enemy to say, "Stop this madness! If you let us retreat safely, we will allow you to tend to your wounded!" A bear will probably focus on whatever is moving. Regardless, I think the idea that outright killing unconscious PCs should be saved for the most savage and depraved attackers (an idea that I feel like is common) is not a good one. Players should assume that their opponents are fighting to kill, and be relieved to find out that they are not.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="redrick, post: 6618331, member: 6777696"] Yeah, I didn't mean coup-de-grace in a mechanical sense. It just writes out more nicely than "attack the unconscious character with advantage and an automatic critical on a hit, thereby causing that character to fail two death saves." I guess the point of my post was that monsters [I]killing[/I] PCs makes sense a lot more often than we give it credit when we play under the "gentleman's agreement" that monsters, generally, will attack conscious PCs before unconscious ones. Goblins aren't brilliant, but they have a decent sense of self-preservation, and will certainly kill or try to kill a downed PC if it has a better chance of saving their skin than attacking a conscious PC. If there's one thing that's pretty much guaranteed to get a goblin killed, it's standing between a healthy PC and a downed PC in need of healing. Now, in practice, it still plays out with different enemies taking different approaches. Some might take the opportunity of a downed enemy to say, "Stop this madness! If you let us retreat safely, we will allow you to tend to your wounded!" A bear will probably focus on whatever is moving. Regardless, I think the idea that outright killing unconscious PCs should be saved for the most savage and depraved attackers (an idea that I feel like is common) is not a good one. Players should assume that their opponents are fighting to kill, and be relieved to find out that they are not. [/QUOTE]
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Grind-out fights, unconscious heroes, and retreat
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