D&D 5E My New Players Have Quit 5th Edition

[Dausuul]

What happens if you're at 1 hp, and a goblin hits you for 3 damage...you're not -2, you're 0. But there are other gobins attacking you at the same time, technically they all attack at once and you're stabbed simultaneously 3 times for a full total of 15 damage.

No, technically they attack in sequence, one at a time. I often put monsters on the same initiative and roll their attacks at once to speed up play; but if Monster #1 drops a PC with its attack, I will have Monsters #2 and #3 attack somebody else*.

If they did keep attacking the same PC, what would happen is:

• Goblin #1 attacks, hits, and drops the PC. The PC is now at 0 hit points.
• Goblin #2 attacks and hits. The damage is not equal to the PC's max hit points, so instant death does not kick in. Instead, the PC remains at 0 hit points and gets one failed death save.
• Goblin #3 attacks and hits. Same as #2. The PC now has two failed death saves.
• On the PC's turn, the character must make a death save. If she fails, she has three failed death saves and dies. If she succeeds, she has two failed and one successful, and lives... that round.

[SIZE=-2]*This is not to be nice, but because monsters plan their tactics the same way PCs do, and PCs don't normally waste attacks on fallen foes. If the monsters see that fallen PCs keep jumping up to rejoin the fray, they will again behave like PCs and adjust their tactics; PCs will find the monsters are now making sure of their kills. Or they will find that all of a sudden, the monsters are single-mindedly focusing fire on the cleric...[/SIZE]

 

[Tony Semana]

What happens if you're at 1 hp, and a goblin hits you for 3 damage...you're not -2, you're 0. But there are other gobins attacking you at the same time, technically they all attack at once and you're stabbed simultaneously 3 times for a full total of 15 damage. Does this count toward the "instant death rule" of being equal to or higher than your max hit points, or does it have to be from one attack.

No, you would not be able to use the sum of the attacks, each distinct damage roll is resolved individually as it relates to the instant death roll. So in you example, the first hit brings you to 0 and you are unconscious. For each additional goblin attack that deals damage, you auto-fail a death save. So, if there were 2 more goblins after the first hitting you, you would be down to 1 fail left, if 1 of those 2 were to get a critical you'd be dead, likewise if there were 3 additional goblins you would be dead.

The fiction is that everything is happening at simultaneously in each round round but each entity in the combat still has its distinct turn. In the same way that characters get to decide their action based on what happened just before (in initiative order), even though you might lump all goblins in the same slot in initiative order they get the same treatment of resolving each of their turns individually.

And then there is the inevitable complaint by the player "Hey that first attack dropped me, the goblins would go fight someone else!"

Might be valid, might not. That's DM's discretion if they play these as particularly bloodthirsty/single-minded/dim and would swarm a downed target rather than move on to other threats.

 

[ExploderWizard]

My first game of d&d was OD&D..Keep on the Borderlands. I rolled up my character...a magic user...I found my way to the kobald lair. I cast my one magic missile spell for 1d4+1 damage. Then I died. Kept on playing...

You were animated as a zombie? Cool.

Something changed.
You die at Negative HP value.
The first encounter has 4 goblins and a bugbear who puts out damage a few points below the ogre.

If they get surprise (due to bad rolls etc) and roll normally you're looking at at least one dead PC because the bugbear can reduce direct to dead all of the pre-gens with a lucky dice roll.
On a crit he kills everyone. even the fighter.

There is no bugbear in the first encounter. If there is then it is due to DM editing.

Right, I think he's saying the bugbear can do this on a lucky roll. Don't have the Starter Set, myself, so I can't confirm that there even is a bugbear (since this appears to be in dispute), let alone how much damage it does.

There IS a bugbear but he is several encounters into the adventure, and not in the first encounter.

 

[wedgeski]

I have to say that I really like 5E's death and dying rules. Good job Mearls et al.

 

[am181d]

I didn't add hit points because we all agreed to try to play the game according to the starter set rules without me putting in a ton of house rules yet. Just to see what would happen. I had a pretty good idea from the pre-gen character's low hit points that there would be a few deaths.

So can you confirm if:

1) you added monsters to the first encounter?
2) you followed the rules for making death saves rather than ruling PCs auto-died at 0?
3) you followed the instructions in the adventure that the monsters were trying to capture rather than kill the PCs?

If you followed the rules above, the only way a PC could die in the first encounter would be if one of the goblins' crit exceeded 2x the PC's HP. The odds of that happening twice in one round are something like 1 in 1000.

(Admittedly, if thousands of groups play through the Starter, this will happen a few times.)

 

[Tormyr]

No, you would not be able to use the sum of the attacks, each distinct damage roll is resolved individually as it relates to the instant death roll. So in you example, the first hit brings you to 0 and you are unconscious. For each additional goblin attack that deals damage, you auto-fail a death save. So, if there were 2 more goblins after the first hitting you, you would be down to 1 fail left, if 1 of those 2 were to get a critical you'd be dead, likewise if there were 3 additional goblins you would be dead.

The fiction is that everything is happening at simultaneously in each round round but each entity in the combat still has its distinct turn. In the same way that characters get to decide their action based on what happened just before (in initiative order), even though you might lump all goblins in the same slot in initiative order they get the same treatment of resolving each of their turns individually.



Might be valid, might not. That's DM's discretion if they play these as particularly bloodthirsty/single-minded/dim and would swarm a downed target rather than move on to other threats.

Or goblin #2 could get advantage for attacking an unconscious opponent and coup de grace. None of those pesky death saves.

EDIT: If it was in melee range.

 

[Thaumaturge]

Or goblin #2 could get advantage for attacking an unconscious opponent and coup de grace. None of those pesky death saves.

EDIT: If it was in melee range.

I'm not seeing coup de grace as an option in 5B. It was in some of the playtests, but I don't think it made the cut.

Thaumaturge.

 

[Dausuul]

Or goblin #2 could get advantage for attacking an unconscious opponent and coup de grace. None of those pesky death saves.

EDIT: If it was in melee range.

5E doesn't have coup de grace rules. At least basic 5E doesn't.

 

[Umbran]

Or goblin #2 could get advantage for attacking an unconscious opponent and coup de grace. None of those pesky death saves.

Sorry, but the term does not appear in Basic. So, outside the available rules.

 

[Tormyr]

Ooh...missed that one. My players lucked out on Wednesday night then. I let them coup de grace a half-orc cleric that was part of a group of 3 clerics that were overmatched for the party. Kept him from being healed and back in the fight.