D&D 5E Death and 0 Max HP

DND_Reborn · Jul 22, 2019

jaelis said:
So here’s an actual argument to consider. There are many effects that reduce your max hp. As far as I recall, all of them say you die if it is reduced to zero. You could reasonably generalize from that that you always die if your max hp is zero.

Fine, I'll bite. Like what? How are they reduced? How are they recovered?

If, like the vampire, they are also only recovered via a long rest (or powerful magic), which I suspect they are, then YES, the same argument applies and our interpretation would be the same.

(The dead horse vampire is rising from its grave! RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!!)

Maxperson · Jul 22, 2019

dnd4vr said:
Fine, I'll bite. Like what? How are they reduced? How are they recovered?

If, like the vampire, they are also only recovered via a long rest (or powerful magic), which I suspect they are, then YES, the same argument applies and our interpretation would be the same.

(The dead horse vampire is rising from its grave! RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!!)

Not sure what you are biting on. That post agreed with us.

Hriston · Jul 22, 2019

Maxperson said:
Except it isn't conflation. It's interpretation. You view the effect as tertiary. I don't. I see it as part of the same effect that kills the victim.

That’s conflation. You’re combining multiple effects into one. The target dies is one effect. The target rises as a vampire spawn is another effect. They each have their own separate conditions.

The reason “the target rises as a vampire spawn” is a tertiary effect of the bite is that the bite has three primary effects:
1. The target takes piercing and necrotic damage.
2. The target’s hit point maximum is reduced by the amount of the necrotic damage (restores on a long rest).
3. The vampire regains a number of hit points equal to the reduction.
Effect 2 gives rise to a secondary effect: the target dies if effect 2 reduces its hit point maximum to 0.
Which further gives rise to a tertiary effect: the target rises the night following burial as a vampire spawn under the vampire’s control if (a) the target is a humanoid, (b) the target is slain by the secondary effect of effect 2, and (c) the target is then buried in the ground.

Also, I think it’s worth repeating that the duration stated for the reduction of the target’s hit point maximum caused by effect 2 (until the target finishes a long rest) applies only to the numerical reduction of the target's hit point maximum itself and not to effect 2 in general or its secondary and tertiary effects. By conflating all of these, particularly the stated duration of the reduction and the secondary effect, you get the odd result that the target remains dead as long as its hit point maximum is 0, when that isn't a stated effect of the bite.

Maxperson said:
Both views are valid views. At this point that's the main contention. We see both interpretations as valid. Your side seems to view your interpretation as the one true way.

I can get to something like your interpretation by regarding the duration of the "reduction" (until the target finishes a long rest) as applying to not only the action of the hit point maximum being made less, but also everything that follows from that action (i.e. death if hp max is reduced to 0, etc.), but I would also need to make what I feel are some grammatical errors to get there. I think there's been a reluctance on the part of the defenders of your interpretation in this thread to discuss what those errors are.

My goal isn't to invalidate your interpretation. You're welcome to it. IMO, it relies too much on extratextual beliefs about what's going on in the fiction, but that's really just a matter of taste.

DND_Reborn · Jul 22, 2019

Maxperson said:
Not sure what you are biting on. That post agreed with us.

Hey! You're right! Sorry, I am just so use to people continuing to argue the other way. LOL!

Oofta · Jul 22, 2019

Hriston said:
I can get to something like your interpretation by regarding the duration of the "reduction" (until the target finishes a long rest) as applying to not only the action of the hit point maximum being made less, but also everything that follows from that action (i.e. death if hp max is reduced to 0, etc.), but I would also need to make what I feel are some grammatical errors to get there. I think there's been a reluctance on the part of the defenders of your interpretation in this thread to discuss what those errors are.

My goal isn't to invalidate your interpretation. You're welcome to it. IMO, it relies too much on extratextual beliefs about what's going on in the fiction, but that's really just a matter of taste.

I would just add that with any interpretation of the rules, I try to keep my interpretation to the simplest option and what's going to work for the game.

So in this case we know one way of dying in the game. There are several, all stated pretty much as "when X happens you die". My interpretation of the rule is "if you go from max HP of 1 or more to 0 you die". Once you're at 0, you can't be reduced further.

This is a special case because we also have max HP drain, but there's no rule that specifically states "you can't be raised from the dead if you have 0 max HP".* In addition, we know people can be alive with 0 hp.

But the reason I'm bothering to post is to explain how I look at the "how does this work in game" aspect. If you follow the rules strictly you can't raise your max HP above zero if you're dead. You can't long rest, you can't cast greater restoration on a corpse.

Without another house rule (greater restoration simultaneously with raise dead) even true res wouldn't work. It's perma-death. Pretty harsh since wights also have a similar attack and are only a CR 3. Since we're pretty much making up the rule on how to handle this, I think the easiest solution is best: you can be raised from the dead even if you can only have 0 HP. After a raise dead you're alive but unconscious and need a greater restoration or similar. No jumping through hoops, no special ceremonies required. Treat it like any other death and reduced max hp scenario.

*Unless you use circular logic to say that this particular effect means you can't be raised so that's the rule that it doesn't work.

Hriston · Jul 22, 2019

Oofta said:
I think the easiest solution is best: you can be raised from the dead even if you can only have 0 HP. After a raise dead you're alive but unconscious and need a greater restoration or similar.

Like I said up-thread, revivify should have brought the PC back to life with 0 hit points. I mean, 300 gp of diamonds isn't chump change!

DND_Reborn · Jul 23, 2019

Hriston said:
Like I said up-thread, revivify should have brought the PC back to life with 0 hit points. I mean, 300 gp of diamonds isn't chump change!

Are you kidding? 300 gp is nothing at all...

As it is, Revivify is WAY TOO POWERFUL! Basically, once you reach 5th-level or have access to a 5th-level cleric or such, character simply won't die (and stay dead) unless the DM is a prick. Without the risk of death, the game is pretty boring IMO. But I guess I shouldn't be surprised with the state of things...

Gone are the days of the Resurrection Survival Check... Gone are the days of Insta-death around every corner... No wonder so many people are returning to older systems and other games. While 5E has a lot of great things going for it, character mortality is hardly one of them. Personally, I'm glad our DM ruled Revivify didn't work, it actually added some horror and despair to the game. Now, we have to race to find a way to save our fallen comrade and hope we can find a cleric powerful enough and have enough money to pay for it, or our DM will likely require a quest for the service.

And while I agree with Oofta that the easiest solution is best: saying Revivify simple isn't powerful enough is a pretty simple and easy solution IMO. You can't be raised if your max hp is 0. Nice and terrifying! I LOVE IT! MWAHAHAHAHA!

Maxperson · Jul 23, 2019

dnd4vr said:
And while I agree with Oofta that the easiest solution is best: saying Revivify simple isn't powerful enough is a pretty simple and easy solution IMO. You can't be raised if your max hp is 0. Nice and terrifying! I LOVE IT! MWAHAHAHAHA!

I don't think the easiest solution as the best. I think the solution that makes the most sense is the best.

Hriston · Jul 23, 2019

dnd4vr said:
Are you kidding? 300 gp is nothing at all...

300 gp is six pounds of gold, worth over $137,000 US by today’s prices. I wouldn’t exactly call that chump change, although it does seem like a bargain for bringing back a fallen comrade.

I actually think your party may have had more interesting logistical issues to deal with if your companion had been brought back with a 0 hit point maximum than you did having to transport her corpse. Keeping the copper pieces on her eyes sounds like a bit of a challenge, but if she were alive, you’d have to be careful about causing any damage, or she’d die instantly, but I guess at that point you could just cast revivify again, so I kind of see what you mean.

Maxperson · Jul 23, 2019

You know what has always bugged me about 300gp worth of diamonds, or 10,000gp worth of diamond dust? What happens if you walk into a country that has a diamond mine and diamonds are worth 20% less there? Does the fact that your 300gp worth of diamonds just dropped to 240gp worth of diamonds keep you from casting the spell? And since diamonds are commonly used for spells and are generally consumed forever, diamonds should be fairly rare and hard to come by after thousands of years of consumption, so fewer and fewer of them will be needed to hit the 300gp mark as time goes by.

It seems to me that it should be a weight of diamonds, like say 10 carats or something.