L&L 3/05 - Save or Die!

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Can you offer an example?
Did the hero in your example stop turning partway through the process? (ie made a 2nd or 3rd save)

In The Neverending Story, the scene in the swamp. The hero had to fight back against the despair or he would be dragged into the swamp to die.

I can recall scenes where a character fights against petrification, continuing to plod forward even though he's turning to stone. I can't think of an example where a character turns back. But I think you're conflating what I proposed in this thread with 4E's SSSoD. I never said anything about turning back.

 

[Kannik]

That just seems boring. "Oh look, a medusa, who cares I have to fail 3 saves to turn to stone. There is no tension until 2 saves are failed. Only minor annoyances such as -2 to hit or whatever, which is not much different than the medusa having leather armor on, or having precast a prayer spell or what have you.

Sure, I wouldn't suggest that either as a way to run it. I would try something like that if you fail your save, on your next turn you are immobilized, the turn after that you are unconscious, and a turn after that you are stone. This gives you, the affected player, one turn to try do something, your party one other turn to try to do something (and at that point you're out of the fight), and then you're stone. Gets even more interesting should two in the party be affected at the same time...

Or maybe L&L's suggestion here is a good one, with a min HP barrier. Suddenly those crits that knock off a lot of HP just got a lot scarier in this encounter...

Or maybe it's a limited use ability by the creature, with a reversible effect in some significant way by the PCs...

I think there are plenty of ways this could be written up to be scary, impactful and dramatic, and what ways could be used are likely different for different creatures, or if it was a trap, or something else.

Looking at a medusa with sod present presents an "oh crap" moment as the die bounces across the table, hoping for a good roll. Even high level characters crap their pants, because all 20 sided dies have ones on them.

Personally I'm hoping that the tighter math hinted at in D&D^N means high level characters are not so powerful that both low level creatures become totally blasé to them or that they overwhelm even even-level creatures.

peace,

Kannik

 

[FireLance]

Not true, unless he bans spells from the phb. Since my group is a bunch of old friends, it's no big deal, we just wouldn't play 5e, we'd play something else that makes us happier. Which is not what WOTC seems to want in an edition made specifically to bring folks like us back.

Still kind of missing the point, I'm afraid. What 5e is supposed to do is to give groups a variety of options on how to play the game. In the case of SOD, for example, you can adjust the dial to "more lethal" (hp thresholds are always set above the PCs' hit points) or "less lethal" (hp thresholds are set very low, so that PCs are only in danger of SOD when they are near death in the first place).

If you and your DM aren't on the same page, 5e isn't going to help you. If you and your DM are on the same page, your group can play 5e with highly lethal SODs while another group plays 5e with the less lethal option. Why do you care that some other group has the option to make SOD less lethal if you can have the more lethal option you want?

 

[Kannik]

Again, this only applies to a "win the game" perspective. Which is fine if that is what you want.

But I've been in games in which characters got turned to stone. And I've seen reactions of "Damn!" BUT, these moments were still a ton of fun and remain talking points years later.

I am uncertain exactly what you are trying to put forth in this post with the "win the game perspective" -type statements. If you are stating that alteration of SoD effects will reduce the game to guaranteed win encounters, or even moreso, that alteration of SoD effects will remove nasty elements that the party will need to work around, both in and out of combat, and lead to epic stories told over and over again to one's gaming buddies for years to come, then I disagree. I think there is no reason to believe that there is no other mechanic that can be constructed that generates the desired outcomes of SoD-type effects (those listed just above, for example) while reducing or removing the undesirable outcomes of SoD-type effects.

And, btw, this is being spoken from someone whose PC has been turned to stone and played on in the excitement that arose from it. Removing adversity, even being turned to stone, is not the intent.

Lastly, if you are stating that people who dislike or have an issue with straight-up SoD effects just want to "win the game," just want to play a "meaningless narrative substance" game, and any modification to it has an air of "fundamental wrongness" to it, well, I would call all that false and an unnecessarily dismissive statement.

peace,

Kannik

 

[Mattachine]

What I like about the hp threshold is that a similar mechanic, Power Word spells, exist in several editions of the game, and many folks are comfortable with that mechanic.

 

[Andor]

I'm generally on board with Mike's idea. It basically means that Save or Dies aren't completely bypassing the HP system, and are really just conditional damage; i.e., this does X additional damage if that would kill the target.

An idea for a mechanism that might scale nicely:

Save or dies are simply HP-based saves. The attack would have a DC, and the defender would roll d20 plus their current HP. The DC would be significantly higher than one for an ability-score-based save.

For example (assuming spells are primarily attacks, like in 4E):

Finger of Death
INT vs. Dexterity: 2d8+INT damage. In addition, target makes an HP save against DC 15+CL. Dies on failure.

So, for a 20th level Wizard, it would be 35 DC. A target with 34 or more HP saves no matter what. Less than that, there's a chance of death. But at 14 HP, death is automatic. If we assume around 100 HP for a typical level 20, I think that's reasonable.

I think this would be workable, IF there was a simple and handy mechanism to gauge about how effective the spell would be. A sense motive check or the like to gauge remaining level/power/meat points so that the mage spell doesn't get blown on a foe it couldn't possible effect.

It also depends on the growth scale of HP. If it's like 3e where you could see characters with a hundred HP rountinely, then it would work better as "Save vs con-10 or die, get a +1 to your roll for every 5 hp remaining."

 

[13garth13]

Gotta go old school on this one!

Put me down for old-fashioned, turn your trousers brown, everything hinges on that single roll of the die for your character, scary-as-heck SOD mechanics (although some of the threshold ideas are interesting and certainly applicable for some creatures, to be sure, I want gorgon breath, medusa gaze, catoblepas breath/gaze, bodak gaze, Finger of Death spell, etc etc to be single roll type stuff).

Cheers,
Colin

 

[Lanefan]

An idea for a mechanism that might scale nicely:

Save or dies are simply HP-based saves. The attack would have a DC, and the defender would roll d20 plus their current HP. The DC would be significantly higher than one for an ability-score-based save.

For example (assuming spells are primarily attacks, like in 4E):

Finger of Death
INT vs. Dexterity: 2d8+INT damage. In addition, target makes an HP save against DC 15+CL. Dies on failure.

So, for a 20th level Wizard, it would be 35 DC. A target with 34 or more HP saves no matter what. Less than that, there's a chance of death. But at 14 HP, death is automatic. If we assume around 100 HP for a typical level 20, I think that's reasonable.

Interesting idea, though given how high h.p. totals can get the d20 might be too narrow a window.

It's a tiny bit more math, but one could have the save modified by +1 per x h.p. remaining, where x could be 5, or 10, or whatever. Or, for more difficulty, modify it by -1 for each x h.p. below full you are. Note that this also works with saving throw tables as well as the DC system.

Easy save: d20 + 1 per 2 h.p. you are currently at.
Tougher save: d20 + 1 per 10 h.p. you are currently at.
Nasty save: d20 - 1 per 5 h.p. you have lost.

The problem again, however, is that by tying it to number of h.p. you are either benefiting or screwing over the classes that naturally tend to have more h.p. e.g. Fighters. To really make this work across the classes the modifier would have to tie to what % of your total h.p. you are at or have lost, but that's even mathier.

And then there's all the other save modifiers...yikes.

Lan-"for grade 5 you will need a calculator"-efan

 

[GM Dave]

Lots of thoughts from 11 pgs of reading.

1> I agree with having hit points being an affect on SOD mechanics. We discussed several ideas in the previous SOD thread. I proposed that SOD mechanics would put a 'flag' on the character that would go into effect when they received enough physical damage and 'affliction' damage to total their hit points.

2> The suggestion to change the hit point limit when SOD effects occur is an interesting way to still cause players to worry (I can now be knocked out of the fight when I still have 25 hit points left!) but reduce the lethality from every SOD is a deadly event.

3> I like that people have pointed out the threshold for where the SOD mechanics could kick in is in the control of the DM. DM's liking more lethality can have no upper limit on the threshold and people with no desire for SOD could put the limit down to the floor of 0 hit points. Different threshold for different groups and different playstyles.

4> I do agree with several of the people that one mechanic does not fit all the SOD situations.

Look at your basic 100' pit trap. It makes little sense that a group of players can dance a congo line around it because they have enough HP to avoid it.

You could make a ruling that every round being on the edge of the pit 'inflicted' damage as you were 'sliding' over the edge. The problem would be that many would call gamist foul and ask where were the swords or Sarlock teeth that were sucking you down to your doom.

There are also many SOD mechanics that are related not to death (or its sub-forms like petrification) but to horrible conditions like Blindness and Deafness (death is often easier to fix then blindness in DnD).

5> I also agree that SOD does have a place in game play. Players don't feel 'danger' unless they have a risk of losing something. I just recently dealt with my players not respecting the hints of danger they were in.

I repeatedly warned them (sounds of animals growing more numerous), mentioned in a in-between game post when I asked on further plans that I had plenty of resources still in the temple, and asked whether they were staying and fighting or making a run for it with what they could grab. Two left with the suggestion and seven stayed. Of those seven, two invited trouble by shooting missiles at the Four PF Summoners with Brood option (who had spent the last 5 rounds summoning level 1 summons).

If players feel they are going to always get a 'fair' fight or be coddled then they will treat things as a Sunday picnic. I swept the 20 creatures down on the Seven players that were remaining to fight (five of which in later rounds went screaming for the exit after the first two). The last two were on last legs (but my summons were on last legs only having a round or two left). I still didn't inflict the 'worst' I could do with my resources but it was enough to make them realize they needed to play smart or they could get killed.

A SOD encounter is nasty but it teaches play lessons and gets players to treat 'danger' and hints of warning as serious things to pay attention.

6> I also agree that one mechanic is not the solution. Mike Mearles idea is great for adding another tool to the tool box. The more tools the better.

I recently ran a Carrion Crawler encounter and replaced the tentacles of paralysis with each hit removing 5' of base speed. When a character was reduced to 0' of speed then they were paralysed. It worked well as a mechanic for that game and allowed me to use a dangerous monster in a way that was 'scary' and memorable (several players lost speed and went into the next encounter moving slow).

One of the strengths of DnD has been the richness of the monsters with their different mechanics. This is why I liked the Monster Vault because it listed many monsters with different versions of essentially the same attack allowing the monsters to be used in a variety of ways.

Overall Conclusion

It is great to have a suggestion for a new way to use SOD and implement the rules but it is also great the many other suggestions in this thread for other possible mechanics and ways to handle other SOD situations.

 

[GreyLord]

What I like about the hp threshold is that a similar mechanic, Power Word spells, exist in several editions of the game, and many folks are comfortable with that mechanic.

Power Word: Kill

Hmmm...he seems to have to many HP to kill.

That's similar to what I thought on Mearl's explanation in relation to an older version example.

PS: Then I turned around and became CE and voted for Save or Die!