doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Yeah a lot of characters aren’t dealt with at all post-battle, and are just assumed to have either bled out of stabilized without the PCs seeing them.
D&D 5E "If They Have a Name They Get Death Saves. . ."
Yora
Legend
My approach has long been "If they have class levels, I need to give them a name and personality".
Clearly distinguishing between NPCs with speaking roles and faceless background extras and making the minor characters actual full characters makes for much more interesting interactions.
Clearly distinguishing between NPCs with speaking roles and faceless background extras and making the minor characters actual full characters makes for much more interesting interactions.
Strong is the power of baptism in the world of D&D.
However, I get a list of names ready for encounters. If the PCs face a semi-important (named) NPC and his horde of 12 mooks, I am pretty sure one of them will be captured (by virtue of the players remembering they can do non-lethal damage) and the players will ask to reveal his name... something to which "err, let me think of something" doesn't feel a satisfying answer. So uninteresting survivors get assigned a name as needed, after the fight (and I write the brief description besides their name on the name list at the end of the session...). During the fight, I try to distinguish mook #11 from mook #8 by giving them a semi-distinctive feature (except a cape. PCs always focus on a cape-wearing opponent).
However, I get a list of names ready for encounters. If the PCs face a semi-important (named) NPC and his horde of 12 mooks, I am pretty sure one of them will be captured (by virtue of the players remembering they can do non-lethal damage) and the players will ask to reveal his name... something to which "err, let me think of something" doesn't feel a satisfying answer. So uninteresting survivors get assigned a name as needed, after the fight (and I write the brief description besides their name on the name list at the end of the session...). During the fight, I try to distinguish mook #11 from mook #8 by giving them a semi-distinctive feature (except a cape. PCs always focus on a cape-wearing opponent).
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Yeah sometimes I’ll see how many are possibly alive, and roll an appropriate die, and the number rolled is the number that stabilized or are still bleeding.
I just want to know if the bad guys introduce themselves formally one-by-one, or in a pre-initiative song.
I certainly hope your player was just curious about the answer, and not actually angry about it. Because the response would have to be to tell them "Look, if you WANT me to roll death saves for every creature you fight, I CAN... but that means you all are going to probably have to use many of your turns just attacking unconscious foes to kill them quickly. If you'd LIKE to add that to your responsibility while playing, doing nothing on some rounds but stabbing prone bodies just to give them two failed death saves... that's fine, I certainly can add it in... but I thought I was doing you a favor by skipping over that tedious part of the game for you."
iserith
Magic Wordsmith
Everybody just knows everybody in my games. "I went to high school with that goblin."
