D&D 5E 0 HP =/= Down, Dying, and Death

[DND_Reborn]

First, I really don't want to turn this into another "What are HP?" thread, so if we can all just refrain from the meat/non-meat debate I would appreciate it. Thank you.

Now, I've been exploring some things for my upcoming campaign, mostly focused around making dying (and staying dead) a more frightening concept. IME, it is too easy to recover from death, so the fear of death is not really a deterrent.

That, and some comments (forgive me for not citing who said what) got me thinking about what does it really mean for creature to reach 0 hp. For most monsters, it is death. Some (more important?) ones might be unconscious and making death saves, etc.

However, one comment that struck me as significant was maybe reaching 0 hp is more about something else? Maybe it is about losing the will to fight and the creature surrenders? Whether you give up, go down, or die... you're out of the fight no matter which you choose--so how much does it matter really for that combat?

Taking it a step further, what if it was the player's choice in some cases and in others determined by a mechanic? Perhaps if you hit 0 hp as the result of a critical hit, you are dying, maybe unconscious. But, if you hit 0 hp otherwise you're defeated--you give up and know you're done. The player could choose and might say the character falls unconscious or maybe they say the PC drops his weapon and surrenders, or something else along the lines that would effectively remove him from the fight.

I know most people will see reaching 0 hp sightly (or hugely) in a different light, so I'm not expecting any great answers to all this, it has just been something on my mind the last couple days and I wanted to share. Thanks for reading.

 

[prabe]

This reminds me a lot of Fate's "Taken Out" mechanic. It might work, though it's something of a paradigm shift from more-conventional D&D (which isn't necessarily a bad thing).

 

[Rhenny]

From a role playing perspective I like your idea. Giving a player a choice to drop weapon and cower, or just cower until healed can add a lot to the pc story. If that’s not the player’s desire then unconscious it is. In either case, any healing will end the condition so I guess you’d still have players out of combat and back in again as usual. (Unless you have them die when critically hit and reduced to 0).

 

[FrogReaver]

First, I really don't want to turn this into another "What are HP?" thread, so if we can all just refrain from the meat/non-meat debate I would appreciate it. Thank you.

Now, I've been exploring some things for my upcoming campaign, mostly focused around making dying (and staying dead) a more frightening concept. IME, it is too easy to recover from death, so the fear of death is not really a deterrent.

That, and some comments (forgive me for not citing who said what) got me thinking about what does it really mean for creature to reach 0 hp. For most monsters, it is death. Some (more important?) ones might be unconscious and making death saves, etc.

However, one comment that struck me as significant was maybe reaching 0 hp is more about something else? Maybe it is about losing the will to fight and the creature surrenders? Whether you give up, go down, or die... you're out of the fight no matter which you choose--so how much does it matter really for that combat?

Taking it a step further, what if it was the player's choice in some cases and in others determined by a mechanic? Perhaps if you hit 0 hp as the result of a critical hit, you are dying, maybe unconscious. But, if you hit 0 hp otherwise you're defeated--you give up and know you're done. The player could choose and might say the character falls unconscious or maybe they say the PC drops his weapon and surrenders, or something else along the lines that would effectively remove him from the fight.

I know most people will see reaching 0 hp sightly (or hugely) in a different light, so I'm not expecting any great answers to all this, it has just been something on my mind the last couple days and I wanted to share. Thanks for reading.

Death at 0 hp works. Throw a few extra starting hp at players. Remove revival spells if desired. Make deaths epic (not just narratively - but allow them to provide meaningful opportunities for the remaining PC's)

If you want to change what 0 hp means then you could set 0 hp as unconscious and dying and unable to be affected by healing magic. Give a stabilize spell or not...

You could have healing those on deaths door anger the god of death and provide consequences that way.

You could just make a campaign rule that sets 0 hp to be tied to a major setback toward your characters or the parties goals. You drop and something bad always seems to follow...

 

[Charlaquin]

I think this is a great move and you should absolutely try it.

 

[tetrasodium]

This reminds me a lot of Fate's "Taken Out" mechanic. It might work, though it's something of a paradigm shift from more-conventional D&D (which isn't necessarily a bad thing).

something akin to being taken out & more importantly conceeding in fate could work with d&d, but it lacks the same kind of thing as scenes & aspects so could be abused even worse than it could be in fate.

 

[RangerWickett]

See, I want to go for a system that merges 'fighting spirit' and 'physical wounds.' My belief is that if you make it harder to randomly die, you will not need to make resurrection into a core part of the game. It will make death more meaningful. Also, I want to be able to chop limbs off.

Also, I mean, I work at a medical library. The human body doesn't go from 'up and fighting' to 'dead' in 6 seconds, not even a minute. Short of decapitation or brain destruction, your heart might stop, you might lose consciousness, but in a setting with magical healing, people ought to lie seemingly dead for a few minutes and still be available to resuscitate.

My rough idea is:

You get 3 points of Resolve per day.

HP is your ability to stay on your feet and keep defending yourself, so that a 'hit' will just hurt instead of actually delivering a meaningful wound. When you spend an hour to rest, you can spend a point of Resolve to regain all your HP.

If you suffer a critical hit, instead of taking extra damage, you suffer a serious wound which lasts for a day. If the critical hit reduces you to 0 HP, instead it's a critical wound which is permanent. If you spend a point of resolve, you reduce it to a light wound, which only lasts until you're able to rest.

For a crit, you roll 1d8:
1 - Head. Target is stunned for one round, and thereafter has a level of Exhaustion that lasts as long as the wound does.
2 - Eyes. Target is blinded for one round, and thereafter has disadvantage on Perception.
3 - Mouth. Target is mute for one round, and thereafter can only speak at a low rasp.
4 - Gear. A piece of armor or weapon is dented (if a light wound), broken (if serious), or destroyed (if critical).
5 - Left Arm. Target drops what it's holding, and thereafter cannot use that limb.
6 - Right Arm. Ditto.
7 - Left Leg. Target falls prone, and thereafter its speed is reduced by 10 feet.
8 - Right Leg. Ditto.

A level 1 cure spell restores a light wound. Level 3 restores serious. Level 4 restores critical.

When you're at 0 HP, you are stunned but conscious (so if you regain hit points, you have awareness of the situation). You still make death saves as usual, but if you fail a third, you're not dead. You're just imperiled, and need to receive healing within 5 minutes.

 

[tetrasodium]

See, I want to go for a system that merges 'fighting spirit' and 'physical wounds.' My belief is that if you make it harder to randomly die, you will not need to make resurrection into a core part of the game. It will make death more meaningful. Also, I want to be able to chop limbs off.

Also, I mean, I work at a medical library. The human body doesn't go from 'up and fighting' to 'dead' in 6 seconds, not even a minute. Short of decapitation or brain destruction, your heart might stop, you might lose consciousness, but in a setting with magical healing, people ought to lie seemingly dead for a few minutes and still be available to resuscitate.

My rough idea is:

You get 3 points of Resolve per day.

HP is your ability to stay on your feet and keep defending yourself, so that a 'hit' will just hurt instead of actually delivering a meaningful wound. When you spend an hour to rest, you can spend a point of Resolve to regain all your HP.

If you suffer a critical hit, instead of taking extra damage, you suffer a serious wound which lasts for a day. If the critical hit reduces you to 0 HP, instead it's a critical wound which is permanent. If you spend a point of resolve, you reduce it to a light wound, which only lasts until you're able to rest.

For a crit, you roll 1d8:
1 - Head. Target is stunned for one round, and thereafter has a level of Exhaustion that lasts as long as the wound does.
2 - Eyes. Target is blinded for one round, and thereafter has disadvantage on Perception.
3 - Mouth. Target is mute for one round, and thereafter can only speak at a low rasp.
4 - Gear. A piece of armor or weapon is dented (if a light wound), broken (if serious), or destroyed (if critical).
5 - Left Arm. Target drops what it's holding, and thereafter cannot use that limb.
6 - Right Arm. Ditto.
7 - Left Leg. Target falls prone, and thereafter its speed is reduced by 10 feet.
8 - Right Leg. Ditto.

A level 1 cure spell restores a light wound. Level 3 restores serious. Level 4 restores critical.

When you're at 0 HP, you are stunned but conscious (so if you regain hit points, you have awareness of the situation). You still make death saves as usual, but if you fail a third, you're not dead. You're just imperiled, and need to receive healing within 5 minutes.

a lot of old school games tried to do things like that, but rarely did it amount to anything but a lot of wasted paperspace & hassle to track. The only game I can recall it working well was battletech/mechwarrior with sheets like this for a very different kind of game.

 

[RangerWickett]

Nah, BT was way more complicated than what I'm talking about.

I'm thinking something reminiscent of the FFG Warhammer 40k rules, but less fiddly. You have HP, and when you run out (and sometimes before you run out), you can get a wound. And often those wounds lead to you getting cool cybernetics (or magic mithral arms, ruby eyes, or adamantine noses, or whatever).

 

[Helldritch]

I have been tackling with something along those line, but it would not occur at death but would start with wound threshold.
It could go like this:

At 50% of total HP, a player or a monster must make a Fear Saving throw (based on wisdom) with a DC equal to 8 + half the damage taken or that player/monster becomes frightened. Naturally a save at the end of every round will remove the condition. The frightened character/monster will have to try to get away from combat.

The same check will be done when the player/monster will reach 10% of HP. But this time the save should be made with disadvantage.

A player that gets down and is healed back (the whack a mole syndrome) must now make a frightened check DC 20 - current hit points and the check would be made at a disadvantage.

The advantages of this would be:
1) The healing done to a player would now be done way before the said player would go down.

2) Going low on HP now has a distinct disadvantage. The efficiency of the character is reduced but he can recover. So it is not detrimental to the character but it is a significant game effect (fighting at disadvantage) that the players will now not be so willing to go to low on HP and start the whack a mole. This could lead to a variety of tactics where the players would try to rotate positions, use healing a wee bit earlier or even start defensive maneuvers before a save would be required (i.e. the dodge action).

3) In the case of a downed player. The healers would now have to heal the downed player to a higher number of HP or the risk of seeing the character fleeing from combat would be very real. This might put some strain on healers but it would force players to find new strategies.

4) Monsters would be in the same bag as the players. Some monsters are immune to the frightened condition. Just as some classes are better at wisdom saves. But with monsters, this brings a new meaning to fearless.

5) This would prevent house rules in which going down could bring permanent detrimental conditions to the character. No one wants to have a character missing a limb. I know some spells will restore the lost limbs but in the mean time; it is quite a blow to the enjoyment of said character and detrimental to the fun the player might have in playing it.