D&D 5E A death save house rule proposal

Charlaquin

Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
I don’t really like how death saves work. They’re abstract, and kind of arbitrary, and the whack-a-mole healing thing is silly. I’ve played around with a few hoserule alternatives, and they all have their benefits and drawbacks. I’ve recently come up with a new one I’m thinking about trying out, thought I’d run it by you folks for a vibe check. Here’s the idea:

When you first fall to 0 hit points, you automatically fall Prone. Whenever you take damage or start your turn while at 0 hit points, make a DC 10 saving throw (no modifier). On a failed save, you gain the Stunned condition until the end of your next turn. If you already have the Stunned condition, you instead gain the Unconscious condition. If you already have the Unconscious condition, you die.

This would completely replace death saving throws and the whole stable/unstable status.
 
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cool idea

What exactly happens on a successful save at 0 hp?
They don’t get stunned/unconscious/dead. On their first turn that buys them a turn to drink a potion or something. If they fail that first one, they need to succeed twice in a row to get that turn to act. Once they fall unconscious, success just starts buying them turns until someone else can heal them.
What happens if someone does try healing the PC at 0 hp?
They regain the HP as normal. Don’t have to keep making saves if you don’t have 0 HP.
 


This sounds a lot like dying in 3.5 except instead of losing a hp every round, Once they are stunned, they could just waffle between stunned and unconscious until they inevitably die. Your chances are 50% to go one way or another so you can just spend the whole combat going back and forth.

It doesn’t solve the whack-a-mole because healing still brings them back up, fully charged.

So, while I think it will work fine and, while it’s slightly less abstract, I don’t think it will solve the issues you have with the current system.

I kind of like where you’re going with it, though. I wonder if there’s a way to combine it with the exhaustion rules? The idea I’m formulating in my head might be too complicated though.
 

They regain the HP as normal. Don’t have to keep making saves if you don’t have 0 HP.

It doesn’t solve the whack-a-mole because healing still brings them back up, fully charged.
What @TaranTheWanderer says here ☝️

In our Ravenloft/Curse of Strahd campaign, we implemented a rule that magic does not remove Death Save Failures, only a Long Rest does - this eliminated the whack-a-mole issue, and made going down a bit scarier.

Of course, you are not using Death Saves but maybe you can adapt that idea... like if a PC is at 0 and gets healed, they start at stunned next time they go to 0 hp that day. Or maybe the DC increases the next time they go to 0. It's a bit fiddly, IMO, and record keeping for that mechanic might get annoying, but maybe that will inspire something more elegant that jives with your system.
 

This would completely replace death saving throws and the whole stable/unstable status.
You've done an excellent job of cleaning up garbage rules, but as stated above, I don't think you've solved the problems you were out to solve.

the whack-a-mole healing thing is silly
This is a complex issue, but I think you can clean it up neatly with a rule for DMs:

- NPCs aren't allowed to attack revived PCs until the end of that PC's first full turn after revival.

If that's a little too awkward, you can introduce the Guardian Angel:

- A revived PC is immediately visited by his/her guardian angel, who delivers useful advice that only the PC can hear, like: "play dead until the catoblepas goes away," "you have 3 HP, now's a good time to flee," or "you can't charge back into the fight yet - you haven't even picked up your sword!"
 



what if you do it like you said but every time they go from unconscious to stunned, they take a level of exhaustion. So, waffling on death’s door takes a toll, even if you’re healed. That, and waffling for too long kills you anyways. (I think the last level of exhaustion is still death?)
 

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