D&D 5E Creatures with traits that deal damage to melee attackers

[Stormonu]

Meanwhile I'd narrate it as "as you land the killing blow fire erupts from the wound". If I stab someone and they bleed, it's not a reaction that the target is taking, it's the interaction of my weapon and their form.

eh, if I was playing an Alien game and someone put a load of buckshot in a xenomorph, I’d have them deal with the resulting acid spray - even if it killed the Alien.

D&D, I do case-by-case, and unless it was “at the start of your turn”, if they kill it they avoid the bad juju (unless its like a Draconian that explodes upon death). It’s just a personal preference.

 

[Lanefan]

That was why I put reaction in quotes. It doesn’t use up a reaction, but it has a reaction-like trigger. “If in 5 feet, then this happens” or “player hits creature in melee and this occurs”

I’d apply it on a case-by-case basis, but if, for example, a player killed a fire elemental with their attack I’d narrate it as the flames disappating around the PC, burning out before the character was damaged.

Where I might have it go up with a bit of a 'woof', doing one last shot of (maybe enhanced) damage as it dissipated.

Still doesn't explain these things triggering only on a hit, though, rather than on any* attempted melee attack or just being/moving within x-distance.

* - exceptions being attacks made with long polearms, lances, etc.; this being one of the few places where such things really can come in handy.

I often do the same with spells - drop the caster and ongoing effects generally end immediately. Matches a lot of what you see in the climatic storylines in a movie - some person is on their dying breath and hero takes out the bad guy and we watch the suffering character immediately recover (Not that I always like this sort of resolution, but it fits the genre).

For me it depends on the specific spell. Anything requiring concentration ends when the caster drops, even if only asleep or unconscious. Charms and other controls end when the caster dies, as do invisibility and polymorph effects. Anything else with a set duration, however, runs until it would normally end (or forever, if duration is permanent), as spells running (or trying to run) their full duration is the default; thus if a caster puts a Continual Light on a stone and then drops dead the next round, that stone will stay lit.