D&D 5E (2024) Effects that kill you at 0 hp

[James Gasik]

What the heck are you talking about? 3.x is the edition that standardized ability score bonuses at +/-1 every 2 points up/down from ten. Prior to that con looked like this
View attachment 411920
/and healing worked like this

Spoiler

Every edition since 3.x has used the same unified attribute bonus breakpoints

I believe what he's talking about is the ability to increase ability scores to high values was much more of a thing in 3e. Just about any mid-level PC can afford a +4 Con item, and having a stat above 20 was perfectly cromulent. Also, Barbarians technically boosted their Con even more (though it's hard to count this, as when your Rage ends, those bonus hit points are gone, gone gone).

I remember Pathfinder Society in 1e, which only had PC's getting up to level 12 (at the time) were having serious problems with 30 Charisma Oracles and Sorcerers by "endgame", forcing them to start nerfing things that added Charisma to anything to try and keep them in check (an Oracle can easily have Cha to AC for example). For example, the Advanced Class Guide had a Feat that let you get Cha to saves by level 5. It got pretty much Day 1 errata to become something truly useless (with the same prerequisites) because someone realized what a potential +10 to all saves on a Feat would do to their public play scene!

 

[tetrasodium]

I believe what he's talking about is the ability to increase ability scores to high values was much more of a thing in 3e. Just about any mid-level PC can afford a +4 Con item, and having a stat above 20 was perfectly cromulent. Also, Barbarians technically boosted their Con even more (though it's hard to count this, as when your Rage ends, those bonus hit points are gone, gone gone).

I remember Pathfinder Society in 1e, which only had PC's getting up to level 12 (at the time) were having serious problems with 30 Charisma Oracles and Sorcerers by "endgame", forcing them to start nerfing things that added Charisma to anything to try and keep them in check (an Oracle can easily have Cha to AC for example). For example, the Advanced Class Guide had a Feat that let you get Cha to saves by level 5. It got pretty much Day 1 errata to become something truly useless (with the same prerequisites) because someone realized what a potential +10 to all saves on a Feat would do to their public play scene!

Perhaps, but that would have nothing to do with my point back in post 31 about the quoted post drastically understating the impact of a 2-12 point crit in editions prior to 3.x when bonuses were standardized (and healing/recovery became far more generous through various means)

 

[Stormonu]

Just yesterday, I was running Tales of the Valiant (so pretty close to 5e). Unlike 2024e, they didn't improve healing. They gave the classes more bennies and things to do, but there wasn't a significant boost to sustainability, while the monsters, if anything, got fiercer.

They were fighting a CR 4 Weretiger. This is it's attack routine:

Multiattack: the weretiger makes four(!) Claw or Scimitar Attacks. It can replace one attack with Bite if in an appropriate form.

Claw: +5 to hit, 7 (d8+3) damage.

Scimitar: +5 to hit, 6 (d6+3) damage.

Bite: +5 to hit, 8 (d10+3) damage plus DC 13 Con to avoid being cursed with weretigerism.

Bonus-Bleed Prey: choose one creature within 30'. Can pinpoint prey's location within 60'. If the weretiger hits that creature with two melee attacks, they rend- DC 13 Con save to avoid 7 (2d6) damage at the start of their next turn.

So a new player just joined the game with a 4th-level Ranger. 36 hit points, AC 16. Round 1, they ran up to the weretiger, making three attacks (ToV Rangers get a bonus action for two off-hand attacks with no stat to damage when two-weapon fighting).

The Weretiger in turn, uses Bleed Prey on the Ranger. They hit with three claws (on a natural 20) and their bite. I use average damage unless there's a crit, then I roll the damage di(c)e for the critical. So from the Ranger's point of view, this was the turn:

"Take 7 damage, take 7 damage, take 12 damage, take 8 damage. Ok, now make a DC 13 Con save. You failed? (+2 Con save, ToV Rangers are proficient with Str/Dex saves) Ok, that's 7 more damage."

"....I'm down." The Ranger's player makes a sad face.

That was it, that was his first combat round. From full to 0. If the monster could kill him at 0 hit points, he'd be dead. No warning, no nothing. No opportunity to do anything about it, make a new character. The party would get him up with minimal hit points (even a level 2 Cure Wounds from the Bard is only 2d8+4, the Ranger's own Cure Wounds is d8+3, and the Bard's performance allows you to spend a Hit Die to heal with a bonus equal to the Bard's Charisma, so that's 1d10+6 in this case. If all of those are used in the same turn, the Ranger isn't even back at their maximum hit points, and the Weretiger has demonstrated the ability to bring them from full to 0 already. So the melee Ranger was forced to disengage, drop their short swords on the ground, and switch to their longbow and deal d8+5/2 (because of course the weretiger is resistant to non-magical attacks) instead of using their +1 short sword for the rest of the combat. Because using the party's limited resources to keep healing him back to full only to have the monster decide to kill him again really wasn't worth it.

And that was kind of how it went for the rest of the session. A fight with some Death Dogs, a brawl with a Minotaur, the final battle with a CR 5 Sorcerer...every time he got into melee to do his Amazing Ginsu routine, the monster would see him as a threat, unload their damage on him, and he'd be on the ground bleeding out again.

And you can't even say he should have switched Con and Wis for example- all he'd have gotten was 4 more hit points.

Now some people reading the above might say "good! Low level characters should drop like flies! They need to be more cautious! He should have known better than to attack a weretiger head on!" and honestly, if that's someone's preferred style of gaming, that's great.

But this is what I keep seeing in 5e (and 5e-alikes). Almost no interaction between "player healthy" and "player critical" when it comes to combat. And no ability for a player to gauge "hm, can I afford to attack the monster and not die?" until after they've seen it tear large bloody chunks out of them!

So yeah, a good "death buffer" is fine by me. I don't want players to die due to actually thinking they can enter melee combat.

*Plus, in this particular circumstance, if I really wanted a character dead, with four friggin' attacks, downed PC's have zero chance to survive.

I'm in the camp "Shoulda been more careful before rushing in or considered a different approach than fighting."

Of course, I've been playing a good bit of Helldivers 2 lately and success in that game really enforces caution before blindly deciding to take on everything head on - or even attracting it's attention (Needless to say, I have suffered many deaths).

 

[AlViking]

I'm in the camp "Shoulda been more careful before rushing in or considered a different approach than fighting."

Of course, I've been playing a good bit of Helldivers 2 lately and success in that game really enforces caution before blindly deciding to take on everything head on - or even attracting it's attention (Needless to say, I have suffered many deaths).

But much like "If everybody is special then no one is", "If everybody is in the back line avoiding danger then no one is."

 

[tetrasodium]

Just yesterday, I was running Tales of the Valiant (so pretty close to 5e). Unlike 2024e, they didn't improve healing. They gave the classes more bennies and things to do, but there wasn't a significant boost to sustainability, while the monsters, if anything, got fiercer.

They were fighting a CR 4 Weretiger. This is it's attack routine:

Multiattack: the weretiger makes four(!) Claw or Scimitar Attacks. It can replace one attack with Bite if in an appropriate form.

Claw: +5 to hit, 7 (d8+3) damage.

Scimitar: +5 to hit, 6 (d6+3) damage.

Bite: +5 to hit, 8 (d10+3) damage plus DC 13 Con to avoid being cursed with weretigerism.

Bonus-Bleed Prey: choose one creature within 30'. Can pinpoint prey's location within 60'. If the weretiger hits that creature with two melee attacks, they rend- DC 13 Con save to avoid 7 (2d6) damage at the start of their next turn.

So a new player just joined the game with a 4th-level Ranger. 36 hit points, AC 16. Round 1, they ran up to the weretiger, making three attacks (ToV Rangers get a bonus action for two off-hand attacks with no stat to damage when two-weapon fighting).

The Weretiger in turn, uses Bleed Prey on the Ranger. They hit with three claws (on a natural 20) and their bite. I use average damage unless there's a crit, then I roll the damage di(c)e for the critical. So from the Ranger's point of view, this was the turn:

"Take 7 damage, take 7 damage, take 12 damage, take 8 damage. Ok, now make a DC 13 Con save. You failed? (+2 Con save, ToV Rangers are proficient with Str/Dex saves) Ok, that's 7 more damage."

"....I'm down." The Ranger's player makes a sad face.

That was it, that was his first combat round. From full to 0. If the monster could kill him at 0 hit points, he'd be dead. No warning, no nothing. No opportunity to do anything about it, make a new character. The party would get him up with minimal hit points (even a level 2 Cure Wounds from the Bard is only 2d8+4, the Ranger's own Cure Wounds is d8+3, and the Bard's performance allows you to spend a Hit Die to heal with a bonus equal to the Bard's Charisma, so that's 1d10+6 in this case. If all of those are used in the same turn, the Ranger isn't even back at their maximum hit points, and the Weretiger has demonstrated the ability to bring them from full to 0 already. So the melee Ranger was forced to disengage, drop their short swords on the ground, and switch to their longbow and deal d8+5/2 (because of course the weretiger is resistant to non-magical attacks) instead of using their +1 short sword for the rest of the combat. Because using the party's limited resources to keep healing him back to full only to have the monster decide to kill him again really wasn't worth it.

And that was kind of how it went for the rest of the session. A fight with some Death Dogs, a brawl with a Minotaur, the final battle with a CR 5 Sorcerer...every time he got into melee to do his Amazing Ginsu routine, the monster would see him as a threat, unload their damage on him, and he'd be on the ground bleeding out again.

And you can't even say he should have switched Con and Wis for example- all he'd have gotten was 4 more hit points.

Now some people reading the above might say "good! Low level characters should drop like flies! They need to be more cautious! He should have known better than to attack a weretiger head on!" and honestly, if that's someone's preferred style of gaming, that's great.

But this is what I keep seeing in 5e (and 5e-alikes). Almost no interaction between "player healthy" and "player critical" when it comes to combat. And no ability for a player to gauge "hm, can I afford to attack the monster and not die?" until after they've seen it tear large bloody chunks out of them!

So yeah, a good "death buffer" is fine by me. I don't want players to die due to actually thinking they can enter melee combat.

*Plus, in this particular circumstance, if I really wanted a character dead, with four friggin' attacks, downed PC's have zero chance to survive.

That is the reason why older editions didn't try to rush the nearest bbeg trusting in the power of plot armor and instead worked to do things like undermine the bbeg with more level appropriate bite sized adventuring days. Alternatively they would work with level appropriate adventures focused on strengthening themselves while building good will with the NPCs in what will become their safe harbor place of refuge.
Did the players have other options they ignored/discarded or did the GM discover that they unintentionally presented a meat grinder?

Either way it was a learning experience

 

[Stormonu]

But much like "If everybody is special then no one is", "If everybody is in the back line avoiding danger then no one is."

No. There are other ways to resolve conflict than hitting it over the head repeatedly.

Also, in the words of Qui Gonn, "There's always a bigger fish." If the Ranger can ginsu an enemy, he should expect there are creatures that can do the same back to him - and probably worse. (I also have to ask, was the Ranger taking this in melee solo, instead of with a friend who might be able to absorb half the attacks or so?).

 

[AlViking]

No. There are other ways to resolve conflict than hitting it over the head repeatedly.

Also, in the words of Qui Gonn, "There's always a bigger fish." If the Ranger can ginsu an enemy, he should expect there are creatures that can do the same back to him - and probably worse. (I also have to ask, was the Ranger taking this in melee solo, instead of with a friend who might be able to absorb half the attacks or so?).

If anyone wants a game that every obstacle can be resolved without combat, D&D isn't the game for them.

 

[TiQuinn]

Except with D&D's swingy amount of damage there often isn't much tension before you hit zero. As always this is just my personal observation, I drop characters to 0 often enough that there is significant tension. As others have pointed out healing, even with the boost from the 2024 rules, can't keep up with damage.

If it works for you, great. It makes for less tension for me.

This has been my experience with 5e. Healing mid combat is at best a neutral type of action because of the likelihood that the creature damaging you is going to at least do an equal amount of damage as you healed. Pressing the fight and trying to end it outright or fleeing to escape always tends to be better options than healing in combat.

 

[AlViking]

This has been my experience with 5e. Healing mid combat is at best a neutral type of action because of the likelihood that the creature damaging you is going to at least do an equal amount of damage as you healed. Pressing the fight and trying to end it outright or fleeing to escape always tends to be better options than healing in combat.

There are times, especially at higher levels with a life domain cleric, that the healing mid-combat can make sense. But sometimes discretion (aka "RUN!") is the better part of valor.

 

[Stormonu]

If anyone wants a game that every obstacle can be resolved without combat, D&D isn't the game for them.

Don't be dense. I'm not talking every obstacle, but if your first inclination is "I can take this head-on" without regard for some form of caution, that's not a game I want to be involved in, as the result is always the same.