D&D 5E Friendly NPCs and death saves

[Wik]

Last week, one of the NPC Henchmen, a rude invoker named Izban, ran into a barracks filled with Goblins. He hid behind a bunk for cover and used his firebolt, but didn't notice the goblins behind him, and was promptly filled with arrows.

As he began to make dying saves, I (on the fly) decided that NPCs shouldn't take so long to die. "NPCs die at two failed dying saves, but need three successes to stabilize" I announced to the table, as if it were a rule in the book. They nodded, felt like it was a fair rule, and went on playing.

For what it's worth, Izban lived. The fighter with the Protection style got nearby and stabilized him with a healer's kit, and then protected him from incoming arrow fire while the barbarian and party wizard just destroyed goblin after goblin.

Anyways. Here's my question: is this a good place for a house rule? Should NPC hirelings/henchmen get three dying saves like PCs, or less? Should they die at one failed dying save? Or even dead at zero hit points? Or should they be treated exactly like PCs? I'm aware that you can say "your campaign may differ", so let's just throw that argument out. Let's pretend you're a designer for WOTC and this question comes up at a designer meeting.

 

[Lancelot]

At my table, a meaningful NPC (e.g. an established ally, who is relevant to more than a single session, and has a name) will get the standard 3 successes / 3 fails. A non-meaningful NPC (e.g. a nameless soldier, or someone with no "character levels") will be dead as soon as they hit 0 hp.

If I'm pretending to be a designer for WotC and I'm asked the question in the meeting, my response would be: "Don't codify it in the rules. Let the individual DM decide what's important for them to be able to tell the story and have a fun game."

...which means I think the way you handled it is a perfectly good one, too. I'd be happy with that if I was a player in your game.

 

[Sunseeker]

As creatures of plot, NPCs live and die by it, so I think it's fine to say that some NPCs don't last as long, or potentially last longer than others.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Anyways. Here's my question: is this a good place for a house rule? Should NPC hirelings/henchmen get three dying saves like PCs, or less? Should they die at one failed dying save? Or even dead at zero hit points? Or should they be treated exactly like PCs?

Whenever you consider adding a rule to a game, there are two questions you need to ask: 1) Does this rule improve the game? and 2) Does it improve the game enough to justify the added complexity?

As it stands, all characters fall into one of two categories - important characters who use the full dying rules, and unimportant characters who are assumed to be dead when they hit zero. If nobody cares about this NPC, and nobody is going to waste a spell or a healer's kit on him, then there's no reason to track it and you should just consider him dead. If somebody does care, enough that they would bother spending time and resources to save him, then the NPC is important enough to warrant the dying rules.

Note that the assumption of death at zero is just a simplification of using the dying rules for everyone, in any situation where outside aid is a non-factor. It doesn't change the in-game reality at all. Most enemies don't have access to healing magic, and most monsters don't carry a healer's kit, so just saying that they die is merely an aid to bookkeeping; if half of all downed monsters were actually unconscious and stable, the PCs would just slit their throats anyway.

 

[Wik]

I disagree, slightly. The idea of having NPCs die on GM fiat is one that doesn't always sit well with me - I kind of prefer a game where I let the story happen, and try to do my best to actually avoid having input into that story... I just run and referee what is put before me, and how the PCs react to those events.

So, choosing whether an NPC lives or dies is not something I wanna do too often, because it means another point where my own wants gets in the way of the ongoing story.

The original idea (at least, as I see it) for the three dying saves rule was to a) give a player something to do every round and b) give them a fairly good chance of not dying (as dying sucks, since you don't get to play while it's happening!). PCs are designed to not die. And I'm totally okay with this. I think it's a good rule.

However, allied NPCs are not beholden to those rules. They're not essential to the story (and if they are, I believe you need to fix that, pronto - only PCs are really ever essential). If they don't do anything, there's no bored player bringing everyone down. And, to be honest, having them die is often kind of fun. NPCs should come issued with red shirts.

Hence, my logic behind reducing their number of dying saves. "Two death saves versus three to live" means they're more likely to die than live without PC intervention, and it makes saving them a choice done by players (they'll rush to save other PCs, and maybe NPCs they like, but those they're not a huge fan of - Izban, above, for example - they might take their sweet time to rescue, and if they die, "meh").

I might even reduce it to "one death save, three to live".

 

[77IM]

I've thought of making this change for PCs as well, actually. PCs are just too darn survivable, and 3 successful saves to live vs. 2 failures to die can make dropping to zero much more hazardous.

FWIW, my house rule is that NPCs who drop to zero exist in quantum superimposed state, neither alive nor dead, like Schrödinger's cat. This lasts until someone tries to stabilize them with a Wisdom (Medicine) check, DC 10 + 5 per full round they've been dead. If the stabilization check fails, the NPC is dead. Thus, PCs who want to save an NPC's life need to really hustle. I generally also let expenditure of potions or magical healing revive the NPC if applied within "the first few rounds" although I haven't formalized this yet.

One other good, simple house-rule is: NPCs fail all death saves. So they drop to 0 and 3 rounds later they die, unless someone intervenes. The privilege of rolling death saves is reserved for PCs.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Note that the assumption of death at zero is just a simplification of using the dying rules for everyone, in any situation where outside aid is a non-factor. It doesn't change the in-game reality at all. Most enemies don't have access to healing magic, and most monsters don't carry a healer's kit, so just saying that they die is merely an aid to bookkeeping; if half of all downed monsters were actually unconscious and stable, the PCs would just slit their throats anyway.

If you do the math you'll find that it actually alters in-game reality by write a lot. Anyone who gets death saves has about an 18% chance of rolling a natural 20 and regaining a hit point some time before they die or stabilize, so if you roll for everyone, players may need to start double-tapping downed foes.

It's about 40% chance of dying, 40% stabilizing, 20% regaining 1 HP.

 

[Unwise]

Personally in my games I never want to have to think about them again for the rest of the combat. If they are not important to the plot, then they die in such a way as to make it clear that they are not coming back, e.g. decapitation. If the PCs are more heavily invested in them, then they have 2-3 turns to stabilize them. NPCs auto-fail death saves and only replenish their supply of three at the end of the adventure.

I once made it so that all NPCs die at zero HP, but that resulted in PCs never wanting to team up with melee classes, as they can be pretty sure they will die during the adventure.

 

[iserith]

I generally have "friendly" NPCs die at the bottom of the initiative count. Sometimes the PCs can get to them and help and sometimes they can't. Villains and monsters die at 0 hp unless the players tell me they're going for a knockout blow.

I had a scene in my current campaign where a demon-possessed veteran started killing commoners outside of a church after services. Only the PC cleric (10th level) was present at the outset of the scene. Because the veteran has multiple attacks and minimum damage was enough to drop a commoner as long as he hit, sometimes multiple commoners were down. The PC then had to prioritize whether he would attack the possessed veteran or heal the commoners. It was a very intense scene that the cleric's player was very fond of. He was busting off just about every heal he had and even some revivify spells to keep people alive and buy time before his friend, the rogue, could show up to take the veteran down. The cleric earned his status among the townsfolk that day, that's for sure.

 

[S'mon]

One other good, simple house-rule is: NPCs fail all death saves. So they drop to 0 and 3 rounds later they die, unless someone intervenes. The privilege of rolling death saves is reserved for PCs.

That's my preference. I have no desire to roll death saves (at all), but especially not for NPCs.
But I don't necessarily want major NPCs like the (pregnant!) Paladin wife of the Barbarian PC IMC to be dead at
zero, at very least she'd deserve some dying words.