D&D General How Do You Handle Falling Damage?

[Clint_L]

This came out of another discussion, but I'm curious as to how other DMs handle falling damage. Matt Mercer famously killed Marisha Rey's character Keyleth because he doesn't cap falling damage.

I find it much too lenient, so I don't cap it, and I also use D10s, because I like the synergy of rolling a D10 for every 10 feet fallen. But I do allow a skill check against acrobatics for half damage, DC depending on access to potential means to break the fall, and a natural 20 means that you survive no matter how far you fell (it does happen).

 

[el-remmen]

I like the d10s thing. I may need to use that. I use d6s but do the cumulative thing of 1d6 for first 10 feet, 3d6 for 20 feet, 6d6 for 30, 10d6 for 40 feet and so on, and have never worried about a cap. I also require a Con save vs. death if you take over 50 points of damage (DC 10 + 1 / 10' of the fall) - a failure meaning no matter what your HP total you are dying when you hit the bottom. And sometimes require similar saves vs. being stunned depending on what you land on.

I too allow an acrobatics check for half damage.

 

[TiQuinn]

Past 200 feet, we just call it instant death.

 

[jmartkdr2]

I've only every handled it RAW, but I've also never had anyone fall off an airship and not get caught by someone or something.

If they just fell, they'd need some special feature beyond "a lot of hit points" - or maybe not, depending on the details of the character and scenario.

 

[Distracted DM]

I've only ever handled it RAW, but I can't say that I'm happy with that.

 

[DrJawaPhD]

I use standard 1d6 damage per 10 feet, but no cap on damage taken. RAW is incredibly silly to pretend like you reach terminal velocity after only 200 feet, I'm all for suspending real life physics but that's just so far off

 

[Clint_L]

I've only ever handled it RAW, but I can't say that I'm happy with that.

I don't think I've met anyone who thinks the current RAW is a great solution. A barbarian should not be able to rage and drop a thousand feet into combat as a viable strategy.

I'm a bit surprised it didn't get reassessed with the 2024 rules update.

 

[Tonguez]

Yeah no cap, Dex (Acrobatics) save to catch a wall, and if you take more than 50 damage you roll con save or drop to 0

 

[Lanefan]

I've only every handled it RAW, but I've also never had anyone fall off an airship and not get caught by someone or something.

As DM I once had a character fall 10,000 feet and land on the pyramid he thought he was inside.

For damage I just picked up my dice bag, tipped it out on the table, and said "Add 'em up". As that included various d20s and other dice with somewhat more than six sides, the total was rather staggering...and even then he got lucky; most of the big dice rolled low, so he "only" took about 170 points damage.

Which was about 135 more than what he had at the time.

Splat.

They needed a shovel to scrape up enough remains for a Resurrection.

 

[Celebrim]

In a very complicated manner.

I use 1d20 per 10' fallen, capping at 20d20 for medium creatures, but damage is divided by the result of a 1d6. But then additionally, whatever you fall onto attacks you and potentially does additional damage to you. A smooth stone floor for example attacks you like a club, and can crit you. Additionally, all sorts of things about the above can produce traumatic damage saves that represent things like broken bones depending on how much damage you took. The combinations produce a very random value that varies from basically no damage to enough to kill just about any PC. The idea is to not kill a PC with every fall, but to make falling so risky that you're motivated to avoid it. It also roughly models that a fall off a 6 foot ladder can kill, but it's also possible to survive falling out of an airplane without a parachute.