Knocking PCs Unconscious...

[Pbartender]

...without the dying condition.

I know the rule for knocking creatures unconscious. I also know a very easy way to make an ad hoc ruling on this one.

But I'm curious... Does anyone know if there's an official ruling on this?

How do bad guys take the PCs alive, should they want to capture them?

 

[Flipguarder]

is the rule for 0 hp just applied specifically for players? I was under the assumption that it worked for anyone.

 

[yesnomu]

I don't believe there is an official rule. In my game, when confronted by people that wanted to kidnap and brainwash them, I just had PC dying work normally, but said that if they failed 3 saves/dropped below -bloodied, they'd just be out of the fight for good, not actually dead.

 

[N0Man]

...without the dying condition.

I know the rule for knocking creatures unconscious. I also know a very easy way to make an ad hoc ruling on this one.

But I'm curious... Does anyone know if there's an official ruling on this?

How do bad guys take the PCs alive, should they want to capture them?

If your plot needs knocking the PCs unconscious without them dying, then do it. It's not much of a stretch to allow NPCs to *choose* to knock them unconscious instead of killing them in the same manner PCs can do, and it's certainly not a stretch for a DM to bend a rule for the sake of the story.

Just do it.

I might let them have the saving throws anyway, and they have a chance to recover with a 20 and spend a surge to get back in the fight. If you specifically are looking to avoid this, you say that the NPCs weapons are poisoned in a way that drugs the PCs once they go unconscious. That way they don't have to die while restricting their ability to pop back up.

It all depends on your story and how you want to handle it.

 

[Jhaelen]

creatures[/I] unconscious.

PCs _ARE_ creatures, so that's a non-issue.

And there's even another method to make sure PCs can be knocked unconsious:
The DM simply states, that they are indeed knocked unconscious. This option may not work for every group (or in every situation), though.

 

[Pbartender]

Yeah, guys... That's pretty much what I was planning on doing.

I just wanted to make sure that there wasn't already something out there that I was missing.

 

[Pbartender]

Oh, and upon re-reading the rule, I must have missed the "Until it regains hit points, the creature is unconscious but not dying" bit. That makes it perfectly clear.

on me.