Less death, more "dying"

[Plane Sailing]

We have some excellent rules (which are the only house rules to be used in every single DMs campaign in our group). I think they will do the trick for you.

Expanded death and dying rules

Rule

1) A character is 'disabled' from 0hp down to '-level' hp.

2) A character is 'dying' after '-level' hp and down to -(Con + level) hp.

Examples

A 1st level fighter with Con 12 is disabled at 0 or -1hp, dying at -2 down to -13hp and dead after that.

A 13th level rogue with Con 15 is disabled at 0 to -13 hp, dying at -14 down to -28hp and dead after that.

Rationale

1) At higher levels it is increasingly common that the standard 10hp dying buffer is blown straight through in one hit. The expanded dying range means that it is more likely that the same kind of 'rescue the downed PC' activities can come into play at high levels as at low levels.

2) The 'disabled' rules are really nice... only take one action a round, if it is strenuous (a standard action rather than a move/ME action?) you lose 1hp after completing the action. They give lots of interesting opportunities for the specially heroic to make last ditch efforts to escape/pull the lever/sacrifice themselves for their mates. The standard rules have it rarely coming into play, since it is only on *exactly* 0hp. This expanded rules means that more heroic (aka higher level) characters also get more opportunity to perform heroic actions while on deaths doorstep.

Try it - you'll like it

 

[AuraSeer]

We're already using the -Con rule. It's better than RAW, but in most cases it's only a tiny difference, and it only helps characters who already have the hp bonus from high Con. The elf sorcerer doesn't get any benefit from it at all, and she's the most likely one to end up in negative hp in the first place.

I think I'm going to mush together several of these suggestions at once. Here's my first attempt:

• Any character with hit points from 0 to -(Con) becomes Disabled.
• Any character with -(Con) hit points or less becomes Dying. There is no instant death from hit point damage.
• A Disabled character who is damaged again immediately shifts to Dying, regardless of hit point total.
• A Disabled character who takes a strenuous action immediately shifts to Dying, unless that action raised his hit points.
• After entering Dying status, a character will Die in 1d4 rounds unless healed. He might die on his very next turn, so the healer had better be quick.
• If a Dying character receives healing that brings his hit points to -Con or higher, he is no longer Dying (but remains unconscious).
• Nonmagical first aid can only stabilize a character
• This doesn't change anything that kills a character without doing hit point damage, such as coup de grace, death effects, or Constitution damage.

What have I overlooked so far?

 

[XCorvis]

IMC, it's -10 or -Con score (not mod), whichever is better. It started as -Con, but we quickly changed that after an encounter with a fairly basic poison dart trap which would have killed a PC outright via HP loss. Actually, I like Nifft's -10+HD rule better, I might steal that.

I should clarify this, as it's the major problem with the -Con house rule. Poison that does Con damage changes your negative HP. A PC with a 10 Con who takes 6 points of Con damage looses 3 HP per level AND dies at -4. That'll kill a lot of low hp characters flat out. We didn't realize it until it (almost) happened.

 

[Plane Sailing]

What have I overlooked so far?

You proposals are untested, don't really allow much to be done when disabled (you only do one thing then you are dying) and dying characters will die much more quickly!

I strongly recommend you try my rules above as-is. It has been heavily playtested for nearly 3 years now and works really well. You know it makes sense

Cheers

 

[AuraSeer]

You proposals are untested, don't really allow much to be done when disabled (you only do one thing then you are dying) and dying characters will die much more quickly!

Yes on all three counts. I should explain my reasoning better.

First off, all proposals are untested when they are first invented. If all of us stuck to only what other people invented, we'd never discover anything new, which would be boring. Besides, what works well for my group may not work at all in yours, and vice versa.

I don't want people doing very much while Disabled. When a PC reaches that state, he's taken critical, life-threatening wounds. Any ordinary person would already be dead, but because the PC is a star of this movie, he keeps himself conscious and mobile through sheer effort of will. He can throw his remaining energy into one last-ditch dramatic action, but that will use up his reserves and he'll fall down in a heap afterward.

And though it's true that characters will die more quickly once they've reached the Dying state, my proposal makes it harder to reach that state. PCs don't start Dying at all until they hit -10 hp or less. If something does enough damage in one round to put him there, then by RAW the target would have been dead anyway; my proposal allows a short window for the healer to dash over and get his heart started again.

I'll also point out that my current APL is 3, so starting the bleeding at -Con is more favorable than starting it at -level.

I did just notice that I left out a way for Dying characters to stabilize on their own. I don't particularly like the standard flat 10%, but I'll have to think for a bit and see if I come up with anything better.

 

[Kisanji Arael]

Plane Sailing:

Let me see if I understand you correctly, because if I do, I'll probably be adopting it.

Disabled: any number between 0 and (1*character level)
Dying: any number following disabled, which extends a number equal to a characters Constitution score.

In both cases, Con modifier is ignored. Are hit Dice treated as levels?

All undead creatures with Con 0, according to this, would only ever be functioning or disabled, after which point they would be dead (until the sequel).

 

[Pyrex]

I'll be using the following in my upcoming Expedition to Castle Ravenloft game:

He's only Mostly Dead
Any character killed by HP damage is Mostly Dead.
Most effects that outright kill a character (i.e. Phantasmal Killer) leave a character Mostly Dead.
Characters killed by a [Death] effect or any other effect which would otherwise prevent Raise Dead is just plain Dead.

When the combat ends**, Mostly Dead characters rescued by the party are discovered to be Slightly Alive.

Slightly Alive characters are stable at -9hp and gain one negative level.

Negative Levels from being Mostly Dead cannot be removed normally and stick around until the next time you gain a new level, at which time half (round up) of these negative levels go away.

**’Combat Ends’ being loosely defined as “when the party has been off round-by-round initiative for at least one minute”.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Plane Sailing:

Let me see if I understand you correctly, because if I do, I'll probably be adopting it.

Disabled: any number between 0 and (1*character level)
Dying: any number following disabled, which extends a number equal to a characters Constitution score.

In both cases, Con modifier is ignored. Are hit Dice treated as levels?

All undead creatures with Con 0, according to this, would only ever be functioning or disabled, after which point they would be dead (until the sequel).

That is correct, except that undead (like constructs) are still destroyed automatically as soon as they reach 0hp (just like now). monster HD are treated like levels, so the 10HD, 23 Con giant is disabled at 0 to -10, dying at -11 to -33.

Cheers

 

[Yesminde]

Why even have negative HP at all? Any number you use requires tracking by someone. Here's a system I came up with on the fly that uses no immediate tracking:

1. If the blow that would drop you to 0 HP is a crit, you are dead, end of discussion.
2. If it's not a crit, make a fort save vs. damage done. If you make it, you're still conscious and disabled, if not, you're dying and unconscious.
3. Strenous activity while disabled = dying (the Diehard feat would enable you to make a fort save DC 20 to remain conscious while dying, which would stack better with Endurance because Endurance would give you a +4 to this save)
5. Dying characters must make another fort save in 5 minutes (DC 20) and either stabilize or die. Endurance feat would add to this roll as well.

Alternate extra dying Heal rules:

1. A successful Heal check DC 10 can stabilize a passed out character, meaning that they don't have to make a fort save to stay alive, and a DC 20 check can restore a passed out person to disabled but conscious.
2. Disabled people only heal when they are left to rest peacefully. After each day of peaceful rest, they make a fort save DC 20 - days of rest (can be replaced by a Heal check) to recover from disabled. Once they recover, they regain hit points normally. (This could probably be modified in various ways to account for various states of convalescene.)


Why I think this is a useful method:

It has a rule to deal with instant death (crits)
It can handle such real-life situations as a desperately injured person driving himself to the emergency room (or in D&D, figuring some non-strenuous way to get on a horse then letting the horse take him to civilization)
It makes the Diehard and Endurance feats actually quite useful.
Heal makes more sense to me this way.