D&D 5E Let 'em live or die?

[iserith]

I dislike any system which means you need to metagame to get results which match the fiction, and the current death save approach certainly does encourage that, sadly. Whether they attack downed creatures or not should be on the personality/nature of the being, y'know, roleplaying, not on metagame-y stuff like "altering difficulty". IMHO anyway.

Anything can be made to make sense in the fiction. Just tack on whatever explanation is needed. That's the beauty of a fantasy game.

 

[Helldritch]

Except in real combat that's absolutely not how people typically act.

In real combat, people don't typically finish downed opponents, because it's actually kind of difficult and requires making yourself vulnerable. Thus I find the "any damage at all = death save" approach to be... weak. Unsatisfying. Not quite right.

Except in real life there is no such things as healing word, regeneration and other shenanigans. You must take these into account. In a fantasy world, they exist and tactics will be adjusted accordingly. When you know that if you don't "finish" the fallen enemy that his friends can and will bring him back with a fury, you don't take any chances. You "finish" the job.

Just like your players will torch a troll, the hobgoblins will remove a threat permanently. I do not see this as punishing but as logical. Hey, even a wyvern might get off with a fallen one to eat the poor sod in its nest. Why fight to the death when you already have your tasty snack?

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Except in real life there is no such things as healing word, regeneration and other shenanigans. You must take these into account. In a fantasy world, they exist and tactics will be adjusted accordingly. When you know that if you don't "finish" the fallen enemy that his friends can and will bring him back with a fury, you don't take any chances. You "finish" the job.

Just like your players will torch a troll, the hobgoblins will remove a threat permanently. I do not see this as punishing but as logical. Hey, even a wyvern might get off with a fallen one to eat the poor sod in its nest. Why fight to the death when you already have your tasty snack?

I think that presents a totally unrealistic take on how common that kind of magic is, and worse it's definitely metagaming of a clear and undeniable nature, because none of these monsters/NPCs know that it takes 3 hits doing any amount of damage, to finish a PC and prevent them from getting up again. So you either have to have a situation where NPCs frequently make mistakes, because they don't know how many hits it actually takes to prevent healing etc., sometimes hitting too few, sometimes hitting too many times, if you're staying in the setting, or you have to have them basically not do it and avoid opening the can of worms.

If you keep having NPCs go around and neatly use the correct number of hits to use up the death saves, that's pure, uncut, 100% metagaming.

There's no non-magical way a normal NPC or monster can tell when a player is so injured that they can't be brought up by Healing Word or the like. They don't know what death saves are. They don't know that any three sources of damage will do. You seem to going with PCs laying there moaning or something, but they're not - they're unconscious at 0HP. So if someone wants to lay into them, they can, but they can't tell when they're done unless it's crazy overkill.

What I suspect you're thinking is fine is a situation like, you have six guards around a downed PC, you decide to kill him, first three guards attack and hit, and because you, metagaming, know he's dead, the other three move off and attack other targets.

It's a ridiculously metagame situation. In the fiction, one guard would likely stab him, and the rest would move off (or none would). In an earlier edition, one guard would CdG, which would make sense. Not so in 5E though.

Anything can be made to make sense in the fiction. Just tack on whatever explanation is needed. That's the beauty of a fantasy game.

Hahahahaha no. That's just not even arguably true, and a great way to casually destroy the fiction.

 

[iserith]

Hahahahaha no. That's just not even arguably true, and a great way to casually destroy the fiction.

Only if you're terrible at it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Only if you're terrible at it.

Sure, sure, yeah you've packing ten inches of hardened steel and you drive a Ferrari and you can sing like an angel and you can make anything make sense.

Next up "I can make any RPG play any setting and it'll be great! Systems don't matter guys!" and so on.

This sort of mega-brag stuff "everyone who can't do what I claim I can do is a loooooser!" is sooooo 1990s.

 

[iserith]

Sure, sure, yeah you've packing ten inches of hardened steel and you drive a Ferrari and you can sing like an angel and you can make anything make sense.

Next up "I can make any RPG play any setting and it'll be great! Systems don't matter guys!" and so on.

This sort of mega-brag stuff is sooooo 1990s.

I mean, we're talking about a game that shares elements with childhood games of make-believe. So make-believe. If a child can do it, so can I. And maybe you can, too. That's hardly a brag though. It starts with subordinating what a creature "will," "would," or "should" do to what they "could" or "might" do and then saying why that is. Easy, particularly in the context of a fantasy world.

To suggest otherwise is to admit to a failure of imagination. Not sure if that's what you intend, but here we are.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I mean, we're talking about a game that shares elements with childhood games of make-believe. So make-believe. If a child can do it, so can I. And maybe you can, too. That's hardly a brag though. It starts with subordinating what a creature "will," "would," or "should" do to what they "could" or "might" do and then saying why that is. Easy, particularly in the context of a fantasy world.

To suggest otherwise is to admit to a failure of imagination. Not sure if that's what you intend, but here we are.

You're really proving my point here. Just making empty and vague statements that don't even support what you're saying, and using a cheap generalized ad hominem to try and force people to agree with you.

 

[iserith]

You're really proving my point here. Just making empty and vague statements that don't even support what you're saying, and using a cheap generalized ad hominem to try and force people to agree with you.

If your point is that you're unable to imagine why a monster or NPC might attack a downed PC, I take you at your word and hope that you can find a way some day. I already gave an example upthread of an actual game in which I played, demonstrating that it can be done, even if that particular game enjoyed some levity. A ghoul feasting on a downed PC might have a more serious tone, if that's what is preferred. But to suggest that it's not possible because something something "metagaming?" Maybe it's time to revisit Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood of Make-Believe to reclaim a forgotten skill.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

If your point is that you're unable to imagine why a monster or NPC might attack a downed PC, I take you at your word and hope that you can find a way some day. I already gave an example upthread of an actual game in which I played, demonstrating that it can be done, even if that particular game enjoyed some levity. A ghoul feasting on a downed PC might have a more serious tone, if that's what is preferred. But to suggest that it's not possible because something something "metagaming?" Maybe it's time to revisit Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood of Make-Believe to reclaim a forgotten skill.

Your claim was that it was always possible to justify.

I disagree. You don't seem to be saying it's "always" possible now though so...

More importantly, as I pointed out, it devolves into really basic and shoddy metagaming very, very quickly. There's no way around that. Most enemies have absolutely no in-combat way to determine if a PC is unconscious or actually "dead" in a way that means healing magic can't get to them.

 

[iserith]

Your claim was that it was always possible to justify.

I disagree. You don't seem to be saying it's "always" possible now though so...

More importantly, as I pointed out, it devolves into really basic and shoddy metagaming very, very quickly. There's no way around that. Most enemies have absolutely no in-combat way to determine if a PC is unconscious or actually "dead" in a way that means healing magic can't get to them.

Yeah, I claim it's always possible. Again, because make-believe in a fantasy world. It's a skill.

Your claim may hold true for some games, but not all, since you can't claim to know the quality of all games. One doesn't even need to worry about whether a monster has any "in-combat" way to determine if a PC is unconscious or actually dead. It doesn't really matter. The ghoul feasts. The iced up frost giant tweaks. The berserker goes berserk. The cultist pulls out entrails in the name of their horrible godling. And on and on.

To be clear, I have never claimed that all enemies should always attack downed PCs. Only that they could and that one can establish why as needed.