Pathfinder 1E Sudden Onset Death

[Fauchard1520]

So uh... Barbarians. How do you keep them from exploding when they hit 0 hp and fall out of rage? I love the idea of the berserker who stays in the fight on willpower alone, but not at the cost of rolling up a new dude after my first unlucky combat.

Is there some easy fix that I'm missing?

(Comic for illustrative purposes.)

 

[Alzrius]

Play an unchained barbarian. The hit points they gain from raging are explicitly temporary hit points, so there's no "sudden onset death" to worry about.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

I like the sudden onset death thing. It's true to the literature. Also, I don't think barbarians need any more power upgrades. YMMV.

 

[Wasteland Knight]

Aegis of Recovery could be of help.

But the concept of berserker who finish’s the last for snd then drops dead of their rounds because their body was (briefly) continuing to fight past death is a critical part of the barbarian.

It’s a feature, not a bug. Not a class that works well with a cautious play style. It’s pretty much go big or go home.

 

[glass]

There is a feat that allows you to keep raging if you fall unconcious (Raging Vitality), which prevents the sudden explosion as long as your aliies can heal you before you run out of rage. It is basically a feat tax for original-flavour Barbarians.

_
glass.

 

[Fauchard1520]

Play an unchained barbarian. The hit points they gain from raging are explicitly temporary hit points, so there's no "sudden onset death" to worry about.

That reduces my archetype choices though, right?

 

[Alzrius]

That reduces my archetype choices though, right?

It shouldn't, at least not very much. The classes section of Pathfinder Unchained says:

Finally, with the exception of the monk, these classes should work with any of the archetypes from previous books as long as the classes still have the appropriate class features to replace.