Hey. I found an online stats sheet for a 4e villain that I plan to convert to 5e. I'm not sure whether it's official or homebrew.
However, one of the villain's abilities is that whenever an enemy of his dies, every other enemy in a certain range loses a Death Save. It's an interesting concept that would really throw my characters for a loop. So he's my question:
If a character loses his last Death Save but still has HP left, do they just die? If not, when do they die?
Creatures can't 'lose' death saving throws if they're not dying (at 0 hp, unconscious and not stabilised). You track failed saves while at 0, but they reset to 0 failed saves (and 0 successful saves) once the creature is stabilised. As such this ability as described simply doesn't work in the current edition of D&D as far as death saving throws work.
Giving it a think, there's no real way to track deducted death saves on individual creatures effectively. You could have an ability on the monster itself that reduces the number of saves a creature needs to fail before they die within a certain area, but that'd still be clunky within RAW.
The ability reads a bit as if every time a player dies, all other dying players also get a failed save, with no effect for still active PCs. Can you please name the 4e villain you are talking about?
@Voras The character is Vorkhesis, First of the Sorrowsworn. I think he might be someone's homebrew but he has an awesome image you can look up.
@Davedamon I see your point. I thought Death Saves reset after a Long Rest, not gaining hit points. I might have to change the way the ability works to count how many fallen enemies there are close to Vorkhesis, then have someone who loses hit points start at that number.
Found him, he is in the Shadowfell boxed set from 4e, however, the rules you were citing are homebrew. The original Vorkhesis has an attack, that forces players to make death saves even when not dying, leading to instant death after 3 failed saves, this only happens on a critical though. The aura you mentioned is new.
Could this translate to the Exhaustion Condition in 5e? The character dies if the Exhaustion Condition level reaches 6. As one progresses toward level 6, bad conditions start to stack up.
1: Disadvantage on ability checks. 2: The above plus movement is halved. 3: All the above plus disadvantage on attack and savings. 4: All the above plus max hit points halved. 5: All the above plus speed reduced to 0. 6: Death.
Exhaustion levels must be removed by rest or some specific effect. So, I wouldn't make this an aura type of effect if it were me (and it's not). When that critical lands, then I would bump up the exhaustion by 1. (Some effects can bump it up more than 1 level.)
EDIT: At death, it's just 0 HP and the standard Death Saves begin if I understand it correctly. I don't think you get the 1HP or more revival until the level is reduced from 6, but I'm not sure. I think one can only be stabilized at level 6. (It might be dead death, though.)
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider. My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong. I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲 “It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
I may be misremembering, but I think in 4e, death saves did not reset as easily as they do in 5e. I think you needed some type of rest to reset them in that edition.
In 5e, the death save rules seem to heavily imply that they're only made at 0 hp and give a specific reset rule as "The number of both (succeeded and failed death saves) is reset to zero when you regain any hit points or become stable." There are two ways to interpret this: you need to actually gain hitpoints or "become stable" (which seems impossible if you are conscious) to reset them, or by having hitpoints or being stable/conscious it is impossible to have any failed or succeeded saves.
Hey. I found an online stats sheet for a 4e villain that I plan to convert to 5e. I'm not sure whether it's official or homebrew.
However, one of the villain's abilities is that whenever an enemy of his dies, every other enemy in a certain range loses a Death Save. It's an interesting concept that would really throw my characters for a loop. So he's my question:
If a character loses his last Death Save but still has HP left, do they just die? If not, when do they die?
Any help would be appreciated.
Creatures can't 'lose' death saving throws if they're not dying (at 0 hp, unconscious and not stabilised). You track failed saves while at 0, but they reset to 0 failed saves (and 0 successful saves) once the creature is stabilised. As such this ability as described simply doesn't work in the current edition of D&D as far as death saving throws work.
Giving it a think, there's no real way to track deducted death saves on individual creatures effectively. You could have an ability on the monster itself that reduces the number of saves a creature needs to fail before they die within a certain area, but that'd still be clunky within RAW.
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The ability reads a bit as if every time a player dies, all other dying players also get a failed save, with no effect for still active PCs. Can you please name the 4e villain you are talking about?
@Voras The character is Vorkhesis, First of the Sorrowsworn. I think he might be someone's homebrew but he has an awesome image you can look up.
@Davedamon I see your point. I thought Death Saves reset after a Long Rest, not gaining hit points. I might have to change the way the ability works to count how many fallen enemies there are close to Vorkhesis, then have someone who loses hit points start at that number.
Found him, he is in the Shadowfell boxed set from 4e, however, the rules you were citing are homebrew. The original Vorkhesis has an attack, that forces players to make death saves even when not dying, leading to instant death after 3 failed saves, this only happens on a critical though. The aura you mentioned is new.
@Voras Cheers. Clearly I should check out that stat block then. It might give me a better perspective of how strong Vorkhesis actually is.
Could this translate to the Exhaustion Condition in 5e? The character dies if the Exhaustion Condition level reaches 6. As one progresses toward level 6, bad conditions start to stack up.
1: Disadvantage on ability checks.
2: The above plus movement is halved.
3: All the above plus disadvantage on attack and savings.
4: All the above plus max hit points halved.
5: All the above plus speed reduced to 0.
6: Death.
Exhaustion levels must be removed by rest or some specific effect. So, I wouldn't make this an aura type of effect if it were me (and it's not). When that critical lands, then I would bump up the exhaustion by 1. (Some effects can bump it up more than 1 level.)
EDIT: At death, it's just 0 HP and the standard Death Saves begin if I understand it correctly. I don't think you get the 1HP or more revival until the level is reduced from 6, but I'm not sure. I think one can only be stabilized at level 6. (It might be dead death, though.)
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider.
My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong.
I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲
“It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
I may be misremembering, but I think in 4e, death saves did not reset as easily as they do in 5e. I think you needed some type of rest to reset them in that edition.
In 5e, the death save rules seem to heavily imply that they're only made at 0 hp and give a specific reset rule as "The number of both (succeeded and failed death saves) is reset to zero when you regain any hit points or become stable." There are two ways to interpret this: you need to actually gain hitpoints or "become stable" (which seems impossible if you are conscious) to reset them, or by having hitpoints or being stable/conscious it is impossible to have any failed or succeeded saves.
Yes, for 4e it was 3 failed death saves before a rest and you are gone for good. Even stabilizing did not reset that. Afaik.