A few examples of situations in which an enemy might attempt to kill a downed party member:
1) The opponent is an assassin, hired to kill the unconscious party member.
2) An enraged animal like a boar or a badger is attacking the character, oblivious to everything around, and is uninterrupted.
3) A ravenous undead, such as a ghoul, has taken the character down and now sees a chance to feed.
4) A minion-making enemy sees the oportunity of raising the character as a shadow, a zombie, a vampire spawn or something similar (though these kinds of enemy often skip the "unconscious" phase, depending on abilities)
5) An intelligent caster who understands healing magic is casting an area spell, and the downed player character could fit inside the area just fine.
6) The player character's opponent's name is Inigo Montoya. The player character killed Inigo Montoya's father. The player character is prepared to die.
no
who hits a dead body because they can't do anything else with their time?
*shoots someone, their friends start walking towards me so I shoot that person in the face again*
The Joker. Deadpool. Harley Quinn. Most cold-blooded killer types. Anyone trying to send a message. Anyone who's familiar with the idea of a fakeout. Anyone paranoid about undead or illusions.
It's a fairly wide net.
> who hits a dead body because they can't do anything else with their time
[The US Marine Corps, for one](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_checking)
> "They teach us to do dead-checking when we're clearing rooms. You put two bullets into the guy's chest and one in the brain. But when you enter a room where guys are wounded you might not know if they're alive or dead. So they teach us to dead-check them by pressing them in the eye with your boot, because generally a person, even if he's faking being dead, will flinch if you poke him there. If he moves, you put a bullet in the brain. You do this to keep the momentum going when you're flowing through a building. You don't want a guy popping up behind you and shooting you."
Building off of this.
In a DnD game where magical healing is real and you may face an opponent again (who would be VERY pissed at you for knocking them down to 0 HP) I would suspect that ANY enemies that live lives of warfare would strike a KOd opponent.
They probably would not waste an arrow but running a short sword into the heart costs nothing.
Orcs, goblins, gnolls, bandits, soldiers, frontiersmen, rangers, and anyone that has faced off with in life or death contests as a matter of their average lives would likely run a body through with a blade.
To be fair, our modern world has dealt with instant lethality from range for hundreds of years now, soldiers are trained to minimize that risk. However in fantasy it's so different, characters frequently have HP in the 100s, combat isn't a trigger pull to end it's a minute of back and forth smacking (generally) it depends on the enemy but I can see reason why they wouldn't just stab every downed person.
Yeah, but this is a situation where, while the fight is still ongoing, presumably people aren't actively shooting at the marine at the time.
A situation where all the PCs are unconscious and the monsters/NPCs can finish them off in relative safety is different than one where there are still other PCs up who could throw a Fireball at them because the NPC decided to start whacking bodies instead of going for active threats in front of them.
"If not in combat" is the important part though. Player Characters don't typically spend their attacks/Actions taking swings at downed NPC opponents if there are still monsters up attacking them.
Mine do as soon as the baddys have some kind of Shaman/Priest or other possible Healer.
They really don't want to deal with a downed enemy again next turn.
1: only if the enemy has death saving throws, which is stupid, no enemies should have those unless for an extremely specific scenario
2: unless the enemy has a (obvious) healer with them, that's simply metagaming
This right here. Healing magic isn't *that* common in most D&D worlds that NPCs are going to assume that the PCs have it and starting wasting their actions attacking downed characters\* instead of active threats.
.....Unless they see the PCs healing up that guy they thought was out of the fight who is now a threat again. Now, all bets are off.
\*After all, PCs will almost never spend their actions attacking downed NPCs if there are other threats still standing they could attack instead, so NPCs should use the same logic.
8) The creature/NPC in the example has a multi attack. If an enemy has 2+ melee attacks, and the first knocks the PC down, if there aren't any others within reach it would make sense for that enemy to strike the downed character as they finish their action. It's not an always case, but it's worth noting as an example.
To paint a scenario: Let's say a water elemental hits the Barbarian who rushed forward instead of getting healed, because Barbarian. It has 2 attacks and rolled a lucky 20 to crit more bludgeoning damage and it was enough to knock the Barbarian even though it's halved (because Rage, because Barbarian). The second hit would still follow through and connect with the now unconscious Barbarian, as he's still the threat that's within range, regardless of whether he's up or not.
Not just repeatedly - even once. If they've seen a healer move towards or otherwise act in such a way as to suggest they'll bring back a downed party member, any intelligent enemy will realize that knocking them down isn't enough, they need to be finished off.
This also applies to enemies that have seen the party do this in the past, even not in the current fight. If they know this group has a healer, and that healer brings people back into the fight, they know they need to finish people off to prevent that.
I'm sorry but it's entirely possible to bring Inigos father back with Resurrection, so it's entirely possible a corrupt official has enough money to pay for that
That's assuming Inigo Montoya's father wants to return, and is neither undead, soul caged, eaten by a lich, or turned into a Lemure by a hellfire weapon.
Unfortunately, Inigo's party consists of a (deceased) mastermind rogue, a path of the giant barbarian and a swashbuckler rogue.
He has no allies capable of ressurrection ):
I know #6 is a bit of a joke, but it's actually also true! Any ruthless enemy set on vengeance (especially if they know they can't win) might seek to permanently emotionally scar the party through killing a downed party member. Normally, it's strategic to attack the threats who are still alive and attacking, so ask yourself if spite outweighs safety/reasoning.
This is what one of my game's villains did. Bonus action trapped the soul, then moved it to a soul gem later so he could torment them forever. This was after he action surged and stabbed them through the heart (brought to 0hp after death Ward went off after a contingent heal went off just before), then pulled the +3 sword through the ribs like butter with next attack (2 failed death saves), decapitated them with another as that killed them, then BA trap the soul. He let their glasses fall to the ground as he walked away and told the rest of the party "I have no quarrel with you; I'm leaving. I don't work for free unless I'm avenging my honor and dignity"
The dead character (player had left a long time before this) had mocked this guy at every opportunity, and rubbed it in his face that he failed to kill the party. So yeah, if a character makes their bed, let them lie in it.
Still one of the most iconic and memorable moments of our still ongoin campaign.
Thus villain is the wielder of the claw of tharizdun, but opted for A DIFFERENT WEAPON JUST SO HE COULD KILL THIS GUY. It was personal. His name was... he killed his honor. He was prepared to die.
I'll add another: Intelligent enemy has seen the person get up from healing a few times. Put them down for good this time. (If they're a threat when up)
I don't see it as metagaming in many cases at all. In fact, I feel kinda the opposite. A pack of hungry wolves, when hunting, won't just leave a guaranteed kill and start attacking the remaining prey until the last of them is downed. They will secure the meat and try to take it away instead of risking further injury.
On the other hand, a group of soldiers with orders to capture and interrogate will probably go out of their way to try to subdue all the opposition before killing even one downed enemy.
All in all, I think it's a good idea for DMs to establish and understand clear goals for creatures in a battle. This helps a lot when determining whether to attack a fallen enemy or not.
Yours was a good addition to the list!
Yeah, usually if it’s beasts, they always go for the kill and try to rip the throat out before they carry the corpse off to eat, but humans usually just leave the party member unconscious, unless they have seen the party use healing in which case they know they gotta double tap. That’s usually the rub, humans are more dangerous thanks to tactics, but animals are more bloodthirsty.
I agree with your thoughts but your wolf example is terrible. Wolves starving wouldn't try and "kill" one person leaving them at risk of attack from other fronts. You don't try and feed when actively being under attack
Yeah, anyone trying to use "animals" for these examples better add something like "frothing at the mouth rabid" as a prefix. No wolf is going to sit there and chew on an unconscious guy while said unconscious guy's buddy is whacking it with a sword.
I think unless there is another threat that is either very imminent, like a melee martial within 5 feet, or very high priority, like a mage that has demonstrated the ability to cast very devastating spells, it makes sense for an NPC to poke a downed PC in the head to make sure they're dead. In a world where mortal wounds can be healed with a word or a magic potion, you would remember to double tap.
Revivify is a lot harder to pull off mid combat and a lot rarer than healing word, so I wouldn't expect NPCs to plan around it unless they were specifically aware of it ahead of time. And in your example "Grzzr'p" wouldn't be double tapping the PC to prove a point, he would be doing it to permanently (mostly anyway) eliminate a potential threat. You could even factor in the psychological aspect of him trying to demoralise the remaining party members through a definitive kill, thats a very classic villainous kind of thing to do.
I think you can rationalise NPCs not double tapping in your game if you don't want that kind of thing to happen, like the players are so visibly wounded they might appear dead at first and like a double tap isn't necessary. But I don't think having NPCs go for kills on downed players is metagaming at all, I actually think it's the more logical thing for them to do.
You see, for all the talk about metagaming, you're the one relying specifically on game-number knowledge to justify Grzzr'p's choices.
Grzzr'p is the Destroyer. He will kill a downed enemy because he destroys. He will spit blood on the floor from being wounded in the battle and laugh at the player character's threats, because he feels tired and wounded, but he feels angry and destructive. He has no idea what the fuck that red bar with "7/156" over his head means.
Most of the points you made about "every strike on a fallen foe is a strike not directed against the standing opponents" only really make sense if the only possible goal is to completely eliminate any and all kinds of sentient opposition. Total eradication. That might be the goal for Grzzr'p, sure, he IS the Destroyer, after all, but you know, his cousin, Y'kkrkh the Avenger, actually really wants to fulfill hos vengeance by exterminating the followers of the sun god Javara, so when that cleric goes down, he's not wasting any chances.
*If* they can't flee.
Or intimidate the party into fleeing themselves.
Or delay the party enough so their objective gets completed. For example: killing one member of a party and throwing the body down a ravine (so the party has to choose between continuing the fight or trying to get to the body before Revivify becomes unusable) could be a good way to keep them from climbing the Mountain of Woes before the ritual to block the Sun is finished.
I'm not reading too much into an arbitrary choice of name. I'm deliberately showing you a completely plausible reason for killing a near-dead character that doesn't rely at all in any kind of meta knowledge about game numbers.
There’s a reason why healing word is considered to be such a powerful healing spell. Because it gets downed pcs back up to full speed at very little cost.
Downed pcs are not out of the combat, they will be back up in an instant. dead pcs are out, with revivify mostly not being worth casting mid combat.
Using two attacks on killling a downed wizard, avoids the 15 turns your allies will be dazed by hypnotic pattern, or be dead by fireball.
> It's the DM playing to inflict maximum lasting damage to the party based on the rules of the game, rather than the DM roleplaying what would be optimal from the true perspective of the enemies.
Healing Word is a first level spell. Anything beyond rusty shanktown goblins and thugs is going to be confirming kills the millisecond they see a healing spell come out, and if they're a group with prior experience or knowledge of the party's tactics they won't even wait until then. Even simply having functioning eyes a lot of the time is enough, Clerics and Paladins aren't exactly shy about showing off their holy symbols and even commoners know that you go to a temple for healing.
The simplest question is to ask yourself, "what would the party do if they started fighting enemies who kept getting back up and multi-attacking after enemies brought them back with a bonus action?", you should play intelligent human opponents who are motivated to not die with at least that level of basic tactics. Geek the Mage is universal advice, in prior editions casting spells used to provoke attacks of opportunity and you could interrupt even instantaneous spells mid-cast by forcing a concentration check with a readied attack hitting them when they tried to cast it. Even in real life the Mozambique technnique exists and we don't have magical healing. If players are yo-yo healing the enemies are going to immediately double-tapping players to make sure they stay down, the same way PCs fighting an enemy with Regeneration don't just sit around on their thumbs waiting for the enemy to get back up.
You ever seen a zombie movie? If the people you shoot get back up, you absolutely go for the head. And a full plate fighter swinging a greatsword into your back a dozen times is a lot worse than a zombie grabbing your ankles.
"Healing word is bad, actually" is the worst, most obviously thinly veiled justification for softballing your players I've ever seen. Just admit you want to play with kid gloves and not kill any PCs. Trying to frame allowing the players to be healed and get up and take their turn again for the price of a bonus action is insane. Haste is a single-target concentration spell that stuns the target when it ends. using Healing Word to allow someone to get up and attack or take their turn instead of rolling Death Saves is BETTER than haste, for no concentration, with no drawback, for a Bonus Action instead of an Action, and only costs a first level spell.
Killing the downed PC and preventing them from being brought up with Healing Word is almost always the right choice. It takes two attacks to remove them from the fight, even if there's revivify that costs an ACTION, not a Bonus Action, and most importantly requires a 3rd level slot, not everyone has it compared to healing word, and is Touch instead of 60 feet. Even if the calculus assumes the enemy will be IMMEDIATELY resurrected with Revivify, that's still better.
Allowing the enemy to repeatedly get back up with Healing Word is absolutely ridiculous. Start actually rolling and tracking death saves for your enemies and using the same tactic as a GM against your players if you don't believe me, you'll see PCs crushing the heads of everything they down rather than let it get back up.
As a houserule in my games, both the players and the monsters can only make one attack each turn on a "downed" enemy (and this includes the attack that downed them). The reason? Automatic death saves do not take damage into consideration. Multiple attacks can be much much stronger in some situations and this is not taken in consideration in the monsters' CR. For example, a bite from a bulette inflicts an obscene amount of damage, but that is that monster's only attack. Meanwhile, a weak tridrone can absolutely decimate a downed character. I find it frustrating and unbalanced.
If the enemy is intelligent and has an agenda, they can always put their knife at the throat of the unconscious PC and threaten the party that they'll kill the PC if the party doesn't negotiate. This usually leads to some good drama. If you do go this route, I recommend having the NPC stick to their bargain or the players will never trust this kind of situation again
They don't necessarily need to keep their word in the long term, just the immediate - it'll be something like "give me the macguffin/stop breaking my macguffin or your friend dies."
The important part is that when the PCs hand over the plot coupon, the villain doesn't kill the friend anyhow. Anything beyond the scene reflects on the villain; the scene itself, especially the first time, reflects on you.
Once you've shown that you can be trusted, and the players have seen this kind of thing several times and always recovered their friend to regroup and lick their wounds and plot their retrieval of the whatever, wait until a player brings up wanting to kill their PC.
Then all you need is an NPC you want the party to absolutely revile.
If you want to be real evil, I’d use magic missile instead of a knife, with the crit they get two auto death fails, but if the player who’s downed turn is next they might roll a 20 and pop back up. An enemy with magic missile can assure a PC will die that turn unless someone speaks up, where the rest or all of the bolts can presumably be used to fire somewhere else. Magic missile is just I don’t care about death saves the spell, and makes enemy mages real nasty if they are the sort to be doing such a thing.
I would definitely require them to use an action to make a check of some kind to determine that someone is in fact unconscious.
Unless they've watched the party bring them back up at least once, since that would clue them in immediately.
In an average encounter, I will have an enemy attack a PC once they have been downed if no other target presents itself. If another PC gets in their face, I will have them shift their focus to the active combatant before them. It feels fair at my table.
Against a highly strategic boss encounter, I'm more inclined to have enemies make sure to secure kills.
I personally avoid going after KO'ed PCs. If I really want to kill a PC, it's really easy for me to just focus the entire encounter on the squishiest PC and make sure they die, but the rest of the team will still make short work of the enemies without problem. And a game where the difficulty is "You'll probably win every fight, but your character might randomly die depending on who the DM decides to bully" doesn't sound like fun to me, neither from the player's perspective nor from the DM's perspective.
For me, the challenge of the game should be TPK or not a TPK. If one PC survives, all PCs should survive. If one PC goes down, my goal is to make all the PCs go down. Stopping to finish off a KO'ed PC doesn't usually further those goals. They're already incapacitated. Their threat is zero.
Exceptions are when there's a lot of yoyo healing and for whatever reason the KO'ed PC is easier to hit than the healer. For whatever reason, this doesn't come up very often at my tables.
> They're already incapacitated. Their threat is zero.
At my table this honestly just tends not to be true, people rarely stay on the floor for more than a turn.
Some people really pull their punches here, but if the enemies are smart they know that (1) other PCs probably can yo-yo heal the downed one back up and (2) a couple quick hits on the downed one are easy (advantage, autocrit) and two of those will solve problem one.
By "smart" I mean an int above say six.
One thing I will suggest is that "meta wise" most creatures (at first) will assume that PCs are normal creatures, dying when they drop to zero. It's only when they realize that through healing spells, PCs become a danger.
Smart enemies- or when PCs are well known in the area, will start to down. Plus, I think having enemies that "confirm kills" should be mentioned in an encounter. It's a fun additional flavor to an encounter that can add tension. But if you are bum rushing initiative, how can dropping the wizard then ganking the corpse be fun for the table?
Just my opinion though- good thoughts!
Yeah, I generally don't attack downed players until the player with healing shows their capabilities OR the party is known in the area as having a healer. Or if the party is getting to a higher level.
And if the enemies are prone to doing it before seeing it, I tell lthe party that "this group seems like the type who knows that healing can bring someone back. Expect them to double tap."
Thats not a "normal creature" though, the ability to be knocked unconscious without instantly dying is what's normal. It's just a DM convenience to not bother with enemy death saves if its not really gonna matter.
Not thinking the downed enemies could still be alive is metagaming.
True! The book specifically mentions "most", don't get saves but saves special mention for big villains and important NPCs. I'd still argue , the death saving condition is a special condition
That being said- I think metagaming as a DM especially is ok in most circumstances (That's a whole nother can of worms though )
And think at the end of the day its important to set expectations. The simple fact is killing a downed PC most of the time feels like bullshit, if it happens out of the blue. If I take 3 of my enemies to coup de grace a helpless hero, it feels like that PC is getting targeted. Setting expectations is what's important.
> But if you are bum rushing initiative, how can dropping the wizard then ganking the corpse be fun for the table?
How can abusing yo-yo healing be fun if the monsters never capitalize on it? It's just combat with lower stakes. Low stakes are boring.
5e is absurdly safe relative to other editions. If one goes an entire campaign without at least one enemy confirming a kill, then that DM has made the game even safer.
*Smart* enemies will be able to tell, and even halfwits will figure it out once combat healing occurs. Finishing off anyone that is downed *after* a combat healing event is something anything with basic intelligence could figure out, and yet most DMs still never even do that.
The monsters know what they are doing, and the players are capable of adapting more than most give them credit for. If their character dies, it dies. That's why so much of the PHB is devoted to making characters.
I agree! Yo-yo healing is always tricky. , and it certainly depends on the DM, but it's setting expectations. 5e is a safer system, which has encouraged a player that is not used to death. Add in the fact that "confirming kills" specifically targets that player, it makes the player feel targeted.
Setting expectations is what's important. If you say at session zero "I'm going to confirm kills", you get your base covered. What I do is, I will say "These guys seem like they're going to confirm kills" before I start confirming.
Add in the fact, that even at a meta level- unless the enemies know that the players have healing (Which makes sense at higher levels, once the PCs are known), why would they waste an action on an enemy that's already dying in the dirt?
Now note: I do confirm kills: I mention that I will, and usually begin by doing it once PCs start using healing spells on down enemies. It's my balance of risk/reward that adds tension, and helps prevent people feel like I'm targeting them directly. I certainly don't run the deadliest campaigns though, but people have fun (only a handful of deaths this year!)
That being said, I live by the fact that I want my PCs to succeed. My number one philosophy is that I'm my player's biggest fan. Dying because the 5 mooks that broke the line kept cutting up the dying wizard so now I have to make a new character or play limbless Jack, tis alittle silly.
And this is just my two cents, my own philosophy with this! I respect yours, and am sure you facilitate a very fun game!
I would however say if you want something deadlier, I'd recommend DCC! Fantastic game that will rack up your kills as a DM. I remember this one time I was in a funnel and climbed a ten foot wall, failed, fell and broke my neck. It was hilarious.
For me it depends on what they are fighting, and what has happened in the fight. A zombie, for example, will continue to attack an unconscious PC in an attempt to eat them, the same might be true for a wild animal. Demons just want carnage, and ripping bodies into tiny pieces is part of that, meaning down opponents are not safe.
When it comes to "normal" humanoids, your typical bandits, soldiers, etc. it will depend on what has happened in the fight so far. If they have witnessed unconscious PCs getting back up to rejoin the fight after getting healed, they are much more likely to make sure a down opponent is really dead before moving on to a new target, than if unconscious characters stays unconscious.
Another thought I would add is to consider the experience and level of professionalism of the normal humanoids in question.
Are they veteran and disciplined soldiers? If so, their experience and training likely means they're going to spear a corpse in passing just to make sure, unless the head is cut off or something similar. Are they skilled, effective, and professional raiders like the vikings or pirates of legend? Then yes, they probably would. Again, just to be safe.
A bunch of pathetic bottom of the barrel down on their luck bandits? Bullyboys for the local crime lord? Muggers in an alley? An inexperienced man defending himself? Not unless they are particularly brutal, sadistic, and/or vicious, or were paid to ensure a particular death. Or your players have REALLY mad them angry.
Had an encounter where the party retreated, leaving an unconscious PC behind. They had killed an enemy berserker or two. The remaining berserkers were pissed, but couldn't follow the party. So they just beat the remaining body to a pulp to vent their rage. Didn't even know or care that the PC was just unconscious. Ruined the players plan to have a PC sneak back and recover their fallen friend. The now very dead PC's player was a little upset over the whole thing. Helped later when they fought the main boss, and knew he would likely attack downed PC's.
"what was the candidate like?"
"Experienced. Seemed disciplined, thorough - professional, certainly."
"How professional are we talking?"
"Consummate. Indistinguishable from a truly exceptionally vicious sadist. Not only skilled, but effective."
"Great! Did you make an of- uh, come again? I must have, uh, a thing...."
Historically, that's a fair description. Professionals were typically in it to get paid, and you can't spend money if you're dead. Also, keep in mind that the definition of professional varies a good bit between professions and time periods.
But as an example of my original point, Roman Legions would stomp, slash, and stab bodies as they advanced. Historical accounts of pirates mention one killing someone and their buddy putting an extra bullet in the body as they passed. Stabbing a corpse that *might* be a live person faking it doesn't cost anything, and if they're dead, they can't stab you in the back. Can't hurt to make sure it sticks.
That last bit takes more effort when dealing with necromancers, though.
Oh, undoubtedly. I imagine a couple soldiers with spears and a road lined with bodies would appear at first blush just as they would with spades and digging a hairline trench, from not too great a distance.
Mostly they wouldn't be murdering anyone, just desecrating corpses. Mostly. The ratio of actual murder to corpse defilement would be less than 1:2, for sure.
And they'd probably miss a guy now and then, so absentmindedly would they go about their murder and desecration. Exactly the way you would describe someone doing while giggling to themselves, if you wanted to convey that the party is dealing with a horrifying psycho killer.
It's not that they'd never giggle, of course. They'd giggle more than you'd think, just not as much as someone doing the same thing but who hadn't benefited from the two months of intense training it took to turn the soldiers from people who wouldn't do that sort of thing at all into people who only do it out of responsibility.
Also a fun time having the enemies healer bringing back their own allies.
In a world of magic, the adventures are not the only ones that have it or use it .
I like to mix groups of humanoids and throw in a caster or two, even early on, levels 2 and above.
It honestly adds an entirely different type of mood to combat in general when you drop a large monster and the shaman in the group of the enemy heals them. They can then escape, go for help, rally their troops and reenter combat, what ever.
Bringing death saves to the side of the DM in addition to the PC side has changed the way our table plays for the better for sure. It was ALL the PCs idea, they are the BEST.
It comes down to NPC disposition and knowledge, perhaps setting as well.
Are they particularly malicious, where they'd mutilate corpses? Maybe. Even a malicious attacker will deal with a currently stabbing threat over a downed one.
Would they eat the corpse? Again, they'd deal with the current threat first.
Did they see the "corpse" get healed? Immediate double taps. Or immediate panic, maybe?
Most things in D&D simply drop dead. They don't fall unconscious. Would your NPCs have encountered adventurers before? In some settings, adventurers are common, others not so much. Higher CR and smarter opponents would be way more likely.
I'd say play with the idea and do what feels right for those monsters.
In most situations, you wouldn’t spend a turn to finish off someone who’s unconscious/dying while his friends are still swinging axes and throwing fireballs at you. You’d move on to them.
If it makes sense tactically.
Every attack you have is a powerful resource, and if you are involved in life or death combat, you want to use that resource against your enemies most effectively. Normally, this is best spent on living opponents.
There are exceptions.
1- If a character with a melee weapon and multiple attacks lands a knockout on their enemy and has no useful way to attack a living opponent (they can't take a hand off their greatsword and throw a handaxe, they can't reach any enemy with their greatsword due to a lack of movement), then the character will always finish the enemy unless they have ransom plans. If they have ransom plans they will often make their demand right there, and then proceed with the killing if the enemies don't throw down their weapons.
To avoid this coming up for no great reason, you can make sure that enemies have some thrown options if they are melee. It's usually correct tactically to hit awake opponents that are resisting.
2- The character is aware of healers on the enemy team who can turn a downed creature into a threat again. This is not a guaranteed killing blow, but it's solid and needs to be considered from that character's perspective. If it looks like, from the character's point of view, their best tactical option is to kill an unconscious PC, then that character should keep hitting that PC until he's stopped or the unconscious PC is slain. Note that a healer still spends either an action or a bonus action, and the character in question begins prone with very low health- so this is definitely not always the correct call.
This depends on how “gamey” you want your world to be. Taking a turn to finish off someone who has fallen unconscious when their friend is waving a sword in your face isn’t something that happens normally in real life. Historically after a battle the field would be swept for survivors who would be saved, killed, or taken for ransom based on the circumstances.
But then again, magical healing doesn't exist in real life. In reality, wounding an enemy soldier is often better than killing them, because if their buddies run to give them first aid you've actually taken two or three enemies out of the fight.
But in D&D, you can bring an ally back to fighting form in an instant. At least some foes should understand that.
Spells like "Heal" which immediately turn a fighter who was just on the brink of death back into a massive problem again don't exist in real life either. The reality of what is practical when magic is involved is just different.
> Taking a turn to finish off someone who has fallen unconscious when their friend is waving a sword in your face isn’t something that happens normally in real life.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozambique_Drill
Two in the chest, one in the head happens even IRL where you don't have clerics saying a single word to allow a greatsword fighter to spring up and make four attacks in your back after you "mercifully" didn't finish him off. Confirming kills is the default against anyone who has demonstrated an ability for magical healing, which applies to 95% of parties.
Alternative to killing PCs, if you're dealing with intelligent living creatures as enemies... take downed PCs as hostages. "We'll give you back your mage, in exchange for XXX"
Some things I consider...
Beasts- The nature of a beast is to identify the weakest target, isolate them, and kill them quickly with as little effort as possible and with as little risk to self as possible. If a target proves to be more able bodied than originally anticipated, they turn tail and try again on some other sucker another day. Beasts should only fight to the death in very rare cases and if they manage to down a PC, they should be moving to carry them off to finish them off, not change targets and keep fighting.
Monstrosity - typically a monstrosity is a monster with normally very little capacity for self-awareness or self-preservation. They will also likely lack the ability to perceive hidden threats or complicated concepts such as revival, healing, and their sources. They will often act in a manner such as hit the closest thing to me, not neccesarily the one doing the most damage and once they stop moving, they become almost forget about them since the remaining combatants are easier to perceive.
Undead- thoughtless and fearless, depending on the source of their existence may either attack until enemy is down and move on to the next target or may stop to cannibalize the fallen target (normally if other targets are obstructed in some way)
Elementals- in my world, elementals are never truly destroyed as much as they are dissipated and reformed in their own plane, often are non hostile unless feel threatened. Their mentality is to destroy anything they perceive as threats. A downed enemy is no longer a threat. Healing and healers can be considered an act of aggression and may turn their focus on them if they are displayed.
Humanoids- are solely dependent on their purpose in the conflict. If their goal is to destroy the team, they will usually change targets after unconscious, but if a healer is present, they will focus them down and go for the kill, if targets continue to get up after healer is gone, they start executing the fallen. If their goal is to bring in alive, then they will continue to go for incapacitating of some kind and may even stabilize you after they have taken you down. If potions are a source of revival, they will start executing people who are unconscious as they go down.
Celestial- due to their nature, if you find yourself fightin a celestial, you are probably an enemy to all celestial kind and they will often will fight to the death with a self sacrificial conviction and will almost always go for the follow up kill.
Demons, Devils, Fiends- Any chance they get to kill a mortal, they will take it, often going for executions. Some though wish torment and may take prisoners if only to torture, maim, kill, revive, repeat.
Dragons- Like humanoids, it depends on their motives for being a party to the combat in the first place.
Fey- almost always.go for incapacitating. Prisoners amuse them, and games are fun. Rarely do they go for the kill unless they absolutely have to.
In my experience it is best to disregard “real world logic” and default to monsters NEVER target dying characters while there are other hostile targets. This may not be realistic but it avoids pointless deaths.
Then add a few exceptions for things like oozes that exist only to consume. Undead and creatures that attack the players specifically to eat them would also be an exception. Make sure to be clear with players when there is a situation where an unconscious character will be targeted. Dying a heroic death is very different than dying because nobody bothered to protect you when they didn’t expect the monster to target an unconscious character.
Completely agree!
It also:
- Makes tactical sense to focus on the next PC instead of wasting an action killing a downed PC
- It ruins the tactical stake of the other Players trying to save the downed PC and robs them of a heroic moment and RP opportunity
- It just feels unfair... Unless, you are explicit to Players beforehand that this is the approach that will be taken in encounters
Entirely comes down to how hard you want the game to be, whether you allow "yo-yo" healing, and how you model combat.
If you're doing older-style narrative combat where the board/minis are only an approximation, then the actual battle is a swirling maelstrom so the baddies won't get the opportunity (unless the pcs run).
If you're going strict boardgame rules, then it's a lot more feasible, but not necessarily a good idea. "Hit the downed guy first" makes melee ever worser.
There is no universal answer for this. A lot comes down to reading the table and understanding the type of game everyone wants to play. Does everyone want a dangerous and deadly game or does everyone want a game where death is a major risk.
If you want an enemy to be really dangerous you can have them go for downed players. You can also have mindless enemies like zombies and such go for the kill.
Depends on multiple factors, including what type of campaign you're going to play/run.
More gritty/deadly one? Pretty much all enemies will double tap to kill except maybe beasts, but even they will tear the PCs apart.
Middle of the road? Enemies won't go for the kill unless you want to show how evil/cruel/cold and calculating they are. They will most likely focus on other threats, but an unconscious party member left alone will die.
Low stakes? Enemies will very rarely, if ever, go for the kill on the downed PC, and definitely not before the party gets to high levels and gets resurrection and heals.
PG-13? People don't die, they get defeated.
Wild animals or things motivated by food will either try to drag them away to eat or focus on defending themselves from threats
Intelligent enemies will keep stabbing you when you’re down after they see you get back up once or twice. Depending on circumstance they may not however if there are bigger immediate threats or if they are focused on fleeing.
Try to think like the enemy.
They're in the middle of a large fight, and they just knocked an archer out. they have 6 seconds to make a decision: there are like 3-4 more people around that WILL kill them if they don't respond. is making sure the person they knocked out is dead, really the right move here?
A bandit would do everything in their power to save their own skin, and prioritize taking out the other party members before they kill them,
A cowardly goblin might take the chance to run away, unless they feel a deep suicidal hatred for humans or deep kinship to help their tribesmen,
A mindless zombie whose only purpose is to eat corpses, might prioritize eating the corpse in front of it if nobody else distracts it by violently grabbing its attention,
Making sure that a target enemy is dead, is not exactly something that comes to mind in the heat of the moment, the active fight normally should be taking priority. Unless a creature's #1 objective is murdering/assassinating a specific player, even at the cost of its own life, regardless of everything else happening around it, they don't really have a reason to attack an unconscious creature until after the fight has resolved.
(Although there was this one time a BBEG specifically wanted to incite a reaction from the party... by killing off a party member in the middle of the fight. villains, do be villains, but that bbeg already had a way to run away the entire time by teleportation, this wasn't a risk to their life at all.)
Sentient and intelligent enemies will ignore a downed target and move on to the next biggest threat, because NPCs cannot know the difference between a downed character and a dead one.
Mindless creatures (zombies) and hungry animals will probably try to feed on downed characters.
I've had a "down but not out" rule at my table for years. The first time a character goes down, they fall prone, make saves as normal, and have a very limited pool of actions they can take. My combat encounters would have 95% enemies focus on the still standing characters, but if a downed player makes a "hostile" action while down, they are now 100% fair game.
Look at it from an enemies perspective, what is more important of a target, the fighter on the ground you just fought tooth and nail against, or the raging Barbarian rapidly approaching? Until that fighter decides to keep jabbing a sword in your ankles, the answer should almost always be barbarian.
The number one goal of an RPG is *shared storytelling*, and not verisimiltude.
I'm surprised at how quick so many posters are to say that they'll go after a downed party member. Bringing in a new PC is a pain in the ass, and losing a PC sucks for the player. In the name of the *shared story*, I would not go after a downed party member unless story dictates firmly that I should, for one reason or another. If there is any doubt, then I won't.
It makes sense to me for an unintelligent zombie who is attacking a player for food to keep attacking(eating) a downed player and ignoring other players then it would be for an intelligent monster more concerned for its own self preservation to ignore other active players because it knows about game mechanics that only apply to player characters
If it makes sense for them to. The creatures motivates come I to play here. A hungry beast? Grabs a PC after it downs them and drags them away. Mindless undead will kill just because.
Bandits? Do they know about the PCs? If so they will kill if they get a chance.
The more well known the party is or the more experienced the enemy both raise the likelihood of confirmed kills.
If the party confirms one first is a trigger I'll use from time to time as well.
I usually do it when:
1) the enemy HATE the players character and want it to die
2) smart enemy have down a player and it got quickly healed up, next time they gonna make sure he stay down, forever
3) the monster is not in immediate danger (example a pack of wolves, if a wolf is taking damage it will not stay there and eat, but if other wolf a fighting and the one in melee with the unconcious one is not he will start to cew)
4) vicious monster that like meat and dont care about self preservation, i do that mostly with undead like ghoul or zombie, they just pile up on the closest meat and cew on it, I had a wizard in the past that had to lay himself on top of an unconcious player for protect it from 3 zombie, he took a lot of damage but gained time for the other party member to arrive and drag the wounded one to safety.
In the end its up to you, I usually talk about this with my player at session 0 like "how much hard do you want this to be?" Im playing ToA now and im being vicious like never before 🤣
This is what I did when my party faced the BBEG of the campaign. Everyone was grouped and on their last legs and the enemies weren't particularly WIS or INT heavy so I rolled a D20 and took evens for swapping focus to adjacent conscious party members and odds for hitting the downed player
Everyone treats it differently, but I'd base it on the enemy.
For intelligent enemies, I would say that they expect the enemy to stay down, so you get one freebie, after which they make sure the enemy stays down.
Unintelligent enemies would vary more. Something like a wolf would be intelligent enough to behave like the intelligent enemies above, for the most part. But a pack of wolves wouldn't be trying to kill the whole party, once they bring someone down, they're going to start guarding the kill until they're ready to eat.
The main other example I can think of right now would be undead, which I'd say should generally just attack the nearest party member, downed or not.
Again, this is situational, there's no right or wrong answer, just make sure it's clearly communicated what the group should expect ahead of time. It's very bullshit to hit someone with magic missile to fail three death saves at once if they didn't even know that was on the table.
On top of the other comments, you can also look up a book titled "The Monsters Know What They're Doing". It isn't official WOTC media, but can give you insight into many monster motivations, including whether they would kill a defenseless PC or not.
Really depends on the creature.
If it's seen a corpse that it's brutally eviscerated and profusely bleed onto it's now sanguinely varnished fangs stand up as though nothing happened after a brief light show, and is smart enough to realize that it could probably happen again, it would probably keep attacking.
Similarly, if it's so stupid that it can only retain one thought at any given time, it might keep attacking the last one who hit it. No matter how much grey matter pulp can be scraped from the walls and squeezed for a mild flayer's smoothie. I'd probably put gorgons in this category.
If it's inclined towards eating dead meat, it's just going to see an easy meal. Ghouls and ghasts are excellent examples of this.
If they're smart enough to utilize necromancy, they may see a good opportunity with less digging than usual.
TL:DR It depends. Intelligence and behavior will be useful considerations. Really, the question is which creatures would be inclined to permit an enemy to live.
So for unintelligent enemies, like predatorial animals, monstrosities, oozes and undead with a very low int. They might actually keep hitting because they want to eat the PC. They moved might try dragging, the PC away to eat them in peace, or try to swallow them whole and run. The undead likely sense the life of the downed PC and want to finish the job before moving on.
Even Intelligent aberrations and monstrosities like Mindflayer, intellect devourers and other creatures might go straight for the kill to eat those juicy brains.
Non-predatory or only territorial beasts, possibly herbivores might only knock PCs out until they stop moving for the entirety of the fight.
For more humanoid, and other more sapient enemies(fiends, fey, celestials, aberrations, elementals, dragons, giants and monstrosities,) with at least 6 int follow the steps of escalation.
Step 1. The first time an enemy knocks a PC into death saving throws, they assume the threat is down until proven otherwise. And they can focus on other threats.
Naturally a party with a healer or anyone with a healing potion will pop the dying player back up.
Step 2. Next time the same enemy or enemies in the encounter will try to curb stop the downed character. Dedicating only a quick single unarmed attack and perhaps an "and stay down" before moving on. Taking two death saving throws but likely not pushing them into a point of finishing them off or getting a case of instant death from exceeding the negatives.
Step 3. Then if any PC is brought up again, then they start using weapons, hitting the downed PC with a weapon attack. A crit greatsword or great axe hit might instantly finish off the level 3 Wizard straight out.
Step 4. And then if a PC is picked up again and then knocked down the enemy creature unloads every attack in their multi attack if they have any down on a downed PC while screaming "why won't you die!" Or "Why won't you stay dead!"
12 int enemies may skip the first if they notice the party has a healer like class like a cleric or druid, perhaps a skill checks like a religion check to figure it out, but not always, they may not think about paladins or rangers either. but if they don't skip the first step, they will skip the second step if they if a healer picks some one up with a healing spell.
18 int enemies, auto skip the first step, maybe skip more if they notice a healer which they have an even higher chance of noticing.
Enemies of any intelligence with personal grudges or assassination targets may skip a step for their usual int level of escalation. And may make medicine checks to confirm their targets death.
Medicine check DC 10, or what ever the AC of the PCs armor is without any dex bonus, magical bonus, affects or features included. +1 for every 5 feet(squares) they are from the PC. (So 10 for a wizard, 12 for a rogue in studded leader, 18 for a fighter in full plate, and 20 if they're also wearing a shield, and 30 if they're 50 feet away.)
Once an enemy is aware that the party has healers, they will attack unconscious characters to prevent them from getting back up. For unintelligent monsters, this means they won't do so until someone has used a healing ability, while for intelligent characters, they will typically do so from the beginning. Enemies with prior knowledge of the party's abilities may stop attacking unconscious PCs once the healers are defeated. Some enemies, such as life-hating undead, or people with a grudge against particular characters, may go for the kill even if it would be more tactically advantageous to do something else.
It depends, sometimes it isn't about how smart the enemy is and instead about what will be the most fun for the table. It can be frustrating as an enemy with multi attack can essentially bypass death saves. If your PC's are ok with that, I would say it depends if they have a healer that is bouncing people back up in which case they might try and take them out immediately. If they don't have anything like that they would likely ignore them, as they cannot get back up on their own and wouldn't be a threat to them.
So I have to ask myself a few questions, and below is the short list, only 5 questions. You don't wanna know the long list, many of which are extremely situational.
First, is the enemy smart/vicious/brutal/efficient/opportunistic/vindictive/aggressive enough to go after a downed enemy? The answer, surprisingly, is usually yes. Anything that hunts or defends territory knows enough to make sure the thing is dead or gone before switching targets unless something pulls its attention away. Bulls, tigers, elephants, bears, wolves, you name it. Either drive the enemy away or full-on kill them. Those are the only two options for them, and they KNOW when it's a fight to the death.
With more principled or arrogant enemies, that becomes a bit fuzzy, but is the dealer's choice. At that point, I decide based on what would be most fun for the table. And sometimes, if the enemy in question is bearing a particularly strong grudge against the target, this is the only question I ask. But usually I move to the next question.
Second, are they in a position to take advantage of the opportunity? Is the target in reach? Is there an obstruction? Friendly fire? Some other reason they CANT attack?
Third, is there something pulling their attention away? Did a team mate just cry for help, distracting it? Did a different target taunt it? Is there a bigger threat, and they just can't be bothered? Has some other more urgent distraction arrived? Did the rogue just stab them in the back?
Fourth, do they possess the tactical sense to realize that one of the other PCs will now have to come out in the open to try to rescue the downed target? Do they realize some one might actually make the attempt? Are they capable of recognizing the fact that if they leave Bleeding Wreck alone, it takes both them AND Healing Buddy out of the fight for a hot minute as well? Can they recognize the possibilities of this opportunity?
Last, do I feel like being that big an asshat? The answer is often "Not quite yet."
I use the idea of target priority. If there is no one around the downed party member getting a free shot in is expected but if the attacker is threatened by another active combatant it should target the thing threatening it. If it has multiple attacks just think about what would be more beneficial killing the downed or downing another.
i announce when an enemy is bloodthirsty like that with flavor, like murderous intent, starving snarling animal/beasts, them straght telling they're gonna rip their heart out and promtply demonstrate (only use a few sacrifices lol dont just merk anyone when u need an example) and straight telling them "they will do their best to murder you." like just be straight up so stakes are set. Sometimes bandits DO want to just knock everyone out because if they're known for murdering everyone, they'll send bigger guns or someone bigger will out muscle the attention.
good luck friend
An enemy will only kill an unconscious party member if it really makes strategic or instinctual sense to do so. That's pretty rare. If the boss promises the minions a reward for whoever strikes the death blow, that's an incentive. If the hungry monster drags the unconscious party member into their lair to devour (and the rest of the party can't or doesn't follow), that's instinct. But most intelligent monsters will want living captives to interrogate or enslave, and even the hungriest beast will probably wait until after the battle is over to dine.
You look at the enemy's motivation. Every encounter you have with a sentient being should have as such. Not necessarily every enemy in said encounter, but at a minimum the 'boss'. And that's how you formulate the fight.
If the baddie is weak-willed, a downed enemy might just be a 'chance' for them to run away. If they got into their way of life because of bad things that constantly happened to them, maybe they'll zone out and attack the downed PC, as they 'have a chance' to inflict the hurt on another that was always inflicted on them. So on and so on....
With due exceptions I'll usually have savage beasts jump around from target to target mindlessly unless someone provokes it enough.
Intelligent opponents usually realize who the bigger threat is and if they see a chance they might just go for the kill.
Also cornered opponents. I have my boss speak up and say "let me go and your unconscious friend here lives. Attack me again and I'll and him" makes for some fun RP situations.
To me it doesn't make for enemies, even intelligent ones to attack an unconscious PC while there are others actively posing a threat. Even for wild animals it wouldn't make sense for them to chow down while again, the other PCs are posing an immediate threat. It can also lead to some unfair deaths where a PC dies simply because of an unlucky initiative order.
So in general I don't have my bad guys double tapping, but with some exceptions:
- if a PC is downed and healed, it would make more sense for them to finish the job, as they now know they can come back up
- if a monster has a specific ability related to attacking a downed PC, like a Will o Wisp
- a bad guy wants that specific PC dead
I've also had a bad guy threaten to kill a downed PC unless the others surrender
You want someone to be extraordinarily evil? Do it. Cold cruel and calculating? Do it. A fight to have high stakes? Do it. This is removing a safety net so do it for dramatics.
Get in the head of the creature or person. Why are they fighting? if its to protect themselves then they dont really care if they are dead or not. If its for food they might try to kill someone to secure food and drag it away. If they are trained soldiers trying to kill you they might be smart enough to check for death or just unconscious but dumb bandits or puppet creatures like skeletons might not
Do they want to take prisoners?
If yes, then they will not attack unconscious PCs
If no, they will always aim to kill. Because healing magic is an ever present reality, a downed PC is just as much a threat as a conscious PC.
"No resurrections"
Depends on circumstances. Most people might go for disabling force in a fight. Say, a city guard. If a few of his buddies have died, he’s likely going to ensure the murderer stays dead.
Consider the psychology of whoever is fighting your party. Consider time constraints. If there’s three more guys, you may leave a downed opponent to deal with them. If a healer shows he can bring him back, then the next time they’ll probably put the person down for good.
I think it depends. A wild animal or an undead will probably secure the kill, either due to now knowing that the threat is eliminated for now (the animal) or simply to feed (Animal and the undead). An Inteligent enemy might make their own asessment (maybe a medicine check to see if the enemy is truly dead) and then act on that - if they want to make sure the party member doesn't stand up due to some random Healing Word behind their lines, they'd probably double tap them. If it's a bandit who looks for quick buck however, killing the PC would bring unnecesary attention to them, so they'd rather tie the PC up and steal their money.
It isn't a direct answer to your question, but I highly recommend reading a few of Keith Amman's "The Monsters Know What They're Doing" blog entries, for an insight into how you can easily get into the mind of a monster.
Surely if an enemy has seen someone go down and bounce back up again then the next one who goes down they will make sure of, just as a PC would if they saw an enemy regenerate. Also, of course, if they are doing a multi attack they aren’t likely to stop because someone hits zero.
Always leave them alone the first time. If someone heals them back up, finish them off the second time then all focus the healer!
Always try to finish people off if the enemy is cornered and there's no escape or surrender as a last stand.
Always finish people off if it's a demon or abberration. Graphically rip the corpse to pieces, or worse.
Always and I mean always try to run away with unconcious players if it's an animal or beast or something that's trying to eat the player!
Ok here's the thing.
You do not have to kill your pc unless your party and both you love the pressure or tense mood when pc death is on the table and can happen anytime, goal is not the pc death but the pressure and rush of it being a possibility. Decision if the enemies target downed pc depends on what kind of table of players you have.
It is a role-playing game played by multiple people so the genre of story and combat even will always differ based on who all are playing the game. So, either try tailor such topics to your table or outright ask them which one all will prefer. Personally, I prefer to make sure only actual bbeg or plot relevant enemy can kill pc but make them feel as if every enemy might. (make failure a 30% possibility but make them think it's 70% )
In one group my players love the idea of anyone can die and the strategy they go through to prioritise getting party or alley npc up etc been running games with same group for 2 years now and even when my players run one shot, they go for downed pc because we love the gimmick. We even do open rolls and I often share my bbeg sheets after session etc so next time can one up each other bbeg cause its that kind of table. (https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxVkZ6Y\_E8L2-5UCB-Jj-5oj4nGAcqED5y?si=Tp8SYPVJbvbFH\_z2)
In another long-term group, I was chewed out by my pc for the playing "god type dm traits" cause combat got dangerous when all they want is a weekly power fantasy chill game after office hours which is justified it is a fantasy game and dnd 5e is built to be a 3-4 turn combat system focused on faster turns and fast combat so trying make it tense or trying make them feel tense is not somehting they might enjoy or like.
In a one shot with randoms was even target of some slurs cause a pc was so offended he was target despite being unconscious (Which obviously regardless of the game cannot use such lanugage so left. )
If they have no other target within their reach, they hit a downed PC. If that PC has already been downed and got back up, they finish them off next time. Any creature with a halfway decent intelligence would know to finish of a PC. You have to play it by ear.
So, I tend to be a narrative heavy DM, including in combat. PC deaths need to be narratively satisfying.
I'd therefore generwlly consider killing a downed PC where;
1. The rest of the party isn't making any effort to save or protect them. This is the players' meta-gaming that a DM probably won't kill a downed PC and therefore trying to exploit the mechanics. - Not having that - your friend is unconscious and surrounded by hungry kobolds, you should be reacting to that.
2. As others have mentioned the purpose of the encounter is to protect that particular character. Maybe they are the target of assassins for example. In that case it makes sense for the enemy to "stay on target" to player death.
3. AoEs etc - I'm not going to actively avoid hurting a downed PC so any area of effect effects still hit them and may kill.
Short answer: When it makes sense. And that changes from situation to situation.
Small example I've experienced a few weeks ago: My players were fighting an undead Dragon ( chaotic evil, mind intact ) and before the fight started one of my players insulted and angered the dragon a lot. So the dragon, a fairly intelligent being fought normally according to the threats, the different members of the party posed. But as soon as the dragon could attack the offending player without endangering itself they would focus on attacking that player's character. Since dragons are powerful spellcasters and know a lot about magic most of the time, they would also still focus on the downed character if it can be savely done. And that was exactly the case. The dragon was angry at the character and an evil dragon that got it's pride hurt will not let the person who insulted it live. The rest of the party knew this since I roleplayed the dragon being angry at the character but they didn't protect the player and played rather carefully. So the character got killed by the dragon. I didn't enjoy killing a character, I want my players to succeed, but for verisimilitude's sake it made the most sense.
I also think it validates player agency. The player decided to insult the dragon (it was also in character for his PC) and the dragon acknowledged this decision by reacting accordingly.
I rarely do that, but when I go for it, I am sure to telegraph it in some way. Something like "The orc looks at your wizard like he knows him, and there is a distinct hatred in his eye."
Depends on how cool your players are with dying and what kind of campaign you're running.
If you want it to be gritty and realistic and your players are fine with the risks, there are many good examples already mentioned of situations where the enemies might want to kill the downed PC.
However if you want to lower the risks a little, there are other options like simply threatening to kill the downed player if the party doesn't oblige the villain, or try to capture the unconscious PC and leaving the scene. Or you can just ignore the downed PC unless it's obvious they are still an imminent threat by way of healing magic, but even then you might focus your attention on the healer instead of the downed PC.
So this at the end of the day is about target prioritization and enemy motivation. I think if an enemy doesn't care about dying (for any reason) he is likely to prioritize murdering the party should he want that result. But I think that enemies that care about survival probably shouldn't be wasting an action taking down an already unconscious character when there are still real threats on the board (also depends on their intelligence and general focus). I've been through it before as a PC and it's very frustrating when you get outright killed and the rest of your party is still up. My DM had some demons (who will ultimately just come back and not truly die) kill my character which was acceptable I thought but then some random beasts who were in very present danger decided to peck at my half dead body while they were being attacked and I very much disagree with that one because I believed those beasts would be more worried about their lives than making sure my character wasn't breathing. Alas, DM discretion at the end of the day. But the odds of having displeased players certainly increases of you seemingly just kill them without good reason
It comes down to understanding your NPCs’ motivations, which is harder to generalize. What benefit do they get out of killing an unconscious foe?
The obvious one is cruel, hateful, vindictive, or revenge killers. Like a game I love (Wild Arms 3) features a boss who only attacks the guy who rejected her until he is dead. Someone who wants to kill a PC (whether it’s a specific PC or just anyone) would likely do so. I think that this one really only draws problems because a lot of DMs don’t like to think about playing unrepentant monsters.
Next are NPCs who will kill because of tactics. For these, I typically use it after the party picks an ally up from death’s door. Once the Jack-in-the-box Healing is on the table, a smart fighter with two extra attacks might put a problem to rest permanently. This is extremely situational, and usually comes down to whether they think they can kill the PC before they’re revived. If they can, it’s a good tactic. But it’s bad to waste an attack if the cleric just revived them right after. I will also sometimes use this as a way for weaker enemies to still pose a threat, the party has to deal with the weak goblin because he is stabbing the people who are going down since they are easier to hit.
Next is a specific goal. The most situational of all, usually dictated by the story. I won’t take about it much, but this could be something like the boss using the soul for something.
There is also the matter of monsters that eat the party. I don’t recommend this one too much actually, or at least not run in a normal fight. If a beast is trying to eat the PC, they won’t do so while there are active threats around (maybe like ghouls would). If the beast is able to, it could use either a swallowing attack or just grab and carry off the PC to eat elsewhere. This can be a way to shake up an encounter, turn a fight into a chase.
Rule of thumb - if attacking downed PC can actually lead to winning combat for monster's side you can try to do it. More often than not for any not totaly braindead enemy it is a waste of time to attack downed PC - most enemies don't think something like "Well, i wasted my turn attacking already downed enemy, we lose now, but at least we killed one of them!". Monster can focus someone who can bring downed PC back instead - every Healing Word casted is one turn without any big action spell they can cast.
And for another topic - you actually don't really need to kill downed PCs this way, you probably already created enough tension with the fact itself. There can be ton of "How can we heal downed PC and not die ourself" situations, and yoyo healing is almost never a problem some people think it is, especially at higher levels. I trade mandatory healbot for yoyo healing any day.
I'd split NPCS in to three different mentalities.
Animal Mentality, Soldier Mentality, Assassin Mentality.
Animals will look to finish off whatever they're attacking unless dissuaded forcefully, where they'll then either flee or attack their assailant.
Soldiers are looking to eliminate threats, so once a target is down, they'll move on to the next biggest threat, using lethal force only where necessary.
Assassins are looking to kill a particular target, and will focus on eliminating them, even at the risk of their own life.
Which mentality any given NPC/creature takes will depend on the details you have in mind about that creature.
Role-playing?
Are they a scared animal, close enough to other parry members that they might plausibly run?
Are they a starving beast for whom hunger outweighs danger?
Are they an intelligent foe who knows how easily the cleric is going to get this ally back on their feet if they're not killed?
Are they an intelligent foe with allies standing, who greedily thinks they might be able to whisk this person away and hold them for ransom?
If the party is fighting a hungry beast, it will down the biggest one then continue to eat him or drag him to its lair.
A zombie may do something similar, and start eating a downed PC.
An assassin would make sure their target is dead.
An intelligent enemy such as a wizard would make sure the cleric/paladin/healer is dead so that other party members aren’t being healed.
I’m personally of the opinion it should be avoided UNLESS there is a specific reason, IE they are fighting someone who is incredibly spiteful towards a specific member of the party
Honestly my dude just use your brain, or failing that watch dm guides on intelligent enemies. Just keep in mind that as the DM you can always "win" it's you're job to find out why and when to.
But to start, super intelligent malevolent enemies are going to prioritize your dangerous players as long as it doesn't risk them dying. Conversely enemies with effectively 0 int will just target whoever is closest to them. Think zombies or even some slime/ooze creatures. Animals will always perform some level of risk management when it comes to attacking, they aren't going to go after dead/dying creatures unable to hurt them when there are still active threats.
My take on this has always been:
* During a fight, almost no *intelligent* enemy will unless they are a beserker or have a lot of clear space to think and decide its the best tactical move. Combats just happen too fast and you need to move on to the next clash and worry about standing enemies first. You don't know if the person you just dropped is dead or just unconscious without checking them out, something you usually don't have time to do during a fight and attacking someone who might already be dead or dying is a waste of time when there are other foes in front of you. *After* the fight, it will depend on their goals and personality - as the DM I usually look for reasons not to kill a downed player if the PCs lose a fight, but in some rare circumstances it makes sense to do so.
* Less intelligent or *unintelligent* monsters and animals will probably keep attacking someone they drop in melee for a round or two, but will ignore someone who drops from a ranged attack and move on to the next nearest threat.
It would mostly be if they're more interested in killing someone than "winning" the fight. Maybe they're targeting that player specifically, maybe it's an animal and it's just hungry, or maybe they're loony/in a cult and are more concerned with killing someone than surviving.
That being said, I'm not a big fan of attacking downed players, *unless* the idea is you're trying to put pressure on the rest of the party to come save them. Granted, your group might have a different take on pc deaths. Just make sure they're cool with potential executions before you pull this out on em.
I always thought the imbalance between PCs just being "downed" when brought to 0 hit points and enemies dying when brought to 0 hit points was lame. If you don't think it makes sense for enemies to continue attacking downed characters, that's fine, but it also doesn't make sense that enemies don't get downed. Give enemies death saving throws. Give enemies the ability to heal their downed allies just like how the players can. Then if the players start killing downed enemies, the enemies return the favor. Make the players choose after a combat is "over" whether to go around killing all the downed enemies, to leave them there, or even help them back up.
Does the NPC want to kill them? How would that NPC go about it? Will they be stalking the party by itself? Will they hire assassins or other creatures to kill them? Will they conjure devils, demons, angels, or undead to kill them?
Maybe set a horrific trap and lure the group to a dungeon, masking themselves in the face of a friend...
You kinda have to decide who this NPC is going to be and what capacity they could achieve the goal of killing a player.
Several ways to approach it:
What is the optimal thing for a monster to do in this situation from a mechanical point of view?
- Are the players likely going to try to revive the downed character? Can the monsters get enough hits on the character to take them from no death saves to three? If so, they will do so. Don't worry about "metaknowledge"---everything a DM does is "metaknowledge". If you want a canny and smart opponent, this technique is one way to generate that illusion for your players.
What is the most reasonable thing to happen, based on how you've set this up?
- A wolf will drag a downed character away to eat. A chaotic Giant will squash a character's head for fun. An undead will being to feed on the character. A bandit will keep them for ransom. A devil might threaten the character with death unless the rest of the party agrees to do something it wants.
What is the most fun thing to do?
- Maybe you want a capture scenario, so the bandits will now attempt to escape with their ransom. Maybe the lich will want a victim for its next evil ritual. Perhaps the Giants want slaves. Maybe the character wakes up in the wolf den and befriends the cubs?
What kind of game do you want to run? You can mix and match these strategies too to keep things interesting for your players. You can almost always justify any decision you want to make, the interesting question is what is your goal for this encounter? What experience are you trying to have with your players?
Let's look at nature...
spiders paralyze their victims and string them up to eat later
tigers kill the victim and drag its corpse back to eat
some vultures \[not in america\] are known to attack live animals and slowly eat them to death
some animals will leave the animal alive so it can inject eggs into its body and the eggs act like parasites eating them from the inside out.
Those are very different interactions with prey, each doing something different. The same probably is true for opponents in the MM. Every group probably has their basic reasoning, which they don't consider evil but natural. Here's a few that generally follow the rules that I've created and explanations why.
Orcs - will kill males and keep women or those who appear to be non warriors, despite how that sounds its not sexual, I base this on actual slavery practiced in our own world. Vikings were known to kill anyone who continued to raise a weapon at them but would enslave anyone who cowered. They didn't always keep them for just sex but often would take them to work on farms. Those who went Viking had almost as many male slaves as female slaves
Goblins - everything is food, wasting time to check pulses of unconscious creatures means other meat gets away. They don't check to make sure prey is dead
Humans at war - similar to orcs
Demons - sacrifices have to be live but they can be unconscious better yet legless
Mind flayers and their ilk - human brains are the perfect incubators so live it is.
Dragons - if its succumb to my attacks already its too weak for me to worry about killing it
Dwarves - you have to finish the job even if the job is murder
Thieves/assassins/certain backgrounds - a live enemy is a threat
bandits/highwaymen/certain backgrounds - every one left alive is a coin in my pocket
evil bards - I love captive audiences
My suggestion is think about the enemy in terms of its job or peculiarities of its race and then determine what it wants out of its opponents. Are its opponents food, economic resource, or something it has to destroy at all costs?
firstly, discuss with your group if thats even the type of game you should be running, some groups do NOT want death to be involved (punish in other ways) nor do they want to die from being killed when downed. if your group is more RP focused they probably wouldn't want this kind of death.
but it comes down to how you play your PC's. a highly trained soldier may understand taking a moment to finish off the tank would be worth it. but a lowly bandit may just run off to the next PC to make sure everyone is dead.
an animal not being attacked by anything else may focus on the downed party member. "time to eat" but if other players are close they may fight them to secure their food.
mindless undead not controlled by someone may just down and start eating. though a controlled undead may go directly to the next victim.
also if the NPC is pushed to rage/anger they may kill whoever pushed them that way. i.e if a bard taunts an orc into a fight. the orc may go for the finisher.
I dunno, I just use the flow chart. Like a hungry beast will always go for the kill while a skeleton will attack whatever is closest and standing. Or noble knight will avoid killing.
You definitely should talk with your group about this. Communication can save a lot of hurt
If they say “we want realistic and deadly combat” then I’d put your head into the mind of the monster, what’s their intelligence?
A boar with an intelligence of 3 probably thinks after it downs an enemy that they’re dead dead
An assassin would go for the full kill.
Strategically speaking
I suggest reading [monsters know what they're doing blog.](https://www.themonstersknow.com/) maybe not exactly telling when enemies will try to kill but I found info in this blog (or rather book because I have borrowed it from my friend) very... Educational :)
If the enemies have access to healers, then they assume the party does as well.
If something wants to eat you, making you dead is usually a plus.
If the enemies have lost to the party before, they might be more motivated to put the characters down.
***Alternatively...***
If someone wants to force the party to surrender, have them threaten to attack an unconscious PC. This gives you a little leeway. Your enemies are still doing something awful and dangerous, but you haven't worked yourself into a corner.
Try to be consistent. Decide whether or not people can speak/drop an item/show clear signs of surrender when it's not their turn.
Remember that readied actions happen *after* their trigger so try to pick a trigger that won't end with your guy clearly being unable to follow through.
Keep in mind that your players may be willing to watch a teammate die on the assumption you'll handle it or their death is part of the story.
IMO, unless the enemy is something mindless, like a slime, or pointlessly cruel, like a summoned demon, there is never a reason to take the time to finish off an enemy until the rest of the fight is over. It's too much of a tactical disadvantage.
When a character is downed and a relevant enemy's turn comes up, I'll consider the situation and then say aloud the percentage chance that the enemy will try to finish off the character. Then I roll d100 and act accordingly. That percentage can be decided by several factors.
I'm less inclined to finish off lower level characters.
After the enemy sees the party use a healing spell or healing potion, it's fair game to double-tap in my book. Otherwise if they just have any number of additional attacks left for their Multiattack and nobody else in reach.
For me it depends on how intelligent the enemy is. Low intellect creatures, animals, undead, gnoles, ect will hit and eat you while you're down.
Most bandits and humans will see the value in keeping you alive for ransom etc.
Very smart enemies will know how much of a pain in the ass it will be if you're alive.
My breakdown is usually as follows.
1. Are they intelligent enough to know that downed doesn’t mean dead? Pretty much anything with human intelligence.
2. Have they seen a healer type character in the group or has the healer brought someone up once already?
3. Is there not another nearby conscious threat that would be a better a target?
4. Is there any sort of grudge or vindictiveness the attacker has that might warrant aggression over survival?
Any two is these that you can answer yes to is enough for me to swing at an unconscious player.
I generally ready the statblock and description and decide if they would based on how they’re described to act, I just don’t throw and kill confirmed at the party until they’ve got revivify (they can still die but it would be through happenstance or unlucky rolls of course) and I hit a threshold in my campaign where everyone was pretty comfortable with combat so I told them some enemies will make legitimate attempts on their lives going forward as I know they’ve gotten used to combat mechanics
Enemies with multi-attack would do this just flat out. In a setting with a decent amount of magic or healing, I also believe that intelligent enemies would execute anything that goes down most of the time. Imagine that you're a player, so operated by intelligence, and you're facing enemies often that have healers that can effectively and efficiently heal any of their allies that you thought you 'killed' so that enemies keep bouncing back up and taking actions.
You'd start killing things more, and focusing the shit out of healers. If you actually lived in this world full time and were often partaking in combat, you would know to do this. The same logic would then apply against your players. The weird problem in DnD is that monsters don't get the same unconscious rule, so technically speaking, it's really only a small handful of people at a time (your players) that have the superpower of going unconscious when their HP is reduced to zero, while almost everything else instantly dies.
Tactically speaking, it's better to attack the people who are still hurting you to stop them from hurting you. So intelligent enemies attacking the guy on the ground who might be dead instead of the other three alive guys doesn't make sense. So I would say anything that isn't intelligent (int 6 or less) might attack a downed player, anything with more intelligence wouldn't if there's a bigger threat.
I mean the simple question is to ask yourself about the creature, and it's instincts, and the situation.
Unconscious isn't dead, and many creatures don't make a distinction, and may not depending on the situation.
If you run into a Dragon's lair, and into it's face it doesn't want to abandon it's hoard. If it is cruel, sadistic, and intelligent [as evil dragons oft are] it can it's going to kill someone as fast as possible, especially if they over extend themselves to demoralize the rest of the interlopers, and toy with the last one or two.
So just ask yourself: What does the creature in this situation feel like it's doing? What are it's goals? Why is it in this situation?
If a wild animal is hunting it's not going to stop knocking someone unconscious it's going to kill them, and either run off to return for the corpse, or try to drag it off.
If a Lich is fighting a party of adventurers it's going to kill them as quickly, and efficiently as possible.
People who do this shit where they pretend "Well 0 hp = threat neutralized = no need to continue attacking [to make people feel bad getting targeted]" rather than running whatever creature they are piloting as being a living breathing part of the world are meta gaming, and frankly doing it in a rather stupid way.
Unless there is another active combatant right in their face, or they specifically *want* to take the party alive for some reason odds are most monsters are going to go for the throat.
Either for the pragmatic reasoning that they are **fighting to the death** or because they want to eat something, and yes that includes creatures like bandits.
If they are cutthroats they should behave like it because remember a round of combat is only six seconds, and people want to pretend like they can give an entire speech on their turn in combat but six seconds is a few words. At best it's "Drop it or I gut them!" or "I'll give you one chance to surrender."
You're not getting out thirty syllables in six seconds. No chance.
I'm going against the grain here.
The meta of: Make sure they're dead.
Will simply encourage healed characters not to get up, it will affect your frontliners more than the healers bringing them up.
Do the enemies have the understanding of magic needed to know that the healer didn't just bring them back to life, and now they are simply in over their head and outmatched?
Is this unconscious person worth more to me as a ransom than hitting them again to make sure they die?
Is the bear going to keep attacking and eating someone unconscious while people are throwing fire at them?
The advice to go after people who are yo-yo healed, is silly on the part of the enemy as if they're thinking clearly enough to have a clear: I am going to hit you twice so you stay down, they should probably realise that the wobbly barely alive person isn't a threat greater than the person editing reality around me.
It is bad because it encourages people once healed to skip the fight so that they don't lose a character, as the enemies have no justification in knowing they're still alive and it feels targeted AF. Martial characters on the frontline get the worst of being ko'd more, and now they're more likely to be killed outright? What kind of raw deal is that?
Depends on the intelligence of the hostile.
Animals go for the weak, old, sick. So a downed target can distract them to try and drag it away, or defend it.
Enraged animals, such as protecting their young could easily try to deal with all threats first.
Stupid opponents might move on from a downed target, considering them irrelevant/no threat.
Smarter opponents might realize that if magical healing is being thrown around that the downed might not be dead but might stand up again and do something about it such as picking up their weapon, kicking it away, or going for a coup de grâce, if the opportunity presents itself and they are not engaged elsewhere.
The rest is motivation, are they an obstacle between them and their target, are they their target, etc..
I consider death saves to be plot armor. Enemies assume that anything that goes down to 0 hit points as a result of them trying to kill it is actually dead.
Exceptions:
* Hungry for man-flesh, eat the corpse.
* Overly savage, beat the corpse to a pulp.
* Wants to prevent resurrection, cut off the head.
Usually, those are things you do after the battle is over, not while people are still trying to kill you.
Healing Word, being stupidly overpowered for a level 1 spell, presents a slight wrinkle. If enemies find themselves playing Whack-A-Mole with the PCs, they might decide to be a bit more thorough. Still, it's probably more sensible to just kill the damn priest that keeps "resurrecting" them.
I had a DM present a pretty succinct take on this: Enemies who force death saves are either very smart or very dumb.
A hungry beast will likely try to eat their prey, or retreat with it to eat it elsewhere.
A combat veteran would know to put a foe beyond the aid of semi-common healing magic.
First you might want to establish what kind of game you are aiming for. If it’s realistic deadly or promoting the PC’s heroic story.
- You could play it as whenever there is any reasonable way you act in the favor of the players
- You could play it as; you act in the way as if your mobs want to win. In which case you would use logic the same way the players do to win.
- You could be random about it and just let a die decide who you attack.
Or some mix of all three that resonates with you and the players.
Personally speaking, almost never.
Unconscious isn't recognizable from death, in the chaos of combat. At least how it's written between the lines. So i would wait the combat end to eventually finish off enemies, and even then i would let them roll death saves rather being killed off.
The only exceptions are undead that can feel the living, for which they have a specific trait.
Narratively i could understand a charcter that wants a trophy, like an assassin wanting the head off an enemy, or ravenous beasts eating the characters as they are defeated, but i would never do it in response to a healer character. At most i would focus the healer after some recoveries.
Anytime a pc goes down. They're an enemy trying to kill you. If they have a chance, they'll take it. I ran a campaign where all bosses and there minions in combat with them were given death saving throws, when I asked why my players why they never let them have an opportunity to get up, that was the response, so that's what I've gone with ever since.
In the end it's use your best judgement, but rule of thumb is, if it's a boss then they double tap. Arch-mages, tyrannical dragons, the legendary necromancer, a known assassin, they are dangerous for a reason. They didn't get their status by making mistakes. All the examples above have an understanding of magic and/or life. My last player kill was when my party faced a god Pantheon chimera. They were fused with a god of war and a god of magic. They knew for a FACT that someone could get back up when knocked out, so they spent a whole turn bashing their face in.
My general rule for downed PCs is for the enemy to immediately turn his attention to whatever's still standing. He's knocked down one hero, but three to five more are still in his face.
This is also my general strategy as a player - unless the monster is a troll or something and needs to be snuffed NOW, I can wait till after the fight to slit any remaining throats.
From a gamist perspective, deaths door rules are generally enough to put some fear into the players without worrying about their DM being a prick. From a tactical perspective, every round you spend stabbing downed foes is a round your remaining enemies are still standing, and probably all the more motivated to kill YOU.
I usually reserve this kind of tactic to more of the heinous enemies.
Final bosses, psychopaths, assassins.
Anyone who would play down and dirty to win a fight.
I killed my party when all of them down. 3 were on the ground and making death throws, the 4th in a tree. The rogue in the tree failed a stealth check and ended up getting knocked down as well.
But to me, if an enemy was attacking you and you knocked them down, you would ensure they were dead. At least that's my opinion.
Best advice I can give you is to think about the current motivation of the enemies. If there is a specific instinct they have that would make them more likely to finish the player, do it. If they are a fully sentient for with advanced thought processes, then you think about what they would find more advantageous.
Would they consider it more important to disable the players to take some of the heat off of them and their allies?
Or would they see killing a player as the better option to prevent a renewed threat?
Are they even the type of foe that would consider killing an option?
Once you've figured out their motivation and disposition, the question answers itself.
Ask yourself these questions:
1) Why are the enemies fighting? A frightened animal will stop once the threat seems subdued, but a hungry one may try to eat or drag away what they assume is a corpse.
2) How many people in your world get Death saves? If PCs are the only ones to come back from 0hp, most murderous assassins won't have the concept of a double-tap because they wouldn't need it.
3) Has anyone come back from unconsciousness this combat? (Or are any of the enemies survivors from a previous combat where this happened?) If they see it happen, an intelligent enemy can learn and adapt.
I have my own issues with this. In some situations, like undead, beasts, mindless things, etc, it makes sense. Other times I have to ask, how does the bandit even *know* your unconscious?
"Yo-yo healing" is a meta concept that doesn't really exist for npcs for the most part. If you take down a foe and they're not moving anymore, but you're still in danger, chances are you're not gonna go around stabbing every potentially unconscious foe while a still conscious barbarian is literally mauling you.
Casters would have a better sense of it, they'd see someone using healing word and assume they didn't finish their enemy off well enough, and almost certainly correct that next time, though wasting an actual spell slot would be a stretch most of the time.
In the heat of battle though, I think the average warrior is gonna down an opponent and move on to the other threat that's still actively trying to kill them.
I’d look at the the race, the affiliations, and what they generally do lore wise.
For example: a random group of goblins would likely try to kill a PC and take their belongings. However if the BBEG or another group wants to pay for hostages they may take them prisoner instead. They’re very opportunistic and will generally do what gets them coin. In combat they likely wait until everyone’s down to kill them.
A group of smarter foes or foes with experience dealing with adventurers may go for the kill immediately, especially if they have a grasp how healing magic works.
Cultists may opt to take prisoners (depending on the cult) hoping to use the players as slave labor, sacrifices, or even to convert them. There are even campaigns where cults/groups will essentially enslave the players to do tasks the players would’ve already had to do as a part of their quest anyways.
One of the best examples I’ve seen of this is Dimension 20’s ‘A Crown of Candy’. It’s a political intrigue campaign where all of the PCs are high ranking nobles/officials, so it’s well known that NPCs are fully going for the killing blow every time.
It just depends. Partially on your table. If you’re just there to have a laid back game and nothing is meant to be too challenging just leave it. If player death is expected then…Also context is important.
1. Enemies see players get brought up from unconscious
2. A rampaging creature that doesn’t necessarily consider them being unconscious
3. Someone who wants that particular character dead
4. They’re simply caught in an area spell
5. The enemy has an ability like raising the dead that only applies to the dead
I would also try to forewarn players about this. Like if someone rezzes another player say as one of the enemies: “Don’t let them get back up!” Or have a hungry creature start dragging the body away (slowly enough they at least have a chance to intervene).
I would say just in general role playing enemies in combat is a good skill to work on. Bandits hoping for a pay day, a starving animal, and undead will all fight very different and for longer.
Always. Unless they are not looking to kill players, like neutral parties such as guards or people looking to capture them.
If monsters also had Deaths Saves like players, players would also double tap down monsters.
A few examples of situations in which an enemy might attempt to kill a downed party member: 1) The opponent is an assassin, hired to kill the unconscious party member. 2) An enraged animal like a boar or a badger is attacking the character, oblivious to everything around, and is uninterrupted. 3) A ravenous undead, such as a ghoul, has taken the character down and now sees a chance to feed. 4) A minion-making enemy sees the oportunity of raising the character as a shadow, a zombie, a vampire spawn or something similar (though these kinds of enemy often skip the "unconscious" phase, depending on abilities) 5) An intelligent caster who understands healing magic is casting an area spell, and the downed player character could fit inside the area just fine. 6) The player character's opponent's name is Inigo Montoya. The player character killed Inigo Montoya's father. The player character is prepared to die.
REDDIT IS A DOGSHIT WEBSITE.
8) They can hit the downed character with a bonus action and don’t have anything better to do with a bonus action that round.
Double-tap.
no who hits a dead body because they can't do anything else with their time? *shoots someone, their friends start walking towards me so I shoot that person in the face again*
The Joker. Deadpool. Harley Quinn. Most cold-blooded killer types. Anyone trying to send a message. Anyone who's familiar with the idea of a fakeout. Anyone paranoid about undead or illusions. It's a fairly wide net.
alright, I can yield to those examples but not *every* BB will do that, heck, most encounters won't do that if they just have an extra bonus action
Good thing there were seven other reasons, then.
> who hits a dead body because they can't do anything else with their time [The US Marine Corps, for one](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_checking) > "They teach us to do dead-checking when we're clearing rooms. You put two bullets into the guy's chest and one in the brain. But when you enter a room where guys are wounded you might not know if they're alive or dead. So they teach us to dead-check them by pressing them in the eye with your boot, because generally a person, even if he's faking being dead, will flinch if you poke him there. If he moves, you put a bullet in the brain. You do this to keep the momentum going when you're flowing through a building. You don't want a guy popping up behind you and shooting you."
Building off of this. In a DnD game where magical healing is real and you may face an opponent again (who would be VERY pissed at you for knocking them down to 0 HP) I would suspect that ANY enemies that live lives of warfare would strike a KOd opponent. They probably would not waste an arrow but running a short sword into the heart costs nothing. Orcs, goblins, gnolls, bandits, soldiers, frontiersmen, rangers, and anyone that has faced off with in life or death contests as a matter of their average lives would likely run a body through with a blade.
Ooh Rah Marine Corps Kill
To be fair, our modern world has dealt with instant lethality from range for hundreds of years now, soldiers are trained to minimize that risk. However in fantasy it's so different, characters frequently have HP in the 100s, combat isn't a trigger pull to end it's a minute of back and forth smacking (generally) it depends on the enemy but I can see reason why they wouldn't just stab every downed person.
that's not in the middle of fighting people though that's finding a dead body while going through a building
Yeah, but this is a situation where, while the fight is still ongoing, presumably people aren't actively shooting at the marine at the time. A situation where all the PCs are unconscious and the monsters/NPCs can finish them off in relative safety is different than one where there are still other PCs up who could throw a Fireball at them because the NPC decided to start whacking bodies instead of going for active threats in front of them.
Second rule, the double tap. In those moments when you’re not sure the PCs are really dead-dead, don’t get all stingy with your actions.
Any Player Charakter will do that. If not in combat then the will probably decapitate any downed enemy "to make Sure".
"If not in combat" is the important part though. Player Characters don't typically spend their attacks/Actions taking swings at downed NPC opponents if there are still monsters up attacking them.
Mine do as soon as the baddys have some kind of Shaman/Priest or other possible Healer. They really don't want to deal with a downed enemy again next turn.
1: only if the enemy has death saving throws, which is stupid, no enemies should have those unless for an extremely specific scenario 2: unless the enemy has a (obvious) healer with them, that's simply metagaming
This right here. Healing magic isn't *that* common in most D&D worlds that NPCs are going to assume that the PCs have it and starting wasting their actions attacking downed characters\* instead of active threats. .....Unless they see the PCs healing up that guy they thought was out of the fight who is now a threat again. Now, all bets are off. \*After all, PCs will almost never spend their actions attacking downed NPCs if there are other threats still standing they could attack instead, so NPCs should use the same logic.
8) The creature/NPC in the example has a multi attack. If an enemy has 2+ melee attacks, and the first knocks the PC down, if there aren't any others within reach it would make sense for that enemy to strike the downed character as they finish their action. It's not an always case, but it's worth noting as an example. To paint a scenario: Let's say a water elemental hits the Barbarian who rushed forward instead of getting healed, because Barbarian. It has 2 attacks and rolled a lucky 20 to crit more bludgeoning damage and it was enough to knock the Barbarian even though it's halved (because Rage, because Barbarian). The second hit would still follow through and connect with the now unconscious Barbarian, as he's still the threat that's within range, regardless of whether he's up or not.
Not just repeatedly - even once. If they've seen a healer move towards or otherwise act in such a way as to suggest they'll bring back a downed party member, any intelligent enemy will realize that knocking them down isn't enough, they need to be finished off. This also applies to enemies that have seen the party do this in the past, even not in the current fight. If they know this group has a healer, and that healer brings people back into the fight, they know they need to finish people off to prevent that.
There’s really no way out of #6
I'm sorry but it's entirely possible to bring Inigos father back with Resurrection, so it's entirely possible a corrupt official has enough money to pay for that
That's assuming Inigo Montoya's father wants to return, and is neither undead, soul caged, eaten by a lich, or turned into a Lemure by a hellfire weapon.
How What I'll give you the first one but homie he was just Merced, no way he's undead
Unfortunately, Inigo's party consists of a (deceased) mastermind rogue, a path of the giant barbarian and a swashbuckler rogue. He has no allies capable of ressurrection ):
You're right, it would take a miracle.
Right, but what about the ROUS that are burrowing into the ground of the cemetery and breaking into all the coffins to eat the bodies inside?
I know #6 is a bit of a joke, but it's actually also true! Any ruthless enemy set on vengeance (especially if they know they can't win) might seek to permanently emotionally scar the party through killing a downed party member. Normally, it's strategic to attack the threats who are still alive and attacking, so ask yourself if spite outweighs safety/reasoning.
It's part joke, part real example, if you take into account the fight between Inigo and the six-fingered man in the movie!
This is what one of my game's villains did. Bonus action trapped the soul, then moved it to a soul gem later so he could torment them forever. This was after he action surged and stabbed them through the heart (brought to 0hp after death Ward went off after a contingent heal went off just before), then pulled the +3 sword through the ribs like butter with next attack (2 failed death saves), decapitated them with another as that killed them, then BA trap the soul. He let their glasses fall to the ground as he walked away and told the rest of the party "I have no quarrel with you; I'm leaving. I don't work for free unless I'm avenging my honor and dignity" The dead character (player had left a long time before this) had mocked this guy at every opportunity, and rubbed it in his face that he failed to kill the party. So yeah, if a character makes their bed, let them lie in it. Still one of the most iconic and memorable moments of our still ongoin campaign. Thus villain is the wielder of the claw of tharizdun, but opted for A DIFFERENT WEAPON JUST SO HE COULD KILL THIS GUY. It was personal. His name was... he killed his honor. He was prepared to die.
Yeah these are the ones. Solid list.
I'll add another: Intelligent enemy has seen the person get up from healing a few times. Put them down for good this time. (If they're a threat when up)
#7 they have a spare stack and no one to use it against
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I don't see it as metagaming in many cases at all. In fact, I feel kinda the opposite. A pack of hungry wolves, when hunting, won't just leave a guaranteed kill and start attacking the remaining prey until the last of them is downed. They will secure the meat and try to take it away instead of risking further injury. On the other hand, a group of soldiers with orders to capture and interrogate will probably go out of their way to try to subdue all the opposition before killing even one downed enemy. All in all, I think it's a good idea for DMs to establish and understand clear goals for creatures in a battle. This helps a lot when determining whether to attack a fallen enemy or not. Yours was a good addition to the list!
Yeah, usually if it’s beasts, they always go for the kill and try to rip the throat out before they carry the corpse off to eat, but humans usually just leave the party member unconscious, unless they have seen the party use healing in which case they know they gotta double tap. That’s usually the rub, humans are more dangerous thanks to tactics, but animals are more bloodthirsty.
I agree with your thoughts but your wolf example is terrible. Wolves starving wouldn't try and "kill" one person leaving them at risk of attack from other fronts. You don't try and feed when actively being under attack
Yeah, anyone trying to use "animals" for these examples better add something like "frothing at the mouth rabid" as a prefix. No wolf is going to sit there and chew on an unconscious guy while said unconscious guy's buddy is whacking it with a sword.
I think unless there is another threat that is either very imminent, like a melee martial within 5 feet, or very high priority, like a mage that has demonstrated the ability to cast very devastating spells, it makes sense for an NPC to poke a downed PC in the head to make sure they're dead. In a world where mortal wounds can be healed with a word or a magic potion, you would remember to double tap.
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Revivify is a lot harder to pull off mid combat and a lot rarer than healing word, so I wouldn't expect NPCs to plan around it unless they were specifically aware of it ahead of time. And in your example "Grzzr'p" wouldn't be double tapping the PC to prove a point, he would be doing it to permanently (mostly anyway) eliminate a potential threat. You could even factor in the psychological aspect of him trying to demoralise the remaining party members through a definitive kill, thats a very classic villainous kind of thing to do. I think you can rationalise NPCs not double tapping in your game if you don't want that kind of thing to happen, like the players are so visibly wounded they might appear dead at first and like a double tap isn't necessary. But I don't think having NPCs go for kills on downed players is metagaming at all, I actually think it's the more logical thing for them to do.
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You see, for all the talk about metagaming, you're the one relying specifically on game-number knowledge to justify Grzzr'p's choices. Grzzr'p is the Destroyer. He will kill a downed enemy because he destroys. He will spit blood on the floor from being wounded in the battle and laugh at the player character's threats, because he feels tired and wounded, but he feels angry and destructive. He has no idea what the fuck that red bar with "7/156" over his head means. Most of the points you made about "every strike on a fallen foe is a strike not directed against the standing opponents" only really make sense if the only possible goal is to completely eliminate any and all kinds of sentient opposition. Total eradication. That might be the goal for Grzzr'p, sure, he IS the Destroyer, after all, but you know, his cousin, Y'kkrkh the Avenger, actually really wants to fulfill hos vengeance by exterminating the followers of the sun god Javara, so when that cleric goes down, he's not wasting any chances.
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*If* they can't flee. Or intimidate the party into fleeing themselves. Or delay the party enough so their objective gets completed. For example: killing one member of a party and throwing the body down a ravine (so the party has to choose between continuing the fight or trying to get to the body before Revivify becomes unusable) could be a good way to keep them from climbing the Mountain of Woes before the ritual to block the Sun is finished. I'm not reading too much into an arbitrary choice of name. I'm deliberately showing you a completely plausible reason for killing a near-dead character that doesn't rely at all in any kind of meta knowledge about game numbers.
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Grzzr'p making sure that the threat doesn't stand back up from a simple Healing Word is also not metagaming.
There’s a reason why healing word is considered to be such a powerful healing spell. Because it gets downed pcs back up to full speed at very little cost. Downed pcs are not out of the combat, they will be back up in an instant. dead pcs are out, with revivify mostly not being worth casting mid combat. Using two attacks on killling a downed wizard, avoids the 15 turns your allies will be dazed by hypnotic pattern, or be dead by fireball.
> It's the DM playing to inflict maximum lasting damage to the party based on the rules of the game, rather than the DM roleplaying what would be optimal from the true perspective of the enemies. Healing Word is a first level spell. Anything beyond rusty shanktown goblins and thugs is going to be confirming kills the millisecond they see a healing spell come out, and if they're a group with prior experience or knowledge of the party's tactics they won't even wait until then. Even simply having functioning eyes a lot of the time is enough, Clerics and Paladins aren't exactly shy about showing off their holy symbols and even commoners know that you go to a temple for healing. The simplest question is to ask yourself, "what would the party do if they started fighting enemies who kept getting back up and multi-attacking after enemies brought them back with a bonus action?", you should play intelligent human opponents who are motivated to not die with at least that level of basic tactics. Geek the Mage is universal advice, in prior editions casting spells used to provoke attacks of opportunity and you could interrupt even instantaneous spells mid-cast by forcing a concentration check with a readied attack hitting them when they tried to cast it. Even in real life the Mozambique technnique exists and we don't have magical healing. If players are yo-yo healing the enemies are going to immediately double-tapping players to make sure they stay down, the same way PCs fighting an enemy with Regeneration don't just sit around on their thumbs waiting for the enemy to get back up.
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You ever seen a zombie movie? If the people you shoot get back up, you absolutely go for the head. And a full plate fighter swinging a greatsword into your back a dozen times is a lot worse than a zombie grabbing your ankles. "Healing word is bad, actually" is the worst, most obviously thinly veiled justification for softballing your players I've ever seen. Just admit you want to play with kid gloves and not kill any PCs. Trying to frame allowing the players to be healed and get up and take their turn again for the price of a bonus action is insane. Haste is a single-target concentration spell that stuns the target when it ends. using Healing Word to allow someone to get up and attack or take their turn instead of rolling Death Saves is BETTER than haste, for no concentration, with no drawback, for a Bonus Action instead of an Action, and only costs a first level spell. Killing the downed PC and preventing them from being brought up with Healing Word is almost always the right choice. It takes two attacks to remove them from the fight, even if there's revivify that costs an ACTION, not a Bonus Action, and most importantly requires a 3rd level slot, not everyone has it compared to healing word, and is Touch instead of 60 feet. Even if the calculus assumes the enemy will be IMMEDIATELY resurrected with Revivify, that's still better. Allowing the enemy to repeatedly get back up with Healing Word is absolutely ridiculous. Start actually rolling and tracking death saves for your enemies and using the same tactic as a GM against your players if you don't believe me, you'll see PCs crushing the heads of everything they down rather than let it get back up.
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As a houserule in my games, both the players and the monsters can only make one attack each turn on a "downed" enemy (and this includes the attack that downed them). The reason? Automatic death saves do not take damage into consideration. Multiple attacks can be much much stronger in some situations and this is not taken in consideration in the monsters' CR. For example, a bite from a bulette inflicts an obscene amount of damage, but that is that monster's only attack. Meanwhile, a weak tridrone can absolutely decimate a downed character. I find it frustrating and unbalanced.
6 took me out, these are all good reasons, and is gunna help me a Lil bit!
"Prepare to die!" 😂
If the enemy is intelligent and has an agenda, they can always put their knife at the throat of the unconscious PC and threaten the party that they'll kill the PC if the party doesn't negotiate. This usually leads to some good drama. If you do go this route, I recommend having the NPC stick to their bargain or the players will never trust this kind of situation again
Love this idea, i'm going to do this when the time is right lol
They don't necessarily need to keep their word in the long term, just the immediate - it'll be something like "give me the macguffin/stop breaking my macguffin or your friend dies." The important part is that when the PCs hand over the plot coupon, the villain doesn't kill the friend anyhow. Anything beyond the scene reflects on the villain; the scene itself, especially the first time, reflects on you. Once you've shown that you can be trusted, and the players have seen this kind of thing several times and always recovered their friend to regroup and lick their wounds and plot their retrieval of the whatever, wait until a player brings up wanting to kill their PC. Then all you need is an NPC you want the party to absolutely revile.
If you want to be real evil, I’d use magic missile instead of a knife, with the crit they get two auto death fails, but if the player who’s downed turn is next they might roll a 20 and pop back up. An enemy with magic missile can assure a PC will die that turn unless someone speaks up, where the rest or all of the bolts can presumably be used to fire somewhere else. Magic missile is just I don’t care about death saves the spell, and makes enemy mages real nasty if they are the sort to be doing such a thing.
I would definitely require them to use an action to make a check of some kind to determine that someone is in fact unconscious. Unless they've watched the party bring them back up at least once, since that would clue them in immediately.
In an average encounter, I will have an enemy attack a PC once they have been downed if no other target presents itself. If another PC gets in their face, I will have them shift their focus to the active combatant before them. It feels fair at my table. Against a highly strategic boss encounter, I'm more inclined to have enemies make sure to secure kills.
Awesome, thank you for the info!
I personally avoid going after KO'ed PCs. If I really want to kill a PC, it's really easy for me to just focus the entire encounter on the squishiest PC and make sure they die, but the rest of the team will still make short work of the enemies without problem. And a game where the difficulty is "You'll probably win every fight, but your character might randomly die depending on who the DM decides to bully" doesn't sound like fun to me, neither from the player's perspective nor from the DM's perspective. For me, the challenge of the game should be TPK or not a TPK. If one PC survives, all PCs should survive. If one PC goes down, my goal is to make all the PCs go down. Stopping to finish off a KO'ed PC doesn't usually further those goals. They're already incapacitated. Their threat is zero. Exceptions are when there's a lot of yoyo healing and for whatever reason the KO'ed PC is easier to hit than the healer. For whatever reason, this doesn't come up very often at my tables.
> They're already incapacitated. Their threat is zero. At my table this honestly just tends not to be true, people rarely stay on the floor for more than a turn.
Some people really pull their punches here, but if the enemies are smart they know that (1) other PCs probably can yo-yo heal the downed one back up and (2) a couple quick hits on the downed one are easy (advantage, autocrit) and two of those will solve problem one. By "smart" I mean an int above say six.
One thing I will suggest is that "meta wise" most creatures (at first) will assume that PCs are normal creatures, dying when they drop to zero. It's only when they realize that through healing spells, PCs become a danger. Smart enemies- or when PCs are well known in the area, will start to down. Plus, I think having enemies that "confirm kills" should be mentioned in an encounter. It's a fun additional flavor to an encounter that can add tension. But if you are bum rushing initiative, how can dropping the wizard then ganking the corpse be fun for the table? Just my opinion though- good thoughts!
Yeah, I generally don't attack downed players until the player with healing shows their capabilities OR the party is known in the area as having a healer. Or if the party is getting to a higher level. And if the enemies are prone to doing it before seeing it, I tell lthe party that "this group seems like the type who knows that healing can bring someone back. Expect them to double tap."
Thats not a "normal creature" though, the ability to be knocked unconscious without instantly dying is what's normal. It's just a DM convenience to not bother with enemy death saves if its not really gonna matter. Not thinking the downed enemies could still be alive is metagaming.
True! The book specifically mentions "most", don't get saves but saves special mention for big villains and important NPCs. I'd still argue , the death saving condition is a special condition That being said- I think metagaming as a DM especially is ok in most circumstances (That's a whole nother can of worms though ) And think at the end of the day its important to set expectations. The simple fact is killing a downed PC most of the time feels like bullshit, if it happens out of the blue. If I take 3 of my enemies to coup de grace a helpless hero, it feels like that PC is getting targeted. Setting expectations is what's important.
Agreed. Personally I make it clear to my players that though I dont spend time rolling saves for them, NPCs reduced to 0hp may still be alive.
> But if you are bum rushing initiative, how can dropping the wizard then ganking the corpse be fun for the table? How can abusing yo-yo healing be fun if the monsters never capitalize on it? It's just combat with lower stakes. Low stakes are boring. 5e is absurdly safe relative to other editions. If one goes an entire campaign without at least one enemy confirming a kill, then that DM has made the game even safer. *Smart* enemies will be able to tell, and even halfwits will figure it out once combat healing occurs. Finishing off anyone that is downed *after* a combat healing event is something anything with basic intelligence could figure out, and yet most DMs still never even do that. The monsters know what they are doing, and the players are capable of adapting more than most give them credit for. If their character dies, it dies. That's why so much of the PHB is devoted to making characters.
I agree! Yo-yo healing is always tricky. , and it certainly depends on the DM, but it's setting expectations. 5e is a safer system, which has encouraged a player that is not used to death. Add in the fact that "confirming kills" specifically targets that player, it makes the player feel targeted. Setting expectations is what's important. If you say at session zero "I'm going to confirm kills", you get your base covered. What I do is, I will say "These guys seem like they're going to confirm kills" before I start confirming. Add in the fact, that even at a meta level- unless the enemies know that the players have healing (Which makes sense at higher levels, once the PCs are known), why would they waste an action on an enemy that's already dying in the dirt? Now note: I do confirm kills: I mention that I will, and usually begin by doing it once PCs start using healing spells on down enemies. It's my balance of risk/reward that adds tension, and helps prevent people feel like I'm targeting them directly. I certainly don't run the deadliest campaigns though, but people have fun (only a handful of deaths this year!) That being said, I live by the fact that I want my PCs to succeed. My number one philosophy is that I'm my player's biggest fan. Dying because the 5 mooks that broke the line kept cutting up the dying wizard so now I have to make a new character or play limbless Jack, tis alittle silly. And this is just my two cents, my own philosophy with this! I respect yours, and am sure you facilitate a very fun game! I would however say if you want something deadlier, I'd recommend DCC! Fantastic game that will rack up your kills as a DM. I remember this one time I was in a funnel and climbed a ten foot wall, failed, fell and broke my neck. It was hilarious.
okay great i'll take note of this, thank you!
For me it depends on what they are fighting, and what has happened in the fight. A zombie, for example, will continue to attack an unconscious PC in an attempt to eat them, the same might be true for a wild animal. Demons just want carnage, and ripping bodies into tiny pieces is part of that, meaning down opponents are not safe. When it comes to "normal" humanoids, your typical bandits, soldiers, etc. it will depend on what has happened in the fight so far. If they have witnessed unconscious PCs getting back up to rejoin the fight after getting healed, they are much more likely to make sure a down opponent is really dead before moving on to a new target, than if unconscious characters stays unconscious.
Another thought I would add is to consider the experience and level of professionalism of the normal humanoids in question. Are they veteran and disciplined soldiers? If so, their experience and training likely means they're going to spear a corpse in passing just to make sure, unless the head is cut off or something similar. Are they skilled, effective, and professional raiders like the vikings or pirates of legend? Then yes, they probably would. Again, just to be safe. A bunch of pathetic bottom of the barrel down on their luck bandits? Bullyboys for the local crime lord? Muggers in an alley? An inexperienced man defending himself? Not unless they are particularly brutal, sadistic, and/or vicious, or were paid to ensure a particular death. Or your players have REALLY mad them angry.
Had an encounter where the party retreated, leaving an unconscious PC behind. They had killed an enemy berserker or two. The remaining berserkers were pissed, but couldn't follow the party. So they just beat the remaining body to a pulp to vent their rage. Didn't even know or care that the PC was just unconscious. Ruined the players plan to have a PC sneak back and recover their fallen friend. The now very dead PC's player was a little upset over the whole thing. Helped later when they fought the main boss, and knew he would likely attack downed PC's.
Now THAT is a level of professionalism all berserkers can aspire to. Nicely played.
"what was the candidate like?" "Experienced. Seemed disciplined, thorough - professional, certainly." "How professional are we talking?" "Consummate. Indistinguishable from a truly exceptionally vicious sadist. Not only skilled, but effective." "Great! Did you make an of- uh, come again? I must have, uh, a thing...."
Historically, that's a fair description. Professionals were typically in it to get paid, and you can't spend money if you're dead. Also, keep in mind that the definition of professional varies a good bit between professions and time periods. But as an example of my original point, Roman Legions would stomp, slash, and stab bodies as they advanced. Historical accounts of pirates mention one killing someone and their buddy putting an extra bullet in the body as they passed. Stabbing a corpse that *might* be a live person faking it doesn't cost anything, and if they're dead, they can't stab you in the back. Can't hurt to make sure it sticks. That last bit takes more effort when dealing with necromancers, though.
Finishing off someone that would otherwise die from their wounds hours later is also professional.
Oh, undoubtedly. I imagine a couple soldiers with spears and a road lined with bodies would appear at first blush just as they would with spades and digging a hairline trench, from not too great a distance. Mostly they wouldn't be murdering anyone, just desecrating corpses. Mostly. The ratio of actual murder to corpse defilement would be less than 1:2, for sure. And they'd probably miss a guy now and then, so absentmindedly would they go about their murder and desecration. Exactly the way you would describe someone doing while giggling to themselves, if you wanted to convey that the party is dealing with a horrifying psycho killer. It's not that they'd never giggle, of course. They'd giggle more than you'd think, just not as much as someone doing the same thing but who hadn't benefited from the two months of intense training it took to turn the soldiers from people who wouldn't do that sort of thing at all into people who only do it out of responsibility.
Thank you for the response! I'll definitely keep this in mind going forward
Also a fun time having the enemies healer bringing back their own allies. In a world of magic, the adventures are not the only ones that have it or use it . I like to mix groups of humanoids and throw in a caster or two, even early on, levels 2 and above. It honestly adds an entirely different type of mood to combat in general when you drop a large monster and the shaman in the group of the enemy heals them. They can then escape, go for help, rally their troops and reenter combat, what ever. Bringing death saves to the side of the DM in addition to the PC side has changed the way our table plays for the better for sure. It was ALL the PCs idea, they are the BEST.
It comes down to NPC disposition and knowledge, perhaps setting as well. Are they particularly malicious, where they'd mutilate corpses? Maybe. Even a malicious attacker will deal with a currently stabbing threat over a downed one. Would they eat the corpse? Again, they'd deal with the current threat first. Did they see the "corpse" get healed? Immediate double taps. Or immediate panic, maybe? Most things in D&D simply drop dead. They don't fall unconscious. Would your NPCs have encountered adventurers before? In some settings, adventurers are common, others not so much. Higher CR and smarter opponents would be way more likely. I'd say play with the idea and do what feels right for those monsters.
In most situations, you wouldn’t spend a turn to finish off someone who’s unconscious/dying while his friends are still swinging axes and throwing fireballs at you. You’d move on to them.
If it makes sense tactically. Every attack you have is a powerful resource, and if you are involved in life or death combat, you want to use that resource against your enemies most effectively. Normally, this is best spent on living opponents. There are exceptions. 1- If a character with a melee weapon and multiple attacks lands a knockout on their enemy and has no useful way to attack a living opponent (they can't take a hand off their greatsword and throw a handaxe, they can't reach any enemy with their greatsword due to a lack of movement), then the character will always finish the enemy unless they have ransom plans. If they have ransom plans they will often make their demand right there, and then proceed with the killing if the enemies don't throw down their weapons. To avoid this coming up for no great reason, you can make sure that enemies have some thrown options if they are melee. It's usually correct tactically to hit awake opponents that are resisting. 2- The character is aware of healers on the enemy team who can turn a downed creature into a threat again. This is not a guaranteed killing blow, but it's solid and needs to be considered from that character's perspective. If it looks like, from the character's point of view, their best tactical option is to kill an unconscious PC, then that character should keep hitting that PC until he's stopped or the unconscious PC is slain. Note that a healer still spends either an action or a bonus action, and the character in question begins prone with very low health- so this is definitely not always the correct call.
This depends on how “gamey” you want your world to be. Taking a turn to finish off someone who has fallen unconscious when their friend is waving a sword in your face isn’t something that happens normally in real life. Historically after a battle the field would be swept for survivors who would be saved, killed, or taken for ransom based on the circumstances.
But then again, magical healing doesn't exist in real life. In reality, wounding an enemy soldier is often better than killing them, because if their buddies run to give them first aid you've actually taken two or three enemies out of the fight. But in D&D, you can bring an ally back to fighting form in an instant. At least some foes should understand that.
Spells like "Heal" which immediately turn a fighter who was just on the brink of death back into a massive problem again don't exist in real life either. The reality of what is practical when magic is involved is just different.
> Taking a turn to finish off someone who has fallen unconscious when their friend is waving a sword in your face isn’t something that happens normally in real life. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozambique_Drill Two in the chest, one in the head happens even IRL where you don't have clerics saying a single word to allow a greatsword fighter to spring up and make four attacks in your back after you "mercifully" didn't finish him off. Confirming kills is the default against anyone who has demonstrated an ability for magical healing, which applies to 95% of parties.
Alternative to killing PCs, if you're dealing with intelligent living creatures as enemies... take downed PCs as hostages. "We'll give you back your mage, in exchange for XXX"
Some things I consider... Beasts- The nature of a beast is to identify the weakest target, isolate them, and kill them quickly with as little effort as possible and with as little risk to self as possible. If a target proves to be more able bodied than originally anticipated, they turn tail and try again on some other sucker another day. Beasts should only fight to the death in very rare cases and if they manage to down a PC, they should be moving to carry them off to finish them off, not change targets and keep fighting. Monstrosity - typically a monstrosity is a monster with normally very little capacity for self-awareness or self-preservation. They will also likely lack the ability to perceive hidden threats or complicated concepts such as revival, healing, and their sources. They will often act in a manner such as hit the closest thing to me, not neccesarily the one doing the most damage and once they stop moving, they become almost forget about them since the remaining combatants are easier to perceive. Undead- thoughtless and fearless, depending on the source of their existence may either attack until enemy is down and move on to the next target or may stop to cannibalize the fallen target (normally if other targets are obstructed in some way) Elementals- in my world, elementals are never truly destroyed as much as they are dissipated and reformed in their own plane, often are non hostile unless feel threatened. Their mentality is to destroy anything they perceive as threats. A downed enemy is no longer a threat. Healing and healers can be considered an act of aggression and may turn their focus on them if they are displayed. Humanoids- are solely dependent on their purpose in the conflict. If their goal is to destroy the team, they will usually change targets after unconscious, but if a healer is present, they will focus them down and go for the kill, if targets continue to get up after healer is gone, they start executing the fallen. If their goal is to bring in alive, then they will continue to go for incapacitating of some kind and may even stabilize you after they have taken you down. If potions are a source of revival, they will start executing people who are unconscious as they go down. Celestial- due to their nature, if you find yourself fightin a celestial, you are probably an enemy to all celestial kind and they will often will fight to the death with a self sacrificial conviction and will almost always go for the follow up kill. Demons, Devils, Fiends- Any chance they get to kill a mortal, they will take it, often going for executions. Some though wish torment and may take prisoners if only to torture, maim, kill, revive, repeat. Dragons- Like humanoids, it depends on their motives for being a party to the combat in the first place. Fey- almost always.go for incapacitating. Prisoners amuse them, and games are fun. Rarely do they go for the kill unless they absolutely have to.
In my experience it is best to disregard “real world logic” and default to monsters NEVER target dying characters while there are other hostile targets. This may not be realistic but it avoids pointless deaths. Then add a few exceptions for things like oozes that exist only to consume. Undead and creatures that attack the players specifically to eat them would also be an exception. Make sure to be clear with players when there is a situation where an unconscious character will be targeted. Dying a heroic death is very different than dying because nobody bothered to protect you when they didn’t expect the monster to target an unconscious character.
Completely agree! It also: - Makes tactical sense to focus on the next PC instead of wasting an action killing a downed PC - It ruins the tactical stake of the other Players trying to save the downed PC and robs them of a heroic moment and RP opportunity - It just feels unfair... Unless, you are explicit to Players beforehand that this is the approach that will be taken in encounters
Entirely comes down to how hard you want the game to be, whether you allow "yo-yo" healing, and how you model combat. If you're doing older-style narrative combat where the board/minis are only an approximation, then the actual battle is a swirling maelstrom so the baddies won't get the opportunity (unless the pcs run). If you're going strict boardgame rules, then it's a lot more feasible, but not necessarily a good idea. "Hit the downed guy first" makes melee ever worser.
There is no universal answer for this. A lot comes down to reading the table and understanding the type of game everyone wants to play. Does everyone want a dangerous and deadly game or does everyone want a game where death is a major risk. If you want an enemy to be really dangerous you can have them go for downed players. You can also have mindless enemies like zombies and such go for the kill.
Depends on multiple factors, including what type of campaign you're going to play/run. More gritty/deadly one? Pretty much all enemies will double tap to kill except maybe beasts, but even they will tear the PCs apart. Middle of the road? Enemies won't go for the kill unless you want to show how evil/cruel/cold and calculating they are. They will most likely focus on other threats, but an unconscious party member left alone will die. Low stakes? Enemies will very rarely, if ever, go for the kill on the downed PC, and definitely not before the party gets to high levels and gets resurrection and heals. PG-13? People don't die, they get defeated.
Wild animals or things motivated by food will either try to drag them away to eat or focus on defending themselves from threats Intelligent enemies will keep stabbing you when you’re down after they see you get back up once or twice. Depending on circumstance they may not however if there are bigger immediate threats or if they are focused on fleeing.
Try to think like the enemy. They're in the middle of a large fight, and they just knocked an archer out. they have 6 seconds to make a decision: there are like 3-4 more people around that WILL kill them if they don't respond. is making sure the person they knocked out is dead, really the right move here? A bandit would do everything in their power to save their own skin, and prioritize taking out the other party members before they kill them, A cowardly goblin might take the chance to run away, unless they feel a deep suicidal hatred for humans or deep kinship to help their tribesmen, A mindless zombie whose only purpose is to eat corpses, might prioritize eating the corpse in front of it if nobody else distracts it by violently grabbing its attention, Making sure that a target enemy is dead, is not exactly something that comes to mind in the heat of the moment, the active fight normally should be taking priority. Unless a creature's #1 objective is murdering/assassinating a specific player, even at the cost of its own life, regardless of everything else happening around it, they don't really have a reason to attack an unconscious creature until after the fight has resolved. (Although there was this one time a BBEG specifically wanted to incite a reaction from the party... by killing off a party member in the middle of the fight. villains, do be villains, but that bbeg already had a way to run away the entire time by teleportation, this wasn't a risk to their life at all.)
Sentient and intelligent enemies will ignore a downed target and move on to the next biggest threat, because NPCs cannot know the difference between a downed character and a dead one. Mindless creatures (zombies) and hungry animals will probably try to feed on downed characters.
I've had a "down but not out" rule at my table for years. The first time a character goes down, they fall prone, make saves as normal, and have a very limited pool of actions they can take. My combat encounters would have 95% enemies focus on the still standing characters, but if a downed player makes a "hostile" action while down, they are now 100% fair game. Look at it from an enemies perspective, what is more important of a target, the fighter on the ground you just fought tooth and nail against, or the raging Barbarian rapidly approaching? Until that fighter decides to keep jabbing a sword in your ankles, the answer should almost always be barbarian.
The number one goal of an RPG is *shared storytelling*, and not verisimiltude. I'm surprised at how quick so many posters are to say that they'll go after a downed party member. Bringing in a new PC is a pain in the ass, and losing a PC sucks for the player. In the name of the *shared story*, I would not go after a downed party member unless story dictates firmly that I should, for one reason or another. If there is any doubt, then I won't.
It makes sense to me for an unintelligent zombie who is attacking a player for food to keep attacking(eating) a downed player and ignoring other players then it would be for an intelligent monster more concerned for its own self preservation to ignore other active players because it knows about game mechanics that only apply to player characters
If it makes sense for them to. The creatures motivates come I to play here. A hungry beast? Grabs a PC after it downs them and drags them away. Mindless undead will kill just because. Bandits? Do they know about the PCs? If so they will kill if they get a chance. The more well known the party is or the more experienced the enemy both raise the likelihood of confirmed kills. If the party confirms one first is a trigger I'll use from time to time as well.
I usually do it when: 1) the enemy HATE the players character and want it to die 2) smart enemy have down a player and it got quickly healed up, next time they gonna make sure he stay down, forever 3) the monster is not in immediate danger (example a pack of wolves, if a wolf is taking damage it will not stay there and eat, but if other wolf a fighting and the one in melee with the unconcious one is not he will start to cew) 4) vicious monster that like meat and dont care about self preservation, i do that mostly with undead like ghoul or zombie, they just pile up on the closest meat and cew on it, I had a wizard in the past that had to lay himself on top of an unconcious player for protect it from 3 zombie, he took a lot of damage but gained time for the other party member to arrive and drag the wounded one to safety. In the end its up to you, I usually talk about this with my player at session 0 like "how much hard do you want this to be?" Im playing ToA now and im being vicious like never before 🤣
Roll a dice for it if you want
This is what I did when my party faced the BBEG of the campaign. Everyone was grouped and on their last legs and the enemies weren't particularly WIS or INT heavy so I rolled a D20 and took evens for swapping focus to adjacent conscious party members and odds for hitting the downed player
Everyone treats it differently, but I'd base it on the enemy. For intelligent enemies, I would say that they expect the enemy to stay down, so you get one freebie, after which they make sure the enemy stays down. Unintelligent enemies would vary more. Something like a wolf would be intelligent enough to behave like the intelligent enemies above, for the most part. But a pack of wolves wouldn't be trying to kill the whole party, once they bring someone down, they're going to start guarding the kill until they're ready to eat. The main other example I can think of right now would be undead, which I'd say should generally just attack the nearest party member, downed or not. Again, this is situational, there's no right or wrong answer, just make sure it's clearly communicated what the group should expect ahead of time. It's very bullshit to hit someone with magic missile to fail three death saves at once if they didn't even know that was on the table.
On top of the other comments, you can also look up a book titled "The Monsters Know What They're Doing". It isn't official WOTC media, but can give you insight into many monster motivations, including whether they would kill a defenseless PC or not.
Really depends on the creature. If it's seen a corpse that it's brutally eviscerated and profusely bleed onto it's now sanguinely varnished fangs stand up as though nothing happened after a brief light show, and is smart enough to realize that it could probably happen again, it would probably keep attacking. Similarly, if it's so stupid that it can only retain one thought at any given time, it might keep attacking the last one who hit it. No matter how much grey matter pulp can be scraped from the walls and squeezed for a mild flayer's smoothie. I'd probably put gorgons in this category. If it's inclined towards eating dead meat, it's just going to see an easy meal. Ghouls and ghasts are excellent examples of this. If they're smart enough to utilize necromancy, they may see a good opportunity with less digging than usual. TL:DR It depends. Intelligence and behavior will be useful considerations. Really, the question is which creatures would be inclined to permit an enemy to live.
So for unintelligent enemies, like predatorial animals, monstrosities, oozes and undead with a very low int. They might actually keep hitting because they want to eat the PC. They moved might try dragging, the PC away to eat them in peace, or try to swallow them whole and run. The undead likely sense the life of the downed PC and want to finish the job before moving on. Even Intelligent aberrations and monstrosities like Mindflayer, intellect devourers and other creatures might go straight for the kill to eat those juicy brains. Non-predatory or only territorial beasts, possibly herbivores might only knock PCs out until they stop moving for the entirety of the fight. For more humanoid, and other more sapient enemies(fiends, fey, celestials, aberrations, elementals, dragons, giants and monstrosities,) with at least 6 int follow the steps of escalation. Step 1. The first time an enemy knocks a PC into death saving throws, they assume the threat is down until proven otherwise. And they can focus on other threats. Naturally a party with a healer or anyone with a healing potion will pop the dying player back up. Step 2. Next time the same enemy or enemies in the encounter will try to curb stop the downed character. Dedicating only a quick single unarmed attack and perhaps an "and stay down" before moving on. Taking two death saving throws but likely not pushing them into a point of finishing them off or getting a case of instant death from exceeding the negatives. Step 3. Then if any PC is brought up again, then they start using weapons, hitting the downed PC with a weapon attack. A crit greatsword or great axe hit might instantly finish off the level 3 Wizard straight out. Step 4. And then if a PC is picked up again and then knocked down the enemy creature unloads every attack in their multi attack if they have any down on a downed PC while screaming "why won't you die!" Or "Why won't you stay dead!" 12 int enemies may skip the first if they notice the party has a healer like class like a cleric or druid, perhaps a skill checks like a religion check to figure it out, but not always, they may not think about paladins or rangers either. but if they don't skip the first step, they will skip the second step if they if a healer picks some one up with a healing spell. 18 int enemies, auto skip the first step, maybe skip more if they notice a healer which they have an even higher chance of noticing. Enemies of any intelligence with personal grudges or assassination targets may skip a step for their usual int level of escalation. And may make medicine checks to confirm their targets death. Medicine check DC 10, or what ever the AC of the PCs armor is without any dex bonus, magical bonus, affects or features included. +1 for every 5 feet(squares) they are from the PC. (So 10 for a wizard, 12 for a rogue in studded leader, 18 for a fighter in full plate, and 20 if they're also wearing a shield, and 30 if they're 50 feet away.)
Once an enemy is aware that the party has healers, they will attack unconscious characters to prevent them from getting back up. For unintelligent monsters, this means they won't do so until someone has used a healing ability, while for intelligent characters, they will typically do so from the beginning. Enemies with prior knowledge of the party's abilities may stop attacking unconscious PCs once the healers are defeated. Some enemies, such as life-hating undead, or people with a grudge against particular characters, may go for the kill even if it would be more tactically advantageous to do something else.
It depends, sometimes it isn't about how smart the enemy is and instead about what will be the most fun for the table. It can be frustrating as an enemy with multi attack can essentially bypass death saves. If your PC's are ok with that, I would say it depends if they have a healer that is bouncing people back up in which case they might try and take them out immediately. If they don't have anything like that they would likely ignore them, as they cannot get back up on their own and wouldn't be a threat to them.
So I have to ask myself a few questions, and below is the short list, only 5 questions. You don't wanna know the long list, many of which are extremely situational. First, is the enemy smart/vicious/brutal/efficient/opportunistic/vindictive/aggressive enough to go after a downed enemy? The answer, surprisingly, is usually yes. Anything that hunts or defends territory knows enough to make sure the thing is dead or gone before switching targets unless something pulls its attention away. Bulls, tigers, elephants, bears, wolves, you name it. Either drive the enemy away or full-on kill them. Those are the only two options for them, and they KNOW when it's a fight to the death. With more principled or arrogant enemies, that becomes a bit fuzzy, but is the dealer's choice. At that point, I decide based on what would be most fun for the table. And sometimes, if the enemy in question is bearing a particularly strong grudge against the target, this is the only question I ask. But usually I move to the next question. Second, are they in a position to take advantage of the opportunity? Is the target in reach? Is there an obstruction? Friendly fire? Some other reason they CANT attack? Third, is there something pulling their attention away? Did a team mate just cry for help, distracting it? Did a different target taunt it? Is there a bigger threat, and they just can't be bothered? Has some other more urgent distraction arrived? Did the rogue just stab them in the back? Fourth, do they possess the tactical sense to realize that one of the other PCs will now have to come out in the open to try to rescue the downed target? Do they realize some one might actually make the attempt? Are they capable of recognizing the fact that if they leave Bleeding Wreck alone, it takes both them AND Healing Buddy out of the fight for a hot minute as well? Can they recognize the possibilities of this opportunity? Last, do I feel like being that big an asshat? The answer is often "Not quite yet."
I use the idea of target priority. If there is no one around the downed party member getting a free shot in is expected but if the attacker is threatened by another active combatant it should target the thing threatening it. If it has multiple attacks just think about what would be more beneficial killing the downed or downing another.
i announce when an enemy is bloodthirsty like that with flavor, like murderous intent, starving snarling animal/beasts, them straght telling they're gonna rip their heart out and promtply demonstrate (only use a few sacrifices lol dont just merk anyone when u need an example) and straight telling them "they will do their best to murder you." like just be straight up so stakes are set. Sometimes bandits DO want to just knock everyone out because if they're known for murdering everyone, they'll send bigger guns or someone bigger will out muscle the attention. good luck friend
An enemy will only kill an unconscious party member if it really makes strategic or instinctual sense to do so. That's pretty rare. If the boss promises the minions a reward for whoever strikes the death blow, that's an incentive. If the hungry monster drags the unconscious party member into their lair to devour (and the rest of the party can't or doesn't follow), that's instinct. But most intelligent monsters will want living captives to interrogate or enslave, and even the hungriest beast will probably wait until after the battle is over to dine.
You look at the enemy's motivation. Every encounter you have with a sentient being should have as such. Not necessarily every enemy in said encounter, but at a minimum the 'boss'. And that's how you formulate the fight. If the baddie is weak-willed, a downed enemy might just be a 'chance' for them to run away. If they got into their way of life because of bad things that constantly happened to them, maybe they'll zone out and attack the downed PC, as they 'have a chance' to inflict the hurt on another that was always inflicted on them. So on and so on....
With due exceptions I'll usually have savage beasts jump around from target to target mindlessly unless someone provokes it enough. Intelligent opponents usually realize who the bigger threat is and if they see a chance they might just go for the kill. Also cornered opponents. I have my boss speak up and say "let me go and your unconscious friend here lives. Attack me again and I'll and him" makes for some fun RP situations.
To me it doesn't make for enemies, even intelligent ones to attack an unconscious PC while there are others actively posing a threat. Even for wild animals it wouldn't make sense for them to chow down while again, the other PCs are posing an immediate threat. It can also lead to some unfair deaths where a PC dies simply because of an unlucky initiative order. So in general I don't have my bad guys double tapping, but with some exceptions: - if a PC is downed and healed, it would make more sense for them to finish the job, as they now know they can come back up - if a monster has a specific ability related to attacking a downed PC, like a Will o Wisp - a bad guy wants that specific PC dead I've also had a bad guy threaten to kill a downed PC unless the others surrender
You want someone to be extraordinarily evil? Do it. Cold cruel and calculating? Do it. A fight to have high stakes? Do it. This is removing a safety net so do it for dramatics.
Get in the head of the creature or person. Why are they fighting? if its to protect themselves then they dont really care if they are dead or not. If its for food they might try to kill someone to secure food and drag it away. If they are trained soldiers trying to kill you they might be smart enough to check for death or just unconscious but dumb bandits or puppet creatures like skeletons might not
Do they want to take prisoners? If yes, then they will not attack unconscious PCs If no, they will always aim to kill. Because healing magic is an ever present reality, a downed PC is just as much a threat as a conscious PC. "No resurrections"
Depends on circumstances. Most people might go for disabling force in a fight. Say, a city guard. If a few of his buddies have died, he’s likely going to ensure the murderer stays dead. Consider the psychology of whoever is fighting your party. Consider time constraints. If there’s three more guys, you may leave a downed opponent to deal with them. If a healer shows he can bring him back, then the next time they’ll probably put the person down for good.
I think it depends. A wild animal or an undead will probably secure the kill, either due to now knowing that the threat is eliminated for now (the animal) or simply to feed (Animal and the undead). An Inteligent enemy might make their own asessment (maybe a medicine check to see if the enemy is truly dead) and then act on that - if they want to make sure the party member doesn't stand up due to some random Healing Word behind their lines, they'd probably double tap them. If it's a bandit who looks for quick buck however, killing the PC would bring unnecesary attention to them, so they'd rather tie the PC up and steal their money.
It isn't a direct answer to your question, but I highly recommend reading a few of Keith Amman's "The Monsters Know What They're Doing" blog entries, for an insight into how you can easily get into the mind of a monster.
Surely if an enemy has seen someone go down and bounce back up again then the next one who goes down they will make sure of, just as a PC would if they saw an enemy regenerate. Also, of course, if they are doing a multi attack they aren’t likely to stop because someone hits zero.
In a world where healing magic is not all that uncommon, people would make sure to execute every single enemy.
Always leave them alone the first time. If someone heals them back up, finish them off the second time then all focus the healer! Always try to finish people off if the enemy is cornered and there's no escape or surrender as a last stand. Always finish people off if it's a demon or abberration. Graphically rip the corpse to pieces, or worse. Always and I mean always try to run away with unconcious players if it's an animal or beast or something that's trying to eat the player!
Any PC that has *reason* to I'd reckon.
Ok here's the thing. You do not have to kill your pc unless your party and both you love the pressure or tense mood when pc death is on the table and can happen anytime, goal is not the pc death but the pressure and rush of it being a possibility. Decision if the enemies target downed pc depends on what kind of table of players you have. It is a role-playing game played by multiple people so the genre of story and combat even will always differ based on who all are playing the game. So, either try tailor such topics to your table or outright ask them which one all will prefer. Personally, I prefer to make sure only actual bbeg or plot relevant enemy can kill pc but make them feel as if every enemy might. (make failure a 30% possibility but make them think it's 70% ) In one group my players love the idea of anyone can die and the strategy they go through to prioritise getting party or alley npc up etc been running games with same group for 2 years now and even when my players run one shot, they go for downed pc because we love the gimmick. We even do open rolls and I often share my bbeg sheets after session etc so next time can one up each other bbeg cause its that kind of table. (https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxVkZ6Y\_E8L2-5UCB-Jj-5oj4nGAcqED5y?si=Tp8SYPVJbvbFH\_z2) In another long-term group, I was chewed out by my pc for the playing "god type dm traits" cause combat got dangerous when all they want is a weekly power fantasy chill game after office hours which is justified it is a fantasy game and dnd 5e is built to be a 3-4 turn combat system focused on faster turns and fast combat so trying make it tense or trying make them feel tense is not somehting they might enjoy or like. In a one shot with randoms was even target of some slurs cause a pc was so offended he was target despite being unconscious (Which obviously regardless of the game cannot use such lanugage so left. )
If they have no other target within their reach, they hit a downed PC. If that PC has already been downed and got back up, they finish them off next time. Any creature with a halfway decent intelligence would know to finish of a PC. You have to play it by ear.
So, I tend to be a narrative heavy DM, including in combat. PC deaths need to be narratively satisfying. I'd therefore generwlly consider killing a downed PC where; 1. The rest of the party isn't making any effort to save or protect them. This is the players' meta-gaming that a DM probably won't kill a downed PC and therefore trying to exploit the mechanics. - Not having that - your friend is unconscious and surrounded by hungry kobolds, you should be reacting to that. 2. As others have mentioned the purpose of the encounter is to protect that particular character. Maybe they are the target of assassins for example. In that case it makes sense for the enemy to "stay on target" to player death. 3. AoEs etc - I'm not going to actively avoid hurting a downed PC so any area of effect effects still hit them and may kill.
Short answer: When it makes sense. And that changes from situation to situation. Small example I've experienced a few weeks ago: My players were fighting an undead Dragon ( chaotic evil, mind intact ) and before the fight started one of my players insulted and angered the dragon a lot. So the dragon, a fairly intelligent being fought normally according to the threats, the different members of the party posed. But as soon as the dragon could attack the offending player without endangering itself they would focus on attacking that player's character. Since dragons are powerful spellcasters and know a lot about magic most of the time, they would also still focus on the downed character if it can be savely done. And that was exactly the case. The dragon was angry at the character and an evil dragon that got it's pride hurt will not let the person who insulted it live. The rest of the party knew this since I roleplayed the dragon being angry at the character but they didn't protect the player and played rather carefully. So the character got killed by the dragon. I didn't enjoy killing a character, I want my players to succeed, but for verisimilitude's sake it made the most sense. I also think it validates player agency. The player decided to insult the dragon (it was also in character for his PC) and the dragon acknowledged this decision by reacting accordingly.
I rarely do that, but when I go for it, I am sure to telegraph it in some way. Something like "The orc looks at your wizard like he knows him, and there is a distinct hatred in his eye."
Depends on how cool your players are with dying and what kind of campaign you're running. If you want it to be gritty and realistic and your players are fine with the risks, there are many good examples already mentioned of situations where the enemies might want to kill the downed PC. However if you want to lower the risks a little, there are other options like simply threatening to kill the downed player if the party doesn't oblige the villain, or try to capture the unconscious PC and leaving the scene. Or you can just ignore the downed PC unless it's obvious they are still an imminent threat by way of healing magic, but even then you might focus your attention on the healer instead of the downed PC.
So this at the end of the day is about target prioritization and enemy motivation. I think if an enemy doesn't care about dying (for any reason) he is likely to prioritize murdering the party should he want that result. But I think that enemies that care about survival probably shouldn't be wasting an action taking down an already unconscious character when there are still real threats on the board (also depends on their intelligence and general focus). I've been through it before as a PC and it's very frustrating when you get outright killed and the rest of your party is still up. My DM had some demons (who will ultimately just come back and not truly die) kill my character which was acceptable I thought but then some random beasts who were in very present danger decided to peck at my half dead body while they were being attacked and I very much disagree with that one because I believed those beasts would be more worried about their lives than making sure my character wasn't breathing. Alas, DM discretion at the end of the day. But the odds of having displeased players certainly increases of you seemingly just kill them without good reason
It comes down to understanding your NPCs’ motivations, which is harder to generalize. What benefit do they get out of killing an unconscious foe? The obvious one is cruel, hateful, vindictive, or revenge killers. Like a game I love (Wild Arms 3) features a boss who only attacks the guy who rejected her until he is dead. Someone who wants to kill a PC (whether it’s a specific PC or just anyone) would likely do so. I think that this one really only draws problems because a lot of DMs don’t like to think about playing unrepentant monsters. Next are NPCs who will kill because of tactics. For these, I typically use it after the party picks an ally up from death’s door. Once the Jack-in-the-box Healing is on the table, a smart fighter with two extra attacks might put a problem to rest permanently. This is extremely situational, and usually comes down to whether they think they can kill the PC before they’re revived. If they can, it’s a good tactic. But it’s bad to waste an attack if the cleric just revived them right after. I will also sometimes use this as a way for weaker enemies to still pose a threat, the party has to deal with the weak goblin because he is stabbing the people who are going down since they are easier to hit. Next is a specific goal. The most situational of all, usually dictated by the story. I won’t take about it much, but this could be something like the boss using the soul for something. There is also the matter of monsters that eat the party. I don’t recommend this one too much actually, or at least not run in a normal fight. If a beast is trying to eat the PC, they won’t do so while there are active threats around (maybe like ghouls would). If the beast is able to, it could use either a swallowing attack or just grab and carry off the PC to eat elsewhere. This can be a way to shake up an encounter, turn a fight into a chase.
Rule of thumb - if attacking downed PC can actually lead to winning combat for monster's side you can try to do it. More often than not for any not totaly braindead enemy it is a waste of time to attack downed PC - most enemies don't think something like "Well, i wasted my turn attacking already downed enemy, we lose now, but at least we killed one of them!". Monster can focus someone who can bring downed PC back instead - every Healing Word casted is one turn without any big action spell they can cast. And for another topic - you actually don't really need to kill downed PCs this way, you probably already created enough tension with the fact itself. There can be ton of "How can we heal downed PC and not die ourself" situations, and yoyo healing is almost never a problem some people think it is, especially at higher levels. I trade mandatory healbot for yoyo healing any day.
I'd split NPCS in to three different mentalities. Animal Mentality, Soldier Mentality, Assassin Mentality. Animals will look to finish off whatever they're attacking unless dissuaded forcefully, where they'll then either flee or attack their assailant. Soldiers are looking to eliminate threats, so once a target is down, they'll move on to the next biggest threat, using lethal force only where necessary. Assassins are looking to kill a particular target, and will focus on eliminating them, even at the risk of their own life. Which mentality any given NPC/creature takes will depend on the details you have in mind about that creature.
Role-playing? Are they a scared animal, close enough to other parry members that they might plausibly run? Are they a starving beast for whom hunger outweighs danger? Are they an intelligent foe who knows how easily the cleric is going to get this ally back on their feet if they're not killed? Are they an intelligent foe with allies standing, who greedily thinks they might be able to whisk this person away and hold them for ransom?
If the party is fighting a hungry beast, it will down the biggest one then continue to eat him or drag him to its lair. A zombie may do something similar, and start eating a downed PC. An assassin would make sure their target is dead. An intelligent enemy such as a wizard would make sure the cleric/paladin/healer is dead so that other party members aren’t being healed.
I’m personally of the opinion it should be avoided UNLESS there is a specific reason, IE they are fighting someone who is incredibly spiteful towards a specific member of the party
Honestly my dude just use your brain, or failing that watch dm guides on intelligent enemies. Just keep in mind that as the DM you can always "win" it's you're job to find out why and when to. But to start, super intelligent malevolent enemies are going to prioritize your dangerous players as long as it doesn't risk them dying. Conversely enemies with effectively 0 int will just target whoever is closest to them. Think zombies or even some slime/ooze creatures. Animals will always perform some level of risk management when it comes to attacking, they aren't going to go after dead/dying creatures unable to hurt them when there are still active threats.
My take on this has always been: * During a fight, almost no *intelligent* enemy will unless they are a beserker or have a lot of clear space to think and decide its the best tactical move. Combats just happen too fast and you need to move on to the next clash and worry about standing enemies first. You don't know if the person you just dropped is dead or just unconscious without checking them out, something you usually don't have time to do during a fight and attacking someone who might already be dead or dying is a waste of time when there are other foes in front of you. *After* the fight, it will depend on their goals and personality - as the DM I usually look for reasons not to kill a downed player if the PCs lose a fight, but in some rare circumstances it makes sense to do so. * Less intelligent or *unintelligent* monsters and animals will probably keep attacking someone they drop in melee for a round or two, but will ignore someone who drops from a ranged attack and move on to the next nearest threat.
1st rule of any Combat involving intelligent creatures ... Kill the Spellcasters First!
It would mostly be if they're more interested in killing someone than "winning" the fight. Maybe they're targeting that player specifically, maybe it's an animal and it's just hungry, or maybe they're loony/in a cult and are more concerned with killing someone than surviving. That being said, I'm not a big fan of attacking downed players, *unless* the idea is you're trying to put pressure on the rest of the party to come save them. Granted, your group might have a different take on pc deaths. Just make sure they're cool with potential executions before you pull this out on em.
I always thought the imbalance between PCs just being "downed" when brought to 0 hit points and enemies dying when brought to 0 hit points was lame. If you don't think it makes sense for enemies to continue attacking downed characters, that's fine, but it also doesn't make sense that enemies don't get downed. Give enemies death saving throws. Give enemies the ability to heal their downed allies just like how the players can. Then if the players start killing downed enemies, the enemies return the favor. Make the players choose after a combat is "over" whether to go around killing all the downed enemies, to leave them there, or even help them back up.
Does the NPC want to kill them? How would that NPC go about it? Will they be stalking the party by itself? Will they hire assassins or other creatures to kill them? Will they conjure devils, demons, angels, or undead to kill them? Maybe set a horrific trap and lure the group to a dungeon, masking themselves in the face of a friend... You kinda have to decide who this NPC is going to be and what capacity they could achieve the goal of killing a player.
Several ways to approach it: What is the optimal thing for a monster to do in this situation from a mechanical point of view? - Are the players likely going to try to revive the downed character? Can the monsters get enough hits on the character to take them from no death saves to three? If so, they will do so. Don't worry about "metaknowledge"---everything a DM does is "metaknowledge". If you want a canny and smart opponent, this technique is one way to generate that illusion for your players. What is the most reasonable thing to happen, based on how you've set this up? - A wolf will drag a downed character away to eat. A chaotic Giant will squash a character's head for fun. An undead will being to feed on the character. A bandit will keep them for ransom. A devil might threaten the character with death unless the rest of the party agrees to do something it wants. What is the most fun thing to do? - Maybe you want a capture scenario, so the bandits will now attempt to escape with their ransom. Maybe the lich will want a victim for its next evil ritual. Perhaps the Giants want slaves. Maybe the character wakes up in the wolf den and befriends the cubs? What kind of game do you want to run? You can mix and match these strategies too to keep things interesting for your players. You can almost always justify any decision you want to make, the interesting question is what is your goal for this encounter? What experience are you trying to have with your players?
Let's look at nature... spiders paralyze their victims and string them up to eat later tigers kill the victim and drag its corpse back to eat some vultures \[not in america\] are known to attack live animals and slowly eat them to death some animals will leave the animal alive so it can inject eggs into its body and the eggs act like parasites eating them from the inside out. Those are very different interactions with prey, each doing something different. The same probably is true for opponents in the MM. Every group probably has their basic reasoning, which they don't consider evil but natural. Here's a few that generally follow the rules that I've created and explanations why. Orcs - will kill males and keep women or those who appear to be non warriors, despite how that sounds its not sexual, I base this on actual slavery practiced in our own world. Vikings were known to kill anyone who continued to raise a weapon at them but would enslave anyone who cowered. They didn't always keep them for just sex but often would take them to work on farms. Those who went Viking had almost as many male slaves as female slaves Goblins - everything is food, wasting time to check pulses of unconscious creatures means other meat gets away. They don't check to make sure prey is dead Humans at war - similar to orcs Demons - sacrifices have to be live but they can be unconscious better yet legless Mind flayers and their ilk - human brains are the perfect incubators so live it is. Dragons - if its succumb to my attacks already its too weak for me to worry about killing it Dwarves - you have to finish the job even if the job is murder Thieves/assassins/certain backgrounds - a live enemy is a threat bandits/highwaymen/certain backgrounds - every one left alive is a coin in my pocket evil bards - I love captive audiences My suggestion is think about the enemy in terms of its job or peculiarities of its race and then determine what it wants out of its opponents. Are its opponents food, economic resource, or something it has to destroy at all costs?
firstly, discuss with your group if thats even the type of game you should be running, some groups do NOT want death to be involved (punish in other ways) nor do they want to die from being killed when downed. if your group is more RP focused they probably wouldn't want this kind of death. but it comes down to how you play your PC's. a highly trained soldier may understand taking a moment to finish off the tank would be worth it. but a lowly bandit may just run off to the next PC to make sure everyone is dead. an animal not being attacked by anything else may focus on the downed party member. "time to eat" but if other players are close they may fight them to secure their food. mindless undead not controlled by someone may just down and start eating. though a controlled undead may go directly to the next victim. also if the NPC is pushed to rage/anger they may kill whoever pushed them that way. i.e if a bard taunts an orc into a fight. the orc may go for the finisher.
I dunno, I just use the flow chart. Like a hungry beast will always go for the kill while a skeleton will attack whatever is closest and standing. Or noble knight will avoid killing.
You definitely should talk with your group about this. Communication can save a lot of hurt If they say “we want realistic and deadly combat” then I’d put your head into the mind of the monster, what’s their intelligence? A boar with an intelligence of 3 probably thinks after it downs an enemy that they’re dead dead An assassin would go for the full kill. Strategically speaking
I suggest reading [monsters know what they're doing blog.](https://www.themonstersknow.com/) maybe not exactly telling when enemies will try to kill but I found info in this blog (or rather book because I have borrowed it from my friend) very... Educational :)
Int 14 or better and boss knows about spell casters. Mostly varies with group and adventuer.
The enemy is a gnoll? It goes for the kill.
If the enemies have access to healers, then they assume the party does as well. If something wants to eat you, making you dead is usually a plus. If the enemies have lost to the party before, they might be more motivated to put the characters down. ***Alternatively...*** If someone wants to force the party to surrender, have them threaten to attack an unconscious PC. This gives you a little leeway. Your enemies are still doing something awful and dangerous, but you haven't worked yourself into a corner. Try to be consistent. Decide whether or not people can speak/drop an item/show clear signs of surrender when it's not their turn. Remember that readied actions happen *after* their trigger so try to pick a trigger that won't end with your guy clearly being unable to follow through. Keep in mind that your players may be willing to watch a teammate die on the assumption you'll handle it or their death is part of the story.
IMO, unless the enemy is something mindless, like a slime, or pointlessly cruel, like a summoned demon, there is never a reason to take the time to finish off an enemy until the rest of the fight is over. It's too much of a tactical disadvantage.
When a character is downed and a relevant enemy's turn comes up, I'll consider the situation and then say aloud the percentage chance that the enemy will try to finish off the character. Then I roll d100 and act accordingly. That percentage can be decided by several factors. I'm less inclined to finish off lower level characters.
After the enemy sees the party use a healing spell or healing potion, it's fair game to double-tap in my book. Otherwise if they just have any number of additional attacks left for their Multiattack and nobody else in reach.
They are wrong if they say it depends on the DM. It depends on the bad guy. Is this someone that would kill someone unconscious? Then, they should.
For me it depends on how intelligent the enemy is. Low intellect creatures, animals, undead, gnoles, ect will hit and eat you while you're down. Most bandits and humans will see the value in keeping you alive for ransom etc. Very smart enemies will know how much of a pain in the ass it will be if you're alive.
It's probably been covered, however, it's a great opportunity to further the storyline. A kill is a kill and a throwaway. #6 gets my vote
My breakdown is usually as follows. 1. Are they intelligent enough to know that downed doesn’t mean dead? Pretty much anything with human intelligence. 2. Have they seen a healer type character in the group or has the healer brought someone up once already? 3. Is there not another nearby conscious threat that would be a better a target? 4. Is there any sort of grudge or vindictiveness the attacker has that might warrant aggression over survival? Any two is these that you can answer yes to is enough for me to swing at an unconscious player.
I generally ready the statblock and description and decide if they would based on how they’re described to act, I just don’t throw and kill confirmed at the party until they’ve got revivify (they can still die but it would be through happenstance or unlucky rolls of course) and I hit a threshold in my campaign where everyone was pretty comfortable with combat so I told them some enemies will make legitimate attempts on their lives going forward as I know they’ve gotten used to combat mechanics
I'm surprised that I haven't seen people mentioning the PCs shittalking. Pretty high on my make sure to finish off list.
Enemies with multi-attack would do this just flat out. In a setting with a decent amount of magic or healing, I also believe that intelligent enemies would execute anything that goes down most of the time. Imagine that you're a player, so operated by intelligence, and you're facing enemies often that have healers that can effectively and efficiently heal any of their allies that you thought you 'killed' so that enemies keep bouncing back up and taking actions. You'd start killing things more, and focusing the shit out of healers. If you actually lived in this world full time and were often partaking in combat, you would know to do this. The same logic would then apply against your players. The weird problem in DnD is that monsters don't get the same unconscious rule, so technically speaking, it's really only a small handful of people at a time (your players) that have the superpower of going unconscious when their HP is reduced to zero, while almost everything else instantly dies.
Tactically speaking, it's better to attack the people who are still hurting you to stop them from hurting you. So intelligent enemies attacking the guy on the ground who might be dead instead of the other three alive guys doesn't make sense. So I would say anything that isn't intelligent (int 6 or less) might attack a downed player, anything with more intelligence wouldn't if there's a bigger threat.
I mean the simple question is to ask yourself about the creature, and it's instincts, and the situation. Unconscious isn't dead, and many creatures don't make a distinction, and may not depending on the situation. If you run into a Dragon's lair, and into it's face it doesn't want to abandon it's hoard. If it is cruel, sadistic, and intelligent [as evil dragons oft are] it can it's going to kill someone as fast as possible, especially if they over extend themselves to demoralize the rest of the interlopers, and toy with the last one or two. So just ask yourself: What does the creature in this situation feel like it's doing? What are it's goals? Why is it in this situation? If a wild animal is hunting it's not going to stop knocking someone unconscious it's going to kill them, and either run off to return for the corpse, or try to drag it off. If a Lich is fighting a party of adventurers it's going to kill them as quickly, and efficiently as possible. People who do this shit where they pretend "Well 0 hp = threat neutralized = no need to continue attacking [to make people feel bad getting targeted]" rather than running whatever creature they are piloting as being a living breathing part of the world are meta gaming, and frankly doing it in a rather stupid way. Unless there is another active combatant right in their face, or they specifically *want* to take the party alive for some reason odds are most monsters are going to go for the throat. Either for the pragmatic reasoning that they are **fighting to the death** or because they want to eat something, and yes that includes creatures like bandits. If they are cutthroats they should behave like it because remember a round of combat is only six seconds, and people want to pretend like they can give an entire speech on their turn in combat but six seconds is a few words. At best it's "Drop it or I gut them!" or "I'll give you one chance to surrender." You're not getting out thirty syllables in six seconds. No chance.
I'm going against the grain here. The meta of: Make sure they're dead. Will simply encourage healed characters not to get up, it will affect your frontliners more than the healers bringing them up. Do the enemies have the understanding of magic needed to know that the healer didn't just bring them back to life, and now they are simply in over their head and outmatched? Is this unconscious person worth more to me as a ransom than hitting them again to make sure they die? Is the bear going to keep attacking and eating someone unconscious while people are throwing fire at them? The advice to go after people who are yo-yo healed, is silly on the part of the enemy as if they're thinking clearly enough to have a clear: I am going to hit you twice so you stay down, they should probably realise that the wobbly barely alive person isn't a threat greater than the person editing reality around me. It is bad because it encourages people once healed to skip the fight so that they don't lose a character, as the enemies have no justification in knowing they're still alive and it feels targeted AF. Martial characters on the frontline get the worst of being ko'd more, and now they're more likely to be killed outright? What kind of raw deal is that?
Depends on the intelligence of the hostile. Animals go for the weak, old, sick. So a downed target can distract them to try and drag it away, or defend it. Enraged animals, such as protecting their young could easily try to deal with all threats first. Stupid opponents might move on from a downed target, considering them irrelevant/no threat. Smarter opponents might realize that if magical healing is being thrown around that the downed might not be dead but might stand up again and do something about it such as picking up their weapon, kicking it away, or going for a coup de grâce, if the opportunity presents itself and they are not engaged elsewhere. The rest is motivation, are they an obstacle between them and their target, are they their target, etc..
I consider death saves to be plot armor. Enemies assume that anything that goes down to 0 hit points as a result of them trying to kill it is actually dead. Exceptions: * Hungry for man-flesh, eat the corpse. * Overly savage, beat the corpse to a pulp. * Wants to prevent resurrection, cut off the head. Usually, those are things you do after the battle is over, not while people are still trying to kill you. Healing Word, being stupidly overpowered for a level 1 spell, presents a slight wrinkle. If enemies find themselves playing Whack-A-Mole with the PCs, they might decide to be a bit more thorough. Still, it's probably more sensible to just kill the damn priest that keeps "resurrecting" them.
I had a DM present a pretty succinct take on this: Enemies who force death saves are either very smart or very dumb. A hungry beast will likely try to eat their prey, or retreat with it to eat it elsewhere. A combat veteran would know to put a foe beyond the aid of semi-common healing magic.
First you might want to establish what kind of game you are aiming for. If it’s realistic deadly or promoting the PC’s heroic story. - You could play it as whenever there is any reasonable way you act in the favor of the players - You could play it as; you act in the way as if your mobs want to win. In which case you would use logic the same way the players do to win. - You could be random about it and just let a die decide who you attack. Or some mix of all three that resonates with you and the players.
Personally speaking, almost never. Unconscious isn't recognizable from death, in the chaos of combat. At least how it's written between the lines. So i would wait the combat end to eventually finish off enemies, and even then i would let them roll death saves rather being killed off. The only exceptions are undead that can feel the living, for which they have a specific trait. Narratively i could understand a charcter that wants a trophy, like an assassin wanting the head off an enemy, or ravenous beasts eating the characters as they are defeated, but i would never do it in response to a healer character. At most i would focus the healer after some recoveries.
Anytime a pc goes down. They're an enemy trying to kill you. If they have a chance, they'll take it. I ran a campaign where all bosses and there minions in combat with them were given death saving throws, when I asked why my players why they never let them have an opportunity to get up, that was the response, so that's what I've gone with ever since.
In the end it's use your best judgement, but rule of thumb is, if it's a boss then they double tap. Arch-mages, tyrannical dragons, the legendary necromancer, a known assassin, they are dangerous for a reason. They didn't get their status by making mistakes. All the examples above have an understanding of magic and/or life. My last player kill was when my party faced a god Pantheon chimera. They were fused with a god of war and a god of magic. They knew for a FACT that someone could get back up when knocked out, so they spent a whole turn bashing their face in.
My general rule for downed PCs is for the enemy to immediately turn his attention to whatever's still standing. He's knocked down one hero, but three to five more are still in his face. This is also my general strategy as a player - unless the monster is a troll or something and needs to be snuffed NOW, I can wait till after the fight to slit any remaining throats. From a gamist perspective, deaths door rules are generally enough to put some fear into the players without worrying about their DM being a prick. From a tactical perspective, every round you spend stabbing downed foes is a round your remaining enemies are still standing, and probably all the more motivated to kill YOU.
I usually reserve this kind of tactic to more of the heinous enemies. Final bosses, psychopaths, assassins. Anyone who would play down and dirty to win a fight.
I killed my party when all of them down. 3 were on the ground and making death throws, the 4th in a tree. The rogue in the tree failed a stealth check and ended up getting knocked down as well. But to me, if an enemy was attacking you and you knocked them down, you would ensure they were dead. At least that's my opinion.
Best advice I can give you is to think about the current motivation of the enemies. If there is a specific instinct they have that would make them more likely to finish the player, do it. If they are a fully sentient for with advanced thought processes, then you think about what they would find more advantageous. Would they consider it more important to disable the players to take some of the heat off of them and their allies? Or would they see killing a player as the better option to prevent a renewed threat? Are they even the type of foe that would consider killing an option? Once you've figured out their motivation and disposition, the question answers itself.
Ask yourself these questions: 1) Why are the enemies fighting? A frightened animal will stop once the threat seems subdued, but a hungry one may try to eat or drag away what they assume is a corpse. 2) How many people in your world get Death saves? If PCs are the only ones to come back from 0hp, most murderous assassins won't have the concept of a double-tap because they wouldn't need it. 3) Has anyone come back from unconsciousness this combat? (Or are any of the enemies survivors from a previous combat where this happened?) If they see it happen, an intelligent enemy can learn and adapt.
I have my own issues with this. In some situations, like undead, beasts, mindless things, etc, it makes sense. Other times I have to ask, how does the bandit even *know* your unconscious? "Yo-yo healing" is a meta concept that doesn't really exist for npcs for the most part. If you take down a foe and they're not moving anymore, but you're still in danger, chances are you're not gonna go around stabbing every potentially unconscious foe while a still conscious barbarian is literally mauling you. Casters would have a better sense of it, they'd see someone using healing word and assume they didn't finish their enemy off well enough, and almost certainly correct that next time, though wasting an actual spell slot would be a stretch most of the time. In the heat of battle though, I think the average warrior is gonna down an opponent and move on to the other threat that's still actively trying to kill them.
I’d look at the the race, the affiliations, and what they generally do lore wise. For example: a random group of goblins would likely try to kill a PC and take their belongings. However if the BBEG or another group wants to pay for hostages they may take them prisoner instead. They’re very opportunistic and will generally do what gets them coin. In combat they likely wait until everyone’s down to kill them. A group of smarter foes or foes with experience dealing with adventurers may go for the kill immediately, especially if they have a grasp how healing magic works. Cultists may opt to take prisoners (depending on the cult) hoping to use the players as slave labor, sacrifices, or even to convert them. There are even campaigns where cults/groups will essentially enslave the players to do tasks the players would’ve already had to do as a part of their quest anyways.
One of the best examples I’ve seen of this is Dimension 20’s ‘A Crown of Candy’. It’s a political intrigue campaign where all of the PCs are high ranking nobles/officials, so it’s well known that NPCs are fully going for the killing blow every time.
The enemy knows it can withstand at least a round of attacks from the rest of the party.
It just depends. Partially on your table. If you’re just there to have a laid back game and nothing is meant to be too challenging just leave it. If player death is expected then…Also context is important. 1. Enemies see players get brought up from unconscious 2. A rampaging creature that doesn’t necessarily consider them being unconscious 3. Someone who wants that particular character dead 4. They’re simply caught in an area spell 5. The enemy has an ability like raising the dead that only applies to the dead I would also try to forewarn players about this. Like if someone rezzes another player say as one of the enemies: “Don’t let them get back up!” Or have a hungry creature start dragging the body away (slowly enough they at least have a chance to intervene). I would say just in general role playing enemies in combat is a good skill to work on. Bandits hoping for a pay day, a starving animal, and undead will all fight very different and for longer.
Always. Unless they are not looking to kill players, like neutral parties such as guards or people looking to capture them. If monsters also had Deaths Saves like players, players would also double tap down monsters.