Knocking a Creature Out Rules

[Dr. Cliché]

Does anyone else think that the rules for knocking creatures out are a bit weird?

The fact that you can choose to knock a creature unconscious after attacking it normally just seems really wrong to me.

[Addaran]

Since there's no drawback to doing non-lethal damage, it wouldn't change much if you choosed before and just always did non-lethal. At most, you'll waste a little bit of time after the fight to kill them (might be evil to kill defenceless enemies) or in the rare case the enemie have healing, they can healing word the ally.

[Dr. Cliché]

Since there's no drawback to doing non-lethal damage, it wouldn't change much if you choosed before and just always did non-lethal. At most, you'll waste a little bit of time after the fight to kill them (might be evil to kill defenceless enemies) or in the rare case the enemie have healing, they can healing word the ally.

But that's the point - it seems moronic that there isn't any sort of penalty for doing nonlethal damage.

Surely the whole point is that you're holding back and/or using your weapon in a less efficient manner (e.g. striking someone with the flat of your sword or the butt of your axe)? I see no reason why doing this should deal exactly the same damage as using the weapon normally.

[Pope Scarface]

Non-lethal damage has always been a gamist thing anyway. Why would the flat of a sword be less lethal than a club? Both are blunt force trauma. I'd be tempted to drop it all together, and if you want to beat someone into unconsciousness and them not die, have someone with the medicine skill on hand, or hope they stabilize on their own.

[Addaran]

Non-lethal damage has always been a gamist thing anyway. Why would the flat of a sword be less lethal than a club? Both are blunt force trauma. I'd be tempted to drop it all together, and if you want to beat someone into unconsciousness and them not die, have someone with the medicine skill on hand, or hope they stabilize on their own.

Very true, it's more of a "game" feature then something realistic.

I remember in LARP, we used to overkill other players during PvP (or when the NPC downed a player) then just say "you're just unconscious". We kinda had to overkill cause the system wasn't balanced, we had lvl 1 people along-side lvl 7-8.

[Mellack]

The whole idea of nonlethal damage is as a gaming construct. Hitting someone with a club/chair/etc to knock them out is very likely to kill them. Having it be easy to KO without needing to kill means characters don't need to always be murderhobos, which is something to be encouraged in my book.

[Pope Scarface]

Knockunconscioushobos is not really that much of an upgrade. A lack of safe ways to knock somebody out makes some scenarios less solvable with violence, which is something to be encouraged in my book.

[Toadkiller]

Our DM has a ruling that you need to be able to explain what you are doing to subdue them.

Something like: "the goblin seems to be wobbling so I'm going to whack him with the guard of my sword and try to knock him out."

But then if you roll a crit, they die anyhow.

[Gastronomie]

It's because murdurhobos are only second-rank adventurers.

Real adventurers are torturehobos, capturing enemies after beating them to a pulp, collecting as much information as possible from them and then finally letting them die.

Okay, on topic: weigh reality and game efficiency and take whatever seems best for your gaming group. Even if everyone here agreed it's better to auto-suceed in sparing foes and you listen to their advice, if your gaming group doesn't think so, you're a bad DM. And vice versa. Talk it over with'em for the best solution to this problem.

[mer.c]

I just fluff it to myself that dropping a monster to 0 HP is the same as dropping a PC to 0 HP. They're not dead necessarily; they've taken a bad beating and are for all intents and purposes out of the fight. They may be dying, or maybe not. For PCs, that's decided by dice. Letting the players decide to knock someone out or kill them just keeps the game moving.

[Daishain]

HP isn't meat, at least not entirely.

If I hit and take someone from 50 HP to 40 HP, I'm not leaving behind a massive gash. Bruises and minor cuts yes, but not serious wounds. That 10 HP essentially represents me wearing down the defender's ability to keep me from hitting anything truly vital. Once that is gone, the difference between a slit throat and a pommel strike is relatively minimal.

[TheFlyingCleric]

Well there's one very good point to make about the rules; they're damn simple.

I don't see any situation arising where you might want to kill/knock out someone before you make an attack, but want the opposite after it hits. That would have to be a very special (and unlikely) situation. But what it does mean is that you don't have to declare 'non-lethal' before every single melee attack in order to avoid killing that guy you really need to take hostage.

I like the Knocking-Out rules because they are very quick and easy to use. That's a big plus, especially if you're new to D&D.

[hymer]

I think for my next campaign, I'll tie it into the slightly altered Inspiration rules. Making the last blow non-lethal costs Inspiration.

[Dr. Cliché]

I think for my next campaign, I'll tie it into the slightly altered Inspiration rules. Making the last blow non-lethal costs Inspiration.

I like that idea.

[MrFahrenheit]

Does it seem silly? Yeah. Does it also make DMing far more easy than 3.5, where you had to keep track of a separate pool of HP? Also yeah. I just play it by RAW.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Ehh, seems like it would be easier to knock a wounded guy out that one who's otherwise unarmed. Makes sense to me.

[Dr. Cliché]

Ehh, seems like it would be easier to knock a wounded guy out that one who's otherwise unarmed. Makes sense to me.

I assume you mean 'unharmed'.

Regardless, this seems entirely unrelated to my point. It *might* be easier to knock out a wounded man, but last time I checked axes didn't have a 'stun' setting. :smalltongue:

[Lombra]

Creatures have hit points, aka the number of hits that they can withstand before falling unconcious. Damage indicates how quickly the weapon/spell can knock down creatures. Most creatures from the MM are hard to knock down even with a well-placed hit at the back of their head, if you are thinking in an hitman kind of way, be aware that everyone in hitman is a commoner, a creature with very low stats that can be quickly stunned (knocked out). When a creature falls unconcious has to (DM's call) perform death saving throws. The creature is killed outright only if the excess damage dealt to it is equal or greater than ts maximum HP. I see no issue with the system, it's simple and works just as it should.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I assume you mean 'unharmed'.

Regardless, this seems entirely unrelated to my point. It *might* be easier to knock out a wounded man, but last time I checked axes didn't have a 'stun' setting. :smalltongue:
I stab him in the arm and he passes out from the pain?

[Daishain]

I assume you mean 'unharmed'.

Regardless, this seems entirely unrelated to my point. It *might* be easier to knock out a wounded man, but last time I checked axes didn't have a 'stun' setting. :smalltongue:
Just hit them with the haft or the side of the axe. If the ax isn't double sided you don't even have to adjust your swing, just reverse the blade. Nearly all melee weapons have an effective blunt edge somewhere. Even with a dagger you can just swing your fist down and crack their head with the pommel.

[Dr. Cliché]

Just hit them with the haft or the side of the axe. If the ax isn't double sided you don't even have to adjust your swing, just reverse the blade. Nearly all melee weapons have an effective blunt edge somewhere. Even with a dagger you can just swing your fist down and crack their head with the pommel.

Sure. But why does that still deal slashing damage, as opposed to bludgeoning? Moreover, why does hitting them with the flat of the blade or pommel deal exactly the same damage as the actual edge of the weapon? I mean, what's the point in those weapons even having an edge when any part of the weapon can deal the same damage?

[Moosoculars]

I actually was pleased when I saw they were far simplified. It made capturing or knocking out mechanically just as easy as murdering.

This is better for pcs and dms alike.

How is it done? Well pcs and ems can describe their knockout blow in any number of ways. It all adds to the story.

[Dr. Cliché]

It all adds to the story.

I disagree. What adds to the story is when PCs actually have to think when they want someone taken alive.

Stabbing someone with a sword or smashing their skull in with an axe, and just being able to say 'no, they didn't die' adds nothing but contrivance. It's just yet another problem that can now be solved with brute force and no thought whatsoever.

[Moosoculars]

If you mechanically penalise characters with for trying to make an improvised attack or pulling a blow like in previous editions many players will simply kill a dangerous opponent rather than try to subdue. This way stories are opened with easier capture, interrogation, arrest etc. fights don't always have to end in death. It opens up stories and role playing.

Definitely better imho.

[Daishain]

Sure. But why does that still deal slashing damage, as opposed to bludgeoning? Moreover, why does hitting them with the flat of the blade or pommel deal exactly the same damage as the actual edge of the weapon? I mean, what's the point in those weapons even having an edge when any part of the weapon can deal the same damage?
I'd rule that it does do bludgeoning damage in that case. But that's beside the point. The current rules keep the matter simple, 5E was designed with the intention of removing fiddly little details that don't significantly add to the game.

And don't forget that HP isn't entirely meat. For the most part that edge doesn't matter until the last blow anyways.

[Zman]

Hit Points are abstract, it allows many ways to explain the last HP being removed to knock someone out instead of kill them.

How you explain that is up to you and could be... "Your furious attack sends your foe off balance, his guard drops as your bring the blade to his throat, with a deft jab of your greatsword's hilt across his face you knock him unconscious and he falls in a heap."

[Saeviomage]

If you want to remove the 'knock unconscious' rule for something more risky, then just remove it and treat monsters at 0 hit points the same way as PCs at 0 hit points.

Personally I'd rather it be not so easy for PCs to knock out a foe, because
1. I don't want the PCs to feel too bad for not rounding up every single foe they ever defeat and delivering them to arkham asylum. It's dumb in batman, and it would be dumb in D&D. If knocking out a foe is easy, then it means that NOT knocking them out is deliberately murdering them, which is pretty hard to justify.

2. I don't really want my PCs interrogating every single foe they fight. Most of the time the foe won't have much of interest to say anyway.

3. If I want to have my PCs interrogate a foe, the foe will surrender.

4. If my PCs want to try to save foes mid-fight so they can interrogate them... then great! When they get some info, they'll feel like they earned it.

[Slipperychicken]

it seems moronic that there isn't any sort of penalty for doing nonlethal damage.

Because they tried that in previous editions. It was so hard to take people alive in 3rd edition and its derivatives that virtually nobody who understood the rules tried, and the community poured scorn on people trying to do that. There were very few good ways to go about taking people alive, and they often meant sinking significant build resources into it (like wealth, feats, weapon choices, etc). Also, players have a hard time remembering to declare their intent to deal nonlethal damage, which also caused issues.

The current rules are unrealistic in the extreme, but that is intentional. They solve real problems that existed with nonlethal combat in prior editions of dnd.

[Pope Scarface]

Nonlethal damage wasn't complicated at all in 3rd. One or two solid hits with a -4, and then go back to attacking normally so the target KOs before you risk killing them.

[Slipperychicken]

Nonlethal damage wasn't complicated at all in 3rd. One or two solid hits with a -4, and then go back to attacking normally so the target KOs before you risk killing them.

It was not very complicated (although some of my fellow players had trouble tracking nonlethal damage separately). It was that taking people alive was difficult and unattractive because it meant eating a penalty equivalent to being nonproficient. People I saw usually kept taking the -4 for many attacks because if they mismatched lethal and nonlethal damage by just 10 points the target could well die, and they didn't want to take the risk that they might get a x3 crit or something.

[Pope Scarface]

I've found that you rarely are trying to capture someone that is a big enough threat for that -4 to be a major hurdle, and if you are it still makes sense for pulling punches against someone that is a match for you would make it difficult to succeed.

[krugaan]

or just lethal plus the stabilize cantrip works ... doesn't it?

[Slipperychicken]

or just lethal plus the stabilize cantrip works ... doesn't it?

It works if your DM gives the enemy death saves, and you don't overkill the monster by its entire maximum hp, as that kills it instantly no matter what. The latter could be a real problem with the game's weakest enemies.

But if you know the enemy is getting death saves, and it isn't at risk of being overkilled, then you're pretty much solid. You can replace "stabilize cantrip" with "one use of a healer's kit" if desired. If you really need that guy alive, you can keep Revivify prepped and rez him if he happens to die.

[Daishain]

It works if your DM gives the enemy death saves
I'm not sure that is necessary either. DMs don't generally bother with death saves for the sake of simplicity, but that doesn't mean that one must consider the creatures automatically dead. I generally let opponents bleed out on the floor by default, and allow the players to decide whether they want to ignore them, coup de grace the living, or stabilize those not quite dead. Yes, it can have an impact story wise, and no the impact is not always obvious.

If someone wants to revive a specific enemy for whatever purpose, I generally let them. If it was more than five rounds after being cut down, I roll a single death save to see if they made it that long. If they were chunky salsaed, or otherwise obviously dead, it doesn't work then either.

[JakOfAllTirades]

Our DM has a ruling that you need to be able to explain what you are doing to subdue them.

Something like: "the goblin seems to be wobbling so I'm going to whack him with the guard of my sword and try to knock him out."

But then if you roll a crit, they die anyhow.

And this is where things get even sillier. In this situation, your DM is actually penalizing the character for rolling "too well."

[pwykersotz]

And this is where things get even sillier. In this situation, your DM is actually penalizing the character for rolling "too well."

I think a better way to look at it is as modeling the chance that harm significant enough to incapacitate can potentially be a greater issue. You could, of course make it a little more in theme of "high rolls good" to just say that if you hit the enemy AC exactly, you deal a lethal blow instead of a nonlethal one. Same % chance of the bad effect. But it's just perspective, not really a mechanics change.

[DireSickFish]

Magic will kill instantly, as will ranged attacks. That's been a concern in games that I have played. Very few parties consist of all players dealing melee attacks. So yon Wizard has to limit his effectiveness in a fight if the party wants to not kill them for whatever reason. The archer with sharpshooter has to put away his bow and go in with his dagger.

It's a team game and if some of the party can't use there main feature then it will make the combat harder. This is the difficulty in subduing opponents. I don't think an additional penalty is necessary on top of it.

[Doug Lampert]

I think a better way to look at it is as modeling the chance that harm significant enough to incapacitate can potentially be a greater issue. You could, of course make it a little more in theme of "high rolls good" to just say that if you hit the enemy AC exactly, you deal a lethal blow instead of a nonlethal one. Same % chance of the bad effect. But it's just perspective, not really a mechanics change.

The marginal hit is lethal is better in several ways, (1) it preserves high roll is good, and (2) it doesn't penalize champion fighters and any others with increased crit chances.

More generally, if NPCs were treated the same as PCs then it's not subduing them that's hard, it's actually killing them when they go down that's horribly unlikely. The simplifying abstraction is NOT that you can subdue so easily, it is that most of your enemies are killed so easily rather than being disabled.

[krugaan]

The marginal hit is lethal is better in several ways, (1) it preserves high roll is good, and (2) it doesn't penalize champion fighters and any others with increased crit chances.

More generally, if NPCs were treated the same as PCs then it's not subduing them that's hard, it's actually killing them when they go down that's horribly unlikely. The simplifying abstraction is NOT that you can subdue so easily, it is that most of your enemies are killed so easily rather than being disabled.

I kind of agree. IRL people rarely die immediately, but usually die from exsanguination or whatever. Naturally, some injuries (crits) are immediately lethal, but its simpler just to treat npcs like pcs. Or like bags of XP. whichever.