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View Full Version : Dramatic NPC Deaths (or How to Thwart Healers)



SpikeFightwicky
2007-10-22, 07:21 AM
With the over abundance of healing in D&D, I find it gets annoying trying to think of a way to have an NPC slowly die but still relay a bit of information before he dies. Here are the main problems:

- At < 0 HP, the NPC's unconcious, and thus can't talk. So he has to relay any information before that point.
- At > 0 HP, the NPC's not dying, and thus there isn't any drama.
- The PCs can cast a heal spell to instantly cure them up.
- The PCs can make heal checks to stabilize them.
- There's no 'Too Far Gone' state in D&D where an NPC isn't going to make it, but is still lucid enough to communicate with the PCs.

Thus far, my only solution, when I absolutely want an NPC to get smoked (and even this isn't 100% fool-proof) is to make use of poisons so that no matter how much damage the NPC is healed of, he still takes multiple d6s of Con damage and dies at 0 con. Since I'm in control of the NPC's Fort saves, this works best. Another option (though I use it VERY sparingly) is to have the NPC somehow scribble some last minute words on something before he buys the farm. This is a 'safer' solution, but can't be used too often because, well, not everyone can write out death messages. Without delving into the realm of house ruling (my Players HATE house-ruling), are there any other ways to let an NPC die off, but still communicate with the PCs (and I'm not talking about 'speak with dead')? Something that drains con at an alarming rate would probably work best.

Skjaldbakka
2007-10-22, 07:27 AM
D&D doesn't do this very well, unless you resort to the dreaded box text method.

SpikeFightwicky
2007-10-22, 07:28 AM
What is this 'Box Text method', and why is it dreaded?

Skjaldbakka
2007-10-22, 07:33 AM
Modules often have boxed text. It is somewhat of a running joke in Living Campaigns (which use modules exclusively) that you


Cannot interrupt the boxed text!

Kurald Galain
2007-10-22, 07:37 AM
What you do is simply this:

Once a character, by the rules, is dead (i.e. under -10 hit points, or fail a save against something nasty), the character by the story dies 2d6 rounds later. If the character weren't unconscious prior to death (i.e. he was at positive HP before the death blow), he remains conscious, albeit helpless.

The character may take no actions except speaking. For all rule-technical purposes, the character is already dead; i.e. healing spells will not be able to save him. For an example of this, see Shojo's death in OOTS.

If you're into grand heroism, the character may perform one last action (e.g. a single attack, a spell, or activating some kind of magical item) as a Final Strike. This action takes no penalties (it is heroic, after all) but the character dies immediately as the action completes.

Spells like disintegrate are an obvious exception to this - piles of dust don't talk.

SpikeFightwicky
2007-10-22, 08:19 AM
Modules often have boxed text. It is somewhat of a running joke in Living Campaigns (which use modules exclusively) that you

I often give descriptions on the fly that sounded to 'scripted' and come off as boxed text. A few times I'd give a description of something, and one of the players would make a comment like 'Gee, I wonder if that's what's written exactly in the book?' jokingly. Problem, I don't know if this is a bad or good thing.

@Kurald: I'll have to give that a shot. It can work as sort of an interperetation since the 'dead' condition is given to RAW confusion.

Azerian Kelimon
2007-10-22, 08:56 AM
Actually, I'm pretty sure BovD had some kind of unhealable wounds. Those could help, since it allows for the NPC to talk and then die.

Ashtar
2007-10-22, 09:01 AM
Kurald Galain, that is a very very nice house rule. I'm adding it to "The Book" with the following addition: "Any death effect kills immediately" to allow my bad guys to cut short the NPC with a nice coup de grāce.

brian c
2007-10-22, 01:43 PM
I had a dramatic NPC death in the ToB game i ran over the summer, but it was not hard for two reasons:

1) PCs were all ToB characters, so they didn't have any healing
2) The NPC was a paladin who took the feat Diehard, so he was conscious and dying at negative hp.

Fighteer
2007-10-22, 01:48 PM
I ran a game a long time back when a player's henchman was dying and was supposed to give a short speech. The player instead tried to force-feed the henchman a healing potion. Since he was already technically "dead", I had the NPC choke to death.

Needless to say, the player was mad at me, although I'm not sure if it was the drama or the waste of the potion. :smallamused:

Nevar
2007-10-22, 01:48 PM
Now here is what my would do just to tick me off. Spend the money to resurect the poor bastard.... damn it, I can count several times that they have done that. So annoying...

actually, going to hijack this a little bit in another thread. Top things to do to destroy a DM's story... or at least tick him off.

hylian chozo
2007-10-22, 07:06 PM
i would give them the die hard feat, let the PC's find him at -9, treat speaking as a strained action and die as soon as the message is delivered.

Aquillion
2007-10-23, 04:12 AM
As I recall, Ars Magica (one edition of it, anyway) actually had a specific rule, right there in the book, that let mechanically 'dead' characters say one final line before they died. (It covered anyone who had just passed the point of no return on the wound chart--which, in Ars Magica, really was the point of no return, since there's no way to bring back the dead. That's probably why it's allowed... players should at least get a dramatic death.)

mostlyharmful
2007-10-23, 04:40 AM
some kind of homebrew cursed wounding ability similar to the horned devils attack, where the NPC suffers continuous bleeding hp no matter what the PCs do. It'd also work to let them know that not everything is fixable with a wave of the clerics hand.

SpikeFightwicky
2007-10-23, 11:01 AM
Now here is what my would do just to tick me off. Spend the money to resurect the poor bastard.... damn it, I can count several times that they have done that. So annoying...

actually, going to hijack this a little bit in another thread. Top things to do to destroy a DM's story... or at least tick him off.

Actually, the guy being resurrected has to be willing to be brought back. So you could always just assume the character wouldn't come back on his own accord unless speak with dead or something like would be used.

@MostlyHarmful: That could work. Simple design would be to make a consistent vile damage source that dampens healing. The PCs likely won't have the necessary spells ready to heal or, or they just won't have time to jump through all the hoops required to heal Vile damage. Might work as a kind of vile based poison.

Die Hard is a possible choice, but it requires the expenditure of 2 feats, and an NPC may not see much use out of endurance. If they have feats to spare, then it's definately a good choice.

tainsouvra
2007-10-23, 12:48 PM
Just use the rule of good drama...let the poor -10hp sap say some last words before he buys the farm, even though the rules don't explicitly say he can do it, when it's dramatically appropriate for it to happen. If your players actually complain about this, I recommend a nice round of rocks-fall-everyone-dies followed by getting new players.

Fighteer
2007-10-23, 12:57 PM
Just use the rule of good drama...let the poor -10hp sap say some last words before he buys the farm, even though the rules don't explicitly say he can do it, when it's dramatically appropriate for it to happen. If your players actually complain about this, I recommend a nice round of rocks-fall-everyone-dies followed by getting new players.
The problem is that the D&D rules explicitly prevent this interpretation. The very instant that your hit points reach -10 or lower, you're dead and your soul flies off to its destination. There isn't much time there for dramatic death speeches that doesn't permit the reasonable interpretation that the character could be saved with suitable application of healing.

Thus, any variant allowing death speeches must either be a house rule or must occur in a situation where there is no healing or other method available to stabilize or revive the dying character. Otherwise you risk annoying your players.

Edit: I do not recommend using Vile damage as an excuse to prevent healing; that's supposed to be reserved for the very deadliest of evil foes. If every dramatic death scene involves a Vile injury that can't be healed, players will soon lose their suspension of disbelief. And what happens when you want to have the BBEG make a death speech, without the players slapping a CLW on him and bundling him off to the local jail?

MaxMahem
2007-10-23, 01:09 PM
I'd go with the simple rule #0. Story beats rules, everytime. Simply have him deliver his message with his dieing breath, and ignore the rules that would say this is impossible.

Being uptight about the death rules when it comes to stuff like this is pointless. Let villians deliver a dieing curse with there last breath, or give hero's a last exclamation before they depart. Heck, in extream cases let the villian deliver his parting monolog even though he has a spear or something sticking through his chest. Because again, story trumps rules every time.

And don't feel bad about telling your players that no, their healing effects don't work because he was already dead and living on will alone. Or that the message was actually delivered by his departing soul/ghost. Or any other implausible explination. After all, this is D&D, and the players REALLY want to get around these limitations and oh speak with the dead or resurrect the fallen character, there are ways to do that as well.

drawingfreak
2007-10-23, 01:42 PM
I've used divine intervention for this. My NPC was dying and the players were trying to save him, but his patron deity had other plans for him in the higher planes.

hylian chozo
2007-10-23, 06:22 PM
Die Hard is a possible choice, but it requires the expenditure of 2 feats, and an NPC may not see much use out of endurance. If they have feats to spare, then it's definately a good choice.

then make him a militia soldier or another type of character that would make forced marches or another form of nonlethal damage.

Aquillion
2007-10-23, 06:26 PM
Or you could give the NPC deathless rage, have them take absurdly unhealable amounts of damage, then have them speak the last line just as their rage ends. Deathless rage is pretty good for dramatic scenes in general, especially since you don't have to reveal the NPC's con score, and they can just choose to end their rage early if they know they're beyond help and feel it's their time to go.

(Just hope your PCs don't shove their face in a bucket of water to save them!)