Suffocation rules and Regeneration/Fast Healing

[Jon_Dahl]

How do these work together? Do you need air if you can regenerate or have the Fast Healing special ability?

[loky1109]

U can't regenerate damage from suffocation.


Fast healing does not restore hit points lost from starvation, thirst, or suffocation.
DMG, p. 294

Regeneration does not restore hit points lost from starvation, thirst, or suffocation.
DMG, p. 298

[the_tick_rules]

indeed, damage from suffocation, drowning, lack of eating and drinking, and a few other environmental/survival sources and not countered by regen and fast heal.

[PrismCat21]

Fast healing does not restore hit points lost from starvation, thirst, or suffocation.
Regeneration does not restore hit points lost from starvation, thirst, or suffocation.


indeed, damage from suffocation, drowning, lack of eating and drinking, and a few other environmental/survival sources and not countered by regen and fast heal.

Drowning doesn't appear on those two lists.

[King of Nowhere]

Drowning doesn't appear on those two lists.

well, it's a reasonable RAI.
After all, if a creature can regenerate damage from drowning, then the creature basically does not need to breathe.
which would also be a reasonable RAI, incidentally.

so, i would look at the creature, and pick one: either suffocation damage is not regenerated, or the creature is immune to suffocation in the first place

[Darg]

Drowning is suffocation... you can't drown if you aren't suffocating.

[PrismCat21]

well, it's a reasonable RAI.
Reasonable yes. Just need to clarify that it's not RAW.


Drowning is suffocation... you can't drown if you aren't suffocating.

https://i.pinimg.com/736x/04/f4/cd/04f4cda650c7fe693905a0ff83aef566.jpg

[MaxiDuRaritry]

"Drowning is a form of death by suffocation." (https://www.healthline.com/health/how-long-does-it-take-to-drown#:~:text=Drowning%20is%20a%20form%20of,intake %20then%20interferes%20with%20breathing.&text=If%20a%20person%20is%20submerged,and%20eventu ally%20death%20by%20drowning.)

By its very definition, drowning is suffocation, just when liquid is involved in cutting off breathing.

[newguydude1]

i kill all my regeneration monsters by burying them alive. rules are clear. suffocation sets their hp to a certain value, and then they die the next turn. at no point do they take damage.