When a character’s Hit Points fall to 0, the dangers and harm they endured have become unbearable. Will they break? Will they run?
Depending on their role within the story, defeated characters will have different options available to them.
When a Non-Player Character’s Hit Points reach 0, that character loses all will to fight. Whoever defeated them gets the right to determine their fate: they may be:
Example: Yezma lands her final blow against a magically tainted boar, reducing its Hit Points to 0. Now that the creature is defeated, Yezma must decide its fate — she knows, however, that the great beast had turned aggressive only because of the arcane corruption plaguing its mind and body. Because of this, Yezma decides to spare the creature and simply scare it off, in the hope of finding a way to restore its mind later on.
This being said, some creatures might simply be destroyed when reduced to 0 Hit Points — constructs such as golems and robots will cease to function, elemental beings will vanish or dissipate, and undead often crumble to dust.
Philip Forlenza (Order #)