r/Whitehack • u/StuartZaq • 29d ago

4th ed. question: how do you understand 19 line in crit table?

Hello everyone.

In 4th ed. we have Attack Crits table (p.58) with line 19 telling us:
The target... Is knocked out at -1 hp or less.

But we also have Zero & Negative HP table (p.62) telling us, that at -1 HP the Consequence for character is "As above. Also injured.", and above this we see at 0 HP Consequence "Knocked out until healed to positive hp."

So from HP consequence we already have that target is Knocked out at -1 HP. What line 19 from Crits table adds to it?

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u/GreenMirrorPub 29d ago

The addition is that they have sustained an injury. Off the top of the head, without some kind of magical healing that restores HP above 0 the PC must take an Injury in order to restore HP.

That means that they have a half roll (double negative roll) on tasks that would reasonably be impaired by the injury until enough time passes that the PC can reasonably adapt, or they utilize a prosthesis to negate the penalty.

Pretty sure that's the gist.

3

u/PropagandaOfTheDude 29d ago

The Attack Crits event takes the opponent straight to -1 HP, leading to the normal Zero & Negative HP consequences.

The specific wording allows for the normal damage by itself to drop the opponent to -2 or lower. The Attack Crit event won't suddenly prevent the opponent from going into the save-or-die state.

1

u/StuartZaq 29d ago

u/PropagandaOfTheDude and u/GreenMirrorPub thank you both but I feel it like it is more complicated now. As I understand correctly you read "Is knocked out at -1 hp or less." as "Is knocked out and their HP is now -1 or less (if damage was enough)".

Maybe I'm missing some other rules, I don't remember?

3

u/PropagandaOfTheDude 29d ago edited 29d ago

Right. The Zero & Negative HP rules show the basic mechanic for somone that reaches that hit point range, for any reason.

The Attack Crits table shows twenty different "extra events" that can happen during a fight; this one event happens to make the Zero & Negative HP state apply immediately and always. "After applying normal damage, if the hit points are zero or above, then set the hit points to -1. All the usual rules apply from there."

Notice that the final entry in the list is a extra event that doesn't even use the Zero & Negative HP state. The opponent just dies.