PC Life or Death Problem

[MinisculeMax]

I'm currently DMing a session where my PCs and I are at a little problem.

My PC is currently on horseback with an PC who is currently knocked out on the horseback, and is confronted in the middle of the road. The person who is confronting them has a very good idea that they were doing something (just making it short), and wants to take them in.

My PC wants to sprint away on horseback, with would be 50x4 feet, making a total of 200ft, the character confronting them had a shortbow on his back, PCs are arguing that, without an initiative roll, 200ft away from a shortbow renders it useless, but I aruge that, with initiative, and him winning it (which he has) he gets a shot off before they even get running.

How does this work?

You decide the fate of my PCs

[Rynjin]

I'm having a hard time figuring out how a single bow shot decides the fate of anything but a cute little bunny rabbit. Do your PCs only have 1 HP or something?

BTW, eve if they were 200 feet away, his bow can still fire that far. It's in the 4th range increment, meaning he takes -6 to-hit, but he could still hit them.

[MinisculeMax]

Rynjin wrote:

I'm having a hard time figuring out how a single bow shot decides the fate of anything but a cute little bunny rabbit. Do your PCs only have 1 HP or something?

BTW, eve if they were 200 feet away, his bow can still fire that far. It's in the 4th range increment, meaning he takes -6 to-hit, but he could still hit them.

If they're 200 feet away, he misses, my PC is at 4HP.

[Scavion]

MinisculeMax wrote:

Rynjin wrote:

I'm having a hard time figuring out how a single bow shot decides the fate of anything but a cute little bunny rabbit. Do your PCs only have 1 HP or something?

BTW, eve if they were 200 feet away, his bow can still fire that far. It's in the 4th range increment, meaning he takes -6 to-hit, but he could still hit them.

If they're 200 feet away, he misses, my PC is at 4HP.

You do know you can have -hitpoints equal to your con right? Sure you'll bleed a little, but a DC15 heal check stabilizes you. Or any cure spell with pop you back up.

[Joe M.]

I take it that the question is something like this: can the players sprint away before the enemy has a chance to react, catching him by surprise and putting some distance between them and his bow?

Here's how I'd adjudicate that.

(1) PCs roll Bluff v. enemy's Sense Motive.

(2) If PCs successfully Bluff the enemy, they get a surprise round (so, one move away); then:

(3) Enter initiative order and act.

If the PCs fail to Bluff the enemy but he wins initiative, I wouldn't have him fire his bow straight away. He suspects they're about to make a dash for it, but he doesn't want to just shoot them on a hunch. So he readies an action, "If they try to escape, I'll shoot them." Maybe have him attempt to deal nonlethal damage or shoot the horse, depending on his motivations.

[MinisculeMax]

Scavion wrote:

MinisculeMax wrote:

Rynjin wrote:

I'm having a hard time figuring out how a single bow shot decides the fate of anything but a cute little bunny rabbit. Do your PCs only have 1 HP or something?

BTW, eve if they were 200 feet away, his bow can still fire that far. It's in the 4th range increment, meaning he takes -6 to-hit, but he could still hit them.

If they're 200 feet away, he misses, my PC is at 4HP.

You do know you can have -hitpoints equal to your con right? Sure you'll bleed a little, but a DC15 heal check stabilizes you. Or any cure spell with pop you back up.

This is the last alive PC.

[Rynjin]

Meaning unless he crits you'll still be alive though unconscious (unless you have like 7 Con), and your horse will probably carry out his last received command (run thataway).

But in your original case, I'm trying to figure out order of events.

If your PCs are running away, you shouldn't be rolling Initiative AFTER the fact. They should already have been in Initiative order, and if this guy won Init then yes he goes first and fires, and your PCs never ran away at all. Seems like you've messed up the order of things a bit (not a jab at you, I do this sometimes as well).

So really, it's your decision, do you go with this little retcon (he won Initiative, which means he goes before you get a chance to act, and fires, meaning you never got the chance to order your horse to run), or just let things play out (Initiative was roll after you had already sprinted away, his arrow narrowly misses).

By the rules, Option A should probably be what happened, but does it make the story more interesting? What's the guy going to do to them?

Arrest them? That could be interesting.

Coup de grace? Less cool.

MinisculeMax wrote:

This is the last alive PC.

Doesn't matter. If he stabilizes and ends up somewhere he won't be attacked for a day or two, he'll wake up (since you heal a small amount of HP from sleeping).

[Pan]

MinisculeMax wrote:

Scavion wrote:

MinisculeMax wrote:

Rynjin wrote:

I'm having a hard time figuring out how a single bow shot decides the fate of anything but a cute little bunny rabbit. Do your PCs only have 1 HP or something?

BTW, eve if they were 200 feet away, his bow can still fire that far. It's in the 4th range increment, meaning he takes -6 to-hit, but he could still hit them.

If they're 200 feet away, he misses, my PC is at 4HP.

You do know you can have -hitpoints equal to your con right? Sure you'll bleed a little, but a DC15 heal check stabilizes you. Or any cure spell with pop you back up.

This is the last alive PC.

If the PC is tagged and goes down will they be killed or jailed by the cofnronter? Even if the guy gets a shot off he could still miss. Though it sounds like if he wins initative and thinks they are taking off then its a move action to get the bow out and a standard to let loose so yeah shot before they even move.

[MinisculeMax]

Pan wrote:

MinisculeMax wrote:

Scavion wrote:

MinisculeMax wrote:

Rynjin wrote:

I'm having a hard time figuring out how a single bow shot decides the fate of anything but a cute little bunny rabbit. Do your PCs only have 1 HP or something?

BTW, eve if they were 200 feet away, his bow can still fire that far. It's in the 4th range increment, meaning he takes -6 to-hit, but he could still hit them.

If they're 200 feet away, he misses, my PC is at 4HP.

You do know you can have -hitpoints equal to your con right? Sure you'll bleed a little, but a DC15 heal check stabilizes you. Or any cure spell with pop you back up.

This is the last alive PC.

If the PC is tagged and goes down will they be killed or jailed by the cofnronter? Even if the guy gets a shot off he could still miss. Though it sounds like if he wins initative and thinks they are taking off then its a move action to get the bow out and a standard to let loose so yeah shot before they even move.

This opponent would kill them at the slightest hint of escape.

[MinisculeMax]

After reading everything, and some excellent lawyering from my PCs, they've survived. Thank you all for your responses, if I have any other problems, i'll gladly asking ask the forum!

[Rynjin]

So the question is, do you WANT a TPK?

IME nobody likes a TPK. Makes it real damn hard to keep a campaign on track with an entirely new cast.

[boring7]

Bounties are almost always higher on live targets, not to mention more likely to be paid at all.

Note that this isn't mercy in medieval justice, it's just math. A bounty hunter brings in a corpse mutilated beyond recognition, oh sure MAYBE that's the target, or maybe the bounty hunter found some easy target and is trying to scam the authorities (or even help the bounty-head fake her own death).

And proper guardsfolk, well, they might not get bounties but they're generally NOT supposed to be Judge Dredd and they still tend to get paid better if the suspect is brought in alive. Living targets can pay fines, be ransomed by family members, pay the "fine" (bribe), or even be sold into some brand of slavery (if we're talking Darker and Edgier Medieval Times game world). They might have less incentive but they still have incentive, and it's not like the party has attacked the guy, they just ran, so he's not exactly afeared of his life, just annoyed that they're trying to get away. If the enemy is disabled and he can bring them in alive it makes sense for the dude to try.

I mean there are times where the kill-crazed hair-trigger no-mercy authority figure makes sense, but I've seen plenty of times where it didn't and was still showing up anyway because the GM was mistaking "raw and dark and real" for "everyone is a thieving, murdering psychopath if given half an excuse."

I mean hell, if nothing else you want to interrogate the runner so you can find out if his stuff's magic and if he had any confederates you need to hunt down.