Persistent damage and dying condition

[Supes]

It would seem to me that if you are taking persistent damage and go unconscious, you would continue to take persistent damage. In that case you would continue to progress down the dying track every round since you take the damage before any flat check is made. My question is two fold:

1. Does persistent damage, in fact, continue after a PC becomes unconscious therefore moving you down the dying track?
2. If the character continues the damage, do they still get to make the flat check if they are unconscious?

I have been playing as if the answer is “yes” to both. Please let me know if I am doing this mechanic correctly.

Thanks in advance

[Gary Bush]

It is a tough road to take, but I would say yes to both as well.

This is why the party members need to be aware and make sure to help the character end the persistent damage ASAP. They could use two of their actions to give the other character another chance to remove the persistent condition.

[TomParker]

Yes and yes, as far as I can see. That’s how I’ve played it.

[Kelseus]

Yes and yes.

PG 468-469 CRB
START YOUR TURN(among other things)- "If you’re dying, roll a recovery check"

END OF YOUR TURN (ditto)- "If you have a persistent damage condition, you take the damage at this point. After you take the damage, you can attempt the flat check to end the persistent damage."

pg 459 CRB
KNOCKED OUT AND DYING
"As a player character, when you are reduced to 0 Hit Points, you’re knocked out with the following effects:
You immediately move your initiative position to directly before the turn in which you were reduced to 0 HP."

So, hypothetical round you have persistent bleed damage. The Orc in question hits with his greataxe, taking away your few remaining hit points. You go to 0hp and dying 1.

You spot in the initiative order now moves to immediately before the aforementioned Orc.

At the beginning of your next turn, you roll your recovery check. If you succeed you are no longer dying, but unconscious. If you fail you go to dying 2.

You cannot act, so you end your turn. At this point you take the persistent damage, if you were dying your dying condition increases by 1. If merely unconscious but not dying, you are now dying 1. Then you make your DC 15 flat check to remove persistent damage.

Making the flat check isn't an "action" although you can take an action to get a free flat check (medicine for bleed for instance).

Now it's the Orc's turn. GOOD LUCk!

[Aratorin]

Kelseus wrote:

Yes and yes.

PG 468-469 CRB
START YOUR TURN(among other things)- "If you’re dying, roll a recovery check"

END OF YOUR TURN (ditto)- "If you have a persistent damage condition, you take the damage at this point. After you take the damage, you can attempt the flat check to end the persistent damage."

pg 459 CRB
KNOCKED OUT AND DYING
"As a player character, when you are reduced to 0 Hit Points, you’re knocked out with the following effects:
You immediately move your initiative position to directly before the turn in which you were reduced to 0 HP."

So, hypothetical round you have persistent bleed damage. The Orc in question hits with his greataxe, taking away your few remaining hit points. You go to 0hp and dying 1.

You spot in the initiative order now moves to immediately before the aforementioned Orc.

At the beginning of your next turn, you roll your recovery check. If you succeed you are no longer dying, but unconscious. If you fail you go to dying 2.

You cannot act, so you end your turn. At this point you take the persistent damage, if you were dying your dying condition increases by 1. If merely unconscious but not dying, you are now dying 1. Then you make your DC 15 flat check to remove persistent damage.

Making the flat check isn't an "action" although you can take an action to get a free flat check (medicine for bleed for instance).

Now it's the Orc's turn. GOOD LUCk!

Not quite. If you make your recovery check, you would gain wounded one, so you would go directly to dying 2 from the persistent damage.

[Unicore]

persistent damage is the biggest PC killer I have seen in PF2 thus far.

[Supes]

Very good. Thank you. It is as brutal as I thought. I like it.

[The Gleeful Grognard]

1. Yes, but remember that the PC's initiative moves to directly before the thing that downed it. So persistent damage likely has a full round to go.

2. Yeah, the DC 15 flat check is just the natural end point if the PC does nothing.

[Shade of Undeath]

How does one even cure persistent damage in the first place? First Aid (Medicine) for Bleed, Dispel Magic for spell based damage, and Treat Poison (Medicine) for poisons?

Any other types of persistent damage I missed?

[Fumarole]

Emphasis mine.

CRB p. 621 wrote:

Assisted Recovery

You can take steps to help yourself recover from persistent damage, or an ally can help you, allowing you to attempt an additional flat check before the end of your turn. This is usually an activity requiring 2 actions, and it must be something that would reasonably improve your chances (as determined by the GM). For example, you might try to smother a flame, wash off acid, or use Medicine to Administer First Aid to stanch bleeding. This allows you to attempt an extra flat check immediately. The GM decides how your help works, using the following examples as guidelines.
• Reduce the DC of the flat check to 10 for a particularly appropriate type of help, such as dousing you in water to put out flames.
• Automatically end the condition due to the type of help, such as healing that restores you to your maximum HP to end persistent bleed damage, or submerging yourself in a lake to end persistent fire damage.
• Alter the number of actions required to help you if the means the helper uses are especially efficient or remarkably inefficient. Persistent damage runs its course and automatically ends after a certain amount of time as fire burns out, blood clots, and the like. The GM determines when this occurs, but it usually takes 1 minute.