Should barbarians die when their rage ends?

SharGuidesMyHand

I was just playing as a barbarian and when her rage ended, she simply collapsed without being hit and without making a sound, and then the "death's hand" screen played. She had received a fair amount of damage while raging, so I assume her death was the result of readjusting to "non-raged" status with a low number of hit points.

I know berserkers automatically lose 15 HPs when their rage ends, which can kill them if they have less than 15 HPs by that time - but does the same also hold true for barbarians? I played as barbarians often in BG2, and I don't ever recall one dying when their rage ended. The way she simply collapsed without making a sound was also strange - it leaves me wondering whether this is really a bug.

Dragonspear

Zerkers and Barbs both get extra HP when raging/enraged, if you fall below that extra HP when it expires, you will die.

Example: You're playing a Dwarven Berserker/Barbarian, you start with 15 hit points cause you were awesome and maxed con. When raging you got 15 more hit points (now you're up to 30). If you drop to 15 hit points or less when raging, when the rage ends you die (in my understanding), because you will LOSE the gained hit points, rather than them just fading away (like Larloch's Minor Drain or Aid).

Edit: This is one reason why I'm afraid to play one in the early couple levels, cause the temptation is there, and the death animation not long after.

magpie

The topic title sort of made me expect a poll
-no, everyone gets mad once in a while
-yes, such display of a lack of self-restraint should not go unpunished

anyway, I was under the impression that in the case of the berserker, if the lost hitpoints would bring them under 0, they would be knocked out instead. If that's true, it would be nice if the same would happen with the barbarian. But since their bonus HP comes from a chance in constitution, things might work differently.

Kaltzor

I don't think AD&D had getting knocked out with 0 HP... Only death.

But falling unconscious would make more sense than dropping dead.

And the old loading screen tips of BG2 actually did warn that if your Berserker's rage ends with the char at 15 or less HP they would die...

magpie

Kaltzor said:

I don't think AD&D had getting knocked out with 0 HP... Only death

yeah, but I thought I read somewhere that they changed it for BG:EE to getting knocked unconscious. BRB, going to check.

EDIT: yup, berserker is knocked unconscious when rage ends with less than 15 hp, but the barbarian dies.

Fafnir

That's because while the Berserker is straight out handed bonus HP, while the Barbarian gets a Constitution boost instead. There's no safety system in place to deal with post-rage Constitution loss.

abacus

I quite like the imagery of a wild eyed barbarian, covered in arrows and sword cuts, collapsing to his knees as the adrenaline fades and then keeling over onto a heap of dismembered enemies...
(Also, I always pictured the raise dead spells as being like the adrenaline shot in Pulp Fiction... made me feel ok about using it whilst role-playing.)

SharGuidesMyHand

Fafnir said:

That's because while the Berserker is straight out handed bonus HP, while the Barbarian gets a Constitution boost instead. There's no safety system in place to deal with post-rage Constitution loss.

It seems like this is an issue that should be addressed by the devs. If nothing else, there should be some sort of warning indicating to the player that a barbarian may die at the end of a rage, like there is for the berserker. And how can players calculate for themselves whether the barbarian will die once the rage ends? Also, why should the game be changed so that a berserker is only knocked unconscious (which is apparently the new rule), but a barbarian still dies?

Anduin

Should barbarians die when there rage ends?

Yes.

Schneidend

abacus said:

I quite like the imagery of a wild eyed barbarian, covered in arrows and sword cuts, collapsing to his knees as the adrenaline fades and then keeling over onto a heap of dismembered enemies...
(Also, I always pictured the raise dead spells as being like the adrenaline shot in Pulp Fiction... made me feel ok about using it whilst role-playing.)

That became a staple of my Barbarian in PnP, this seventeen year-old kid who would flip out and punch and strangle everything to death. Sadly, about 33% of the time, I'd be at slightly less than 0 HP after raging, so "Segard exhales heavily as his rage ends...aaand falls unconscious."

Also, you're kinda right about Raise Dead. In PnP, it only works within a few hours of your death unless you cast other spells to keep your body fresh and it can't give you back any missing limbs or reassemble your body if it was destroyed.