Dropping to 0 hit points doesn’t usually kill a character in fifth edition. It knocks them unconscious and starts a short, tense countdown that the rest of the party gets to fight.
The death saving throw
At the start of each of your turns while you are at 0 hit points, roll a d20 with no modifiers:
- 10 or higher is a success; 9 or lower is a failure.
- Three successes and you are stable — still unconscious, but no longer dying.
- Three failures and your character dies.
- A natural 1 counts as two failures. A natural 20 brings you back with 1 hit point.
The successes and failures don’t need to be in a row, and both reset when you regain any hit points or become stable.
Getting hit while you’re down
Taking any damage at 0 hit points is an automatic failure, and a critical hit is two. Attacks from within 5 feet of an unconscious creature are critical hits when they hit, so one monster swing can turn a close call into a death. Smart monsters move on; cruel ones don’t — talk with your group about which kind of game you want.
Instant death
If the damage that drops you to 0 has enough left over to equal or beat your hit point maximum, you die outright. A 12-hit-point wizard on 4 hit points who takes 16 damage is gone. This mostly matters at low levels.
Saving a dying friend
- Any healing — a potion, a cure wounds spell, a healing word from 60 feet away — brings them back conscious with that many hit points.
- Stabilize them with a DC 10 Wisdom (Medicine) check as an action, or a healer’s kit, or the spare the dying cantrip.
- A stable creature that isn’t healed regains 1 hit point after 1d4 hours.
Track it on your sheet
Roleplayer character sheets have death-save boxes you tick at the table, so nobody loses count mid-fight, and the dice roller calls out natural 1s and 20s. Rules reference: Damage and Healing.