Death in RuneQuest

Whilst preparing the lastest episode of Runecast and researching through the various rule books and supplements, I realised that the rules of RuneQuest - Roleplaying in Glorantha were not crystal clear in terms of when it is, exactly, that a character dies.

First of all, and contrary to what happens in a lot of TTRPGs (especially fantasy ones, in which combat plays such a predominant role), there is no section titled ‘Death’ in the Combat chapter or ‘Character Death’ in the Adventurers chapter.

You have to read the non-emphasised text beneath the ‘Attributes’ heading of the Adventurers chapter of the core book (page 55) to find the following:

When your adventurer has taken sufficient damage to surpass their total hit points, they will die at the end of the combat round.

(Which is a very convoluted way of saying that the adventurer dies when their hit point total reaches −1 or below [not 0, because of “surpass”]). Honestly, I would have expected a side bar or something similar to make sure how a character dies is crystal clear to anybody who is reading the core book. And by the way, why restrict this to ‘adventurers’... NPCs and monsters will die at the same threshold. Also this is contradiction with the Starter Set, which specifies that a character “dies at the end of the melee round if the total hit points are equal to or less than 0”.

Of course losing all their total hit points is not the only way your player character might die in a RuneQuest game. Excess damage in a vital hit location is probably the main cause of death among RQ adventurers. But to get this kind of information you have to read on and reach the ‘Damage’ heading of the Game System chapter (pages 146-149), to find the following:

p147: Damage Equal to or More Than the Location’s Hit Points

• Abdomen: If not healed or treated with First Aid within ten minutes, the adventurer bleeds to death.
• Chest: The adventurer bleeds to death in ten minutes unless the bleeding is stopped by First Aid.
• Head: The adventurer is unconscious and must be healed or treated with First Aid within five minutes or they will die.

p148: Damage Equals or Exceeds Double the Location’s Hit Points

• If the head, chest, or abdomen suffers more than twice as much damage as the adventurer has hit points in that location, the adventurer becomes unconscious and begins to lose 1 hit point per melee round unless healed or treated with First Aid.

p148: Damage Equals or Exceeds Triple the Location’s Hit Points

• A head, chest, or abdomen hit for three times as much damage as the adventurer has hit points in that location results in instant death.