I was reading the section on encounters with dragons in the new Draconomicon book, and something stood out:
At its simplest, a subdual encounter is one in which the dragon stops fighting and the characters win when the dragon is bloodied. But the degree of the victory matters, so you will need to keep track of how many characters were bloodied during the course of the battle.
In my review of the book, I wondered if this was a bone thrown at 4e players by WOTC designers as an attempt to reduce encounter lenghts, as fights in 4e have a tendency to drag on a bit. I was quickly corrected by commenters that subdued dragons have a long history in D&D. I honestly had no idea. Either way, it made me think, why not use this mechanic in fights that aren’t against dragons, and shorten those fights? Let’s look at the mechanic:
A subdued dragon will grant passage through its territory, part with important lore or clues, or end alliances with foes of the characters. Again, you can provide a graduated award. The dragon might part with only cryptic clues if the characters were all bloodied, offer more detailed lore if just one or two were bloodied, and give them an accurate map of their next destination if none of the characters became bloodied.
So we are fighting an intelligent solo creature, and the creature becomes bloodied. At this point, the creature blasts its when-first-bloodied power, and quickly gives up. Begs the characters for forgiveness or mercy, and offers something in return… Passage through its territory, a secret they need, whatever, the degree of the monster’s help would depend on how hurt the party was at the end of the encounter. The more bloody the party, the less he offers. The party could take your cue as a DM, and play along, or they could attempt to bring him down, it’s always their choice. If they subdue the monster, they still get XP for the encounter, depending of course, on how tough the monster was.
The book’s example has the party fighting a dragon 4 levels above theirs, and pointing out that if the battle ends when he’s bloodied, he would have had fewer hit points than a solo of the PC’s level, but with stronger attacks and defenses. A fair fight.
I make no attempts at being a designer or anything of the sort, but I figured this could be an interesting way of getting around a long fight with an intelligent solo. The idea that the degree of success depends on the number of players that got bloodied during the fight makes it imperative that they stay healthy and not just beat at the monster without giving the fight any though, and some interesting role-playing elements could come out of the whole thing.
This is a little different than using the intimidation skill on a bloodied enemy, and attempting a surrender. Here, he automatically surrenders and the degree of success is dependent on the party’s health overall. Who knows, maybe it could be tweaked to a resources expended mechanic. (?)
So what do you think? Does it make sense to use this beyond the dragon encounters it’s made for? Would you consider this in your game to try and trim down combat time and battle grind?
www. Newbie DM .com 
Alric
November 30, 2009
The first time I saw the concept of dragon subdual in D&D date back to the first edition of the Advanced D&D game, published in 1977. At the start of combat with a dragon, players used to have an option to decide whether their goal was to slay or subdue the beast, with the benefits of subdual being largely the same as those you described in your post.
That being said, there’s nothing in the history of the concept to suggest that your theory about using subdual to get around a long fight isn’t correct.
Personally, my first guess would be that WotC scoured everything they or TSR ever printed about dragons for material to recycle, and they brought back subdual; but doing so as a way to speed up what has played out to be very long combats certainly isn’t out of the question.
deadorcs
November 30, 2009
I’ve only ever allowed subdual of a powerful foe (in this case “intelligent solos”) when the story line of the adventure allowed for it. Suddenly having a “free agent” no longer interested in fighting the characters, can unintentional turn the tide in a strange direction. This is okay, if you DM on the fly; or you’re an experienced “sandbox” player. However, as a DM, if you have specific story goals in mind; a powerful subdual can wreck them.
newbiedm
November 30, 2009
I agree… you’d have to go into the encounter from the beginning planning for either the subdual, or the monster’s death. If they decide to kill the guy it’s in their right, so you better have a plan B to keep your story going.
You can’t apply this on the fly I think, this needs to be thought out ahead of time.
Dave
November 30, 2009
Monsters don’t have to actually surrender when bloodied, but it’s actually kind of unrealistic for a monsters to fight to the death. Wild animals will generally run away. A band of orcs might start out willing to fight to the death, but once their numbers have been halved, bloodying one might cause him to flee or consider surrendering if there’s a merciful-looking paladin nearby.
Personally, I like the idea of the enemies being defeated once they are all bloodied (it makes sense, as they have far fewer healing surges than PCs do, so the proportional damage is much higher). It also means shorter combats (which results in MORE combats!). Unfortunately, most of my campaign’s recent combats have been against undead and it does make any sense for a zombie to run away or surrender.
Thunderforge
November 30, 2009
Back when Wizards was doing its DM hotline, I asked about the Intimidate to Surrender rule in the PHB and was told that it was mostly intended to be used once or twice a campaign on random mooks rather than solos (otherwise, there’s nothing stopping you from having a high enough Intimidate skill to scare Vecna into surrendering, which is just ridiculous).
Since Wizards says that they don’t intend for solos to be Intimidated to surrender like that, it seems like a subdual encounter is a much better option. If I were running one, I don’t think I’d ask the players first because you’re basically asking “Do you want to fight him till he’s dead or do you want to fight him till he’s bloodied and then talk to him,” which just seems pointless. I’d just let the BBEG talk after he’s bloodied and, should the players decide to attack him after he’s said his thing, just have him book it off the map.
Charmth
December 1, 2009
I read that section in the D:M and didn’t think about applying it to Solos but that is an exceptionally good idea. For any major boss fight this would be a good thing to plan for in advance. Bad guys lie too, so you can implement a dramatic twist by having a villian flee instead of surrendering or attack instead of giving up it’s reward. That would have to be used very lightly, otherwise the players will just go back to hit it till it’s dead methods.
AlioTheFool
December 2, 2009
This is a good idea. It sort of reminds me of the old morale mechanic. Interestingly, I used to dislike morale because I used to think “Well, why would a creature just run when someone was trying to kill it?” Obviously the answer is “Because they don’t want to die.”
I was glad the mechanic was removed from the game, but maybe it’s more appropriate these days? It definitely doesn’t work in every case (such as the above undead situation) but perhaps it could be useful in more than just the solo case? The question is, how would I structure a morale save?
Noumenon
December 2, 2009
A subdued dragon will grant passage through its territory, part with important lore or clues, or end alliances with foes of the characters.
That sounds too much like the reward for actually beating him — it’s treading on the toes of combat by being basically a “half combat.” I would do subdual as “You’re not strong enough to beat this thing, but like the Sarlacc, you can make its life unpleasant enough that it will go away.”
DiceGolem
December 2, 2009
It’s perfectly reasonable to assume that a powerful and intelligent solo creature would try to bargain with aggressors. Even something as simple as “Don’t kill me, I know that thing you need to know” would be an excellent role-playing opportunity that would otherwise go to waste.
Subdual encounters are also an excellent way to handle sparring with NPC heroes or defeating mythical guardians. Literature has instances when you only needed to prove your worthiness, rather than rend a devious beast limb from limb. Guardians of dangerous locations are best defeated, rather than destroyed; would you really want to kill Charon and let any old shmuck into the underworld?
I’m not so sold on the idea of subdual encounters being applied to group combats. Perhaps that band of orcs fights to the death simply because the shame of surrender would be a death warrant once/if they return to their tribe. Goblins, on the other hand, are a different story entirely! As always, it’s up to the individual DM and his campaign environment to decide when a monster flees or fights to the death.
Swordgleam
December 6, 2009
I don’t trust my party not to just try to kill it anyway, and get themselves killed trying. Otherwise, I’d have to give this mechanic some thought.
Philo Pharynx
December 9, 2009
I often have bad guys flee or surrender when things are looking bad. Lurkers and controllers are big on this – they aren’t very good in a direct fight and when the brutes and soldiers are all down, they will often do whatever it takes to save their own skins. This sometimes happens when they are near full hp. I also take the creature’s motivations into account – acolytes of a cult are oftne fanatics where mercenaries are more likely to want to survive. In some cases the bad guys will be able to join another group. One interesting encounter happened when the majority of the bad guys were defeated, but the party was badly hurt. It became a standoff where the kobolds left and promised not to return, but took their belongings (i.e. treasure)