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Sleep, as well as all other powers that cause extended unconsciousness, should have a chance of ending when the target takes damage.

In the hands of PCs, these kinds of powers can trivialize encounters. In the hands of monsters, they can remove all of a PC's actions for an entire encounter. Either way, it makes for a poor gaming experience.

For low level powers, the effect should end immediately when the target takes damage. For higher-level powers, the target should get an additional saving throw when it takes damage.

Ending on a save is not enough. One or more full rounds of coup-de-grace attacks does not make for compelling or interesting gameplay, in my opinion.

Each time an unconscious target takes damage, it should at least have a chance of dropping the condition.

Nov 14, 2011 -- 7:38AM, erachima wrote:

Winter Court's unconscious for 1d4 hours iirc, but it ends on damage.

Yes, the hit effect of sleep should be closer to that of slumber of the Winter Court. Also note that currently the hit effect of slumber of the Winter Court is weaker than that of sleep, but the power is 14 levels higher.

However, as errata for Slumber of the Winter Court, the unconsciousness for the miss effect should also end when damaged. As it stands, the miss effect is better than the hit effect -- "unconscious (save ends)" is much more powerful than unconscious for any other duration, but which ends when damaged.

Nov 14, 2011 -- 7:38AM, erachima wrote:

the key point you're missing is that you have to fail saves to get into the condition to start with.

That's not much of a restriction, considering the large number of options available to penalize, force rerolls, or force automatic fails of saving throws. Effectively, it's a save-or-die power, and options exist to make that save impossible.

Nov 14, 2011 -- 7:38AM, erachima wrote:

That delay is what justifies it being a win condition.

I don't agree. No single power, let alone a level 1 power, should ever be an encounter-breaking win condition.

Nov 18, 2011 -- 11:27AM, Keithric wrote:

Yeah, I'd like to see Sleep's hit effect improved, but the unconscious end on any damage, and that tag added to Winter's Court miss line as well.

Make it so!

The issue isn't just limited to sleep.  The following powers that cause the unconscious condition should be modified:

• sleep
• vestige of Baatar
• mind blade
• wave of sleep
• slumber of the Winter Court (miss effect)
• rune of the penultimate step
• sunder spirit
• waves of languor

Some powers that cause the unconscious condition already end or grant saves on damage, which is reasonable:

• knockout
• whispers of the Dream King
• garrote grip
• soothing song

Alternately, this could be added as a general rule for the unconscious state, as I noted here.