This may have been asked before but I am running into a dilemma when players in my groups suffer harm. Here is the scenario…
A player was choked unconscious by an enemy in combat. That player was assigned level 3 harm and is considered based on the rules ” incapacitated and can’t do anything unless you have help from someone else or push yourself to perform the action”.
This player chose to do nothing as they were choked out and it wouldn’t have made sense. It feels like I am stuck with a character who is now invincible as they are never going to take an action and therefore never open to a consequence. It reads as though the player can’t do anything unless they have help or push themselves, meaning, if they chose to do neither, they can forfeit taking an action.
The way I understand the game to be played is that the GM doesn’t take actions for the NPC’s and consequences are only assigned to the player taking that action and any players assisting. Therefore, a player who never takes an action is effectively unkillable.
I can see in a situation where a player simply chose not to fight maybe they stand in the corner while the gang is attacking their friends and do nothing. Maybe in that spot I make the guard attack them and they roll finesse or something appropriate to avoid the attack or suffer the consequence. However, doing this to a character that is incapacitated seems severely unfair considering they have no way of defending themselves.
I am sure there is a way around this but I continuously get stuck here when GMing sessions and am not sure how to threaten death on anyone for making mistakes as when they receive level 3 harm they can simply not act.
Is the solution to have an NPC attack them? Again, if so, I feel like that goes against the spirit of the game in having the player’s rolls determine the outcome.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. We all love playing the game and are just looking to fully grasp the mechanics.