Fatemaster characters' death

[Purzel]

I have another rules question, and probably, hopefully, you will point me to the parts of the Rulebook (2nd Ed.) that clarifies it.

How do Fated kill Fatemaster characters (FMC) (or knock them unconcious)?

1. Any FMC of rank Enforcer or higher will never fall unconcious as a result of Wounds < 0.

2. Hard to kill FMC -> same as 1.

3. Non-living FMCs (Undead, Constructs, Spirits...) never gain Bleeding Out

4. I understand the only way characters die is by reaching Bleeding Out+10, a coup de grace (only for unconcious chars) or the Bloody Mess critical (I assume, it doesn't even say so, it just says it is somewhat unpleasant to behold). Yeah, and because of some other effects, like diseases or curses and such.

So, how do the Fated kill Enforcers+?

Do they have to add up damage and be lucky for the repeated draw of high cards to reach Bloody Mess on the Severe Table? Some of the lower effects have Bleeding Out or Unconciousness Challenges but the latter don't affect Enforcers+ and the former only Living FMC.

How about only bringing Enforcers+ down, because the Fated don't want to kill them?

Theoretically, non-living Enforcers+ can withstand any amount of damage until they finally explode in a gory mess. Maybe they lose a couple of limbs in the process, but they stand (Black Knight Style) and fight until they are reduced to a puddle... Is that the intention of the rules or what am I missing again?

[solkan]

1 hour ago, Purzel said:

How about only bringing Enforcers+ down, because the Fated don't want to kill them?

The section on Unsconsciousness Challenges on page 313 is probably a bit poorly organized, and thus a bit misleading.

There are three sources of Unconscious tests:

• If a character receives damage and as a result they are at 0 or fewer wounds, they take an Unconscious test and suffer a Critical Effect.  
  • This is the test that living minions and peons automatically fail, and enforcers etc. automatically pass.
    • If you have Hard to Kill and use it to ignore the Critical Effect, that also causes you to ignore the Unconscious test if you have one at the same time.  Hard to Kill doesn't make you immune to Unconscious tests.
• Critical effects may specify an Unconscious test.
• All of the assorted stuff that says 'take an Unconscious test' like a spell, manifest power, the result of "I buy chloroform and knock the target out", etc.

That's what the last paragraph in that section is trying to point out, when it calls things like Unsconsiousness tests specified on the critical effects chart.  Honestly, it probably would have been simpler to just specify that the TN10 Unconscious test is basically rigged when dealing with Fatemaster characters at 3+Rank Value.  🤷‍♀️  (It'd still have to have the thing about ignoring the Unconscious test coincidental to an ignored critical effect, I suppose.)

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I think it's worth pointing out that the idea of "beating someone until they're unconscious" is a terrible idea due to the medical risks.  But once a character is down to 0, it should be much easier to tie up or otherwise incapacitate them.

Most of the time, the objective is "subdue and incapacitate the subject".  When the characters get to the point of "Give up, or we're going to be forced to beat you to death" that's a good time for factors like Intimidation or Persuasion to kick in.  

Is there an effective way to "knock out" an incapacitated zombie or construct?  That's probably a good applied knowledge skill test for a necromancer or engineer.  👿