History Main / CombatResuscitation

For team-based multiplayer games, these solutions aren't always viable: it would be frustrating for your team to be forced to continue the mission by themselves with a man down, not to mention how boring it would be for the dead player to be forced to wait for them to finish. To remedy this, such games may opt for the CombatResuscitation mechanic: characters who run out of HitPoints are not immediately removed from the game, instead being put in a helpless state where they aren't of much use to their team, but can be revived by a teammate and brought back into the fight.

* "VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft" has five classes capable of resurrecting others, and/or themselves during combat. Druids have the ability Rebirth, which targets a single player and restores them to life. Warlocks have the use of a soulstone to either use upon themselves, or on another player. Paladins in the Dragonflight expansion have the ability Intercession. Death Knights have Raise Ally, which they can resurrect a friendly player, but leave them with a flavor debuff. Shamans have a self battle rez called Reincarnation, which they can use to return to life upon death. It has a 30 minute cooldown, but cools down 75% faster while at full health.

* "[[VideoGame/Worldofwarcraft]]" has five classes capable of resurrecting others, and/or themselves during combat. Druids have the ability Rebirth, which targets a single player and restores them to life. Warlocks have the use of a soulstone to either use upon themselves, or on another player. Paladins in the Dragonflight expansion have the ability Intercession. Death Knights have Raise Ally, which they can resurrect a friendly player, but leave them with a flavor debuff. Shamans have a self battle rez called Reincarnation, which they can use to return to life upon death. It has a 30 minute cooldown, but cools down 75% faster while at full health.

* "VideoGame/Worldofwarcraft" has five classes capable of resurrecting others, and/or themselves during combat. Druids have the ability Rebirth, which targets a single player and restores them to life. Warlocks have the use of a soulstone to either use upon themselves, or on another player. Paladins in the Dragonflight expansion have the ability Intercession. Death Knights have Raise Ally, which they can resurrect a friendly player, but leave them with a flavor debuff. Shamans have a self battle rez called Reincarnation, which they can use to return to life upon death. It has a 30 minute cooldown, but cools down 75% faster while at full health.

* In ''VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown'', soldiers have a small chance upon taking "fatal" damage where instead of dying ([[{{Permadeath}} which is irreversible]]), they become "critically wounded", where they'll still out of action, but if someone can stabilize them with a Medkit or the mission can be completed within three turns before they bleed out and die for real, they can be saved and recover at the med-bay. The "Revive" ability of [[SupportPartyMember Support]] soldiers allows them to use a Medkit to get the soldier back up and running again to continue the fight, though they will still need time to recover if they manage to complete the mission.

* In ''VideoGame/XComEnemyUnknown'', soldiers have a small chance upon taking "fatal" damage where instead of dying ([[{{Permadeath}} which is irreversible]]), they become "critically wounded", where they'll still out of action, but if someone can stabilize them with a Medkit or the mission can be completed within three turns before they bleed out and die for real, they can be saved and recover at the med-bay. The "Revive" ability of [[SupportPartyMember Support]] soldiers allows them to use a Medkit to get the soldier back up and running again to continue the fight, though they will still need time to recover if they manage to complete the mission.

* ''VideoGame/{{Fortnite}}'' Battle Royale restricts this to team-based modes ''without'' respawning, leading to odd cases in certain [=LTMs=] where being KO'd early in the match counts as an immediate [[NonLethalKO elimination]], but later in that same match you can crawl around for several seconds first because SuddenDeath has begun and respawning is no longer an option.

* A variation: In ''Videogame/TeamFortress2'' Mann vs. Machine, after you die it is possible for a Medic on your team to use his medigun to instantly revive you, bypassing the usual respawn timer. After reviving you are also located exactly where you died, rather than on the usual spawn point next to the upgrade station.

** In ''Advanced Warfighter'', downed teammates will bleed out and die unless healed by the player or a medic within a minute or so. In the sequel, you only have five medkits to do so per mission.

** In ''VideoGame/TeamKirbyClashDeluxe'', defeated characters can be revived by standing near them and pressing Y.

* In both ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil5'' ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil6'', if a player or their partner gets critically injured by attacks which are not OneHitKill, they will enter the "Dying" status. A dying player can be healed with the help of a partner (or fully healed if the partner is carrying a First Aid Spray), and the time limit of bleedout depends on the difficulty level.

* In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil5'', if a player or their partner gets critically injured by attacks which are not OneHitKill, they will enter the "Dying" status. A dying player can be healed with the help of a partner (or fully healed if the partner is carrying a First Aid Spray), and the time limit of bleedout depends on the difficulty level.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTactics'' has a rare single-player example of this trope: characters who run out of health are knocked down, and have a timer appear above them. If you don't revive them or end the fight before it reaches zero, they suffer {{Permadeath}} and turn into a crystal which can be used by another unit to heal themselves.

In most games, running out of HitPoints means your character [[CriticalExistenceFailure dies instantly]], or at least suffers a NonLethalKO. The consequences of this are usually either [[VideoGameLives losing a life]], being sent back to the nearest {{Checkpoint}}, having to reload your save file, or sometimes [[FinalDeath being forced to start the whole game all over again]].

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTactics'' has a rare single-player example of this trope: characters who run out of health are knocked down, and have a timer appear above them. If you don't revive them or end the fight before it reaches zero, they suffer FinalDeath and turn into a crystal which can be used by another unit to heal themselves.

* VideoGame/DawnOfWar II: In the campaign, downed heroes can be revived by having another hero go to them and revive them (in the orks' case, presumably by kicking him in the fork), or be in range of someone using a medpack. If every hero is downed, the level ends with everyone getting an emergency teleport. In Retribution's ork campaign, this leads to the particularly amusing combo of using Brikkfist to crash into the enemy and fight until dead, detonate a bomb hidden on his body, then use Spookums' grappling hook to drag him away where he can be revived safely.

In 3.5e and {{TabletopGame/((Pathfinder}} which is based on those rules, a character who is given first aid or healing magic to stabilize them can recover hit points naturally even if their HP is still negative, a character who is NOT given first aid has to make three rolls to start recovering HP and will lose 1 HP if they fail the roll, first they have to make one roll every combat round, then they have roll every hour to become conscious (with severe penalties), then they have to roll every day to finally start healing.

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* ''VideoGame/DragonMarkedForDeath'': The playable characters get four "lives" in the sense that if they die, they can revive up to three times during said mission, either immediately upon pressing the button prompt or automatically after a few seconds (which can come in handy with invincibility frames to avoid a particularly dangerous attack). After that last life, they fail the mission and go back to the hub world minus any items they picked up from chests and any gold they would have obtained from completing the mission (though they are allowed to keep the experience and gold obtained from killing enemies or picked up respectively, and any consumable items used will be returned). It's recommended to avoid relying on this, however, as each subsequent revive lowers the total amount of bonus experience earned from completing the mission on top of killing the enemies.

* ''VideoGame/DragonMarkedForDeath'': The playable characters get four "lives" in the sense that if they die, they can revive up to three times during said mission, either immediately upon pressing the button prompt or automatically after a few seconds (which can come in handy with invincibility frames to avoid a particularly dangerous attack). After that last life, they fail the mission and go back to the hub world minus any experience from killing enemies or items they picked up from chests. It's recommended to avoid relying on this, however, as each subsequent revive lowers the total amount of bonus experience earned from completing the mission on top of killing the enemies.