Death Mechanics

A window, titled You ran out of Health!, displaying the character and an empty health bar on the right, along with the following text on the right: Don't Despair! You lost a Level, your Gold, and a piece of Equipment, but you can get them all back with hard work! Good luck--you'll do great — The death alert pop-up message on the website

As players fail to complete Dailies or fall into bad Habits, they will lose health points (HP). When players run out of health, they "die", and get a pop-up message showing their avatar, without their current pet or mount.

After death, the player is revived with full HP. They lose the following:

One level, plus all XP they had accumulated toward the next level
One attribute point from a random attribute, which is regained when they regain the level (it will have to be re-assigned)
All of their gold points (GP)
One piece of equipment, chosen at random

There are no other effects of death.

Since the game's inception, the concept of dying has been under active debate. Should it be easier or harder? More punishing or less punishing? Should it be customizable? Please share any thoughts on the Trello discussion thread.

Sudden, Unexpected Death

A window containing all of the same information as the website pop-up, the differences being that the health bar and image of the character appear above the death message, and the window is missing the tips message. — The death alert message, as shown on Habitica's iOS app.

If players died unexpectedly, here are some common explanations:

They are in a boss battle, and one (or several) of their party members' missed Dailies dealt a large amount of damage. They can check this by looking at the party's chat page. Click the "Fetch Recent Messages" button next to the "Send Chat" button to see all messages.
A player's own Dailies caused more damage than expected. Powerful bosses can cause missed Dailies to deal several times as much damage as usual. Dailies that have turned red or been marked as Hard deal much more damage than Easy or blue Dailies.
Players clicked too many negative Habits.
Players are using a browser extension that monitors their browsing habits and subtracts Health for lingering on bad websites (e.g., Chrome Extension).
The web page failed to sync with the server, causing players to take damage for some of yesterday's Dailies even though they completed them. Look at the streaks -- any Daily that doesn't show a streak of at least 1 was treated as if it was missed. Refer to Sync Errors for ways to minimize sync errors.

If none of those apply, players may want to file a bug report in the Report a Bug guild or using the report a bug option in one of the mobile apps.

Undoing Death

If the death was truly unjust, players can restore their level, GP, and XP using the Fix Character Values button in Settings. They can also add extra GP to repurchase the equipment they lost.

Examples of unjust deaths include:

Sync errors that caused a player to take damage from Dailies that they actually completed, or that prevented them from resting at the Inn.
Bugs, such as Cron occurring at the wrong time.
Medical or life emergencies or internet outages that prevented the player from getting online.
Accidentally clicking on a negative Habit.
Boss damage caused by another party member for any of these reasons, because damage received by party members cannot be prevented or mitigated by any means.

It's up to each player to decide what constitutes a fair death and to resist abusing the power of "Fix Character Values".

Lost Equipment

The piece of equipment that is lost upon death is randomly chosen from among the equipment that is specific to the player's current class and equipment that is not class-specific (e.g., the Enchanted Armoire equipment). Equipment from other classes and free items will remain safe.

Lost equipment can be re-purchased in the Market. It will also be automatically pinned to a player's Rewards. This includes special and limited-time items that are no longer available to new players.

If the piece of equipment that is lost is class-specific, but not the ultimate gear, then it must be repurchased before better equipment in that tier can be bought (or repurchased).

Free equipment cannot be lost since that would give an unfair advantage to subscribers who own many free Mystery Items.

If an item that is currently being worn is lost, then the starter item for that type of equipment will be equipped, replacing the lost equipment as the player's worn equipment.

In case the piece of equipment that is lost is class-specific and the player changed class afterwards, e.g. Orb of Rebirth, then they will not be able to purchase that equipment back. They still need to be in the correct class to buy that particular class-specific equipment.

Past Version

The website's and iOS app's earlier version of the Death Mechanic had the player being visited by the Grim Reaper of Habitica. The Grim Reaper has now retired.

Strategies for Staying Alive

Healing Options

The main way to heal is to gain a level, which restores all of a player's HP.
Players can purchase a Health Potion in the Rewards area for 25 GP. It immediately restores 15 HP. In most cases, this will cost less than dying!
Healers can restore HP using the skills Healing Light (for themselves) or Blessing (for the entire party).
Players can purchase a Fortify Potion using gems, which restores all of their HP (as well as providing other benefits).

Skills

Certain classes possess skills other than direct healing that can help mitigate damage.

The Rogue skill Stealth allows players to avoid damage from some, or all, missed Dailies.
The Warrior skill Brutal Smash reduces the redness of a non-challenge Daily/Habit, reducing the damage taken from missing it. The Healer skill Searing Brightness has similar effects, but affects all of the non-challenge tasks at once.
The Healer skill Protective Aura buffs Constitution, reducing damage taken by missed Dailies and negative Habits. The Warrior skills Defensive Stance and Intimidating Gaze buff Constitution as well, but to a lesser extent.
Mages can obtain extra XP by using Burst of Flames, and Rogues can do so with Backstab. This can help players if they are close to leveling up, which will restore all HP.

Pause the Game

If a player needs to take a break (for example, during an illness or vacation), it is possible to avoid damage from all uncompleted Dailies by Resting in the Inn. It is also possible to manually disable some or all Dailies by changing their Start Date to a future date.

If a player is participating in a quest against a boss, their uncompleted Dailies will not cause any damage to them or their party members while they're in the Inn. However, they will still take boss damage caused by other party members' incomplete Dailies.

Build in Easy Points

Because a player regains all health upon leveling up, adding easy Habits, Dailies, and To-Dos can make the game easier. The extra XP increases a player's chance of leveling up before dying, and the extra gold can be spent on health potions. For example, a player who is very consistent about cleaning their home may not consider adding it as a task, but doing so would help them avoid death.

Become, or Party with, a Healer

The Healer's primary attribute is Constitution, which reduces the damage taken by uncompleted Dailies and negative Habits. Their skills include solo and party healing as well as a party defense buff.

Because of the way character HP are calculated, a healer may also be able to revive "dead" characters before death takes them. For example, upon seeing that a party member has -5 HP, a healer can quickly cast Blessing to revive the party mate before that players' Cron takes effect (and kills their character).

Additional Strategies

Need more help to avoid dying? See the Obstacles page.

Reviving

After death, the player can revive by clicking the Continue button on the site or the Revive button on the mobile app. The player's health will then be restored back to 50.

Altering the Death Mechanic

It is possible to organize Habits and Dailies so that it is impossible to die. Players can also set self-imposed rules that allow them to skirt some deaths, or partially restore their GP or stats following a death. Beware -- using this method may also reduce motivation to keep up with good Habits.

Optional Alterations

Make a rule that death costs a set amount of GP, rather than removing all GP. This is especially helpful if players are saving up for a very long-term reward and don't want one death to undo weeks or months of progress. Use Fix Character Values to restore the GP that shouldn't have been lost according to the rule.
If players want to ensure they always have the opportunity to purchase Health Potions before death, make all Dailies into Habits (click + if it was completed and - if not).

Immortality

If the threat of death does not make habits more fun or motivating, it can be removed:

Disable the repeat feature on Dailies. Make sure all days of the week are disabled. The player does not lose HP on disabled Dailies (this also means that streaks will never be lost).
Use only positive Habits.
Do not join boss quests, which can cause players to take damage from party members' missed Dailies.

Players can replace HP loss with GP loss by creating custom rewards that correspond to bad Habits or missed Dailies. Use these fines as punishments and lose GP if a task is not completed.

Special Cases

A Level 1 character who dies will lose all their XP, but will remain at Level 1.
A level 10 character who dies after changing classes will retain their new class.
A character who drops below the level at which they gained a skill will lose that skill until they regain the required level (e.g., Healers gain the Healing Light skill at level 11, and will temporarily lose it if they drop to level 10 or below).
A character who dies while affected by a buff will retain the buff when they revive.
A character who has never allocated any attribute points will not lose one when they die, but also won't gain one when they level up.