Extra Life - I get knocked down, I get up again?

[Kromm]

It will depend on what you're facing – not all versions of Extra Life for monsters are created equal.

The golem-armor swordsman is the only monster in the set that has the trait as standard. It's supposed to be slow and take time to get back up, but it can also be programmed to do so slasher-movie style, when nobody is looking. Thus, it takes a turn to get to its knees and a second turn to get to its feet as a step (probably with Attack). With DR 17, High Pain Threshold, and a tendency to be Berserk and not defend anyway, it isn't so easy to wipe out casually during the one turn it's obviously moving and on its knees.

But sure, some monsters might work differently.

I could see anything that flies into small bits at death reassembling on its feet. I'd handle a creature made of bugs or links of chain or loose bones that way: The bugs, links, or bones zip back together as if someone hit "rewind," and then the monster is standing the way it was just before it went down.

I could see a lot of monsters beginning their Extra Life in another form!

A lich might go down as a lich but come back as a levitating skull . . . which, since it can levitate and doesn't have prone and kneeling postures, simply rises into the air. It might even have enough air Move to streak out of reach on the turn it reanimates.

A zombie whose animating spirit returns as a poltergeist after the body is destroyed wouldn't have a second material form. Its evil presence would commence being evil, and present, on the next turn . . . but it an abstract way that defies posture and movement. It would go from being a material monster to being a sort of curse that can't be physically attacked at all.

On the other hand, an infected living person who's a de facto zombie might stay prone on the ground for hours or days before coming back as an undead zombie. In that case, the trick is in convincing the players they've killed their foes for good, only to have the heroes come back through the battlefield later in the adventure and find it repopulated. That's mostly a "meta" justification for having two zombie fights in the same area with any logical way to bring in reinforcements.