I would guess because it has awkward rules interactions so its another layer of crap to deal with.

5E (which this looks like) doesn’t tend to do negatives for species. Centaurs actually do have one of the rare ones, but it’s only that climbing is more difficult for you, so it’s very rare. I think the reasoning is just that the features centaurs do get are basically completely useless to a normal wizard build - a charge ability to get you into melee where wizards don’t want to be, natural weapons for all the punching wizards don’t do, and a bunch of skills tied to an ability score that wizards don’t need

Think of the unbridled roleplay potential.

Also maybe take Artificer to build yourself an iron lung.

They’d be a lot weaker if they weren’t a centaur. Sure 2 HP isn’t much, but all it takes is a party tank with Mounted Combatant and you can’t be hit by an attack and will take no damage on a successful Dex save (and half damage on a failed save).

Unfortunately in 5e at least, your minimum is always 1 added.

That being said, yeah you’d actually have 2/3 chance of being irrecoverably dead. I think RAW the only thing that would help is true resurrection

Funnily enough, I don’t think even True Resurrection would save you in that case.

The spell resurrects anyone except people who have died of old age, and dying by negative hit points would count as old age IMO. Even if you go ahead and cast it, the spell doesn’t alter your HP in any way, so you’d be resurrected with negative HP and die anyway.

Think your kinda square and rectangling here, you die of old age, you have hp max of zero or lower, but there are other ways to have your maximum HP altered that aren’t related to old age.

My thought there was it can make a new body, you could make a body with a better con, or in a body of another creature type. This is something that happens in DND lore, although is not described mechanically in 5e that I can think of.

If it’s an old age thing, then reincarnate should cover it.

Then figure out/haggle with your DM for what stats should/would be for the age you come back as.

And how often are you going to be climbing in combat, where it would matter that it takes them two and a half times as long to climb?

I think the reasoning is just that the features centaurs do get are basically completely useless to a normal wizard build

The fact that you can have a Tank with Mounted Combatant riding you is very useful to a normal wizard build.

I’d say the biggest downside is getting left behind when everyone moves at twice their pace for an hour. The guy you’re carrying is riding you, so they can move double the distance for the first hour, but since you don’t have a mount you can’t keep up. Though in the 2024 version of the rules, it says “the group” has to have mounts, so I guess nobody can move fast and it’s not as silly as in 2014.

And how often are you going to be climbing in combat

Not often at all, that’s why I don’t think it’s the reason they picked centaur

The fact that you can have a Tank with Mounted Combatant riding you is very useful to a normal wizard build.

It’s definitely a valid approach, but it’s worth remembering that player centaurs are only medium-sized so the rider actually loses the advantage against medium-sized enemies that Mounted Combatant would otherwise give them. It’s not useless by any means, especially if the centaur takes Protection (although that would require grabbing a fighting style one way or another too), but I’d be surprised if it was all that much better than just having the rider on a regular horse and the wizard not in melee. The wizard does still have to actually pass the dex saves, after all, and this one is not going to be doing that very often

The thing about centaurs requiring their own mounts to keep up is pretty damn funny

If anyone sneezes while in the same room as this wizard, he’s gonna have to roll for damage.