In the Auntie Ethel boss fight, if you get her below 20 health, on her next turn, she will try to bargain with you to safe her life, and you can get a powerful item, that you do not get if you just murder her.
So this is useful for bringing her down, without risking killing her on an accidental crit or just being careless
But if you accidentally get her to zero nonlethally, will she get up and negotiate with you? Or will she just lay there forever and/or immediately resume hostilities to the death?
In other words, what's the difference between using non-lethal attacks vs using attacks that just don't do a lot of damage?