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Doesn't some damage have to be explained as actual wounds? How do you take poison damage from the stinger of a giant scorpion without actually being hit? I am sure there are other examples of this.
So far I have liked 4e but it seems in all of the editions (including this one) there is some disconnect between the description/mechanics of combat/healing and the description/mechanics of some monsters attacks.
What I have been trying to do, at least cosmetically, is to say an attack was "successful" rather than an attack "hit". It's not much but breaking out of that saying that we have been so ingrained with is at least helping me visualize what is actually happening.
Did you happen to check out the post I made a few posts above yours? Just because hit points can describe wounds, and things other than wounds, doesn't mean that hit point loss can't mean that it can be both of these things at the very same time. Even in real life, a wound has more effect than just the wound itself, such as morale and will power. Isn't that the basic justification of why some use injuries as part of torture when attempting to get something from them?
A storyteller isn't going to necessarily describe all of these secondary effects though, the are going to usually focus on either the most dramatic, the most obvious, or whatever supports their theme.
I'm sure we've all seen shows and movies where enemies fall over from exhaustion, a tiny poke that pushes them over the edge (but would obviously do no real damage), taking a final hit that causes them to retreat, or fall (without dying or going unconscious) and just staying down. All of us see the blows and they physical responses, but we don't see what's going on in their head.
So, as I stated earlier, people are trying to resolve a conflict between hit points being wounds and hit points also including all of these other factors, when there isn't really actually a conflict.
It isn't necessary for NPCs to follow the same rules, because hit points are an abstraction and a plot device anyway. Expecting PCs and NPCs to all have to follow the exact same rules might appeal to some simulationist nature, but it severely ties your hands as a storyteller. It's ok for heroes to follow different rules, otherwise we could never have story hooks that involved the heroes being used in order to help save a dying NPC, unless it involved a disease path and a ritual.
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Last edited by N0Man; 22nd July 2009 at 03:57 PM..
Doesn't some damage have to be explained as actual wounds? How do you take poison damage from the stinger of a giant scorpion without actually being hit? I am sure there are other examples of this.
In general minimizing does not necessarily mean "nullifying".. mostly nicks and scratches that while not necessarily 'healed' arent going to bother a hero work fine.
There are some that imply one way or another, scorpion venom
I can answer that specific one.. the halfling rogue Shinarin is a lucky hero doesnt want to think of his hide being cut even a little.. describes it thusly.
"The poison spills out of the stinger on to my armor/gear and creates on going risk because while I move about the poison or acid is shaking about and settling.. does it find that nick in my skin I got shaving the other day and/or the crack in the armor etc. saving throws may tell, whether I feel slightly woozy after the battle but I have never been been "hit".
Now his buddy is a Warlord who thinks of himself as an tough hero the same hit is definitely a skin cut with poison around the wound if not outright in it.
The bleeding wound.... ie type-less ongoing damage is hardest for the halfling to fess up to though.... as having him scramble back every round describing the damage as him being afraid of the sharp thing that "almost" just cut him is embarassing even if thematically correct for the character..
and he was making a psychological heal check too ;-), so it can be done.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Naszir
So far I have liked 4e but it seems in all of the editions (including this one) there is some disconnect between the description/mechanics of combat/healing and the description/mechanics of some monsters attacks.
What I have been trying to do, at least cosmetically, is to say an attack was "successful" rather than an attack "hit". It's not much but breaking out of that saying that we have been so ingrained with is at least helping me visualize what is actually happening.
Sure successful works nicely.(I have a fondness for a rule from Unearthed Arcana called "Players roll all the dice" so I just describe the initiation of the attack and the player gets to roll an active defense - mechanically identical for the most part.)
Well, if I want to play a realistic game, D&D is certainly not among the top choices.
Bye
Thanee
"Realistic" and "Internally consistent" are not synonyms.
Unrealistic games are oodles of fun.
Games without internal consistency force you out of the mood and slam you in the face with "It's just a game!".
Generally, players "play along" and don't push too hard at the scenery. It's part of their buy-in. But if the system forces conflicts between expectations of what "should" happen and what the rules say happens, it can be jarring and fun-ruining.
Flavor text helps. How does my Bard's singing not only heal, but move people around, even when they can't move themselves? (Forced movement ignores immobilization). I've decide that my Bard uses fragments of Supernal, and that he is "changing the song of the world" -- literally altering reality, very slightly, with each song. So when he uses Majestic Word, he is undoing the event which caused the wound he heals, and then shifting someone's position in the universe. He's hacking the system, in essence, changing the values.
Now this gets back to consistency. We were in a society where arcane users were given a lot more rights than everyone else. I claimed to be an arcane caster, and a guard said "prove it". I used Majestic Word on the unwounded guard to move him a few feet to the side. If my DM had said "You can't do that" or "It doesn't work, he doesn't need healing", it would have been very jarring, because there's no reason the power shouldn't work 'out of combat'. As it is, he allowed it, and now I've got a very useful trick -- in essence, I have "Twice every five minutes, may move a willing target five feet". I can see a lot of uses for this.
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Flavor text helps. How does my Bard's singing not only heal, but move people around, even when they can't move themselves? (Forced movement ignores immobilization).
well I might be inclined to describe it different depending on the circumstance... and it would completely depend on why they are immobilized.
But my first response was the inspiring song causes a burst of spirit which temporarily overrides the immobilization it works for me... I like a somewhat less arcane interpretation of the Bardic abilities than some do.
but
"The unicorn force is said to respond to song and wells up in listeners and the unicorn not only heals but frees all, atleast for the moment" -- and that is how my under optimized hybrid bard swordmage would describe it.
A loss of hit points can be directly due to a wound. It can also be the other effects such as fatigue, pain, morale loss, bleeding, or the ability to remain conscious and not succumb to shock. It can be both of these things at the very same time. However, that doesn't mean that you are going to (or should) hear, "your long sword draws a heavy gash across the monster's chest, and he loses... 3 points of wound hit points, 2 points of morale hit points, and 2 hit points of fatigue hit points."
Well, lets look at that for a second, shall we?
HPs include "fatigue." Reasonable to think since resting gets you back healing surges which means you get your HPs back I suppose. But lets look at things that fatigue people. Climbing, jumping and oh, say... running an ultra marathon. These things cause fatigue, do any of them cause HP loss in 4E? No. No they don't. I think it's pretty believable that someone that just ran a marathon, swam a lake, kayaked up a rapids, swung a sword for 10 minutes and climbed a cliff is not in the same fighting shape as someone who didn't. But there are no rules in 4E for physical or mental exertion reducing HPs. In previous editions exhaustion and the like often gave a penalty to attack and skill rolls. So I think it's pretty clear that HPs and fatigue are not in fact related at all.
HPs include "moral." Well whats the most obvious case of moral break? Fear. What does fear from, say, a dragon do in 4E, does it reduce HPs? No, it involves an attack penalty, much like previous editions. In some cases it involves stunning or running away, but nowhere does loss of moral cause HP damage. Likewise a successful intimidation check against bloodied opponents doesn't drop them to the ground dead. So again, it seems pretty clear HPs and moral are completely unrelated according to the actual rules of 4E.
What causes HP damage? Being hit with things, fire, hostile magic and magical effects, falling off a cliff and all things that we associate with wounding, bone breaking and the like. Additionally removal of things required to sustain human life such as starvation, suffocation and dehydration will also, unsurprisingly, cause HP loss.
Although debates like this happened in previous editions because HPs are an odd abstraction, they were nothing like what we get in 4E with the addition of the utterly bizarre healing surge mechanic which has no parallel in real life. The only answer is to accept that it has no parallel, stop trying to call it moral or make some other excuse for it being a simplification or abstraction for something because it's not. Just accept it's a game mechanic and move along. NPCs are for killing or getting plot hooks from.
Last edited by Regicide; 22nd July 2009 at 06:49 PM..
I've never felt the need to explain it, nor have players asked for an explanation. Obviously the "Damage" taken was impairing at the time, but not really that permanent.
Also remember that PCs in combat are doing all they can to minimize the deadliness of the attacks against them, that's why a sword thrust doesn't, you know, kill them instantly. So yes, it is also the fatigue of battle and avoiding all those deadly blows that lower HP. Why don't HP lower when climbing a cliff or running a marathon? Because they are a measure of how vulnerable a PC is to serious injury/death. If that threat isn't there, sure, they may get tired, but pushing it too far (which would be falling to low HP in a combat) won't result in letting their guard down so an orc can stab them fatally. In combat, that happens.
Last edited by Jack Colby; 22nd July 2009 at 07:02 PM..
HPs include "fatigue." Reasonable to think since resting gets you back healing surges which means you get your HPs back I suppose. But lets look at things that fatigue people. Climbing, jumping and oh, say... running an ultra marathon. These things cause fatigue, do any of them cause HP loss in 4E? No. No they don't. I think it's pretty believable that someone that just ran a marathon, swam a lake, kayaked up a rapids, swung a sword for 10 minutes and climbed a cliff is not in the same fighting shape as someone who didn't. But there are no rules in 4E for physical or mental exertion reducing HPs. In previous editions exhaustion and the like often gave a penalty to attack and skill rolls. So I think it's pretty clear that HPs and fatigue are not in fact related at all.
By failing skill challenges you can cut into Healing Surges. Healing Surges seem to me can be thought of as a reserve of hit points. All of the things described as fatigue can be represented by reducing healing surges as part of a failed skill challenge.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Regicide
HPs include "moral." Well whats the most obvious case of moral break? Fear. What does fear from, say, a dragon do in 4E, does it reduce HPs? No, it involves an attack penalty, much like previous editions. In some cases it involves stunning or running away, but nowhere does loss of moral cause HP damage. Likewise a successful intimidation check against bloodied opponents doesn't drop them to the ground dead. So again, it seems pretty clear HPs and moral are completely unrelated according to the actual rules of 4E.
I'll agree with you on this one.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Regicide
What causes HP damage? Being hit with things, fire, hostile magic and magical effects, falling off a cliff and all things that we associate with wounding, bone breaking and the like. Additionally removal of things required to sustain human life such as starvation, suffocation and dehydration will also, unsurprisingly, cause HP loss.
Don't forget there is psychic damage too. That causes HP damage.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Regicide
Although debates like this happened in previous editions because HPs are an odd abstraction, they were nothing like what we get in 4E with the addition of the utterly bizarre healing surge mechanic which has no parallel in real life. The only answer is to accept that it has no parallel, stop trying to call it moral or make some other excuse for it being a simplification or abstraction for something because it's not. Just accept it's a game mechanic and move along. NPCs are for killing or getting plot hooks from.
The healing surge mechanic is not that bizarre. There are some things with that are not so easily explanable but adrenaline rushes are common and so are quick recoveries. The ability of NFL players to play through great pain week in and week out is a good parallel in real life.
Absence of other fatigue causing phenomena in rules in D&D excepting wounds causing hitpoints are not evidence that they are not representing fatigue it is more evidence that the things arent considered interesting in a heroic D&D context where as wounds are considered interesting.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Regicide
Well, lets look at that for a second, shall we?
Likewise a successful intimidation check against bloodied opponents doesn't drop them to the ground dead.
Hitpoints are a buffer... intimidation is indeed not reducing your morale you are using your morale to nullify intimidation... how again does that not make sense exactly?
I would like hitpoints to act as more of a buffer for other effects than just the absolute submission
A perfect fatigue system for D&D in any version would have hitpoint loss from fatiguing activities but my experience is unless the activity is also exciting.. people just dont want to track it.
ahhh thats right I forget skill challenges reducing the healing surges... of course yes that could mean they are taking damage and being forced to use there surges to recover... or it could be a fatigue abstraction.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Regicide
Although debates like this happened in previous editions because HPs are an odd abstraction, they were nothing like what we get in 4E with the addition of the utterly bizarre healing surge mechanic which has no parallel in real life.
Except adrenaline surges that allow someone to sudden burst out of there funky state like magic, ignoring fatigue and minor pains etc ... hey they have the same word in them I wonder if just maybe they correlate.
Last edited by Garthanos; 22nd July 2009 at 09:57 PM..
The healing surge mechanic is not that bizarre. There are some things with that are not so easily explanable but adrenaline rushes are common and so are quick recoveries. The ability of NFL players to play through great pain week in and week out is a good parallel in real life.
Drugs and training are in no way a parallel to healing surges what so ever. I'll change my mind and agree with you when NFLers who are dying on a stretcher on the way to the hospital, spring up and say "put me in coach" with their concussion mysteriously gone. And they stop missing games due to injuries. Or when the commentators stop saying how the injuries from previous games are hurting a team's performance despite the fact that they've had a couple nights to get all their healing surges back.
A far better parallel to your sports analogy is when there WASN'T healing surges and you only gained back HP based on level per night so could in fact take an extended amount of time to recover completely.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Garthanos
Absence of other fatigue causing phenomena in rules in D&D excepting wounds causing hitpoints are not evidence that they are not representing fatigue it is more evidence that the things arent considered interesting in a heroic D&D context where as wounds are considered interesting.
Fatigue causing actions which are in the game not causing HPs loss is in fact evidence HPs aren't fatigue.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Garthanos
A perfect fatigue system for D&D in any version would have hitpoint loss from fatiguing activities but my experience is unless the activity is also exciting.. people just dont want to track it.
ahhh thats right I forget skill challenges reducing the healing surges.
Actually the 3E system, which is used in a lot of places actually, was pretty good with a penalty to rolls. 4Es removal of penalties, like non-profiency and sub-10 abilities is probably why exhaustion got taken out. Skill challenges reduce HPs because characters "injure themselves", like spraining ankles and falling out of trees.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Garthanos
Except adrenaline surges that allow someone to sudden burst out of there funky state like magic, ignoring fatigue and minor pains etc ... hey they have the same word in them I wonder if just maybe they correlate.
No, an adrenaline surge is what every PC has at the start of a fight when they realize their life is in danger. It prepares the body for fight or flight. Last I checked, you don't lose a healing surge for entering combat.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Garthanos
which for many of those attacks sounds very like morale loss...
Psychic damage and moral are unrelated. You're really really reaching because you have nothing to stand on. Next time someone reaches into your brain and rearranges it can argue otherwise.
Last edited by Regicide; 22nd July 2009 at 10:49 PM..
No, an adrenaline surge is what every PC has at the start of a fight when they realize their life is in danger. It prepares the body for fight or flight. Last I checked, you don't lose a healing surge for entering combat.
I have run numerous times until very winded and yup got a second wind and that is caused by yup a surge of adrenaline to overcome the muscle pain we call fatigue. The fear surges you feel often aren't at the start of the activity but when things get hairy and when you get hurt ..not just the initial flight or fight.
The lady fell down the cliff damaged incredibly and managed to travel many miles is an extremist example... because it represents a phenomena of adrenaline surges suppressing pain and which doctors says is common and more extreme than I think any hero in any story I have read experienced - maybe thats just a sign I dont read enough.(Adrenaline also gives burst speed and other effects cause its the bodies supercharger... and why I think barbarian rages should expend healing surges but that is my own issue).
Healing surges are bloody obviously a significant part of the simulation of Adrenaline Surges but they only represent part of what an adrenaline surge represents ... umm so what? its a damn good paralell and you are being disingenuous to claim otherwise (there are a group of powers whose fluff also invoke adrenal surges and pain suppression and who also interact with hitpoints and thp).
I admit I was reaching saying psychic damage seems to be morale depletion while I do mark it that way for a few Bard attacks most (are dominations and charm effects wreaking havoc).
There are also effects like Warlord healing also based around hit points being partially reflection of morale and you havent got anywhere near refuting hitpoints acting as morale in the case of intimidate attacks against the bloodied.(you fluffed around it)
The backgrounds that allow different stats to act as the basis for hit points. Is another divorcing of hit points from physical damage and a nod towards other elements.
Because hit points represent multiple things they very much cant represent any of them exactly especially in a one to one corresponding way all the things which interact with them are doomed to do so at an abstraction level.
Last edited by Garthanos; 23rd July 2009 at 01:44 AM..
This game is not at all truly and utterly not false (purley in terms of likeness to the real world and its scientific laws) and should not be super realistic.
Last edited by Flipguarder; 23rd July 2009 at 02:17 AM..
HPs include "fatigue." Reasonable to think since resting gets you back healing surges which means you get your HPs back I suppose. But lets look at things that fatigue people. Climbing, jumping and oh, say... running an ultra marathon. These things cause fatigue, do any of them cause HP loss in 4E? No. No they don't. I think it's pretty believable that someone that just ran a marathon, swam a lake, kayaked up a rapids, swung a sword for 10 minutes and climbed a cliff is not in the same fighting shape as someone who didn't. But there are no rules in 4E for physical or mental exertion reducing HPs. In previous editions exhaustion and the like often gave a penalty to attack and skill rolls. So I think it's pretty clear that HPs and fatigue are not in fact related at all.
Your claim that hit points are divorced from fatigue aren't true. Many of these examples fall into the realms of Endurance checks, and Endurance checks *can* cause loss of healing surges and hit point loss. "Climbing a cliff" wasn't specifically mentioned, but "climbing a mountain" is.
Quote:
HPs include "moral." Well whats the most obvious case of moral break? Fear. What does fear from, say, a dragon do in 4E, does it reduce HPs? No, it involves an attack penalty, much like previous editions. In some cases it involves stunning or running away, but nowhere does loss of moral cause HP damage. Likewise a successful intimidation check against bloodied opponents doesn't drop them to the ground dead. So again, it seems pretty clear HPs and moral are completely unrelated according to the actual rules of 4E.
The fact that you can't intimidate someone until they are bloodied doesn't make you think that hit point loss doesn't have *something* to do with morale? Once an NPC surrenders, is allowed to retreat their hit points don't really matter anymore.
Quote:
What causes HP damage? Being hit with things, fire, hostile magic and magical effects, falling off a cliff and all things that we associate with wounding, bone breaking and the like. Additionally removal of things required to sustain human life such as starvation, suffocation and dehydration will also, unsurprisingly, cause HP loss.
Or exhaustion from climbing a mountain, hiking through the cold, hot weather, or at a high altitude, or swimming great distances.
Or in the case of Astral Terror, reeling from divine terror.
Or in the case of Vicious Mockery, being sent into a blind rage.
Or in the case of Dishearten, having your will to fight sapped.
Or in the case of Ravening Thought, having your thoughts invaded by ideas barbed by contradictions and horrors.
Or in the case of Fortune's Reversal, having your luck and happiness turn into misfortune and sorrow.
Or in the case of Prophecy of Zhudun, having a vision flash into your mind that is so horrifying you lose track of your surroundings.
Or in the case of Spiteful Glamor, being filled with detest and loathing.
Or in the case of Dreadful Word, having your mind reel with terror.
Or in the case of Horrid Whispers, being heavily distracted and driven to obsession.
Those are just level 1 powers that have hit point loss from effects that cause fear, confusion, will power, morale and anger and similar descriptions. I left out things such as illusions or "mental blasts".
Quote:
Although debates like this happened in previous editions because HPs are an odd abstraction, they were nothing like what we get in 4E with the addition of the utterly bizarre healing surge mechanic which has no parallel in real life. The only answer is to accept that it has no parallel, stop trying to call it moral or make some other excuse for it being a simplification or abstraction for something because it's not. Just accept it's a game mechanic and move along. NPCs are for killing or getting plot hooks from.
I've always thought that having a second wind does have parallels in real life, as well as in fiction. Healing surges are really just an extended hit points pool that you can't have all at once. Now I can't say that healing overnight has a parallel in real life, but neither does shooting magical fireballs and killing dragons.
But frankly, I'm baffled as to why this is even a debate. The game designers came out and said that it's not *just* wounds. They didn't imply it. They didn't hint at it. They flat out stated it. They gave examples of it. They flavored powers based on it.
Now if you don't like that, fine. If you don't want it to be like that in your game, fine. But for you to come in here and tell everyone that they are wrong for defining a game term in the very way that the game designer said that the game term is defined is absolutely ludicrous.
Furthermore, I'm completely and utterly confounded how the very people who refuse to see hit points as anything other than wounds then turn around and rail against the powers that don't fit their view. Of course it's not going to. If you reject the game designer's usage of the term, then of course some of the applications of that term aren't going to make sense.
You can say you don't like this representation, but saying this representation isn't true is nonsense.
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In a game where you have magic that can raise the dead, create things out of nothing, spontaneously regenerate any creature....
....there is a problem of suspension of disbelief that someone might -actually- use these things outside of battle, and that such a system could be explained as easily as 'You heal to full at the end of each extended rest.'
Seriously, some people -really- need to learn rational places to draw their lines of versimilliatude.
We're playing a video game. I don't really have to explain it, and there's no WAY to explain it that is remotely logical. But it's fun and i don't really mind that it doesn't mirror real life. In reality, D&D heroes would be stone cold dead after one stab from a kobold with a rusty kitchen knife.
I would like it though if surges didn't recharge so fast, that would help the suspension of disbelief more.
In a game where you have magic that can raise the dead, create things out of nothing, spontaneously regenerate any creature....
....there is a problem of suspension of disbelief that someone might -actually- use these things outside of battle, and that such a system could be explained as easily as 'You heal to full at the end of each extended rest.'
Seriously, some people -really- need to learn rational places to draw their lines of versimilliatude.
Stop with the generic insults, thanks.
The issue as portrayed crops up in all-martial parties, with no magic around at all. I can understand how this would cause annoyance to people wanting to have a semblance of verisimilitude.
For me personally, in 4e I just ignore it. The only wounds that get described are killing wounds and that's it. The system is too abstract for me to worry about doing more (this has been true for all D&D IMX).
If I want descriptive wounds and a slightly higher level of verisimilitude, I turn to RQ2 where "You hack his arm off" is a meaningful result in combat which can be fast and bloody!
Cheers
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"It makes as much sense as having Batman kill his parents and then go on to fight mutants from another dimension." - Rykion
Wow, I make a post and come back 2 days later and see there are 4 pages worth of responses. Never expected that.
Time to start reading. But I too have been using the John McClain style descriptions.
Here was a recent email to my players after a game:
Quote:
Thorgim and Rix take turns on watch, letting Kadius get rested. The night goes by uneventful other than odd noises that only manage to make you paranoid.
Rix does all he can to rub off the acid that left his leathers scarred and discolored. His skin is still peeling from it ... like a bad sunburn.
You all get a good rest, and by morning, despite being bruised and battered, you are filled with determination to find your friend.
Kadius finishes wrapping his torso with scraps of cloth taken from whats left of his cloak. His back had taken the brunt of the acid burns as the acid made its way down through small openings in his scale armor.
He puts on his armor, grabs his sword and shield, and stands ready. "They caught us off guard. This time we will have the upper hand." He says with renewed energy.
"I like your confidence, but I saw many Kobolds. We may end up prisoners as well ... or worse." Rix says as he restores all his daggers to their proper locations.
"Take heart, this happened for a reason. Fate takes strange turns, but we may be right where we need to be." Thorgrim picks up his shield and looks ready to move.
"I hope you're right," Rix replies. "Follow me, and stay silent."
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