But, unfortunately, Hit Point loss, has never fully represented taking physical damage. Not with OD&D, 1e, 2e, 3.x, PF, 4e, not with any of them. Hit points have always been a very abstract concept that includes a bunch of factors, including, but certainly not limited to, physical health, mental health, endurance, vitality, ability to mitigate damage, glancing blows, luck, etc.
Actually, in 3.5, here's what it says in the PHB:
3.5 Player's Handbook said:
What Hit Points Represent: Hit points mean two things in the game world: the ability to take physical punishment and keep going, and the ability to turn a serious blow into a less serious one. For some characters, hit points may represent divine favor or inner power. When a paladin survives a fireball, you will be hard pressed to convince bystanders that she doesn't have the favor of some higher power.
It's clear to me, in the opening sentence, that what hit points represent isn't a variety of factors, like it had been explained in past editions. Personally, I think the reason for this change in 3.X was that hit points had never been treated differently than how 3.X describes them. That is, a "poison, injury" hits you no matter how much hit points you have, as long as I deal 1 damage. Why is that? Because the game treats HP as meat, and 3.X acknowledged it. 4e is closer to the roots of the game by switching back, but it's another direct change away from 3.X that a lot of people took subtle but important notice of, because the implications are large.
I'm not going to respond to everything you've written, mainly because I believe we're pretty close to being on the same page. I appreciate your being civil as well, and your willingness to agree to disagree. In the end, I like your sig, as it pretty much sums up my feelings.
Cool
This is certainly correct. More simulation = more abstraction. More gamey = less abstraction. Abstraction isn't a bad thing, per se, but too much interferes with the actual game play.
Um, I'd argue that the more abstraction you have, the less it could potentially interfere with game play. That's why we have an increasing number of games go rules "lite" on us, really. It says, "here are some very basic, abstract rules. Now, we won't bog you down in the little stuff. Wing it, and enjoy the game instead of looking up rules." I don't like rules "lite" games too much, but I certainly see the appeal. And they rely heavily on abstraction.
And this might be the difference. Immersion, for my regular group, comes secondary to having fun. We certainly enjoy immersion, don't get me wrong, but if it interferes with other things that make the game fun for us, we're willing to let a bit go. This is where the suspension of disbelief comes in. I have players in my group that run the gamut as well. For one of my players, he shows up at our games because he wants to "Kill some
." I have another player who doesn't particularly care for the combat system of 4e, but loves how unrestricted it is (with regards to alignment, and other "forced RP" mechanics of older systems) for RP, so he's willing to deal with the combat system for the immersion it gives him in other areas. My other players fall somewhere in between. As for me, as a player, I don't care what system I'm playing, I just want to play. As a DM, well, at this point, I won't DM anything but 4e, but I have other reasons for that, none of which have anything to do with the HS mechanic.
That all makes sense to me. It doesn't reflect my group, but hey, tastes differ, and I'm okay with that. Tear stuff up with your group.
Whole heartedly agree. My group is in that category.
I thought you might be
Most games can get away without a real heave base in realism. A tabletop RPG, like D&D, really can't. That's sort of the point of the game. My problem is rules that attempt to emulate reality by sacrificing fun.
This is where my view differs. If you have a basis in realism, with nods to realism all over your game, and then you seemingly knowingly abandon it for a mechanic for ease of use, our group gets pulled out of immersion pretty quickly. That pulls us out of the game, and out of the fun.
This is why every successful MMO (sorry to bring up video games, it's just a good example) doesn't have permanent death. And in most cases, their explanation was extremely half-assed. Star Wars Galaxies was one of the worst, if you've ever played that. They added "clone resurrection" in a world where nothing like this was ever mentioned in any movie, book, or source material. (I know, clones exsist, but the idea of cloning yourself after you die, did not.) But they knew that the game wouldn't be fun if you had to start over everytime you died.
Well, to be fair, I've never seen an MMO that I could immerse in. So, it's not really they're goal. Immersion was key to my design goals when I was designing my game. And, it really shows in the rules, in my opinion. It's obviously not the case for MMOs. MMOs can be a lot of fun, as can CRPGs, but I don't play them, personally, to feel immersed. That is, however, what my group plays fantasy PnP RPGs for.
I know many people disagree, but the Healing Surge Stick (aka. Wand of CLW) and required Cleric made the game less fun for me and my group. Hence, I'm ok with healing surges, even if they aren't realistic. And removing magic shops and not handing out Wand of CLW won't work if your players are more than willing to make them, and mine were.
And while I played 3.X for years, we had groups without healers of any kind, and we literally
never used a wand of CLW. In fact, I think we used a wand maybe in three or four encounters total, in thousands of hours of game play. So, I probably don't agree on the nature of their necessity to the game.
But, my group is okay with avoiding or going without combat, too. We started a new campaign (new setting included), and we've played four real sessions so far. Each session lasts about ten hours. In those four sessions and 40 hours of play, there have been two combats. Both combats only involved one player, and they lasted one round (first combat), and four rounds (second combat). In the party of six players, two are completely built around combat, three are adept but built around other things (thief lord, amazing craftsmen, amazing negotiator), and one is just now getting decent at defending himself (chancellor / interrogator).
The point of our sessions is to immerse in the characters, see what story unfolds from the evolving setting, and experience interesting play, whether that's fighting a mercenary unit with other mercenaries you've hired, or if it's talking them into leaving you alone. The party has talked their way out of more fights, and purposefully avoided more fights, simply because they want a higher chance of success in the long term. I'm not sure that this would mesh well with your group, but it works for us. It's never been about killing stuff and taking their things (even though it's kind of what they want to do on the macro scale... they're warlords).
Just wanted to make a quick comment on this. According to all pre-4e rulesets, if my players have a Wand of CLW with enough charges, they could continue literally indefinately, without stopping for sleep/rest. Of course, the magic users wouldn't get their spells back, but the melee classes would never have to stop, ever. 4e gives each character a set amount of endurance. When you're out of HS, you pretty much need to stop. Now, before you comment, I know, the dual health, vitality system you proposed would fix this, but without it (like we are now) 4e means you must rest. 3e and prior, you don't.
That's not what I meant by sleep. The context was in terms of the assumption of sleep alone denotes a nod towards realism that will drastically effect game play.
Additioanlly, your experience is vastly different from mine, but we didn't use wands of CLW. And if we had, my players would have wanted to save the charges on the wands, which means using easily renewable resources, like spell slots. Which means resting.
One of the biggest selling points of 4e to me was the cinematic feel of everything. John McClane in Die Hard should have been incapacitated after the first 20 minutes of the movie. Instead, he lasted the entire length of the movie and defeated the BBEG, Professor Snape.
It really takes away from that feel if my players have to go back to town to rest at the inn for 2 weeks after every 3 or 4 encounters. I'd quit a game like that, so would my players. Again, we're willing to suspend some disbelief to have that slightly over-the-top, cinematic feel.
Whereas I think that type of game is possible with two health pools. If his "other" pool is the only thing that gets injured, you have cinematic combat. If it hits your "physical" pool, you don't get that. It leaves options for both stories to be told. Now, that's not the case. It's all Diehard, all the time. Sometimes I want Conan the Barbarian. Yes, he was a badass in that movie. Yes, he did get beaten down by a bunch of fanatics at then "crucified on the Tree of Woe." Literally, a bunch of random snake cult fanatics just dogpiled on him and he was done. I'm cool enough with Conan to accept both that possibility, and the possibility that I'm about to kill 40 guys on horseback with just me and my thief friend. I want both possibilities in my game.
What I don't want to see in any edition of the game, which 4e did come closer to, was the "cinematic" feel at the very early levels. I don't want to see level 1's expect to be John McClane. You want to do cinematic stuff? I'm okay with that after the first few levels. Say, level 5-6. Then again, in my game, I place the average settled adult NPC at around hit die 4 (in a system that caps at 20). This is all just personal preference, though. If I say, "I don't want this" or "I want this" it doesn't mean I think it's what's best for the hobby. It means it's my preference.
Again, my players characters are heroes in the vein of any fantasy/action movie. In LotR, sure, Frodo had to rest after he got stabbed by the Nazgul, but after that point, he never had much of an extended break. Any real person wouldn't have been able to do what he did. They make the setting progress (either by actively affecting it, or choosing not to participate in something). The setting doesn't make my players progress.
Well, LotR basically did something I touched on: how much story happened in the world between the time Frodo and Sam got separated, and the time they got captured by Faramir? Or, between the time they got released by him, and the time they reached the pit to throw the ring into? By having to walk everywhere, they're letting time pass, the setting evolve, and story is happening. Which is one of the things I touched on.
As far as continuing on with wounds received, I'm okay with that as long as your "physical" pool isn't depleted. If you have 25 "physical" hit points and 60 "other" hit points, and your physical hit points get depleted down to 4, you can still move about for all I care. You're super messed up, though. But you can heroically carry on, if you think it's more important than healing (as many heroes will).
Bolded is the key for me. That's not heroic. That's normal. Characters aren't normal. They are heroes. I agree with a lot of the travel stuff, but at a certain point, there's no reason why an 18th level wizard (thinking 3e and prior) can't go pretty much wherever he wants to go. He's practically a god in anything else he does, but he has to walk from town to town? Not very heroic. At low levels? Sure, you're hoofing it.
Well, let's look at LotR, since you brought that up. It's always one of two things for them: being in the action, or traveling to the action. I'm asking for a system that reflects that. It's really easy to skim over a one month travel time from defending the mountain pass against demons that eventually overrun you to the fortress protecting the source of immortality for the immortal races. In one month, though, a lot can happen elsewhere. You have the following:
(1) Action in the mountain pass!
(2) We're skimming over the one month travel in about 3-5 minutes, though this allows for the setting to evolve everywhere else in the world.
(3) Action at the fortress!
I'd call Gandolf heroic. I'd call Strider heroic. These people had the same restrictions I'm talking about now.
Here it is. The key point.
It looks like we will be agreeing to disagree.
Okay
Definitely nothing wrong with either of our preferences.
Put this in a game and I'll play it.
Seems like if gives the best of both worlds. Let's hope Mr. Cook can do something like this for 5e.
Hopefully he's reading this and stealing it. If he is... hit me up, Mr. Cook!
From what I've seen, people either love or hate Monte Cook. For me, I like a lot of what he's done. But there are some things that are questionable. I don't like the 3e skill system. I think the more simplified 4e system is superior. But that's just an opinion. Sure he created the base of current skill system, but the older one just got out of hand very quickly.
Yep, and I like most of what he's done. I really like the 3.X skill system, and think the 4e system is too binary and rigid (but like I said, I like narrow skills, not broad skills). I just didn't like the skill system presented recently.
I'm with you here.
Great. Glad we can see eye to eye on so much, even if our preference differs in "gritty" versus "non-gritty" (I hesitate to say gonzo, as I don't know if that's your preference, and I won't say heroic, as my gritty games definitely have heroic characters). Thanks for the satisfying conversation. As always, play what you like
