Falling Damage - Anyone else hopes falling hurts just a little bit more?

[mmadsen]

The question still stands. High level characters survive being shot at (by tanks and missiles) or being submerged in lava for several seconds. So why should they be killed by falling from a cliff?

Why should swords and spears do any damage to them at all?

 

[Derren]

Why should swords and spears do any damage to them at all?

Because they are wielded by supervillians (BBEG) and its superminions (high CR creatures). A high level PC who is attacked by CR 1 ork laughs about the feeble attempts of the ork to kill him. That is how D&D works and even if 4E makes lower level monsters a little more dangerous it doesn't change the situation. High level PCs can simply do amazing things and are not bothered by most mundane threats. Why should falling from a cliff be different?

 

[Celebrim]

The question still stands. High level characters survive being shot at (by tanks and missiles) or being submerged in lava for several seconds. So why should they be killed by falling from a cliff?

Again, let me turn around the question.

What if the problem isn't with how many hit points the high level characters have, but with the rules for lava, tanks, and missiles?

Most of the rules for lava seem to think that its about as hot as an oven, and seem to have no understanding of the difference between temperature and heat. For that matter, they seem to think that lava has the vicosity of water and the density of vegetable oil. Do you know how much force it would take to submerge someone in lava?

Once again, if it is not enough to melt the stone wall and turn the tree into a torch from a distance of 30', why should it only do 10d6 damage?

Unless of course, you really think it is the intention of the designer to describe a universe where lava isn't that hot and falling doesn't involve alot of energy? Instead, in both the case of lava and falling, I think that at some early point in the game a designer (or designers, since I can give multiple instances actually) wanted to use the flavor of a deep pit or a pool of lava and assigned some damage level to that hazard suitable for the level of characters in the adventure without regard to any sort of rules consistancy. And since setting those precedents, the damage done by those hazards hasn't really changed even though modern PC's may have hitpoints several times higher than the PC's had at the time the original numbers where assigned. So not only did the original numbers come about to challege say 7th level PC's, but the relative damage from the hazard has gone down over time to the point where 20d6 damage even isn't almost certainly lethal.

And in fact its worse than that, since early descriptions of lava often involved not 10d6 or 20d6 (or whatever) damage per round, but 10d6 or 20d6 damage per segment - which means the actual damage then is 10 times the current rate/action (and involved doing as a percentage 2 or 3 times as much damage to the PC). So that now we are a state were we can talk about how much damage lava does in terms of how little it actually does and how survivable it actually is, whereas initially quite the opposite was probably intended.

Incidently, the reason for the 'damage per segment' rules was probably so that fire resistance wouldn't need a ridiculously high number to provide protection from the heat.

My point being that even to the extent that the original numbers were based on some attempt to simulate lava, they certainly aren't now attempting to do that.

UPDATE: One last thing, the best way to use hit points is not to say, 'You are submerged in lava, take 20d20 damage' and then find out if that kills the character. The best way is to roll 20d20 damage, find out of that kills the character, and if it doesn't explain it in some fashion like, 'You fortunately fall onto a large chunk of floating rock, but its still hotter than a forge here - take 217 damage.'

 

[Derren]

What if the problem isn't with how many hit points the high level characters have, but with the rules for lava, tanks, and missiles?

Then you have a problem with all of D&D. Being shredded by a troll, stomped on by a giant, cleaved by a ogre with a huge axe, breathed on by a dragon, burned by a devil etc. should all kill the PCs no matter their level.

So either you turn D&D into rolemaster where every combat is likely crippling or keep D&D as it is and accept that high level characters in D&D are simply superhumans.

 

[Celebrim]

Then you have a problem with all of D&D. Being shredded by a troll, stomped on by a giant, cleaved by a ogre with a huge axe, breathed on by a dragon, burned by a devil etc. should all kill the PCs no matter their level.

So either you turn D&D into rolemaster where every combat is likely crippling or keep D&D as it is and accept that high level characters in D&D are simply superhumans.

Sorry, figured you'd go this way but didn't update my post in time.

Quoting myself: "One last thing, the best way to use hit points is not to say, 'You are submerged in lava, take 20d20 damage' and then find out if that kills the character. The best way is to roll 20d20 damage, find out of that kills the character, and if it doesn't explain it in some fashion like, 'You fortunately fall onto a large chunk of floating rock, but its still hotter than a forge here - take 217 damage.'"

D&D's rules are for abstract damage. They type of injury doesn't describe the amount of hit points lost. The amount of hit points lost, describes the injury. The problem comes when the amount of hit points lost is so low, that it represents a neglible threat from something that it is versimilitude breaking to treat as a negligible threat. It's much easier to cognitively handle dodging aside the hurtling axe of a frost giant, or fighting ones way out of the grip of a troll, than it is to deal with 'You fall 200' onto a solid stone floor'. It's not that it would be bad for a character to survive that. It's bad for the character to know that's survivable, and not only survivable not necessarily more than a nuisance.

 

[mmadsen]

So either you turn D&D into rolemaster where every combat is likely crippling or keep D&D as it is and accept that high level characters in D&D are simply superhumans.

That's a false dichotomy. Real-life humans can face giant monsters in real-life combat and live without any superpowers. The Roman legions, for instance, faced war elephants. Did they defeat the elephants by withstanding a stomping? No. They did it by letting the elephants pass by, then stabbing them in the eye with javelins. D&D doesn't lend itself to that kind of thing though.

 

[Stalker0]

That's a perfectly valid opinion, and I respect the fact that there are people who think so and I even understand why they think so.

But speaking for myself, had I been another player in that group and what you described happened, I would given serious thought to quietly and without fanfare making that the last session I showed up to. It just would have killed the fun for me. If you got a 'ring of feather' falling, great. If you 'boots of the soft landing', swell. But if you are just jumping off 150' cliffs landing on your feet and be off and running with no explanation but that you are super tough and know you can take it, it turns the game into 'swords and capes' and I'm really not interested in that.

I've always been intrigued by this argument, because it is truly a big sticking point for people.

As mourn mentioned earlier in the thread, players are routinely bathed in acid, literally showering in dragon fire, and walk out just fine even if they completely fail their reflex save. But someone falling is what balks people's sense of disbelief.

And Celebrim, though I'm quoting you, this is not directed at you specifically, there are obviously a lot of people that feel strongly about this issue.

Perhaps it is the real world aspect of it, we've all taken a fall, but few people here have ever taken an acid bath.

As to solutions for it, in 4e, we may have a version of SAGA's condition track. In that case, you could simply apply a few points off the track for a bad fall, which abstractly represents the stunning, broken bones, and other injuries some expect for a bad fall.

For a quick fix, convert 3d6 points of falling damage to 1 Con damage. So a person who falls for 5d6 damage instead takes 1 con damage and 2d6 damage. Ability damage better represents broken bones and intense injuries, its much more noticiable to a player, and it always hurts!!


Finally, a lot of people want falling damage to scale exponentially. But keep in mind, damage ALREADY DOES!!!

1d6 points of damage has a good chance of knocking out a commoner, 2d6 is highly likely, 5d6 is guaranteed to knock them out, if not outright kill them. Even though the damage is linear, its effect on the person scales up exponentially.

Even though each level seems linear, to the world it represents a huge increase in skill and power. While PCs level consistently, they are also routinely battling things that no sane person would do. So when you consider that characters are taking blows from creatures stronger than anything that has ever been experienced on earth, its not that surprising that they can take such punishment.

 

[apoptosis]

That's a false dichotomy. Real-life humans can face giant monsters in real-life combat and live without any superpowers. The Roman legions, for instance, faced war elephants. Did they defeat the elephants by withstanding a stomping? No. They did it by letting the elephants pass by, then stabbing them in the eye with javelins. D&D doesn't lend itself to that kind of thing though.

On the other hand, elephants also can kill people very very easily (most dangerous animal at the zoo).

It is not a simple question, this issue pops up most systems except ones like champions where there is supposed to be a disconnect between damage that can destroy a building but just stun a superhero.

 

[apoptosis]

Sorry, figured you'd go this way but didn't update my post in time.

Quoting myself: "One last thing, the best way to use hit points is not to say, 'You are submerged in lava, take 20d20 damage' and then find out if that kills the character. The best way is to roll 20d20 damage, find out of that kills the character, and if it doesn't explain it in some fashion like, 'You fortunately fall onto a large chunk of floating rock, but its still hotter than a forge here - take 217 damage.'"

That is a good way of looking at it.

HP either need to be a story element or if they are real toughness you need to have much less of them (and maybe some type of action points) or visualize high-level characters as really super tough and mythic in character.

OR just not care about the total lack of consistency.

 

[Filcher]

...the best way to use hit points is not to say, 'You are submerged in lava, take 20d20 damage' and then find out if that kills the character. The best way is to roll 20d20 damage, find out of that kills the character, and if it doesn't explain it in some fashion like, 'You fortunately fall onto a large chunk of floating rock, but its still hotter than a forge here - take 217 damage.

Thank you, this is exactly right. And it applies to something as simple as getting stuck with a sword.