Forked Thread: Alternatives to mountains of hit points

[Galloglaich]

I think the main issue with ranged weaponry in D&D is that they do not reflect how deadly a bow or crossbow can be. A hero (lots of hit points) would not be affected by supressing fire as a successful attack is almost inconsequential. Hell, what's the point of cover even when you can march up and start wailing with the sword? If however, bolts and arrows represented a realistic threat, then I think the "ranged" side of combat would be more dynamic than just simple sniping.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

Well yes, but if you limit the hit points to say, the Constitution score, and give high-energy missile weapons like Longbows, Arbalests etc. an armor -piercing bonus, and make Critical Hits a little more lethal, then you have that covered pretty simply.

We also have an optional rule in the Codex that the more dice you apply to a given attack, thats how many extra damage dice you will roll on any Critical Hit. This makes ranged weapons in particular very lethal since you often don't have to worry about defense (if the other guy doesn't have one as well)

I really don't think any PC should ever have more than about 30 hit points realistically, even that is well nigh superhuman but it seems to be a sweet spot for my games, enough HP so that higher level PC's don't feel like a single lucky shot will waste them, but not so much that they are willing to walk into a wall of spears or not care if they fall off a cliff.

G.