How do you reconcile hit points?

[Manbearcat]

The answer to the question is not to ask it in the first place.

The first rule of HP Club. Clearly your HP-Fu is strong.

 

[Greenfield]

The problem with the "magic forcefield" type of hit points, (i.e. "that literally turns blows, transmutes poisons, regenrates seared flesh...") is that the Healing skill works as a way to evaluate someone's injuries.

If there is no physical manifestation of the wound then there should be no way to tell if someone is in perfect health or a strong breeze away from falling down.

If it turns blows proportionally, so that a percentage of each one shows up on the body, then we're back to the paradox: Somehow it takes more Healing Potions or Paladin-Lay on Hands to fix the healthiest guy in the party, and almost nothing to fix the low level commoner or wizard.

We tried to ameliorate the issue in our 3.5 game by changing the way healing works: Instead of all the healing spells, potions, wands etc. doing D8s of healing, we made a houserule change so they heal what ever size dice the target is using for hit dice. So Fighters get D10s of healing, Rogues and Bards get D6s, and Cure Light being cast on a Wizard rolls a D4.

It doesn't address the difference in character level, but at least levels the playing field a bit with regards to the different classes.

 

[Ahnehnois]

How do you reconcile hit points?

I don't. I always use another health system regardless of which game I'm playing.

Typically, for D&D I'll use some form of vp/wp. Among other things, this divide ensures that actual wounds will take a while to heal, and that the same will be true for everyone in that regard.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

Reconciling healing is easy. Make it percentage based or based on the character's hit dice. 4E did the former. For D&D Next, I suggest the latter.

For example, cure light wounds could heal 1d4 for each of the target character's total hit dice. Cure moderate would be 1d6, and so on.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

The problem with the "magic forcefield" type of hit points, (i.e. "that literally turns blows, transmutes poisons, regenrates seared flesh...") is that the Healing skill works as a way to evaluate someone's injuries.

Life/protective energy is observable. A heal check represents either 1) the healer 'feeling' the target's life energy reserves from a distance, much like channelers in the Wheel of Time can feel the strength of other channelers, or 2) the healer taking the target's energy 'pulse' much like how a real medic can take someone's heart pulse. It depends on whether your injury evaluation house rule allows for distance evaluations, or not.

Additionally, every character has some awareness of their own energy reserves, much as real people have some awareness of their own health.

 

[FireLance]

Regarding 4e Healing: Being able to go from "near death" to "full health" in 24 seconds, without magic, isn't in the same time zone as "making perfect sense". With magic you at least have the excuse that it's magic. But simply be expending Healing Surges? Sorry, but whatever WOTC was selling there, I'mk not buying.

It seems to me that the solution, for you, is not to adopt 4e healing wholesale. As others have mentioned, proportional healing (say, cure light wounds heals 20% of hit points, cure serious wounds heals 40% of hit points, cure critical wounds heals 60% of hit points) would fix the problem you have identified.

You don't also have to adopt daily limits on (most) healing and non-magical healing (the warlord's inspiring word, the Second Wind action, spending healing surges during a short rest, etc.) if that does not fit the way you want to run your games.

EDIT: But to answer the original question, for me, hit points are almost all abstract luck, dodging skill, determination, etc. Hit point loss is somehow avoiding the full effect of an attack that would kill a normal man. Actual physical damage, until the loss of the last hit point, is usually negligible - a minor bruise, a small cut (enough to deliver poison), etc., but nothing that would be sufficient to kill a normal man.

Seriously, if you cut yourself shaving, do you lose even one hit point? Even as a normal man, are you in any significant danger of death if you get a paper cut, or hit your thumb with a hammer while putting up a picture, or sit on a thumb tack (set aside the possibility of infection and tetanus, etc. for the moment and focus on just the physical tramua, okay)? Or even if all of the above happen to you? In my view, a person could be covered all over with minor cuts, bruises and scrapes and have not lost even one physical hit point, and I imagine a high-level character who has lost most (but not all) of his hit points will look something like that.

Now, if the same character receives non-magical healing, all these cuts, scrapes and bruises still remain. Visually, what might happen is that the character seems less tired. His breathing is more even, he looks more alert, and he might appear more calm or determined. This can happen even if he has sustained a serious injury (his hit points have dropped to 0 or less) - in the short term, he is overcoming the pain and incapacitation through willpower or inspiration, and in the longer term, he (or his allies) have had a chance to bandage and treat the wound so that it no longer hinders him as much.

Now, it is quite alright not to like narrations like the above, or the frequency which such narrations are encountered in a system like 4e, but I think it makes perfect sense to me.

 

[Greenfield]

Tequila Sunrise: That works, if we presume that the healing skill includes a mystical sense even for people who aren't spell casters.

I mean, if a person with healing magics can sense life force, it kind of makes sense. But for Bob the Farmer to do it? At that point everyone in the world is psychic, and that's a place I don't think I want to go.

Jeff Carlson: The varying dice size idea has merit. Still, the Wizard heals fully (on average) from a Cure Light while the Fighter needs Cure Critical every time. (Cure Light does D4's, same as a Wizard's hit dice. Cure Moderate would do D6s, which is a perfect fot for Rogues and Bards. Cure Serious does D8s, which works for Clerics, Monks and 3.5 Rangers. Cure Critical rolls D0s, which are appropriate for the Fighter or the Pathfinder Ranger. And the Barbarian, with his D2 hit dice just has to suck it up. )

By the way, I'm not being argumentative just for the sake of obstructionism. As I wrote in the OP, I'm pursuing this more or less out of boredom. I'm honestly not trying to be a jerk, and I'm sorry if it comes across badly. This is a mental exercise for me.

4e does indeed address the idea, mostly, by routing everything through healing surges, which are about quarter of the character's hit points, no matter how high they are. This mechanic, coupled with the idea that you can take as many healing surges as you like between combats (up to your daily limit, of course) leads to everyone having a functional Regeneration that puts Marvel's Wolverine to shame: Death's door to fully healed in 24 seconds flat (4 rounds). So it deals with the paradox by burying under massive healing overkill.

Odd observation: The basic Healing Potion in 4e, if I recall correctly, does nothing that a character can't do by themselves: It trips a Healing Surge. It's only real use is that it allows you to use more than one Healing Surge in a combat. Normally you're only entitled to Second Wind once per fight. Kind of pathetic, for a magic item, when you think about it.

 

[FireLance]

4e does indeed address the idea, mostly, by routing everything through healing surges, which are about quarter of the character's hit points, no matter how high they are. This mechanic, coupled with the idea that you can take as many healing surges as you like between combats (up to your daily limit, of course) leads to everyone having a functional Regeneration that puts Marvel's Wolverine to shame: Death's door to fully healed in 24 seconds flat (4 rounds). So it deals with the paradox by burying under massive healing overkill.

Sorry, but I don't get the four rounds bit. Spending healing surges between fights requires a short rest, which is 5 minutes by the rules. Also, non-magical hit point recovery does not mean regeneration. The mechanical effect may be similar (back to full hit points), but narratively, the cuts and bruises are still there (see my edit to the post just above yours for details).

 

[Nellisir]

Still the best explanation for hit points ever. It makes just as much sense as anything else.

You will note that a dagger has only an eentsy little blade. The thing is that as characters advance in levels (sometimes termed "developing", or "maturing"; this is a process a bit like fruit ripening) they develop a protective force field around them. This force field is sometimes called the "dude factor". The dude factor is very thin for 1st level characters, in particular 1st level commoners, who are not dudes at all. 1st level PCs are by definition dudes, so they have more of a dude factor. As your level increases, so does your dudeness, and hence the thickness and strength of your protective dude field. A dagger, having only an eentsy blade, can only penetrate a certain thickness of dude field. A longsword has a bigger blade, and so can penetrate many more inches of dudeness (only dudes can wield a longsword, which is why it's a martial weapon, whereas any schmuck can wield a dagger, which is a simple weapon). Finally, a greatsword is the ultimate dude weapon, and has unsurpassed ability to penetrate dude fields. Even the most mojo dudes find it hard to control a greatsword, which is why it needs two hands to use.

 

[Sunseeker]

Personally? I recognize them as an abstract game mechanic. As long as they are serving their purpose - being a number that show how far you are from dying - I'm okay with that.

-O

THIS. It's an abstract game mechanic to avoid other, more complex systems or make hitting feel pointless though high damage reduction. It's no different than "spell slots" or any other game mechanic, I mean what is really stopping the wizard from casting high level spells all the time other than the game says "NO"?