D&D 4E How I Fixed 4e

[StAlda]

I was doing some things awhile back with critical hits, and this thread about wounds got me thinking. How about the hit that takes you below 0 is considered a critical hit based on the House Rule I've included below?



I like the idea of a critical hit to be more rare (as some have suggested). Either needing to exceed AC by 10, or by having to "comfirm" a critical hit (meaning you've rolled the 20, now roll to hit again - success means crit).

Critical hits do not have extra/max damage, you roll damage normally, but they affect your maximum hit points. On the character sheet you'll have 2 scores one is Healthy MAX HP and the Current MAX HP. Current MAX HP does not affect you bloodied or healing surge values.

Crits heal on there own 1d6+CON Mod hp per day. A cleric would have another Class feature - something like this below:

Cure Critical Wounds
Cleric Feature
You utter a simple prayer as divine light washes over your target, healing their most grievous wounds.
Daily ✦ Divine, Healing
Standard Action Close burst 5 (10 at 11th level, 15 at 21st level)
Target: You or one ally
Effect: The target is healed 1d6 + Wisdom modifier of critical hit points.
Increase critical hit points healed to 2d6 + Wisdom modifier at 11th level and 3d6 + Wisdom modifier at 21st level.

 

[Korgoth]

Interesting stuff here.

I would think (not having played/read 4E) that for dungeons, if you want an older-school feel, you should not count random encounters toward "milestones". Random encounters are supposed to be things you avoid because they just wear you down.

I like the idea of critical hits reducing max hp. That's an easy way to put dire wounds back in. You could say that max hp increases back to normal at the rate of 1 per day (or 1 per day per level, or whatever); however, you could also say that any magical healing is able to heal you up to the true maximum (so warlord powers and resting don't help much here, but magic stuff and cleric powers do).

 

[Syntallah]

Wounded: I think you should consider using the condition track from Saga edition to handle the wounds. It is MUCH simpler and you can use it to have broken bones etc. This allows you to retain all the HP and healing surges, but make it something special to heal condition damage.

Can you give us a quick summary of this?

 

[Rel]

I was doing some things awhile back with critical hits, and this thread about wounds got me thinking. How about the hit that takes you below 0 is considered a critical hit based on the House Rule I've included below?



I like the idea of a critical hit to be more rare (as some have suggested). Either needing to exceed AC by 10, or by having to "comfirm" a critical hit (meaning you've rolled the 20, now roll to hit again - success means crit).

Critical hits do not have extra/max damage, you roll damage normally, but they affect your maximum hit points. On the character sheet you'll have 2 scores one is Healthy MAX HP and the Current MAX HP. Current MAX HP does not affect you bloodied or healing surge values.

Crits heal on there own 1d6+CON Mod hp per day. A cleric would have another Class feature - something like this below:

Cure Critical Wounds
Cleric Feature
You utter a simple prayer as divine light washes over your target, healing their most grievous wounds.
Daily ✦ Divine, Healing
Standard Action Close burst 5 (10 at 11th level, 15 at 21st level)
Target: You or one ally
Effect: The target is healed 1d6 + Wisdom modifier of critical hit points.
Increase critical hit points healed to 2d6 + Wisdom modifier at 11th level and 3d6 + Wisdom modifier at 21st level.

That's a pretty interesting idea. I think if I were going to use it that I might go the route of saying that you only heal CON Mod HP per day without aid but that you could also benefit from a Heal check. DC 10 = 1d4 extra HP healed, DC 15 = 1d6 extra HP healed, etc. up to DC 30 for an extra d12.

Do I interpret correctly that your crits reduce both your current hit points AND your current maximum hit points? If they only reduce the latter then that set's up some potentially screwy situations where the players end up saying, "Man, I wish I hadn't critted that guy."

Your idea of the extra daily power for the Cleric is neat but I still lean toward Rituals as the way to handle this. This lends support to the idea that a town might have a sort of Hedge Wizard or Witch Doctor type healer and also to take a bit of pressure off if none of the players wants to play a Cleric.

 

[Rel]

Nice Stuff Rel.

I am considering adding some of these for my home game (also in the Triangle ). One question, how about during a Short Rest? Do they just burn surges at 1/2 value instead? OR can then only be healed by a Cleric using his encounter powers (or Healing Word) during the short rest?

My original version of the Wounds rule included the idea that you couldn't voluntarily spend Surges after a Short Rest to regain as many hit points as you desired. It was pointed out that an easy workaround for this was the Cleric doing Healing Word, take another Short Rest, do Healing Word again, etc. It was also pointed out that, lacking a Cleric, they could simply Second Wind themselves back to health in the same manner.

In the interests of simplicity I decided to go the route of letting them spend as many Surges as they like but each only heals half as much as normal. I think it achieves the effect I'm after.

 

[keterys]

How about your current HP can not rise above your Bloodied value? That's a real downside, being bloodied until you can deal (Heal, Endurance, ritual, what have you)

 

[StAlda]

That's a pretty interesting idea. I think if I were going to use it that I might go the route of saying that you only heal CON Mod HP per day without aid but that you could also benefit from a Heal check. DC 10 = 1d4 extra HP healed, DC 15 = 1d6 extra HP healed, etc. up to DC 30 for an extra d12.

Do I interpret correctly that your crits reduce both your current hit points AND your current maximum hit points? If they only reduce the latter then that set's up some potentially screwy situations where the players end up saying, "Man, I wish I hadn't critted that guy."

Your idea of the extra daily power for the Cleric is neat but I still lean toward Rituals as the way to handle this. This lends support to the idea that a town might have a sort of Hedge Wizard or Witch Doctor type healer and also to take a bit of pressure off if none of the players wants to play a Cleric.

Yes both current and max hit points. I could easily see a ritual as well as the Daily. Rituals cost money, so that is the give and take. I'd say you heal at least 1 + con mod per day, but I like the heal check - a combination would probably work.

 

[ashockney]

Rel,

Good stuff, and thanks for throwing it out here for the entire world. A little trickier than many may realize.

I'm particularly fond of your handling of milestones. I agree that it's better as written for "all campaigns" in the books, but that this will add a cool "flava" element to a running campaign.

PC wounding - ok, I get that it's not quite gritty enough. Your example is a good one. My primary concern here is that juggling with the wounding will prove "fatal" to your party at some point. I try to avoid like the plague anything that requires me to make adjustments to "pre-built" encounters, because saving time is king in my gaming experience. If my PC's all agreed they wanted a grittier campaign, with greater threats, I would probably do something like this:
1) Anytime you are bloodied or unconscious make a save. Failed save results in a wound.
2) Steal a wound chart from Rolemaster or Hackmaster and determine randomly.

I also like your thoughts on skills, and the bonus skills to begin the game. I agree with your assessment that the core game system leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to character creation. Very little beyond the basic race/class/buy generic stats. This is a change that is positive in that direction without worrying about unbalancing issues.

 

[Rel]

Rel,

Good stuff, and thanks for throwing it out here for the entire world. A little trickier than many may realize.

I'm particularly fond of your handling of milestones. I agree that it's better as written for "all campaigns" in the books, but that this will add a cool "flava" element to a running campaign.

PC wounding - ok, I get that it's not quite gritty enough. Your example is a good one. My primary concern here is that juggling with the wounding will prove "fatal" to your party at some point. I try to avoid like the plague anything that requires me to make adjustments to "pre-built" encounters, because saving time is king in my gaming experience. If my PC's all agreed they wanted a grittier campaign, with greater threats, I would probably do something like this:
1) Anytime you are bloodied or unconscious make a save. Failed save results in a wound.
2) Steal a wound chart from Rolemaster or Hackmaster and determine randomly.

I also like your thoughts on skills, and the bonus skills to begin the game. I agree with your assessment that the core game system leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to character creation. Very little beyond the basic race/class/buy generic stats. This is a change that is positive in that direction without worrying about unbalancing issues.

Thanks for the feedback!

Funny thing about wounds is that my original idea was very similar to yours in terms of rolling on some kind of chart to determine a sort of wound and its effects. After some consideration and advice from others I decided to scale that back to something that required no additional modifiers or rolls during combat to make sure it didn't slow things down. This is partly for obvious reasons and partly because my campaign setting includes some elements that are likely to impose penalties like that at some point and I didn't want that stacked on top of a wound system with fiddly bits.

As for the deadliness, you are undoubtedly correct. After I had mulled the idea over a bit I thought, "This is kinda screwing the PC's over a bit with no offsetting benefit." So I e-mailed my players and asked what they thought. Their collective response was basically, "We're used to you screwing us over. It makes the games intense and challenging. We really wouldn't know how to feel if you didn't so bring it on."

I've got great players.

However I intend for the Wounds system to be on probation from the start. We're going to use it for the first several sessions and see how it makes the game feel. If it makes things too deadly or threatens the pace of the game that I want then I'll ditch it.

 

[Rel]

Oh, another idea that I'm contemplating using is this:

In my idea above for Milestones and the associated APs it could well be that I'm giving them out at a lower rate than is assumed under the rules. To compensate for that I'm thinking about letting the players define their characters in ways similar to the "Nature and Demeanor" rules from World of Darkness (or at least they were in the old WoD - I don't have the new rules).

Basically you define how your character thinks and acts in a couple of ways. When you roleplay the PC in accordance with that then you get a bonus AP. That's pretty much the extent of it.

So if your PC is a "Rebel" and you deviate from the group's plan but the group succeeds anyway, you get a bonus AP. If you are a "Bon Vivant" and you stop in the middle of the dungeon to crack open the cask of really nice wine the party discovered, you get a bonus AP. That sort of thing.

I'm not 100% settled on doing this but I figured I'd toss it out there and see what others thought.