In the heat of battle, is hit point loss a wound?

[Mercutio01]

You said, and I quote "I hate mundane healing" over on the other thread. Getting your endurance and hence your hit points back from resting is healing. It's getting your hit points back.

Again, the restoration of all hit points by taking a long nap is my problem.

And here I offered another compromise which you rejected out of hand. I'll get rid of the 8 hour rest when wizards need to go to a tower, library, or lab to prepare spells and clerics need time in the temples. This is a gamist issue and one that makes the 15 minute adventuring day even more absurd.

While your precious wizards get everything back after 8 hours, so do the fighters. Change one and the other moves with it. And I'll gladly move both in my games.

Would it surprise you to know that I can count on one hand the number of wizards or clerics I've played? In fact, I play rogues about 50% of the time, fighters about 25%, and monks about 15%. The rest are various other classes. So it's not about my love of wizards. I just think of wizards minus spells as worthless. I don't agree that HP for fighters and spells for casters need to be on the same recharge cycle. For one, a fighter who's down even half his HP is far more effective than a wizard who's out half his spells.

 

[Neonchameleon]

For one, a fighter who's down even half his HP is far more effective than a wizard who's out half his spells.

What level wizard, what edition, and what's he done with his spells - are any of them used on ongoing buffs? Also how does the wizard fight? A 3.X conjurer is massively more effective than an evoker.

This ties into Linear Fighter/Quadratic Wizard and the notorious Giant In The Playground duels pitting level 3.5 level 20 fighters vs level 13 wizards (end result 1:1 with one draw - and it was only close due to the fighters having a massive advantage from the wealth by level rules - the initial proposal was core only wizard vs dumpster diving fighter).

 

[Mercutio01]

Those are problems with spell power balancing, not spell availability balancing.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Those are problems with spell power balancing, not spell availability balancing.

I fail to see a meaningful difference between the two. Especially if the wizard gets both more spells each level and more powerful ones.

 

[thewok]

So, what you're saying, is that those of us who have a "hit" and "damage" follow the actual dictionary definitions of the real words are playing D&D wrong? Because that's complete and utter BS.

I wouldn't say that you're playing D&D incorrectly. I would say that, while you're using the dictionary definition of "hit," so are we.

Hit | Define Hit at Dictionary.com
7. to have a marked effect or influence on; affect severely.
10. to reach or attain (a specified level or amount).

Damage | Define Damage at Dictionary.com
1. injury or harm impairing the function or condition of a person or thing

So, when I hit someone, I have hit (reached or attained (via the die roll)) their AC. I have also hit them in that I have a marked effect on them (by reducing their hit points).

Damage to the hit point pool impairs its function; there is less of it to account for the next hit, and the one after that.

Now, a hit can certainly be an actual physical hit. I doubt many people here have said that it's not (though I'm sure some have). But it need not be. And, unless it puts someone into the ground, it's not a blow that can't be healed naturally or via magic.

The trick is not to narrate yourself into a corner. If you have no magical healing, then don't describe a vicious assault that skewers your fighters gut, pulling out his intestines when the spear is removed. No one is going to survive that kind of wound without magical help. Even if the damage could be repaired, the chance of infection is too high. If your healer is, for example, a warlord, perhaps a solid critical hit slams into your shield hard enough to make it feel as if your arm has broken. Or maybe an arrow pierces the thigh muscle, but goes through cleanly, easily disinfected and wrapped; it will be painful to continue, but the person can continue. Or maybe that orc's axe hits hard enough to crease the fighter's plate, causing a bruise, and maybe a rib fracture--painful, but possible to work through if wrapped, especially with a high pain tolerance.

Narrate the combat to the capabilites of the group. That's the idea here.

 

[Mercutio01]

I do. As I noted in several examples above. I do narrate to the capabilities of the group. I don't narrate myself into a hole. Or, at least, until 4E I didn't. 4E changed how healing works from every other edition (even if Gygax's hit points are abstract, the healing rules just didn't support that), and thus I would have either had to change how I play (I like how I play. I'm invested in how I play. How I play makes sense to me and has worked for decades.), change how 4E works (I don't like to break systems, and changing how 4E's healing works is too major a change for my liking and too much work to really do right), or not play. After a year, I chose option 3.

I think I could even have accepted the warlord's shouts if they granted temporary HP instead. But the complaints against that are either complexity (let's face it, 4E is complex enough as is, with a dozen+ conditions, keywords, etc) or that since it's not true healing, you still need a cleric.

I, frankly, don't understand the cleric hate. I know people have to bite the bullet from time-to-time, but couldn't that be fixed by adjusting playstyle just as much as changing "hits" to "near misses" is adjusting playstyle?

Anyway, until 3E came along with its negative hit points, that argument about hits only being hits when someone drops was a nonstarter. I think I'd rather do away with negative hit points but keep the death saves around.

 

[Obryn]

Hit points are a nonsensical, abstract game construct.

I don't think there's any reason to give them such deep thought. If the game works well, they're doing their job. If it doesn't, they're not.

Edit: Basically, this

Beyond this, I just remind myself to stop over thinking things. This is D&D, that's just how it works here.

-O

 

[Mercutio01]

I don't think there's any reason to give them such deep thought. If the game works well, they're doing their job. If it doesn't, they're not.

Fair enough. They don't won't for me as written in 4E or D&DNext.

 

[Obryn]

Fair enough. They don't won't for me as written in 4E or D&DNext.

...Which is fine? HPs are a game construct, and like any other game construct, they exist to serve a purpose. If they don't adequately fulfill their purpose for you, then you either find a way to make them work better or you move on to something different.

-O

 

[Mercutio01]

...Which is fine? HPs are a game construct, and like any other game construct, they exist to serve a purpose. If they don't adequately fulfill their purpose for you, then you either find a way to make them work better or you move on to something different.

Right, and my point in posting in this thread was explaining why they don't work for me, and what it would take for them to work for me.

Hopefully the modularity buzzword that gets bandied about makes it so that I don't have to work too hard on fixing them to my preference, but if not, if they stay as written, then I'll house rule them.