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

[Mercutio01]

Not in the face, I'm assuming!

Sure? Why not? One of the pellets grazes along the cheek bone, or takes off a small piece of the ear.

Of course they can be hit. It's just that, like your shotgun guy, it's generally not serious enough to impede them, or stop the refocusing and pushing on.

Sometimes they get hit and dropped. As per the advice in HeroWars, you narrate these ones at a sufficient level of generality that either death or recovery is feasible (like Aragorn's fall over the cliff in the 2nd LotR movie - the filmmakers show us he's hurt, but leave it unspecified exacty how badly).

Again, that's reasonable, but it is not how I've ever played, and thus, requires me to change my approach to the game, which is something I'm not interested in. I don't feel the general need to change my approach to the game if I can choose not to change my approach to the game by not using the rules that require changing my playstyle.

Well likewise, a 4e PC who gets badly stabbed will die. But most hit point loss to a rapier attack does not represent being badly stabbed. It's a bit like your shotgun guy you mentioned.

Here's a question: Let's use Flynn's turn as Captain Blood for an example. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uog-mJYyloQ"].[/ame]. What level fighter would you think he is? And, in his fight with Basil Rathbone (which he wins), how many "hits" would you think are taken by either character and how much "damage" is delivered? It's totally subjective, but from my own point of view, they are both rogues (d6 HP in 3E), I would call them level 3, with about 15 hit points. I'd call Flynn hit three times each for about 4 damage* (he stumbles at about :21 after missing an attack and hits the rocks behind Rathbone, he is knocked down at 1:30, and then at 1:36 he's pushed back to the rocks rather hard), and Rathbone hit four times, each for about 4 damage, with the last hit being a crit (Flynn's attack misses at :20 but he's knocked into the rocks, he falls down at 1:00, he's hit at 1:37 when Flynn's counter-attack swipes across, and he's skewered at 1:50). The entire rest of that 2 minute long fight is miss after miss.

*Figure a rapier's damage as 1d6 + 1 (neither are particularly strong men, but not weaklings) and attack bonuses of +3.

I would have to imagine that you view this fight as a higher level with more hits and a higher HP count.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

OK, I've loudly recovered some hit points - but I won't be much use fighting until someone fixes this ankle that won't support my weight; oh, and I think a couple of gods named Tommy and John want a word with my right elbow too.

Lan-"ouch"-efan

Ah, yes - that -10' penalty to your speed that you gained from that ankle injury incurred when the duergar attacked you two rounds ago, and that -2 penalty to all attacks involving your left arm that you suffered because you engaged in more than 20 rounds of combat each day for three weeks.

Yeah, I briefly remember reading that table from the Rules Cyclopedia, 1E DMG, 2E DMG, 3E DMG, 3.5E DMG, and Pathfinder Core Rules Book. But can you remind me what page it was on? I need to brush up.

 

[fenriswolf456]

Oh, gee, silly us. I mean, how else would people define "hit" "hit point" "damage" "heal"? It would be totally absurd to use the standard agreed upon dictionary definition of those words, wouldn't it?

It certainly would be without taking the context of the word into consideration, or rule explanations. Otherwise, we could just as well be speaking about how popular a song is, or taking tokes on a spliff, and how does a 'hit' narrow to a sharp tapered end?

It always seemed pretty clear to me that damage meant a loss of hit points, and healing meant to regain hit points, with 'hit points' being a measure of the damage your character can take before reaching the unconscious, dying or dead states. There's no need to go fishing through dictionaries to figure out what the game is using these terms for.

Even if we ignore the fact, that I'm sure every edition has stated, that a hit is simply equalling or surpassing the target's defense, most definitions of hit seem to indicate it is a 'blow'. Would this mean that things like touch attacks could never actually 'hit' something?

Now if every 'hit' draws blood for you, that's fine. Most of my hits do the same; cuts, scratches, bruises, etc. But we can talk about hits to intangible things; "taking a hit to morale", "her leaving like that hit him hard", and damage and healing can be emotional and/or spiritual in nature. Nor do I think there is an issue with a character taking say psychic damage, which would inflict no physical wound, or need a physical blow to actually hit in the first place.

And in looking over definitions and rules, I'm now interested to see if there is any written rule about magical healing actually sealing up and removing physical wounds from a person. Most of what I see is talk that healing, even magical, simply "restores hit points", or the characters "regains X hit points". The closest I see is some spells 'curing' X hit points. I don't have access to 2E or older editions, and it's been 15+ years since I've played those, so I have no certainty on any actual descriptions of magical healing.

 

[Nathal]

Now if every 'hit' draws blood for you, that's fine. Most of my hits do the same; cuts, scratches, bruises, etc. But we can talk about hits to intangible things; "taking a hit to morale", "her leaving like that hit him hard", and damage and healing can be emotional and/or spiritual in nature. Nor do I think there is an issue with a character taking say psychic damage, which would inflict no physical wound, or need a physical blow to actually hit in the first place.
.

Hitpoints has from the very beginning referred to more than physical harm. Does Dexterity refer only to manual dexterity in D&D? No. It is a similar issue...the words used in the game have taken on broad connotations, all within the lexicon of the hobby. These meanings are so common I'm surprised people still argue over it. I can understand how somebody might say, "I don't like how Hitpoints depict more than physical damage," but to argue over the word itself? That is a waste of time.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Here's a question: Let's use Flynn's turn as Captain Blood for an example. .. What level fighter would you think he is? And, in his fight with Basil Rathbone (which he wins), how many "hits" would you think are taken by either character and how much "damage" is delivered? It's totally subjective, but from my own point of view, they are both rogues (d6 HP in 3E), I would call them level 3, with about 15 hit points. I'd call Flynn hit three times each for about 4 damage* (he stumbles at about :21 after missing an attack and hits the rocks behind Rathbone, he is knocked down at 1:30, and then at 1:36 he's pushed back to the rocks rather hard), and Rathbone hit four times, each for about 4 damage, with the last hit being a crit (Flynn's attack misses at :20 but he's knocked into the rocks, he falls down at 1:00, he's hit at 1:37 when Flynn's counter-attack swipes across, and he's skewered at 1:50). The entire rest of that 2 minute long fight is miss after miss.

I'm with you on the number of hits taken by both Flynn and Rathbone. And that is an excellent illustration of a sword fight with hit points.

But what I don't understand is your contention that it must take Flynn days to recover from running into rocks, and being knocked down. My view is that with a few minutes rest he will have back most of his hit points and just be a little bruised at most. Most of his hit points will therefore have healed non-magically. And in a single short rest. And he'll be ready for the next swashbuckling swordfight if he needs it.

 

[Mercutio01]

I'm with you on the number of hits taken by both Flynn and Rathbone. And that is an excellent illustration of a sword fight with hit points.

But what I don't understand is your contention that it must take Flynn days to recover from running into rocks, and being knocked down. My view is that with a few minutes rest he will have back most of his hit points and just be a little bruised at most. Most of his hit points will therefore have healed non-magically. And in a single short rest. And he'll be ready for the next swashbuckling swordfight if he needs it.

I think he could heal a portion of those overnight, but probably not all of those. I think even after a short rest, he'd be hard-pressed to take the same amount of punishment in a second battle of the same length and difficulty. Even the next day I don't think he'd be fighting at full strength.

That said, I've already gone on record supporting the way Hit Dice are in play in the playtest document and think that recovering Hit Points via the Hit Dice in that manner is just fine. But I don't think he'd be able to fight that same kind of battle again without taking far fewer hits.

 

[Hussar]

Can't XP you, but good points. For your first example, I would have narrated it as a glancing blow, something that maybe knocked the wind out of the wizard, but nothing more serious than that. But it would still have been a hit.

But, there is zero lasting effect to having the wind knocked out of you. You recover 100% from that within minutes, or a day at the absolute most.

So, you have no problems with our putative wizard recovering 100% of his hit points overnight?

 

[Neonchameleon]

I think he could heal a portion of those overnight, but probably not all of those. I think even after a short rest, he'd be hard-pressed to take the same amount of punishment in a second battle of the same length and difficulty. Even the next day I don't think he'd be fighting at full strength.

That said, I've already gone on record supporting the way Hit Dice are in play in the playtest document and think that recovering Hit Points via the Hit Dice in that manner is just fine. But I don't think he'd be able to fight that same kind of battle again without taking far fewer hits.

Far fewer hits? How can you take far fewer hits than three? A negative number of hits? I think his offence would have suffered more than his resilience there.

 

[Mercutio01]

Far fewer hits? How can you take far fewer hits than three? A negative number of hits? I think his offence would have suffered more than his resilience there.

I guess "far" isn't necessary, really. Fewer hits, meaning one more might have been the end. In fact, it very nearly was the end there. Yeah, I think even if he had five minutes to rest, another hit might have dropped him. He really only won because he got a lucky crit. (Not to mention that Rathbone was clearly the better swordsman but the narrative forced him to lose.)

 

[Mercutio01]

But, there is zero lasting effect to having the wind knocked out of you. You recover 100% from that within minutes, or a day at the absolute most.

So, you have no problems with our putative wizard recovering 100% of his hit points overnight?

In 3E, he'd have received back 10 of those 15 hit points (10th level wizard). So, not quite back to full HP (his chest would probably still be tender) but mostly back to fighting shape.