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Narrating Hit Points - no actual "damage"
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7349257" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>Hit points support two of the three most common pillars of gameplay very well.</p><p></p><p>First, they support 'challenge' or 'gamist' gameplay because they offer very predictable math. You can make estimates of how much damage per round a given party can on average inflict on a given monster based on their assumed capabilities and the monsters defenses. You can make estimates of how much damage the monster can inflict on a PC per round based on the PC's defenses. You can use these numbers to produce well balanced somewhat predictable encounters that support tactical play. A relatively large amount of hit points relative to amount of damage produced in a round mitigates against luck. The fact that the loss of some hit points doesn't alter the math on subsequent rounds makes the whole system more predictable. </p><p></p><p>Secondly, they support 'thespian' or 'narrative' goals in play because they don't impose a description on the player. Even better, the very fact that they are a predictable buffer against death means that they tend to act as a sort of plot protection for the character, allowing the character to persist through multiple trials and a long story arc in a mostly predictable manner especially if the game is 'fair' or the GM is deliberately prioritizing narrative over challenge. If you are going for verisimilitude to fantasy stories, the ability to narrate abstract hit point loss in a variety of concrete ways depending on scale or situation allows the GM wide latitude to simulate a lot of fantasy and action adventure type stories where as a trope the protagonist receives minor injuries but is rarely actually handicapped by this and is frequently restored to health with the flip of a page or a wave of a magical hand. Yet on the other hand, gritty injuries can be narrated when the character receives sufficiently high damage to be threatened by death by the system. </p><p></p><p>Compared to almost every other system that has ever been invented - wound tracks and wound as condition systems are two that come to mind - hit points just flat out outperform those systems in terms of supporting 'challenge' and 'narrative'. I say this not as theory crafting, but after having actually played such systems and experienced the upsides and downsides. And one big piece of evidence that this observation is true or at least widely held is that none of the alternative systems have ever really caught on in the world of video games, which ubiquitously use 'hit points' across a wide variety of video game genera's including virtually all RPGs. If hit points didn't out perform other systems, some adventurous designer would have utilized some other system. In those rare cases where they have done so (Dwarf Fortress and War Thunder come to mind), I strongly encourage you to compare the sort of gameplay with non-hit point systems to what you've come to expect from hit points.</p><p></p><p>Where hit points break down is supporting simulation in an RPG. Hit points will never give you any sort of sense of what it is actually like to be injured and in pain, and help you explore that and play that out in the game. While you can narrate hit point loss in a way that doesn't break suspension of disbelief, you can never from the mechanics learn about injury and pain because hit points just aren't interested in those things and don't model them in any way. </p><p></p><p>I suggest that there is a very good reason for that. Injury and pain aren't particularly fun. Not only do most narratives only pay lip service to injury and pain only to show that the protagonists are touch and heroic, but being injured and acting it out isn't particular fun. In fact, real injuries are debilitating and crippling and tend to sideline you so that you are only an observer and not participant in the action. Not only does this work against the other two aesthetics that are otherwise playing together fairly nicely, it works against the game as a whole by removing agency from the player. Finally, no one playing the game is completely unacquainted with pain. They've either been injured themselves or they've been sufficiently hurt to imagine what being in crippling pain or having a crippling injury is like. We've all probably been 'gimped' at some point or experienced physical agony to some degree. Even if we simulated these things, it's not clear that the game would be offering to teach us by way of simulation anything we couldn't really learn by other means. There might be some educational merit to RPing out the horrors of combat, but you wouldn't do it over and over.</p><p></p><p>So, in short, hit points are the worst system in gaming until you compare it to everything else.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7349257, member: 4937"] Hit points support two of the three most common pillars of gameplay very well. First, they support 'challenge' or 'gamist' gameplay because they offer very predictable math. You can make estimates of how much damage per round a given party can on average inflict on a given monster based on their assumed capabilities and the monsters defenses. You can make estimates of how much damage the monster can inflict on a PC per round based on the PC's defenses. You can use these numbers to produce well balanced somewhat predictable encounters that support tactical play. A relatively large amount of hit points relative to amount of damage produced in a round mitigates against luck. The fact that the loss of some hit points doesn't alter the math on subsequent rounds makes the whole system more predictable. Secondly, they support 'thespian' or 'narrative' goals in play because they don't impose a description on the player. Even better, the very fact that they are a predictable buffer against death means that they tend to act as a sort of plot protection for the character, allowing the character to persist through multiple trials and a long story arc in a mostly predictable manner especially if the game is 'fair' or the GM is deliberately prioritizing narrative over challenge. If you are going for verisimilitude to fantasy stories, the ability to narrate abstract hit point loss in a variety of concrete ways depending on scale or situation allows the GM wide latitude to simulate a lot of fantasy and action adventure type stories where as a trope the protagonist receives minor injuries but is rarely actually handicapped by this and is frequently restored to health with the flip of a page or a wave of a magical hand. Yet on the other hand, gritty injuries can be narrated when the character receives sufficiently high damage to be threatened by death by the system. Compared to almost every other system that has ever been invented - wound tracks and wound as condition systems are two that come to mind - hit points just flat out outperform those systems in terms of supporting 'challenge' and 'narrative'. I say this not as theory crafting, but after having actually played such systems and experienced the upsides and downsides. And one big piece of evidence that this observation is true or at least widely held is that none of the alternative systems have ever really caught on in the world of video games, which ubiquitously use 'hit points' across a wide variety of video game genera's including virtually all RPGs. If hit points didn't out perform other systems, some adventurous designer would have utilized some other system. In those rare cases where they have done so (Dwarf Fortress and War Thunder come to mind), I strongly encourage you to compare the sort of gameplay with non-hit point systems to what you've come to expect from hit points. Where hit points break down is supporting simulation in an RPG. Hit points will never give you any sort of sense of what it is actually like to be injured and in pain, and help you explore that and play that out in the game. While you can narrate hit point loss in a way that doesn't break suspension of disbelief, you can never from the mechanics learn about injury and pain because hit points just aren't interested in those things and don't model them in any way. I suggest that there is a very good reason for that. Injury and pain aren't particularly fun. Not only do most narratives only pay lip service to injury and pain only to show that the protagonists are touch and heroic, but being injured and acting it out isn't particular fun. In fact, real injuries are debilitating and crippling and tend to sideline you so that you are only an observer and not participant in the action. Not only does this work against the other two aesthetics that are otherwise playing together fairly nicely, it works against the game as a whole by removing agency from the player. Finally, no one playing the game is completely unacquainted with pain. They've either been injured themselves or they've been sufficiently hurt to imagine what being in crippling pain or having a crippling injury is like. We've all probably been 'gimped' at some point or experienced physical agony to some degree. Even if we simulated these things, it's not clear that the game would be offering to teach us by way of simulation anything we couldn't really learn by other means. There might be some educational merit to RPing out the horrors of combat, but you wouldn't do it over and over. So, in short, hit points are the worst system in gaming until you compare it to everything else. [/QUOTE]
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