Realism vs. Believability and the Design of HPs, Powers and Other Things

[Gorgoroth]

still.

a wand with a million billion cure charges in it wrecks my believability less than some guy off on his own springing back to full after FIVE MINUTES REST with no magic at all.

It's so ridiculous that it's not even worth debating. As far as making curative potions, I think that's a way better mechanic. Everyone should try to pick up some brewing skill, if they want to boil some herbs and drop some pixie dust in it at just the right moment and temperature (pixie dust or X magical ingredient would be rare enough or need a survival check or knowledge to find or extract and harvest from mythical beasts). Orcs might make their healing potions from the tears of halflings mixed with elf blood, humans might use extract of beholder eyes or whatever. Suddenly, without super easy / cheap wands, you have a reason to barricade the door from orcs barging in while you spend 1/2 hour and try to brew up a fresh batch of cure potions. Maybe they don't last more than a few hours before the potency is lost, who knows.

There are a million bajillion ways I can think of to make curative magic work given the need to avoid the 15 minute work day and cheese at the same time, and still mix in some skill checks required and foraging or cutting out the glands from that dragon over there. Why not? Make the PCs work for it, or fast forward that part when you rest, but the amount of healing could be held back by limited access to magical reagents, so it's still in the hands of the DM, and the PCs would have to go kill that nasty beast back there to make potions out of its goo before heading further down the dungeon.

One thing I did love in 4e was minor action healing. Though it's really sad they seem to be removing the standard>move>minor hierarchy. I'd love to play a cleric with worthwhile healing but still the ability to attack. Just like how an offhand attack could be a minor action (1/round max) for rangers, a cleric would have his standard to fight and his minor to touch his ally and "halleluliah" him a bit. There are really a lot of good things about 4e, but let's learn from that edition's mistakes and make something that works mechanically while keeping suspension of disbelief in check.

"The best part is...it's learning"--Archer, Re: Fisto Roboto

 

[Neonchameleon]

Yes, in addition to the surges, which makes death (again, my play experience for 4E) so rare as to be nonexistent (as in, no character in any game I played in 4E has ever died) and thus the game felt stale and boring as there was never a real threat except for those that were ridiculously over-budget.

Post MM3 YMMV. A lot. We've had more kills with me running 4e for a year than 5 years of 3e did.

That's what a DM is for. A lot of the complaining I see about healing wands goes hand-in-hand with the complaints about magic Walmarts, neither of which were present in my games (neither as player, nor DM, nor in 3.0, nor 3.5). It seems that the two go together. Magic Walmarts lead to everyone with a wand lead to characters that die as often or even less than 4E superheroes.

It's not necessary. You just need someone to take the craft wand feat or to spend their WBL on wands rather than magic swords.

a wand with a million billion cure charges in it wrecks my believability less than some guy off on his own springing back to full after FIVE MINUTES REST with no magic at all.

But they aren't. They aren't back at full until their healing surges are restored. They are just able to function effectively, having been bandaged and having had their wounds stop bleeding. (Now the one night of rest issue is a genuine one). A bandaged wound isn't the same as a healed wound but it's a lot less of an inconvenience than an unbandaged one, especially to an action hero.

 

[Mercutio01]

Post MM3 YMMV. A lot. We've had more kills with me running 4e for a year than 5 years of 3e did.

Okay. I'm not really interested in buying more than the core 3 books for any edition unless I find enough in those books to recommend purchasing more. I don't feel like I should have to buy in that far (MM3) just to get threats that are threatening. That should be pretty basic.

It's not necessary. You just need someone to take the craft wand feat or to spend their WBL on wands rather than magic swords.

Again, DM concerns. WBL is not a guaranteed. It's not even OGL content. It's distinctly part of the DMG and the DM's options. And craft wand is generally okay, as it uses a ton of time and resources that a character wouldn't necessarily want to spend in a game.

But they aren't. They aren't back at full until their healing surges are restored. They are just able to function effectively, having been bandaged and having had their wounds stop bleeding. (Now the one night of rest issue is a genuine one). A bandaged wound isn't the same as a healed wound but it's a lot less of an inconvenience than an unbandaged one, especially to an action hero.

But that is fluff that you are adding to the game. That isn't the mechanics of how it works, and it's not even the fluff of the actual game itself. All this "surges used = bandaged wounds" is ex post facto explanation. I mean, I can see how Saga's Wounds/Vitality turned into Healing Surges (with a few changes to try to cover up its DNA), but that's not at all how it's described, and then you are still left with the fact that healing surges /= wounds "healed" (otherwise you then deal with Warlord's shouting wounds closed) and that's a whole other issue.

And you still can't honestly say that the change isn't a large and important difference from the previous 30+ years of D&D: It is contentious because of that alone. For many people, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. I, for one, didn't have any problems with magical healing being solely the domain of a cleric or with someone "biting the bullet" and playing the cleric. That was never really an issue.

 

[B.T.]

If I may interject briefly:

If you want D&D to feel like D&D, you need to have healing spells, not healing surges. You can argue about what makes more sense or which is more believable or which is better, but the most important question is, "Does this feel like D&D?"

The transition from 2e to 3e "felt" like D&D to a lot of people, even with ascending AC and changes to saving throws. The transition from 3e to 4e did not. I don't care if 4e was a commercial success or not--we could argue all day about that and it's one of those stupid debates where people pull things out of their ass to justify their beliefs--but to a lot of people (myself included), 4e did not feel like D&D. Ultimately, that's what matters.

I won't deny that 4e is a fairly solid game. The math is certainly better than 3e. The classes are more balanced. The skill system is simpler and streamlined. The monster design and encounter creation rules are much better than 3e's. And, in the end, none of that matters. If the game has the D&D brand, it had damn well better look and feel like D&D. (Nerds get emotionally attached to their RPGs in the way that sports fans get emotionally attached to their favorite teams. Change things at your own peril.)

What does D&D feel like? Clerics healing hit points with cure light wounds, not clerics using healing word to allow a character to spend a healing surge.

 

[pemerton]

If you want D&D to feel like D&D, you need to have healing spells, not healing surges.

<sip>

The transition from 2e to 3e "felt" like D&D to a lot of people, even with ascending AC and changes to saving throws. The transition from 3e to 4e did not.

<snip>

to a lot of people (myself included), 4e did not feel like D&D. Ultimately, that's what matters.

<snip>

If the game has the D&D brand, it had damn well better look and feel like D&D.

<snip>

What does D&D feel like? Clerics healing hit points with cure light wounds, not clerics using healing word to allow a character to spend a healing surge.

I think "feeling like D&D" is fairly subjective.

For me, 4e does not feel like D&D in one way: it doesn't have boring combats of little more than hit point attrition. The healing rules are one important part of this.

It does feel like D&D in another way: it has fantasy adventure with gonzo PCs and gonzo monsters. The healing rules are pretty orthogonal to this.

Personally, what I value in D&D clerics is their "holy warriors with maces" vibe, not their "cure light wounds take a round to case and restor 1d8 or 1d6+1 hp, depending on edition" vibe.

 

[Mercutio01]

Personally, what I value in D&D clerics is their "holy warriors with maces" vibe, not their "cure light wounds take a round to case and restor 1d8 or 1d6+1 hp, depending on edition" vibe.

And the trick to 5E is reconciling those two points of view. For me the paladin fulfills the former while the latter is exactly what I think a cleric should be. And neither of us is wrong or right objectively, but one of those has the weight of 30+ years of gaming and one has the weight of only 4.


EDIT: I'll point out that your simplification is reductive to the point of absurdity as I don't know of any person whose cleric was a one-trick pony that only cast healing spells every round. In fact, most of them did lots of other things during combat, like buffs/debuffs/flame strikes/etc.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I have a pretty low threshold for 'feeling like D&D'. Rifts, World of Warcraft and Dragon Age all feel like D&D to me, for example.

The name of the militant semi-Christian/semi-pagan clergyman's magic healing power? I find it utterly trivial. Which is not to say ENWorld hasn't generated fifty page threads on even more trivial subjects. Like dragonboobs.

 

[pemerton]

And the trick to 5E is reconciling those two points of view. For me the paladin fulfills the former while the latter is exactly what I think a cleric should be. And neither of us is wrong or right objectively, but one of those has the weight of 30+ years of gaming and one has the weight of only 4.

I first encountered clerics as holy warriors with maces in Moldvay Basic in 1982. That's more than 4 years ago.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Okay. I'm not really interested in buying more than the core 3 books for any edition unless I find enough in those books to recommend purchasing more. I don't feel like I should have to buy in that far (MM3) just to get threats that are threatening. That should be pretty basic.

They rebaselined the math and at high levels it undoubtedly needed it. And have a new set of base books in 4e - Essentials. Which are IMO a lot better. Monster Vault (the "new" MM) creatures are vicious.

Again, DM concerns. WBL is not a guaranteed. It's not even OGL content. It's distinctly part of the DMG and the DM's options. And craft wand is generally okay, as it uses a ton of time and resources that a character wouldn't necessarily want to spend in a game.

The Wand of Cure Light Wounds does not take "a lot of time" to craft. It takes one day. If that's a lot of time in your games, I wonder that the PCs even have time to sleep. As for the cost? Under 400GP to craft? When a +1 sword is over 2000GP to buy?

But that is fluff that you are adding to the game. That isn't the mechanics of how it works, and it's not even the fluff of the actual game itself.

It is undeniably true that after recovering after a short rest the PC is still down endurance and resilience because they are down healing surges and therefore can not take as many further hits in the day as they otherwise would be able to. And that there are spells and only spells that regain hit points without spending a surge. The bandages in specific are my fluff - in the rules both hit points and healing surges are presented as abstract.

And you still can't honestly say that the change isn't a large and important difference from the previous 30+ years of D&D: It is contentious because of that alone. For many people, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

And for many people hit points were always broke. Healing surges are less broke.

I, for one, didn't have any problems with magical healing being solely the domain of a cleric or with someone "biting the bullet" and playing the cleric. That was never really an issue.

I've never had problems with warlords either. I do however prefer a game that gives me the option to have a non-crippled genuinely low magic party. I'm playing a LoTR game using D&D rules - no casters in the party. No wizard, cleric, or druid wouldn't really work in older editions. If I read Appendix N, I see almost nothing that looks like a D&D wizard or cleric (Vancian wizards looking much more like 4e characters). If I want to play D&D other than as a self-referential game, most of the inspirations do not have D&D style clerics. Warlords, who can inspire people to keep going when they are weary and wounded are much more common.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Originally Posted by pemerton
Personally, what I value in D&D clerics is their "holy warriors with maces" vibe, not their "cure light wounds take a round to case and restor 1d8 or 1d6+1 hp, depending on edition" vibe.

And the trick to 5E is reconciling those two points of view. For me the paladin fulfills the former while the latter is exactly what I think a cleric should be. And neither of us is wrong or right objectively, but one of those has the weight of 30+ years of gaming and one has the weight of only 4.

A cleric as a holy warrior with a mace? Off the top of my head, that's almost a thousand years old at a minimum. You might have the weight of 40 years of gaming. But against that we can set 30 years of gaming and almost a thousand years of history and stories.

And I care more that my game resembles good fiction than that it's self-referential.