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The Issue of Hit Point Inflation and Related Materia
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<blockquote data-quote="Jack7" data-source="post: 4661614" data-attributes="member: 54707"><p>I don't really mind Weal increasing with level as a factor of physique EW, because Weal is about general bodily well being (it includes things like Hit points and general health, freedom from diseases and injury, physical performance, etc.) and because experience and exposure to dangerous situations, over time, makes you tougher, stronger, and more capable.</p><p></p><p>As a matter of fact that's the way I devised it. So I'm having Weal increase by level like hp totals, but it works differently because it is directly tied as a factor to your physique.</p><p></p><p>However strikes against your Weal also weaken strength, slow reflexes, and cause other problems, so being wounded doesn't just subtract hit points it actually lowers capabilities. This gives everyone incentives to fight hard and fast as quickly as possible because as your Weal fails then your overall effectiveness in combat is reduced as well. That's true for men and monsters.</p><p></p><p>Therefore the longer you fight the less incentive there is to remain "brawling" because you weaken, not just reduce in hit points, as you fight. Two or three serious injuries reduce you significantly (whereas four or five smaller wounds might have the same effect) and by percentage of your Weal rather than by hit points per se, and as Weal fails so do other things.</p><p></p><p>So everyone, character and monster, has a built in incentive to strike hard and effectively, and lethally, as quickly as possible.</p><p></p><p>A higher level character will not be killed by a single strike in most cases, but that is possible under the right conditions, but his attrition rate is comparatively far faster than in 4E, and the same for monsters, though monsters can take it up front better, but after reaching their "breaking point" they decline in Weal rapidly.</p><p></p><p>Characters can't take as much damage up front but they can take it longer. Their rate of Weal decline is more proportionately even, and steady.</p><p></p><p>So monsters have the up-font advantage, but characters the long term advantage, but the incentive is to kill quickly to avoid serious injury which reduces capabilities from the start. This also encourages and incentivizes combatants to become better "killers" and not just better "fighters."</p><p></p><p>Being a good fighter can get you killed, but being a good killer will get the opponent killed.</p><p></p><p>Now as an attribute I'm including Will, which is of course Will-power. Will is an attribute, like Strength or Physique, but it can affect every other attribute. Will scores can be temporarily expended or used to bolster other abilities, or capabilities.</p><p></p><p>For instance Will can be temporarily used to reinforce Spares (Saving Throws), to bolster Wisdom, to augment Strength, or in combat even to temporarily reinforce Weal. As examples of how Will works as a "reinforcement attribute."</p><p></p><p>So in combat situations Will, or force of Will, can be used to reinforce and strengthen a flagging or injured Weal. Because I've seen more than one fight resolved by little else than "force of will."</p><p></p><p>Fairly evenly matched, one party ends up defeating or killing the other because the first party used their "force of Will," and their training, to bolster their effectiveness in combat or a fight.</p><p></p><p>So in combat it is Weal as a measure of injury and capability, and Will as a measure of control over ability. so it's Weal and Will. Then Will has to recharge after being expended, just like Weal has to regenerate through rest and recuperation.</p><p></p><p>So if you have a Weal Score of 16 (attribute scores run from 1 to 20), and a Will score of 19, and you are a second level fighter then your Weal score is 32.</p><p></p><p>A single serious injury might reduce that (your Weal) by 50% to 16 and lower his Strength by 2 and his Dexterity by 3(and thereby lower his ability bonuses correspondingly), and then the character could expend 10 points of Will to give him a temporary combat score of 26 Weal, raising his strength back up to normal and his dexterity, or agility, by 2 for the rest of the combat, or until taking another blow to Weal.</p><p></p><p>A monster could also use Will to reinforce Weal, but some monsters would not possess Will. Most monsters would be more resistant to injury up front, in the early stages of a battle injuries scored against them would do less Weal damage, but after a certain point injuries against them do more damage. So they are harder to kill up front but easier once they become exhausted and worn down. </p><p></p><p>So the incentive for the character is to do a lot of real damage to a monster right up front and thereby push him quickly past his exhaustion and breaking point, and theater he is less dangerous and easier to kill (many musters anyways, there would be exceptions). The incentive for the monster is to do a lot of real damage up front to the character because by doing so they not only kill the characters more efficiently, they also weaken their effectiveness in counter-attack.</p><p></p><p>A character could also get Second Winds but they only last for 3 combat rounds and then he falls back to his pre-wind condition.</p><p></p><p>(Will can also be used to temporarily boost offensive capabilities, like striking and damage bonuses, but if you expend Will for offense you cannot expend it then for defense until after it is recovered. In combat situations you might think of will as "focused determination," whereas in skill challenges it would function more as "focused concentration.")</p><p></p><p>Nobody wants to see long drawn out battles in this system because the monster knows if he is worn down quickly he is killed more easily (so he wants to kill fast and first), and the character knows that even if he survives initial vicious attacks and can better withstand damage long term, he also becomes a less effective fighter the longer he is in the fight. And so by becoming less effective he makes it harder on himself to cross the breaking threshold of the monster. (A lot of more intelligent monsters will surrender at this point if they feel they can because they know that they will be dispatched quickly after they "break.")</p><p></p><p>Long term injuries or serious diseases can errantly lower Weal and Weal can be increased by level gains, experience, exercise, and toughness training.</p><p></p><p>I am experimenting with a system in which a single die roll (d20) will tell you whether or not you successfully struck, what part of the body, how much damage you did to the opponent's Weal, how much damage you did to armor, what effect you had on their ability to want to continue fighting (morale, important if they are not really wanting to fight or are uncommitted to the fight), if an injury inflicted is debilitating in some way, etc.</p><p></p><p>Monsters fight on one advantage chart, characters on another, but those trained to be lethal (monster or man - and any character, no matter class, can undergo lethality training - but combatants [fighters] do as part of their professional training) fight on a "Lethality Chart."</p><p></p><p>If you are trained to be lethal then you are trained to kill, not just fight.</p><p>And you are trained to destroy your opponents Weal and Will and thereby quickly overcome or kill him, not just reduce his hit points.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I agree with that too FL. but then again fights shouldn't become a brawl instead of what they really are, a lethal combat.</p><p></p><p>It's not like a real fight in the fact that things move relatively slowly, and you can see the fight from a bird's-eye view, or almost as a disinterested, objective bystander (instead of really worrying if someone is gonna off you or your buddies). Then again you want fights to be far more dangerous, lethal, and fluid then just a hit point exchange.</p><p></p><p>I think it's a balance between tactics and maneuver (which is the stage play aspect and wargaming interest of an RPG fight), and purpose and lethality (which is the real intent of the fight - to kill the opponent).</p><p></p><p>You want it to be dramatic and fake enough to be an interesting mental exercise, but dangerous and lethal enough to stimulate real excitement and emotion. <em>You want it to look dramatic</em>, <strong>but feel dangerous</strong>.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jack7, post: 4661614, member: 54707"] I don't really mind Weal increasing with level as a factor of physique EW, because Weal is about general bodily well being (it includes things like Hit points and general health, freedom from diseases and injury, physical performance, etc.) and because experience and exposure to dangerous situations, over time, makes you tougher, stronger, and more capable. As a matter of fact that's the way I devised it. So I'm having Weal increase by level like hp totals, but it works differently because it is directly tied as a factor to your physique. However strikes against your Weal also weaken strength, slow reflexes, and cause other problems, so being wounded doesn't just subtract hit points it actually lowers capabilities. This gives everyone incentives to fight hard and fast as quickly as possible because as your Weal fails then your overall effectiveness in combat is reduced as well. That's true for men and monsters. Therefore the longer you fight the less incentive there is to remain "brawling" because you weaken, not just reduce in hit points, as you fight. Two or three serious injuries reduce you significantly (whereas four or five smaller wounds might have the same effect) and by percentage of your Weal rather than by hit points per se, and as Weal fails so do other things. So everyone, character and monster, has a built in incentive to strike hard and effectively, and lethally, as quickly as possible. A higher level character will not be killed by a single strike in most cases, but that is possible under the right conditions, but his attrition rate is comparatively far faster than in 4E, and the same for monsters, though monsters can take it up front better, but after reaching their "breaking point" they decline in Weal rapidly. Characters can't take as much damage up front but they can take it longer. Their rate of Weal decline is more proportionately even, and steady. So monsters have the up-font advantage, but characters the long term advantage, but the incentive is to kill quickly to avoid serious injury which reduces capabilities from the start. This also encourages and incentivizes combatants to become better "killers" and not just better "fighters." Being a good fighter can get you killed, but being a good killer will get the opponent killed. Now as an attribute I'm including Will, which is of course Will-power. Will is an attribute, like Strength or Physique, but it can affect every other attribute. Will scores can be temporarily expended or used to bolster other abilities, or capabilities. For instance Will can be temporarily used to reinforce Spares (Saving Throws), to bolster Wisdom, to augment Strength, or in combat even to temporarily reinforce Weal. As examples of how Will works as a "reinforcement attribute." So in combat situations Will, or force of Will, can be used to reinforce and strengthen a flagging or injured Weal. Because I've seen more than one fight resolved by little else than "force of will." Fairly evenly matched, one party ends up defeating or killing the other because the first party used their "force of Will," and their training, to bolster their effectiveness in combat or a fight. So in combat it is Weal as a measure of injury and capability, and Will as a measure of control over ability. so it's Weal and Will. Then Will has to recharge after being expended, just like Weal has to regenerate through rest and recuperation. So if you have a Weal Score of 16 (attribute scores run from 1 to 20), and a Will score of 19, and you are a second level fighter then your Weal score is 32. A single serious injury might reduce that (your Weal) by 50% to 16 and lower his Strength by 2 and his Dexterity by 3(and thereby lower his ability bonuses correspondingly), and then the character could expend 10 points of Will to give him a temporary combat score of 26 Weal, raising his strength back up to normal and his dexterity, or agility, by 2 for the rest of the combat, or until taking another blow to Weal. A monster could also use Will to reinforce Weal, but some monsters would not possess Will. Most monsters would be more resistant to injury up front, in the early stages of a battle injuries scored against them would do less Weal damage, but after a certain point injuries against them do more damage. So they are harder to kill up front but easier once they become exhausted and worn down. So the incentive for the character is to do a lot of real damage to a monster right up front and thereby push him quickly past his exhaustion and breaking point, and theater he is less dangerous and easier to kill (many musters anyways, there would be exceptions). The incentive for the monster is to do a lot of real damage up front to the character because by doing so they not only kill the characters more efficiently, they also weaken their effectiveness in counter-attack. A character could also get Second Winds but they only last for 3 combat rounds and then he falls back to his pre-wind condition. (Will can also be used to temporarily boost offensive capabilities, like striking and damage bonuses, but if you expend Will for offense you cannot expend it then for defense until after it is recovered. In combat situations you might think of will as "focused determination," whereas in skill challenges it would function more as "focused concentration.") Nobody wants to see long drawn out battles in this system because the monster knows if he is worn down quickly he is killed more easily (so he wants to kill fast and first), and the character knows that even if he survives initial vicious attacks and can better withstand damage long term, he also becomes a less effective fighter the longer he is in the fight. And so by becoming less effective he makes it harder on himself to cross the breaking threshold of the monster. (A lot of more intelligent monsters will surrender at this point if they feel they can because they know that they will be dispatched quickly after they "break.") Long term injuries or serious diseases can errantly lower Weal and Weal can be increased by level gains, experience, exercise, and toughness training. I am experimenting with a system in which a single die roll (d20) will tell you whether or not you successfully struck, what part of the body, how much damage you did to the opponent's Weal, how much damage you did to armor, what effect you had on their ability to want to continue fighting (morale, important if they are not really wanting to fight or are uncommitted to the fight), if an injury inflicted is debilitating in some way, etc. Monsters fight on one advantage chart, characters on another, but those trained to be lethal (monster or man - and any character, no matter class, can undergo lethality training - but combatants [fighters] do as part of their professional training) fight on a "Lethality Chart." If you are trained to be lethal then you are trained to kill, not just fight. And you are trained to destroy your opponents Weal and Will and thereby quickly overcome or kill him, not just reduce his hit points. I agree with that too FL. but then again fights shouldn't become a brawl instead of what they really are, a lethal combat. It's not like a real fight in the fact that things move relatively slowly, and you can see the fight from a bird's-eye view, or almost as a disinterested, objective bystander (instead of really worrying if someone is gonna off you or your buddies). Then again you want fights to be far more dangerous, lethal, and fluid then just a hit point exchange. I think it's a balance between tactics and maneuver (which is the stage play aspect and wargaming interest of an RPG fight), and purpose and lethality (which is the real intent of the fight - to kill the opponent). You want it to be dramatic and fake enough to be an interesting mental exercise, but dangerous and lethal enough to stimulate real excitement and emotion. [I]You want it to look dramatic[/I], [B]but feel dangerous[/B]. [/QUOTE]
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