Tony Vargas
Legend
Its precisely because I'm all too familiar with a variety of ways of modeling - and failing to model - plot armor, that I find the idea tweaking firearms to high-damage in D&D is a poor solution.Now you come across as someone unfamiliar with other role-playing designs than hit points and levels, but I'm sure that's not really the case.
Hps are a model of plot armor, and a workable one. That's better than a lot of other, nor sophisticated systems have managed.Meaning all of that is certainly not a defining feature of hit points, and in fact, a way to use hit points that is deeply unsatisfactory to many.
Yes, thinking of them as undifferentiated physical structure that must be abated is problematic unless you're talking golems and the like - so don't think of them that way.
The player does, the character is imagined as Not knowing it.How's that? Because with hit points you *know* the first stab or bullet is not going to reduce your fighting capability in any way.
That's a failure of imagination, but not an insurmountable one.Not everybody is capable of feeling the excitement and (exaggerated) fear of death there.
Well, and Vancian casting, and a lot if other things D&D did ...oddly.This is a major reason why other RPGs were invented.
There's a simple catch-22 there, if you design your plot-armor mechanic to 'feel' to the player like real danger, RPGs not being that opaque, it'll have to actually be that, and PC death will be too frequent for players to get into any one character.That is, to better model a scenario where each bullet could kill you (but not really, since you're a hero). But fundamentally, to replace hit points with Dodge tests, built in physical resistance, and relying much more on armor, cover and tactics.
As a designer, you have to trust players to have some imagination.
Oh, it's bad, real bad, y'know it.(And for the umpteenth time, not because D&D is bad, only because it's suited to another set of expectations on how a combat "should" go down)
But, seriously, hps as plot armor are one of the less-bad bits.