Alternative HP systems

[Katemare]

I noticed some discussions of abstract HP nature lately. This made me thinking... There are other ways to represent character's resilience in RPGs: health levels, separate pools, endurance roll...

There is one HP system I like very much: Eldritch RPG's.
Characters have Active Defense Pools, representing defenses via actions:

• Weaponry, parries. The sum of weapon skills and wielded weapon's parry ability.
• Evade, in-place dodging.
• Dodge (can't say I care for this term), dodging via movement, such as running away.
• Reflect, shielding. Sum of shield skill and wielded shield quality.

...and Passive Defense Pools:

• Toughness, good old HP.
• Resiliense, non-lethal damage and willpower.

So, when a foe hits you, he rolls an attack. Resulting number is harm.

1. First, you can defend via actions: run away, parry and so on. Appropriate Active Defense Pool is depleted by harm value.
2. If harm is bigger than points left in the pool, the rest goes to either Toughness (physical attacks) or Resilience (mental, magic, and so on).
3. Some effects are also reduced by armor, and some go for Toughness after they destroy resilience (magic does that a lot).

Active defenses are fully replenished after combat, and passive one restore 10% per hour (20% per hour if sleeping).

Most monsters have Resilience and HP pools only, and you can describe how they handle hits in whatever manner you desire (dodging, parring, getting wounded, and so forth). Important monsters can be constructed and treated like characters, with all appropriate Defense Pools.

What's so good about active defenses? They're both cinematic and logical (you can't run if you have nowhere to run, for example). Love that %) And the system treats them is such way that they are easy to modify or houserule, but it's just an added bonus.


Thoughts? Other examples of interesting HP systems?

 

[Woas]

Does having so many Defense Pools slow the game down at all? How do you determine what pool is the target of an attack? Is it up to the player every time they are attacked?

As for me, I'm a big fan on the death spiral/damage to physical stats setup, where as a character takes damage, it reflects on their actions. Two good examples of these are Savage Worlds and Traveller.

 

[dm4hire]

I've been thinking of an interesting alternative that would reflect the more unpredictable nature of death. Characters are assigned a Fatality die or pool that represents the maximum number of fatal hits they can take. Then at the start of combat the player rolls the die and writes down the number. That represents how many fatal hits in that combat the character can take before dying.

My intention is to represent how you can live through all kinds of stuff then die slipping on a pebble and breaking your neck. So a fighter might have a d10 or even 2d10 for their Fatality and most fights they might be able to take quite a few hits, but then another fight the fighter might only be able to take one or two hits then drops like a rock in water.

 

[FireLance]

The active defence pools are an interesting idea, but I would prefer to model them as encounter powers in 4e, to cut down on how many numbers a player needs to track. Each one would allow you to negate one hit (or alternatively, reduce the hit point damage of one hit) once per combat.

What is the game effect of running out of Resilience before Toughness, or vice-versa? If the game effect is not significant, it might be better to just have a single hit point pool.

As a side point, a healing rate of 20% per hour means that a character only needs five hours of sleep to be fully healed. That will not go down well with those who think that healing fully after a six-hour extended rest is unrealistic...

 

[ExploderWizard]

There are a lot of ways to model HP and defenses. Which one is best depends on what the game is attempting to model.

Katemare, in the system you outlined, what determines if an attack was successful in the first place? Is the roll compared to an attack skill or are all attacks automatically successful?

 

[Dyson Logos]

Multiple defensive pools sounds like even more tracking / book-keeping than the old optional Wounds rules from Dragon Magazine that got shrugged off by most for requiring too much work.

Then again, I loved those rules and just re-wrote them to be a bit simpler and to apply across the gamut of D&D-style games here: ARRRGH!!! – Pain and Wound Rules for Dungeons and Dragons « A character for every game

 

[Katemare]

Does having so many Defense Pools slow the game down at all? How do you determine what pool is the target of an attack? Is it up to the player every time they are attacked?

Yeah, the target's player says "I parry", or "I run", or something. And you say "the giant sting crushes your shield and scratches your armor" (Reflect DP is depleted to zero, and armor took the rest of the hit).

There is only one attack roll incorporating both to-hit and damage, and only characters and bosses have distinct Active DP, so it isn't slower than D&D4, in my experience.

As for me, I'm a big fan on the death spiral/damage to physical stats setup, where as a character takes damage, it reflects on their actions. Two good examples of these are Savage Worlds and Traveller.

Right, forgot that one... Thanks.

 

[Katemare]

Katemare, in the system you outlined, what determines if an attack was successful in the first place? Is the roll compared to an attack skill or are all attacks automatically successful?

Skills are nested and count by die ranks (Melee d10 > Swords d4, for example). For an attack, you roll your skill (whole related branch), and the sum of the roll is harm value. This value you try to defend against.

Well, this probably means that every attack is successful, since unless it bounces off armor, it depletes this or that Defense Pool anyway.

 

[Katemare]

The active defence pools are an interesting idea, but I would prefer to model them as encounter powers in 4e, to cut down on how many numbers a player needs to track. Each one would allow you to negate one hit (or alternatively, reduce the hit point damage of one hit) once per combat.

Good point. There is an alternative rule to roll DP instead of treating them like a pool, but this means more rolls, more luck (and less book-keeping).

What is the game effect of running out of Resilience before Toughness, or vice-versa? If the game effect is not significant, it might be better to just have a single hit point pool.

If I recall correctly, some effects in D&D only start dealing lethal damage once your subdual damage equals HP; this is something of sorts. Other things in Eldritch (poison, mind control, etc.) affect only the resilience-less character.

Yeah, that creates some fuzzy effects of characters being immune, then instantly vulnerable %) Too bad Eldritch is not perfect. But at least easy to houserule. Such as single or rolled Defense Pools or longer rests.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Skills are nested and count by die ranks (Melee d10 > Swords d4, for example). For an attack, you roll your skill (whole related branch), and the sum of the roll is harm value. This value you try to defend against.

Well, this probably means that every attack is successful, since unless it bounces off armor, it depletes this or that Defense Pool anyway.

So skill is represented by die size and number? This means that defense/damage resources get chewed up no matter the skill difference between the fighters. Interesting. I will check out the quickstart rules and take a look.