How do you explain overnight Healing in your game?

[N0Man]

Doesn't some damage have to be explained as actual wounds? How do you take poison damage from the stinger of a giant scorpion without actually being hit? I am sure there are other examples of this.

So far I have liked 4e but it seems in all of the editions (including this one) there is some disconnect between the description/mechanics of combat/healing and the description/mechanics of some monsters attacks.

What I have been trying to do, at least cosmetically, is to say an attack was "successful" rather than an attack "hit". It's not much but breaking out of that saying that we have been so ingrained with is at least helping me visualize what is actually happening.

Did you happen to check out the post I made a few posts above yours? Just because hit points can describe wounds, and things other than wounds, doesn't mean that hit point loss can't mean that it can be both of these things at the very same time. Even in real life, a wound has more effect than just the wound itself, such as morale and will power. Isn't that the basic justification of why some use injuries as part of torture when attempting to get something from them?

A storyteller isn't going to necessarily describe all of these secondary effects though, the are going to usually focus on either the most dramatic, the most obvious, or whatever supports their theme.

I'm sure we've all seen shows and movies where enemies fall over from exhaustion, a tiny poke that pushes them over the edge (but would obviously do no real damage), taking a final hit that causes them to retreat, or fall (without dying or going unconscious) and just staying down. All of us see the blows and they physical responses, but we don't see what's going on in their head.

So, as I stated earlier, people are trying to resolve a conflict between hit points being wounds and hit points also including all of these other factors, when there isn't really actually a conflict.

It isn't necessary for NPCs to follow the same rules, because hit points are an abstraction and a plot device anyway. Expecting PCs and NPCs to all have to follow the exact same rules might appeal to some simulationist nature, but it severely ties your hands as a storyteller. It's ok for heroes to follow different rules, otherwise we could never have story hooks that involved the heroes being used in order to help save a dying NPC, unless it involved a disease path and a ritual.

 

[Garthanos]

Doesn't some damage have to be explained as actual wounds? How do you take poison damage from the stinger of a giant scorpion without actually being hit? I am sure there are other examples of this.

In general minimizing does not necessarily mean "nullifying".. mostly nicks and scratches that while not necessarily 'healed' arent going to bother a hero work fine.

There are some that imply one way or another, scorpion venom
I can answer that specific one.. the halfling rogue Shinarin is a lucky hero doesnt want to think of his hide being cut even a little.. describes it thusly.
"The poison spills out of the stinger on to my armor/gear and creates on going risk because while I move about the poison or acid is shaking about and settling.. does it find that nick in my skin I got shaving the other day and/or the crack in the armor etc. saving throws may tell, whether I feel slightly woozy after the battle but I have never been been "hit".

Now his buddy is a Warlord who thinks of himself as an tough hero the same hit is definitely a skin cut with poison around the wound if not outright in it.

The bleeding wound.... ie type-less ongoing damage is hardest for the halfling to fess up to though.... as having him scramble back every round describing the damage as him being afraid of the sharp thing that "almost" just cut him is embarassing even if thematically correct for the character..
and he was making a psychological heal check too ;-), so it can be done.

So far I have liked 4e but it seems in all of the editions (including this one) there is some disconnect between the description/mechanics of combat/healing and the description/mechanics of some monsters attacks.

What I have been trying to do, at least cosmetically, is to say an attack was "successful" rather than an attack "hit". It's not much but breaking out of that saying that we have been so ingrained with is at least helping me visualize what is actually happening.

Sure successful works nicely.(I have a fondness for a rule from Unearthed Arcana called "Players roll all the dice" so I just describe the initiation of the attack and the player gets to roll an active defense - mechanically identical for the most part.)

 

[Lizard]

Well, if I want to play a realistic game, D&D is certainly not among the top choices.

Bye
Thanee

"Realistic" and "Internally consistent" are not synonyms.

Unrealistic games are oodles of fun.

Games without internal consistency force you out of the mood and slam you in the face with "It's just a game!".

Generally, players "play along" and don't push too hard at the scenery. It's part of their buy-in. But if the system forces conflicts between expectations of what "should" happen and what the rules say happens, it can be jarring and fun-ruining.

Flavor text helps. How does my Bard's singing not only heal, but move people around, even when they can't move themselves? (Forced movement ignores immobilization). I've decide that my Bard uses fragments of Supernal, and that he is "changing the song of the world" -- literally altering reality, very slightly, with each song. So when he uses Majestic Word, he is undoing the event which caused the wound he heals, and then shifting someone's position in the universe. He's hacking the system, in essence, changing the values.

Now this gets back to consistency. We were in a society where arcane users were given a lot more rights than everyone else. I claimed to be an arcane caster, and a guard said "prove it". I used Majestic Word on the unwounded guard to move him a few feet to the side. If my DM had said "You can't do that" or "It doesn't work, he doesn't need healing", it would have been very jarring, because there's no reason the power shouldn't work 'out of combat'. As it is, he allowed it, and now I've got a very useful trick -- in essence, I have "Twice every five minutes, may move a willing target five feet". I can see a lot of uses for this.

 

[Garthanos]

Flavor text helps. How does my Bard's singing not only heal, but move people around, even when they can't move themselves? (Forced movement ignores immobilization).

well I might be inclined to describe it different depending on the circumstance... and it would completely depend on why they are immobilized.

But my first response was the inspiring song causes a burst of spirit which temporarily overrides the immobilization it works for me... I like a somewhat less arcane interpretation of the Bardic abilities than some do.
but
"The unicorn force is said to respond to song and wells up in listeners and the unicorn not only heals but frees all, atleast for the moment" -- and that is how my under optimized hybrid bard swordmage would describe it.

 

[Regicide]

A loss of hit points can be directly due to a wound. It can also be the other effects such as fatigue, pain, morale loss, bleeding, or the ability to remain conscious and not succumb to shock. It can be both of these things at the very same time. However, that doesn't mean that you are going to (or should) hear, "your long sword draws a heavy gash across the monster's chest, and he loses... 3 points of wound hit points, 2 points of morale hit points, and 2 hit points of fatigue hit points."

Well, lets look at that for a second, shall we?

HPs include "fatigue." Reasonable to think since resting gets you back healing surges which means you get your HPs back I suppose. But lets look at things that fatigue people. Climbing, jumping and oh, say... running an ultra marathon. These things cause fatigue, do any of them cause HP loss in 4E? No. No they don't. I think it's pretty believable that someone that just ran a marathon, swam a lake, kayaked up a rapids, swung a sword for 10 minutes and climbed a cliff is not in the same fighting shape as someone who didn't. But there are no rules in 4E for physical or mental exertion reducing HPs. In previous editions exhaustion and the like often gave a penalty to attack and skill rolls. So I think it's pretty clear that HPs and fatigue are not in fact related at all.

HPs include "moral." Well whats the most obvious case of moral break? Fear. What does fear from, say, a dragon do in 4E, does it reduce HPs? No, it involves an attack penalty, much like previous editions. In some cases it involves stunning or running away, but nowhere does loss of moral cause HP damage. Likewise a successful intimidation check against bloodied opponents doesn't drop them to the ground dead. So again, it seems pretty clear HPs and moral are completely unrelated according to the actual rules of 4E.

What causes HP damage? Being hit with things, fire, hostile magic and magical effects, falling off a cliff and all things that we associate with wounding, bone breaking and the like. Additionally removal of things required to sustain human life such as starvation, suffocation and dehydration will also, unsurprisingly, cause HP loss.

Although debates like this happened in previous editions because HPs are an odd abstraction, they were nothing like what we get in 4E with the addition of the utterly bizarre healing surge mechanic which has no parallel in real life. The only answer is to accept that it has no parallel, stop trying to call it moral or make some other excuse for it being a simplification or abstraction for something because it's not. Just accept it's a game mechanic and move along. NPCs are for killing or getting plot hooks from.

 

[Jack Colby]

I've never felt the need to explain it, nor have players asked for an explanation. Obviously the "Damage" taken was impairing at the time, but not really that permanent.

Also remember that PCs in combat are doing all they can to minimize the deadliness of the attacks against them, that's why a sword thrust doesn't, you know, kill them instantly. So yes, it is also the fatigue of battle and avoiding all those deadly blows that lower HP. Why don't HP lower when climbing a cliff or running a marathon? Because they are a measure of how vulnerable a PC is to serious injury/death. If that threat isn't there, sure, they may get tired, but pushing it too far (which would be falling to low HP in a combat) won't result in letting their guard down so an orc can stab them fatally. In combat, that happens.

 

[Naszir]

Well, lets look at that for a second, shall we?

HPs include "fatigue." Reasonable to think since resting gets you back healing surges which means you get your HPs back I suppose. But lets look at things that fatigue people. Climbing, jumping and oh, say... running an ultra marathon. These things cause fatigue, do any of them cause HP loss in 4E? No. No they don't. I think it's pretty believable that someone that just ran a marathon, swam a lake, kayaked up a rapids, swung a sword for 10 minutes and climbed a cliff is not in the same fighting shape as someone who didn't. But there are no rules in 4E for physical or mental exertion reducing HPs. In previous editions exhaustion and the like often gave a penalty to attack and skill rolls. So I think it's pretty clear that HPs and fatigue are not in fact related at all.

By failing skill challenges you can cut into Healing Surges. Healing Surges seem to me can be thought of as a reserve of hit points. All of the things described as fatigue can be represented by reducing healing surges as part of a failed skill challenge.

HPs include "moral." Well whats the most obvious case of moral break? Fear. What does fear from, say, a dragon do in 4E, does it reduce HPs? No, it involves an attack penalty, much like previous editions. In some cases it involves stunning or running away, but nowhere does loss of moral cause HP damage. Likewise a successful intimidation check against bloodied opponents doesn't drop them to the ground dead. So again, it seems pretty clear HPs and moral are completely unrelated according to the actual rules of 4E.

I'll agree with you on this one.

What causes HP damage? Being hit with things, fire, hostile magic and magical effects, falling off a cliff and all things that we associate with wounding, bone breaking and the like. Additionally removal of things required to sustain human life such as starvation, suffocation and dehydration will also, unsurprisingly, cause HP loss.

Don't forget there is psychic damage too. That causes HP damage.

Although debates like this happened in previous editions because HPs are an odd abstraction, they were nothing like what we get in 4E with the addition of the utterly bizarre healing surge mechanic which has no parallel in real life. The only answer is to accept that it has no parallel, stop trying to call it moral or make some other excuse for it being a simplification or abstraction for something because it's not. Just accept it's a game mechanic and move along. NPCs are for killing or getting plot hooks from.

The healing surge mechanic is not that bizarre. There are some things with that are not so easily explanable but adrenaline rushes are common and so are quick recoveries. The ability of NFL players to play through great pain week in and week out is a good parallel in real life.

 

[Garthanos]

Absence of other fatigue causing phenomena in rules in D&D excepting wounds causing hitpoints are not evidence that they are not representing fatigue it is more evidence that the things arent considered interesting in a heroic D&D context where as wounds are considered interesting.

Well, lets look at that for a second, shall we?
Likewise a successful intimidation check against bloodied opponents doesn't drop them to the ground dead.

Hitpoints are a buffer... intimidation is indeed not reducing your morale you are using your morale to nullify intimidation... how again does that not make sense exactly?

I would like hitpoints to act as more of a buffer for other effects than just the absolute submission

A perfect fatigue system for D&D in any version would have hitpoint loss from fatiguing activities but my experience is unless the activity is also exciting.. people just dont want to track it.
ahhh thats right I forget skill challenges reducing the healing surges... of course yes that could mean they are taking damage and being forced to use there surges to recover... or it could be a fatigue abstraction.

Although debates like this happened in previous editions because HPs are an odd abstraction, they were nothing like what we get in 4E with the addition of the utterly bizarre healing surge mechanic which has no parallel in real life.

Except adrenaline surges that allow someone to sudden burst out of there funky state like magic, ignoring fatigue and minor pains etc ... hey they have the same word in them I wonder if just maybe they correlate.

 

[Garthanos]

Don't forget there is psychic damage too. That causes HP damage.

which for many of those attacks sounds very like morale loss...

 

[Regicide]

The healing surge mechanic is not that bizarre. There are some things with that are not so easily explanable but adrenaline rushes are common and so are quick recoveries. The ability of NFL players to play through great pain week in and week out is a good parallel in real life.

Drugs and training are in no way a parallel to healing surges what so ever. I'll change my mind and agree with you when NFLers who are dying on a stretcher on the way to the hospital, spring up and say "put me in coach" with their concussion mysteriously gone. And they stop missing games due to injuries. Or when the commentators stop saying how the injuries from previous games are hurting a team's performance despite the fact that they've had a couple nights to get all their healing surges back.

A far better parallel to your sports analogy is when there WASN'T healing surges and you only gained back HP based on level per night so could in fact take an extended amount of time to recover completely.

Absence of other fatigue causing phenomena in rules in D&D excepting wounds causing hitpoints are not evidence that they are not representing fatigue it is more evidence that the things arent considered interesting in a heroic D&D context where as wounds are considered interesting.

Fatigue causing actions which are in the game not causing HPs loss is in fact evidence HPs aren't fatigue.

A perfect fatigue system for D&D in any version would have hitpoint loss from fatiguing activities but my experience is unless the activity is also exciting.. people just dont want to track it.
ahhh thats right I forget skill challenges reducing the healing surges.

Actually the 3E system, which is used in a lot of places actually, was pretty good with a penalty to rolls. 4Es removal of penalties, like non-profiency and sub-10 abilities is probably why exhaustion got taken out. Skill challenges reduce HPs because characters "injure themselves", like spraining ankles and falling out of trees.

Except adrenaline surges that allow someone to sudden burst out of there funky state like magic, ignoring fatigue and minor pains etc ... hey they have the same word in them I wonder if just maybe they correlate.

No, an adrenaline surge is what every PC has at the start of a fight when they realize their life is in danger. It prepares the body for fight or flight. Last I checked, you don't lose a healing surge for entering combat.

which for many of those attacks sounds very like morale loss...

Psychic damage and moral are unrelated. You're really really reaching because you have nothing to stand on. Next time someone reaches into your brain and rearranges it can argue otherwise.