The ONE Hit Point World

[Sir Robilar]

Hire hirlings to carry all your loot.

But hirelings could easily kill you for the loot.

 

[Argyle King]

I think you would also need to add an option for active defenses similar to how a game of GURPS works. Being hit tends to be more deadly, but that's offset by the fact that you're not assumed to get hit; you can parry with your weapon, dodge out of the way, and/or block with a shield.

I remember there being an optional 3rd Edition rule which added a defense roll to combat. My memory is vague on the details, but I seem to remember the basic concepts being that the target of an attack also got to roll a d20. This usually worked pretty will with using the wound point system (from Unearthed Arcana) instead of the more traditional HP model.

 

[jonesy]

I would kill the hit point and take its stuff. What? Oh, you mean everyone gets a hit point?

Dungeons would become slaughter houses. No-one in their right mind would ever venture into one.

 

[MarkB]

In this instance, I'm not sure there's a great deal of difference between one point and no point at all.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

"I smell the peppery bush."

"Make a Fort save."

*rollrollrollroll* "Its a 4."

"You sneeze, blow out a blood vessel in your head and die."

 

[Oryan77]

1. Create a potion that can give people 2 hit points.

2. Sell them.

3. Make millions.

4. Hope nobody makes a potion that gives people 3 hit points.

 

[Hussar]

Doesn't Savage Worlds do pretty much this?

It's been a while since I read the rules, but, pretty much everyone in the world dies in one hit. Wildcards (PC's and some NPC's) take (IIRC) 4 hits to take down.

It's simple and quick.

 

[malcolypse]

I also think there was d20 game with a similar mechanic. All players rolled d3 for HP, and got 1 per level. This in a post-apocalypse setting, which meant that most weapons could easily one-shot you. Can't remember the name though.

Ha, I found this game's name. It was "The End," and was set after the biblical rapture. It was a bleak setting and a brutal system.

I once had a character get bitten by a rattlesnake and the other players were deciding how to split my gear before they even rolled to try to save me, because death was pretty much a done deal in that game. I survived, and outlived all of them.

I recall that there was a prestige class that got a d4 or a d6 hit points per level and they were pretty much unstoppable.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Play a revenant with the whole "I keep acting even when I'm on negative hitpoints" kit and kaboodle. Take AOE and auto-hit powers.

 

[Mailanka]

It's not much of an exaggeration to say that the real world pretty much operates on that principle, depending on how you scale "one point of damage." One would argue that you get ridiculous results like household pets killing people... but sometimes household pets, stubbed toes and tripping down the stairs do kill people. War isn't about people slugging it out until someone keels over, but trying to be lucky enough to not get hit at all.

So it wouldn't end violence, it would just scale up intimidation and the use of armies to exert power and bodyguards to protect you. In short, it'd become more of a political and strategic game than a tactical one (in the sense that most D&Ders mean "tactical," that is "interesting exchanges of blows between two individuals or two very small groups." It would certainly fulfill more classic definitions of "tactical," in the sense of "winning a battle between armies."

(Come to think of it, most wargames, especially ones with minis, just gives everyone "1 hit point," unless you're a totally awesome hero character)

Oh, and fast-draw/initiative would be king.

I'd play it, but I play GURPS, in which a single solid hit might not kill you, but it can easily be a fight ender, even if it comes from a mook. In my last GURPS Samurai game, one of our elite 350 point super-warriors got floored by a 25 point Yakuza goon with a crappy shortsword because he wasn't paying attention, let someone get behind him while he was otherwise occupied and got shived in the back. His buddies swooped in and made quick work of the goon, but it really highlighted how careful you have to be.

Of course, chambara (samurai stories) really focus on how fleeting life his and how dangerous battle can be, something I'm explicitly trying to emulate, but it wouldn't be appropriate to all genres.