I don't get the dislike of healing surges

[Bedrockgames]

Why is there nothing you can do? I regulate Healing Surges in my game differently than is presented. You don't automatically get them back as soon as you wake up the next day. I do the same with Daily powers. One interesting revelation of this thread is that people immediately stop the buck at 4e in regards to regulation of the rules. Somewhere along the line, RAW became a sacred cow.

As others have pointed out, the game is designed around healing surges, so you can remove them but it will impact play. Personally I am fine removing it, but haven't been able to convince any groups I've played 4E with to do the same.

Really though, HS are just the tip of the iceberg for me with 4E. It is one of the major issues i have, but not the only. Rather than reworking the rules I find it much easier to either go back to 3E or play another game.

 

[Matt James]

I'm not advocating their removal. I love the Healing Surge system and how it prevents the infinite healing day. I never liked that since I started 2e. I'm sure a future system will refine and combine the two--making an adequate system. Either way, using tweaks of my own, the Healing Surge system works great. I even use it in other game systems.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I'm not advocating their removal. I love the Healing Surge system and how it prevents the infinite healing day. I never liked that since I started 2e. I'm sure a future system will refine and combine the two--making an adequate system. Either way, using tweaks of my own, the Healing Surge system works great. I even use it in other game systems.

Tweaking the system works great if it is something relatively minor like that. One tweak we used in our 3E games was to allow STR to modify intimidate rolls. It was a minor thing but made intimidate more believable to us. However we tweaked in the first place because the system as a whole worked and we liked the skill system. But I don't like the concept of healing surges to boot and the rest of the system just isn't my cup of tea. So I don't have have much of a desire to make tweaks.

 

[Matt James]

My apologize, I thought you played 4e (thus the participation).

 

[Bedrockgames]

My apologize, I thought you played 4e (thus the participation).

I play on occassion, but it isn't my prefered system. It depends on the group. Was participating because the OP seemed to be asking why some people don't like healing surges.

 

[Umbran]

I think people need to take step back and breath here.

I thoroughly agree.

Take a breather, folks. If someone's actively trying to get a rise out of you, then you shouldn't give them the satisfaction of succeeding. If they aren't actively trying to get a rise out of you, your anger or upset is misplaced. Either way you cut it, you shouldn't let what they say get to you.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The other issue is one is magic and one isn't, which is what is what creates the believability/consistency issue for many.

Yep.

 

[LostSoul]

But this has nothing to do with the point I made. "Shaping the fiction" as you describe here is completely compatible with being in the story. Shaping the fiction by actually changing the world around you by whim is a completely different matter. And whether that comes from explaining why an unintelligent plant responds to Come And Get It or why no fighter may EVER be wounded in a way that requires medical care, these are elements that create the break down in the narrative merit.

Let me try to put this in my own words in an attempt to understand where you are coming from:

You want to feel like you are inside a novel. You get that feeling by making choices that your character can make. Mechanics that support choices that your character would make help you get that feeling. Mechanics that rely on you stepping outside of the role of your character defeat the purpose of playing the game.

So when it comes down to combat and injury, you want the mechanics to 1) support the chance that your character will have to deal with injury, 2) allow you to deal with injury as your character (instead of as an author), and 3) support choices that your character would take to deal with that injury. If the mechanics don't require your character to deal with injury, they require you to step out of your role, or they don't support choices that your character would take, those mechanics are not going to help you play the game that you want.

How's that?

 

[BryonD]

You keep saying that.

Yet in 3 of my last 4 sessions (for my 4e game) someone in the party has required some form of medical care (be it the ministrations of a healer/shaman or the attempted heal check of another party member). As a matter of fact this comes up significantly more in my current 4e game than my last 3e/3.5 game as all too often that came down to "wave of the hand or the magic wand" as opposed to care of any kind.

The thing I keep saying is that by the rules, any combat damage may be surged away by any character.

Healing surges divorce the game from magical healing (and can limit magical healing as well)

True, but they divorce healing from EVERYTHING else at the same time. You call it a hand wave in 3E, and yet a 4E fighter can literally remove ANY wound with just that.

- this can easily make more room for dramatic life saving requirements be it through rescue of a dying PC (my last game had the PCs scrambling to rescue one of the party who was drowing as he had a lousy endurance check and no healing surges left - which led to a save the PC or run after the bad guy choice) or having to stop mid adventure to cure the disease after mucking through a filthy sewer.

First, disease, poison, etc... are a separate matter that have nothing to do with the surge discussion. Second, you claim more room, and yet you provide no justification whatsoever that the rest doesn't happen in non 3E games. Because it does AND I don't have surge issues.

I suppose I just disagree with your base assertion here:

1) D&D has never been good at dealing with wounds so saying a prior eddition is better in that regard is suspect.

2) I actually find 4e quite good at this aspect - I've been able to challenge my players with wounds (or as close as it makes no difference) and lasting conditions quite nicely using existing mechanics - so just don't see the problem.

This is where I get very frustrated. This exact point has been beaten over and over through this thread and prior threads.

Hit points have issues and I agree with that. 4E hit points have ALL the issues of HP and SURGES bring a whole new realm of problem on top of that.

You are going to go back and find where I already discussed all this or just not worry about it. Because the second I repeat it all YET AGAIN, another person will drop into the thread and declare that I am required to start over from the beginning again.

Lastly, you are mixing and match conditions and wounds. Conditions are nothing new to 4E. Conditions bring awesome benefits to the game. I will, at least for sake of argument, just concede that conditions in 4E are every bit as awesome as they are in 3E. But, in 3E I have conditions and I also have wounds that fighter may not simply surge out of existence. The topic is surges and 4e fighter may surge away their (non-condition) wounds.

The bottom line seem to be that what is "as close as it makes no difference" to you is nowhere near close enough for me. And that is fine. I'm not saying that I'm right and you are wrong. I'm saying I have my opinion and tastes and you have yours and anyone who claims they can't "get" the dislike of surges simply needs to either ignore the point or work on understanding opposing viewpoints. But the insistence that finding surges to fundamentally and negatively impact the quality of the game is unreasonable is just silly.

 

[BryonD]

Let me try to put this in my own words in an attempt to understand where you are coming from:

OK

You want to feel like you are inside a novel. You get that feeling by making choices that your character can make.

So far so good.

Mechanics that support choices that your character would make help you get that feeling. Mechanics that rely on you stepping outside of the role of your character defeat the purpose of playing the game.

I can't say I would use these words. You are not a million miles off, but the spin here seems to be stuck in a mechanics first perspective.

Forget mechanics completely for a second. Now, what does your character do in situation X? Once that choice is made, now let the mechanics model that and establish an outcome, and a selecting from a range of the possible outcomes is part of that.

Now, of COURSE, a player (or character, if you will) is going to be informed on his choice by mechanics. A 10th level fighter will much more readily charge a hill giant than a 1st level fighter. And the mechanics, and the player's knowledge of them define why that is.

But that is no problem. Think about LotR. Aragorn knows he can kick an orc's ass. He knows he can probably hold off the Ring Wraiths for brief time. He knows the Cave Troll is a serious problem. And he knows that all he can do with the Balrog is carry hobbits, run like hell and hope Gandalf can buy enough time. And he knows that for each of those (with the possible exception of the Balrag) that luck can make things go better or worse that he expected, possibly dramatically so. When I read the books or watch the movies, I see all of that as understood knowledge. And it has nothing to do with mechanics. It is just an understanding of the narrative definitions of those various entities.

And a player running a 10th level fighter doesn't need to think 10th level to simply think "bad ass guy who can charge a hill giant, even though that hill giant could take out a team of 25 commoners". The mechanics PURELY come later as a reliable, consistent model for backing up that narrative definition.

Edit: I'd certainly loathe the idea of Aragorn's actions and results being defined not by a quality story but instead by concerns over how Frodo felt about the pacing.

So when it comes down to combat and injury, you want the mechanics to 1) support the chance that your character will have to deal with injury, 2) allow you to deal with injury as your character (instead of as an author), and 3) support choices that your character would take to deal with that injury. If the mechanics don't require your character to deal with injury, they require you to step out of your role, or they don't support choices that your character would take, those mechanics are not going to help you play the game that you want.

How's that?

Again, I'm not really feeling the whole "mechanics require" me to "step out of my role". I can do whatever the hell I want. The mechanics can not EVER REQUIRE anything. GOOD mechanics may prohibit things.

I think it can be said simply.

Anything that would make me declare a novel completely stupid and stop reading needs to be avoided.


Conan never receiving any wound that he couldn't make never require any further attention just by wishing it so would be on a list of things that would make me move on to something better to read.