Why do we really need HP to represent things other than physical injuries?
- Thread starter Li Shenron
- Start date
Or, because he was low level when the dragon reared its head back he had no idea what it was doing because of his lack of experience as an adventurer and then when he did finally figure it out he had one of those horror movie, panicked double takes trying to figure out what to do which caused him to get fried while the other guy got out of the way and survived.
Same with the dragon bite. The experienced fighter saw what it was doing and anticipated the attack. I'm sure the dragon was trying to bite his head off. He juked it a little, not enough to make it totally miss and so it clamped his armor instead of taking off his head.
Experience is hardly a meta factor like luck or divine intervention. Its right there on your character sheet as a simple number representing the fact that you've been around the block a few times and know what your doing.
Mishihari Lord
First Post
The main bad thing I see happening is that people who consider meta hp to be necessary to D&D decide to pass on 5E, which from WOTC's point of view would be bad indeed. This would be a bigger change than healing surges surges and we saw the impact that had on 4E's reception.
I'll also answer your question with a question. Why would we want to change it? What bad things happen to the game if we leave it as is? I'm inclined to not fix something that's not broken.
Hit points are a very gamist construction, and they look really wonky if you try to rationalize them from any kind of simulationist point of view. Viewing them as pure physical damage or a meta resource both have problems, which have been explained in depth by other posters. This issue has been argued about since at least 1980, when I started playing, and I long ago gave up hope that any explanation of hit points can be reconciled satisfactorily with either reality or genre conventions. If you want something that makes sense you have to ditch hit points, which at this point in the life of the D&D brand is not a viable option.
Redbadge
Explorer
My take on the OPs original question was why can't HP represent just "meat", as opposed to any other meta explanation, such as luck, stamina, morale, skill, etc.
My answer would be that HP can't realistically be just meat as written because your 50 damage dragon bite would then have to have similar effects on both a level 1 and level 10 fighter at full health.
HP goes up as level (experience/training/skill) increases, yet meat (size/weight/thickness of skin) is not something I envision also increasing at that same rate.
Going just by the OP's statements, I don't think HP represents just pure physical damage (i.e. the number of times you can get stabbed in the heart without dying), but a person's ability to withstand/mitigate/roll with what would otherwise be debilitating/fatal blows (experience/training). In other words, your "been around the block a few times", which I find synonymous with lasting longer (fatigue), luck (more likely intuition and timing), skill (training and practice), and somewhat better muscle mass/endurance/ability to stay standing and fighting (stamina).
What differences did you have in mind when you say "experience" isn't meta, but these other non-meat factors are?
I would say that experience isnt meta game because its not something you need to go outside of the characters perspective to know or understand.
For instance
"bob can survive that fall, he has 100 HP and falls can only do 60" is something i would consider meta-game.
But
"sure that ogre's big but Bobs a badass. Remember when he took out both those trolls by himself last week while he had a bad leg? This guys nothin, go get him Bob." Isnt necessarily meta game.
Sure the players know that Bobs a high level fighter who can smack an Ogre around with no problems. But the Characters ALSO know that Bobs beaten bigger, badder monsters then an Ogre lots of times. So its not unreasonable for them to assume that he can take it without much problem.
By the same token, at least to me, assuming you narrowly avoided being hit a few times but got tired from dodging and lost HP once or twice, eh okay.
But assuming it happens over and over and over stretches credulity for me.
Although I agree it cant be all meat without some pretty serious mystic stuff going on or drastically reducing HP bloat.
On the other side of the coin though look at real world monks. You can find video of them having bricks smashed on them, spear points bent on them, and denting iron plates with a punch.
I'm inclined to believe most of that is faked personally but so far as i know no monk has ever been caught hoaxing a video. So maybe not? And if a spear point can bend on your stomach through iron body training and force of will then why not let high level characters have similar abilities and describe it as such?
JonWake
First Post
Just a side note: its a combination of conditioning and sideshow tricks. Anyone can bend a spear on their throat, or break a brick with a few weeks of training. During the Boxer's Rebellion, when monks rushed gunmen, they became dead monks just like anyone else.
Tequila Sunrise
Adventurer
I haven't read the whole thread, so I don't know who used 'meat' first. But you may be taking it much more literally than intended.
I've never heard of anyone who imagines that high level PCs actually have denser bodies than they had ten levels ago. What I have heard, and this is my own preferred philosophy, is that PCs get [more] magical as they gain levels. D&D is a magical world, so it follows that even its most mundane denizens don't follow all of the rules we're accustomed to.
Namely, all D&D creatures have a certain amount of magic body mojo that protects and heals. And the more it's used, the better it works. And that's why the 1st level PC loses his head to the dragon, while the 10th level PC gets a hickey.
Redbadge
Explorer
Honestly, I think everyone is really agreeing with each other to some degree, but we haven't realized it yet. Your whole post here is something I might have written to you
.I agree that those monks have more HPs, and that alot of HP represents more bad-assery. I also agree that your fall-damage calculation is meta-gamey.
However, many people seem to say these things, but then go on to say that fatigue, luck, morale, or skill should not be factored into HP, and that it should be pure physical toughness. With your monk example here, I don't think any of those 115 lb monks are all that much physically tougher than your average man; they are just talented in other ways that aren't pure-meat. In other words, they don't have the ability to take more pure physical damage (to quote the OP), they are just much better at taking less physical damage.
Another example is from your other post: "he had one of those horror movie, panicked double takes trying to figure out what to do which caused him to get fried while the other guy got out of the way and survived." You called this less experience; I might call this less courage/morale. The thing is, I find that in D&D, both increase as you level. Both are represented in HP. And both represent increasing chances of survival when faced with the dragon's fire.
I don't know if anyone has mentioned this but what I would like to see is a system where it's implemented that hit point loss in sections starts adding on different minuses or something equivalent. Let's say for example a PC has 40 hit points. Now he gets hit and takes 10 points of damage. Well what happens is he takes say a -1 to damage or -2 or something along those lines.
Or, I think if you are going to have hit points I would call them armor points and have those taken off as your hit. If you don't wear armor then a spell shield or something like that would have an armor rating. PC's would have a small number of hit points while armor would have it's own points. Very much like RIFTS.
Or, I think if you are going to have hit points I would call them armor points and have those taken off as your hit. If you don't wear armor then a spell shield or something like that would have an armor rating. PC's would have a small number of hit points while armor would have it's own points. Very much like RIFTS.
