D&D is not a supers game.

[Blackbrrd]

I would love 5e to have the current starting HP, but adding them up more slowly than they do in the playtest, or that there is a cutoff quite fast. For instance in AD&D you didn't get much additional hp past level 10 or so.

 

[Campbell]

Well, it's very simple what we do. We give feedback to the play test programme, then wait and see. If the final product is to our liking then we might buy it. If it isn't then we don't.

If we have a D&D game with unequitable levels of HP to NPCs at 1st Level then, for me, it's a deal breaker. Quite simply, it doesn't replicate the D&D experience I want and can find from other RPGs. And that is the feedback I am providing.

Really it comes down to what the default rule is. We're literally talking about the difference between having a sidebar titled "For More Heroic 1st Level PCs" and "For More Down to Earth PCs". For experienced gamers like you and me it makes no difference which solution is implemented. The question is which makes for a better default experience for new players using the default dials. I personally believe more heroic PCs is a better introduction to the game and I refuse to believe that a game that assumes rolled hp is going to be so finely balanced that a difference of ~14 hp is going to be so finely balanced. It's not about your game or my game. It's about theirs.

Edit: Like I said previously if low level D&D provided a more satisfactory experience I might feel different.

 

[TrippyHippy]

Really it comes down to what the default rule is. We're literally talking about the difference between having a sidebar titled "For More Heroic 1st Level PCs" and "For More Down to Earth PCs". For experienced gamers like you and me it makes no difference which solution is implemented. The question is which makes for a better default experience for new players using the default dials. I personally believe more heroic PCs is a better introduction to the game and I refuse to believe that a game that assumes rolled hp is going to be so finely balanced that a difference of ~14 hp is going to be so finely balanced. It's not about your game or my game. It's about theirs.

Edit: Like I said previously if low level D&D provided a more satisfactory experience I might feel different.

You are presenting your own preferences and experiences as being universal. Where is the research to say that new players want higher powered beginning characters? From my own experiences, starting play in older editions provided fun, memorable experiences that has hooked me for most of my life since.

 

[Jack99]

1. Pet peeve: the word "awesome" is decades out of date. I don't know why it gets used so much in the gaming community.
2. The last thing I want is for new players to think that they can accomplish something without earning it.

Maybe HIMYM is popular amongst gamers?

I'm not of the persuasion that my friends who have decided to sit down to enjoy a game in their free time should have to earn anything in order to have fun, or to enjoy the things their character can do.

The notion that players should have to "earn" their enjoyment is nonsense, and I'm tempted to say it comes from a place of gamer elitism, which this hobby has no room for.

Disco.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I'm not of the persuasion that my friends who have decided to sit down to enjoy a game in their free time should have to earn anything in order to have fun, or to enjoy the things their character can do.

The notion that players should have to "earn" their enjoyment is nonsense

I think, even in games that are very heavily gamist, and feature a high level of challenge, players don't have to earn their enjoyment. Playing the game, participating, should be enjoyable from the start. In gamist play, players certainly do earn something, but those are markers of success - level ups, magic items, treasure, castles and the like. Achieving these does produce a sense of accomplishment, and pleasure, but the whole process - the striving, sometimes losing and sometimes winning - ought to be enjoyable.

Not everyone wants high challenge gamism, ofc. Some people want low challenge gamism, or games that are gamist in some aspects but not others, or no gamism at all. One example would be a Friday night hack n' slash game, where everyone is frazzled from the week's work and just wants to relax and kill things. Another would be a game where the main emphasis is on roleplaying - developing and portraying character and/or exploring the GM's world.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I think Zero To Hero, Hero To Even More Awesome Hero, and Zero To Competent Guy, are all perfectly legitimate ways to play D&D. Zero To Competent Guy is probably best represented by E6.

Prior to 4e, we always struggled with the problem of 1st level PCs not having enough hit points, solving it either by starting at higher than 1st level, or levelling up very rapidly in the first few sessions. We also struggled with high level play not really working in 3e, but had no good solution other than to end the game.

I played in a long running 2e campaign that was pretty much Zero To Competent Guy, due to low magic and lack of PC casters. Personally I found it to be quite dull, although it was very well DM-ed.

 

[Ichneumon]

D&D is not a supers game, even with starting hit point levels in the mid to late teens. Neither is it an austerity exercise doling out success like Scrooge dispensing hundred-dollar bills. I tend to distrust games that masquerade as thinly veiled attempts to teach me to be a better, less entitled person.

 

[TrippyHippy]

D&D is not a supers game, even with starting hit point levels in the mid to late teens. Neither is it an austerity exercise doling out success like Scrooge dispensing hundred-dollar bills. I tend to distrust games that masquerade as thinly veiled attempts to teach me to be a better, less entitled person.

Talk about self entitlement. "The world owes me a living, and D&D owes me Superpowers..."

 

[Ichneumon]

Talk about self entitlement. "The world owes me a living, and D&D owes me Superpowers..."

Time to get a new post interpreter. The one you're using looks broken.

 

[Minigiant]

I like my starting character to be competent.

Why?

Because I am tired of inventing an great personality and background for a PC only for him or her to be slain by a goblin or rat. Then having to us his or her sibling... omly for him or her to die too.

It's not entitlement. It's the ability to stay in character.