D&D 5E Damage on a Miss: Because otherwise Armour Class makes no sense

[guachi]

Obviously a lot of people do care.

And not caring about an issue doesn't mean you don't run into it. You just don't care when it does happen. So you have not really challenged or changed my point.

And while it is completely cool that you enjoy a radically different game experience than I do, not caring caring tends to disqualify you from having helpful insights for those who do care, regardless of which way they prefer.

I'm challenging your desire to care. My argument basically boils down to: the people who first played D&D didn't dwell on what HP actually meant; neither should you.

 

[Joe Liker]

It's a game, not a simulation. All other arguments are invalid.

 

[pemerton]

With the bounded accurracy of 5E the ridiculous target numbers that generate huge miss rates are gone along with the need for damage on a miss.

In this respect, accuracy in 4e was just as bounded - because attack bonuses escalated at the same rate (per level) as defences. The function of "ridiculous" target numbers in 4e isn't to cause the expected rate of success to change (it is a fairly constant 60%) but to interact with the Monster Manuals, and thereby step up the opposition over the course of play (from goblins to demon lords).

-If my sword is poisoned and I succeed To Hit the creature is poisoned
-If I fail To Hit and the creature still takes damage it is not poisoned.
-But I can still cause the creature to be dead so I must have hit it, so why isn't it poisoned?

As [MENTION=27160]Balesir[/MENTION] indicated, perhaps you clocked it on the skull with your pommel.

Furthermore, I put this in the same category as "What happens if I roll my d6 and it lands perfectly balanced on its corner?" The outcome you describe is unlikely ever to come up in play, certainly not on a regular basis, and so can be narrated as seems appropriate at the time.

Will he accept that the words "Hit" and "Miss" have no meaning and no correlation to what they've described for him since toddlerhood?

For me a game is fun when rules are intuitive and simple to understand. When a hit isn't a hit and a miss isn't a miss something has seriously went wrong with the game design.

<snip>

I just don't understand why a game would even want to redefine basic terms from the English language like "Hit" and 'Miss".

This was answered by [MENTION=336]D'karr[/MENTION], and also by [MENTION=6680772]Iosue[/MENTION] in this thread's first go around: the words "hit" and "miss" refer to hitting or missing a target number. They describe the events of gameplay, not the events in the fictional gameworld.

Balesir has also explained the sensible reason for this - in a fight between skilled combatants, they do not literally miss. Rather, they block, parry, deflect etc.

If the goal was to empower DM's to narrate combat any way they liked then the "To Hit" role would be renamed to the "Attack" roll, HP's would be remained "Stamina", and "Damage" would become "Fatigue".

The "to hit" roll has been renamed the "attack roll" for at least two editions (4e and 5e). I don't know what 3E called it.

Damage is an odd one. In the real world, speaking ordinary image, living organisms don't suffer damage. They suffer wounds and injuries. Inanimate objects suffer damage. So the use of damage to describe harm inflicted to living things is already slightly unusual. (And has obvious wargame roots - as referring to damage dealt to a unit rather than to a living thing.)

Hit points also have their origins in wargaming terminology. They reflect, in some loose way, the capability of the play piece to suffer hits (ie successful attacks) and survive. Obviously in D&D there have always been many ways to ablate hit points other than via successful attacks, though (eg falling damage, traps, spells, etc).

**************************************

What do hit points represent?

In my view, nothing.

The event of adding or subtracting hit points does represent something. When something happens in the fiction that pushes a character closer to death, deduct hp (this is called "damage"). When something happens in the fiction that restores or revitalises a character, or otherwise makes death less likely, add hp (this is called "healing").

But the hit point total itself doesn't represent anything. It is just an outcome of applying the addition and subtraction rules.

(This is my answer to [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]'s "1 hp challenge".)

 

[Hand of Evil]

Just call it what it is, an automatic hit unless skill or feat is used to avoid. The "To Hit" roll is just used for Crits. Any long winded damage on a miss just confuses everything.

 

[BryonD]

I'm challenging your desire to care. My argument basically boils down to: the people who first played D&D didn't dwell on what HP actually meant; neither should you.

Ok. Wow
First, It is really bizarre to me that you would assume to tell me what should be fun to me.

Second, I'd point out that modern D&D (not mention modern tabletop roleplaying as an industry) has evolved vastly from the 1970s. I have ancient ancestors who didn't need feet. I still like my feet.

Third, you have not actually made an argument. You've simply made two highly questionably claims.
It is true that in strict war gaming this debate is almost never an issue. And it is true that early D&D evolved directly from war gaming. To claim it as fact that those who made that evolutionary leap automatically carried this specific holdover with them is in great doubt. OD&D was not a war game. A lot of things changed.
I started playing around 1981 and I can recall that the debates over how to best narrate HP were quite common. So I call BS on your claim that they didn't care.
Your second highly questionable claim is that what those people did or did not care about has any influence on what other people (then or now) find enjoyable. I think any rational person will see the absurdity of this claim.

 

[Umbran]

Having clear language that everyone can understand is critical. The requirement of a language translator is asinine.

First off, in the name of keeping the discussion rational, let's be careful about our own language use. The term "asinine" is aiming at the emotions, not the rational part of the discussion. If you want this to degrade into, "ME NO LIKE! IT GO AWAY! *THUMPTHUMP!" then by all means, let's take the language there, and I can close the thread quickly.

I, however, will refer to an author highly regarded in many geek circles:

"We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!"

Language is a wonderful thing - but if you want the rulebooks to be absolutely and unambiguously clear, that is apt to make them unusable as reference works to play a casual hobby game. The length, detail, and style required for true lack of ambiguity would have our rulebooks looking more like books of law - difficult to read and absorb, and no fun to actually work with.

We are not talking about the rules to a game on which big money will change hands due to how it plays out. We should not take ourselves quite so seriously. The world will not end if you and another GM have a different interpretation of what a hit point is, or what a "hit" in game terms means in narrative terms.

You are playing with intelligent, creative, mature adults, yes? Then, any confusions can be worked through at the table, without needing to impose similar decisions on the world at large. You play it how you want, someone else will play it how they want, and it's all good.

 

[ExploderWizard]

In this respect, accuracy in 4e was just as bounded - because attack bonuses escalated at the same rate (per level) as defences. The function of "ridiculous" target numbers in 4e isn't to cause the expected rate of success to change (it is a fairly constant 60%) but to interact with the Monster Manuals, and thereby step up the opposition over the course of play (from goblins to demon lords).

Yes, and it was a major cause of the grind. I don't mind scaling attacks & defenses, so long as Hp/stamina doesn't get ridiculous at the same time or of attacks outpacing defense resulting in higher hit ratios with the Hp/stamina scaling instead.

Just please please for the sake of 3 hour combats, don't do both.

 

[Hussar]

Yes, and it was a major cause of the grind. I don't mind scaling attacks & defenses, so long as Hp/stamina doesn't get ridiculous at the same time or of attacks outpacing defense resulting in higher hit ratios with the Hp/stamina scaling instead.

Just please please for the sake of 3 hour combats, don't do both.

Well, they largely fixed that specific problem with the new monster math. What really dragged out combat, IMO, was the proliferation of interrupt effects. When every single action at the table has to go through every player at the table to see if anyone wants to stop/modify/whatever that action in combat, it makes combat very, very slow.

 

[Uchawi]

Yep.

 

[billd91]

Because combat is abstract, there is no reason that a "miss" on the target number cannot have a "splash" effect of depleting mojo (decreasing HP). If a portion of HP is thought of as Stamina, even a miss on the target number can deplete your stamina. Time in the ring with an opponent that is trying to kill you is going to tire you (decrease your chance of staying in the fight) even if they don't hit with every jab, swing or upper-cut. In no edition of D&D have HP ever been described as solely a physical thing (meat). They have always been described as a metaphysical combination of a lot of things (luck, stamina, skill, etc.).

The problem here is that damage on a miss actually narrows the set of outcomes such as an attack that really has no significant effect - and surely, there's no reason for them not to exist, even in an abstract combat system.