D&D 5E Hit Point Recovery Too Generous

[Umbran]

As long as the player is the one making the decision, about whether or not his/her character becomes wounded, then that's not a D&D-ized version of anything.

A principle aspect of D&D is that players state their intended actions, and the DM determines the results of those actions. It is beyond the role of the player to ever determine whether a hit received manifests as HP loss or some long-lasting wound.

You don't like the idea, don't use it in your games.

But giving players a choice does not somehow magically make it suddenly cease to be D&D.

How about I restate it: Characters have three "Wound Slots" they may choose to spend. It is now a player resource, like Hit Dice or spells, that the player may choose to spend.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

How about I restate it: Characters have three "Wound Slots" they may choose to spend. It is now a player resource, like Hit Dice or spells, that the player may choose to spend.

Hit Dice and spell slots are character resources. They are not player resources. D&D is not a game where players invoke narrative control beyond the capacity of their characters to cause real change within the world.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Hit Dice and spell slots are character resources. They are not player resources. D&D is not a game where players invoke narrative control beyond the capacity of their characters to cause real change within the world.

Well, except for the Lucky feat. Which is arguably a good reason to ban it--but it's so temptingly powerful!

But yes, by and large, players control only the actions of their PCs, not the results of actions.

 

[Flamestrike]

I'm slowing healing a bit by only allowing recovery of half expended HD on a long rest.

Also using the following rules:

1. Damage overflow has been tweaked to be either 1/2 max HP or your Con score (whichever is higher).

2. If you are reduced to 0 HP and not killed outright you gain a level of fatigue on raising to 1 HP.

3. If you are reduced to 0 HP and not killed outright you may instead remain on 1 HP, and roll on the lingering injuries chart in the DMG. You may only use this option once per short rest.

The last option allows PC's (and at the DM's option, important NPC's) to accept a 'critical hit' instead of being knocked to 0 HP. Its effectively an optional critical hit system that a player can buy into, and that doesn't disadvantage the PC's (in fact it arguably helps them).

As long as the player is the one making the decision, about whether or not his/her character becomes wounded, then that's not a D&D-ized version of anything.


A principle aspect of D&D is that players state their intended actions, and the DM determines the results of those actions. It is beyond the role of the player to ever determine whether a hit received manifests as HP loss or some long-lasting wound.

For reasons implied in my above house rule number 3, I disagree.

Also - see the optional rules for Plot points in the DMG - the ability for PC's to determine what happens to them is right there as an optional rule in the core rulebook.

 

[Umbran]

Hit Dice and spell slots are character resources. They are not player resources.

In what game world does the *character* wake up and say, "Hey, I'm going to spend a hit die now?" The tomes in the library of the Great Sage Snarglepants do not contain the phrase "hit die". The Hit Die does not exist within the game world. Arrows and iron rations might be character resources, but things that do not exist within the fictional world cannot be character resources.

And, in any event, all character resources are player resources anyway, as the character is itself a player resource, and so character resources are the player's by inheritance.

D&D is not a game where players invoke narrative control beyond the capacity of their characters to cause real change within the world.

Again, with the "this is not D&D" thing. I am sorry, but your personal definition of what constitutes D&D carries no weight. You are not an authority that gets to dictate the One True Way of D&D. To *you*, maybe these things are important parts of the experience, but you don't get to say what's important to others. You are going to have to come up with something a lot more powerful than, "I say so," before you will be in the least bit convincing. And, before you go there, the traditionalist, "it has always been thus" will make you look like a stiff follower of dogma. History is informative, but not proscriptive of the future. What Gygax did does not prohibit me from doing something different.

Give me a real reason why this is so danged horrible it cannot be considered a part of the game, and then we can talk. Otherwise, as I said - if you don't like it, don't use it. But stop trying to rain on other people's parades, please.

Me, I'm not a fan of anchovies, so I don't order them on my pizza. But you don't see me trying to tell people that if it has anchovies, it isn't pizza.

 

[pemerton]

D&D is not a game where players invoke narrative control beyond the capacity of their characters to cause real change within the world.

Besides the examples [MENTION=6788736]Flamestrike[/MENTION] has given a few posts upthread, there is the Inspiration rule. Playing so as to earn Inspiration is a player-level choice, not a character-level choice.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Spell slots may be character resources, but I don't for one moment consider hit dice to be. They're absolutely a meta-construct used by the player to represent the character's degree of recovery from a battle.

4E may have had much more of the "players take narrative control regarding their character" than other editions, but other editions have it here and there. It's not somehow anti-D&D.

 

[Hussar]

Hit Dice and spell slots are character resources. They are not player resources. D&D is not a game where players invoke narrative control beyond the capacity of their characters to cause real change within the world.

I'll bite on this one. How is a Hit Die a character resource? Can you choose how much you are going to heal today? How do you do that?

/edit - heh, should have read to the end of the thread before hitting reply. Sorry for the monkey pile.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

In what game world does the *character* wake up and say, "Hey, I'm going to spend a hit die now?" The tomes in the library of the Great Sage Snarglepants do not contain the phrase "hit die". The Hit Die does not exist within the game world. Arrows and iron rations might be character resources, but things that do not exist within the fictional world cannot be character resources.

The words may be different, but the concept is the same. A character knows whether it possesses the capacity to recover during a short rest, as surely as it knows how many Hit Points it has left. The same way a Barbarian knows if it can muster any more Rage today. The numbers may not translate perfectly, word for word, but it's a concept that the characters understand.

Besides the examples [MENTION=6788736]Flamestrike[/MENTION] has given a few posts upthread, there is the Inspiration rule. Playing so as to earn Inspiration is a player-level choice, not a character-level choice.

Inspiration is earned by playing in-character, and it's an entirely in-character decision for someone to act in accordance with their own goals.

Moreover, since it's only awarded by the DM, it's actually immune to meta-gaming. You can't only pretend to act like who you are; self-identity doesn't work that way. You do something, because that's what you'd do, and you do it particularly well because you are being true to yourself.

 

[Mouseferatu]

The words may be different, but the concept is the same. A character knows whether it possesses the capacity to recover during a short rest, as surely as it knows how many Hit Points it has left. The same way a Barbarian knows if it can muster any more Rage today. The numbers may not translate perfectly, word for word, but it's a concept that the characters understand.

I've never for one moment felt that the characters know how many hit points they have or how much they can recover. They have a vague sense of "I'm only slightly wounded" vs. "I'm about to die," but nothing remotely as mechanical or as granular as hp/hd. The decision to spend hit dice is the player choosing to represent the character recovering, not the character choosing whether or not to recover.

I mean, obviously, one doesn't have to play it that way. But neither is the reverse true, and the reverse certainly isn't required for the game to "really" be D&D.