D&D 5E The "everyone at full fighting ability at 1 hp" conundrum

[Tony Vargas]

I apply action movie logic to D&D.

In action movies characters become visibly injured. They get scrapes, they start looking dirty. They grimace more. They might even develop a limp.

They still fight at full capacity though.

Action heroes get wounded and then after a break they are completely fine again.

They just need a bandage or two, some stitches, and a nap. Then good as new.

Hit points can map to that, with careful attention to narration, and an open mind.

FATE, OTOH, that's just how it works.

 

[Oofta]

Action heroes get wounded and then after a break they are completely fine again.

They just need a bandage or two, some stitches, and a nap. Then good as new.

Don't forget the wince of pain the first time they take their arm out of a sling. That wince is an important reminder of how hurt they are which can then be ignored for the rest of the show.

 

[Tony Vargas]

If we assume the following:

• HP loss does not reflect wounds (because you heal completely after only 8 hours rest, so they couldn't be wounds, but near misses as people have described)
• You can lose 99% of your hit points and not suffer any effects to any of your abilities, combat or otherwise (which rules out fatigue and wear and tear)

Those both seem to overstate it.

HP loss cannot be /just/ wounds for those reasons, sure. But could include not-too-serious wounds that could be dealt with (bandaged/stitched/whatever) in the course of a short rest.

The fact that hp loss does not initiate a "Death Spiral" does not rule out fatigue or wear & tear, it just means that, in the moment a creature attacks, it can do so without being held back by those factors - a burst of rage/fear, spite/hate, heroic effort or a surge of adrenaline if you wanna get all scientific.

So, no, assuming both those, to that degree, doesn't seem warranted.

then the DM narrated correctly as the above would advise. Not the DM's fault. That's the paradox I was referring to.

The PH sidebar (and it's in the basic rules, quoted by iserith, I think, above), while giving DMs carte blanche to describe hp loss as they see fit, does talk about 'signs of wear' after taking 1/2 hps. So the DM is advised to narrate hp loss.
And, really, 5e is so all-in on DM Empowerment, everything's the DM's fault.

On one hand, we're expected to believe the above is true, but on the other we use things like how much you damage a creature to determine things like what attacks are effective, which aren't, how close to defeat it is to offer surrender or another spell, etc.

There have been a number of examples of ways to narrate that sort of thing given, so far, most of them seemed pretty reasonable.

 

[5ekyu]

Action heroes get wounded and then after a break they are completely fine again.

They just need a bandage or two, some stitches, and a nap. Then good as new.

Die Hard... he bleeds including pilling shards of glass out of his feet, he moans, he moves slowly limping, he seems barely able to stand, looks like needs an ambulance but...
When he needs to go one-on-one with blonde teutonic giant merc, he does.
When he needs to do a one shot quick draw kill, he does.
When he needs to sprint, jump, grab his wife from plummet to doom, he does.

This to me follows the HP model dead spot on including narrative including wounds and signs of trauma as the events unfold.

To me, one thing I would strongly recommend for GMs having cognitive issues with HP, long rest overnight recovery, narrative descriptions and the like is to, well, consider finishing the job.

Just like you narratively describe the very John McClean combat woes, provide some narrative hooks for the recoveries. Maybe add-in a scdne or description of "common remedies" that help bridge this issue in hour fantasy world. We all know that the Twinkies, dome cigarettes and a cloth wrapped loosely around a gaping flag doesnt let you walk around much less run and jump on what big bad John had, but its acceptable in the context of the film. We all know a break to chew down aspirin and frt dome water wont get your action here back to slaughter mode, but it's a nod within the scenes to "a hook" to hang that suspension onto.

So, maybe have some scene mentions of use of "known herbs" or "Miagi tea and masssge" that covers these things.

But... second topic...
I am strongly considering a slight change in the next game, removing unconscious at zero.

Basically embrace that hp = buffer plot armor and have zero hp be "exposed". At that point, one or more potential fatal flaws has been created and now "its life or death". Now, at zero, more damage causes death saves where a success gets you a condition (wound) and failure get you a death point and a condition. X death points equals dead. These conditions and death points wont be as simple as just curing to 1 hp.

Now, if you want a less cut and dried feature, maybe we just let the damage that brings you to zero cause it too. I font like this but can see it as likely.

Narratively, the descriptions of lost hp, especially after half or lower, can lead to this "expose". I kind of fo that now, giving hit themes to NPCs and sometimes using that in the final kill narration.

 

[cbwjm]

I narrate how beat up someone is. I'll use the term bloodied from 4e when they hit half health. I also often mention when someone is close to death so it gives the PCs an idea who to focus on.

 

[Charlaquin]

Some of the discussion from other threads, and my gaming session last Sunday, has had me thinking about this a little more, and why it's problematic.

We all know HP are abstract. And we know that a certain suspense of disbelief has to happen. And when we ask, "Why are you at full fighting power from 100 hp down to 1 hp, but then suddenly lose everything, and if you lose 99% of your hp, it make no sense to heal all of it after 8 hours?" the common response is "because HP aren't meat, and all those hits you took aren't real hits, they are just grazing attacks that might not have hit you directly."

Well, there's another big problem with that. One that I as a player encountered last Sunday, and the sleep thread reminded me of just now. I.e., unless loss of hp actually does have a narrative effect (the DM describing the wounds from each attack), and there is no difference from the PC's perspective to guess how close they are to beating the creature, it has a significant detrimental effect to the players. In the sleep thread, it impacts whether or not the wizard will use that spell slot to end a battle. if they have no idea roughly how worn down the target is, they are more hesitant to use it. In my example last Sunday, I had first used magic missile. The DM pretty much narrated nothing with each attack people did, and when I asked, it was "it hits the creature." I was sure the creature had a resistance to something (it did, it was a gray ooze), but my magic missile, firebolt, and other PCs' attacks were all narrated the same so I had no idea what worked better than another.

This is why 4e had the “bloodied” status and why the guidelines for describing damage in 5e say that a creature shows visible signs of injury at half HP.

So it seems like a paradox of sorts. HP are not just meat or fighting capability, but if you don't act like they are meat in the game, it has a negative affect to game play.

I don’t think it causes this problem if you narrate the effects of damage the way the rules suggest.

 

[Sacrosanct]

This is why 4e had the “bloodied” status and why the guidelines for describing damage in 5e say that a creature shows visible signs of injury at half HP.



I don’t think it causes this problem if you narrate the effects of damage the way the rules suggest.

Right. But if you describe all attacks at less than half hit points as actual wounds, then the other side of the paradox gets exposed: it makes no sense to heal completely back to full after 8 hour with not so much as a limp.

I think that's why I have such a hard time with the recover to full rule. I've always narrated attacks like wounds that nick away at the opponent. I think most people do. And that rule just throws that logic out of the window.

 

[5ekyu]

Right. But if you describe all attacks at less than half hit points as actual wounds, then the other side of the paradox gets exposed: it makes no sense to heal completely back to full after 8 hour with not so much as a limp.

I think that's why I have such a hard time with the recover to full rule. I've always narrated attacks like wounds that nick away at the opponent. I think most people do. And that rule just throws that logic out of the window.

For a non-magic environment, sure. But for a magic environment... a world where giant behemoths fly as a matter of course?

 

[Tony Vargas]

Right. But if you describe all attacks at less than half hit points as actual wounds, then the other side of the paradox gets exposed: it makes no sense to heal completely back to full after 8 hour with not so much as a limp.

Not if they're relatively minor wounds. Then, like 5ekyu's Action Hero, you've bandaged them up and shrugged off their effects by the next day, if not the next short rest.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

For a non-magic environment, sure. But for a magic environment... a world where giant behemoths fly as a matter of course?

The default assumption for any speculative fiction is that things which don't exist in the real world can act however is necessary for the story, but things which do exist in the real world should behave as we expect them to unless we're told otherwise.

If there was some line in the book about how the planet's manasphere causes wounds to heal quickly, then we could go with that. In the absence of such an explanation, we're left fumbling with inconsistent details.