D&D General D&D Combat is fictionless

[Lyxen]

Inspiring word:
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother.

Healing word:
Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit
To his full height.

Majestic word:
There is none of you so mean and base,
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start.

Only the last two are magical and therefore can have an effect that looks magical to onlookers and to people following the fiction. I agree that all three work the same way in the mechanistical environment that the system creates, and if it's what you are looking for, it's fine, but by doing this you are deliberately turning your back to fiction, so don't then be surprised that it's harder to support the narrative...

 

[Nefermandias]

Except that this paradigm is specific to 4e

What? Seriously?

From the 5th edition PHB, p196:

"Hit points represent a combination of physical and mental durability, the will to live, and luck. Creatures with more hit points are more difficult to kill. Those with fewer hit points are more fragile."

I'm under the impression you are suggesting the definition of hit points are somewhat different between the editions? I don't see it.

 

[Lyxen]

What? Seriously?

From the 5th edition PHB, p196:

"Hit points represent a combination of physical and mental durability, the will to live, and luck. Creatures with more hit points are more difficult to kill. Those with fewer hit points are more fragile."

I'm under the impression you are suggesting the definition of hit points are somewhat different between the editions? I don't see it.

I'm not talking about hit points, where I agree that the overall paradigm has not changed ever since Basic (although there have been some variations about including things like divine favor and endurance, and where resolve is I think specific to 4e), I'm talking about the concept of Martial Power, which in general would be fine with me if it did not do things which are clearly magical while at the same time announcing itself as non magical. This is where the problem lies for me, where it starts being mechanistic in providing a source of power that does not match what fiction expects in terms of effect.

 

[Garthanos]

Speaking of Moldvay's Basic (which by the way, is one of my favorite versions of this game alongside 4e), it's funny how it has rules like "monsters in the dungeon are always able to see in the dark" and "doors will slam shut on their own after you leave a room" and yet, you never see people complaining about B/X having dissociated mechanics. There has to be something more than just that going on.

Same thing occurred in AD&D, it may have been one dungeon, but it seemed to me a method of trying to make the thief class valuable when it really really wasn't.

 

[Garthanos]

I'm not talking about hit points, where I agree that the overall paradigm has not changed ever since Basic (although there have been some variations about including things like divine favor and endurance, and where resolve is I think specific to 4e),

Then why use hit points as an example you have done it multiple times so I think you arent being honest with yourself you are denying the fiction the game presented all the way back, about hit points to insist it "must" only be restored by magical effects.

 

[pemerton]

It is declared before the attack is resolved, and therefore before it is described as successful or not, so no retcon.

This is not correct. Here is the spell description (from the Basic PDF):

Shield​

1st-level abjuration​

Casting Time: 1 reaction, which you take when you are hit by an attack or targeted by the magic missile spell​

Range: Self​

Components: V, S​

Duration: 1 round​

An invisible barrier of magical force appears and protects you. Until the start of your next turn, you have a +5 bonus to AC, including against the triggering attack, and you take no damage from magic missile.​

The trigger is being hit. And then the AC bonus has the potential to undo that hit. Mechanically it is just the same as a 4e D&D immediate interrupt effect. And is a "retcon".

Except that this paradigm is specific to 4e and matches nothing in fiction of the genre, where at least some magic is used.

First, as @Nefermandias has posted, it's not specific to 4e. As well as the passage from 5e that Nefermandias posted, there is the fact that 5e has "psychic" damage. What is that, but a weakening of resolve and mental fortitude? And the line of continuity from Gygax's description of hit points in the AD&D PHB and DMG through to 4e's treatment is pretty clear.

Second, even suppose that it was 4e specific (and it can certainly be contrasted with other RPGs' systems for resolving physical attacks, such as RQ and RM), that wouldn't show that it's incoherent. It's completely coherent, as the quotes I posted show: healing is the restoration of hit points, which is to say the restoration of (inter alia) resolve.

Third, there is ample fantasy fiction (and adventure fiction more generally) in which characters are able to overcome seeming defeat through resolve. I already posted an example from LotR: Gandalf lifting the hearts of the defenders of Minas Tirith. Faramir and Aragorn likewise lift the hearts of their friends and those under their command. It's a staple of fight-based films (boxing, martial arts, etc). In heroic military fiction, commanders are able to restore order and inspire their troops to reform ranks and push onward.

It's a great virtue of 4e D&D that it perfectly captures these romantic tropes. It even has CHA (Galahad) as well as STR (Lancelot) paladins!

EDIT: Here is the passage about Gandalf (pp 855-56 of my one-volume edition of LotR):

So it was that Gandalf took command of the last defence of the City of Gondor. Wherever he came men's hearts would lift again, and the winged shadows pass from memory. Tirelessly he strode from Citadel to Gate, from north to south about the wall; and with him went the Prince of Dol Amroth in his shining mail. . . .

And yet - when they had gone, the shadows closed on men again, and their hears went cold, and the valour of Gondor withered into ash.​

This is not a story about the supernatural, or D&D-style "healing magic". It is a story about hope, and courage, and inspiration. We see the same in relation to Faramir (p 840):

"Faramir! The Lord Faramir! It is his call!' cried Beregond. "Brave heart! But how can he win to the Gate, if these foul hell-hawks have other weapons than fear. But look! They hold on. They will make the Gate. No! the horses are running mad. Look! The mean are thrown; they are running on foot. No, one is still up, but he rides back to the others. That will be the Captain: he can master both beasts and men. . . ."​

Faramir is not a magician (which is the irony in the accusation that Denethor, who does use the magic of the Palantir, levels at him). He is an inspiring leader, whose men love him because of that.

This is the fiction that 4e's approach to healing emulates.

 

[Lyxen]

Then why use hit points as an example you have done it multiple times so I think you arent being honest with yourself you are denying the fiction the game presented all the way back, about hit points to insist it "must" only be restored by magical effects.

Because when someone is down due to wounds (and, accessorily being "bloodied" in 4e, although I agree that, with the flexible definition of hit points, it might not be actual blood), you don't restore him to full efficiency just by talking to him. At least not in the fiction that I've watched or read about.

 

[Lyxen]

This is not correct. Here is the spell description (from the Basic PDF):

Shield​

1st-level abjuration​

Casting Time: 1 reaction, which you take when you are hit by an attack or targeted by the magic missile spell​

Range: Self​

Components: V, S​

Duration: 1 round​

An invisible barrier of magical force appears and protects you. Until the start of your next turn, you have a +5 bonus to AC, including against the triggering attack, and you take no damage from magic missile.​

The trigger is being hit. And then the AC bonus has the potential to undo that hit. Mechanically it is just the same as a 4e D&D immediate interrupt effect. And is a "retcon".

And again, we are not speaking about the mechanics in this thread but about the fact the fiction. Moreover, in 5e (and actually in all editions), being "hit" is just mechanics, it does not mean that you have been physically hit, and even less physically wounded. If the Shield spell increases your AC so that you are technically not hit, it's even before the action has been resolved and even less described.

First, as @Nefermandias has posted, it's not specific to 4e. As well as the passage from 5e that Nefermandias posted, there is the fact that 5e has "psychic" damage. What is that, but a weakening of resolve and mental fortitude?

Damage to your brain ? I've seen a lot of people insist that psychic damage is seen through something like a nosebleed at the very list. I'm not there, because I think that hit points represent more than just physical damage, the only thing I'm pointing out is that "resolve" is a specific 4e concept as far as I know.

And the line of continuity from Gygax's description of hit points in the AD&D PHB and DMG through to 4e's treatment is pretty clear.

Not completely, see above.

Second, even suppose that it was 4e specific (and it can certainly be contrasted with other RPGs' systems for resolving physical attacks, such as RQ and RM), that wouldn't show that it's incoherent. It's completely coherent, as the quotes I posted show: healing is the restoration of hit points, which is to say the restoration of (inter alia) resolve.

It's consistent in terms of mechanics (never said otherwise), but it does not mean that it's consistent in terms of fiction.

Third, there is ample fantasy fiction (and adventure fiction more generally) in which characters are able to overcome seeming defeat through resolve. I already posted an example from LotR: Gandalf lifting the hearts of the defenders of Minas Tirith. Faramir and Aragorn likewise lift the hearts of their friends and those under their command. It's a staple of fight-based films (boxing, martial arts, etc). In heroic military fiction, commanders are able to restore order and inspire their troops to reform ranks and push onward.

And again, it does not mean healing them. Once more, I like Warlords, I just find that the martial powers should be confined to, well marital things, in particular not like closing wounds, because it does not match what the fiction of the genre shows.

For me, a good use of what you are mentioning is actually better modelled in 5e through the granting of temporary hit point, which indeed bolster your will to fight but which don't have an effect on whatever wounds, physical, spiritual, etc. you have suffered.

It's a great virtue of 4e D&D that it perfectly captures these romantic tropes. It even has CHA (Galahad) as well as STR (Lancelot) paladins!

These are completely different subjects.

 

[pemerton]

Because when someone is down due to wounds (and, accessorily being "bloodied" in 4e, although I agree that, with the flexible definition of hit points, it might not be actual blood), you don't restore him to full efficiency just by talking to him. At least not in the fiction that I've watched or read about.

In the second LotR film, Aragorn is unconscious having fallen over a cliff, and is returned to consciousness by the memory (or is it more than that? the film is a little ambiguous) of Arwen.

In the film Excalibur, Perceval is hanging unconscious from a tree and is revived by an encounter - purely in his mind - with the Holy Grail.

In LotR, when Frodo is stabbed by the Orcish captain in Moria, he falls and his friends worry that he is dead. He recovers when Aragorn picks him up and carries him out of the chamber.

 

[Garthanos]

Because when someone is down due to wounds (and, accessorily being "bloodied" in 4e,

Right "Wounds" that never reduce any skills, wounds that never cause protracted slower movement, could it be its resolve and luck and relatively short term fatigue etc that is wearing down just like the description? (With scratches and minor bruises and things which show it visibly)

He was never ever functioning less never moving slower never attacking less, never taking penalties on skill rolls.

Your leaders "words" of each archetype primarily include inspired continuance heroes digging deeper to go on hence healing surges from the subject of the effect ... sure the cleric may also stitch the superficial mostly cosmetic wounds which are already defined by D&D as not impairing at all.