D&D General When the fiction doesn't match the mechanics

[James Gasik]

Now I know why there was that butterfly in a bottle in Skyrim!

 

[Micah Sweet]

And as was said before, it could be just a minor scratch from a poisonous blade. Nothing serious, if it was not for the poison.

Sometimes when I come back from a hike I find one or two scratch on myself and could not tell when or where I got them. I certainly don't feel like I'm closer to death, I didn't even feel nothing when I got them.... now, if the plant was poisonous, that could be another story, maybe told by someone else....

Same could be said for a venomous spider bite. The bite itself does nothing, it's the venom that might kill you.

I was arguing against the claimed point that in 5e, until you have taken 50% of your hp you don't have a scratch on you. That cannot be true at the very least because of poison, no matter what the rules say.

Also, I have to ask why any version of D&D bothers with damage types at all if nothing connects. What does it matter that you have resistance to fire if the fire attack never hits you? Also, what's the difference between a hit and a miss if nothing connects? Contact of some kind has to be made, and the rules saying otherwise are nonsensical.

 

[Micah Sweet]

So?

Poison can be delivered by a minor scratch. As in something that would not, in any way, be considered an actual wound.

Additionally, you can still deliver poison through attacks that deal zero damage. A creature immune to non-magical attacks, for example, can still be poisoned by that attack. So, we know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that that target took no wound, yet is still poisoned.

Poison is not the slam-dunk that people seem to think it is.

You're the one who said that you don't have a scratch on you in 5e until you take at least 50% of your hp.

 

[Micah Sweet]

But that's you adding something that isn't there. And has never, ever been there. It's entirely on you.

Great axe hits target for X damage that does not kill the target. I can narrate that in any way I want because the loss of HP is 100% divorced from the narrative. Electric blue butterflies explode from the target, it loses 15 HP. It's the old Final Fantasy games where the sprite shakes a bit and a number pops up above the target.

Why does the great axe, or any attack, deal varying amounts of damage at all if nothing connects?

 

[Micah Sweet]

But, again, that's my point. You are jumping to a particular narrative that is, in now way, actually supported by the mechanics. My butterfly example, while silly, is every bit as supported as your HP=wound.

Once you ignore that, and accept that any narrative is equally valid, then HP become a lot less problematic. And, you can do a lot more with them.

Make the narrative meaningless, and anything is possible. Got it.

 

[Guest 7042500]

Honestly, I'm a little surprised to hear that! Such openly gamist approaches tend to be just as openly disliked. As the previous post not so subtly implies.

But I submit the fiction derives from what the mechannics create. D&D hit points are perfectly cromulent when viewed as a valuable resource that must have a cost to regain.

If people don't like that, there are many other wonderful games out there. Much heartbreak has resulted from people trying to turn D&D into something it was never intended to be, and I'm sorry for their frustration. D&D wil never make sense in the way they want it to, and it's just going to break their hearts.

 

[Lanefan]

NOt really though.

I have a scratch on my arm from a cat. It's visible, but, it in no way indicates anything about my condition. And that's, at most, what HP loss is. A couple of bruises. Maybe a fat lip? At least until that attack kills the PC, THEN that's a visible wound.

Otherwise, it makes no sense. If those minor physical injuries actually gave some guidance as to what condition the foe is in, then those physical injuries would impact the foe in some way. But they don't. They never have. Not in D&D anyway.

I'm not so sure here. A foe can still be fully able to fight and yet you can still tell - from the nicks and bruises and other visual cues - he's taken a beating and might not have much stamina left.

That said, I agree there should be mechanical implications to being at low-ish hit points. 4e at least gave us "bloodied" but didn't go nearly far enough with it as a mechanic. A wound-vitality or body-fatigue system would be even better.

And if this leads to a death spiral, good. That's the point. Don't lose those first hit points and you won't have to worry about losing the last.

I can't believe after all the years of this being shown over and over again, people still want to insist that HP=some sort of meat. They don't. Heck, in 5e, until you lose 50% of your HP, you do not have so much as a scratch on you, and that's straight from the rules.

Reading that literally, it makes everyone immune to weapon-delivered poison until they are at less than half h.p.!

Somehow I don't think that's what was intended. Ergo: dumb rule. Toss it.

Never minding things like short rests, where I can rest for an hour, and be restored to full HP, all without a single spell. What, do those physical injuries seal up and go away in an hour?

People keep trying to force narrative onto the mechanics that just isn't supported.

Designers keep trying to force unrealistic mechanics into the game that the fiction can't handle.

 

[Lanefan]

The overwhelming majority of setting lore is "filler at best". That was the point I was making earlier. I'll bet dollars to donuts that all those people who have talked about owning Faiths and Avatars and Powers and Pantheons haven't used more than 10% of the material in those books. And that's pretty much true for every setting book. 10% use at a given table. At best. Probably a lot less.

Compare to an Adventure Path (presuming you actually play through it). Where 75% or more of the book is used. THAT'S what supplements should be. These are game supplements. They aren't novels. They aren't for light reading. They are meant to be used. They have a purpose and that purpose is to be used at the table.

I own three or four hardcover adventure paths from the last few editions and I've yet to use any of them in full; and have only used small parts of two of them.

I didn't buy them to run. I bought them to mine for ideas and to provide me maps etc. when I couldn't be arsed to make up my own.

These setting books ... serve little practical purpose and are largely there for reading material.

That can be said for just about any work of fiction ever written. Why should RPG books be held to a different standard?

 

[pemerton]

Again, poison.

I was arguing against the claimed point that in 5e, until you have taken 50% of your hp you don't have a scratch on you. That cannot be true at the very least because of poison, no matter what the rules say.

Gygax tells us how to handle this, in his DMG: the narration follows the mechanical result. So if the character suffers no poison damage (or, in AD&D, if the player rolls the save vs poison) then the stinger/fang/whatever didn't penetrate. But if the character takes damage (or, in AD&D, if the player fails the saving throw) then there was at least a scratch or puncture, such that some poison entered the victim's system.

This does require departing from the literal words of the 5e rules text regarding hit points, but I don't think it's a very demanding departure. Most attacks don't inflict poison damage.

I have to ask why any version of D&D bothers with damage types at all if nothing connects. What does it matter that you have resistance to fire if the fire attack never hits you?

This is exactly Gygax's argument against damage types in his DMG: that because no contact is made, it doesn't matter! He uses the same argument against hit locations.

Of course this doesn't stop him having creatures, like demons and devils, with various degrees of damage resistance; nor rules for the different AC of bodily locations in some of the MM entries. So he's not entirely consistent!

The answer I've always assumed is that if a character is not vulnerable to fire, they are less threatened by fiery attacks and hence do not get as worn down by avoiding/enduring them.

Also, what's the difference between a hit and a miss if nothing connects? Contact of some kind has to be made, and the rules saying otherwise are nonsensical.

Make the narrative meaningless, and anything is possible. Got it.

Well, the mechanical difference is clear - the degree of hp ablation. In the fiction, an attack that does (more) damage is one that pushes the victim harder, requires greater resolve to resist/avoid/endure, etc.

It's self-evident that the narration of that is mere colour, in the sense that the action resolution doesn't care about it. There are combat systems in which it is not mere colour (eg RQ, RM, Burning Wheel) but D&D has never been one of them.

If those minor physical injuries actually gave some guidance as to what condition the foe is in, then those physical injuries would impact the foe in some way. But they don't. They never have. Not in D&D anyway.

<snip>

Never minding things like short rests, where I can rest for an hour, and be restored to full HP, all without a single spell. What, do those physical injuries seal up and go away in an hour?

My mental image tends to be that the scrapes, scratches etc are not debilitating - hence no penalties suffered - but they might still be visible. Regaining hp doesn't necessarily mean that the scrape, bruise or whatever has healed up. Rather, it means that the character has regained their stamina, resolve etc.

Obviously the above narration would not be plausible for broken bones, serious sprains, evisceration etc. That's why I would not include those as part of my mental image, nor as part of my narration.

 

[Hussar]

I never thought HP were problematic. They always seemed to be some combination of wound taking ability, luck, stamina and heroic grit when I thought about them. Any narration that seemed plausible based on the way the damage was taken has always seemed good to me.

Having the world set up where you can never notice child abuse because hitting doesn't leave marks until they hit zero and there are no rules for mental trauma from it, or that the party will never notice which towns person must have been the one they chased through the briar patch because the briars don't scratch unless it's lethal, etc... well, go for it if it fits your story.

Wow. Really? That’s the direction you want to take?