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You're already killing mooks left and right? You're so overpowered this game is stupid? You cast 100,000,000d100 Inbaasu-style Fireball upon your foes. Tell me when you're done rolling.

I think the perfect rpg Elf can see in the dark, swim underwater at great speeds, talk underwater as if they were on land, and only need to surface for air about once an hour. They need to spend a few minutes catching their breath afterwards though. They also look like tall fair-skinned humans...

You are both right, of course. Some of us like a little more verisimilitude than others, but it's kinda silly to argue over which unrealistic abstraction is more unrealistic.

Since when is every combat in a fantasy world going to allow a second wind? And even so, It's not the point that the tactic was possibly avoidable, only that the historical record shows it was feared and effective on the field. It's strategy is all offense, allow them no defense. D&D came from a...

Did you just compare a football game to actual life or death combat with medieval weapons? You seriously think people repeatedly barraged can take rests, repeatedly block, and hold back without being overcome? This kind of misguided notion is exactly why silly and unnecessary munchkin mechanics...

Depends on perspective. One could say hp already takes that into consideration. However, I understand the abstraction used to justify the mechanics now.

It's thought that originally they were considered some kind of lesser-deity spirits that inhabited natural places. Follow tradition and make them anything you want them to be. I kinda drift toward the Poetic Edda, but even in that there are some inconsistencies.

Mattachine-sama is absolutely right about the hp abstraction. Not joking at all. You roll for hp and you know your total, but when you're struck all you're told is how it happened and how severe it was by description. The number is secret. Makes things really scary, doesn't it?

I think I at last see the abstraction from the perspective of the 4th Edition players. You're just deciding when to give it that extra effort under stress, the same as your character would if under duress and desperate. Is that correct?

My character knows he has a potion. Drinking it decides what he does. Your DM is super kind if he lets you know your hp total! My character knows he's exhausted. I don't decide what he does, I give him a second wind and it triggers the healing surge.

It's not a matter of knowing you have a second wind. It's a matter of you deciding for your character that now is the time for it. Triggered is fine. It's the decision outside the game to have it that rubs people the wrong way, I think. You as a human playing sports might get a second wind, but...

Player control is good when they are playing characters and making them do things. It's bad when players are deciding for characters by giving them things they have no knowledge of in the game world.

Fighting a dragon, you might have raised your shield and took smoke inhalation damage. The abstraction is endless. A fall from a high place robs a lot of energy on impact, and perhaps he fell on an outcrop or grabbed a ledge just in time. For every excuse anybody has come up with to think...

That's the thing, hp is not necessarily "health points". The recovery time has always been a issue of debate, and nobody agrees on how long it should be or how much actual physical/mental wounds a loss of hit points entails.

It's the exception-based worldview of 4th that allows for these mechanics. When you consider it from that angle the abstractions are perfectly sensible.

The healing spells give energy to the body in order to repair damaged cells. Excess energy infustion provides our character's bodies enough energy to continue to block, dodge, evade, and if we're lucky the Cleric's deity grants us a little divine protection/luck to boot! If you are fighting at...

No true justification for in-character healing surges ever been given. Yes, some people like and want them, but that doesn't justify them. Many have always thought the abstraction of hp already takes reserves of energy and adrenaline into account. I really don't mind if D&DN has them or not...

It's an interesting idea, but the extra die roll slows down play, and really doesn't provide more verisimilitude when hp already includes blocks, deflections, and evasions within it's abstraction. An interesting interpretation might be to think of a d20 attack roll as timing to reach impact...

Assume that in the fight exhaustion took place, and after the fight have them automatically "catch their breath". This can restore hp to a prearranged max threshold based on CON and Class or what-have-you. When players hit 0hp or below have them roll on a chart to determine which finger was...

The Chainmail Man-to-Man rules killed you in one hit, the Naval Wargame rules were added to prevent that, and finally the abstractions were added to stifle complaints that it wasn't realistic. Adding Bilge pumps helps a lot. I don't mind if 5th has them or it or not, but I don't think there is...