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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mlund" data-source="post: 6164402" data-attributes="member: 50304">That's really the elephant in the room that we keep seeing cludgey hacks for in every edition. Bypassing Hit Points with Save-or-Suck effects is the underlying problem that should be refactored directly. It sucks when it happens to player characters (see the pack of Ghouls in the A1 playtest) and it really isn't much more fun when it happens to antagonists. It is so anti-climactic that big-bad monsters have had hacks built into them for several editions: Legendary Status in Next, +5 saves for Solos in 4E, and silly blanket Spell Resistance in 3.X. A Magic Missile can kill a kobold flunky outright. It might scuff the scales on a Dragon ... or it might kill him if he's on his last leg (down to 3-4 hit points when he started with 200). It's a strict might vs. might comparison. If someone has enough Hit Points then Magic Missile from a level 1 Wizard isn't going to kill him, not even on a Critical Hit. If a high-HD target is worn down he's more vulnerable and it might finish him off. The same should go for a Sleep spell or Power Word: Kill. The impact should be a matter of Spell Level vs. Target Hit Points, not "I hope he rolls a 1 on his Saving Throw" or "He's got more than 4HD, so he's immune."Even something like an HP "buy out" from the suckage of Save-or-Suck could work. Something like a spell having a lesser effect on targets that pass their saving throw -or- that expend X Hit Points to fight off the effects, some sort of heroic exertion mechanic. The efforts keep you from being knocked out (and subsequently Coup de Graced by any intelligent foe worth his salt) but they do eat up some of that margin that keeps you from catching a fatal blow in combat. That kind of mechanic might be more balanced than HP thresholds too, since it allows characters with small Hit Dice to still use it, since grinding their own HP in combat isn't something they normally put themselves out for like a high HD character does (like the Barbarian or Fighter).We should also address player-resources vs. antagonist resources. Straight level-ports with spell slots was a terrible idea, and still is. Antagonists are balances to appear in a single scene. Player characters are balanced to appear in a series of sequential scenes. Just slapping on character-level spell resources to antagonists creates a Nova Problem. If the Evil NPC Wizard (TM) isn't unloading an entire 15th Level PC Wizard's bag of tricks onto PCs in a single encounter then maybe the spam save-or-die problems diminish somewhat.- Marty Lund</blockquote>

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