D&D General 4e Healing was the best D&D healing

[Neonchameleon]

Okay, now I know you're trolling. It can be hard to tell on the internet, but that tipped your hand. I'm not going to take any more of your bait.

I absolutely am not trolling here. Your own rhetoric leads inexorably to the conclusion that most people should be downed by a solid melee hit by any trained combatant. Most people should not have a bag full of hit points.

If you don't believe that and instead believe either (a) most people should be able to take a solid hit by a trained combatant with a weapon intended for killing or (b) that hit points do not in fact represent damage and hits aren't hits then I will agree with you.

But this is, so far as I can tell, where your rhetoric leads. That 4e is the most realistic version of D&D because it has minion rules. Meaning it has rules where most people are taken out by a solid hit by a veteran with a deadly weapon. Not to a game where a 0th level character has an almost 50% chance of taking a direct hit from an orc with an axe without serious ill effect because the orc only does 1d8 damage. Meanwhile minion rules lead to civilians and militia going down when hit - but let them do damage with weapons.

 

[Gorgon Zee]

Yes, and those rules that say only 1 item gets damaged are garbage. Chuck 'em out and, if the bearer fails his-her own save, force everything carried to save.

And yes this takes longer at the table. So be it.

and also do the same when a mace hits your body, as it would naturally destroy items. And absolutely for falling damage as that is almost certain to break flasks, bend knives and dent armor/shields.

Hit points are an abstraction; trying to make them anything like realistic is a fool‘s errand

 

[Lanefan]

and also do the same when a mace hits your body, as it would naturally destroy items. And absolutely for falling damage as that is almost certain to break flasks, bend knives and dent armor/shields.

If that damage is above a certain threshold, absolutely.

A mace doesn't usually do the same amount of damage as a fireball or a long fall.

Hit points are an abstraction; trying to make them anything like realistic is a fool‘s errand

Meh - there's some realism to be had there, if one keeps one's expectations low.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

But this is, so far as I can tell, where your rhetoric leads. That 4e is the most realistic version of D&D because it has minion rules. Meaning it has rules where most people are taken out by a solid hit by a veteran with a deadly weapon.

The bad faith of your strawman argument is transparent in your claim that "a solid hit by a veteran with a deadly weapon" is mechanically reflected in "1 damage from a successful attack."

No believable person would die instantly and irrevocably to the weakest conceivable hit from a toddler-sized humanoid with a stick (who was nevertheless intent on inflicting serious injury), which is an accurate description of what "1 damage from a successful attack" actually means. Nevermind the fact that most minions are canonically supposed to be armored soldiers that are tougher than regular humans.

Under a reasonable ruleset, a solid hit from a deadly weapon will drop (but not immediately and irrevocably kill) a normal adult human (with 4-5 HP), but the weakest conceivable hit from a toddler-sized humanoid won't. A system which fails to distinguish between those is a bad system, especially when toddler-sized humanoids feature prominently in the default setting!

And since you are apparently incapable of taking this topic seriously, I would thank you to not address me further, or it will be reported as harassment.

 

[Fanaelialae]

The bad faith of your strawman argument is transparent in your claim that "a solid hit by a veteran with a deadly weapon" is mechanically reflected in "1 damage from a successful attack."

No believable person would die instantly and irrevocably to the weakest conceivable hit from a toddler-sized humanoid with a stick (who was nevertheless intent on inflicting serious injury), which is an accurate description of what "1 damage from a successful attack" actually means. Nevermind the fact that most minions are canonically supposed to be armored soldiers that are tougher than regular humans.

Under a reasonable ruleset, a solid hit from a deadly weapon will drop (but not immediately and irrevocably kill) a normal adult human (with 4-5 HP), but the weakest conceivable hit from a toddler-sized humanoid won't. A system which fails to distinguish between those is a bad system, especially when toddler-sized humanoids feature prominently in the default setting!

And since you are apparently incapable of taking this topic seriously, I would thank you to not address me further, or it will be reported as harassment.

An alternate explanation would be that things like a toddler hitting you with a stick don't cause HP loss. It may be unpleasant, but it can't kill you.

As I see it, the minion rules were relative. A creature wasn't a minion (in the reality of the world). However, it could be a minion relative to the heroes it was fighting. Similarly, it could be elite relative to them, but not relative to the world.

It was (IMO) an elegant approach to monster reuse in a leveled game like D&D. When you first fight an ogre it is a boss. A few levels later, you face off against a pair of them that are elite. A few more levels and you fight an entire group of (regular ogres). Finally, as you get into the high tiers you can face off against entire hordes of ogres and slice through them like wheat. The ogres haven't changed; the players characters have grown in power.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

An alternate explanation would be that things like a toddler hitting you with a stick don't cause HP loss. It may be unpleasant, but it can't kill you.

As I see it, the minion rules were relative. A creature wasn't a minion (in the reality of the world). However, it could be a minion relative to the heroes it was fighting. Similarly, it could be elite relative to them, but not relative to the world.

It was (IMO) an elegant approach to monster reuse in a leveled game like D&D. When you first fight an ogre it is a boss. A few levels later, you face off against a pair of them that are elite. A few more levels and you fight an entire group of (regular ogres). Finally, as you get into the high tiers you can face off against entire hordes of ogres and slice through them like wheat. The ogres haven't changed; the players characters have grown in power.

It was an utter failure of the system to properly scale and represent creatures in the setting. Having to have four different statlines to represent the same creature depending on who they're fighting is a horrendously ugly kludge.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

An alternate explanation would be that things like a toddler hitting you with a stick don't cause HP loss. It may be unpleasant, but it can't kill you.

The monster manual had plenty of examples of low-strength small humanoids who would deal 1 damage with a club attack. The designers are fully aware of what a 1 damage attack actually looks like. This is entirely within the context of what the game rules should be able to describe.

 

[Fanaelialae]

It was an utter failure of the system to properly scale and represent creatures in the setting. Having to have four different statlines to represent the same creature depending on who they're fighting is a horrendously ugly kludge.

You say it's an ugly kludge, whereas I found it to be the most elegant implementation in any edition of D&D.

Rather than a failure, I saw it as an astounding success. You could have the same creature appear over a long length of time, and each time it would feel different in terms of relativewithout being wildly unbalanced (in every edition prior to 4e an ogre could usually one shot a low level party member). It was truly excellent.

To each their own.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

You say it's an ugly kludge, whereas I found it to be the most elegant implementation in any edition of D&D.

Rather than a failure, I saw it as an astounding success. You could have the same creature appear over a long length of time, and each time it would feel different in terms of relativewithout being wildly unbalanced (in every edition prior to 4e an ogre could usually one shot a low level party member). It was truly excellent.

To each their own.

5e's bounded accuracy achieves the same thing without needing four different statlines for the same creature.

 

[Fanaelialae]

5e's bounded accuracy achieves the same thing without needing four different statlines for the same creature.

It comes close in application, but no, it has a different feel at the table IME.