Abstract HP

[Glyfair]

I am not cool with getting stabbed in the arm and poisoned from a monstrous scorpion's stinger, when the same attack from a goblin would have "reflected off you shield, but still causes you to lose 3 hitpoints."

One thing to consider is that most DMs don't worry too much about carefully enforcing the abstract part of hit points always. It's quite reasonable that the stinger attack that hits actually misses you physically but wears you down when you make your fortitude save.

Set aside for now the falling issue; how about being plunged into acid that inflicts 10d6 damage a round? Defensive skills will not let you dodge the acid. Luck will not make it stop eating into your skin. Morale will not keep the flesh on your bones. The only way you're going to survive longer than the next guy is if you can take more punishment.

Real life, maybe. However, the Joker (in several variations of his origin), managed to survive falling into a pit of acid.

I have yet to read any good fantasy fiction (not mythology because that is often a symbol laden story reflective of the psycho-spiritual dynamics of the culture in question) that makes normal (or even exceptional) humans into godlike beings who can survive orbital reentry (without powerful magic) because of a stupid rule convention.

Look at real life. An RAF tailgunner jumped from his flaming turret without a parachute at 18,000 feet and survived. A Czech flight attendant was in a plane when a terrorist bomb went off at 33,330 feet and she survived the fall (partially in the plane, still in her chair) and survived although with severe injuries (the Guiness World Record for surviving a fall without a parachute). You can find lots of stories of people falling huge distances and surviving. None of them are "godlike beings."

Are these best situations represented by hit points? Probably not. However, any system that accurately portrays the ability to survive these sort of situations, and yet also portrays the ability to die from the very minor things we can die from (like sitting too long and dieing from a blood clot) isn't particularly enjoyable.

I think the hit point system does a fine job. I think where the improvement in the willing suspension of belief is in better educating the players and DMs in this concept. Make sure they understand that every hit doesn't necessarily indicate a physical wound so that the attacks are described in such a way that they aren't all physical wounds. 4th edition isn't adding this new concept, they seem like they are just better portraying the concept that has been around since at least the AD&D days.

 

[Glyfair]

For each way of damage (claw attack, breath weapon, trap, acid pool, weapon) assign a special damage type on a critical confirmation roll.

Sounds like Arms Law. While part of the Rolemaster system, it was originally supposed to be an alternate weapon system for D&D (and other RPGs). Every single weapon had a chart of damage with different critical effects.

While an interesting option, I'm against it. There is a reason that I never took up Rolemaster as a system of choice.

 

[simply not edible]

Look at real life. An RAF tailgunner jumped from his flaming turret without a parachute at 18,000 feet and survived. A Czech flight attendant was in a plane when a terrorist bomb went off at 33,330 feet and she survived the fall (partially in the plane, still in her chair) and survived although with severe injuries (the Guiness World Record for surviving a fall without a parachute). You can find lots of stories of people falling huge distances and surviving. None of them are "godlike beings."

And now I want the button saying "Break this record?"...

 

[SteveC]

The age-old Hit Point debate. It was fun back in the days where Runequest first came out, and it's still fun now!

Hit Points have never just represented physical damage, as the quote from the AD&D PHB comes in.

I have always thought of increasing hit points as being a very simple method of representing a damage divisor. Let's say you start off with 10 HP at level one. We'll call that your physical toughness. When you reach 20 HP what's really going on is that all of the damage you take is divided in half by luck, fate, training ... you name it. When you hit 30 HP you have a damage divisor of three, 40 HP divides damage by four and so on. When you're hit, you still take some physical effect, but it is largely turned away.

The other side of this argument is healing, which doesn't scale with HP, such that a cure light wounds spell can full heal you from near death at level one, but when you hit 20 HP, there's no way it can do this. My answer to that is "of course." The very same factors that help you absorb damage in the first case hurt you in the second. Sure, that cure light wounds spell might be just the ticket for Joe the Nameless Fighter, but mighty Beowulf needs more of everything to make him go. If this isn't the case, then the Inflict Wounds spells should directly attack your Con or something similar.

The new edition of the rules gives us a chance to tweak the damage rules a bit, by adding the Bloodied condition. Maybe the snake that bites you only causes HP damage unless you're Bloodied by it.

Similarly, if a character heals at a higher rate, you could easily have cure spells heal based on how a character would heal naturally. In Star Wars SAGA a second wind heals you 1/4 of your HP or your CON, whichever is higher. You can make that the effect of a Cure Light Wounds, with a Cure Moderate healing twice that and so forth.

I think those changes would be received positively by the gaming community, but I'd also say they're only necessary to help with verisimilitude.

Just my $.02,

--Steve

 

[RigaMortus2]

Falling damage should deal Con damage AFTER you fall a certain amount of feet...

Or another alternative, it should deal a certain percentage of hit points (up to 100%) depending on how far you fall (10% per 10 feet fallen?).

Of course, then you run into the "I once read about a man who fell out of a plane at 30,000 feet and hit the ground, broke every bone in his body, but lived!"... To this you could say, "He used an Action Point"

 

[WayneLigon]

Chris Sims's article makes it clear that the Official position on HP is that they are abstract and represent luck or skill at dodging or somesuch. In all the history of gaming this has never made one damm bit of sense in systems like D&D where the PCs gain HP by the bucketload as they level. Why? Because all the luck in the world will not explain why my dwarven fighter can survive orbital re-entry.

Vesna Vulović holds the Guinness Book of Records world record for surviving the highest fall without a parachute: 10,160 meters (33,316 feet).

She was pretty banged up but I'd certainly call that lucky

I, as a player, can always back the GM into a corner where he has to either admit the system does not portray abstract HP, or he has to break the rules in order to kill my character to preserve the illusion of squishyness on the part of high level characters.

The notion that you somehow become supernaturally tougher and stronger, your skin or body somehow changes as you go up in levels, going from a state where a dagger wound is dangeous to you being able to survive walking through fire is simply doesn't stand up.

Look at movies, books, etc. I mean really watch them. Great heroes don't take wound after wound after wound. They dodge. They don't get hit. They block. They get the hell out of the way of damage. Then one or two good blows bring them down. Conan didn't take wound after wound after wound. He wore armor and he got out of the way of most blows (luck, skills etc - IE, abstract); but a wine bottle or kosh in an unwary moment and he folded like a sack of flour just as most other people would. He'd get cut but he wouldn't take 20-30 wounds like a D&D character would if D&D was a non-abstract system; he'd take a half-dozen good blows where most people would fold after 1-2 of that magnitude. That's what made him the greatest warrior of his age. Same applies to John McLane.

Y'all simply have to accept that D&D has an abstract combat system. It isn't something that's really up for debate or arguement. Yes, there are places where it doesn't work as well - falling, poison and a couple other things - but that's the price you pay when you want an abstract system and a system that is clean and simple to use. Some things get sacrificed for a fast play experience. Do y'allunderstand what that means? It means that sometimes design ideas must trump accuracy or simulation in order for the play experience to be quick and clean.

There have been a huge number of house rules about hit points and all that and none of them have survived because they do one of twothings (1) they complicate things to the point that no-one bothers with the sub system (2) they make the game too deadly to be fun.

Yes, we could have a system whereby a cleric's healing spell gives you back, say, up to your CON in hit points. It would pretty much suck to be a cleric then, wouldn't it? We don't want the cleric to suck and we want some means of getting back hit points so the healing spells 'bring back luck' and so-on and so-forth. That's just something you have to handwave and live with to gain a speedy and simple play experience. That's just the way game design works and the sooner some people buckle down and accept that, the better off we'll all be.

 

[Daniel D. Fox]

Abstract HP are fine for me as well.

For falling, I still make it rather dangerous. I use a number of d6 equal to the character level for every 10 feet fallen to a cap of 20d6.

6th level fighter falls 30 feet = 18d6

1st level wizard falls 40 feet = 4d6

10th level rogue falls 50 feet = 20d6

5th level wizard falls 20 feet = 10d6

 

[GreatLemur]

Chris Sims's article makes it clear that the Official position on HP is that they are abstract and represent luck or skill at dodging or somesuch. In all the history of gaming this has never made one damm bit of sense in systems like D&D where the PCs gain HP by the bucketload as they level.

Wait, wait, so you're saying HP increase by level makes more sense if HP represent literal, physical health and toughness? And less sense if they represent defensive skill?

That said, I totally agree that D&D's hit points are a pretty bad system, and that this poorly-defined area they're supposed to represent is kind of a nightmare to rationalize in a lot of situations. Certainly , we can do it, but I hate that it requires so much bending-over backwards.

Let's be honest here. If we wanted to play a game where a few guards with crossbows actually worried our PCs we would be playing WHFRP or GURPs or Fantasy Hero or freaking Amber. Obviously we dig the concept of PCs who rapidly pass out of the realm of mere mortal toughness and into the realm of the action movie badass or superhero.

This is kind of weird, too. I mean, Amber characters are basically gods. Mine recently regenerated from being reduced to mush after a city exploded around him. I can't figure out if your statement was hyberpoble of some kind, or just the result of a weird misunderstanding. (Or maybe my Amber GM is crazy generous?)

I feel compelled, nay - required to post this;

Each character has a varying number of hit points, just as monsters do. These hit point represent how much damage (actual or potential) the character can withstand before being killed. A certain amount of these hit points represent the actual physical punishment which can sustained. The remainder, a significant portion of hit points at higher levels, stands for skill, luck, and or magical factors. A typical man-at-arms can take about 5 hit points of damage before being killed. Let us suppose that a 10th level fighter has 55 hit points, plus a bonus of 30 hit points for his constitution, for a total of 85 hit points. This is the equivalent of about 18 hit dice for creatures, about what it would take to fill four large warhorses. It is ridiculous to assume that even a fantastic fighter can take that much punishment. The same holds true to a lesser extent for clerics, thieves, and the other classes. Thus, the majority of hit points are a symbolic of combat skill, luck (bestowed by supernatural powers), and magical forces.

Any guesses where thats from?

1st ed AD&D players handbook, page 34.

Oh, cool. Thanks for posting that. I'd actually really been wondering if the abstract conception of hit points had been around from the beginning.

So now we've got to ask, why does the correct defintion of this very basic game term have so much trouble catching on with people? Is it because the definition just isn't trumpeted loudly enough in the rules? Is it mechanics that occasionally treat HP like physical toughness alone? Is it terminology like "hit" and "damage"? Just the fact that people like the idea of unreasonably-increasing physical toughness? Or that taking "26 points of damage" sounds like it ought to be a serious, bloody wound, regardless of how many hit points the target has left?

All of the above, I'd guess.

I'm hoping 4e does a better job of reminding people what their HP pool and damage rolls actually represent, since the general slant of its mechanics seems to really depend on that proper definition a whole lot more than past editions. But, hell, maybe that slant is exactly what's necessary to get the whole definition to stick. It'll clearly result in cognitive dissonance for a lot of the older crowd, but maybe the new players will start out with a better understanding.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

The notion that you somehow become supernaturally tougher and stronger, your skin or body somehow changes as you go up in levels, going from a state where a dagger wound is dangeous to you being able to survive walking through fire is simply doesn't stand up.

My question as posed up-thread is very simple. why not? What about this makes it something you can't accept?

There have been a huge number of house rules about hit points and all that and none of them have survived because they do one of twothings (1) they complicate things to the point that no-one bothers with the sub system (2) they make the game too deadly to be fun.

Why does HP=physical damage have to be the province of house rules or increased deadliness? So far it seems like all your points have simply been because characters should not be able to survive taking wounds that are unsurvivable wounds in the real world damage has to be explained abstractly. If you don't deal with damage abstractly you have to limit the character's survivability to plausible IRL levels with causes too much deadliness or complicate the system via multiple mechanics.

Is it that hard for you to accept the idea of a character who can already do the impossible surviving impossible wounds?

 

[SteveC]

Y'all simply have to accept that D&D has an abstract combat system. It isn't something that's really up for debate or arguement. Yes, there are places where it doesn't work as well - falling, poison and a couple other things - but that's the price you pay when you want an abstract system and a system that is clean and simple to use. Some things get sacrificed for a fast play experience. Do y'allunderstand what that means? It means that sometimes design ideas must trump accuracy or simulation in order for the play experience to be quick and clean.

There have been a huge number of house rules about hit points and all that and none of them have survived because they do one of twothings (1) they complicate things to the point that no-one bothers with the sub system (2) they make the game too deadly to be fun.

I am not usually someone who uses the "quoted for truth" post, but I can't help it.

I think one additional thing about houserules for wounding is that they also tend to have their own quirkiness associated with them that can make them seem just as unreasonable in different situations. Beyond that, the systems that seem to be the most realistic turn out to be just as unrealistic when you look at studies about combat and injury.

Give me some HP and let's get on with the game.

--Steve