Abstract HP

[Andor]

One pointy of clarification. I don't have a problem with D&D having abstract combat. If I wanted to track down which metacarpal got broken when my character fumbled while punching a wall I can dig out Morrow Project or Albedo and go to town.

I do have a problem with the insistance that the difference between Thornan the Ironballed (a 20th level Barbarian with a 20 con and 250 HP) and Ernie the bakers assistant (Commoner 1, 2 hp) is not actually visible in game and that they look exactly the same when reduced to 0 hp. This inspite of the fact that Ernie can drop himself to 0 hp by grabbing a hot tray, and it takes an elephant a good deal of trampling to do the same to Thornan. Granted at 0 hp they are both standing there looking woozy while a mysterious voice shouts "Finish him!" But a CLW will always bring Ernie right back to full health while it would take an entire temple of clerics working in shifts to fix Thornan's pachydermal abrasions.

HP affect too much inside a game world to be waved away as not existing from the viewpoint of those inside that world. And to argue otherwise breaks my suspension of disbelief.

I'm not saying HP are realistic, I'm just saying they are real.*

*In the context of a D&D world, obviously.

 

[bgaesop]

About heal checks and hit points not representing actual physical damage:

I have First Responder training, which is like First Aid++, or let's say at least 5 ranks in heal (maybe Cleric Training once 4e comes out?). A while back I was walking around in Rome and I turned a corner to see a young man who only seconds before had been hit by a bus. He was lying down on the sidewalk, his sister crying while holding his head in her lap, his shoe and sock missing, his foot covered in blood, his face a pallid white, and his whole body shaking profusely. I got him out of the path of foot-traffic and got him in the proper position, took a good look at his wound (it was relatively minor, about four centimeters diameter lack of skin on his ankle but no damage to tendons or bone), bound it with his sister's shirt (I left my first aidhealer's kit back at the hostelinn, stupid stupid me), did a full body pat-down to see if there was any more damage (there wasn't), gave him some water, and talked him through all of it. By the time I was done, not even a minutefew rounds later, he had stopped shaking, his face was a good colour again, and if I'd let him he could have walked. He wasn't healed back to full, but he had a hell of a lot more hit points than he did a few rounds earlier.

Just my two coppers.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

What I'm saying is, it's pretty unimaginable for me, that someone could survive being actually HIT by 300 arrows unless they were supernaturally empowered. Not just "epic" or "wuxia". Actually supernatually empowered. A dozen sure.

Still, in D&D a dozen arrows'll kill ya most of the time, so it's usually okay. Only rarely does it venture into the realm of the retarded.

Thank you, exactly what I've been trying to get at with my questioning. The why behind the problem. And in most cases it seems to come down to once the character grows past the point where they can survive events that wouldn't be possible (in general, there are always flukes & the whim of Murphy) IRL it's too much for suspension of disbelief.

 

[JohnSnow]

Thank you, exactly what I've been trying to get at with my questioning. The why behind the problem. And in most cases it seems to come down to once the character grows past the point where they can survive events that wouldn't be possible (in general, there are always flukes & the whim of Murphy) IRL it's too much for suspension of disbelief.

Oh, I don't think that's it.

A "normal" person dies when hit by a single arrow, maybe two. If you decide that hit points represent purely physical damage, the high-level D&D hero can survive a dozen or more of such hits (that do max damage). One arrow does 8 hit points. A 20th-level fighter could easily have almost 200. That's like 2 dozen direct hits, with the PC still standing.

Speaking for myself, it's not that I have a problem with a heroic character being able to take 3 or even 4 times what a normal human being can, it's that the SoD is strained, but not broken, when that happens. Up to there, and maybe a little past that, is like the SoD it takes to watch a Die Hard, James Bond, or Indiana Jones movie. But asking me to believe that a character can take a dozen or 20 times what a normal human can...that's too much, and my suspension of disbelief is shattered.

On the other hand, it's a lot easier to believe that the character survived the attacks because they weren't really as solid as they seemed. That, to me, is heroic luck at work.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

I don't have a problem with players who want to play with a house rule that hp = toughness. But I would have a problem with changing a system that has worked for years (even if it has a few problems) just to satisfy the house rules some people use.

Luckily, I don't have to house rule anything to make hp = toughness, because hp = abstract isn't a rule, it's just flavor text. Absolutely nothing in the rules has to be changed to play hp as toughness, in fact it would be exactly the way most people in my expereince play. You just say that you got hit when you get hit, say that it did injury when it overcomes damage reduction*, etc. Folks who don't like high level characters being that tough may then need houserules, but I don't need any to use hp as a measure of how much physical punishment a character can take and say that some physical damage is done every time hp loss occurs**.

*How on earth would you let the characters know a creature has damage reduction if you are actually using the abstract definition? "You swing at the monster, it dodges but is knocked off balance... but isn't actually off balance from it... but when it dodges Bob's silver mace it is REALLY off balance that time."

**This may be a compromise position similar to the "divide by 10" rule above, in that I'm OK with saying that some portion of each hit might be explained away, but the mechanics just don't work for me (nor does the narrative, personally***) without a hit that does damage actually being a hit that does physical injury at some level.

***If I can, I like to describe how a miss misses and how a hit hits. Dodging aside is a description of when the attack misses both regular and touch AC, deflected by shield/armor is when it would have hit your touch AC but is, in fact, stopped from being a hit by shield or armor contribution to AC, and so on.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

That's like 2 dozen direct hits, with the PC still standing.
....
On the other hand, it's a lot easier to believe that the character survived the attacks because they weren't really as solid as they seemed. That, to me, is heroic luck at work.

D&D really doesn't have any measure of a direct hit or a solid hit, though. You either hit and get to do damage or you miss and don't do any. The FUDGE system is one example of a system where "direct" and "solid" matter - you do more damage based on how many success levels you had to spare.

There does seem to be a number of positions within abstract and toughness. I reject the abstract idea when it is claimed that a character can be at half hp and physically uninjured, or that a damage dealing hit really missed entirely. But HSB might consider me a proponent of abstractness, as I'm likely to describe the seriousness of the hit based on the proportion of hp lost rather than an amount of damage each hp represents.

 

[apoptosis]

The only real way to define hitpoints is "The amount of damage a character can take before they are dead"

Damage being defined as something that does removes hitpoints.

A somewhat circular argument but the other definitions run into problems.

They are a game abstraction with varying levels of simulationist correlation to physical toughness.

HP basically are defined based on circumstance both before and after the event when the HP damage was taken. It is really a gamist or narrative contstruct that has to be pretty malleable based on circumstances.

I guess they could be defined strictly as toughness only if you allow for high HP characters to have basically superhero-level indestructibility in which case you should also remove coup de gras rules and just let falling rules stay like they are.

Apop

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

Oh, I don't think that's it.

A "normal" person dies when hit by a single arrow, maybe two. If you decide that hit points represent purely physical damage, the high-level D&D hero can survive a dozen or more of such hits (that do max damage). One arrow does 8 hit points. A 20th-level fighter could easily have almost 200. That's like 2 dozen direct hits, with the PC still standing.

Speaking for myself, it's not that I have a problem with a heroic character being able to take 3 or even 4 times what a normal human being can, it's that the SoD is strained, but not broken, when that happens. Up to there, and maybe a little past that, is like the SoD it takes to watch a Die Hard, James Bond, or Indiana Jones movie. But asking me to believe that a character can take a dozen or 20 times what a normal human can...that's too much, and my suspension of disbelief is shattered.

On the other hand, it's a lot easier to believe that the character survived the attacks because they weren't really as solid as they seemed. That, to me, is heroic luck at work.

There are variations in exactly where each individual places that point where it breaks suspension of denial. In general it seems to be beyond the Die Hard level where things start to break down with many people. To clarify action movie level is probably the most common threshold.

THREADJACK: I'll note now that Die Hard may pull some serious exaggerations on how well and how long a person can continue to function in that state, but it's not actually THAT far out there. People have survived a lot worse, http://www.history.army.mil/moh.html at this website you can find accounts of people who did things far more outrageous than in any Die Hard movie many of them while injured worse than McClain is at any point in the movie. END THREADJACK

But HSB might consider me a proponent of abstractness, as I'm likely to describe the seriousness of the hit based on the proportion of hp lost rather than an amount of damage each hp represents.

There's a continuum not an either/or shutoff. I'd say you were in the moderate range of the Concrete group. Where JohnSnow for example is in the outer segment of the Abstract group. I'm generally at the hard end of the Concrete group. When describing damage I use the damage potential of the weapon rather than the HP of the character. A 1 is a mere scratch, if it does less than roughly half damage it's a noncritical wound, better than half is a serious wound, critical hit is a run-through or arrow in vital organs situation. If the damage is a greater portion of the character's hp than weapons damage I'll raise the description to match. Coup de Gras is gone and so is the Massive Damage Save though the latter was because by the time it comes into effect it's useless until someone rolls a 1.

 

[WayneLigon]

A high level monk can make a running long jump of better than 70 feet if he maxes the skill. So what about unnatural resilience to injury is harder on suspension of disbelief than any of those things?

A high level monk is using magical (Chi) enhancement to pull off those tricks; they are not something that a person in tip-top athletic conditioning can pull off. This is evident and understood in the make-up of the class. Hit points on the other hand are not magical enhancement or toughness.

 

[MichaelSomething]

If you don't like HP as it is you can do the following....

Invent houserules
Buy new HP system from 3rd party developeer
Use HP system from another game
Play another game if its a dealbreaker for you
Re flavor current HP system to suit own needs
Accept HP as it is anyway

Any option I missed?