Poltergeist said:
Argggh, the Crimster and his hatred of healing! I play in his current campaign you see, where we make do with a bard with a wand of cure light wounds at 9th level. Isn't that healing crappy enough for you, Crimster?????
No. I want to see you bleeeeeeeeeeeeed...
Keep in mind the the magical healing system is a very core concept and in changing the way it works will not simply create more intense scenes when people get hurt. It will have a trickle down effect that will impact your game in a number of very central, very palpable ways.
Well, I'm going to have to disagree with you here. The magic system itself is simply a 'part' of D&D. Can you run a campaign with no magic? Surely, it happens all the time, and it can be very successful. Those games do not suffer for the lack of magic (not just healing!). Take a look at WoT - they
heavily modified the magic (AND healing!) system - and there are hundreds of games being run, without a problem. You can even take out classes (a core concept if there ever was one!) and have it work (d20 Cthulhu, of course). So I think playing with these core concepts is not only possible – it’s happening! Do not fear change!
A couple of points that I would suggest you consider before making a huge alteration to a very essential and core part of the game design:
1) You have to consider that the core D & D system is designed around having hit points cured relatively instantly.
Going to have to disagree with you here,too. Where does it say or imply this? If this were the case, there would be no rules that state you get back your level in hit points per day of bed rest! They would assume you have a portable cleric in your backpack to heal you when you are slightly wounded! I would also state that despite the lack of a true cleric (we'll not mention the Fat Guy) - your group has done well, even without true healing. There
was a time when you didn't have wands of cure light wounds, remember. And I know that there are adventuring groups out there who do fine without a cleric. It just makes it harder, grittier, grimmer. =)
By converting to subdual damage you will have to greatly limit encounters which will greatly slow level progression.
And this is a bad thing? 3E D&D levels come so fast, that you barely get used to your level before you gain another. Of course, this could be another thread entirely, so I’ll end it here.
"Instant healing" allows a fight to occur, healing to be done, and then the adventure to carry on. Having healing only convert regular damage to subdual damage which will require a significant amount of time to recover even after the healing spell has already been cast will essentially create a lot of down time with characters laying about in bed convalescing.
GM: "You have defeated the Grell, and are now back at home, nursing your wounds. It takes about a day of bed rest to be back at full fighting capacity, thanks to your cleric. That day passes uneventfully."
Not that hard, methinks.
While in a "this is realistic way" that might be good, in a "my players have been 3rd level for 18 months way" that can be bad.
Not sure how you tie those two together, but I think this is you attempting to connect subdual healing to slow leveling. As I stated before, this is not a bad thing. It's a good thing. But your example (an obvious exaggeration, of course) would never happen, regardless.
In-game time may pass faster - because of the bed-time (heh) - but that is good too! I don't think a fighter can gain 10 levels in one month (HIS time). I think Rand from WoT has grown too far, too fast (it’s been a little over a year since he left Two Rivers). But I think this is part of the story – i.e., he’s Lews Therin reborn.
Also, players may find it a bit boring when their character have to lay around for hours after any encounter. This can worsen if only one character is significantly hurt, effectively taking them "out of the game" for the rest of the night if there are other tasks that must be completed on a time schedule.
This is a very valid concern. But let's talk about the type of campaign that I want to run. City based; players are thieves (every 3rd, maybe 4th level has to be in rogue) who belong to a guild; other guilds, guards, corrupt guards, secretive wizards, nobles, etc will be the foes; adventures will revolve around breaking into homes, bypassing magical and mundane traps, intra and inter-guild conflict, etc.
Ok, now the image of a wounded comrade being helped from the scene of a battle -
fleeing from the scene of a battle - is appealing. This campaign won't be about heroes. (although in my mind's eye, I can see the PC's becoming heroes, but that's something else). This is about trying to
avoid fighting. Of course, violence will dog your heels like a homeless puppy. Grim? Oh yes. And just the feeling I want.
Essentially, you run the risk of leaving one or two players sitting around for hours with nothing to do while the rest of the group plays. When you factor in your DM stance on always paying attention, even if your character has nothing to do, you are going to be looking at some pretty bored, cranky, and unhappy players.
A problem even when you play normal D&D – I can’t see this making it more of a problem anyways. This comes down to the DM making sure that people have equal time, and that if someone is knocked out (or whatever) it’s for a short duration. I hereby vow as a DM, I’ll do my best not to leave you bored. If this is so, you have my permission to read whenever you want. =)
2) WOT appears both to do significantly less damage (another poster summed it up far better than I could as I have only read over the game and not actually played it) and also adds the defense bonus which reduces the chance of taking damage compard to D & D. I think this combination of factors is what makes the healing to subdual work. D & D is designed with the intent that characters can be "battlefield healed" allowing a fight to continue. As people level up in D & D, armor class does not generally increase at near the rate that attack bonuses do, resulting in characters being hit a lot more often and taking damage a lot more often. However, WOT offers a defense bonus that increases by level so many characters, especially those that rely less on armor, DO get significantly harder to hit as they level up. An Initiate has the worst defense bonus, and they get a total of +8 to their armor class by 20th level. If you are looking at a "low magic" campaign, a lightly armored character like a rogue is likely to essentially have the same armor class at 10th level as they do at first level. If we consider a relatively high dex (16) and leather armor, you are looking at an armor class of 15. That is pretty good at 1st level. At 10th level, a warrior would likely land EVERY BLOW on an armor class 15 character. At high levels, you could be looking at a very significant chunk of time spent sitting around healing subdual damage. Also, fighter and rogue classes are unlikely to do "light" damage at these levels. A rogue's sneak attack can deal a significant chunk of damage, and a single hit from a strong warrior with a great sword could deal as much as 20 points damage without a critical. When you consider that an average rogue would only have 33 hit points at this level, the fate of the unable to be healed in combat rogue does not sound very promising.
Another valid point. Perhaps then it would be a good idea to institute a defense bonus? I do not see this as a major mechanic that would require heavy modifying.
3) D & D core rules present a high magic world. In a world where someone can be instantly killed with a spell, disintegrated by another spell, struck by lightning shot from a mage's finger tips, teleported across the planet, polymorphed into a toad, and so on, how does the idea of magical healing being instant further reduce realism for you?
Our own society, despite the fact that we can fly to the moon, paralyze a person with electricity, and type on a glorified abacus, we cannot instantly heal a small scratch. Regardless, in my concept for this world, there
are ways to do True Healing, it’s just harder. My thoughts are that while ‘Cure Light Wounds’ heals subdual damage at 1st level, the ‘Cure True Light Wounds’ heals HP directly (and maybe that spell is 3rd, or somesuch).
4) Magic potent enough to disintegrate a man in an instant would also likely be potent enough to heal him in an instant.
Bah! You yourself should know it is always easier to harm than to heal.
Making healing the only type of magic affected does not create a low magic campaign, rather it creates a low healing campaign which is a totally different thing. "Lo! I am now a 20th level wizard! I can travel the dimensions, reduce a man's body to ash, control the minds of dragons, teleport instantly anywhere on the planet, and cast horrid wilting which will do 20d8 damage in a wave to everyone around me!" "Well, I am now a 20th level cleric so I can now heal you completely as long as you rest for 21 hours after I do. "
And guess who would be the more popular person? The cleric. The ability to completely heal someone after 1 day of rest?? BY THE GODS! Let’s not even talk about the ability to cure disease!
Essentially, changing healing only serves to do nothing to make the campaign low magic, but rather serves a dual role of making healing classes weaker and making any sort of fight significantly deadlier.
Fights deadlier you say? Ahhh yes. Excellent. Come on – 3E is almost like playing Champions, but with swords. A group of 4th level adventures do not ever, ever, ever fear a group of goblins (unless the DM plays the goblins as tactical geniuses). In my mind, there should always be a sliver of fear. Especially in this type of campaign, where the players are not meant to take on a squadron of guards and win…!
4) As for how this would affect the cleric class: A) keep in mind it would also affect the other healing classes (druid and bard) but to a much lesser degree as spontaneous casting of healing spells is one of the major cleric class features.
Ayup.
B) Healing is certainly one of the most significant roles a cleric plays and changing the healing to conversion from subdual to normal damage would greatly impact the cleric class. Keep in mind that the third level cleric "heal" spell (cure serious wounds) would be healing 3d8 +5 points of damage when first received. However, the third level "damage" dealing spells of sorcerer and wizard would be doing 5d6 damage, frequently to more than one target. The cleric heal is already "less" powerful than the damaging spells when comparing total points gained/lost. (average heal would be about 15 points versus average damage of 17 points per person hit...with a fireball this can be a lot of persons) If you reduce the spell to converting only to subdual damage you have hugely decreased the power of the spell and effectively made it worthless for battle field healing. I think this is a pretty significant reduction for the class, especially as this is affecting what is essentially the cleric's core ability/role. Or to put it another way, do you think that changing all damage done by fighters from regular damage to subdual damage would greatly affect the class? Or making all damaging spells (wizard, sorcerer, cleric included) do only subdual damage? Changing the heal spells purely to a "subdual" conversion with no other changes would be effectively the same kind of thing.
Fighters main focus is dealing damage. Making their damage subdual would take away more from them than my proposed change. Clerics can do SO much more than heal. They have armor. They have weapons. They can hold you, blind you, curse you… Need I go on? However I do agree with you on some small scale, and I am considering
some modification for their relatively small (IMHO) loss.
5) Realism and hit points don't mix, in my opinion. If you do buy the 80/20 type concept (I think in first or second edition it used to be that only hit points rolled at first level plus any hit points gained by con bonus at further levels were considered "real" physical hit points and the rest were a combination of dodging and the "ability of a skilled warrior to turn what could be a fatal blow into a superficial one") it reflects the "source" literature better. I have never read a fantasy novel or viewed a fantasy film or TV show wherein the hero got stabbed 135 times in one fight and walked away standing. Generally, the heroes avoid getting hit for the most part and even a few successful hits leave them quite hurt.
I agree with you here, totally. I do not buy the 80/20 concept.
And no, I have no intention of playing any kind of healing class if I play in this campaign (regardless of the decision on whether healing will be "standard" or conversion to subdual) so I am presenting these points in a purely philosophical manner. [/B]
Of course! This is all theory anyways, I’m not ready to run the City Campaign next week or even the week after. =)
The Crimster
