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Message: <blockquote data-quote="toucanbuzz" data-source="post: 7874811" data-attributes="member: 19270">Is this a philosophical angle (what do hit points actually represent) or a mechanical issue (scaling threats)?If it's philosophical, you could adopt a Vitality system (replaces death saves with a small pool of vitality that represents the actual damage the body can take), wherein hit points reflect the ability to avoid lethal damage and mitigate harm, improving over time with experience, and vitality almost never changes (because one direct hit from a giant's club will kill any humanoid).If it's mechanical, that's an ongoing battle. AD&D capped hit points but didn't cap spell damage, making high level play unbalanced but preserving some lower level threats. On these forums during 3rd edition, a homebrew called E6 was created to cap games at 6th level and provide balanced benefits for adventuring past that level that kept games grounded instead of spiraling into feeling like DC Comics (TM) superheroes.  D&D began by making classes feel special. Only the fighter was good with weapons. Only the rogue could disable traps. Only the cleric could heal. You felt awesome when only YOUR character could save the day. You got your chance to shine in the spotlight. Anything that denigrates the classes by blending them into utility of other classes takes from that. Personally, whatever you want to call it, I'm a fan of anything that makes the classes more unique. I don't use it but that's because I don't see the need for it. Fun as a reward for new players, fun as a "hero point" to help save the day, but to each their own. Plenty of blogs out there how to make it more prominent and meaningful. I don't think they ever have been. House rules can fix this. Don't like long bows (which require historically around 150 to 200 pounds of pull to fire) relying on DEX? Change it. Don't like Dexterity affecting everything under the sun? Switch to a system that applies Intelligence (quicker thinking) to Initiative, for example. Ultimately, I love the system. I think they didn't do a good job with solo monsters or CR at high level, but the more I run games, the better I get what is a good challenge, and the better I get at fixing these things without needing an overhaul. For example, the demon lords in Out of the Abyss are pathetically weak for CR23 monsters. So, I added a bit of homebrew: max hit points, immune to non-magical weapons, resistant to anything less than +3 weapons, added some major spell abilities that they used to have, gave them rakshasa style magic immunity (if they want). You do this, they become a major challenge. Same thing for anything else. I feel they've given us a reminder from Gary Gygax's famous quote: “The secret we should never let the gamemasters know is that they don't need any rules.”</blockquote>

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