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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8615325" data-attributes="member: 42582">If there is a chart with 20 entries, and the rules tell me to roll some dice now to see which entry is introduced into the fiction now, that is "playing to find out".I don't understand this question, in the context of this discussion.Most fiction in (say) a session of Apocalypse World will not have been pre-authored. Nevertheless, it matters. That doesn't make AW a simulationist RPG - I think it obviously is not one. It doesn't use the mechanics to establish the fiction. It uses the mechanics to distribute responsibilities, and set parameters around, the authorship of fiction.I am talking about D&D combat.In RM, or RQ, or for that matter Burning Wheel Fight! (but not Bloody Versus, nor a Torchbearer kill or drive off conflict), by the time the resolution of each declared action is complete, we know what has happened in the fiction: whether or not a blow was attempted, whether or not it was parried/dodged/blocked, if it landed where it landed (with a degree of precision that varies across systems - RQ gives us left or right sides more often than RM but RM gives us thigh vs calf more often than RQ), and how bad the injury was.D&D does not give us that: if a character has 30 hp, and is being attacked by giant ants that deal 6 hp per hit, then if the PC is dropped to zero hit point and next round is stabilised with the use of a healer's kit, or a 1 hp heal spell, we know that none of the attacks caused a mortal injury. If, after the PC is dropped to zero hit points, they die, we know that at least one of the attacks caused a mortal injury. This shows that the fiction of a given attack cannot be settled until after some other actions have been resolved.We can also look at it this way: each injury is mechanically identical - 6 hp of damage - but in the fiction clearly they are not identical - the first one or two are (per Gygax's AD&D and 5e) mere grazes or near-misses or wearing down, whereas later ones may be more serious physical injury - though, as per the previous paragraph, that is all up for grabs based on subsequent action declarations.Here is Robin Laws's advice on page 150 of the original Hero Wars book:When a character suffers a big loss of AP that does not remove him from a contest, describe the event as vividly as you can without describing permanent consequences to that character. Until a character is at 0 AP, he can always come back and win the contest, escaping unscathed. This is especially important in combat situations; otherwise, you might describe a terrible wound which unaccountably disappears at the end of the contest! . . . AP reflect much more than a combatant's physical condition. Mostly, they measure a fighter's position . . .  AP also measure a character's emotional state. Is he ready and willing to fight . . . ? Until the character drops to 0 or fewer AP, any injuries he suffers will be superficial. They may well cause considerable pain, ruining his concentration and slowing him down.As I posted upthread, I see this as a clearer version of Gygax's account of hit points in his DMG. It is an excellent account of how to adjudicate non-simulationist points-ablation resolution, where the relationship between points lost, points recovered, and overall consequences in the fiction, cannot be settled until a whole host of action declarations have been resolved and some final state reached.In some of the text I've elided, Laws also makes comparisons to presentations of combat in film. (I gather films inspired Gygax, although he doesn't discuss it in his rulebook.)Reading this in Laws had to effects on me. First, it gave me a new appreciation of what Gygax was trying to achieve with hit points and saving throws as discussed in his DMG. Second, it gave me a clear idea of how to connect the fiction to the mechanics of hit points and healing surges when GMing 4e D&D.This is also why I find the description of this thread as "hit points suck" frustrating. Identifying a mechanic as non-simulationist isn't a rejection of it, or a criticism of it. I have an active 4e D&D campaign at present. I have never played HeroWars/Quest, but would be happy to do so if the opportunity arose and time permitted - it's a brilliant example of RPG design.The first version of vitality/wounds I know of was published in White Dwarf #15 - "How to Lose Hit Points and Survive", by Roger Musson. It exhibits a clear simulationist ethos, though also is intended to enhance game play in certain respects (eg he has hit points - his version of vitality - returning at 1 per two minutes after a turn of rest; this anticipates the recovery tempo of 4e D&D). Similar simulationst underpinnings are evident in Musson's work on dungeon design - it's not Glorantha, but it contrasts with (say) Lewis Pulsipher's step-on-up motivated discussions of the same era.</blockquote>

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