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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8615337" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't know what, in the fiction, is meant by "the accumulation of bites over time".Even moreso if we make it "the accumulations of sword-blows over time". Or "the accuumulation of scorchings-by-fireball over time".It's true that RM can - in theory - produce similar cases: in theory, a character might suffer nothing but 2 concussion hit nibbles from the giant ant warriors, suffer 20 of those and fall unconscious, then another 30 and start dying from concussion hit loss. In the fiction, we have to imagine someone who has suffered so many mostly superficial abrasions that they are dying from pain and shock. But this is a purely theoretical possibility that will never happen in practice, because of the variation in rolling d% and also because of the attack bonuses that the ants will gain when nibbling on an unconscious target.Furthermore, if the character in RM is dying from being below (in my example) -60 concussion hits, the spell to restore them immediately to consciousness (ie by restoring more than 60 concussion hits instantaneously) is 11th level (heal 7d10) or 15th level (heal 10d10). That's quite different from what is required to heal any individual nibble (a 1st level spell will heal d10 concussion hits). And when the PC regains consciousness, but is on a low concussion hit total, they will be at -30 to most actions.This all establishes a sense of what is happening that is quite different from that which is involved in hit point loss. Personally I think Robin Laws and Gygax are on track when they say that the logic of an ablation-and-restoration of points system is dramatic and cinematic - we know that M is being swarmed by ants, and that M is failing at fighting them off! But not until everything is resolved - the combat is at an end - do we actually get a clear picture of what it was that happened to M. If M survives, we know that the ants caused no harm but superficial abrasion; if not, we know that the ants literally tore pieces off M with their mandibles.The notion of an "accumulation of bites" seems to me to have no place in the most attractive way of using hit points and their analogues. (Here I would count not only HeroWars/Quest, but Torchbearer and Prince Valiant, both RPGs that are dear to my heart.)</blockquote>

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