D&D 5E D&D Should Have Less HP Bloat

[Blue Orange]

It's hard to make a game that will please everyone--I think one of the nice things about the rise of the OSR is if you want to play old versions of the game, you can do that with OSRIC and Blueholme and Labyrinth Lord and the rest of them. If you want to play 3e, there's Pathfinder.

Having read the various editions over the years, it seems the bloat started in 3e when they started giving CON bonuses to monsters and was scaled down somewhat from there...

If you want something more fine-grained than just 'resistance', you could use 'hyper-advantage' (roll highest of 3d20; this gives mean 15.5 versus 13.8 for regular advantage and 10.5 for a regular roll) or 'weak advantage' (roll second highest of 4d20; this gives mean 12.4; this is easy to do online by simply clicking 'roll with advantage' twice).

hat tip to anydice.com

 

[Helpful NPC Thom]

Having read the various editions over the years, it seems the bloat started in 3e when they started giving CON bonuses to monsters and was scaled down somewhat from there...

It's numerous confounding factors. Changing the way modifiers were calculated turned Constitution from an ability score that initially capped out at +3 to average characters getting a +5 or +6 easily. Add onto that the increase in total Hit Dice and you have a recipe for very large pools of hit points. The obscene size bonuses to Constitution did not make matters any better.

 

[Minigiant]

Yes. That was the stated design goal of 5e developers. My personal preference is to drastically flatten the power curve overall, starting the PCs with a little more oomph in their britches and tapering power as the game progresses. There's a reason my preferred playing range is levels 3-7. I appreciate the lower levels and the higher levels for those that want them, but the system math falls apart at either end.

Speaking of which, have you heard the Good News about Savage Worlds?

One thing I think D&D has to eventually do is focus on the tiers.

I was working on a d29 homebrew game and the HP bloat was handed by handling out HD based on tier and not level.

Beginner: 0HD
Apprentice: 1 HD
Veteran: 2HD
Expert: 3HD
Heroic: 5HD
Paragon: 7HD
Master: 9HD
Grandmaster: 11HD
Epic: 13HD
Immortal: 15HD
Exarch: 17HD
Demigod: 19HD

Warrior classes would just get bonus HD.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Yes. That was the stated design goal of 5e developers. My personal preference is to drastically flatten the power curve overall, starting the PCs with a little more oomph in their britches and tapering power as the game progresses. There's a reason my preferred playing range is levels 3-7. I appreciate the lower levels and the higher levels for those that want them, but the system math falls apart at either end.

Speaking of which, have you heard the Good News about Savage Worlds?

When you're already working with something that has a pretty shallow power curve, "drastically flatten[ing]" it any further makes it sound rather like you don't want anyone's numbers to grow or change whatsoever. Given your stated level range is one where proficiency increases by a whopping one whole point, would you agree with this assessment? Because, I mean, if that's the case...again, I feel like that means you want a game designed not to scale much (if at all), which is rather contrary to every edition of D&D, not just the new ones--early editions tended to cut numbers off earlier but still scaled quite a bit. Keep in mind that hitting deep negative AC was not surprising even in 1e.

Edit:
And to be clear, it is entirely possible to gear a design toward "horizontal" power rather than "vertical" power. Horizontal power means you spread out, gaining new competencies you simply didn't have before--think the "E6" or "E8" houserule concepts for 3.X, where you stop gaining levels after 6th (or 8th), but can continue gaining feats thereafter by spending XP. Vertical power is increasing the potency of stuff you already have. Most games feature some of both, but D&D has generally focused its attention on vertical growth. You're going to be moving in rather new directions if you want to mostly eliminate vertical growth and focus almost totally on horizontal instead. The final product will only loosely resemble "D&D" as the term has usually been used.

 

[Helpful NPC Thom]

I like the +2 to +6 increase in modifiers, as I think that's a fair increase. I mostly object to the radical HP increase. I'd like to see more non-combat options added to the game.

 

[d24454_modern]

When you're already working with something that has a pretty shallow power curve, "drastically flatten[ing]" it any further makes it sound rather like you don't want anyone's numbers to grow or change whatsoever. Given your stated level range is one where proficiency increases by a whopping one whole point, would you agree with this assessment? Because, I mean, if that's the case...again, I feel like that means you want a game designed not to scale much (if at all), which is rather contrary to every edition of D&D, not just the new ones--early editions tended to cut numbers off earlier but still scaled quite a bit. Keep in mind that hitting deep negative AC was not surprising even in 1e.

Edit:
And to be clear, it is entirely possible to gear a design toward "horizontal" power rather than "vertical" power. Horizontal power means you spread out, gaining new competencies you simply didn't have before--think the "E6" or "E8" houserule concepts for 3.X, where you stop gaining levels after 6th (or 8th), but can continue gaining feats thereafter by spending XP. Vertical power is increasing the potency of stuff you already have. Most games feature some of both, but D&D has generally focused its attention on vertical growth. You're going to be moving in rather new directions if you want to mostly eliminate vertical growth and focus almost totally on horizontal instead. The final product will only loosely resemble "D&D" as the term has usually been used.

Considering how many people complain about high levels and believe that Campaigns shouldn’t go on too long, it’s not hard to believe that’s the point.

It’s one of the reasons why there’s no material beyond level 12.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Considering how many people complain about high levels and believe that Campaigns shouldn’t go on too long, it’s not hard to believe that’s the point.

It’s one of the reasons why there’s no material beyond level 12.

Honestly, there should be material. The people making the game just don't have an interest in it. Which is deeply frustrating to me! If a game has 20 levels, I want to see 20 levels. I don't want to see "the best 7 levels out of 20."

 

[Minigiant]

Here's a question.

How many HP should the average knight have?
How many HP should the best knight in a country have?
How many HP should the best knight on the plane have?

5e says your average knight in a nation has 8 HD, 52 HP, and 2 attacks.

 

[d24454_modern]

Here's a question.

How many HP should the average knight have?
How many HP should the best knight in a country have?
How many HP should the best knight on the plane have?

5e says your average knight in a nation has 8 HD, 52 HP, and 2 attacks.

I would do it based on both the HD and the actual HP.

An average Knight would have average HP, a low ranking knight would have 25% of potential HP, and a high ranking knight would have 75 to 100% of potential HP.

 

[Minigiant]

I would do it based on both the HD and the actual HP.

An average Knight would have average HP, a low ranking knight would have 25% of potential HP, and a high ranking knight would have 75 to 100% of potential HP.

Then if each step is a 25% increase or decrease, using 5e logic it's

Type	HP	HD	Attacks
Page	11	2	1
Squire	22	4	1
Beginning Knight	39	6	2
Average Knight	52	8	2
Best Knights in the Kingdom	75	10	3
Best Knights on the Continent	90	12	3

To me that seems about right, although I'd d bump up attacks faster. However that's just me not liking the 5e tiers.