D&D 4E Discussion about a Primer on 4e terminology

[drothgery]

This discussion has been split off from this thread: http://www.enworld.org/forum/new-ho...-d-d-4th-edition-terminology.html#post5778453
(Plane Sailing, ENworld admin)

Good idea. Here's another one:

Hit Points: Hit points do not usually represent actual damage. They are representation of your heroic resolve and ability to keep struggling against opponents. This is why you can recover hit points (not just gain temp ones) by using your second wind or having a Warlord yell at you (etc etc) in 4e.

This is true in all editions of D&D, and the rules explicitly say so.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

This is true in all editions of D&D, and the rules explicitly say so.

True. But 4E was more in your face about it, and thus made it harder to ignore or replace.

 

[Vayden]

This is true in all editions of D&D, and the rules explicitly say so.

Yet I keep getting into arguments with people who think the Warlord shouldn't be able to heal . .

 

[Dausuul]

This is true in all editions of D&D, and the rules explicitly say so.

...sort of.

There's one paragraph in every edition of D&D that says this. If you were to black out that paragraph, however, everything else in the rulebooks pre-4E would imply that hit points represent raw physical toughness and high-level PCs are just made of iron.

All of the terminology supports this. Anything that gives you back hit points is described as "healing," anything that takes them away is "damage" which is usually caused by an "attack" that "hits," poison and other rider effects are triggered by loss of hit points, et cetera. Hit point recovery happens either through magical curing spells or through days or weeks of bed rest. Unconscious characters still have full hit points. And so on and so forth.

Take it from a software developer: When the manual tells the user to go one way, and the software pushes them the other way, the software almost always wins. The manual gets one crack at them, if you're lucky*. The software hits them every moment they're in front of the computer. Likewise, the "hit points are not toughness" paragraph gets read once, while the rest of the rules are nudging the players toward "hit points are toughness" every single game.

4E's designers decided that that one "hit points are not toughness" paragraph gave them carte blanche to turn hit points into "whatever is most convenient for our tactical minigame." They might have pulled it off if they had just had the good sense to overhaul the terminology. Instead, however, they left it all like it was; anything that gives you back hit points is healing, anything that takes them away is damage caused by an attack that hits, poison triggered by loss of hit points. The result was some nasty cognitive dissonance. The mechanics were now saying one thing while the flavor was saying something else.

Hence the outcry, and the complaints about warlord healing. If warlords triggered a "heroic surge" that gave you back "vitality," I doubt anyone would be complaining. In a role-playing game, the choice of what to call stuff is really freaking important.

[size=-2]*And if you think you can count on getting even that one crack in, better think again.[/size]

 

[Vayden]

I'm a pretty big fan of tactical mini-games, especially the ones that also allow you to develop a personality and history and non-combat experiences for your pieces. There's this little mod to Chainmail that I've played a few editions of that's particularly good.

 

[Dausuul]

I'm a pretty big fan of tactical mini-games, especially the ones that also allow you to develop a personality and history and non-combat experiences for your pieces. There's this little mod to Chainmail that I've played a few editions of that's particularly good.

Ha. Well said.

In all seriousness, 4E's tactical minigame is generally quite good and I'm not knocking it. I just wish they'd put the same effort into the flavor that they did into the rules.

 

[Vayden]

Ha. Well said.

In all seriousness, 4E's tactical minigame is generally quite good and I'm not knocking it. I just wish they'd put the same effort into the flavor that they did into the rules.

Yeah, you really have to think 4e would have been a lot better received if they'd made one of English major types go through and collect playtest feedback and refine the naming and terms etc. There were entire threads full of outrage about that Golden Wyvern School feat or whatever back in the day.

 

[Wormwood]

There were entire threads full of outrage about that Golden Wyvern School feat or whatever back in the day.

oh man I remember those. My side lost, and the world was deprived of "Mages of the Iron Sigil" in favor of "Orb of Imposition"

le sigh

 

[drothgery]

...sort of.

There's one paragraph in every edition of D&D that says this. If you were to black out that paragraph, however, everything else in the rulebooks pre-4E would imply that hit points represent raw physical toughness and high-level PCs are just made of iron.

All of the terminology supports this. Anything that gives you back hit points is described as "healing," anything that takes them away is "damage" which is usually caused by an "attack" that "hits," poison and other rider effects are triggered by loss of hit points, et cetera. Hit point recovery happens either through magical curing spells or through days or weeks of bed rest. Unconscious characters still have full hit points. And so on and so forth.

Except that you get more hit points by gaining levels but becoming more skilled swordsman does not make a sword less likely to kill you; cure light wounds becomes less effective as you gain levels; armor makes you harder to hit; a single swing of a sword is much more likely to kill a wizard than a warrior...

 

[Tallifer]

I have played and enjoyed systems which used wounds, hit location, crippling injuries and long term effects. D&D has always been abstract and sometimes nonsensical if hit points were considered purely physical. I clearly remember D&D players justifying hit points with arguments of cinematic and narrative devices.

There is something to be said for more realistic combat simulation. However no one can claim that any version of D&D provided that. And I for one was never bothered.

(For example, compare any version of D&D with Aces & Eights. Even the movement and attacks are broken up in incremental bits,second by second. You have to draw your gun, lift it, sight it, aim it if you want a decent chance to hit, and meanwhile everyone else is moving inch by inch and turning and dropping and rolling and shooting.)