D&D General Dumb Idea: Hit Points As Ablative Plot Armor That Doesn't Regenerate

[Reynard]

As the title says, this is a dumb idea but it might be an interesting thought experiment.

What if instead of "health" or "willpower" or whatever, Hit Points were explicit Plot Armor points? And what if once that Plot Armor is gone, your character dies? NOTE: This would be a PCs only rule.

It might look something like this: every PC starts at first level and all the normal rules apply EXCEPT each PC has 1000 HP. HP, once damaged away, never regernate or heal, even with magic. The PCs go on their regular adventures, gaining XP and leveling as per normal, except that ever dwindling pool of HP. A character that runs out of HP has run out of plot Armor. The next successful hit drop them -- forever. No resurrection allowed.

How would this work in play? What impact would it have on player behavior and the feel of PCs? What happens as the PCs gain more power but get ever closer to final death? What do you do with healing magic? Change it or just eliminate those spells? Do you still use temporary HP?

 

[Stormonu]

Seems like it would make 1st level characters invincible and ensure you never reach 20th. I don't see it working on any level of play.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

As the title says, this is a dumb idea but it might be an interesting thought experiment.

What if instead of "health" or "willpower" or whatever, Hit Points were explicit Plot Armor points? And what if once that Plot Armor is gone, your character dies? NOTE: This would be a PCs only rule.

It might look something like this: every PC starts at first level and all the normal rules apply EXCEPT each PC has 1000 HP. HP, once damaged away, never regernate or heal, even with magic. The PCs go on their regular adventures, gaining XP and leveling as per normal, except that ever dwindling pool of HP. A character that runs out of HP has run out of plot Armor. The next successful hit drop them -- forever. No resurrection allowed.

How would this work in play? What impact would it have on player behavior and the feel of PCs? What happens as the PCs gain more power but get ever closer to final death? What do you do with healing magic? Change it or just eliminate those spells? Do you still use temporary HP?

Yep, the title says it all

 

[BookTenTiger]

I love the idea! My gut reaction is that it would turn every single hit into a big deal, because even a 1 HP stab from a goblin means you're that much closer to death.

I've got some other ideas but this is a really fun idea.

 

[aco175]

Maybe the player can just choose to ignore something and take away HP. At first level you have the normal 10ish HP and get into something like a fight. You get hit and choose to take one away and ignore things. You get more at 2nd level to add to what you have remaining.

This means that combat is arbitrary and more just a story and that choosing to get hit or not has not real threat. Everyone 'wins' at D&D.

 

[GrimCo]

Since most games end around levels 8-10, 1000 HP is more than enough to make combat meaningless. You know you can brute force it, even against vastly more powerful opponents. Level 5 party can take out Adult Red Dragon no problem. It does only 56 average damage per round with some 260HP and AC 19. With around 4000HP per party (5 characters, each took about 200hp worth of damage to get to level 5), that's lots of rounds party can stand and duke it out. Hell, they can take couple of dragons, become legends and retire with HP left to spare. While risk of death off the table, you can use this to tell some epic stories about underdogs who punched well above their weight and came on top.

 

[Seramus]

The nature of a Tank is to take hits, and not necessarily be so invincible that enemies simply ignore them.
This does very strange things to anyone trying to fill that niche.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, I'm generally against blatant plot armor, and additionally I feel this would lead some players to be ridiculously reckless in any situation where they know they won't exceed their limit, because logic has been canceled and the campaign is unlikely to make it to high levels anyway. So I'm going to have to say I don't care for it.

 

[Reynard]

I picked 1000 HP out of a hat, so let's do some math. Where would the number have to be to achieve the desired result.

Hit point increases are regular, so that helps. And CR is pretty much exclusively based on damage output.

So, to make things easy, let's assume that on average a character should lose half their hit points in any given Hard fight. And we need 5 hard fights to level. Further, let's use a d8+2 HD as a rough average with no increases based on ASIs.

That means:
Level 1: HP = 12. (12x5)/2 = 30 HP lost
Level 2: HP = 18.5. (18.5x5)/2 = 46 HP lost
Level 3: HP = 25. (25x5)/2 = 63 HP lost
Level 4: HP = 31.5. (31.5x5)/2 = 79 HP lost
Level 5: HP = 38. (38x5)/2 = 95 HP lost
Level 6: HP = 44.5 (44.5x5)/2 = 111 HP lost
Level 7: HP = 51. (51x5)/2 = 128 HP lost
Level 8: HP = 57.5. (57.5x5)/2 = 144 HP lost
Level 9: HP = 64. (64x5)/2 = 160 HP lost
Level 10: HP = 70.5. (70.5x5)/2 = 176 HP Lost
Level 11: HP = 77. (77x5)/2 = 193 HP lost.
Total* HP Lost = 1225
* I stopped at level 11 because that is where "most" campaigns seem to end.

So those folks acting like 1000 HP is way to high are underestimating the amount of damage PCs take over time, I think.

One thing i would do is still have a "threshold" for being knocked out of the fight -- not so much to curb PC power, but to protect them from burning through a much bigger chunk of their "Plot Armor" if things go poorly (because dice are dice).

 

[Reynard]

Yep, the title says it all

Thanks for your contribution to the subject!