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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5926192" data-attributes="member: 42582">[MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION], good examples!Sure, but I'm not sure where that gets us.In some RPG melee combat systems, I can walk up to a demon and try to stab it in the heart with some mechanical chance of success determined by comparing my attack skill to its dodge skill to my weapond damage to its amour and toughness etc.But in D&D, in the first round of combat there is no chance for (let's say) a mid-level warrior to one-shot a Vrock. In AD&D, it's close to mechanically impossible for a character of ordinary strength, armed with a dagger, to one-shot a mercenary (daggers to 1d4 hp, mercenaries have 1d4+3 hp - so 3 in 4 mercanaries are mechanically immune to being one-shotted by daggers).This mechanical impossibility is a consequence of D&D's hit point mechanics - often described as "plot armour" for PCs, and presumably a type of pacing mechanic for NPCs and monsters. (Ie their whole rationale is to prevent one-shotting.)Is a mechanic like hit points, which makes one-shotting enemies mechanically impossible, fundamentally different from a mechanic like martial encounter and daily powers, which make it mechancilly impossible to replicate certain combat moves? Not in my view. They are all metagame techniques to regulate pacing, provide a certain sort of plot authority, etc.</blockquote>