Endurance as quasi-cure wounds?

[hong]

One of the players in my campaign came up with the bright idea of using the endurance spell to get people back on their feet. Example situation: 7th level PC is taken down to -4 hit points (say), rendering them unconscious and dying. Mage comes up to him and casts endurance, granting +4 temp Con points. This translates to +2 hit points per level, which for a 7th level character, is enough to get them conscious again.

This trick has come in very handy on the occasions they've been caught without a healer. I'm not out to nerf the party, but I'd just like opinions on whether it's kosher, rules-wise.

Also, would your opinion change if instead of hit points, we were talking about VP/WP? So rather than going to -4 hit points, the PC takes 4 wound damage. Recall that in VP/WP, vitality represents skill/luck/fatigue/mojo, while wounds are physical damage capacity.

 

[Ravellion]

Perfectly fine oin both accounts (though I have read your house rules on your cure spells, so I can see how this would tick you off).

In the VP/WP example, it is the fatigue part of the VP that makes for a quick boost in energy and hence makes the PC fighting at more effectiveness.

 

[Zhure]

Perfectly legitimate as far as I can see. I've seen it done a couple of times in practice. Works as a nice band-aid until the cleric can heal somebody (or to get the cleric up and running).

 

[SimonMoon5]

Yeah, it works, but that's not the ideal use of Endurance. Since it lasts for hours, you should cast in on someone way in advance of them getting hurt so they don't get taken down in the first place.

(Unless you've only got one Endurance and five PCs to choose from.)

 

[Spatzimaus]

Of course, don't forget to heal them before the Endurance wears off, because when that happens he loses the 2 HP/level he gained from the spell and drops back down to negative or worse.

But, like SimonMoon said, it's better to have the spell on BEFORE the combat. If that's not practical, look into investing in some +CON items (which don't stack with the Endurance spell, of course) for the people who need it.

 

[the Jester]

This is a perfectly legit tactic, and though it's never come up in the sense of bringing someone back to consciousness imc (they're usually low on hp when they do it) I wouldn't have a problem with it at all.

I can't speak to the WP/VP system, having never read or played with it. DnD all the way for this old school gamer!

 

[Hypersmurf]

I've had something similar happen recently in a game I'm running.

After the combat, the only cleric and one other character were unconscious and bleeding. As a recently-formed party, nobody really knew what resources everyone else had... so they didn't know that the other unconscious character had some CLW potions in his pack. They went through the cleric's pack, thinking she might have some... but all of her backup healing was on scrolls. Not much use.

Getting desperate, the rogue with Mafia connections realised there was another possibility. He was carrying a couple of doses of a highly addictive drug... one of the effects of which is a temporary alchemical bonus to Constitution.

He slipped it to the cleric, which gave her just enough bonus hit points to hit "disabled", and she was able to cure herself enough to be able to save the other guy's life.

Of course, now she's carrying a drug addiction, and only the rogue knows about it... but given how slowly PbEMs run, she hasn't had to deal with the symptoms yet.

Soon...

-Hyp.

 

[Destil]

It's accualy more usefull in general if you do it first, because if the PC had had that extra 7 HP before the fight they would have never gone unconcious.

Though it's a nice way to bring someone back to their feet, since you might not want to give everyone endurance every day.

 

[Technik4]

Its a nice wizard-heal, but its dispellable and will eventually fade. I think its a clever tactic to save an endurance spell, although as others have said, had the endurance been cast on a character, perhaps they might have lived (if a character dies at -18, had the mage cast endurance on him earlier in the day, his hp would have been high enough that he would have only have gone down to -8).

Technik

 

[dcollins]

It certainly looks valid by the core rules. The definition of "dying" is being between -1 and -9 hit points (PHB p. 129, glossary, DMG p. 84), so anything that removes that condition makes them presumably no longer "dying" (by definition).