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<blockquote data-quote="LordEther" data-source="post: 2854765" data-attributes="member: 29298">Another thing, one that many GMs/DMs forget, is that the aforementioned abstractness should be incorporated into play. I would humbly suggest not describing every HP loss as a wound, whether that be a flesh wound, shoulder slash, or deep belly penetration (sorry...). While some damaging blows can be actaully damaging in the sense of the narrative, once we hit mid- to high-levels, I tend to think in terms of characters' dodges (barely) or successful, if somewhat painful parries, etc. I find it helps not to start mentioning more serious wounds until HP totals are really low. And then, the &quot;You are an action star!&quot; rationale is more believable, at least for me. &quot;Eh, a flesh wound&quot; works pretty well a couple of times, but there is a point (I'd say at about the 20th lost hit point) at which plausibility drops dramatically.You might already be doing this; I only mention it because, again, the DMs I've played with generally neglect to do so, presumably in an effort to make combat &quot;feel&quot; more dangerous than it is, and it really makes the &quot;HP = Abstraction&quot; argument seem more like an excuse. I couldn't really enjoy D&amp;D for a long time as a result. Hope it helps...</blockquote>

[QUOTE="LordEther, post: 2854765, member: 29298"] Another thing, one that many GMs/DMs forget, is that the aforementioned abstractness should be incorporated into play. I would humbly suggest not describing every HP loss as a wound, whether that be a flesh wound, shoulder slash, or deep belly penetration (sorry...). While some damaging blows can be actaully damaging in the sense of the narrative, once we hit mid- to high-levels, I tend to think in terms of characters' dodges (barely) or successful, if somewhat painful parries, etc. I find it helps not to start mentioning more serious wounds until HP totals are really low. And then, the "You are an action star!" rationale is more believable, at least for me. "Eh, a flesh wound" works pretty well a couple of times, but there is a point (I'd say at about the 20th lost [I]hit [/I] point) at which plausibility drops dramatically. You might already be doing this; I only mention it because, again, the DMs I've played with generally neglect to do so, presumably in an effort to make combat "feel" more dangerous than it is, and it really makes the "HP = Abstraction" argument seem more like an excuse. I couldn't really enjoy D&D for a long time as a result. Hope it helps... [/QUOTE]

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