Falling Dire Bear

[BryonD]

The difference with falling is that the entire body is in motion and then stops suddenly.

...

No need to explain why falling is bad. I get it. A client of mine had a guy die this year from falling of a FOUR foot ladder.

I'm perfectly satisfied that your model is as reasonable as any other game level simplification.

But I don't think your answer addresses the specification of a critical hit by an axe.

Getting hit with an axe IS lethal in the real world. On the scale being discussed here getting hit with an axe is NOT lethal in D&D. Certainly not if you claim falling is not lethal. Specifically, the 30 foot fall you referenced does 3d6 damage or 10.5 points. Easily enough to kill most D&D people (L1 and L2 commoners with a 10 or 11 CON). An axe does 4.5 average damage. So it would take a STR of 22 for a non-critical hit from an axe to do the same average damage as falling 30 feet. So in the D&D world getting hit by an axe is less lethal than falling 30 feet. To take the same damage as the fall, you would need to get hit twice and then take slightly better than typical damage.

So we come back to my point. If you want falling to be lethal like in "the real world", then shouldn't getting critically hit by an axe also be lethal like in "the real world"? How frequently do people survive being stabbed by a short sword three times? I'm sure it can happen, but I'd imagine the odds drop off pretty fast. If you are going to compare one form of physical damage to the real world, you really need some reason not to compare all others.

And by your same logic of non-magic healing time and body damage, should a single axe blow do some DEX and/or STR damage? I'd think a hunk of flesh off my arm would reduce my lifting ability and put a damper on my juggling.

 

[Tellerve]

Tellerve, thank you for pointing out what is only apparent to those with limited reading comprehension abilities. By showing us how to take partial quotations out of context, you’ve opened up a whole new world of fun!

*shrugs* Didn't mean to get ya all snippy, I just found it a really funny post. Wasn't disparaging your actual physics knowledge. Hard to get humor across on e-boards without people getting offended.

Tellerve

 

[KarinsDad]

So we come back to my point. If you want falling to be lethal like in "the real world", then shouldn't getting critically hit by an axe also be lethal like in "the real world"? How frequently do people survive being stabbed by a short sword three times? I'm sure it can happen, but I'd imagine the odds drop off pretty fast. If you are going to compare one form of physical damage to the real world, you really need some reason not to compare all others.

And by your same logic of non-magic healing time and body damage, should a single axe blow do some DEX and/or STR damage? I'd think a hunk of flesh off my arm would reduce my lifting ability and put a damper on my juggling.

No doubt that you could do this for the game. However, the reason I do not is that damage from weapons occurs on an every session basis in my campaign (we play for 8 hours a session and typically have one, possibly two combats in that amount of time).

But, falling happens a lot less frequently (especially with these house rules where players go out of their way to prevent falls). So far in the campaign (of over 40 hours), 3 characters out of 6 have each fallen once 8 to 10 feet. Enough to get injured slightly, but not enough to get injured seriously. We have not yet had a 15 foot or greater fall.

However, since combat happens so much more frequently, I have a different set of rules to emulate the disadvantages of getting injured in combat:

http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=68478

Hence, combat is more lethal than normal in my game, it is just lethal in a different way (i.e. losing overall effectiveness when injured and expecially when just injured).

 

[Al'Kelhar]

This has nothing to do with terminal velocity, and everything to do with scaling laws. Mass varies as the cube of length, but structural strength typically varies as the square. So a big creature will go splat much easier than a small creature, all other things being equal.

Thank you, hong, for pointing this out. Lots of physics being quoted, but it takes a statistician to point out the simple facts of engineering - i.e. applied physics. Small things are grossly over-engineered for the stresses they are put through by simply walking around; big things aren't.

Of course, in the real world, only certain extinct land animals got the size of a dire bear, and they weren't real agile. Drop a brachiosaurus or titanosaurus from 10' and it'd break most bones in its body.

Since (a) D&D is fantasy; (b) the actual effects of something dropping on you are complicated by many factors other than just weight; and (c) damage in D&D is abstract; it's reasonable to say - just as the maximum damage suffered from a fall is 20d6 - the maximum damage suffered from being hit bya falling object is 20d6.

Cheers, Al'Kelhar