Flavour First vs Game First - a comparison

[LostSoul]

You go to sleep at night and the next day you are undamaged.

I think this is where the system lends itself to the most possible absurdity; you can describe wounds all you want and deal with it, but you end up with a PC covered in banadges, sword gashes, arrows sticking out of him, etc.

Oh well. I suggest a Skill Challenge to deal with this if it's important to you. Healing up at night. Failures mean you lose Healing Surges, total failure means you don't refresh any Healing Surges. If you don't have any left to spend and you should lose one, I guess you die. Gritty.

 

[apoptosis]

I think this is where the system lends itself to the most possible absurdity; you can describe wounds all you want and deal with it, but you end up with a PC covered in banadges, sword gashes, arrows sticking out of him, etc.

Oh well. I suggest a Skill Challenge to deal with this if it's important to you. Healing up at night. Failures mean you lose Healing Surges, total failure means you don't refresh any Healing Surges. If you don't have any left to spend and you should lose one, I guess you die. Gritty.

Honestly,

I think some simulationists-heavy players should try a game like TSOY.

Damage in that game is on 1-damage tracker (7 slots) and physical, mental and social damage can fill up your tracker.

The penalties for each slot of the tracker filled ipenalizes you in the specific realm (physical, social, mental) but if you take a bunch of social damage, the next physical damage you take will be worse than if you had been undamaged as the farther up on the tracker the worse the penalties.

I am sure i just did the absolute worst job of describing this but hopefully the idea came through.

It really changes perception (at least for me) of what damage is in terms of game and story.

 

[Mallus]

I should mention that I hate the idea of healing in mid-fight.

Even in 1e/2e/3e when it came at the hands of a clerc/druid/paladin? Healing mid-fight has been around since the earliest days of D&D.

 

[Fenes]

Even in 1e/2e/3e when it came at the hands of a clerc/druid/paladin? Healing mid-fight has been around since the earliest days of D&D.

I dimly recall having seen one cleric in a 2E party once, for a couple adventures. We played from 1991 to 2000 weekly in several campaigns without any cleric that could heal. After 2000, in 3E, we had a bard as "Main Healer", but mid-fight healing was rare (no concentration, no armor, bow user made for less than ideal mid-combat healer anyway). In one 3E campaign we've got a cleric, but he's more into casting other spells.

 

[Raven Crowking]

You are correct there are definitely enough literary serial versions of IM moments (and since i really like Conan stories should have thought this through more). Though it would seem to lose its punch if it keeps happening (it is big deal in Princess Bride, it is more ho-hum in Conan)

Plenty of REH stories include characters needed substantial time to recover from major injuries, though. Including Conan stories. When Conan is crucified, he doesn't get up the next day and start killing things.

The same happens in ERB. In the Mars stories he includes special healing (Martian salves), but lasting wounds can and do happen. In Tarzan the Untamed, Tarzan is dying of hunger and thirst while crossing a desert. He uses what might be described as a "second wind" to kill Ska (the vulture) for food. It is not permanant:

And there he slept, after eating of what remained of Ska, until the morning sun awakened him with a new sense of strength and well-being.

[The above is the second sleep after killing Ska; Tarzan does not recover overnight. He emerges from the desert, still hurting from his ordeal; rain and food have allowed for some "real" healing, but he is far from recovered.]

Three days the ape-man spent in resting and recuperating, eating fruits and nuts and the smaller animals that were most easily bagged, and upon the fourth he set out to explore the valley and search for the great apes.​

In point of fact, this sort of thing is explicitly too gonzo for either Conan or Tarzan. There are no instances where, given a major wound, those wounds simply vanish. None. Nada. Zip. REH, in particular, was a careful writer with this sort of thing. Conversely, there are times when REH specifically has Conan (or other characters) incapacitated by their wounds and forced to rest before being fully healed.

These sorts of things are not too gonzo for comic books, granted. But, frankly, I don't want my game to play like The Flash or Spiderman. YMMV.


RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

So a character with 50 hitpoints and 10 healing surges gets hit by a sword for 4 points of damage. So what if I say "you have a cut on your arm now." Who cares? He uses a healing surge and gets all of his hitpoints back, the cut is still there. I don't know how a cut on his arm would affect him, but I didn't know that in 1E either.

Sure you did. In this case, the cut on the arm affected him by giving him 4 points of damage. They tracked, 1-to-1. If the hit points were restored (rest, magic), the wound was healed.


RC

 

[apoptosis]

Plenty of REH stories include characters needed substantial time to recover from major injuries, though. Including Conan stories. When Conan is crucified, he doesn't get up the next day and start killing things.

The same happens in ERB. In the Mars stories he includes special healing (Martian salves), but lasting wounds can and do happen. In Tarzan the Untamed, Tarzan is dying of hunger and thirst while crossing a desert. He uses what might be described as a "second wind" to kill Ska (the vulture) for food. It is not permanant:

And there he slept, after eating of what remained of Ska, until the morning sun awakened him with a new sense of strength and well-being.

[The above is the second sleep after killing Ska; Tarzan does not recover overnight. He emerges from the desert, still hurting from his ordeal; rain and food have allowed for some "real" healing, but he is far from recovered.]

Three days the ape-man spent in resting and recuperating, eating fruits and nuts and the smaller animals that were most easily bagged, and upon the fourth he set out to explore the valley and search for the great apes.​

RC

That is true (well as consistently as REH wants to be).

But i think the issue is the "fighting on" vs the "not injured"

The IM moment does not depict no injury it depicts "fighting on"

I think the second wind is a gamist device which allows the players to determine how they want the narrative to explain the mechanical effect which is why this uncoupling issue arises.

It gives more power to the player (or narrator) at the expense of less in-game world consistency.

 

[Mallus]

I dimly recall having seen one cleric in a 2E party once, for a couple adventures. We played from 1991 to 2000 weekly in several campaigns without any cleric that could heal. After 2000, in 3E, we had a bard as "Main Healer", but mid-fight healing was rare (no concentration, no armor, bow user made for less than ideal mid-combat healer anyway). In one 3E campaign we've got a cleric, but he's more into casting other spells.

I think your experiences were uncommon, to say the least, especially at higher-level play.

 

[Scribble]

Because, after 10 years, I have some notion of how my players react, and I know how I react. I can already hear the dialogue:

Fenes I'll say again what I said before. If you're intentionally setting out to make a situation not work, you'll probably accomplish that goal. The situation you set up is intentionally ignoring elements that will effect the situation in order to prove the situation doesn't work. You're starting from a this doesn't work mindset and creating a situation to prove an already decided idea.

As I said to RC if ultimately you dislike a game, who am I (or anyone else on this board) to say that you're wrong. But if you're posting on a message board about an issue you're having with the game, that we are not having, then obviously we'll offer our opinion on what we think you're missing. We're not saying we're right and you're wrong. We're just trying to offer advice to other gamers.

My fiance doesn't like red wine. The other day while out tasting, the person pouring put some salt on a plate and had her taste the salt, then drink the red wine. Suddenly she said, "WOW that tastes good!" The woman explained that when a lot of people say they dislike red wine, what they're actually having an issue with is the taste of tanins. Salt takes away the "edge" of the tannins and allows you to taste the fruit of the wine. This is why red wines go with certain foods because those foods tend to be seasoned with more salty seasonings.

She wasn't saying salt would be the right answer, and if my fiance didn't agree she was wrong; she was just offering an idea that might help.

That said here is my idea:

Player: "X is down? What do his wounds look like? bleeding, or just knocked out? If the later, I keep attacking the enemies, he'll get up on his own."
This player is asking for a game element hint. How many HP does he have and can he use a healing surge?

DM: "You can't tell. He's bleeding and on the ground, but still appears to be breathing."
The DM knows X is at negative HP, but does have a healing surge left.

Player: "I am next to him, and the enemy is wielding a waraxe. So, X just got hit "somewhere, somehow", no clues about his wounds? No blood fountain?"

DM: "You have to spend an action to check. Again he's bleeding, but still appears to be breathing. You just can't get an idea of the full extent of the injury unless you really check. It might be really bad, but he might also just be in shock."

Player: "I just want to know if he's bleeding much, or has obvious wounds."
Player is being persnikety, trying to get more info without having to act.

Player X rolls his death save failing it.

DM: "Like I said, he's bleeding pretty bad, but it could just be superficial. You have to check if you want to be sure. He did just make a groaning noise."
Cluing him into the fact that he's not yet dead, and there are game options available.

Player: "Ah, then it's either not really serious, or too serious to do anything without magic. I'll kill the enemy, then we'll wake X up - or bury him."

DM: You're a warlord, you could heal him. If it's not serious enough to kill him, hearing you might just amp him enough to pull through.

Player: He's unconscious, he can't hear my encouraging words, and if such words would be enough to raise him he'll be fine anyway.

DM: Again you're not completely sure of the extent of his injury. he might just be in shock and hearing you might snap him out.

Player: I am no cleric, I don't do healing magic.

DM: Nope not magic just amping him up really.

Player: (Rethinks his decision to attack.) Ok I'll try: "Get up you lazy sack of Orc Droppings! You still got fight in you, walk it off like a man!"

DM: X groans but opens his eyes looking at you, confused.

Player: "That's right barmaid, no time for sleeping! Do your share to help fight, and quit laying around!"

DM: Glaring at you, X struggles to his feet clutching the wound in his side.

Player X: With a grunt I push away the pain of the wound in my side and grip my ax tighter. "I gotta handle everything huh?"

and so on.

 

[Fenes]

Fenes I'll say again what I said before. If you're intentionally setting out to make a situation not work, you'll probably accomplish that goal. The situation you set up is intentionally ignoring elements that will effect the situation in order to prove the situation doesn't work. You're starting from a this doesn't work mindset and creating a situation to prove an already decided idea.

Scribble, in case you didn't get it: I prefer a certain flavor to my game. 4E's mechanics, as you just laid out so nicely, destroy that flavor.

My players (at least some of them) trend to rip holes in some gameist devices.

Now, unless you want to tell me you know better than I do how my game plays like, and how my group acts, I suggest you stop trying to second-guess me, and stop trying to calim I intentionally myke something not work when I can see things that bother me.

Once again, and for the last time: You have no issues with this description you just did; I do. I also have issues with the warlock's powers, as an aside. And please stop trying to feed me your views.