Flavour First vs Game First - a comparison

[Delta]

Why not hard code that into the rules so now you are no longer forced to have a cleric in the group?

IMO, that's exacerbating the flavor-error. I would prefer a fix to the problem you identify (and I agree with), such as (a) reduce clerical healing, or (b) make a reason why clerical healing only works within hours of a "fresh" injury (first-aid), or (c) get rid of clerics entirely (as I did in my Diminutive d20 rules), etc.

There's fixes to be had in AD&D and what came after. The gentlest fix is usually best. I find that post-3.0, a WOTC fix is usually the most clumsy and ham-handed alteration that I could imagine.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Half the hitpoints seems too much, especially compared to the barbarian's rage.

Well, pick what you like. I would suggest basing it on hit points or level, but you could choose a fixed or ability score dependent number, too. Maybe 2d6+CON. Or maybe "[HIGHEST HIT DICE]"+CON+1/2 level. So, a Barbarian5/Fighter5 with Con 15 would get 1d12+7 hit points.

IMO, that's exacerbating the flavor-error. I would prefer a fix to the problem you identify (and I agree with), such as (a) reduce clerical healing, or (b) make a reason why clerical healing only works within hours of a "fresh" injury (first-aid), or (c) get rid of clerics entirely (as I did in my Diminutive d20 rules), etc.

There's fixes to be had in AD&D and what came after. The gentlest fix is usually best. I find that post-3.0, a WOTC fix is usually the most clumsy and ham-handed alteration that I could imagine.

I don't know, your solution doesn't look like anything that makes Clerical Healing less important (you just need it even faster), and it doesn't seem to solve any gameplay problems of having to run challenging encounters with characters at different (unpredictable) hit point conditions.

 

[pemerton]

4E as a whole has extracted a lot of simulation out of the game. It has been a deliberate attempt to err on the side of "that doesn't make sense" rather than "that kinda sucks" gameplay-wise. That does not jive with a lot of people who like their gameworld to make sense though.

The first sentence I agree with. The last sentence I strongly want to dispute - a gameworld with 4e healing surges might be a bit on the gonzo side, but there is nothing about it that doesn't make sense (ie there need be no retconning, nor any stupid narration). It is this suggestion that 4e players are tolerating nonsense in their gameworlds that makes me buck up a bit.

Again, I want to emphasise that I strongly agree with the first sentence, and think therefore that those who prefer simulationist play should avoid 4e.

 

[pemerton]

If your players are cool with having you dictate when they can take the initiative and investigate that creepy old house on the hill, then this could potentially work to a degree. In a game where players are allowed to make those choices, this would not, unless by some miracle the players all decided to have their characters rest months between doing things.

<snip>

I guess what I enjoy during actual play is "Player decisions and in-world events drives action; narration is the result of those decisions". Narration as a sort of commercial break where the DM tells the players their characters rest for X time seems, to me, to be the DM taking decisions upon himself that are not his to make.

I never said that the GM would decide. I said that "another solution is just to have everyone agree that sufficient time passes between episodes." Everyone agreeing means everyone, not the GM.

IMHO, the game itself should present "win conditions" where the desired action occurs as a natural part of playing the game, rather than something forced upon the players by an external agency. The game should make the players want to rest when they are injured.

The last sentence here seems to assume that the players' principal motivation is their PCs' motivation. That is, it seems to propose a weak game/metagame distinction, and a very high degree of immersion at all decision-points in the game. That is, it seems to presuppose non-narrativist play.

In narrativist play the win-conditions, as I said above, are production during the course of play of a thematically compelling story. The players, in narrative play, act in accordance with this win condition. Therefore they will, if they think it produces a more compelling story, agree to the sorts of passage of time that I've mentioned. They will then impute to their PCs the requisite motivations to have this make sense in the gameworld, and the GM will narrate those elements of the gameworld under her/his control so as to be accomodating of those motivations (ie metagame priorities will drive the ingame situation - this is the essence of narrativist play).

If the handling of Healing Surges is a problem for the entire group, why wouldn't the group agree that these "rest periods" are a necessary part to create a believable role-playing experience.

Exactly. Everyone agrees has nothing to do with GM dictation.

There are many aspects in a role-playing world that are not described in the rules. Character motivations. Rules for falling in love, or feelings like hatred, annoyance, compassion. And yet, player characters can act on such emotions. (Heck, there isn't even a rule for what is a "creepy" old house). Why shouldn't they also act on the idea that there characters have injured that, while they managed to overcome them in face of adversity, they need and desire to heal?

I agree. It is this very thought that is underlying the suggestion that everyone might agree to let a degree of time pass between episodes, so as to maintain some desired degree of verisimilitude in the narrative.

 

[pemerton]

I have become more interested in the decoupling (love TSOY for that very reason) but if you like the coupling then 4E more narrative mechanics is a step backward.

I agree that if you like a coupling between hp and injury at every point then 4e won't work - warlord healing will make little sense, for example.

And as RC's posts show, it's worse than that: 4e makes it possible to narrate a given episode of hp loss as an injury, and then to narrate the healing of that very loss as merely moral/spiritual/mental recovery (eg via warlord healing or second wind). So a given quantity of hp changes it's ingame meaning between being suffered and being healed. Even if one is prepared to allow that some hp loss is sometimes non-physical, this possibility might be too much to come at, as it allows a given bundle of hp to cross the categories in a non-simulationist fashion.

That's why I think simulationists probably shouldn't play 4e. But I don't think it means that 4e has to lead to retconning or stupid narration (putting to one side the gonzo issue, which is quite properly a matter of taste).

I am becoming a fan of either true decoupling (past what 4E does) or more of wound system where damage results in true wounds (either specific or details generated by narrative).

I have done a hell of a lot of your second option, playing Rolemaster. I think HARP and TRoS show that this sort of approach can be coupled with overall narrativist play. But I find the 4e approach intriguing because of its narrative flexibility.

By "true decoupling" I assume you mean a system where all conflict is resolved via the ablation of "hit points"/"action points" (choose whatever terminology you like), and thus physical combat isn't handled in a mechanically different fashion from other conflict. HeroWars would be like this; 4e is not, because of the great difference between combat and skill challenges.

Assuming I'm interpreting you correctly, what I like about the 4e approach - the refusal to fully decouple - is that it gives combat a special status in conflict resolution (like superhero comics do, for example) which itself can serve a particular thematic/aesthetic purpose. In this respect it resembles Rolemaster or HARP, which treat combat in a mechanically very different fashion from other situations of skill use. For some reason (psychopathology? slightly infantile taste? too many John Woo movies? too many X-Men comics?) I find this aesthetically appealing.

EDIT: The 4e "refusal to fully decouple" does make it a little hard to carry over the consequences of conflict resolved via combat into a skill challenge, and vice versa (interestingly, RM allows at least the first direction of carry over, because crits can give a bonus on next roll, and next roll need not be an attack). Inspired by some of the actual play examples Lost Soul has been posting, I think that the way to do this is to apply +2 or -2 circumstance modifiers as the carryover.

 

[cwhs01]

ahem. Could someone summarize or point me to the place in the thread where it was made clear how the 3.x HP was anything but a gamist construct? It seems that it is argued to be a simulationist concept, which has me kind of confused.

I don't want to restart an argument, just want a summary of the arguments, as i find it interesting. Just not interesting enough to wade through 20 pages of the thread.

much abliged

 

[Fenes]

ahem. Could someone summarize or point me to the place in the thread where it was made clear how the 3.x HP was anything but a gamist construct? It seems that it is argued to be a simulationist concept, which has me kind of confused.

I don't want to restart an argument, just want a summary of the arguments, as i find it interesting. Just not interesting enough to wade through 20 pages of the thread.

much abliged

It wasn't made clear. What was made clear is that for some players who like a more simulationist game, hitpoints without healing surges are kind of more acceptable than healing surges.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

ahem. Could someone summarize or point me to the place in the thread where it was made clear how the 3.x HP was anything but a gamist construct? It seems that it is argued to be a simulationist concept, which has me kind of confused.

I don't want to restart an argument, just want a summary of the arguments, as i find it interesting. Just not interesting enough to wade through 20 pages of the thread.

much abliged

Hit points like they are in 3E are a gamist mechanic, yes, but for a "simulation"/"immersion" perspective, you have the benefit that every time you take damage, you can decide what it represents in the game-world. If a 80 hp character is hit for 75 points of damage, you can describe that as a slashing wound. You don't take any penalties for it (which would make the situation more believable), but you can always stick with this description.
If the character is then hit for 10 more points of damage (bringing him to -5), you can describe this as a stab wound with strong bleeding. The only way for the character to overcome this wound is
1) stabilizing (representing the bleeding to stop) and slowly healing over the next day or days.
2) magical healing removing the wound.

The Healing Surge mechanic allows you to "overcome" any wounds you have described, but there is a little more going on then that:
1) You can be fully unimpeded by wounds you might have narrated previously. Inspiring Words or Second Wind doesn't close your wounds. While 3E might not give penalties, the wounds still impede your activity since you must avoid taking more hits.
You may still describe your character as covered in bandages after the encounter, but you could go on fighting for another 6 weeks if you wanted.

2) If you drop below 0, there is a realistic chance of dying per RAW. This invites us to describe the wound taken as something like in 3E - heavy arterial bleeding or something like that. But if you take a second wind or the Warlord inspires you to stand up, you're back in the game at regular capacity. This means that either you magically regenerated, or that the wound wasn't as bad as it seemed. But this means that you are unable to create descriptions for hits that are definite. You must stay vague, providing description that can be interpreted either way, since what "really" happened is only decided once you spend a healing surge or die.

Is this good enough for a summary? I hope I didn't misrepresent any position.
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I think the mechanic is in either case motivated by gamist concerns, but one mechanic supports a more simulationist approach (look at your character sheet to see how bad things are and base your further decisions on that), while the other a more narrativist approach (allows you to spend a game resource to decide how bad things are).

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A side question for RC and Fenes: How do you deal with temporary hit points in 3E? Theoratically, a character dropped to -1 hit points (bleeding) in 3E could be inspired by a Bard to gain a 2(d8+CON) temporary hit points - does this only work because in the end, it is still magic? Or did you never think about this specific case, and object to it, too?

 

[Fenes]

A side question for RC and Fenes: How do you deal with temporary hit points in 3E? Theoratically, a character dropped to -1 hit points (bleeding) in 3E could be inspired by a Bard to gain a 2(d8+CON) temporary hit points - does this only work because in the end, it is still magic? Or did you never think about this specific case, and object to it, too?

I require people to hear a Bard to get inspired by him or her, so unconscious people don't get inspired. All other sources of temporary hit points I can think of right now are of magical origin, so they can temporarily staunch a wound.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I require people to hear a Bard to get inspired by him or her, so unconscious people don't get inspired. All other sources of temporary hit points I can think of right now are of magical origin, so they can temporarily staunch a wound.

Makes sense. (Though aren't there some classes or feats that allow you to stay conscious while below 0 hit points? Diehard and Frenzied Berseker? Of course, I will not count the latter in any reasonable discussion on 3E hit points. )