Healing Surge Damage

[wlmartin]

I'd definitely count it as 1/4 max hp damage. Edit: I'd do the same for starvation etc since "damage = level" stupidly penalises higher level characters.

I differ on this opinion.
I wouldn't consider taking any more damage.

But that is just me

FYI : 1/4 max hp damage (or in other words healing surge value) is WORSE than damage = level so doing 1/4 would penalize a character, not the other way around

Damage Equals Level = DEL
Damage Equals Healing Surge = DEHS

A 1st level fighter : 31hp - DEL/1 - DEHS/7
A 11th level fighter : 104hp - DEL/11 - DEHS/26
A 21st level fighter : 172hp - DEL/21 - DEHS/43
A 30th level fighter : 228hp - DEL/30 - DEHS/57

So not sure how choosing Damage = Level over Damage = HS Value would be a better solution.

DEL, typically means that at 1st, you can get hit 31 times, at 11th you can get hit 9 times, at 21st you can get hit 8 times and 30th you can get hit 7 times.... whereas 1/4 hp is 4 times, so it can hit for twice as much power using this type of attack

 

[S'mon]

I differ on this opinion.
I wouldn't consider taking any more damage.

But that is just me

FYI : 1/4 max hp damage (or in other words healing surge value) is WORSE than damage = level so doing 1/4 would penalize a character, not the other way around

Well, yeah. But 30 hp on a level 30 PC is a much bigger penalty than 1 hp on a level 1 PC. You do understand that?

 

[wlmartin]

Well, yeah. But 30 hp on a level 30 PC is a much bigger penalty than 1 hp on a level 1 PC. You do understand that?

Yes that makes more sense in that context

Typically monsters that can perform this type of attack however are rarely on anything challenging Heroic characters anyways.

I think that if you are building a monster that does this type of attack... tread carefully. With the mechanics of 4e, healing is geared around Healing Surges and removing them is basically your way of saying to the group "If you survive this battle, you are going to need to take an extended rest"

This type of encounter IMO should be left to either
a) The final encounter (or 1 off at least) of the day
b) The final encounter (or 1 off at least) of the adventure

Otherwise you will have players screaming for an E/Rest but get told that it is still daylight, 2 hours since their last E/Rest and it isnt allowed whilst fretting that the next encounter they run into could mean their death.

Having an encounter with no healing surges is fine as it creates the risk of death and the DM may get to force Death Saves (muhahaha) however since most encounters are built to assume that players have a way to heal if they need to, even if only once... removing that for more than 1 encounter could cause a balanced encounter into a blood bath... which may be a good idea or a bad idea depending on where that encounter lies in your storyline and just how challenging you intend it to be.

 

[S'mon]

Otherwise you will have players screaming for an E/Rest but get told that it is still daylight, 2 hours since their last E/Rest and it isnt allowed whilst fretting that the next encounter they run into could mean their death.

Who tells the players their PCs can't Extended Rest? Sure they have to wait 12 hours since their last rest before the new one can begin, but otherwise it's up to the players. They can attempt to extended rest after every encounter if they want. Of course bad things may happen - wandering monsters attack, princess gets eaten by dragon - but sometimes it's the rational & reasonable thing to do.

 

[wlmartin]

Who tells the players their PCs can't Extended Rest? Sure they have to wait 12 hours since their last rest before the new one can begin, but otherwise it's up to the players. They can attempt to extended rest after every encounter if they want. Of course bad things may happen - wandering monsters attack, princess gets eaten by dragon - but sometimes it's the rational & reasonable thing to do.

Any DM that allows his players to take an Extended Rest after every Encounter is pandering to his players far too much and threatens to unbalance the game.

Extended Rest = Refresh of Healing Surges and Dailies

If a DM allows his players to take E/Rests after each encounter, the dailies arent dailies at all but are instead encounters.

Also, since taking an extended rest is equivalent to sleep, what kind of immersion does the group get if they are told they can sleep every 30 minutes.

No.. no... no... Extended Rests are overused and the only way to moderate them is with DM control. You can suplement them by creating houserules for moderate rests or similar that enable them to take a longer than normal rest period and regain some of their H/Surges but NO DAILIES.

Allowing players to dictate when E/Rests occur is tantamount to allowing them to decide what monsters to face, what treasure they get and knowing the DC of every roll they make... a DM that allows his players this once in a while, fair enough but one that allows it as a general rule of his game isnt a good DM IMO.

 

[keterys]

By RAW, nothing happens.

And here's the more contentious answer... nothing _should_ happen, as an across the board rule.

Lots of things state if something happens if used on a creature out of surges, and that flexibility is a good and fine thing. Someone who is out of surges is already scraping the bottom of the barrel. If it's a rogue facing nabassu who do 3 surges per whack, I can assure you they weren't balanced to deal 3/4 of his hp per attack after the first 2 hits.

As for the level hp not scaling right... it's not as bad as you think. Most characters increase their surge value by ~1.25 per level, so going up by 1 per level isn't too far off. It's less scary for a level 1, certainly, but a lot of stuff works differently right on a level 1. Compare between a level 8 and a 28 and it's close enough.

No matter what, don't use healing surge value - use half bloodied if you need to. It's very easy to have a big bonus to your healing surge value (for example, a dwarf might have a tier item bonus and add their con bonus)

 

[wedgeski]

Count me among those who thought that you took 1/2 Bloodied damage when out of Surges. There's an implacable logic about it that explains why many people might naturally assume it's the case.

Certainly I think taking Surge damage when you're out of Surges should do *something*... it seems like perfect territory for Endurance or something to come into its own, as I believe someone said further up-thread.

 

[Falstaff]

Thanks for all the suggestions guys.

I also put this question to Mike Mearls via his twitter account, his reply:

You just stay at zero. Nothing weird happens unless the critter's attack specifically says otherwise.

 

[wlmartin]

By RAW, nothing happens.

And here's the more contentious answer... nothing _should_ happen, as an across the board rule.

Lots of things state if something happens if used on a creature out of surges, and that flexibility is a good and fine thing. Someone who is out of surges is already scraping the bottom of the barrel. If it's a rogue facing nabassu who do 3 surges per whack, I can assure you they weren't balanced to deal 3/4 of his hp per attack after the first 2 hits.

As for the level hp not scaling right... it's not as bad as you think. Most characters increase their surge value by ~1.25 per level, so going up by 1 per level isn't too far off. It's less scary for a level 1, certainly, but a lot of stuff works differently right on a level 1. Compare between a level 8 and a 28 and it's close enough.

No matter what, don't use healing surge value - use half bloodied if you need to. It's very easy to have a big bonus to your healing surge value (for example, a dwarf might have a tier item bonus and add their con bonus)

I agree... (+1 for you ma'fella!)

Sometimes people don't realize that throwing in powers (such as insubstantial) for the fun of it is unbalanced.

With insubstantial most creatures with this are balanced, often by modified HP or vulnerabilities... without creating a balanced monster and taking certain things into account you create a monster that is way too powerful for its level.

This is why I say if you want to make an insubstantial type, (or regeneration type) you don't choose the monster and then tack on powers, try and modify the monster that already has those powers.

Say you want to give a Kobold insubstantial... you now have to figure out what level to make it, what defenses to give it and what hp to give it since just tacking it on is not an easy thing to do.

Instead take a creature that has insubstantial of the same level... change its Wraith Strike (or whatever) power to a Spear Thrust, change its Touch of Death to a Stab of Pain and just swap around the flavor.

It is easier to reflavor an existing monster with keyword and origin, skinning them as you like than to buff the powers of a different monster without considering the other issues.


So... to get back to point
Anything in the MM that says "takes healing surges" - that is all it does.
Anything that says "takes healing surges ... and then 1 level damage if none left" - thats all it does

The devs will have factored in the extra damage it can dish out into its level and coming up with something that does twice as much (ie 1/4 level) is not something written anywhere but if it was you can sure imagine it would add tons to the level of the monster

 

[SkidAce]

Any DM that allows his players to take an Extended Rest after every Encounter is pandering to his players far too much and threatens to unbalance the game.

Extended Rest = Refresh of Healing Surges and Dailies

If a DM allows his players to take E/Rests after each encounter, the dailies arent dailies at all but are instead encounters.

Also, since taking an extended rest is equivalent to sleep, what kind of immersion does the group get if they are told they can sleep every 30 minutes.

No.. no... no... Extended Rests are overused and the only way to moderate them is with DM control. You can suplement them by creating houserules for moderate rests or similar that enable them to take a longer than normal rest period and regain some of their H/Surges but NO DAILIES.

Allowing players to dictate when E/Rests occur is tantamount to allowing them to decide what monsters to face, what treasure they get and knowing the DC of every roll they make... a DM that allows his players this once in a while, fair enough but one that allows it as a general rule of his game isnt a good DM IMO.

While I agree with you 99%, the extended rest after a tough battle that occurred first thing in the morning "could" be:

Laying around moaning and bleeding in a coma, sewing leather armor back together, shaking off the "shakes" after your near brush with death, etc.

So abusing it encounter after encounter is uncalled for I agree, but on occasion it would be foolish to press on and my groups hunker down and recoup (in character).