If hit points don't represent physical well being, then why are they lost due to damage (swords, fireballs, falling, etc)? The idea of hit points representing things like morale, luck and other weird things fails completely when you really stop to think about it. If my hit points are morale, then why do I not lose them when I get rejected by a girl, get turned down for a job, lose a friend, or get cursed with bad luck? All the things I have seen that cause you to lose hit points are forms of injury. Why are "healing surges" not "morale surges" or "luck surges"? It is complete nonsense to say that hit points do not represent physical health when they are lost via injury and gained via healing, and nothing else. If they represent something else, why does that something else never come into play?
As far as heroic last stands and the like, I think this could be much better represented by temporary hit points. Yeah, I can see a hero shrugging off some of his wounds for a while, but only for a while. Those injuries don't just magically go away because you will them to. Even if you pull yourself together long enough to finish the battle, you're still going to have to deal with those injuries later. And yes, I'm aware that hit points have been an abstraction from the beginning. I'm just saying why I have never liked it that way. And rather than make hit points based on injury, as they could have done, they have instead made it even worse, IMO.
