Hit points & long rests: please consider?

[Rogue Agent]

I feel that those who oppose the mechanic don't agree with the statements made about injury and the goals of the injury system.

I think it's important to understand that there are actually three separate issues people have with "long rest = everything gets reset". Thinking of them as separate (albeit related) issues is crucial for productive discussion. Otherwise you just end up talking past each other.

(1) Hit point loss represents wounds. Serious wounds should not just automatically vanish overnight. Ergo, a complete hit point reset from a long rest doesn't make sense.

(2) In terms of game design, the "long rest = everything gets reset" encourages the My Precious Encounter(TM) method of adventure design, focusing the game exclusively on tactical-level play instead of a balance between tactical and strategic play.

(3) If the system doesn't feature automatic "long rest = everything gets reset", you can still achieve that by simply increasing the amount of healing resources available to the PCs. But if the system does feature automatic "long rest = everything gets reset", then the only way to fix it is to rewrite the actual rules.

For me, it's the last one that seals the deal: If you go with the balance found in pre-2008 versions of D&D, everybody can play the way they want to without changing the rules. If you go with the system you want, lots of people can only play the way they want by rewriting the rules.

It should be pretty much a no-brainer to figure out which one should be the published default.

I understand completely! In 4th edition you actually needed to wait and describe how you went down until after you were either healed by the cleric or told to walk it off by the warlord. I sure as hell don't want that now.

Yup. It prevents you from roleplaying and forces you to only interact with the game mechanics.

Once you've used the mechanics, of course, you can improvise a little story about what the mechanics meant. But that's not the same thing.

 

[nnms]

Simple: with very rare exceptions the path of least resistance is to make things easier.

Definitely.

If you house rule too far in the "easier" direction, play continues and you revisit the house rules for future sessions.

If you house rule too far in the "harder" direction, you risk character death rates being super higher and TPKs beyond what you intended. Play then stops or resets unless you do a heavy retcon.

 

[SSquirrel]

Note, I read thru the first page of 6 (possibly more since I pulled this page up earlier tonite) and I'm just commenting around the general posts we're seeing.

Since when do we play a game of casting spells and killing dragons to be realistic? Your fighter took an arrow in the knee, so now he can't rescue that princess. Guess she's being fed to the dragon after all. You all only had 2 days to do it and he'll need 2 days under the cleric's care w/no combat, more if you all get jumped by that band of trolls that has been spotted in the area. You may as well try to get out of the kingdom now before the king finds out his daughter is doomed.

Somehow that seems a lot less fun to me. I'm all in favor of the 4E way of doing health. I don't want to sweat what I consider the small stuff, I want my friends and I to be about the business of doing our adventures, saving whoever needs to be saved, killing the giants, assaulting the tower of the wizard, whatever. Oh yeah, I also fail to see how magic missile as an at will breaks the game, but that is a different thread. I'm definitely in favor of a wizard spending his day casting magic and not hunkering down w/a freaking crossbow. This expanded cantrip selection paired w/Vancian is different, but I haven't gotten to try it yet. Still trying to put a new group together heh. Have to see how it plays. I'm one of the Anti-Vancian people, but giving me some actually useful things to do outside of the Vancian system I might be ok.

No I'm not new to the game, so 4E is not my only experience. Basic on up for 24 years or so now.

 

[Lanefan]

Your fighter took an arrow in the knee, so now he can't rescue that princess. Guess she's being fed to the dragon after all. You all only had 2 days to do it and he'll need 2 days under the cleric's care w/no combat, more if you all get jumped by that band of trolls that has been spotted in the area. You may as well try to get out of the kingdom now before the king finds out his daughter is doomed.

That sounds like the start point of a grand campaign! In fact, why not start right there - your first mission is not to rescue the princess but to get out of the kingdom before Important People realize you've already failed.

And to add to the fun your fighter's knee is a mess and will be until she can spend a few consecutive days not standing or walking or running on it...

Lan-"if I was starting a campaign right now I might just use this straight up"-efan

 

[Walking Dad]

That sounds like the start point of a grand campaign! In fact, why not start right there - your first mission is not to rescue the princess but to get out of the kingdom before Important People realize you've already failed.

And to add to the fun your fighter's knee is a mess and will be until she can spend a few consecutive days not standing or walking or running on it...

Lan-"if I was starting a campaign right now I might just use this straight up"-efan

Not everyone wants to tell the same stories.

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To the old hands around, was there often a time limit in the old adventures that use a system with a very slow recuperation time? Or were they most static/location based?

 

[Stormonu]

I'd be fine if the base rules were "heal all HP overnight", but there were modules for extended injuries and options for reducing the amount of healing so that it might take a few days or weeks to get back to full health.

Basically, don't force everyone into Hard mode, but give the option to do so.

 

[IronWolf]

Since when do we play a game of casting spells and killing dragons to be realistic? Your fighter took an arrow in the knee, so now he can't rescue that princess. Guess she's being fed to the dragon after all. You all only had 2 days to do it and he'll need 2 days under the cleric's care w/no combat, more if you all get jumped by that band of trolls that has been spotted in the area. You may as well try to get out of the kingdom now before the king finds out his daughter is doomed.

Some of us would prefer that there be some risk and the chance that we not succeed at our goal. I don't want saving the princess to be automatic, or killing all the giants to be a given or guaranteed success at assaulting the wizard's tower. I think those of us in that camp tend to dislike the heal all your hit points in one night approach.

If these are givens then there really isn't a need to do any real planning or even play out the encounters if I know I am going to succeed.

Not everyone wants to tell the same stories.

Agreed. Luckily for us they can easily handle this sticking point through a module. They can either leave it as written and then provide a "hard" mode through a module or they can tweak it to a compromise between the two under the default assumption and turn the dials up or down through another module.

Several ways to handle it through the turning of dials. This seems one of the slightly easier ones address through the turning of the dials.

 

[synthapse]

Not everyone wants to tell the same stories.

This is key, but it's not just that, either-- not everyone wants to tell the same stories all the time.

If I'm running an Eberron game, I want the HP system to run much like the playtest presents them. If I'm running Dark Sun, I want tougher HP rules--and probably a starvation/dehydration module as well. I strongly subscribe to the concept of different D&D for different people that 5E looks to support, largely because I want some variations between my own campaigns.

For me, D&D has always been able to have a fluidity to the design, albeit often using varying quantities of houserules. I am happy with the HP system as shown in the playtest, largely because I can see how easily it can be adjusted and modified to suit my taste for a particular game.

 

[Walking Dad]

Very insightful.

I think the question should be:

Is the HP system shown in the playtest a good system for adventures like the playtest (dungeon hack / exploration), not your favorite campaign/type of adventure.
If it is a "yes" and this kind of adventure is the "core experience" for D&D, this should be the base/core rule, with other options presented with modules.

Like a gritty "my knee still hurts, is the princess already dead?" setting Lanefan described. But IMHO, I think the former is the more "base" experience and the later a (not worse or wrong) variant.

 

[synthapse]

My experience is similar, but from the posts and polls on these forums, I feel that I may be in the minority.

But if most people want less healing from a long rest, but system keeps the same structure (HD, short rest, long rest), I feel that I can play the game just as I want with little-to-no work.

Which makes me happy.