D&D 5E Hp as meat and abstraction

[jodyjohnson]

If you people want to discuss hp is meat please start a thread about that. This thread is about how we can have both groups using the same rules.

You've already got the answer: we don't use the same rules.

That's what options, dials, and modules are all about.

Kind of disappointing that 'one rule to rule them all' is still getting pushed as a viable option by players.

 

[Minigiant]

Just do multiple variant rules.

One where HP plays as meat.
One where it is mostly meat.
One where it is mostly "I'm not dead because..." excuses
One where no one cares and the focus is making HP match up with dungeon crawling.

 

[GMMichael]

I've already written my module which has 3 categories for HP.

HP as Hit Points - for brutes, or meat only creatures
HP as half Hero Points and half Hit Points - most opponents, roughly like Bloodied.
HP as Hero Points only - PCs and levelled opponents (meat is 0 to - Con or -Con+level)

Hero Points recover fast, Hit Points recover slow.

You write modules and use Hero Points? Have you been playing my RPG?

I'm in the "ignore all metaphysical conundrums and just play" camp.

I'm in the "metaphysical rules are actually really cool" camp. In fact, Metaphysical should be an attribute.

To me, DoaM isn't just the idea that you're wearing the opponent down, but also includes things like hitting him so frickin hard that the force of the blow hurts despite not penetrating armor. Since AC contributes to miss chance, I think that's fair. I seem to recall reading historical accounts of knights crushed inside their armor that would lend a degree of credibility to the idea, for me at least.

DoaM depends heavily on two definitions: "damage," and "miss." It looks like you're adding concussion or bludgeoning to the definition of "damage," which is fine. I'd like to define damage as this:

Damage is a condition resulting from a defender's failure to dodge an attack.

Notice that this definition does not make any reference to the effectiveness of an attack. If you don't dodge (avoid all damage), you take some damage. Take enough damage, something bad happens (not necessarily death).

One final note, future Modos RPG players, is that all this arguing about Hit Points is ignoring something we all know and love about RPGs: roleplaying. Why do you need more rules on hit points and damage? If a player wants a gaping wound in his face after he takes one point of damage, let him have it! If he wants to go completely unscathed until he loses his last hit point, let him!

 

[doghead]

Your hit points tell you how many hit points you can take before your dude shuttles off to the big dungeon in the sky. That's it, that's what they do.

Thats pretty much my view.

In my games, when a character loses HP's, I tend to describe it in terms of being wounded or injured. When they regain HP's, I tend to describe it in terms of healing. I suppose that puts me in the hit points as meat camp. As for all the inconstancies and incongruities, I am just a dog with a small brain, I ignore them and play on.

thotd

 

[Savage Wombat]

One of the things that bothers me about this DoaM issue is similar to something Monte Cook (I think) said about energy immunity. It basically says "my character is immune to fire, haha!" and then someone comes along and says "this is super hot awesome fire that burns people immune to fire".

Saying "My swings are so powerful that they hurt you even when you block them" is just begging for a feat or power that's "I'm so tough / agile that I don't take damage unless you hit me".

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

Hit Points are a combination of physical damage and other factors. For the most part, there is agreement on this. There are few who treat hit points as entirely meat or entirely non-meat.

Disagreement tends to revolve around whether damage or healing can be entirely non-meat. Personally, I think it's best if damage and healing always contain a physical component to them, and prior to 4E, this was probably the common perception. D&D Next is providing various options to healing rates, which will lead each group to establishing the ratio of meat to non-meat for themselves.

Damage on a miss is more difficult to reconcile, because it deals with the nature of the attack roll.

Traditionally, an attack roll represents a period of fighting, and success and failure determine if you successfully deal damage. The nature of that damage is ambiguous. The result is a consistent level of abstraction.

Damage on a Miss makes attack rolls slightly less abstract by trying to simulate particular aspects of the attack without also making defense less abstract at the same time.

The way the rules can reconcile this difference is to limit these effects to part of one or more weapon and armor modules. Perhaps as a module that introduces touch AC and lesser effects for attacks that meet it. Similar modules could include weapon speed, combat fatigue, and moral. Then a group can decide between abstraction and complexity.

 

[Mistwell]

Some people in this thread are missing the point. This discussion is not about whether hp are meat or not, its about how we can get both views in the game with the least amount of rules.

Honestly I think it's you who is missing the point.

Your premise was that some view them as meat, and some view them as non-meat.

Your premise is flawed. EVERYONE views it as some combination of both, and they just differ on what portion is which and how to apply those ideas.

If you disagree, show me someone who thinks you "grow more meat" as you gain levels, or can walk through lava because you have "more meat", and on the other hand show me someone who thinks you die from injury to non-meat (fatigue, luck, etc..)? Nobody agrees with either of those two concepts - we all know it's some combination of both.

The point is there are at least 2 very different styles of play.

Prove that. Prove to me there are two different play styles represented by "meat" and "non-meat" here. I am not seeing it. There's one - some combination of both.

Your issue seems to be with damage on a miss - not hit points.

 

[Mistwell]

Dodging, luck, abstraction, intervention, armour, etc, still makes more sense keeping it in the realm of a "hit" than it does a miss. Trying to describe damage on a miss is just spouting to be honest.

Unless it's done through magic, and then everyone seems OK with it as just "magic".

Unless it's done through a splash weapon, and then everyone seems OK with is as just "grenade".

Almost nobody has a problem with ALL damage on a miss. The issue only seems to enter into it when it's done through a melee weapon, instead of a spell or a spash-weapon.

 

[Texicles]

I really would like to see the rules give everyone what they want, but I'm afraid the scope is too broad to provide separate rulesets to support HP as abstract and HP as meat.

Unfortunately, whether you leave in or strip out things like damage on a miss, you're left with a subset of people for whom the game isn't as balanced. If you say balance isn't important for you, you're saying nuts to the people for whom it is important, and presuming that your wishes supersede those of the other group. If you think that's acceptable, a pox on you.


While I don't dislike OP's damage on a "near miss" suggestion, it's still going to rub some people the wrong way, because the "______ on a miss" debate isn't just about HP abstraction. The underlying boogeyman in such debates is attack roll abstraction, but that doesn't get yelled about as much.


If you really want to satisfy everyone, the place to start is rewrite the rules to roll attack vs derived defense stats, then roll some damage types from that roll against the target's AC, or rework AC as a damage reduction mechanic. But, if you do that, the new streamlined ruleset becomes less so, and a cry of "that's not D&D!" will emanate from all the land.

So, barring that, you're pretty much down to writing two complete versions of everything dealing with mechanics like damage on a miss, or impacted by the inclusion/removal of those mechanics (class features, feats, player HP, monster HP, caster spell progression and damage, etc.). That's a BIG module.

 

[Lokiare]

Honestly I think it's you who is missing the point.

Your premise was that some view them as meat, and some view them as non-meat.

Your premise is flawed. EVERYONE views it as some combination of both, and they just differ on what portion is which and how to apply those ideas.

If you disagree, show me someone who thinks you "grow more meat" as you gain levels, or can walk through lava because you have "more meat", and on the other hand show me someone who thinks you die from injury to non-meat (fatigue, luck, etc..)? Nobody agrees with either of those two concepts - we all know it's some combination of both.



Prove that. Prove to me there are two different play styles represented by "meat" and "non-meat" here. I am not seeing it. There's one - some combination of both.

Your issue seems to be with damage on a miss - not hit points.

I don't respond to semantic arguments.

There are two groups. If you want, we can call them the ones that don't like damage on a miss and martial healing groups and those that like damage on a miss and martial healing groups. You can define it how you want, but there is a big divide.

Now that is out of the way...

The point of this thread is not to argue one side over the other. Its to see if we can get both sides to like 5E.

Some things will just have to be optional modules like martial healing being modular as either temp hp (for the "don't like damage on a miss and martial healing group") and actual hp recovery (for the "like damage on a miss and martial healing group"). Other things might be workable as a single rule like the melee weapon damage on a miss issue being a 'lesser hit' when you miss by 3-5 points or so.

What are some other issues with these groups? What are some rules solutions? That's what this thread is about.