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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dave Turner" data-source="post: 3880205" data-attributes="member: 12329">With due respect, you're creating an issue where none exists.Whether we're talking about hit points or a vitality/wound system, we are, at base, discussing a method of notation for determining when we've overcome an obstacle.  This is a broad level of analysis, but a crucial one.  Regardless of what system we use, the monster is defeated when it runs out of points.  From the tenor of your post, you're likely too committed to thinking of the vitality/wound dichotomy and that commitment will hurt your ability to enjoy D&D.  Unless you can let go of that commitment. In a hit point system, there's one pool of points to cover all conditions your foe might experience, from being stunned to being unconscious to being dead, i.e. defeated.  In the vitality/wound system, there is a mechanical distinction made between losing all your "consciousness points", and thereby becoming unconscious/defeated, and losing all your "wound points", and thereby becoming dead/defeated.  In the end, we're still talking about defeat.You seem to be worried about the gloss or color of that defeat.  You want to kill monsters, but you also want to know when you've stopped destroying their morale and started destroying their bodies.  Ultimately, it's an arbitrary designation in any system that relies on a pool of points (whether hit points or the barely-more-granular vitality/wound point pools).  We know that 4E will contain a "Bloodied" mechanic, which is triggered when an opponent has lost half its hit points.  Why not just create a house rule/convention amongst you and your players that the DM will announce when an opponent is at one-quarter of its original hit points.  That announcement is a trigger for everyone to switch their attack descriptions from the "shield feint" type to the "cleave his head" type.  Below one-quarter hit points, you simply describe physical wounds.  Problem solved!We're not talking about flaws in the mechanics of the game.  If we were, you'd be advocating for different mechanic for tracking your enemy's level of defeat.   You might, for example, argue in favor of the wound mechanics in Runequest 3rd. Edition, which feature specific wounds to specific body regions alongside a pool of general hit points.   You might argue for a Mutants and Masterminds approach that conists of a simple, tiered system of damage conditions.Instead, you're just arguing that we should arrange these general pools of points a little bit differently so that you can more comfortably describe what is going on.  You're putting the cart before the horse.  I've described how, in 4E, the end of every combat doesn't have to be unconsciousness or disarmament.  When a foe drops to zero hp, there's no problem with equating that with the monster's death.  To use another movie example, look at the fight between Indiana Jones and the bald guy on the airfield in Raiders.  At the end of the fight, the bald guy is chopped to bits by an airplane propeller.  In D&D terms, Indy finally succeeded in reducing that opponent/obstacle/threat to zero hit points.  When you reduce something to zero hit points, the game is signaling to you that the threat or obstacle is gone.  The art in playing an RPG is being able to translate those mechanics into evocative stories and play.  Indy punches or hits the bald man with his fists.  When the bald guys hit points reach zero, Indy has defeated the obstacle.  Whether the bald guy slumps to the ground, unconscious and defeated/overcome.  The DM (hopefully with Indy's agreement) describes the bald guy becoming salsa.  Same result.  The obstacle is defeated/overcome and is never ever coming back.  If the game (and the movie) called for the bald guy to harass Indy again, the bald guy would have just been unconscious.  But the players (writers) didn't need him in the story anymore, so he's salsa.  The same can go for your own games featuring abstract systems like hit points and vitality/wounds.  The problem isn't in the system; the problem is in how you play the system.  I understand that you're worried about your suspension of disbelief being broken.  That's your own personal Gordian Knot.  I'm trying to suggest that you've got Alexander's sword in your hand, if you would only realize that the differences between your favorite mechanic of abstract wound measurement is not significantly different from 4E's general hit point pool.</blockquote>

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