I don't get the dislike of healing surges

[BryonD]

Right up until your last sentence, I'm with you. My point is that HP didn't fit a quality narrative about taking wounds anyway, thus surges aren't taking anything away.

This is just flat wrong.
And the distinction has been explained many times.

If you don't get it, then you don't get it. And that is fine.

Surges "take away" the narrative connection between receiving actual wounds and recovering from actual wounds. Playing bait and switch with heroic ignoring of wounds and the actual removal of wounds does not remove the issue, it just makes a feeble attempt to obfuscate it.

 

[prosfilaes]

Right up until your last sentence, I'm with you. My point is that HP didn't fit a quality narrative about taking wounds anyway, thus surges aren't taking anything away.

I don't care about your opinion of what a quality narrative is. You don't get to say that healing surges are fine because the type of gaming that they interfere with is badwrongfun.

 

[Summer-Knight925]

In general, hit points are not very narrative-like for gauging health.

Unless you add 'where you were hit' and adjust minuses for that

To make a realistic health system you would take forever for certain parts, like where you hit, how bad the limb was harmed, ect. ect.

While this could be fun, it should not be forced upon players.


As for healing surges, they're not realistic, they rob a tiny bit of fun (being the cleric) and that is why people don't like them, or at least me, and I think I'm a person....

But if they had a different name (like Potions) then it would make more sense, or a dragon mark like thing, it is the idea we all have to ability to heal ourselves.

It made sense for the 3e monk to be able to heal his or her wounds as a monk ability, but everyone?

Last time I checked, Boromir died and could not heal himself. Gandalf doesn't count, since he technically died and came back all awesome, nothing to do with healing surges.

And we all should know D&D was based off Lord of the Rings. Remember when halflings were hobbits?

 

[BryonD]

First of all, that post I made last night was after a long game of D&D and didn't make the point I wanted.

A 3-CON Wizard is going to heal up a greater percentage of max HP a night's rest than a 20-CON Barbarian. I think that's a head-scratcher, the same way that a Warlord's Inspiring Word can somehow make unconscious characters get back on their feet.

As I described before, I see little to no connection there at all. The "head-scratcher" only comes in if you force HP into real or abstract boxes.

The 3 CON wizard has vastly less HP than the 20 CON Barbarian. Now lets say an evil cleric has created two linked golems that both in perfect unison land identical blows, one on each. Let's add that the wizard is not killed by this blow. Now let's add that the encounter is resolved with zero further damage to either the wizard or the barbarian.

Now, what do we know? Very little.

We can assume that both characters took 4 HP or they took 25 HP, or whatever, it makes no difference.

The first important thing to note is that they will both heal from THAT WOUND in the same amount of time. (assuming they are the same level and they each heal naturally)

But how much of their total HP are physical and how much are fate? The answer is that there is no answer. No answer is needed. (Unless you are using surges in which case 100% fate is needed)

They took the same blow. But maybe the wizard took a lot more physical damage and the barbarian, who has a simply scratch from the attack that didn't manage to kill the wizard, probably dodged aside or deflected much of the blow. Certainly you wound not describe the effect of a 25 HP blow on a 20 HP wizard the same as you would describe a 25 HP blow on a 100 HP barbarian would you? I would not.

So when they are healing their respective 25 HP back, the wizard is, mostly, healing physical damage, while the barbarian is healing, almost entirely, his "fate" back.

There is no reason to be conflicted over comparing the rates of "fate" recovery and physical wound healing.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Granted, that might create new problems. Fair enough. But, it does mean that you can't keep touting Game A as THE ONE TRUE GAME that is beyond any criticism.

I'm really curious where someone has indicated this.

The Healing Surge mechanics might suffer from issues when it comes to narrating wounds particularly when a PC is facing death saves. Fair enough. But, the reason we have Healing Surges in the first place was to resolve issues created by earlier D&D's reliance on magical healing.

It's all about checks and balances. You'll never create the perfect system that is all things to all people. So, you pick and choose where to make changes in an attempt to create a middle ground. People had problems with the idea that the group needed a magical healer and all the knock on effects that resulted in. So, they removed the need for a magical healer at the expense (possibly) of some people's ability to narrate effectively.

Is the trade off worth it? Well, that's for the consumer to decide.

Yep. Although, in a thread where the question was, "why don't you like healing surges?", I find it a little odd that people are flocking to defend them as a matter of taste. That's true, they are. So was THAC0. Some people liked it, some people didn't. It's taste. But, when someone says "I don't get why people don't like healing surges; why don't you like them?" and someone else says, "because of Y", I'm at a loss when people start debating taste with them.

 

[BryonD]

It made sense for the 3e monk to be able to heal his or her wounds as a monk ability, but everyone?

Monk is a great example. For all intents they have had surges all along.
But there is a narrative justification. It is both part of the concept and the story flow.

The concept simply states that monks may close wounds to their flesh simply with the focus of their mind. Cool.

If someone wants to say that ANYONE can close wounds with the power of their mind, then my issue with surges is immediately defeated for that game. Of course, that needs to apply to everyone, PCs and NPCs alike, but it works.

I'm not interested in that game, but only in the same sense that I'm not interested in Spelljammer. Just not to my taste. I have no actual complaints about the quality of the system.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

He misses the first drinks and the prettiest whores, but he's still capable of running for multiple hours in the day with no medical attention.

Because he is not staggered- fatigued or not- the Full HP PC can still do a double move. He will finish the marathon before the 1HP PC, contrary to the assertion that there would be no difference between the results of a marathon between them.

But if you want to REALLY see the difference, turn the marathon into an Iron Man competition.

SRD
Swim
...Each hour that you swim, you must make a DC 20 Swim check or take 1d6 points of nonlethal damage from fatigue.

When 1HP Harry and Full HP Fred hit the water, everything will be OK up until the first failed Swim check. Fred has a decent chance of continuing, but Harry is guaranteed being staggered, and has a 5 in 6 chance of going unconscious and starting to drown.

 

[Pentius]

Yes, you critical comment toward the 3E HP system is completely valid and I agree with it 100%.

And that does NOTHING to make Surges any less flawed.

My comment is that the HP system does not fit a quality narrative about being wounded. Surges cannot take away that quality if it wasn't there.

You CAN work with the narrative issues of HP and describe the situation here.

Yes. Yes, I can.

You can not work with surges the same way.

Actually, I can. You claim to be unable to. You've agreed with my premise(HP have issues), but not my conclusion, which only leaves me more confused.

Surges declare that any and all wounds can be NOT simply ignored by a hand wave of adrenaline or whatever heroic narrative one selects, but be made now and FOREVER GONE. Either fighter CAN NOT be wounded or fighters can heal flesh by thinking about it. That is mechanically implicit to surges.

No, it is not. Implicit to surges is the ability to restore lost hit points. Hit point damage does not deal measurable wounds. The restoration of hit points, be it by sleep, spell or surge, takes one from a state of "Fine." to "Still fine, thanks."

3E HP have issues.

4E HP have every issue that 4E HP have. I'm fine with that.
4E surges bring a whole new realm of nonsense to the table.

I'm completely on board with accepting the high fantasy / heroic / Jack Bauer / Die Hard ignore my wounds and keep kicking ass cliche. That is awesome. And running a marathon when seriously wounded falls into that. Being immune to being wounded does not. Being able to be wounded but cause the wound to cease to exist does not.

But a character, in D&D, who continues with strenuous physical activity is not ignoring his wounds. Mechanically, he doesn't have any. Can you narrate that he does, but is ignoring them? Yes. But if you decide you don't want to narrate that you are ignoring the wounds, penalties do not appear.

It is 4E fans who have over and over POINTED OUT the Jack Bauer idea in an effort to hand wave away surges. And yet suddenly it isn't ok under 3E? That is more than a double standard. Because running a marathon when highly wounded is consistent with cinematic stories and making wounds vanish is not. If running the marathon at 1 HP is unacceptable to you then surges should make your head explode.

If someone comes along and tells me that HP is one key reason they really dislike ALL versions of D&D and they prefer systems with wounds which cause the character to be less effective, then I completely respect that. But that person isn't going to turn around and tell me that not being hurt by wounds is unacceptable but being immune to wounds or blinking them away is fine.

I am entirely okay with Jack Bauer in 3e. What I disagree with is the notion that surges remove wounds. You're willing to say a hero ignores flesh wounds the day he gets them, why do they have to vanish overnight? Why not do like the action heroes do, and just keep ignoring them the second day? You seem to be saying that a character at full HP cannot have a single scratch on his body, presumably because HP are physical wounds. I disagree. Yesterday's scratch is tomorrow's bandage.

This thread is about surges. Telling me about a different issue that 3E and 4E share is not insightful.

HP is not a different issue. Surges begin and end with HP.

If you want to propose a better plan for HP that could, possibly, apply to both 3E and 4E, lets have a new thread.

I don't, honestly. I'm fine with HP as not being a model of physical harm.

Your post provide zero rebuttal to the actual issues with surges, which is the point here.

Again, I disagree. See above.

 

[prosfilaes]

My comment is that the HP system does not fit a quality narrative about being wounded. Surges cannot take away that quality if it wasn't there.

I could argue that D&D can't provide a quality narrative about combat if it can't handle wounds. And thus every single argument about D&D combat should be moot.

In general, I don't think A works well at B, therefore C, which makes A work less well at B, is not a problem, is not an argument for people who find B important. Maybe they should find a system where B works better; maybe there are a bunch of compromises making A the best system for them. Nonetheless, C is not a feature they're going to be happy with.

 

[Pentius]

Wow, serious cascade of responses.

This is just flat wrong.
And the distinction has been explained many times.

If you don't get it, then you don't get it. And that is fine.

It's true, I don't get it. I'd kinda like to get it, thus I continue discussing it.

Surges "take away" the narrative connection between receiving actual wounds and recovering from actual wounds.

What is the connection? What wounds does HP damage give a character? Danny has been doing a great job of finding and posting instances where being at low HP is detrimental to extended physical activity, via non-lethal damage. But that doesn't tell me the character is wounded, it tells me he is tired. He is unable to continue strenuous activity for as long before succumbing to fatigue. But he is equally capable up until that point.

Playing bait and switch with heroic ignoring of wounds and the actual removal of wounds does not remove the issue, it just makes a feeble attempt to obfuscate it.

I agree. So, I ask you, what wounds does the HP system give you that surges are invalidating?