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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JamesonCourage" data-source="post: 5698312" data-attributes="member: 6668292">Actually, in 3.5, here's what it says in the PHB:It's clear to me, in the opening sentence, that what hit points represent isn't a variety of factors, like it had been explained in past editions. Personally, I think the reason for this change in 3.X was that hit points had never been treated differently than how 3.X describes them. That is, a "poison, injury" hits you no matter how much hit points you have, as long as I deal 1 damage. Why is that? Because the game treats HP as meat, and 3.X acknowledged it. 4e is closer to the roots of the game by switching back, but it's another direct change away from 3.X that a lot of people took subtle but important notice of, because the implications are large. Cool <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> Um, I'd argue that the more abstraction you have, the less it could potentially interfere with game play. That's why we have an increasing number of games go rules "lite" on us, really. It says, "here are some very basic, abstract rules. Now, we won't bog you down in the little stuff. Wing it, and enjoy the game instead of looking up rules." I don't like rules "lite" games too much, but I certainly see the appeal. And they rely heavily on abstraction.That all makes sense to me. It doesn't reflect my group, but hey, tastes differ, and I'm okay with that. Tear stuff up with your group. I thought you might be <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> This is where my view differs. If you have a basis in realism, with nods to realism all over your game, and then you seemingly knowingly abandon it for a mechanic for ease of use, our group gets pulled out of immersion pretty quickly. That pulls us out of the game, and out of the fun.Well, to be fair, I've never seen an MMO that I could immerse in. So, it's not really they're goal. Immersion was key to my design goals when I was designing my game. And, it really shows in the rules, in my opinion. It's obviously not the case for MMOs. MMOs can be a lot of fun, as can CRPGs, but I don't play them, personally, to feel immersed. That is, however, what my group plays fantasy PnP RPGs for. And while I played 3.X for years, we had groups without healers of any kind, and we literally never used a wand of CLW. In fact, I think we used a wand maybe in three or four encounters total, in thousands of hours of game play. So, I probably don't agree on the nature of their necessity to the game.But, my group is okay with avoiding or going without combat, too. We started a new campaign (new setting included), and we've played four real sessions so far. Each session lasts about ten hours. In those four sessions and 40 hours of play, there have been two combats. Both combats only involved one player, and they lasted one round (first combat), and four rounds (second combat). In the party of six players, two are completely built around combat, three are adept but built around other things (thief lord, amazing craftsmen, amazing negotiator), and one is just now getting decent at defending himself (chancellor / interrogator).The point of our sessions is to immerse in the characters, see what story unfolds from the evolving setting, and experience interesting play, whether that's fighting a mercenary unit with other mercenaries you've hired, or if it's talking them into leaving you alone. The party has talked their way out of more fights, and purposefully avoided more fights, simply because they want a higher chance of success in the long term. I'm not sure that this would mesh well with your group, but it works for us. It's never been about killing stuff and taking their things (even though it's kind of what they want to do on the macro scale... they're warlords). That's not what I meant by sleep. The context was in terms of the assumption of sleep alone denotes a nod towards realism that will drastically effect game play.Additioanlly, your experience is vastly different from mine, but we didn't use wands of CLW. And if we had, my players would have wanted to save the charges on the wands, which means using easily renewable resources, like spell slots. Which means resting.Whereas I think that type of game is possible with two health pools. If his "other" pool is the only thing that gets injured, you have cinematic combat. If it hits your "physical" pool, you don't get that. It leaves options for both stories to be told. Now, that's not the case. It's all Diehard, all the time. Sometimes I want Conan the Barbarian. Yes, he was a badass in that movie. Yes, he did get beaten down by a bunch of fanatics at then "crucified on the Tree of Woe." Literally, a bunch of random snake cult fanatics just dogpiled on him and he was done. I'm cool enough with Conan to accept both that possibility, and the possibility that I'm about to kill 40 guys on horseback with just me and my thief friend. I want both possibilities in my game.What I don't want to see in any edition of the game, which 4e did come closer to, was the "cinematic" feel at the very early levels. I don't want to see level 1's expect to be John McClane. You want to do cinematic stuff? I'm okay with that after the first few levels. Say, level 5-6. Then again, in my game, I place the average settled adult NPC at around hit die 4 (in a system that caps at 20). This is all just personal preference, though. If I say, "I don't want this" or "I want this" it doesn't mean I think it's what's best for the hobby. It means it's my preference. Well, LotR basically did something I touched on: how much story happened in the world between the time Frodo and Sam got separated, and the time they got captured by Faramir? Or, between the time they got released by him, and the time they reached the pit to throw the ring into? By having to walk everywhere, they're letting time pass, the setting evolve, and story is happening. Which is one of the things I touched on.As far as continuing on with wounds received, I'm okay with that as long as your "physical" pool isn't depleted. If you have 25 "physical" hit points and 60 "other" hit points, and your physical hit points get depleted down to 4, you can still move about for all I care. You're super messed up, though. But you can heroically carry on, if you think it's more important than healing (as many heroes will).Well, let's look at LotR, since you brought that up. It's always one of two things for them: being in the action, or traveling to the action. I'm asking for a system that reflects that. It's really easy to skim over a one month travel time from defending the mountain pass against demons that eventually overrun you to the fortress protecting the source of immortality for the immortal races. In one month, though, a lot can happen elsewhere. You have the following:(1) Action in the mountain pass!(2) We're skimming over the one month travel in about 3-5 minutes, though this allows for the setting to evolve everywhere else in the world.(3) Action at the fortress!I'd call Gandolf heroic. I'd call Strider heroic. These people had the same restrictions I'm talking about now.Okay <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />  Definitely nothing wrong with either of our preferences. Hopefully he's reading this and stealing it. If he is... hit me up, Mr. Cook! Yep, and I like most of what he's done. I really like the 3.X skill system, and think the 4e system is too binary and rigid (but like I said, I like narrow skills, not broad skills). I just didn't like the skill system presented recently.Great. Glad we can see eye to eye on so much, even if our preference differs in "gritty" versus "non-gritty" (I hesitate to say gonzo, as I don't know if that's your preference, and I won't say heroic, as my gritty games definitely have heroic characters). Thanks for the satisfying conversation. As always, play what you like <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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