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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Crimson Binome" data-source="post: 7615056" data-attributes="member: 6775031">Don't conflate the explanation of the rules for the actual rules themselves, even if that explanation is in the book. The actual rules for every edition prior to 4E are that you can only suffer HP damage from things that are physically capable of damaging your body; we know this, by looking at the different things that cause HP damage, and comparing them to the things that work through other mechanics.The explanation for those rules may suggest that it's possible to take HP damage without some corresponding physical injury, but that interpretation is flatly contradicted by the actual rules in the book. If it was possible to cause HP damage without causing physical injury, then there would be something in the game which actually worked that way, but there conspicuously is not. The absence of evidence is evidence of absence.The explanation may suggest that being scared by a ghost can cause HP damage, but the actual rule is that being scared by a ghost can just kill you outright (if you fail your system shock for magical aging); until 4E came along, where it suddenly does "psychic" damage.I care about rules. I don't care about ridiculous interpretations of those rules, regardless of how official those interpretations may be. The game can include twelve paragraphs about how amazingly lethal a sling bullet is, but if it does less damage than an arrow, then those twelve paragraphs are incorrect as a point of simple fact. And the fact of the matter is that, prior to 4E, the description of HP in the book did not align with how the rules of HP actually operated.</blockquote>

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