In the heat of battle, is hit point loss a wound?

[Mercutio01]

HOWEVER - in my games, hit point loss will always mean some form of physical trauma.

Mine too. And although I appear to be outside the plurality opinion, there is still a sizeable portion of gamers who game the way I do, which in itself is fairly reassuring.

 

[Blood & Bones]

Now that's kind of a backwards argument, in that it is in fact the preservation of consistency that requires the extrapolation.

If every hit with a poisoned weapon has a physical damage/injury component, however minor, then consistency requires the same effect be applied to the same event when the weapon is not poisoned.

The presence or absence of poison should not make any difference whatsoever to the narration of the actual damage, though obviously it might make a significant difference to the narration of what comes next.

Lanefan

Yeah... if we are talking internal game logic, one would have to concede this. Then again, some poisons can also work on contact.

 

[Dannager]

If every hit with a poisoned weapon has a physical damage/injury component, however minor, then consistency requires the same effect be applied to the same event when the weapon is not poisoned.

Consistency requires no such thing. Or, perhaps more accurately, the game does not require consistency of that sort to function properly.

The presence or absence of poison should not make any difference whatsoever to the narration of the actual damage,

Why not?

 

[Lanefan]

They should change the name of the spell from "Cure Light Wounds" to "restore light luck / endurance".

Two different spells required:

1. Cure (Light - Serious - Critical) Fatigue. Only works if target is at or above 5 h.p.* at time of spell resolution.

2. Cure (Light - Serious - Critical) Wounds. Only works if target is below 5 h.p. at time of spell resolution. Points cured by this spell that would take a character beyond 5 h.p.* are not lost, and restore fatigue damage instead.**

* - an arbitrary number below which h.p. loss starts representing significant injury.

** - I think the die rolled for Cure xxx Wounds should be smaller than for Cure xxx Fatigues, but that's something each DM can decide.

Lan-"either way, just cure me up and get me on my feet"-efan

 

[Lanefan]

Consistency requires no such thing. Or, perhaps more accurately, the game does not require consistency of that sort to function properly.

There's all kinds of things the game doesn't need in order to function, but does need in order to remain believable and stay within the bounds of common sense. This is one.

Why not?

"You get nicked in the arm for 5 points damage."
"You get nicked in the arm for 5 points damage. Saving throw, please."

Adding on those last three words does not affect the preceding sentence; and nor should it.

Lanefan

 

[Dannager]

There's all kinds of things the game doesn't need in order to function, but does need in order to remain believable and stay within the bounds of common sense. This is one.

Not at all. First, let's stop resorting to "common sense" as an explanation for anything. "Common sense" is a rhetorical crutch, and there's no good reason to resort to if you can deliver your argument in a way that makes actual sense.

Second, there is nothing unbelievable about altering the narration of the game according to its circumstances. That's one of the nice things about narrativist gameplay. D&D, at its core, isn't about making a world that is perfectly coherent in that sense. You don't need to consider the explicit consequences of each butterfly flapping its wings. The story that centers around the PCs' and their actions is more important. If I swing my non-poisoned sword and hit, it makes good mechanical and narrative sense to describe a low-damage hit as simply being a rattling but glancing blow off the opponent's armor. If I swing my poisoned sword and hit, it makes good mechanical and narrative sense to describe that low-damage hit as just barely snaking past the scales of the enemy's armor and delivering a deceptively lethal nick.

"You get nicked in the arm for 5 points damage."
"You get nicked in the arm for 5 points damage. Saving throw, please."

Adding on those last three words does not affect the preceding sentence; and nor should it.

Sure it should - or at least it gives you the option - if the weapon in the first sentence is not poisoned.

 

[Ratskinner]

I cannot accept mundane healing as fixing up cuts and bruises and making characters completely healed simply by sleeping. And the response to me has been, unequivocally, "Stop calling a hit a hit."

Just a suggestion, FWIW. I've taken (and dealt) plenty of little hits that just left a sore spot, not even a bruise. Gone overnight, if not sooner. I know, I normally wouldn't think to track such a thing as injury, but if the 100 hp fighter is just so darn good at reducing the impact of blows, maybe some of those hits still leave a sore spot without a bruise or cut. Perhaps you could adjust your "minimum physical injury" threshold or something. Although if you find it intolerable to narrate getting hit with an Ogre's sword as the equivalent to a "noogie", I can understand that as well.

On the other hand, HP + healing has always been a narrative sore spot for me (this particular issue being the least of my concerns). I do like the mechanics presented so far, because they seem easy to "dial" up or down by modifying a few things. Like:

• Changing the Hit Die reset trigger/time. (a week of rest, never, when you level up.)
• You can only use one hit die to heal during a short rest.
• When you use your hit dice to heal, your resulting total becomes your temporary maximum HP. Magical and conventional convalescent healing increase this temporary maximum HP.

Maybe too much of a dial, the more I think about it.

 

[Mercutio01]

I do like the mechanics presented so far, because they seem easy to "dial" up or down by modifying a few things.

I think a dial is the saving grace we all need here.

 

[Hussar]

/snip

Except when the Warlord shouts at you and you magically get up.

But, that's the thing. Not all hit points are physical. We all agree with that. A warlord shouting at you to get up doesn't restore all your hit points. In fact, he restores NONE of your hit points. All he does is allow you to spend a healing surge. In point of fact, your total hit points have not changed one whit. However, instead of potentially dying (from a wound that can NEVER be specified in any edition because of unrealistic healing rates), you fight through and get back up.

Just like in a bajillion examples of genre fiction.

Works both ways, Hussar. Works both ways. I'm not willing to embrace mundane healing to full hp simply by sleeping for a night. It doesn't fit how I play, and doesn't fit the rules as written from OD&D to 3.5, and it breaks immersion. The response has been to stop narrating the hits as hits and the damage as damage. Or to just play it as a boardgame without engaging in description. Or just pretend its super gonzo and the wounds do magically heal over night. None of those suggestions work for me.

But, that's the point. Why is one night so bad when three nights is fine?

The only thing that will work for me is a slowed return of hit points via mundane healing. That said, I've said it (and I know you have, too), modularity is the only real answer that will satisfy both of us. I'm hoping we see some of that soon.

Again, I'm not seeing the issue here. Ok. That's such an incredibly easy fix, I don't even know why you'd need a module. "You regain X Healing Surges per night of rest" Set X to whatever you feel is fine, and off you go.

Does this really need a whole new module?

/edit to add

I'd say that most of the time, when we narrate hits, it's usually the blood and guts variety. Although, it has always been pretty non-specific. Your character gets tagged for 15 points of damage. "Oof, that hurt" is a pretty common response.

But, on the other hand, we simply don't think about it after that. We don't track things to this detail. I took X number of hits during the day - well, I have no idea how many times my character was hit. Nor do I really care. Cleric less healing is a VERY good thing for the game. I mean, if you want all healing to be magical, go ahead. It's not exactly difficult. I don't. I want the more "action story" vibe going. Which means that my damaged character shakes it off the next day and moves on.

If I want longer lasting wounds, I've got the disease track sitting right there, begging to be used. Works ten thousand times better than trying to shoehorn HP into something resembling a believable narrative.

 

[Ratskinner]

I think this makes the game a lot easier to visualize consistently and design around consistently rather than have some hit points be one factor (morale) and others another (divine grace) and yet have both healed with something that is described as healing wounds.

I'm not sure how you figure that. 4+ editions so far have managed to fail on the consistent narrative. I know 4e is the outlier so bear with me as I talk in 3e terms (most of this would also be valid in almost all the AD&D I played.)

Exhibit A: Mr. Peasant normally has 6 hp. An monster has clawed him for 8. So he's down. Will likely die (is dead in some editions RAW). Yet, he can be restored to life with a Cure Light Wounds spell. Seems rather odd that the cleric would choose that spell with Mr. Peasant knocking on death's door, doesn't it?

Exhibit B: Mr. Fighter normally has 100 hp. He has just fought a monster and is down 50 hp. He can move, fight, speak, carry a load, run, etc. just as well as he could before the fight. (At worst, you can say he has a little less staying power in his next fight.) Nonetheless, friend Cleric decides to burn a Cure Critical Wounds spell in an attempt to heal Mr. Fighter.

"Critical" is defined as follows:
crit·i·cal adjective
<snip movie-critic type definitions>
6.pertaining to or of the nature of a crisis: a critical shortage of food.
7.of decisive importance with respect to the outcome; crucial: a critical moment.
8.of essential importance; indispensable: a critical ingredient.
9.Medicine/Medical . (of a patient's condition) having unstable and abnormal vital signs and other unfavorable indicators, as loss of appetite, poor mobility, or unconsciousness.
<snip physics definitions>

Now, it seems to me that none of these descriptions fit the fighter, but would fit the peasant.

If you're looking for consistency in mechanics, D&D's HP and healing rules are not the place to start, and making every HP partially physical doesn't help much. One of the things that always irks me in the game is that during combat, every wound is a scratch, welt, bruise...whatever. Then, when combat is over, and the Cleric offers healing....suddenly sucking chest wounds open on all the fighters....which immediately close once the Cleric runs out of juice.

That said, I don't have anything better to offer, other than patches like fixing the healing spells to reflect the level of the target rather than the caster.