Let's Talk About Metacurrency

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think the right treating hit points as stamina works best if you want somethnig diegetic that doesn't contradict itself all the time. I would prefer to add some mechanics that allow injuries to still happen.

Conceptually, something like the wounds + vitality system like some of the d20 Star Wars used, except not exactly that, because I don't think the specifics were good, just the basic idea to differentiate them was.
I'd take at least a leaf from 4E and use bloodied as a point where you will take an injury, and you will take another at 0 hit points. Whether that means you're then bleeding out on the floor or someone can inspire you to fight more is another debate, as is what the specific mechanics for the injuries are.

If hit points (the ablative D&D style that grow with level) are a metagame resource to you (at least to some extent), it's definitely one to consider to use, because it enables a type of gameplay that people seem to enjoy, even if it is not without flaws.

 

[TwoSix]

Robin Laws gives good advice on this in one of the original HeroWars rulebooks (it might be in the Narrator Book, but maybe it's in the main book - I can't remember): use ambiguous narration, similar to what LotR uses when Frodo is struck/stabbed by the Orc captain's spear.

That's my general go-to, but I do like narrating a good, visceral hit on occasion as well.

But again, I've alleviated this by simply making adventurers (and any NPC with a "class") innately supernaturally resilient. Since my fantasy inspirations are primarily video games and anime, more so than classic fantasy heroic literature, this works pretty well for me (and my tables, who mostly share similar backgrounds).

 

[TwoSix]

As I posted:
In my experience, players use the numerical/mathematical information that their PCs' remaining hp give them all the time: in deciding whether to rest, whether to fight, who to heal, etc.

But as per my example, the characters can't have the sort of information about the likelihood of dying from a given roll of the attack deice that the players rely on. Hence my assertion that all this player thinking is "meta".

I mean, I don't know anyone (not even myself!) who actually communicates the number of hit points a character has within the fiction. Generally, it's something like "a little banged up" (more than half HP), "I'm pretty hurt" (less than half HP), and "about to fall over" (single digit HPs, assuming not level 1-2.)

 

[mamba]

As I posted:
In my experience, players use the numerical/mathematical information that their PCs' remaining hp give them all the time: in deciding whether to rest, whether to fight, who to heal, etc.

they definitely do, no question there

But as per my example, the characters can't have the sort of information about the likelihood of dying from a given roll of the attack deice that the players rely on. Hence my assertion that all this player thinking is "meta".

I disagree with your example. To me, if you grew up in a world where having 2 HP left from your baseline of 20 HP means 1) you are still fully functional, 2) you cannot really take another hit without dropping dead, and 3) you will bounce back from this after a good rest, the characters are aware of and familiar with all of this, so they can make the decision just as informed as the player does, nothing meta about it

 

[mamba]

But the fact that some (many) people don't want a death spiral, and hence use D&D hit points, isn't an argument that D&D hit points aren't meta. If anything, it seems to me to push the other way: because people don't want in-fiction injury, exhaustion etc they use a meta system to track progress and set-back in combat.

I'd see it as an argument that they are an abstraction that intentionally is not simulating the real world. That does not make them any more meta when spell points or spell slots

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, you know my usual response to that: "You're using D&D why then?" Its been a poor choice for that from the day it came in three little beige books.

(Yes, I know, because its easier to find players. Its still pounding nails with a wrench to me).

It used to be good enough for me to work with. Over time it's become harder. Still, you can always make your world without going crazy on the PC-side superhero stuff, even now.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don’t know, at a minimum the unconscious use is a problem for me. That is no better than an actual luck mechanic, in neither case is it anything the character intentionally influences

Well, YMMV. For me, mechanics representing something real in the setting matters more than anything else.

 

[Micah Sweet]

is it though, or do you need to handwave a lot away because there simply is no good in-world explanation. Not sure what the game you play looks like, but I don’t see how 5e mechanics can reasonably arrive at a low fantasy setting when you actually think things through

Give me an example. Your claim is not so self-evident that you can just put it out there like objective truth without explanation.

 

[mamba]

Well, YMMV. For me, mechanics representing something real in the setting matters more than anything else.

my argument is that both are about as real (or not) as each other, not whether them being real is important or not

 

[mamba]

Give me an example. Your claim is not so self-evident that you can just put it out there like objective truth without explanation.

Really? To me it is pretty self-evident that given the magic system of 5e the world is not a low-magic setting. The only way to maybe get that is for the characters to be some 'chosen' type PCs, otherwise magic is so ubiquitous that low level magic is commonplace just about everywhere.

What percentage of the population knows Cantrips / 1st-level spells / 2nd level spells ? Don't really have to go much farther for things to be exhaustingly high magic already. Instead of cobblers, you have travelling mages casting Mending, diseases are frequently treated in temples and shrines, and blindness, lost limbs etc. can be restored in every bigger town (for a fee), etc. Lord of the Rings this is not