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Message: <blockquote data-quote="rmcoen" data-source="post: 8948101" data-attributes="member: 6692404">[USER=6879661]@TheSword[/USER] , sorry for the late response, but wanted to jump in with a couple other ideas.  This is what we do in my and my friend's campaigns:   (this is "summarized" as best I can)1)  No-one reveals HP, PCs or monsters.  "Fine", "Bruised" (75% or less), "Bloodied" (50% or less), "Battered" (25% or less), and "Crippled" (10% or less).---- 1b) Death Saves and Dying status are hidden.  You don't know until you check.2)  Current health (see #1) matters.  At Bloodied, all attacks and actions are -1; Battered is -2, and Crippled is -3.  (No defense impairment, or movement loss, for reasons.)3)  Hitting 0hp = gain 1 level of Exhaustion immediately.  No matter how many times you hit 0.4)  Injuries:  Take 25% (or more) of your MAX HP in a single strike, or a critical hit (cumulative), take a generic Wound.  This impairs any magical healing you get (1 per Wound, per application) or HD you spend ("disadvantage" on the HD rolled), and impairs Exhaustion.  25pts of magical healing in one delivery removes 1 Wound (in addition to other effects).  (If Wounds > HD... well, we nixed those rules.)5)  Long Rests are weaker.   [Extended Rest or Safe Rest provides better results]5a)  Exhaustion recovery requires a CON save DC 8, DC 12 if you have any Wounds.  One chance per Long Rest, recover 1 level.5b)  Wound recovery requires a CON save DC 10+#Wounds.  One chance per Long Rest, recover 1 Wound.5c)  Healing received is equal to rolling your max HD; remember, 1 HD per Wound is impaired!  You can then spend HD for more healing if you choose.6)  Bad luck sucks.  Some times RNGesus hates you, and "grittier" systems emphasize those nights.  I mitigate all these rules by giving each PC one Fate Point per level.  A Fate Point can change a storyline, super-charge a power/spell/action, or be a "Get Out of Death Free" card - the killing blow is expertly avoided, or knocks you clear of the fight, or whatever.  You can always rejoin the fight... but max 1 Fate Point per encounter, so if RNGesus really has it out for you, watch out![I will be adding Exhaustion impacts to spellcasting: target has advantage on the save.  I've seen that suggestion before, and this thread has solidified my opinion on that to be firmly "yes".  I have pondered taking away spell slots due to exhaustion, but decided I didn't want to do that at this time.  I am thinking of a spell failure chance, though, for spells that have no attack roll or spell save - like flat 25% chance.]So whack-a-mole results in exhausted characters.  Performance declines as damage accumulates, on both sides of the battle; most "unmotivated" foes begin to consider fleeing at Bloodied.  A rough battle can take the PCs days to recover - especially when the Exhaustion level hits 3, and the recovery saves are now at disadvantage!Combat is pretty frequent in my games.  And I don't balance it to the PCs, I balance it to the story and world.  The party is 7th level (just made 8th last session, actually).  They have fought armies, giant war bands, purple worms, ancient iron golems... and also still regularly face goblins/hobgoblins/bugbears (the default not-evil-but-enemies in my game, because Story).  A great plan and insane good luck achieved victory over the purple worm and its brood -- but the wizard was out of action for 5 days, and the cleric for 6.  In the recent commando assault on an enemy town, the cleric died, spent his Fate Point, reentered combat, and died.  The rogue would have died, but spent a Fate Point to acrobatically leap over the ballista bolt that would have killed her - and kept going.  The ranger was so badly messed up that a week later he still has 3 Wounds and 2 levels of Exhaustion.Over the whole campaign, there have been 5 total character deaths.  The Warlock, twice, despite Fate Points (he tends to go off by himself, spend the Fate Point to survive, and then push on to finish the task...).  The Cleric, twice - but once was after becoming an NPC (player's work schedule changed).  The NPC Wizard, once (knocked down in battle with burrowing undead, who then proceeded to eat him = automatic double-death-save hits).There's a lot of travel in my game, and most fights tend to be the only one for the day.  Forced March rules come into play frequently.  Exhaustion and Wounds have been the thing that makes even a quick fight with "just some wolves" have lasting consequences, even if the group can nova.  In my friend's game, my 9th level paladin is currently rocking 6 fricking Wounds that mostly did no damage (weak critical hits, mitigated by Temp HP and Heavy Armor master) that nevertheless are impairing his combat functionality (magical healing is at -6!  First 6 HD I roll are impaired!) without breaking or removing limbs.  Damn penguins!  (confidently ignored the stupid birds, DM got lucky, I took 4 critical hits from the flock, even though each "critical hit" did 0 or 1 damage through my defenses)I will say that the party makeup is "caster-light", though.  Rogue 5 / Druid 2 (because story), Warlock 7, Bard 7 (who acts like a swashbuckler most of the time), Fighter 3 / TricksterRogue 4.  Oh, and the new guy, Ranger 5.  (Cleric was 7, war domain, but as mentioned, left the group due to schedule conflicts.)  The warlock is loathe to use his spells, and was spec'd for a city/intrigue game, so of course the majority of the game has been out in the wilds!  So there isn't a lot of magical healing, most fights are resolved through martial skill.  The Fighter/Rogue does a lot of "I taunt them; I Dodge."  In my friend's game, we've got a Battlemaster 9, a Warlock 9 (replaced the Artificer), a Paladin 6 / Tomelock 3 (replaced the Sorcerer), and now a Druid 9 and a Swashbuckler 9.  (had an NPC cleric up to level 5, and a PC Bearbarian up to level 7).  Only my sorcerer has died (auto-damage from an aura while at 0hp; he was revivified).  We rarely even hit 0hp.  Even with these rules.  We're careful about battles, we spend healing when someone hits Bloodied, and work together as a team.  Because even penguins can F you up with these rules!  <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=":-)" />Hope some of these ideas are helpful.  I've recorded pages and pages of people's house rules and ideas on injuries and death/dying.  I'm pondering some of this thread's suggestions on Remaining Conscious.  But mostly... I reluctantly agree with what has been said several times - D&D 5e isn't the right system for the level of "combat is deadly!" rules I prefer.  So my house rules reflect a compromise position in that regard.  And so far, over 2.5 years, my players have agreed with the "makes it interesting, without overburdening" factor.  [We did scale back a couple ideas, and have tweaked the rules twice.]As an adjunct rule set - we also use the following house rules:1)  base damage from a crit is maxed, but bonus damage is still rolled.  So the paladin's longsword crit + divine smite = 8 (sword) + 4 (str) + +1d8 (bonus sword damage) + 2d8 (smite) + 2d8 (bonus smite damage).2)  you can forgo bonus crit damage to instead do a Stunt.  (DM adjudication, but "weak" effects like prone or knockback are auto-successful, while strong effects like stun or blind get saves up front and every turn.)3)  if you hit by 10+, you get a minor bonus effect based on the attack's type.  Slashing causes a 2pt bleeding wound, firebolt sets the target on fire for 1d4, etc.4)  Spells with attack rolls are attacks, and follow the normal rules.  Spells with saves do MAX damage on a nat1, or MIN damage on a Nat20.  So Nat1 on a Fireball is 48 damage; Nat20 is 4 (min 8, save for half).  Nat1 or Nat20 also provides advantage/disadvantage on any other impacts of the spell for the spell's duration (like slipping in Grease or Ice Storm, or coughing in a Stinking Cloud).</blockquote>

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