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<blockquote data-quote="takyris" data-source="post: 1107006" data-attributes="member: 5171">Fair enough.&nbsp; Back to amenable disagreement it is. <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&nbsp; &nbsp; :)"&nbsp; data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />And I do cede your point about how there is something fundamentally dodgy about the &quot;it doesn't add up at all ever&quot; concept.&nbsp; I've spent so much time defending it that I can now understand and support it as a rule in and of itself (a point upon which you and I will continue to disagree, I wager)... but even though I support it in the abstract, it just doesn't fit with the rest of the d20 hit point system.&nbsp; If ordinary hit points worked that way, too (ie, &quot;You take a minor slash wound that hurts but isn't enough to take you out of the fight, and you can take a ton of those minor slash wounds, provided you make a Fort save each time&quot;), then nonlethal damage would work well as a complementary system.But it doesn't.&nbsp; It forces me as DM to use a different mental mechanic to have it make sense when I flavor-text it.&nbsp; And that's annoying.Not annoying enough that I plan to change the system, mind you, but annoying enough for me to understand other people's points of view.One House Rule that I'm considering, that deals at least tangentially with nonlethal damage: I'm thinking of allowing any nonflexible and non-pointy bludgeoning weapon to do nonlethal damage without penalty.&nbsp; For example, the club, the quarterstaff, or the three-sectional staff are really no harder to use than the tonfa when it comes to stunning people but not endangering their lives.&nbsp; The 'chucks are flexible, so I think that the -4 still makes sense, and something like a D&amp;D morningstar should obviously keep the penalty.Of course, this makes the tonfa less desirable as a weapon -- which, frankly, is fine with me.&nbsp; Nobody should use a tonfa when a perfectly good three-sectional staff is available -- unless they've got a lot more training with the tonfa.I dunno.&nbsp; Maybe it'd help.&nbsp; Maybe not.In any event, I definitely see both sides now.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="takyris, post: 1107006, member: 5171"] Fair enough. Back to amenable disagreement it is. :) And I do cede your point about how there is something fundamentally dodgy about the "it doesn't add up at all ever" concept. I've spent so much time defending it that I can now understand and support it as a rule in and of itself (a point upon which you and I will continue to disagree, I wager)... but even though I support it in the abstract, it just doesn't fit with the rest of the d20 hit point system. If ordinary hit points worked that way, too (ie, "You take a minor slash wound that hurts but isn't enough to take you out of the fight, and you can take a ton of those minor slash wounds, provided you make a Fort save each time"), then nonlethal damage would work well as a complementary system. But it doesn't. It forces me as DM to use a different mental mechanic to have it make sense when I flavor-text it. And that's annoying. Not annoying enough that I plan to change the system, mind you, but annoying enough for me to understand other people's points of view. One House Rule that I'm considering, that deals at least tangentially with nonlethal damage: I'm thinking of allowing any nonflexible and non-pointy bludgeoning weapon to do nonlethal damage without penalty. For example, the club, the quarterstaff, or the three-sectional staff are really no harder to use than the tonfa when it comes to stunning people but not endangering their lives. The 'chucks are flexible, so I think that the -4 still makes sense, and something like a D&D morningstar should obviously keep the penalty. Of course, this makes the tonfa less desirable as a weapon -- which, frankly, is fine with me. Nobody should use a tonfa when a perfectly good three-sectional staff is available -- unless they've got a lot more training with the tonfa. I dunno. Maybe it'd help. Maybe not. In any event, I definitely see both sides now. [/QUOTE]

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