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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8504812" data-attributes="member: 42582">In 4e D&D, the heroes take a beating, but push through the pain. A fiction to this effect is created - we see them be beaten up (eg the get pushed around, knocked down,  poisoned, etc) - and then we see them recover and push through (they stand up, they shrug off the poison, they retake the positions they were pushed out of, etc).But in a system the relies overwhelmingly on hp loss, I don't see the beating. Of course it can be asserted, or colourfully narrated. But where does it appear in the actual play of the game?I mostly play death spiral systems (RM, Prince Valiant, Burning Wheel, MHRP/Cortex+ Heroic, Classic Traveller across combats though not within them).Some involve fiction (eg RM, BW). Some are boxes-to-boxes (eg MHRP/Cortex+ a fair bit of the time). Classic Traveller is interesting because it's a bit like Baker's example of the oppressive heat - while injury within a given conflict is pure boxes-to-boxes, carrying penalties created in one scene into the next creates a sense of a "reality" that is hindering the character. Conversely, in Prince Valiant there is little carrying of penalties from conflict to conflict and so the actual attrition can sometimes feel box-to-box-y, though the corresponding drop in character ability helps give a general sense of a fiction in which the losing character is beset (the resolution is opposed pools with the margin of failure reducing the loser's pool for the next round of rolls). And Prince Valiant has other aspects in its mechanics (like very easy "p 42"-type stuff, crisp rules for situational modifiers and the like) that generate both leftward and rightward arrows.I agree with this. It's also interesting to think about approaches where there is no capability loss, but the fiction is nevertheless changed.One possibility might be this: being hit causes depletion of strength or will or whatever, but a 13th-Age escalation die steps up, generating at least an approximate counterbalance. But then, once the moment of crisis (encounter) is over, the escalation die goes away but the penalty is still there. I'm just making this up, but I think something along these lines could be a way of getting the "oppressive heat" effect without each combat involving a death spiral (though without taking steps - eg resting or healing - there might be an "adventure"-level death spiral).</blockquote>

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