D&D 5E Should 5E have Healing Surges?

[CleverNickName]

Do I think healing surges are perfect as presented in 4e? Nope. But it is an interesting mechanic that I think has the ability add to the game.

Good point. Perhaps they would then be better suited to a separate rules add-on for those who are looking for alternate healing methods, and kept out of the core.

 

[Naszir]

Good point. Perhaps they would then be better suited to a separate rules add-on for those who are looking for alternate healing methods, and kept out of the core.

I would hope that is an option.

But how do you square healing hit points with the fact that not all damage done to your character needs magical healling or long term rest?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Maybe this is a way to pull hps into a more narrativist style while meshing it with the mechanics better.

When you roll an attack and you are successful, you score a "hit". However, the way hit points are described you may not necessarily have been actually hit.

Healing surges were an attempt to say that the character is getting those hit points back that represent other things than physical damage (except when the cleric actually heals his wounds with divine magic).

While I grew up playing all the earlier versions and as I came to understand the game more, my mind couldn't wrap itself around that if hps represent luck, skill, damage avoidance and physical damage why was healing only represented by actual wound recovery?

Why was a cleric able to heal a commoner on the brink of death at 1 hp to full health with CLW? But he was only able to heal a scratch on the heroic fighter with CLW?

Healing surges gave us an entry point to healing the non-physical damage aspect of hps. Could a character catch his breath in-between combats? Why not?

Do I think healing surges are perfect as presented in 4e? Nope. But it is an interesting mechanic that I think has the ability add to the game.

Right, I agree, pretty much entirely. The problem is there's a hard core group of D&D fans out there for whom anything that isn't in the 1e core books is going to be anathema and no amount of saying "this is just as logical and more playable than what we had before" matters one iota.

If it was a DETAIL of the system, like this or that feature of a class or how some terminology is used, or even what magic system you're going to use it isn't really a drastic big deal, we can do things different ways.

The problem is hit points and healing aren't some tack-on aspect of the game. How hit points work and what they mean (see below) is the single most core thing in the game. The one thing that is absolutely shared across virtually every aspect of the game and which must be consistent if you are going to have a coherent game. ALL OF THE RULES need to be able to rely on the fact that "10 hit points of damage" means the same thing in order to make sense. If that's a scratch (for some level of PC) then it needs to consistently always be a scratch, and if it is a highly damaging or lethal wound then it always needs to be that. How you can recover hit points and manage them also MUST be consistent for the game to be coherent.

In other words there is one way that hit points can work. There can be SOME small variations, but the core meaning of a hit point and the ways it can be managed by the players during the game is not something you can plug in and out with a module. It is the foundation of the house that everything else must be built on.

Of course I don't know where WotC is going to come down on this, but more than any other aspect of the design of 5e it is the breakpoint. Most everything else that I value about the way 4e plays stems from its approach to resource management. There's simply not any way that 5e will play in the way that I want built on top of AD&D style hit points. Likewise we can clearly see that many other people aren't much interested in that. I guarantee you this will be the breaking point for acceptance and non-acceptance.

 

[Mengu]

I don't care what the recovery resource mechanic is, as long as the game mechanics don't steer us toward a 5 minute adventuring day.

I think healing surges are fine. I think another mechanic would also be fine. As long as there are good reasons to continue adventuring, and a balance of good reasons to rest, we can probably tweak those reasons to fit our needs as DM.

 

[harlokin]

Right, I agree, pretty much entirely. The problem is there's a hard core group of D&D fans out there for whom anything that isn't in the 1e core books is going to be anathema and no amount of saying "this is just as logical and more playable than what we had before" matters one iota.

If it was a DETAIL of the system, like this or that feature of a class or how some terminology is used, or even what magic system you're going to use it isn't really a drastic big deal, we can do things different ways.

The problem is hit points and healing aren't some tack-on aspect of the game. How hit points work and what they mean (see below) is the single most core thing in the game. The one thing that is absolutely shared across virtually every aspect of the game and which must be consistent if you are going to have a coherent game. ALL OF THE RULES need to be able to rely on the fact that "10 hit points of damage" means the same thing in order to make sense. If that's a scratch (for some level of PC) then it needs to consistently always be a scratch, and if it is a highly damaging or lethal wound then it always needs to be that. How you can recover hit points and manage them also MUST be consistent for the game to be coherent.

In other words there is one way that hit points can work. There can be SOME small variations, but the core meaning of a hit point and the ways it can be managed by the players during the game is not something you can plug in and out with a module. It is the foundation of the house that everything else must be built on.

Of course I don't know where WotC is going to come down on this, but more than any other aspect of the design of 5e it is the breakpoint. Most everything else that I value about the way 4e plays stems from its approach to resource management. There's simply not any way that 5e will play in the way that I want built on top of AD&D style hit points. Likewise we can clearly see that many other people aren't much interested in that. I guarantee you this will be the breaking point for acceptance and non-acceptance.

I agree, and I find it quite dispiriting how many people reject any concept of Healing Surges (in whatever form /whatever compromise) out-of-hand.

As you pointed out, it is not a minor issue, but there is no way I can countenance going back to having to rely on magic, natural healing that took weeks, necking endless healing potions (and people accuse Healing Surges of being Computer Gamey?), let alone the ridiculous Wand of Cure Light Wounds spamming.

 

[Hassassin]

Is "we spend five minutes binding our wounds (spent some HSs)" really all that different from "we spend five minutes binding our wounds (spent some CXW spells and healing potions)"?

Yes. Five minutes to heal someone with magic? Sure, why not - it's magic. A five minute breather and some bandages to completely come back from a blow that sent you unconscious, bleeding, within an inch of death? Nope.

Having a supernatural character like monk self-heal his wounds with a few minutes of intense concentration I can accept (it's magic of another kind), but when I play a fighter I want a very skilled, but still essentially human character. Not a superhero.

 

[harlokin]

Yes. Five minutes to heal someone with magic? Sure, why not - it's magic. A five minute breather and some bandages to completely come back from a blow that sent you unconscious, bleeding, within an inch of death? Nope.

Having a supernatural character like monk self-heal his wounds with a few minutes of intense concentration I can accept (it's magic of another kind), but when I play a fighter I want a very skilled, but still essentially human character. Not a superhero.

This is not intended to be rude, but I cannot believe the game is destined to returned to the **** ol days where anything could be achieved by Magic, because it's......magic, whereas Non-Casters have to put up with the low-fantasy version of the game just because they "not magic".

 

[Wolfpack75]

Make Healing Surges an option...

I am hoping that 5E will be a barebones mechanics structure that has massive amounts of "homebrew" options.

If instead this needs to be hard wired into the system then I would say "No".

 

[Naszir]

The problem is hit points and healing aren't some tack-on aspect of the game. How hit points work and what they mean (see below) is the single most core thing in the game. The one thing that is absolutely shared across virtually every aspect of the game and which must be consistent if you are going to have a coherent game. ALL OF THE RULES need to be able to rely on the fact that "10 hit points of damage" means the same thing in order to make sense. If that's a scratch (for some level of PC) then it needs to consistently always be a scratch, and if it is a highly damaging or lethal wound then it always needs to be that. How you can recover hit points and manage them also MUST be consistent for the game to be coherent.

In other words there is one way that hit points can work. There can be SOME small variations, but the core meaning of a hit point and the ways it can be managed by the players during the game is not something you can plug in and out with a module. It is the foundation of the house that everything else must be built on.

Except what I am proposing here is not a modification to hp directly but instead a way to minimize damage. Use the heroic surge to allow the player to say "well, that might have been deadly hit but my fighter manages to roll out of the way just in time so I only take minimum damage." (The minimum damage represents the effort needed by the character to avoid the deadly hit)

If hit points are kept relatively low this helps the players/characters deal with the RNG a little better. This would mean low hit points without the fear that just one lucky attack takes the character out. It doesn't make the characters invinceable but allows them to be heroic and act heroic.

Hit points as is, with basic through 3e, were just a strange lump of stuff. All editions tried to explain it but as players you just have to go with ignoring the inconsistences. I was fine with that for a long time because it is a game and you learn to game with what you have.

However, I do see your point AA. I have always been a progressive so I like seeing new mechanics tested and new ideas brought in. There are others who like the way it was and always will. Nothing wrong with that.

 

[Hassassin]

This is not intended to be rude, but I cannot believe the game is destined to returned to the **** ol days where anything could be achieved by Magic, because it's......magic, whereas Non-Casters have to put up with the low-fantasy version of the game just because they "not magic".

I don't accept that anything is possible with magic, either. Magics that would greatly alter the world, but aren't well explained away with a corresponding cost or rarity, do cause suspension of disbelief for me.

Note: In case people think I want to deny other players their fun... I haven't played a wizard in ages. Most of my characters are fighter types. I like them non-magical, but effective. I am, however, perfectly ok with relying on other characters for support and sometimes being "just" a support character.

I'm also fine with epic fighters being supernatural and more superhero-like. I just wish there is a large enough range of levels in the lower end to play the kind of game I want.