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

[Naszir]

Well, you don't get hit upside the head with a Longsword in sports.

Tell you what, you stand there while I smack you in the head with a Longsword and then you tell me how plausible it is for you to get that extra effort and stand back up.

Seriously? Ever see how hard a NFL player gets hit gets back up and then later in the game finds another gear? Easily plausible. Adrenaline counts.

But we are not talking about actually getting hit with sword and then saying "ok buddy get up, where's your second wind now?"

Hit points are abstract. Don't give me a specific non-abstract example and then say it doesn't work.

 

[Naszir]

It's not a matter of knowing you have a second wind. It's a matter of you deciding for your character that now is the time for it. Triggered is fine. It's the decision outside the game to have it that rubs people the wrong way, I think. You as a human playing sports might get a second wind, but that's not because the guy upstairs playing you said now's the time, right?

But that is what we do as players. We decide all sorts of things outside of the game for our characters. Like, "hmm, I'm under 10 hp, I'll drink the potion now."

Sure the character thinks, "wow, I'm feeling injured I'll drink my healing potion now."

Why wouldn't second wind work the same way? I see no difference here.

 

[Izumi]

But that is what we do as players. We decide all sorts of things outside of the game for our characters. Like, "hmm, I'm under 10 hp, I'll drink the potion now."

Sure the character thinks, "wow, I'm feeling injured I'll drink my healing potion now."

Why wouldn't second wind work the same way? I see no difference here.

My character knows he has a potion. Drinking it decides what he does.

Your DM is super kind if he lets you know your hp total!

My character knows he's exhausted. I don't decide what he does, I give him a second wind and it triggers the healing surge.

 

[KarinsDad]

Seriously? Ever see how hard a NFL player gets hit gets back up and then later in the game finds another gear? Easily plausible. Adrenaline counts.

NFL players don't get hit with Longswords.

But we are not talking about actually getting hit with sword and then saying "ok buddy get up, where's your second wind now?"

Swords, claws, bites, falling 100 feet.

Actually, we ARE talking about getting hit with a sword and then saying "ok buddy get up" in 4E.

That's why it's so stupid.

Hit points are abstract. Don't give me a specific non-abstract example and then say it doesn't work.

It doesn't work.


This is the funniest argument about people who support the healing surge concept (and worse yet, the self-heal / I'm not wounded concept).

Hit points are abstract. Hence, they don't actually mean damage.

Seriously?

They don't represent damage?

Then how come its called DAMAGE in the game?

How come its called HEALING in the game?

The argument that hit points are abstract, hence it's ok to have abstract Healing Surges is like saying that imaginary numbers are abstract in the real world, hence it's ok to assume that we'll one day travel through wormholes.

One level of abstraction is a lot less nonsensical than the other in both cases.

 

[Naszir]

My character knows he has a potion. Drinking it decides what he does.

Your DM is super kind if he lets you know your hp total!

My character knows he's exhausted. I don't decide what he does, I give him a second wind and it triggers the healing surge.

Very different styles. One is Role-Gaming, and the other is Role-Playing.

My character knows he's exhausted but he also knows that he has some extra effort he can give. I don't decide what he does. He uses his own second wind but also know that this extra effort is about all he has left.

Same style. One is role-playing and the other is also role-playing.

Trying to define me one way and you another is not going to work.

 

[OpsKT]

... and the argument rolled right over my idea.

If that's the way the play-test will roll, I should expect to see none of my feedback in the final product, just like Pathfinder.

 

[Izumi]

My character knows he's exhausted but he also knows that he has some extra effort he can give. I don't decide what he does. He uses his own second wind but also know that this extra effort is about all he has left.

Same style. One is role-playing and the other is also role-playing.

Trying to define me one way and you another is not going to work.

I think I at last see the abstraction from the perspective of the 4th Edition players.

You're just deciding when to give it that extra effort under stress, the same as your character would if under duress and desperate. Is that correct?

 

[Mattachine]

NFL players don't get hit with Longswords.



Swords, claws, bites, falling 100 feet.

Actually, we ARE talking about getting hit with a sword and then saying "ok buddy get up" in 4E.

That's why it's so stupid.



It doesn't work.


This is the funniest argument about people who support the healing surge concept (and worse yet, the self-heal / I'm not wounded concept).

Hit points are abstract. Hence, they don't actually mean damage.

Seriously?

They don't represent damage?

Then how come its called DAMAGE in the game?

How come its called HEALING in the game?

The argument that hit points are abstract, hence it's ok to have abstract Healing Surges is like saying that imaginary numbers are abstract in the real world, hence it's ok to assume that we'll one day travel through wormholes.

One level of abstraction is a lot less nonsensical than the other in both cases.

But, of course, when a character is "hit" by a longsword, they aren't actually hit, cut, bleeding badly . . . because that would end D&D fights pretty quickly. Instead, hit points are deducted to account for exhaustion, minor bruises, and pressing your luck.

The funny thing for me is the insistence that hit points represent physical toughness and health, despite the rules explicitly saying that hit points represent something else, and constitution represents health (which contributes to hit points).

Hit points don't represent how much your character was actually hit with a longsword, because after being hit once or twice (maybe three times at most), your character would be dead.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Well, you don't get hit upside the head with a Longsword in sports.

Tell you what, you stand there while I smack you in the head with a Longsword and then you tell me how plausible it is for you to get that extra effort and stand back up.

If you get hit in the head with a longsword, you're not going to be battered or stunned, you're going to be dead. Getting hit in the head with a longsword is not at all an appropriate analogue to taking some hitpoint damage. You couldn't take the game seriously at all if that is what it meant...

Your DM is super kind if he lets you know your hp total!

I have never before in my life seen a statement about D&D that shocked me as much as this... Talk about getting a rude awakening to exactly just how different someone else's game can be.

I've always considered that the players knowing their character's HP total was a flat out assumed part of the game that nobody ever, ever questioned. I'd consider any DM that refused to let me know something so basic to be sadistic at the very least, and probably deserving of a few terms inappropriate for this forum. The idea that someone would consider something like that "super kind" is staggering...

Please tell me you are joking... Please...

 

[KarinsDad]

Hit points don't represent how much your character was actually hit with a longsword, because after being hit once or twice (maybe three times at most), your character would be dead.

First level monster does 9 in 4E. PCs have 20 to 30 hit points. That's 2 to 3 hits for most PCs and they're dying.

Works for me.