D&D 4E Should hit points continue to be generated randomly in 4e?

[FireLance]

It's randomness, people! D&D is about the conflict between preparation & strategy & RANDOMNESS! If your character dies because of some random event, the proper response is "Well, that sucks, now I will make a new character who will be even better than the old one," not "Oh, curse you, Wizards, I will write a Strongly Worded Letter of Protest so that characters like my perfect, wonderful, one-of-a-kind character will never again be slain in so undignified a fashion."

While I don't disagree with any of the above, the issue here is whether the determination of hit points should fall under "preparation & strategy" or "randomness".

 

[ptolemy18]

While I don't disagree with any of the above, the issue here is whether the determination of hit points should fall under "preparation & strategy" or "randomness".

A reasonable question... what can I say, I just prefer the thrill of randomness, and I enjoy this particular D&D Sacred Cow.

I also tend to love the actual process of making characters, and I generally always start developing ideas for new characters even when I'm in the middle of playing an existing dude, so maybe in that way I'm different than a lot of gamers here -- I get the impression that some people are way more attached to their characters than I am. Character death sucks, but it's also an opportunity to try making a new character, and I think making new characters is fun.

 

[Dragonblade]

Rolling for hitpoints is lame and definitely not fun. If you want to roll go ahead. But I'll take max every level. There everyone is happy.

 

[Gargoyle]

Rolling for hitpoints is lame and definitely not fun. If you want to roll go ahead. But I'll take max every level. There everyone is happy.

Max every level is fun...I actually did it for a long time. But has its problems in 3e. At 8th level or so you start to really notice the difference in hp between a barbarian and a wizard, and as a DM it's sometimes tough adjusting encounters to challenge the former without outright killing the latter, especially with regard to area effect spells.

 

[RFisher]

Hmm.

A big part of why I play TRPGs is the unexpected. It's fun to deal with the unexpected.

I don't find character creation in Gurps fun. There's nothing unexpected. (Once you're familiar with it.) Creating a character is more of a chore I have to struggle through to get to the fun.

I love classic Traveller character generation because it throws a lot of unexpected things at me, while still giving me a lot of choices. On the face of it, it looks like you have a good chance of never getting anything near the PC you set out to create, but that hasn't been my experience.

For Marvel Super Hero games, I love using the all-random character generation. I have a hard time coming up with super hero character concepts. It's fun to try to come up with a name & backstory to fit whatever the dice give you.

In 3e, I've done nearly the same; I've diced to make many of the character creation decisions.

Which is just to try to explain why I enjoy randomness in the character generation process. I fully understand people wanting to craft their PC instead.

Although, this probably would go better in the ability scores thread than the hp one, though. As much as I enjoy rolling for hp, I don't think I get much of a thrill from the unexpectedness of it.

 

[pawsplay]

Well, 3e has an optional rule for fixed hit points.

Honestly I don't see any good reason to keep random hit points. It can only hurt game balance. I guess the argument for it is so that "not every character is the same," but, if hit points are what you're using to differentiate characters something is wrong.

Since I consider game balance to be an untrue harlot, I am all for it.

 

[RFisher]

Honestly I don't see any good reason to keep random hit points. It can only hurt game balance.

Actually, that brings up a good point: Random hp can help keep things from being too balanced. Balance is good, but--like anything--it can be carried too far.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

Well, now I can offer a real-world example of why I don't like random hit-points.

We just levelled up to 3rd level in our (1/3 speed advancement) new campaign. We had just had a 15 minute long discussion about the pros and cons of how crappy rolling for hit points is. I explained my point, that a few bad rollsl shouldn't doom your character to second class status. The GM offered the option to take rounded up half, but I decided to roll and stick with it (no rerolling anything or second tries).

I got a 1.

So now my front-line combat character (who can't wear armor due to character class choices) has less hit points than 3 of the other 4 party members. I will continue to update as my character progresses to let you know how he turns out.

Yay!

DS

 

[RFisher]

Well, now I can offer a real-world example of why I don't like random hit-points.

Based only on your post, though, it would seem your problems have more to do with having choosen to create a front-line combat character who can't wear armor & not taking your DM's option for half-rounded-up hp than with random hp itself.

 

[JustinM]

Nearly 100% of them had some sort of character creation house rule which they were adamantly convinced was real. I had to get the book out to prove otherwise on innumerable occasions. They all loved rolling up new characters, but they tended to roll 7 stats and discard the lowest, 5d6 discard the two lowest, straight rolling but everything gets automatically increased to at least 10, automatic do-over if you don't get at least one 16, etc, etc, etc.

You need to reread your DMG, then. One of those is a RAW creation option, and one other is only one digit off. I won't tell you which, though--you can do your own homework.

As to the actual point of the thread, random (or at least semi-random) hp is the only system that makes sense to me. If you have two soldiers in the Army with the same amount of combat experience and both get hit with some sort of ammunition in roughly the same place on their bodies, there is no reason to believe they will be affected identically. None whatsoever. Proponents of fixed systems will say that what I'm describing is their relative Con scores, but it goes well beyond how tough a person is. Look at Bob Woodruff for example. Or, in more amusing terms, some beer-bellied pseudo-handyman who manages to impale his brain with a powered nail gun or a screwdriver or something and feels no ill effects.

Look, an actual argument from a proponent of rolled hp that doesn't talk about it in anecdotal D&D terms about how it adversely affected a single character.