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<blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6300874" data-attributes="member: 6696971">I've seen you assert this a few times and above you provided context.&nbsp; What you mean to say is &quot;the actual game itself as I have played it and witnessed it being played.&quot;&nbsp; Because I can guarantee you that my almost 30 years of GMing says that there are tons of tables and players out there who don't treat HP as anything approaching even a &quot;minority meat&quot; concept.&nbsp; The last few HP before unconsciousness or death?&nbsp; Sure, sometimes.&nbsp; Further, they don't extrapolate anything universal (such as collision between two objects and subsequent tissue trauma) upon the shared imaginary space from the mechanical result of &quot;hit&quot; or &quot;miss&quot; in the abstract contest of attack roll vs static defense.&nbsp; What is universally inferred at those tables is these things are mechanical states (gamist jargon), not fictional states, waiting to be mapped to the fiction (or not) at their discretion.&nbsp; The game itself is played all sorts of ways and has been forever.&nbsp; I have gamed with well over 100 (extremely experienced) gamers over my 3 decades of play who would laugh themselves into a coma if they were approached with the assertion that they are heretics in some kind of &quot;HP as meat&quot; and &quot;hit means collision between 2 bodies in the fiction&quot; D&amp;D orthodoxy.&nbsp; What is extraordinary to me is how some people have managed to play this game for any length of time and have only played some form of D&amp;D as process simulation.&nbsp; Somehow they haven't come across a fair number of people whose tables are run by fortune in the middle narration of mechanical resolution and/or outright Pawn Stance play with disposable PCs who have names like Bob13 (one of my friend's 1e Fighters as Bob1 - 12 are no longer with us).</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Manbearcat, post: 6300874, member: 6696971"] I've seen you assert this a few times and above you provided context. What you mean to say is "the actual game itself as I have played it and witnessed it being played." Because I can guarantee you that my almost 30 years of GMing says that there are tons of tables and players out there who don't treat HP as anything approaching even a "minority meat" concept. The last few HP before unconsciousness or death? Sure, sometimes. Further, they don't extrapolate anything universal (such as collision between two objects and subsequent tissue trauma) upon the shared imaginary space from the mechanical result of "hit" or "miss" in the abstract contest of attack roll vs static defense. What is universally inferred at those tables is these things are [I]mechanical states [/I](gamist jargon), not fictional states, waiting to be mapped to the fiction (or not) at their discretion. The game [I]itself [/I]is played all sorts of ways and has been forever. I have gamed with well over 100 (extremely experienced) gamers over my 3 decades of play who would laugh themselves into a coma if they were approached with the assertion that they are heretics in some kind of "HP as meat" and "hit means collision between 2 bodies in the fiction" D&D orthodoxy. What is extraordinary to me is how some people have managed to play this game for any length of time and have only played some form of D&D as process simulation. Somehow they haven't come across a fair number of people whose tables are run by fortune in the middle narration of mechanical resolution and/or outright Pawn Stance play with disposable PCs who have names like Bob13 (one of my friend's 1e Fighters as Bob1 - 12 are no longer with us). [/QUOTE]

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