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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ratskinner" data-source="post: 6304700" data-attributes="member: 6688937">The problem with that, though, is that in a novel/movie, the hero doesn't have any chances of failure for us to observe. He only has whatever the author comes up with. So Our Hero still defeats the Bad Guy; in game terms, did he do that with or without a penalty? The answer is undefined because he didn't do it in a game. He defeated (or not) the Bad Guy because that's what the author/plot/editor demanded. That "plot importance" you're talking about invalidates the entire idea that HP (or any other wound/health system) are even going on. HP (as a system) do not offer plot protection to the heroes, because they don't actually prevent them from dying!  I mean, that's one of the big holes in the 2e-era DM advice. Yes! make your heroes epic, give them prophecies, etc. Well, it kinda stinks if you start with a prophecy says Harry will defeat Voldemort and then Harry goes and gets gacked by falling of his broom before the end of book 2! So just fudge the rolls!...<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f615.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":confused:" title="Confused    :confused:"  data-smilie="5"data-shortname=":confused:" />... You can't say a system is great at emulating something if you need to be prepared to ignore that system's results to maintain that emulation! To emulate something like plot importance, you'd need to give a character goals/destinies/or somethings. Fulfilling them would make the character vulnerable to death, but so long as they remain unfulfilled and still valid, the character would be immortal (and, if you are correct about not-failing, unstoppable in any important task.) How you motivate players to cause those destinies to be fulfilled..I dunno, but this is only a part of a theoretical storygame system...which will probably consume some of my thinking time in the near future.<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />HP also don't simulate the fiction, because they actively discourage  the participants from even paying lip service to the severity or nature of their  wounds. ("He hits you for 10" doesn't count.) I mean, think about how many interesting wounds characters in fiction suffer...now compare that to D&D. At least IME, most D&D heroes seem to repeatedly suffer the same sort of nebulous non-debilitating torso wounds fight after fight. I mean, its a strange sort of system that has you preferentially narrating chest wounds rather than broken arms...because the broken arms strain the simulationist sensibilities when the character needs that arm for spellcasting or raising a shield.</blockquote>

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