D&D 5E Spectres, Hit point loss and temp HP

[jrowland]

How would this affect a shapechanged druid? Suppose a druid's animal form gets drained by 10 HP: if the druid shapechanges again before a long rest, is the new animal form's HP reduced by 10?

I would rule -10 MAX HP in all forms

 

[Anth]

How would this affect a shapechanged druid? Suppose a druid's animal form gets drained by 10 HP: if the druid shapechanges again before a long rest, is the new animal form's HP reduced by 10?

The idea with life drain is that it is unescapeable.
I would say that the druid take the damage as a person, not his body (the same way as personality, alignment, INT/WIS/CHA carry over to different forms).

Say that a 2nd level druid with 15 hp change into a bear with 34 hp, then take 20 "life drain" damage. This means that the druid will die when he change back.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Perhaps that IS in fact what the devs intended, but uhh...the thing is, from a purely fluffy perspective the majority of the time when effects grant temporary hit points (Armor of Agathys being one exception), they are described as granting extra vigor, verve, morale, resolve. Not in terms of something protective.

When you put it that way, it makes more sense that such would be protective of a "brush with the utter grave" then when, say, your PC is lit on fire.

Translated literally, "extra vigor" does actually mean "additional life energy". What could be more appropriate than that?

 

[Henrix]

I don't even understand this debate.

Hit points are, after all hit points.

Some of them are temporary, and can during that time exceed the normal maximum hit points.


That's it, really.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

When you put it that way, it makes more sense that such would be protective of a "brush with the utter grave" then when, say, your PC is lit on fire.

Translated literally, "extra vigor" does actually mean "additional life energy". What could be more appropriate than that?

Perhaps Keep in mind that that line of discussion was regarding the idea of temporary hit points being possibly intended to mean "ablative damage barrier" as put forth by another poster. However, damage/Hit Points are necessarily pretty vague and abstract to begin with... let alone the metaphysical underpinings thereof. The idea of giving someone a pep talk that motivates them to ignore injury or to magically infuse someone with nonliving energy just does NOT conceptually seem like it would protect a person against soul draining (which is how I envision the Life Drain ability) to me personally. YMMV of course.

 

[Piratecat]

Hey Shadowdweller00, please see my note in your post 22. If you have any questions, shoot me a PM. Thanks.

 

[txshusker]

IMO - He took 15 points of damage. Whether or not he had temp HP, he still took 15 points of damage. So it's 15 from his real max of 40.

 

[KarinsDad]

"Temporary hit points aren't actual hit points; they are a buffer against damage, a pool of hit points that protect you from injury."

I'm not seeing how these actually protect a PC from hit point damage if Life Drain ignores them (and by ignores them, I mean that a PC with 5 temp and 40 normal hit points and 40 maximum hit points gets hit for 10 life drain and suddenly he is down to 0 temp hit points and 30 current hit points and 30 maximum hit points).

Since they are not actual hit points, using them up does not actually damage the PC. The temporary pool of hit points takes the damage, not the PC. No different than resistance with regard to how much hit point damage a PC takes.

 

[Scorpio616]

"Temporary hit points aren't actual hit points; they are a buffer against damage, a pool of hit points that protect you from injury."

Relevant quote is relevant. I'm now on option 1 as well.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Perhaps Keep in mind that that line of discussion was regarding the idea of temporary hit points being possibly intended to mean "ablative damage barrier" as put forth by another poster. However, damage/Hit Points are necessarily pretty vague and abstract to begin with... let alone the metaphysical underpinings thereof. The idea of giving someone a pep talk that motivates them to ignore injury or to magically infuse someone with nonliving energy just does NOT conceptually seem like it would protect a person against soul draining (which is how I envision the Life Drain ability) to me personally. YMMV of course.

Your is a rational argument.

IMO the idea of "soul draining" is a poetic one, that seems to be inspired by the idea that too much contact with certain undead, such as that vampire, is draining more than a little blood <nudge nudge wink wink>. But we still do not really KNOW what that means. Earlier edition "level loss" is still a rather vague concept, at least until your PC is suddenly dead in a weird way.

For me, Temporary Hit Points are a precious bonus that is difficult to acquire more than very small dollops of. They have been paid for, and are intended to work "like HPs". If you want Undead to bypass this, then make it clear by draining something other than HP with your special attack.