D&D 5E Starting HP based on Size, Race and Class...

[ElPsyCongroo]

The thought occurred to me that many people don't like seeing their character being laid low immediately after starting a campaign. So why not boost HP at the start I thought... to at least Level 3 worth (without the being Level 3) but I'm not a fan of preferential treatment, it would need to be a change across the board PCs, NPCs and Monsters alike.
While I agree that Class should be the primary factor when calculating HP as you progress, but I like the idea of Race providing variation e.g. Yes you're a Wizard but also a Goliath (Racial Trait +1 Con, so increases Race Hit Die by one step) and a medium sized creature...
So your starting Hit Points look like; HP= 1d6(Wizard) + 1d10 (Goliath) + 1d8 (Medium) + Con Mod
1d8 would be the baseline for Racial HP, your standard Human analogue.
A drastic difference for low level play and monsters (hardier goblins for instance), but said difference will have very little effect later on, HP increases per level are still the same. Would this be relatively balanced?

 

[Dragonsbane]

Pathfinder2 gives starting HP for both race and class, check it out for ideas. I think the fact a race is small means fewer starting racial hp so it works with your idea.

 

[delericho]

We've used a couple of options.

For a lot of campaigns, I've used a "hit point advance" rule - characters start with the hit points they would have if they were 3rd level. However, they don't then gain any more until the total they "should" have exceeds their starting total. (Since we don't use multiclassing, that means they gain more hit points at 4th level.)

The other option we've used (back in 3e days) was to give all characters the fixed hit points per level at every level, but also give everyone a one-off boost (usually +5) at 1st level. So, a 1st level Wizard would start with 4+5=9 hit points, the Fighter 6+5=11, and so on. (Funnily enough, the motivation for that one was to correct a 'funny' with multiclassing, whereby a Wizard who became a Fighter would have far fewer hit points than a Fighter who became a Wizard.)

 

[ElPsyCongroo]

Pathfinder2 gives starting HP for both race and class, check it out for ideas. I think the fact a race is small means fewer starting racial hp so it works with your idea.

Thanks I'll give it a look, I've not delved into Pathfinder at all

 

[Deset Gled]

not boost HP at the start I thought... to at least Level 3 worth (without the being Level 3) but I'm not a fan of preferential treatment, it would need to be a change across the board PCs, NPCs and Monsters alike

Wouldn't it make just as much sense to simply start the game at level 3? What's the net gain to adding a house rule empowering low levels if the regular rules already work when you just choose to start a bit later?

 

[ElPsyCongroo]

We've used a couple of options.

For a lot of campaigns, I've used a "hit point advance" rule - characters start with the hit points they would have if they were 3rd level. However, they don't then gain any more until the total they "should" have exceeds their starting total. (Since we don't use multiclassing, that means they gain more hit points at 4th level.)

The other option we've used (back in 3e days) was to give all characters the fixed hit points per level at every level, but also give everyone a one-off boost (usually +5) at 1st level. So, a 1st level Wizard would start with 4+5=9 hit points, the Fighter 6+5=11, and so on. (Funnily enough, the motivation for that one was to correct a 'funny' with multiclassing, whereby a Wizard who became a Fighter would have far fewer hit points than a Fighter who became a Wizard.)

That Hit Point Advance rule is something I contemplated doing after looking around at alternatives somewhat. The groups I was part of usually stuck with the fixed HP/level too just to prevent the worst from occurring

 

[ElPsyCongroo]

Wouldn't it make just as much sense to simply start the game at level 3? What's the net gain to adding a house rule empowering low levels if the regular rules already work when you just choose to start a bit later?

This is true, but I just felt that low level players and low CR monsters were a little too squishy, nothing else has changed but both the PCs and low CR mobs get to interact for longer. Also its just fun to level up.

 

[delericho]

Wouldn't it make just as much sense to simply start the game at level 3? What's the net gain to adding a house rule empowering low levels if the regular rules already work when you just choose to start a bit later?

A couple of possible reasons:

New players are likely to benefit from the simpler 1st level characters, but also from having more hit points.

Also, I've found that my players tend to feel more connected to their characters if they start at 1st level. In theory, it really shouldn't matter, but in my experience at least it does seem to.

 

[Jer]

New players are likely to benefit from the simpler 1st level characters, but also from having more hit points.

Yes. One of the secret strengths of 5e is that the first 3 levels make probably the best tutorial for new players any edition has had. IMO it's better than the red box basic sets as far as guiding new players into how the game works.

(This is also why all of our games without starting players start at either level 3 or level 5 depending on who is DMing. Because the flip side of that progression is that sometimes the experienced players feel like their characters are "incomplete" at 1st level and want to at least start at a level where they have subclasses.)

 

[dave2008]

We give players and monsters Bloodied Hit Points (BHP) based on size (Medium = 1) multiplied by your Str + Con mod. Gives PCs a little boost (1*-10 BHP depending on your stats) at low level.

*Note: the minimum BHP is 1.