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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dausuul" data-source="post: 4100744" data-attributes="member: 58197">Speaking as someone who has wrestled with the same verisimilitude issues, here are the solutions I've found:A "healing surge" is rather misnamed, since it doesn't actually heal you unless granted by divine power.  What's happening is that you're summoning up your heroic willpower and soldiering on.  In most cases, you haven't taken serious injuries and you're just shrugging off the effects of fatigue and minor wounds.  Even if you have been seriously injured, though, you grit your teeth and fight through the pain.Think of Inigo Montoya in the last fight scene of "The Princess Bride."  Every time Inigo says "Hello.  My name is Inigo Montoya.  You killed my father.  Prepare to die," he's triggering a healing surge--notice how he seems to get stronger each time.  His wounds do not miraculously close, but he steels himself to carry on anyway.And only you have them because most people don't have this kind of raw willpower.  When a normal guy takes a dagger to the belly, he's out of the fight.You can don as many rings as you like, at any level.  If you have thirty magic rings handy, you can put three on each finger.  They just don't do anything for you unless you have enough heroic power to control their magic.Again, as with healing surges, you're not actually healing wounds.  You're just recovering your fighting spirit and stamina.I'll assume you're talking about martial powers here, since divine and arcane powers have always followed fairly arbitrary rules.  I haven't seen a really solid IC explanation for the limits on martial powers, but in this case I think there are enough shoddy explanations that you can usually find at least one that's applicable in any given situation.#1: You don't get a lot of opportunities to use some of the martial powers, as they require a lot of work to set up and the circumstances have to be right.  It just so happens to work out that you get about one chance per encounter to use some powers, and one chance per day to use others.  (A nice explanation that solves most of the problems, but does not explain how characters know in advance how many uses of their powers they'll get.)#2: Per-encounter powers require using tricks which your opponents won't fall for twice.  (Feasible in some cases, but overall a very shaky explanation.  Does not account for why you can't use the same power again against a foe who just joined the fight, or why you can't use the same power against unintelligent enemies, or why you can use the same power against the same foe in two separate encounters, or why two people can both use the same per-encounter power in the same combat against the same enemy.  Also does not do anything to explain daily powers.)#3: Per-encounter and daily powers are tiring.  Per-encounter powers you can recover from with a few minutes of rest, but daily powers require six hours' sleep before you're sufficiently recovered to use them again.  (A decent explanation, but fails to explain why you can't substitute one daily or per-encounter power for another--that is, if you have Leaping Mantis Corkscrew Twist usable once per encounter, and Rabid Wombat Sting usable once per encounter, how come you can't do two Rabid Wombat Stings instead of one of each?)#4: You have to mentally prepare yourself and psych yourself up to use these maneuvers, and once you've used them, you've lost that mental edge and have to work to regain it.  For per-encounter powers, only a little effort is required to re-create that edge; for daily powers, you need a full night's rest first, like a 3E wizard preparing spells.  (This actually covers all the game mechanics, but it's a pretty far-fetched excuse.)</blockquote>

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