D&D (2024) The Problem with Healing Powercreep

[EzekielRaiden]

Yes, because your party in your example (Fighter/Rogue, Monk, Barbarian, and Celestial Warlock) looks like it averages a d10, but aside from that a party of 4 at 1st level totals 8 hit dice of healing compared to 2 spell slots on a caster. Those spell slots aren't both dedicated to healing, but if they were that's the same 4 dice of healing.

At second level the caster gains 1 more slot for 2 more dice but the party gains 4 more dice.

The number of dice available for short rest healing is the PC's*level. Yes, that's a lot.

But it is not enough to fully heal on its own, and it never catches up (indeed, it always falls behind!) That's my point here.

 

[dave2008]

Nearly every combat ends with at least one person having taken that much damage in my experience. Not just with Hussar either.

Maybe I just roll poorly! That is not my experience with my group. In fact, we have such a low need for healing my group is likely to spend their HD on other things.

 

[DinoInDisguise]

No it is a game issue because a lot of players(newer ones especially) have never played any ttrpg other than D&D5e and 5e does a lot to enshrine a mindset that there is no way of playing other than what @Micah Sweet described without going into some kind of deviant playstyle.

You don't need to look anywhere past the new dmg for evidence of that in the way it cuts basically all of the optional/variant rules except for a new one that makes it so PCs cannot die. Without the ability to point at a page and say "no it is a valid way of playing that can be fun & you★ are the one being unreasonable by refusing to adapt to the change then using the obvious result as ammunition in an effort to force a revision to stock".

★"you" the GM's player being addressed by the GM not any particular poster.

I can flip this around and make the same statement in reverse. That 5e is too "hard" and that there should be an optional rule to make it easier. Your explanation as to why it's a system issue, quoted below, simply makes all differences in play style, not codified in the rules, into a "system issue."

a lot of players(newer ones especially) have never played any ttrpg other than D&D5e and 5e does a lot to enshrine a mindset that there is no way of playing other than what @Micah Sweet described without going into some kind of deviant playstyle.

So what is the solution beyond infinite optional rules to placate each play style? Is this not just an unsolvable problem that we can use to critique 5e until the end of time? Because even with a thousand books full of just optional rules, someone will still be able to make this argument about their preferred style. Or are we just going to draw arbitrary lines of popularity before a niche requires an optional rule? And if so, who decides where that line is? And who is to say that the mindset Micah described meets that line?

If this is a system issue, all systems have issues equal to or greater than the number of styles of play not specifically addressed by the system. And criticizing a system for this "issue" would be like criticizing an architect because their floor plan doesn't fit the tastes of every potential future owner.

Seems pretty absurd to me as an expectation, and I love optional rules.

 

[tetrasodium]

I can flip this around and make the same statement in reverse. That 5e is too "hard" and that there should be an optional rule to make it easier. Your explanation as to why it's a system issue, quoted below, simply makes all differences in play style, not codified in the rules, into a "system issue."



So what is the solution beyond infinite optional rules to placate each play style? Is this not just an unsolvable problem that we can use to critique 5e until the end of time? Because even with a thousand books full of just optional rules, someone will still be able to make this argument about their preferred style. Or are we just going to draw arbitrary lines of popularity before a niche requires an optional rule? And if so, who decides where that line is? And who is to say that the mindset Micah described meets that line?

If this is a system issue, all systems have issues equal to or greater than the number of styles of play not specifically addressed by the system. And criticizing a system for this "issue" would be like criticizing an architect because their floor plan doesn't fit the tastes of every potential future owner.

Seems pretty absurd to me as an expectation, and I love optional rules.

You use those bolded words "an optional rule"as if it were one of many or that there were other optional rules related to death and dying... That's the problem, it's the optional rule on it... So no you can't flip it around without first stopping to acknowledge that the gm lacks other options related to death and dying they could point at as valid forms or play, thanks for demonstrating the mindset noted though. Stopping to acknowledge that after what I just quoted kinda seems like it would take the punch out of a second try.

Edit:added the rule

 

[pemerton]

Some of the most intense mediaeval-esque RPGing that I've done has been in Greg Stafford's other Arthurian RPG, Prince Valiant. It came out in the late 80s, but I have the version that was released via Kickstarter 6-ish years ago.

Characters in this system have two stats - Brawn and Presence - as well as skills. (From a list of about 30.) Exhaustion and injury are represented as depletion of Brawn. The rules state that it is expressly up to the GM to decide how long it takes to recover lost Brawn, although guidelines are given that factor in both considerations of "realism" and considerations of pacing. There are also rules for distinguishing between light bruising/stunning/exhaustion, and more serious injury that is harder to recover.

The rule for dying is simple: death is not normally a part of Prince Valiant, but if the GM thinks that death is the only feasible consequence (eg a PC is thrown from the top of a high tower to the ground below) then the GM may declare a PC dead.

I don't think such a relaxed approach as I've described would necessarily suit D&D. But the idea that PC death has to be on the table for combat, or play more generally, to matter in a RPG isn't plausible, in my view.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

But it is not enough to fully heal on its own, and it never catches up (indeed, it always falls behind!) That's my point here.

So what? With a hour of rest I can only replenish 80% of my HP. Boohoo! That's insane amount of healing, and all you need to do to replenish them all is to sleep for a night.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

So what? With a hour of rest I can only replenish 80% of my HP. Boohoo! That's insane amount of healing, and all you need to do to replenish them all is to sleep for a night.

And then when you lose another 50% of your HP in the next fight?

And you can only restore 40% the next day?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

And then when you lose another 50% of your HP in the next fight?

And you can only restore 40% the next day?

If you're out of resources take a long rest. Without the gritty rules and banning of Leomund's bunker it is usually trivial. Resource recovery in standard 5e is insanely easy and fast, and that is one of the its biggest flaws.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

If you're out of resources take a long rest. Without the gritty rules and banning of Leomund's bunker it is usually trivial. Resource recovery in standard 5e is insanely easy and fast, and that is one of the its biggest flaws.

Note that you are, as everyone else has been, ignoring the fact that it takes two full days' rest without spending HD to get all of them back.

This is far from guaranteed.

 

[tetrasodium]

Note that you are, as everyone else has been, ignoring the fact that it takes two full days' rest without spending HD to get all of them back.

This is far from guaranteed.

So take two. The resting rules could not possibly set the bar any lower for you.