True 20: using hit points?

[Ruland]

In 'encounters,' characters have hp, which represent a variety of different things. Removing their hp removes them from the encounter, although they can be returned to it by (relatively low-level compared to normal D&D) magic or items.

Out of 'encounters,' lethality is in the extreme. Think of it as all attacks being coup de grace. Worse, death out of encounter is Plot Death - it is real and permanent, and there's no real way to fix it (except, perhaps, a ritual or quest spell).

This split is console RPG inspired and designed to make combat fun and enjoyable for everyone, and death, when it occurs, meaningful and emotional.

For me one advantage of the damage save system is that you do not need to use such a split - with damage saves, you can handle "normal" encounters and ambush or hostage situations on the same set of assumptions, rules-wise. With your splitting of assumptions, players may react surprised or frustrated: first they thought their characters nearly unkillable, than - woops - an ambush happens, and they are victims of a coup de grace from one second to the next.

 

[ValhallaGH]

Not if you encounters (when hit points apply) from out-of-encounter (when hit points don't apply) - such as being ambushed or held hostage.

Basically, this is how I handle it:

In 'encounters,' characters have hp, which represent a variety of different things. Removing their hp removes them from the encounter, although they can be returned to it by (relatively low-level compared to normal D&D) magic or items.

Out of 'encounters,' lethality is in the extreme. Think of it as all attacks being coup de grace. Worse, death out of encounter is Plot Death - it is real and permanent, and there's no real way to fix it (except, perhaps, a ritual or quest spell).

This split is console RPG inspired and designed to make combat fun and enjoyable for everyone, and death, when it occurs, meaningful and emotional.

But ... those are all encounters. Encounters are any time when the characters are challenged by opposition; this includes role playing encounters, trap encounters, puzzle encounters and combat encounters (both expected and unexpected).

Changing the game so that 90% of the time the established mechanics everyone is aware of no longer apply is not something I'm willing to do. I'd rather just change the established mechanics.

 

[Skywalker]

One thing that I am curious about is how difficult it would be to replace the 'damage save' system with bog-standard D&D-style hit points?

Not that difficult. Simply use the conversion guidelines to convert damage. For HP, I would keep with a static number (like in True 20) such as the constituion score (which you would need to convert from the attribute bonus).

The will be a few effects as all the feats are designed for the damage save system e.g. Weapon Specialisation grants only a +1 to damage and Toughness a +1 to HP.

The biggest issue would be that you wouldn't be able to use Conviction on Toughness saves which would make the system far deadlier. However, adding an additional use to avoid any hit or rerolling that attack dice my resolve this.

Overall my advice is stick with the damage save

 

[solkan_uk]

IIRC correctly, in M&M the conversion to hit points was as simple as 1 point of toughness save = 3 hp (or maybe 5, as long as you're consistent it doesn't really matter). The same applies for damage.

 

[Relique du Madde]

Actually it was: constitution + (Con bonus x 3) or Toughness x 5 (for characters without con)