Using Constitution damage rather than level drain

[Erekose]

I dislike level drain and the tedious amount of paper work it can involve (particulalrly after mutiple attacks). I've read several times that others have used Con damage as a substitute for level drain and wondered how this changes play?

In addition, how do people translate the one to the other? i.e. does an attack that causes 1 negative level become 1 Con damage or is it increased by a mutiple (e.g. 1 negative level = 2 Con? or 3 Con?, etc.).

Many thanks for your comments

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

Agreed, level drain is a pain. Honestly, I think I subconsciously avoid it because it's a pain.

I think if you're going to go with Con drain/damage, the "exchange rate" should be -2Con per one level, so that hitpoint loss matches up.

The few times I've tried alternates to level drain, though, I didn't even do Con loss because even it has a lot of paperwork. Rather I just made the whole thing a stackable penalty applied to everything the character does, plus some hp loss:

• -1 on all attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks and ability checks
• -1 on all values calculated from character/class level, or HD (eg, poison or fear attack DCs, or caster level checks)
• -5 HP

So there's no loss of feats or class features, though some abilities might become less effective (eg, when caster levels decrease). In any event it's super-easy to calculate, even in the case of multiple hits, and it works with restoration as expected: just add the losses back on.

The static hp loss obviously favors the fighter types-- but they're usually the ones getting smacked so that sort of balances. Because class features aren't fully lost, this variant is probably less damaging than normal level drain to spell casters because they don't lose spells or slots. Regardless of balance issues, the paperwork is definitely more manageable.

YMMV.

Fwiw, this looks similar to another variant level drain system using Vile damage discussed here on ENWorld a few years ago.

 

[Uder]

The few times I've tried alternates to level drain, though, I didn't even do Con loss because even it has a lot of paperwork. Rather I just made the whole thing a stackable penalty applied to everything the character does, plus some hp loss:

• -1 on all attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks and ability checks
• -1 on all values calculated from character/class level, or HD (eg, poison or fear attack DCs, or caster level checks)
• -5 HP

Negative levels are my preferred replacement for level drain, too. Pathfinder does this as standard, right?

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

Not sure...
:checks:
Yup, looks like you're right: level drain is just permanent negative levels in PF. Good call!

 

[Erekose]

Thanks for the comments!

The Vile damage option is quite appealing in its simplicity. However, I think the benefit of the Constitution drain approach is that it makes undead with level drain threatening regardless of character level (although arguably low HD undead would still have a hard time hitting a relatively higher level character).

The PF negative level approach feels like it's somewhere in the middle: simpler than level drain but more complicated than Vile or Con damage.