D&D 3E/3.5 Vitality/Wound points variant (4e to 3e)

[Li Shenron]

Design targets

- make it possible for the PC to fight a series of challenging battles without being forced to stop and rest often

- have the PC "at near-max capability" (with a reasonable margin, and not necessarily always) before the next fight, as to be able to face an escalation in the CR of the opponents without being too much decreased in capabilities after every battle

- reduce the lethality of combat, to compensate for having more combats than before in the average adventuring day

- these house rules must be integrated to 3.0 core ruleset

- house rules must be as simple as possible!


Starting problems of the core rules

- each fight reduces HP, and healing is limited daily -> need for resting

- each fight reduces resources (spells) -> need for resting

- CRITICAL ITEM: daily limitation of spells is a fundamental balance device for spellcasters vs others; the more this is altered, the harder to keep the game balanced -> avoid extreme house rules (such as completely recharge spells after each battle, which will make spellcasters largely dominate the game)


Preliminary ideas

- complete recharge of HP after each battle: requires re-envisioning the meaning of HP (follow the 4e idea)

- another penalty system should be used together with HP, so that it isn't completely guaranteed to start each battle "fresh": there should be an intermediate situation between being "fresh" and "dead"

- partial/limited recharge of spells after each battle: the spellcaster should be able to sustain more battles than before in a day, but still needs to "think" before casting

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Here are some brainstorming ideas to get closer to the previous requirements.

Simplified Vitality/Wound points

This is based on the V/WP house rules in Unearthed Arcana, but trying to remove anything that isn't strictly necessary.

- Vitality points work exactly like HP, except that "damage taken" means anything non-lethal and non-permanent, including for instance being tired, worn-out, demoralized etc by the battle, and including physical injuries as long as they aren't debilitating. The term "HP" will still be used instead of "VP".

- When dropped down to 0 or less, the character becomes DISABLED: can take only partial actions, and if it's a strenuous action 1 HP more is lost (this is like normal rules, except you don't drop unconscious by doing so)

- When disabled, and only when disabled, each attack or spell that deals damage instead triggers a Fort save (DC = damage dealt); failure results in ability damage (to a random ability score) equal to 1 point each 5 points of damage taken (round up)


Recharging while resting

- when a character is resting, she recharges 10% of her HP every minute (if disabled, she also needs to recharge the negative HP)

- spells recharge is TBD

- resting allows you to only move half speed each round and do minor things

- resting doesn't recharge ability damage


Natural healing

- works as normal, except that it is obviously irrelevant to HP

 

[Li Shenron]

Some considerations after this draft...

1) So far it's pretty simple, which is good. You just play normally until a PC drops to 0 or less. At that point, you only go down in negative HP if you participate actively in the battle (basically 1 more per round if you attack or cast a spell). Instead, when taking damage you roll a Fort save and in case of failure you get some ability damage.

2) I didn't include an option for being unconscious. I don't think it's that important actually.

3) Ability damage in this draft is to a random ability score (d6). This can be changed if it feels inappropriate to apply to mental stats.

4) After the battle, I guess most of the time you don't even need to count the minutes. The 10%/minute rules is there more as a safety measure in case two encounters are really close to each other, in which case the DM can say "after just 3 minutes..." and everyone heals 30% of their total. So just recharge everyone's HP unless the next battle starts quickly, or the group wants to rush.

5) Until someone has dropped to disabled during the day, you are all practically at your max at each new battle. Penalties to ability scores are significant enough so that characters are motivated to stay above 0 HP. This means that healing spells are still useful and worth casting during battles. Otherwise they become useless between battles when instead you might want some Resoration spells.

6) Dying is pretty difficult... technically you'd need to take a lot of ability damage to Con. However heavy ability damage might make you nearly useless, which could mean being at the opponent's mercy in many ways.

7) Natural healing is still useful because it's the only way to heal ability damage besides Restoration spells.

 

[Li Shenron]

Spellcasting recharge rules (MISSING)

I think these are much more complicated to design...

Having to stay in 3.0, we must keep spellcasters limited in daily spells. Otherwise, we'll have them casting spells each single round of every battle, and non-spellcasters will be much weaker in comparison, and we'd need more house rules to make those others on par. Therefore -> no full spells recharge after each battle.

Let's keep in mind that we want it SIMPLE:

a) spellcasting itself should be THE SAME, hence no big variants like spell points

b) nothing that needs to be tracked or bookkept, hence no UA's recharge magic or anything that is based on exact durations

Let's also keep in mind that the amount of daily spells each class gets is designed around the assumption of roughly 4 significant battles per day. I don't want to make a new assumption of a different number, because if I we assume that 8 is the new number, then we may be tempted to simply give twice as many spells per day to everyone: however that will in turn make spellcasters too powerful whenever you have much less battles... it will force us to *always* have a lot of battles.

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My first ideas were to just have some slots recharge while resting after the battle.

It could be a fixed number such as 1 slot per each spell level you can cast.

Which slots refresh may be random, but not necessarily.

One problem is that spells are also cast out of combat. It makes little sense that only those cast in combat would recharge.

Another problem is that the series of battles that needs these house rules could be of two types: many battles in a row (such as when exploring a dungeon or fighting a mass battle) or many battles scattered around the day.
The first one requires immediate/quick recharging, which has a problem with out of combat spells.
The second one would be solved with just "camping rules", which are equivalent of just splitting the day into smaller blocks, but won't help in the first type.

Maybe the best I can achieve is "camping rules" that recharge spells only partially (so that wizards still need to plan ahead at least something), and no recharge by simply resting 10min after battle?

 

[Li Shenron]

Spell Recharge - TRY#1

How about this:

- when you cast a spell out of combat and not distracted (basically you must be in the same conditions as when allowed to Take 10 in a skill), roll a caster level check*: in case of success, the spell slot is not expended

- in combat or under stress, you can do the same only after the combat/stress situation has ended, but you're limited to 1 spell per spell level you can cast (your choice)

Basically during combat (or during a run/pursuit) your used slots are expended, but you can regain SOME of them when the combat is over. You can regain only slots you've used in that combat of course, and you're limited to how many. I think it's ok to let the player choose which ones she wants to try and refresh.
Out-of-combat spells are slightly more likely to be refreshed only because you aren't limited in how many you can try (but of course, only 1 try per slot).

There are a few rolls to make after the battle, up to 10 for very high-level characters. This is not very good. But if I make this automatic, then it won't work for out-of-combat spells.

* maybe a Will check or even an ability check would be better?

 

[Naszir]

Wound Threshold

Anytime a character takes damage equal to 1/3 of their hit points in one shot they take a wound. Wounds can only be healed quickly through magic. Otherwise the character must rest. Wounds also have some negative effects:

1st 1/3 = Battered
Effect: May only take a Standard and Move action during a round.
2nd 1/3 = Badly Injured
Effect: Movement is reduced by 10'.

Catch a Second Wind

Second Wind (once per day, when you are at half your hit points or below, you can gain a second wind as a swift action. Doing so heals one quarter of your total hit points)

This represents being winded and taking a moment during battle to catch your breath and letting adrenaline kick in.

When thinking of this I still have had a problem with how Cure Spells would be used. I think they would have to be changed to longer casting times.

Cure Wound will now become a feat or class ability (similar to Turn Undead) and will be tied to Wisdom for the number of times per day it can be used. There is no hp limit on it. Since a wound on Farmer Joe is the same as a wound on Basher the 10th level fighter (a hit doing damage equal to 1/3 of their hit points or more in one hit) it seems only to makes sense to structure the ability to Cure Wounds this way. An additional feat or class ability allows a character with the Cure Wounds feat to Cure Wounds additional times equal to ½ their character level.

Cure Wound spells could no longer be spontaneous casting in this case (or even be spells for that matter.)

Another thought would be a spell called Vitalize (or something of that nature) that could restore non-lethal damage in the middle of combat.

 

[Li Shenron]

Two nice ideas, but a bit OT

I'm trying to limit the house rules to those design targets, everything else is for later. My concern is to verify if my current ideas meet the targets, and how to deisgn the spellcasting recharge properly.

 

[Naszir]

Two nice ideas, but a bit OT

I'm trying to limit the house rules to those design targets, everything else is for later. My concern is to verify if my current ideas meet the targets, and how to deisgn the spellcasting recharge properly.

Design targets

- make it possible for the PC to fight a series of challenging battles without being forced to stop and rest often

Having a Wound Threshold does this. However lower level characters are clearly at more risk to take wounds. All other damage that is not a wound gets healed after combat is over.

- have the PC "at near-max capability" (with a reasonable margin, and not necessarily always) before the next fight, as to be able to face an escalation in the CR of the opponents without being too much decreased in capabilities after every battle

Again, with a Wound Threshold unless the character has taken a wound they should be at near max capability before the next fight.

- reduce the lethality of combat, to compensate for having more combats than before in the average adventuring day

The lethality of combat is mitigated with Wound Threshold because unless a character has suffered a wound they regain the non-lethal damge taken at the end of a combat.

- these house rules must be integrated to 3.0 core ruleset

- house rules must be as simple as possible!

I believe Wound Threshold can be easily integrated and its simple because there is only one additional thing to be aware of (the characters Wound Threshold) and only two conditions to add to the character if he takes a wound. No additional rolls involved.

The concern from my perspective is how Cure spells have to be modified when using the idea of Wounds.


I've always been interested the design or modification of rules. Hopefully I can give some constructive criticism here if you would like to stay with what you've started:

* complete recharge of HP after a battle.

This may be a bit much. At least flavor wise how would you get around a character that took massive hit point damage in one shot but somehow was not really injured by it?

* At that point, you only go down in negative HP if you participate actively in the battle (basically 1 more per round if you attack or cast a spell). Instead, when taking damage you roll a Fort save and in case of failure you get some ability damage.

So anyone who hits 0 or negative HPs is automatically stabilized unless they try to something? And on top of that there are more rolls introduced here. Though overall this doesn't seem like it will detract from anything. What your doing just gives the characters more hit points but with the condition that if you want to do something you put yourself at risk. Seems like this could give a dramatic feel to those who fall below 0hps.

* Ability damage in this draft is to a random ability score (d6). This can be changed if it feels inappropriate to apply to mental stats.

Personally, I've never liked ability damage. Random ability damage seems to be a strange fit here. Once ability damage is taken you have to start modifiying too many things and to me that just slows things down way to much. This may be different that what you've experienced.

* After the battle, I guess most of the time you don't even need to count the minutes. The 10%/minute rules is there more as a safety measure in case two encounters are really close to each other, in which case the DM can say "after just 3 minutes..." and everyone heals 30% of their total. So just recharge everyone's HP unless the next battle starts quickly, or the group wants to rush.

* Until someone has dropped to disabled during the day, you are all practically at your max at each new battle. Penalties to ability scores are significant enough so that characters are motivated to stay above 0 HP. This means that healing spells are still useful and worth casting during battles. Otherwise they become useless between battles when instead you might want some Resoration spells.

* Dying is pretty difficult... technically you'd need to take a lot of ability damage to Con. However heavy ability damage might make you nearly useless, which could mean being at the opponent's mercy in many ways.

* Natural healing is still useful because it's the only way to heal ability damage besides Restoration spells.

Again, I'm not too keen on the random ability damage or ability damage in general. Once characters start to take ability damage there are a lot of things that now need to be modified and tracked (attack and damage modifiers, skills, hit points, armor class, potentially effects feats, spell DC, saving throws, and there might be a few I am missing.)

Having the characters heal fully after each battle (except for ability damage) will definitely allow you to do what you want. I think the overall concept should work but I would still be concerned with ability damage and the slow down impact it will have on combat due to the ability modifiers effect on so many things.

 

[Li Shenron]

Having a Wound Threshold does this. However lower level characters are clearly at more risk to take wounds. All other damage that is not a wound gets healed after combat is over.

I must have misunderstood, did you suggest your Wound Threshold in addition to my rules?

I thought you intended it as alternative to my idea, so without the auto-healing after battle, in which case the WT makes combat more painful, but maybe this is not what you meant.

This may be a bit much. At least flavor wise how would you get around a character that took massive hit point damage in one shot but somehow was not really injured by it?

I don't know, but I think it all depends on getting used to the idea of HP as something more general than wounds.

Hence for instance, a PC with 50 HP gets "hit" for 40dmg by a massive Ogre's club. He isn't really hit at all, but the blow was so terrible that he's shaken and "wounded" by the effort of dodging/blocking it, that he cannot stand much more "damage" during the same battle.

Same PC with 10 HP gets "hit" again, and this time being hit means something more physical, hence the ST vs DC 30.

So anyone who hits 0 or negative HPs is automatically stabilized unless they try to something? And on top of that there are more rolls introduced here. Though overall this doesn't seem like it will detract from anything. What your doing just gives the characters more hit points but with the condition that if you want to do something you put yourself at risk. Seems like this could give a dramatic feel to those who fall below 0hps.

I didn't consider the stabilization an issue here, and neither going unconscious. I don't see it so interesting for combat that I have to represent it with the rules, but YMMV... sometimes it might indeed be an interesting situation to have a comrade unconscious and you need to save him, but OTOH I would rather have that more rarely (e.g. because of spells or poison) than more often.

Personally, I've never liked ability damage. Random ability damage seems to be a strange fit here. Once ability damage is taken you have to start modifiying too many things and to me that just slows things down way to much. This may be different that what you've experienced.

I see your point. Of course players should not mess up with the character sheet everytime they drop to negative HP! I think it could be handled by just counting the equivalent ability penalty (i.e. if you got a total -2 to Str, you simply apply a -1 to all Str-based rolls). Shouldn't be too difficult, but I understand that it is certainly some extra attention required.

Would negative levels be easier to track than ability damage? Perhaps an interesting alternative would be to gain a "severe wound" every time you fail the save. These severe wounds would work just like negative levels (same effects), but they get a separate in-game description/explanation, and they don't stack with each other.

The idea I have in mind is that characters should be motivated to avoid dropping below HP, like it happen in the normal rules, but the motivation instead of coming from unconsciousness/death comes from accumulating penalties that make the next battles progressively more difficult.

I thought ability damage accomplishes that, and I made it random just because I thought that the only alternatives to that would be plain Con damage or damage to ALL abilities, which is likely too deadly.

 

[Li Shenron]

Take #2

So, if I replace ability damage with "severe wounds" (negative levels), how does it look?

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Simplified Vitality/Wound points

- HP above 0 work normally, except that "damage taken" means anything non-lethal and non-permanent, including for instance being tired, worn-out, demoralized etc by the battle, and including physical injuries as long as they aren't debilitating.

- When dropped down to 0 or less, the character becomes DISABLED (can take only partial actions). HP are defaulted to 0.

- While DISABLED, each attack or spell that deals damage instead triggers a Fort save (DC = damage dealt); failure results in one "severe wound" each full 10 points of damage taken (if damage taken is less than 10p, no need to roll the save). The attack that drops you below 0 in the first place also triggers the save, but you only count the part of the damage that actually brings you to negative HP.

- A "severe wound" works like a negative level, giving the same penalties (and a character dies if he has SW equal or more than his level), but don't stack with negative levels, and if you fail the Fort save after 24 hours you do not lose class levels (you just keep the wound for another 24 hours, then save again)


Recharging while resting

- when a character is resting, she recharges 10% of her HP every minute (if disabled, she also needs to recharge the negative HP)

- spells recharge is TBD

- resting allows you to only move half speed each round and do minor things

- resting doesn't recharge severe wounds


Natural healing (full night rest)

- works as normal, except that it is obviously irrelevant to HP

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Is this too complicated? I want to make it as simple as possible, so that it's easy to remember without ever looking that up again.

To simplify more, maybe we can forget about negative HP altogether. I was keeping track of them so that if you want to go back to positive HP DURING the battle, you may need more or greater healing spells depending on the current negative number. But really this is not needed at all! I changed it so that you are just at 0 HP, and you don't bother about keeping track of the exact number (although if you drop directly down to -X, you already need a first saving throw).

 

[Li Shenron]

In brief, it's simpler than it looks:

(DURING BATTLE)

Everything normal until you drop below 0. When you do, you're disabled (1 action per round only).

If the attack that drops you below 0 actually drops you to -10 or lower, make a save as in the next step.

From now on, ignore attacks that deal less than 10dmg. Those who deal at least 10dmg trigger a Fort save (DC = dmg). If you fail, you get a severe wound, which carries the same penalties as a negative level.

Multiple severe wounds stack, and if you get as many severe wounds as your character level, you die.


(AFTER BATTLE)

Unless you have to rush, fight another battle or do something strenuous, heal all HP within 10 minutes (but severe wounds remain).


(AFTER A NIGHT'S REST)

Make a Fort save for each severe wounds (DC = ?), if successful the wound is healed; in case of failure, the wound stays for another day, and next night you make the Fort save again.