Vitality/Wound points vs Hit points

[Breakdaddy]

I am using the WP/VP system in my D20 Modern/Blood & Guts Modern Military campaign. It works very well for my no-magic/no-FX Modern game. I also set a 35 point damage threshold to make it REALLY interesting. It turns out to be a good bit deadlier even to our level 10 group of Marines fighting Technicals and other assorted terrorist baddies.

 

[Desdichado]

When a character takes wound damage, they must make a Fort save or be Stunned. It's an interesting little bit hidden in the rules that makes any wound potentially dangerous. However, the DC on the save is usually low enough not to be an issue in my experience.

Huh. I didn't remember that little tidbit. I'd probably actually do away with it. It seems like more trouble than it's worth.

 

[Old Drew Id]

We use VP/WP in out d20 Modern Medallions campaign. Plus, we up the gun damage by one extra die (2d6 becomes 3d6, 2d8 becomes 3d8, etc.). We've run it this way for over a year without complaint, although there is some very low level healing magic available which can speed up WP recovery to around 4 or 5 WP a day when needed.

Incidentally, we also use a VP/WP based magic system in this campaign as well. Instead of spell slots and all that, casters just burn VP to cast spells and burn WP to cast more powerful spells. This works out pretty well for us.

 

[RangerWickett]

In my game, I refer to it as the 'Hit Point/Wound Point' system, and I use the system not to make combat more lethal, but to make it more dramatic. You still get WP equal to your Con, but critical hits don't hit your WP automatically.

If you have any WP damage, you take a -4 penalty to Strength and Dexterity. Most folks choose to fall to the ground and grovel in pain once they're out of hit points, because they'd rather grovel than fight, and because they'd have a poor chance of success in a fight. Now, high level villains will still fight, the same way that high level heroes will still fight, but mooks go down once their HP is gone, so things like Great Cleave are still useful.

At 0 WP, it's like you're at 0 HP in core rules (disabled, can only take partial actions, if you take a strenuous action you take 1 point of damage). However, if you go into negative wounds, you stay disabled, but you can make a Fort save (DC 10) to remain conscious for things like dying speeches. Conscious or not, though, you have to make a Fort save (DC 20) each round, or you take 1 point of damage from bleeding and such.

Basically, Wound Points give PCs plot immunity, without making it seem like plot immunity.

 

[Bendris Noulg]

Hi. My group are considering trying the alternative wound points /vitality points system from Unearthed Arcana, and want to hear from others who have tried the same. What do you think of the system? Is it any better than hit points?

"Better" would be subjective, although I've found it's "better" at achieving certain in-game effects (mostly making Criticals more dangerous and allowing mooks the occasional lucky shot, which generally makes combat a less viable option than usual).

And what kind of modifications did you have to do to make it work?

The basics of my system can be found in the Health & Resilience document at this link. A few basics:

Wounds = (Constitution x Size) + BAB
Critical Threats require the die to be in the threat range listed for the weapon and the Attack roll itself to be 5 higher than Armor Class (Improved Critical rewritten to lower this to 3 higher than AC).
Weapons do their extra dice, but only the first damage roll applies to Wounds, the others to Vitality.
Wound Ratings: Minor (less than 50% Wound total, no effects), Major (50%-100% Wound total, minor effects), and Maiming (100+%, major effects). These effects are currently being derived from Torn Assunder.
Some spells rescaled to effect Wound points directly (cure/cause X wounds, etc.).
Extra damage dice (such as from sneak attack) only cause +x damage instead of +xd6 when applied to Wounds.
Undead gain Wound Points from their Charisma score.

This is also coupled by DR for Armor, a Base Defense Bonus that scales with BAB and Defense Rolls instead of static AC, and other odds and ends. We fully implemented W&V about a year ago and started adjusting it to taste. The results have been most excellent. No one's died or been permanently maimed yet (a few close calls, though), but it has eliminated over-dependancy on healing magic and avoids the "fight unhindered until you fall down and bleed to death" effect the Hit Points have.

It also makes jumping out of 100' windows more problematic (Hit Points: Get up and walk away, W&V: Make a big splat).

 

[CrazyDrake]

I've played a Star Wars d20 game from 1st level... we stopped around 16th because it just got too dangerous, and for one reason: critcals going straight to wounds.
why? using a weapon with a threat range of 19-20, taking imp crit brings it to 18-20. either dual-wielding weapon with the threat range, or using rapid shot/multishot, you get 4-5 attacks a round at 10th level, which is really dangerous.

now, the idea of hit-points as normal, with wound points as a kind of extended staggered condition, works rather well, so i'd recommend that.

 

[Trellian]

Wow, thanks for the response guys. What about published adventures which have so and so many encounters for a day? Do these adventures become easier to complete due to the fact that vitality points come back rather quick? Even though losing wound points is worse than sustaining the old hit points, a decent cleric can cure a lot of hit points with a couple cure spells.

 

[Toscadero]

re: responses

I too want to thank everyone for the tips. I've been wanting to try the wp/vp for some time. These posts give me something to think on. We are getting ready to start a new campaign. Once again, thanks for all the tips.

 

[Mercule]

We ran a night of mock combat to test it out. The characters used were three actual PCs scaled to both 1st and 10th level. At 1st level, what we found was that the fight was pretty much the same, just longer. At 10th level, we found that it had one of two effects: 1) make larger bad-guys absurdly tough and 2) exagerate Improved Crit to being a required feat.

For #1, the PCs faced off against a giant spider of some breed. They were taken down pretty handily. Tracking HPs and crit results showed that the spider would have normally dropped before the first PC did. Our conclusion was that either the size multipliers for WP are totally out of whack or critters need to have their CR raised by 1 or more (in addition to the current math) for each size category above Large. Or both.

For #2, the PCs made laughably short work of two fire giants (same CR as the spider). The swashbuckler's keen elven thinblade critted on a 12+ and the tank's mercurial greatsword critted on a 15+. The giants were gone in something like 4 rounds, if that. The PCs were hardly touched. Improved Crit is a gimme feat w/ WP/VP.

We love the idea of WP/VP. Everyone agreed on that, even after the testing. It just doesn't seem to work out in play. I think some modifications need to be in place. Unfortunately, this is one aspect of the game that I don't have the time to tweak, nor do my players have the patience for instability in their health-meters.

Anyone have similar issue? Anyone have fixes for those issues?

 

[DungeonmasterCal]

I'm using them in a new home-brew campaign I run. At low levels, it's like having extra hitpoints (until that confirmed crit smile comes across my face, and then you can hear sphincters tightening up all around the room).

I love the system.