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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JohnSnow" data-source="post: 4043915" data-attributes="member: 32164">It's only bizarre and non-intuitive if you don't buy the general theory about hit points. Once you understand how hit points work, it's a whole lot easier to work it out intuitively. Obviously, if you're of the mindset that hit points represent actual physical damage, it's bizarre and non-intuitive.On the other hand, if you accept that hit points instead represent the capability of a heroic individual to survive and recover from attacks that would kill a "normal" person, things make a lot more sense.In the case of the character with massive negative damage (your -50 hp guy who rolls a 20), consider this. George is fighting a giant and after a bunch of grazing blows, he gets hit by its club. There's a sickening smack and he flies across the room, bounces against the wall and slumps to the ground. Clearly, he's out.Or is he? Since he's a hero, that might have been a killing strike, or he might just be wounded and temporarily winded. He's not unhurt. He just might not be in danger of dying.The trick is, we don't know which until the results are in. If enough time passes that he bleeds out from his injuries, or he fails badly 3 times before he gets aid, then the answer was the first. On the other hand, if he rolls that 20, it looked worse than it seemed, and like a hero in an action movie, he recovers enough to kick ass once more.Some people have a problem with this. But it's not bizarre if you accept that hit points are basically an abstraction that primarily exists for story purposes.</blockquote>

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