D&D 4E What are HPs in 4E?

[AZRogue]

I'm not changing my descriptions. To me, Hit Points will continue to represent physical injury mixed in with luck/fortitude/endurance, but mainly physical injury.

And, no, I haven't had any problem reconciling Healing Surges and non-Divine healing with Hit Points being actual physical wounds. I, personally, have a problem with it, I guess, but my players don't. It has not become an issue even once during our test games and they are more then happy with the system, so one of my concerns from before appears to be groundless or at least only apply to my own preferences.

I do play up the fact that after a few days fighting and adventuring the PCs look like Bruce Willis at the end of a Die Hard movie, their armor covered in dried blood, bandages covering their bodies, etc. They're happy with that and more than happy to accept that they are still just as functional as if they weren't injured. Go figure. So, I don't see any reason to change things compared to how I ran my games before.

 

[Dausuul]

4e hit points go up much much slower than in 3.5. 4e hitpoints are only higher at the very early levels.

It's a little more involved than that. The "hit dice" of 4E (that is, base hit points gained per level) are actually a little bigger than those of 3.X, especially for the more fragile classes like wizards:

Fighter, paladin: 6 hp/level in 4E versus 5.5 hp/level in 3.X
Ranger, cleric: 5 hp/level in 4E versus 4.5 hp/level in 3.X
Rogue, warlock: 5 hp/level in 4E versus 3.5 hp/level in 3.X
Wizard: 4 hp/level in 4E versus 2.5 hp/level in 3.X

However, the fact that you don't get your Constitution bonus added on every level, and the lack of +Con items, means that in practice, hit point totals won't balloon upward in the higher levels the way they did in 3.X.

 

[malraux]

It's a little more involved than that. The "hit dice" of 4E (that is, base hit points gained per level) are actually a little bigger than those of 3.X, especially for the more fragile classes like wizards:

Fighter, paladin: 6 hp/level in 4E versus 5.5 hp/level in 3.X
Ranger, cleric: 5 hp/level in 4E versus 4.5 hp/level in 3.X
Rogue, warlock: 5 hp/level in 4E versus 3.5 hp/level in 3.X
Wizard: 4 hp/level in 4E versus 2.5 hp/level in 3.X

However, the fact that you don't get your Constitution bonus added on every level, and the lack of +Con items, means that in practice, hit point totals won't balloon upward in the higher levels the way they did in 3.X.

Yeah, but the con bonus is a big thing to handwave away. I mean, likely the fighter is getting 7.5/level at least in the early levels. Plus, most games that I've seen don't enforce the roll literally, allowing rerolls on a 1 or your roll or half the value, whichever is greater. So in practice, those averages are a bit low.

 

[ShockMeSane]

Hit points are really no different in 4th edition than they ever were. I'm not going to go digging for the quote, but Gary Gygax himself said something along the lines that the reason a warhorse or some such thing has X hitpoints is an abstract, it does not mean it can take 7 slashes with a longsword to kill.

Now, I will be the first to admit its always been a bit of a poor model, because pretty much the best D&D can represent is cuts and scrapes until the final blow which is enough to incapacitate/kill you or an enemy. Even if you crit a 50 hp ogre for 38, which one would think might be a pretty significant wound in relation to its hp, in the scope of RAW you really arent allowed to have that be much more than a semi-deep slash to the chest or something, as a severed arm or leg or whatever is just not modeled.

I can certainly see people's issues with hps. Really though, the hp model is the same as every other edition, none of which successfully modeled anything other than scrapes/fatigue/luck and then one final killing/incapacitating blow. I think it was a sacred cow that they could have put down with this edition, but we'll see if 5th deals with it

 

[M.L. Martin]

Hit points are really no different in 4th edition than they ever were. I'm not going to go digging for the quote, but Gary Gygax himself said something along the lines that the reason a warhorse or some such thing has X hitpoints is an abstract, it does not mean it can take 7 slashes with a longsword to kill.

It's in the 1E PHB. I don't own it, but if someone wants to look it up, that's where you'd start.

 

[Minigiant]

You can define HP by itself
You have to define a hit, a miss, and a loss of damage

To me, the attack roll is the determination of whether an attack was threatening or not threatening.
The damage is the amount of threat to the target's life the attack has made.
HP is the amount of threat a character can handle using differing methods.

So when a guy attacks a 100 HP monster for 25 damage 4 times, it could mean:
It takes about 4 good hits to the body to defeat the monster
The monster can parry/dodge the first 3 strong hits, but lacks the skill to stop the 4th
The monster can parry/dodge the first 3 strong hits, but lacks the energy to stop the 4th
The monster's luck runs out by the 4 hit
Or a combination of these

 

[Hussar]

You're covered in tiny nuns. Every time you would be hit by a spell or weapon, these tiny nuns selflessly throw themselves between you and the effect. You have as many nuns as you have HPs. You also carry extra nuns in a magic bag, and use of a healing surge entails nothing more complicated than pouring some nuns onto you. If you run out of nuns and go into anti-nun territory, that's a sign of the universe disfavoring you and pouring tiny satanic nuns onto you through an invisible fissure in reality. It takes an act of divine favor to throw off these anti-nuns and return to positive nun status.

These aren't very good nuns, because they breed like bunnies and an overnight rest will restore you to full nun status.

But, how do nun's breed? Hermaphroditic tentacled nuns?

Ah man, gotta lay off the anime for a while.

But, seriously though, HP's are ABSTRACT. Thus, they don't represent anything other than themselves directly. I think people have trouble with the concept of abstract - as in not directly real. So, HP's aren't physical damage, they aren't luck, they aren't anything other than themselves.

Picasso's people are abstract. They are only recognizable as people if you look at them like people. Looked at objectively, they've a bunch of squiggles on a canvas.

Trying to come up with an empirical definition of an abstract concept is a pointless exercise.