D&D 5E what is it about 2nd ed that we miss?

[RotGrub]

Or, rather, what exactly does hp recovery represent? If hp loss is being wounded, and hp recovery is healing those wounds, that gives rise to the question - why do 3 arrows in the shoulder not debilitate you, but the 4th kills you?

If hp loss signals an event of being driven towards defeat (because the character is grazed, or worn down, or loses some luck) then regaining hp means the character has come back from that wearing down. Which could be described as "soldiering on".

For my style of play, there are two reasons for this.

1. Soldiering on means you do it without healing.
2. The only way to recover hit points is via a long rest (weeks) or magic.

Also, Soldiering on should be risky.

Losing hp*does* impede you: Your ability to avoid a killing blow.

Exactly the point.

Gygax, in his DMG, is very clear that narration of hit point loss of monsters like dragons, golems etc is quite different from narrating hit point loss of PCs and NPCs. For the monsters, hit points are primarily "meat" or physical capacity.

Well that's not part of 2e. But what page is this information on? I'd like to read it.

Still, I don't think that makes much sense. What if the PC is a tiny creature, undead, or the PCs is a golem /mechanical like race? Obviously, the description for hit point loss can change. In some cases, greater wounds can be described and others not so much.

My entire point is that HPs loss should be defined how you see fit for the situation at hand. If you want to describe a physical wound you have the freedom to do so. The problem is that with powers like Second Wind and 5e insta-healing your previous narrative might make no sense at all.. You are therefore limited in how you can describe a wound. To fix this issue, some adopt the 50% rule, others claim the only real wound is the one that puts you at or below 0, and others limit hit point loss to anything but an actual wound.

Now, I'm not claiming that you can't adopt these definitions or that people who do so are wrong. I'm simply trying to explain that I have a different definition of HP loss and recovery that IS supported out of the box with 2e.

I'm sure Tony and others here would roll their eyes at my descriptions of damage just as much as my group rolls their eyes at 4e and 5e Insta-healing.

 

[pemerton]

Well that's not part of 2e. But what page is this information on? I'd like to read it.

Page 61 on the LHS.

 

[pemerton]

HPs loss should be defined how you see fit for the situation at hand. If you want to describe a physical wound you have the freedom to do so. The problem is that with powers like Second Wind and 5e insta-healing your previous narrative might make no sense at all.

But this is the bit that I don't understand. In this case, why can't the hp recovery be recovery of the capacity to go on despite the physical injury?

Adding a bit to this: you accept that the injury can be suffered yet not debilitate physical or psychological performance. So why is recovery of the ability to go on, after an act of supreme exertion and grit (second wind) or after a bit of time passes, such a problem?

 

[pemerton]

Warhammer frpg (2nd) has two things about hp to teach us - one is a different approach, but the other *might* be applicable to D&D

First, in this sytem, a starting PC has about 10-12 hp (called "wound" in that system). A powerful champion, renowned as the best warrior of the land, has about 20 hp...

So in that system, adventurers gain a bit of hp as they advance (they do get tougher) but their main means of gaining resiliency is combat skills (better at dodging and parrying)

it made for a somewhat long attack sequence

1: roll to hit
2: roll "countermeasures" if any (dodge or parry check)
3: determine hit location
4: determine how much armor there is on that location (look at your character sheet)
5: roll damage
6: deduce armor value (if any) and toughness bonus from damage
7: remove damage from HP

I believe the first RPG to have this attack system was RuneQuest, back in the late 70s.

I don't know about WH, but in RQ when damage is taken it is applied both to the location and to total hits. Too much damage to a location will disable it (and if it is the head, chest or abdomen can kill the character); too much overall damage can also render the character unconscious or dead.

 

[RotGrub]

But this is the bit that I don't understand. In this case, why can't the hp recovery be recovery of the capacity to go on despite the physical injury?

Adding a bit to this: you accept that the injury can be suffered yet not debilitate physical or psychological performance. So why is recovery of the ability to go on, after an act of supreme exertion and grit (second wind) or after a bit of time passes, such a problem?

Why does it need to be?

I think that if you want to soldier on, then you certainly don't need a power like Second Wind to accomplish that. That power alone suggests that other character classes and/or even monsters can't do such a thing. A wizard can certainly be described as "soldiering on" by entering the next battle without any healing at all.

I just don't understand why recovery of HP even needs to be linked to the concept of soldiering on. It is simply a choice and nothing more.

In addition, my group finds that instant non-magical healing cheapens divine healing. A cleric with divine healing in my game could walk into a trauma unit and heal everyone from their serious burns and gun shot wounds. Wounds that would take weeks or months to heal can be cured. We actually prescribe that level of power to healing magic. It has the ability to close a serious wound, which in turn allows us to describe them

Now, that doesn't mean that a wound didn't also include some sort of trauma that can't be ignored, it just means that in practice we can ignore it because subsequent magical healing makes it irrelevant.

btw, in my game we are using a rule that arrow hits cause 1 hp bleeding damage while fighting. PCs can spend a round to pull them out and bandage. I don't recall if that's an old AD&D rule or a house rule, but we've been using for a long time. I guess this means 5e's non-magical insta-healing complicates our house rules.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I just don't understand why recovery of HP even needs to be linked to the concept of soldiering on. It is simply a choice and nothing more.

Because it's the only thing that makes any sense.

In addition, my group finds that instant non-magical healing cheapens divine healing.

And where is this instant healing coming from? Your houserules? You spend hit dice as part of a short rest - which takes an hour.

A cleric with divine healing in my game could walk into a trauma unit and heal everyone from their serious burns and gun shot wounds. Wounds that would take weeks or months to heal can be cured.

Well, yes. Or even wounds that would not heal at all. But you have to be high level to do it. Cure spells aren't at this level of magic yet - they are simply a pick-me-up for people who shouldn't actually be in A&E in the first place. On the other hand Regenerate, Remove Disease, Restoration, Heal, and even Raise Dead are the spells they want.

That you choose to cheapen the impact of these high level clerical spells by claiming that, contrary to the rules, they merely do things that any first level cleric could by spamming Cure Light Wounds is your affair. And your house rules. But your house rules aren't the rules of D&D as published.

Cure Wounds spells are pick-me-ups with good PR mechanically.

btw, in my game we are using a rule that arrow hits cause 1 hp bleeding damage while fighting. PCs can spend a round to pull them out and bandage. I don't recall if that's an old AD&D rule or a house rule, but we've been using for a long time. I guess this means 5e's non-magical insta-healing complicates our house rules.

Yes, that is your house rules. And your house rules are not about D&D. They are about how you personally change the game.

 

[RotGrub]

Because it's the only thing that makes any sense.



And where is this instant healing coming from? Your houserules? You spend hit dice as part of a short rest - which takes an hour.



Well, yes. Or even wounds that would not heal at all. But you have to be high level to do it. Cure spells aren't at this level of magic yet - they are simply a pick-me-up for people who shouldn't actually be in A&E in the first place. On the other hand Regenerate, Remove Disease, Restoration, Heal, and even Raise Dead are the spells they want.

That you choose to cheapen the impact of these high level clerical spells by claiming that, contrary to the rules, they merely do things that any first level cleric could by spamming Cure Light Wounds is your affair. And your house rules. But your house rules aren't the rules of D&D as published.

Cure Wounds spells are pick-me-ups with good PR mechanically.



Yes, that is your house rules. And your house rules are not about D&D. They are about how you personally change the game.

2e allows for all of that, even my house rules.

 

[Tony Vargas]

One can assume that if lower hit points indicate that you are less likely to avoid a killing blow, then you can also assume that the character is getting tired, sloppy, out of breath, run-down, sweaty, his pulse pounding in his temples.

Of course, that could also impact other things he tried to do, which aren't modeled by the system.

The bottom line is that hps are a very abstract, even 'gamist' little sub-system and reading too much into them - including worrying about how you narrate their loss based on there being more options for restoring them rather than less in 5e - is fruitless.

Loosing hit points is less like gaining a wound and more like being worn down from the fight.

Sure.

In 1E AD&D, Gygax speaks of characters continuing untill about -3 HP or so.

I do not recall that, and I have had occasion to look at those sections of the 1e DMG in recent years... can you quote that? Of course, there were monsters that fought into the negatives, giant boars and such.

For my style of play, there are two reasons for this.
1. Soldiering on means you do it without healing.
2. The only way to recover hit points is via a long rest (weeks) or magic.

1. 'Doing without healing' is not practical in D&D, of any edition, ("Soldiering on" in the sense of proceeding without resting might be more meaningful in the context, as eschewing the 5MWD, for instance.) But, 'Soldiering on' in the sense those you're replying to used it means continuing in spite of taking that beating, yet actually being able to accomplish something. It's a line between heroism and suicide.

2. Understood. An attrition style focusing on spells as the critical resource. Letting something other than spells, or some character other than a spell-caster, be important, undermines that style. Often called 'caster supremacy.' A legitimate and time-honored style of D&D still supported by 5e, heavily so with the right modules in place.

Also, Soldiering on should be risky.

It is, whether you 'soldier on' fully healed but out of HD & slots in 5e, or fully healed but out of memorized Cure___Wounds spells in 2e.

Still, I don't think that makes much sense. What if the PC is a tiny creature, undead, or the PCs is a golem /mechanical like race? Obviously, the description for hit point loss can change.

The question is do you gain hps for leveling. If you don't, your hps may be reasonably visualized as 'all meat' (or all clay, in the case of a classic golem), or at least in a fixed meat|other-stuff ratio. If you do gain hps as you level, the all-meat or fixed-ratio visualization fails.

My entire point is that HPs loss should be defined how you see fit for the situation at hand.

Sure, and to within as much consistency with the mechanics as you're comfortable with. If you're comfortable describing a wound that is inconsistent with mere hp loss and no impairment, for instance, then you shouldn't be uncomfortable with narrating recovering the hps associated with that wound (you can still visualize the wound as present, just stabilized, for instance) after a short rest or night's sleep. Neither is any more inconsistent than the other.

The problem is that with powers like Second Wind and 5e insta-healing your previous narrative might make no sense at all..

This is where you're just stubbornly applying a double-standard. You're fine with ignoring that a wound you describe would realistically impose severe penalties and result in long-term or permanent disability, even if healed. You are not fine with ignoring that it wouldn't heal over night, nor even accepting the perfectly genre-appropriate trope of stabilizing or 'soldiering on' unimpaired by the wound in the sense of restored hps as well as freedom from hps.

Now, I'm not claiming that you can't adopt these definitions or that people who do so are wrong. I'm simply trying to explain that I have a different definition of HP loss and recovery that IS supported out of the box with 2e.

I get what you're trying to do, and it's not that your definition isn't useable in 2e, it's just that it's not any less useable in 5e. You're selectively holding later editions to a much more stringent, genre-inappropriate standard, even as you excuse not only unrealistic, but genre-breaking gaffes in the older editions handling of the same game mechanisms.

5e can handle the way you want to narrate wounds just fine, thank you - all you have to do is cut it the same slack you did 2e. It can also handle more forms of visualizing hp loss and recovery, that better fit with genre tropes. 5e does more, not less, than 2e that way.

 

[Water Bob]

I do not recall that, and I have had occasion to look at those sections of the 1e DMG in recent years... can you quote that?

It's on page 82, under the paragraph for Zero Hit Points.

Although my memory of it was a bit fuzzy. The rule allows, optionally, for a character to be brought to up to -3 Hit Points from the same blow to be rendered unconscious.

Note that Gygax does qualify the abstract with conditions: A person who is knocked to 0 HP (or up to -3 HP optionally) is knocked unconscious and will lose 1 HP per round, finding death at -10 HP.

Gygax says that a person who dies this way dies from an effect like loss of blood, shock, convulsions, non-respiration, and similar causes.

Aid to such an individual consists of binding wounds, starting respiration, administering a draught of spirits or healing potion, or doing what is otherwise necessary for restoring life.





A person that is brought to 0 HP or fewer and revived remains in a coma for 1-6 turns, and thereafter must rest for a week, minimum.



Now, if a character is rendered to -6 HP or fewer and then revived, the 1E AD&D DM's Guide says that this could mean scarring or even the loss of a member, at the DM's discretion. The example is: A character is falls to -9 HP after getting hit by a fireball is considered to be horribly scarred on his face, neck, hands--all skin that was exposed to the fire, if the DM thinks this is appropriate.

 

[Tony Vargas]

It's on page 82, under the paragraph for Zero Hit Points.

That's the section I'm familiar with. I guess I just mis-understood what you meant by 'continue' - apparently you just meant survive, unconscious, rather than 'continue to act.' Sorry for the confusion.

Why does it need to be?

Why does it need to be a problem? It doesn't, that's the point, it's a non-issue that people get all bent out of shape for due to entirely spurious issues of 'realism.' Or do you mean why do you need a mechanic that lets a character recover hps without genre-atypical glowy magical cleric-buddy touching out 'hero' every round or few?
Because I think that should be obvious. ;P

I think that if you want to soldier on, then you certainly don't need a power like Second Wind to accomplish that.

You certainly do, because you need a mechanical effect for that grit and determination. Otherwise you just drop with the next hit from a feather-duster and haven't soldiered on much, at all.

That power alone suggests that other character classes and/or even monsters can't do such a thing.

That is an issue that 5e has introduced.

In addition, my group finds that instant non-magical healing cheapens divine healing.

Instant divine healing cheapens heroism - go ahead and jump into danger, the cleric will just heal or raise you, you're in no real danger. And is less genre-appropriate than the of come-from-behind 'rally' that's almost routine for protagonists in heroic fantasy and action genres, which non-magical hp restoration does a better job of modeling.

That said, it'd be pretty hard to 'cheapen' divine magic, which can, afterall, bring the dead back to life.