Why all the healing?

[Wulf Ratbane]

I agree that given the other system changes, making HP a per encounter resource makes far more sense than jacking up the hit points, jacking up the damage output and then jacking up the healing capabilities. If you instead did some sort of WP/VP system where the VPs area per encounter resource, you could reserve healing for WP and make it actually healing and nearly eliminate the need for the heal-battery (or batteries, in 4E).

Maybe not WP/VP, but would you settle for hit points and Action Points? Action Points then become the dramatic resource to be managed.

Hit points already are a per encounter resource, and the individual combat encounter already is the unit around which the game is balanced. It just isn't "officially so."

The "correct" way to play the game, from the players' side of the screen, is to use healing potions or wands to fully heal up after every combat. (In our case, while the rogues Take 20 using Search on the room, anybody that can use a healing wand uses it during that "invisible downtime.")

Taken a step further, there is nothing to prevent the PCs from engaging in the "10 Minute Adventuring Day." You enter the first room of the dungeon, throw everything at it, then retreat for the day to get all your spells back. We've all seen this. Many of us have done this. It's not satisfactory, it always feels like a cheat, but within the existing rules, it's the only smart thing to do.

In both of these cases the pressure is on the DM to keep the PCs from engaging in this logical "best practice." If the DM doesn't want his players to be fresh for every encounter-- the lament we have seen here and elsewhere of whittling the party resources down a bit at a time-- it falls to the DM keeps the heat on the PCs and keep things moving. If you want an exciting "run and gun" encounter, where the PCs are so harried they don't have time to stop and rest, then simply do that.

Fixing the 10 Minute Adventuring Day is a little more complicated-- it requires a lot more forethought on the part of the DM. Under the existing rules, the DM can't really prevent the PCs from retreating from the dungeon to assault it fresh, time and time again, unless he is equipped with the information he needs to know what the dungeon inhabitants will do during that long down time.

But even this stretches verisimilitude. If the PCs are assaulting a crypt guarded by undead and traps, there really isn't any reason for the undead to sally forth at night to prevent the PCs from resting. So we let them go in, shoot their wad, then we hand wave an entire "game day" and let them go back in rested, restocked, and ready the next day. Functionally speaking, why not just give them everything back after a short, reasonable rest period?

From a designer's perspective, it is a lot easier for me to predict what the bad guys will do with, say, 10 minutes while the PCs stop to rest, than to predict what they will do with almost 24 hours to rest and regroup. As a DM, I would much rather force the action in 5 or 10 minute increments than daily increments.

 

[GlassJaw]

From a designer's perspective, it is a lot easier for me to predict what the bad guys will do with, say, 10 minutes while the PCs stop to rest, than to predict what they will do with almost 24 hours to rest and regroup. As a DM, I would much rather force the action in 5 or 10 minute increments than daily increments.

Also, as you mentioned previously, it's much easier for a DM/designer to build and predict encounters when the party is fully healed. The fact that CR assumes a "clean" fight can't be stressed enough in my opinion.

 

[Desdichado]

because someone wants to shout out "barbarian, heal me!"?

Then get back the answer, "Physician, heal thyself!"

 

[Lord Zardoz]

Another point to consider is that Wizards is hoping to get rid of the dynamic where players will only have 1 fight per day. In 3rd edition, you have a few choices as a DM. Your first option is to run trivial fights where the outcome is known, but grind through those fights in hopes of getting the players to use up spells for that day. Your second option is to run fights that are reasonably difficult, and have your party rest / camp after every encounter.

My example is an oversimplification, but it is reasonably accurate of how games start to run when the players become dependent on either the high level healing spells of your cleric, or the hard blasting spells of the Wizard / Sorcerer. Once the big stuff is gone, there is a huge incentive to rest to get those abilities back.

Another dynamic that Wizards wants to get away from is requiring every party to have a cleric, and having every cleric use most of their spells for healing. In 3rd edition, they tried to achieve this by having spontaneous healing. It was a good step, but this contributed to the '1 fight and rest' dynamic. The cleric has some pretty decent spells that you may want to keep handy. Silence and Dispel magic may not be of much use against a Troll or Hill Giant, but if you convert them to healing, your going to suffer if you run into a spell caster before you can recover your spells.

By spreading around the healing responsibilities, you get several benefits:

- The quest does not grind to a halt to wait for the cleric to recover spells as often
- You are able to make all fights more interesting by having more durable bad guys
- The cleric is no longer the only guy responsible for keeping everyone else alive
- Parties without clerics become more viable
- You gain a new option for class features and feats for non clerics

END COMMUNICATION

 

[Set]

nevermind

 

[GreatLemur]

But what kind of bonuses do people get together? Feint + Flanked + Tripped and then what? Feint II, Double-Flank and Pinned?
And after each combat, the bonuses disappear? And what about negating these bonuses?
Don'tyou end up just another kind of hit points, that you designate as 100 % refreshing after each combat (instead of healing slowly or by magic)

That actually sounds pretty cool, to me. If dynamic situational advantages and disadvantages in combat are "another kind of hit points", then they're a far more interesting one than a single pool of undifferentiated points representing physical health, combat readiness, luck, fatigue, and so on.

Puts me in mind of Spirit of the Century's "consequences" mechanic, where a target can elect to take a specific injury or temporary combat disadvantage instead of generalized health damage . . . which, of course, runs the risk of being exploited to cause them more damage the next time they're attacked, or otherwise impairing their own actions. I haven't gotten a chance to play it yet, myself, but I hear it works so well that some folks are houseruling the hitpoint-esque damage track to be less important, and focusing the combat system on consequences instead.

Sure, it ain't D&D. But it definitely sounds like fun.

 

[Reynard]

The more I think about this the more I think that per-encounter hit points plus "per day" wounds might be the best way to solve the problems inherent in the heal-battery/10-minute-adventuring-day system. Personally, I would prefer if players took care and went with the "old school" style, but it isn't likely to happen, so the next thing to do is actually adjust the system to the way people play (which may be at the heart my 4E issues anyway, now that I mention it).

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

[The] next thing to do is actually adjust the system to the way people play.

This is at the top of my 4e design document.

 

[CleverNickName]

Hit points work just fine for me. For whatever it is worth, we haven't had a "walking band-aid" cleric since potions became available for sale (healing, restoration, neutralize poison, whatever). Drop a few hundred coin in town, and the cleric doesn't have to play doctor all evening.

As for the current damage/healing system, I don't think it is broken at all. I like simple addition and subtraction, and I will always prefer it over any more complicated, convoluted process of per-encounter/per-day, reserve points, damage reduction, etc.

 

[GlassJaw]

As for the current damage/healing system, I don't think it is broken at all.

There's nothing "broken" about hit points and resting per se, it's just that the current system doesn't reflect how people actually want to play.