D&D 5E Why different HD types for classes? (Another HP thread...)

[Cap'n Kobold]

I completely agree CON tends to be no worse than 3rd IME for most characters, but even so I think you'll find warrior-types still normally have better CONs on average. I won't say it is much higher, but probably a +1 bonus on average. Of course, player preference and tables vary so this might not be you experience.

I've not found that. IME many dedicated casters actually have better Con scores than the front-liners due to SAD. When your casting stat is your primary combat stat plus a useful skill stat, plus can be applied in other ways in the other two pillars of the game, you generally can spare the points or choice to make your CON a decent number. When you have both a primary and secondary combat stat, plus using different stats for skills and in the other pillars of the game, you have a lot more stats fighting for priority.

And of course those caster-types practiced getting in fights with other casters so they would know better how to handle spells they might face. This includes damaging spells where saves are part of it maybe, of also aren't. I could easily imagine an apprentice wizard tossing a single magic missile at another to practice learning to shrug off damage.

I can't. You can't "pull the blow" of most spells, and so there is a reasonable chance that any spell will kill your sparring partner.
I addition, I really don't see most wizards practising getting in fights with spells, except as intellectual exercises.

So, you do value meat and dodging over sixth-sense, favor, luck, or whatever else is involved that the wizard has? Why is that (other than game balance)?

Why can't the Fighter have luck, favour, and sixth-sense as well as their combat training and experience?

 

[Shiroiken]

Other than the obvious legacy game mechanic, I view HP as a form of stamina. From this perspective, warrior types (and larger types) having larger HD makes sense.

this is more about understanding a consistent and logical rationale for different HD sizes if you subscribe to the abstract HP concept.

Well THERE'S your problem! Expecting consistency and logical rationale from the internet... what in the 9 Hells is wrong with you?!?

 

[DND_Reborn]

Other than the obvious legacy game mechanic, I view HP as a form of stamina. From this perspective, warrior types (and larger types) having larger HD makes sense.

Well THERE'S your problem! Expecting consistency and logical rationale from the internet... what in the 9 Hells is wrong with you?!?

I guess I expected too much.. Well, live and learn I suppose.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Why can't the Fighter have luck, favour, and sixth-sense as well as their combat training and experience?

IDK... might those count as nice things ...?

 

[DND_Reborn]

Why can't the Fighter have luck, favour, and sixth-sense as well as their combat training and experience?

I would imagine a Fighter would have some, if not all, of these in some measure. My point is other classes would likely have more. I could see a Rogue having more luck, a Cleric more favor, etc. just as a Fighter might have more physical endurance and such.

Given the abstract nature of HP most of us follow IMO, if you break down the components of it, different classes are likely to excel in some areas over others, but taken as a whole, there is no reason why the sum shouldn't be equally represented, such as in using a flat d8 (which is the HD for medium-sized creatures).

 

[Tony Vargas]

I would imagine a Fighter would have some, if not all, of these in some measure. My point is other classes would likely have more.

Yep, must be nice things, spmeone one the internet is arguing the fighter shouldn't have 'em.

Seriously, though, it could be as simple as a bit of unnatural selection. Would-be adventurers who follow the path of the fighter (or, the nigh-suicidal code of the Paladin, or, even worse, barbarian) only survive, even to 1st level, if they are exceptionally gifted in many of the factors that give you bigger HD. (Of course, there's weeding out like that with all classes, but they have other things going for them, as well.)

 

[Seramus]

When you sit down to design a game you have to make choices. The fighter has X points and the wizard has Y hit points because that's the mechanic the game designer chose.

He could have chosen a different mechanic, such as separate HP pool for magic, fortune, and physical damage. But he didn't.

That's why D&D has different mechanics than GURPS and Chronicles of Darkness.

 

[Esker]

I would imagine a Fighter would have some, if not all, of these in some measure. My point is other classes would likely have more. I could see a Rogue having more luck, a Cleric more favor, etc. just as a Fighter might have more physical endurance and such.

Given the abstract nature of HP most of us follow IMO, if you break down the components of it, different classes are likely to excel in some areas over others, but taken as a whole, there is no reason why the sum shouldn't be equally represented, such as in using a flat d8 (which is the HD for medium-sized creatures).

Those other classes get other things that help them avoid dying. Rogues get uncanny dodge, which gives them probably effectively more hitpoints most days than fighters, even accounting for second wind. Then they get evasion, which gives them even more, albeit more situationally.

Clerics can cast various spells, usually optionally on themselves, that prevent dying. At level 3, casting aid is worth more to yourself alone than bumping up your hit die, for example.

But I think you could do what you're suggesting and even out hit dice, and then to compensate, give fighters, paladins, rangers and barbarians extra features to compensate, and give wizards and sorcerers some other penalty. As with any other change you want to make, it's going to mess with game balance if you do it on its own, but if you make the cascade of other changes that would help keep things in balance, then you're fine. It's just hard.

 

[billd91]

You can bring up the "game balance" argument, but there are other ways the game is balanced out, so I really can't buy that anymore.

Lots of people make the mistake of ”not buying” something that is still, nevertheless, true.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

I would imagine a Fighter would have some, if not all, of these in some measure. My point is other classes would likely have more. I could see a Rogue having more luck, a Cleric more favor, etc. just as a Fighter might have more physical endurance and such.

Given the abstract nature of HP most of us follow IMO, if you break down the components of it, different classes are likely to excel in some areas over others, but taken as a whole, there is no reason why the sum shouldn't be equally represented, such as in using a flat d8 (which is the HD for medium-sized creatures).

Most of those justifications for hit points aren't based on the class however, but are abstract values that anyone could have more or less of. Luck is not a specifically Rogue thing, neither is Sixth Sense a specifically Wizard thing (although fits in with Barbarians and maybe Monks pretty well.)

Combat training and experience is something that Fighters as a class have. Feral senses and endurance are part of the Barbarian class identity. These are class-based justifications for higher hit points.

Having said that, hit points are abstract enough that if you really want to reduce all classes to d8, you can probably make a justification for it.
The balance issue this would cause can be rectified by further house rules. - You will need something to rein in casters, particularly gishes since these are the types that actively encroach upon the role of the higher-HD classes. Bladesingers are an example: they are close to being as good combatants as fighters for example, in addition to the full-caster suite of combat and out-of-combat capabilities. Giving them the same hitpoints would risk marginalising someone who wanted to play a fighter even more.