Why Not Just Call Them Stamina Points?

[rkwoodard]

your right never was wrong

I mean this in a spirit of humour and pickyness, but originally in D&D zero was "he's dead, Jim!"

I don't remember when -ve hp first appeared formally (was it 1e?) but in OD&D it was dead when they ran out

Cheers

Yes, your right of course, It use to be the 0 = dead. I started with AD&D and we also had a buffer.

And in the spirit of humour and pickyness....OD&D.....geesh who plays that anymore? (I kid I would sell my dog for a chance to play OD&D).

RK

 

[Shazman]

To me, at least, an actual hit is required to remove hit points. This is something that is very heavily reinforced by terminology and concepts throughout the game. If you attack me with a sword, and the result is to remove some hit points, that's called a "hit," not a "near miss." If there's poison on the sword, I risk being affected if and only if I lose hit points. It's both horribly counterintuitive and not well supported by the rules to have hit points lost to blows that don't actually connect.

That said, a hit does not have to mean significant damage. I figure that until you reach Bloodied, you're taking just scratches and bruises. The wound that takes you into Bloodied is a flesh wound or a superficial cut. When you go below zero, you just took a really serious injury, potentially mortal. If you get dropped below the "instant death threshold" (negative one-half hit points), you were decapitated, stabbed through the heart, et cetera.

So, "hit points" is actually not a bad term. They're points that let you survive being hit. I can dig that. I'd probably have picked "vitality," myself, but "hit points" has a long and storied tradition and it's really not worth the grief that would ensue from changing it.

To me, the real problem is with "healing surge." It's grossly misleading, because it implies that all characters have the power to actually heal themselves mid-combat. Which I'm pretty sure is not the intent at all. It should have been called "heroic surge" or "vital surge" or something; it's your stamina and will to fight that are being renewed, not your battered flesh.

I think the name "healing surge" is probably responsible for half the arguments about 4E hit points.

Exactly, healing surge implies fast healing or regeneration. It's supposed to mean "taking a breather", but that's not what it sounds like.

 

[KarinsDad]

Can't we just say that KarinsDad has "won" and that, despite all evidence to the contrary, hit points primarily represented meatiness in previous editions, and therefor it makes sense that the recovery time were as long as they were, and curative magic was the only thing that didn't make sense.

A typical tactic of a losing side. Misrepresent what your opponent states and then make fun of him.

How to use Falicies on the Internet and Make them Work for You 101.

In fact, you're almost up to the 201 course level. Keep working on it though.


All sarcasm aside, I will reiterate my point:

1) 1E through 3E hit points are a combination of two things: actual damage and the ability to lessen/avoid actual damage.

2) A PC that takes hit point damage is wounded. Not tired, not exhausted.

3) A high level PC down 75% of his hit points is no different than a low level PC down 75% of his hit points. They are both wounded relatively the same amount and in 3E, they naturally heal back at a similar (slower than 4E) rate.

4) In 4E, unless one actually dies, the fast healing rate changes this effect from being wounded to being "out of luck, will, stamina, divine favor, or something else". There is no reason to consider them wounds in any way, shape, or form in 4E unless the PC actually dies. If the PC dies, then one can consider that the last attack was real damage and the rest were not.

It's a different mindset. Hit points do not really mean damage anymore in 4E at all.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

A typical tactic of a losing side. Misrepresent what your opponent states and then make fun of him.

That's why I said you won. There is always a kernel of truth in a joke, remember? And Goodbye...

 

[Jeff Wilder]

1) 1E through 3E hit points are a combination of two things: actual damage and the ability to lessen/avoid actual damage.

2) A PC that takes hit point damage is wounded. Not tired, not exhausted.

3) A high level PC down 75% of his hit points is no different than a low level PC down 75% of his hit points. They are both wounded relatively the same amount and in 3E, they naturally heal back at a similar (slower than 4E) rate.

All true and backed by the rules. I'd just add a couple of "merely"s to (2), so: "Not merely tired, not merely exhausted."

4) In 4E, unless one actually dies, the fast healing rate changes this effect from being wounded to being "out of luck, will, stamina, divine favor, or something else". There is no reason to consider them wounds in any way, shape, or form in 4E unless the PC actually dies. If the PC dies, then one can consider that the last attack was real damage and the rest were not.

Again, absolutely true.

I don't get why people who agree with (4) insist on arguing about (1), (2), and (3). If they're okay with (4) -- and apparently most are, although I personally hate it -- why does it matter to them that 1E, 2E, 3E, and 3.5 did it differently? What's the investment?

(EDIT: To be clear, what I hate is the "no injury except death" aspect, which, arguably, can be divorced from the HP system, strictly speaking.)

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

After all there always had to be a physical component to allow poison to work and for Cure X Wounds to make sense. But equally there always had to be a non-physical element as wounds don't impair functioning and a 10th level fighter's body isn't made out of iron.

I would put it another way.

There has always been a tension between the functional/practical definition and the literal definition of hit points.

In all editions, this has been particularly confusing when it came to healing (both natural and magical) and poison.

4e has not "cured" any of this issues. It is another take on a problem that has no solution that will please everyone.

 

[KarinsDad]

All true and backed by the rules. I'd just add a couple of "merely"s to (2), so: "Not merely tired, not merely exhausted."

We are on about the same page, except here.

The reasons I do not put tired or exhausted into the equation are:

1) If in round one, a PC gets hit with a single attack for 75% of his hit points, I can buy into the argument that he is seriously wounded and he has lost a lot of his divine favor, luck, will to survive, whatever. I cannot buy into an argument that he is suddenly tired because an opponent swung at him a few times.

2) We have rules for exhaustion and fatigue in 3E.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

4e has not "cured" any of this issues. It is another take on a problem that has no solution that will please everyone.

With one exception, I think 4E has done a very good job with HP, mainly due to its emphasis on "percentages" rather than "absolute numbers." Assuming that the fluffy-crunch for HP allows for things like scratches, cuts, and abrasions (for the introduction of poison), but otherwise divorces HP from actual injury, it's a very good abstract model.

The one thing that the overall health system -- as opposed to HP specifically, which is fine -- lacks, and the lack of which I hate, is the possibility of longer-term injury. (And there may well be rules for that, though I doubt it more and more as the flow of information increases.) I just can't accept a rules-set, in a games as combat-focused as D&D, that allows for "injured and dead," but not "injured, but alive and in need of significant rest or magic to heal."

 

[Jeff Wilder]

The reasons I do not put tired or exhausted into the equation are:

1) If in round one, a PC gets hit with a single attack for 75% of his hit points, I can buy into the argument that he is seriously wounded and he has lost a lot of his divine favor, luck, will to survive, whatever. I cannot buy into an argument that he is suddenly tired because an opponent swung at him a few times.

Getting hit makes you tired. Protecting yourself from getting hit worse makes you tired. This is from personal experience as a bouncer for a couple of years at a very big, very busy, moderately redneck bar.

2) We have rules for exhaustion and fatigue in 3E.

It's cool with me if we don't use the words "fatigued" or "exhausted," so's to avoid rules conflation. But I don't see a problem with "tired" or other words to convey the same idea.

 

[VannATLC]

I've not paid massively close attention, so people might actually have said this.. but I certainly, even in 4th ed, don't think a PC walks away without a scratch.

I think they'll have flesh wounds, strained muscles, and assorted other minor injuries.

I don't think any edition has had the internal consistency to model anything other than this, or death.

If you want to put forth the idea that serious wounds occur prior to death, I invite you to demonstrate to me how somebody keeps fighting at all. Any serious wound, in a battle, means you are likely to be out for the count. If you win, well, maybe you get patched up. You were knocked out, but not suffering anything some ungents, bandages, and small amount of time won't fix.

There is a disconnect between the wording and the intention, undoubtly part of a too many chefs issue. But the only position that is internally consistant across all levels of DND is that HP reflects mostly skill. There is a definate component of meat damage, and that component is meaningless, until you are taken out of combat.