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Message: <blockquote data-quote="KarinsDad" data-source="post: 4102919" data-attributes="member: 2011">This is what I love about arguments like this. People never actually examine the other person's arguments.My argument is not that hit points are meat points. It's that they are a combination of meat points and an abstraction of meat points as per what is writtten in 3E:Not one thing. Two things. As per what is written.The "totally abstract" argument takes into account the second of these and mostly ignores or allows one specific interpreation of the first (i.e. try to make it totally about will power or some such and not damage at all). Why?The abstract argument falls apart for this rule. If, like in 4E, hit points are more of a stamina or defensive or luck or skill, how does this rule work with that interpretation?It only works if hit points actually represent damage to a significant degree. Not 100%. But both as a way to turn serious damage into lesser damage, and also as actual damage.My argument is that if a PC is 75% damaged, then he is not "tired and exhausted", he's hurt. It might be a lot of little injuries, but he's hurt.Taking 75% of a PC's damage in round one with a single attack does not suddenly make him tired and exhausted. It makes him seriously damaged. And, the vast majority of players play that PC at that point as if he were seriously damaged, not as if he were tired and exhausted or "nearly out of luck".Just because the system does not have rules in it for having penalities for being wounded does not mean that a PC is not wounded. A PC wounded 75% of his hit points is damaged the same if he is 20th level or 1st level. In either case, he's about to kick the bucket and a single attack (at his appropriate level) might kill him. Yes, hit points are an abstraction of damage. They represent damage as a percentage, not one for one. But, unlike in 4E where it is closer to representing stamina, in 3E it represents damage. In 4E, one wakes up fresh the next morning with zero damage, regardless of how "wounded" he was. That totally changes the model of hit points from 3E to 4E from an abstract representation of damage to an abstract representation of fatigue (or will or some such).The entire 3E game system, from combat to spells, discusses lethal damage and wounds with regard to hit points. It never discusses luck, or skill, or defense with regard to hit points outside of the single phrase that it allows a character to turn a serious blow into a less serious one (and note: the phrase "less serious" does not mean "not serious", a wound can be less serious and still be serious).John's argument is a philosophical one which does not match what is written in the system, nor as how many players have historically viewed the system. He and others are basing that philosophy off of half of the definition of hit points, not the entire definition. He is using the half that is used to explain why high level PCs have many times more hit points than low level PCs and ignoring the other half.If a new player starts in your game system, you do not state that hit points do not really represent damage to the player. You might confuse the heck out of some new players that way. Instead, you tell him that when he takes damage, he subtracts it from his hit points.And, that's the bottom line. Arm chair philosophers can try to find ways to indicate that hit points do not represent damage, but the game system has many instances of words like lethal, damage, hits, wounds, etc. with respect to hit points or their recovery.The change for 4E is that hit points are not necessarily damage at all unless a PC dies. Even going unconscious, it can be considered to not be damage.But historically, hit points have always been about damage. Always. Even as an abstraction, they have been an abstraction of damage, not stamina (or will or luck or skill or some such).</blockquote>

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