Quote from: Sacrosanct;592925Didn't you just get done accusing someone of excluding the middle?  Fantasy isn't all or nothing wushu and magic.

Forgive me, that's not the intent.

I think a high-powered fantasy setting makes for a sensable default, and a gritty setting should be a rules option.  Just like E6 or low magic or what have you.

Better?

Quote from: Bill;592922I am not in any way trying to be argumentative or hostile; I just can't stand the 'Magic Exists so no logic can be applied to the setting' argument.

That's a Mary Sue, and no one can stand those, so that makes perfect sense.

I am not saying 'no logic can be applied'.  You're saying that on my behalf.

Quote from: mcbobbo;592844I'd say you can retain your immersion if you move HP damage away from physical damage, like a lot of other games have done.  Maybe you're not suffering any actual injury until you're very, very low on HPs, maybe not until you're in the negatives.

And when you look at HP that way, it might actually make more sense.  For example, a sword to the throat is no more or less lethal to a typical human at the beginning of their life than it is at their end.  Adventurers included.  The level-gives-more-HP system can't be representing simply tougher throats.  It has to also include avoiding damage in the first place, like twisting just so to change that gash into a scratch.

The problem with that method is that hit points are still all one pool. Even if you are reduced to negative totals (and thus actually badly hurt) you are healed just as quickly as someone who is merely a bit tired.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;592955The problem with that method is that hit points are still all one pool. Even if you are reduced to negative totals (and thus actually badly hurt) you are healed just as quickly as someone who is merely a bit tired.

That's true.

It almost begs for a 'hit points/wound points' scenario instead.

Quote from: mcbobbo;592944That's a Mary Sue, and no one can stand those, so that makes perfect sense.

I am not saying 'no logic can be applied'.  You're saying that on my behalf.

So do you agree that every fighter in a fantasy setting need not have supernatural powers? If so, we have nothing to disagree about here.

Quote from: Bill;592999So do you agree that every fighter in a fantasy setting need not have supernatural powers? If so, we have nothing to disagree about here.

I do.  I see the supernatural healing powers as a fine default that could be opted-out of, and don't see realism as inhibiting that design decision in any way.  There is absolutely nothing illogical about wounds taking a long time to heal, and there is definitely a gamespace for that.

I think they should adapt the Bloodied concept.  The hit dice mechanic can heal hit points above the 50% mark, representing the non-physical injury aspects of hit points.  However, once you're damaged below the 50% mark, those represent physical wounds that cannot be healed by a short rest.

Quote from: Mistwell;593070I think they should adapt the Bloodied concept.  The hit dice mechanic can heal hit points above the 50% mark, representing the non-physical injury aspects of hit points.  However, once you're damaged below the 50% mark, those represent physical wounds that cannot be healed by a short rest.

Yeah, that sounds workable, too.

I was thinking about something similar, but using Constitution (and possibly Level) as the dividing line between badly injured and winded/bruised...

Ultimately, it feels like something that hasn't really been broken in earlier editions, and at worst needs some optional rules presented. Instead they're trying to shoehorn 4E's Healing Surges into the system.

Quote from: Mistwell;593070I think they should adapt the Bloodied concept.  The hit dice mechanic can heal hit points above the 50% mark, representing the non-physical injury aspects of hit points.  However, once you're damaged below the 50% mark, those represent physical wounds that cannot be healed by a short rest.

That sounds good. I would be tempted to have the level 1 base hp be equal to the Con stat.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;592921They are also glossing over the act that HP as pure stamina was one of the things people hated about 4E. Some people liked it, but it was one of the first things people mentioned when healing surges came up.

I have two problems with 4E-style healing/health mechanics:

(1) I've never been a fan of systems in which there are misses, misses that fatigue or wear you down for some reason, and then "real hits" that damage you. The conceptual distinction between the first and second categories doesn't make any sense to me and the mechanics rarely reflect the supposed explanation.

I double-down on this complaint when there's no mechanical distinction between the second and third categories. I triple-down on it with healing surges that are universally limited across multiple "wound" types. (You want to justify limiting the number of times a cleric can use healing magic on me in a day because my body can only endure so much divine energy or whatever? Sure, I'll buy that. But why did Bob yelling at me to boost my injured morale decrease my body's capacity for divine energy? Or vice versa?)

(2) I absolutely can't play with mechanics that treat every wound as if it were Schrodinger's cat, the nature of which cannot be determined until somebody decides to heal the wound.

"Oh crap! That sword thrust just dropped my character to 0 hp! Was it because it cut me open like a gutted fish? Or did it miss me entirely and I'm just cowering in hapless terror? There's no way to know until Bob either uses his Boost Morale ability on me or Suzie uses her Heal Fish-Gutting Wounds ability on me!"

Mechanics that so completely alienate me from the game world and prevent me from engaging with the game world are utterly antithetical to the way I play RPGs.

I can understand why people who play RPGs as if they were tactical miniature games are OK with this. I'm completely baffled by people who claim they like roleplaying and/or storytelling being OK with this.

Quote from: Monster Manuel;592838Sorry if this is disjointed. I'm a bit sick.

Healing surges were an awful mechanic in 4e, and their resurgence in 5e is unwelcome to me. For that matter, the way Healing works in 5th edition is lame. For those who don't know, short rests let you roll a hit die, long rests give you all of your HP back. The problem is that it breaks immersion to have healing be so easy. That's what spells are for.  Modeling long term injury is now impossible, and certain types of drama will not be possible because of it.

I'm not liking the more gamelike aspects of these rules, and I hope they decide to foster immersion rather than reinstate the board game aspects that 4e had. If people wanted those things, they'd just play 4e, right?

This really depends if HPs now track wounds in 5e. I don't know about 3rd and 4th, but 2e back, HP did not represent wounds, and that was not Gygax's origibnal intention for HPs, which were, to paraphrase him "an abstract timing mechanicsm to show how a long a character can last in a fight before taking a debilitating wound".

Quote from: TristramEvans;593133This really depends if HPs now track wounds in 5e. I don't know about 3rd and 4th, but 2e back, HP did not represent wounds, and that was not Gygax's origibnal intention for HPs, which were, to paraphrase him "an abstract timing mechanicsm to show how a long a character can last in a fight before taking a debilitating wound".

Which was totally and completely invalidated when your tenth level fighter walked off a 100' cliff.

Quote from: CRKrueger;593135Which was totally and completely invalidated when your tenth level fighter walked off a 100' cliff.

Really? Seems like instant death to me...HP doesn't enter into it.

Quote from: TristramEvans;593141Really? Seems like instant death to me...HP doesn't enter into it.

Me too, but those weren't the rules, which just goes back to HPs being a weird mix.