TheRPGSite

So a recent discussion in another thread got me thinking about hit points. Now I like them for what they are, which is quick. I can't think of much faster way to handle damage. They fit a certain style of gaming and abstraction very nicely.

However sometimes you want something with more heft. What is your favorite alternative to hit points and why?

Is there a way to get a higher level of grit and granularity without sacrificing speed and ease?

I personally dig what RuneQuest does, however it can be a little slow in play.

The old Star Wars D20 Vitality/Wound divide was nice, I've borrowed it more than a few times with a few modifications.

I also love hit points for their simplicity. If I had to pick a favorite alternative, I'd probably have to go with the wound levels of games like D6/Mini-Six. It's fast but still provides for individual hits that actually hurt characters rather than just causing a pool of points to be reduced until the character finally keels over.

I would point to Harnmaster but you will sacrifice quite a bit of speed and ease.

You could possibly port the concepts, though, to a much more abstract game. I think from what I've heard about Mutants and Masterminds, and maybe True20, they've done something along those lines.

For years I have been using a Vitality/Wound (I just call it HP/Wound for ease)

We started using in in 2e about 25 years ago. You get a set number of wounds. Normally about 3-8 depending on some stat choices etc (the method to compute varies but generally 3+ Con bonus, or 3 + 1/2 (con and Str Bonus)).
This is your "Meat" it doesn't change unless you gain Con or get bigger.

0 level folks and monsters have no HP they just have wounds.

PCs then gain HPs which are their ability and skill to dodge blow avoid damage and roll with the punches.

In play you work through HP til they run out then you take wounds. (we have played version where you can tak X much from HP then the rest rolls to wounds but it tended to slow stuff down).

HP heal fast. We used to use 10% of your toal HP per hour, now I just say Heal all HP over a short rest, but If I wanted a gritter game I would say 10% of HP over a short rest and all over a long rest.
Wounds heal slowly. You can heal 1 per long rest or 1 per week for a grittier game.
For each Wound you get -1 (or 10% on all those old thieves' skills) on all rolls

Healing - 5 points of HP heal can heal a wound (average of 1d8 which is a cure light)  or for ease 1 Cure light will cure 1 wound.

Optional rules
i) Critical hit - deals a wound on its own as well as normal damage
ii) Assassinations (and variants like stabbing a hostage in the throat) - straight to wounds
iii) fiddle with thief's backstab - in the end this got too tough as a direct to wounds so we just leave as is now, especially in 5e where its already lethal

The game plays just the same. Low level guys have a slightly bigger buffer.
Because wounds are low you rarely need to worry about tracking penalties for any of the bad guys. Then tend to surrender or die after being wounded.

I think there is a reason most computer games use hit points. It's just simplest all around.

Though with that said, I also prefer Vitality/Wound points, which actually appeared in an old White Dwarf, issue #15, so it's arguably quite an old school concept.

The D6 wound levels really aren't that different than hit points (as using hit points in D6 is an option found in the D6 Space/Adventure/Fantasy books shows), it's just less ablative,granular.  But mathematically it works out the same in the long run, so it's just the appearance of a difference..

Quote from: JeremyR;841830The D6 wound levels really aren't that different than hit points (as using hit points in D6 is an option found in the D6 Space/Adventure/Fantasy books shows), it's just less ablative,granular.  But mathematically it works out the same in the long run, so it's just the appearance of a difference..

One significant difference from most hit point systems is stuns and wounds in D6 give the target penalties, whereas many hit point systems do not- they use the everything is fine until  hit points reach zero when it stops working altogether.

Pendragon is a bit of a compromise between damage in Runequest and the simpler D&D model. It sacrifices hit locations but it still includes major wounds that cause problems before hit points reach zero.

Quote from: Arkansan;841795However sometimes you want something with more heft. What is your favorite alternative to hit points and why?

Is there a way to get a higher level of grit and granularity without sacrificing speed and ease?

I personally dig what RuneQuest does, however it can be a little slow in play.

To be honest: D&D-style  Hitpoints with no intended negative consequences for actual wounds suck. It may be simple, but this mechanic is so abstract that it lacks almost any interconnection to the  dangers, excitement and bloodlust that a combat in a fictional medium should provide.
 
Also, it is not the speed of play that is important, it is the intensity and excitement that matters. A quicker resolution mechanics only truly needed to prevent that the game flow begins to stutter (and that is largely dependent on the attention span of the involved players; if you play with the kind of guys who get instantly bored if they are notthe centre of the action and attention, a very quick resolution mechanic can be a good idea).

When it comes to events in the game, it is always the quality, not the quantity that matters. A single slow, but intense, enthralling and equally challenging and rewarding combat is infintely superior to a going-through-the-motions, standardised and prepackaged, "balanced" encounter for the sake to fulfill the intended exploration to combat ratio.

Sure, the development of interesting fights is at least as much a result of thoughtful gamemastering - creating an interesting environment, interesting opponents, relevant goals for both sides and so on - as is the underlying set of rules. However, it is quite a bit easier to have truly great battles with accordingly suitable rules instead of despite them.

Depending on your prefered degree of abstraction, there are several good damage systems: Runequest and GURPS both offers a good compromise between simple hit points and a framework of what they actually mean, the hit locations offer additional grit and since injuries matter, the system requires the players to play a bit more careful and a lot smarter.

HarnMaster does not use hitpoints; separate wounds are treated separately for most effects (excluding bloodloss and overall trouble) and the concrete effects of wound shock in this game can be quite a bit unpredictable (which is good; predictability is a basic ingredient of boredom, after all). However, HarnMaster is very concrete and since injuries truly suck (especially if they get inflamed) and dying is actually not that easy, the system provides very visceral, quite brutal results for all-out fights. And memorable ones: In the first HarnMaster combat I ever played  - back in '95 or '96 - one of the characters not even mine scored a critical hit with his mace into his opponent's groin, leading to severe shock and severe bleeding. I still remember this.  

My currenly most played system, Blue Planet, offers a similar system of treating each wound as a separate problem, but is otherwise quite abstract: There are no hit locations, wounds have simplythree tiers (light, seríous, critical), and while the penalties due to wounds add up, they aren't getting increasingly lethal in the death of a thousand papercuts style: Light Wounds are just painful, serious wounds can knock you out, critical wounds can kill you. I like this system a lot. It is so abstract that you can easily fill it with a specific meaning and interpretation of the wounds giving them context within the game, while the rules are also so concrete that such a contextualized interpretation actually mean something and have a certain gravitas.

Hit points serve a certain function and they are not always the right fit for all games.

A lot depends on the role that combat plays within the game as a whole. In original D&D, the combat rules were designed as simple and quick method to resolve conflicts that wouldn't take too much time away from the primary activity of exploration and treasure hunting.

Abstracted hit points, static defenses via AC, simple morale checks , etc. are all evidence that combat was something to be quickly resolved rather than dealt with in depth.

I would say over 90% of the complaints about D&D over the years would be centered on wanting to still play D&D but also wanting combat in the system to be something it was never designed to be.

A game designed with the intention of combat being this vehicle for dramatic tension and one of the primary focuses of play isn't going to resemble D&D  much at all. So really, the concept of hit points is only ONE of many issues when designing a combat system for such a game.

So before deciding to use hit points or something else, look at the combat system as a whole first. What role does combat play in the game? Is it something to be resolved quickly and abstractly, or is it a primary activity within the game?

Only by answering that question can the utility of hit points be determined.

Wound levels can work fine. I don't think they are superior to Hit Points, but they work as an alternative for stuff like WoD and D6.

I used to do the Wound / Vitality thing too, but I found myself not getting anything out of the added complexity.

If I had to name a favorite wound system, it would probably be Warhamer Fantasy 1e. There is the HP grind down, but the finale is a bloody gory mess.

I've wanted to port over something like Interlock's Health track system. Essentially everyone has the same number of health boxes, 4 for each stage (Light, Serious, Critical, Mortal, Mortal 1, etc). Each condition gave penalties as well as called for Stun saves with increasing difficulty.

So in D&D you could either assign HP to these stages evenly, or modify the HP/Stage based on class+con bonus.

GRANTED - all this does is make players realize that combat is dangerous and there's no fighting at 100% efficiency until you hit zero-health. Every hit matters. And for some people this is a turnoff.

I kinda like it. But it's not for every campaign.

I have a huge problem with any penalty-based system.  And that is that there's two ways it can go.  

The first is that one person scores an early hit.  Whether by luck, surprise, whatever.  Then the combat is basically over, because you have less chance to hit, and more chance to be hit, so it's not getting better from here.  Which is fine if that's what you want, but it's not how I tend to like my fantasy.

The second is both sides take penalties, but apply to only attacks.  It looks better, because it doesn't have the double-sided penalty, but leads to the combat eventually dragging to a halt.

Liked one system I saw where you had a small number of wounds but gained power when you took them, and I really like that "HP as buffer, wounds once HP runs out" system above, but in general hate that "wounds make everything suck" thing.

Like hit location charts though.  Hit in the arm, hard to wield big weapons, etc.  Usually takes forever in play.

Kind of just like hit points, they just work.

Yeah you'd have to make some adjustments, definitely. Cyberpunk is a pretty lethal game. Probably why I've never done it.

The basic assumptions of D&D pretty much mean the closest you can go is HP/Wounds and jick the rules around that. Fantasycraft does this, and does it very well. Some of the outcomes of that system are that Sneakattacks dice are lower (because they go to Wounds). But when you Crit - it goes to Wounds too.

I'm still considering just going the opposite direction and do D&D with FASERIP.

Quote from: GreyICE;841979I have a huge problem with any penalty-based system.  And that is that there's two ways it can go.  

The first is that one person scores an early hit.  Whether by luck, surprise, whatever.  Then the combat is basically over, because you have less chance to hit, and more chance to be hit, so it's not getting better from here.

That is what I like to call death-spiral effect. Some systems suffer from it more than others, but it is a geniune problem. Also, I don't like keeping track of too many things.

To the idea of getting bonuses as you're wounded: :forge:

Effects don't have to be long-lasting. In The Fantasy Trip if you take 5 damage you're at -2 to attack for two turns. So there's an incentive to use all-out defense until the penalty wears off. Take 8 and you fall down, but you can get up. Iirc any hit also lets the attacker force you back. It's true that underneath it all it's still an ablative hp system, and you do hit a death spiral when you get down to 3 hp.

I don't mind the whole "death spiral" thing as often it doesn't mean you can't turn it around just that it isn't likely.

The first flush shot often is a game changer, at least in unarmed combat, I would think that would be even more true in armed combat.

Now I like things that rest closer on the simulation side of abstraction, however there really isn't anything wrong with any approach as long as it suits the game and the group.

I did like Vitality/Wounds as a primary option, but after Star Wars Saga Edition came out, I latched onto that system as my favorite. Characters have HP and no Wounds. Damage is taken from HP, but if a character suffers damage from one attack that is higher than his Fortitude Defense (which is 10+Con. Bonus+Level+Class Bonus), he steps one level down the condition track, which results in penalties to attacks/defense/actions. There are five levels of this condition track (-1/-2/-5/-10/out of commission).

If you just take nicks and scrapes all combat, you won't suffer the penalties until your HP hits zero. If a character does hit 0 HP, he drops five steps down the condition track automatically, regardless of whether has taken any massive blows. But he cannot die unless he takes a blow that exceeds his Fortitude Defense, which would be similar to a coup de grâce.

Hey that's pretty nice. I can see how it would work with the regular d20 powercurve while making combat have a real edge.

May have to try that out someday.

I tried (or read about) various alternatives, but none of them did it for me. Often they are just extra complexities added on to a hitpoints system, and I wanted to retain the simplicity of D&D as far as I could.

In the end I hit on a wound system, where any hit that hurts you but doesn't kill you gives you a wound (or wounds), and you just record the cumulative total. All you have to track for each combatant is the number of wounds they have, and I typically use d6s to make that quick and easy.

Wounds makes you worse at parrying/dodging so you are more likely to get hit, and any hit is also more likely to kill you. Hence being wounded moves the battle towards a conclusion, but because you're not worse in your attacks you can always still pull it out of the bag - it never becomes a foregone conclusion.

I've found it satisfies my urge for a less abstract system. That is, I appreciate that if my PC is wounded 2, and the Ogre is wounded 2, we are both just as badly wounded - I know exactly what it means. I did intend to add hit locations and extra detail, but it's never been needed.

There's a proper explanation in the link in my sig, and here's an example of combat (http://explorebeneathandbeyond.blogspot.com/2015/04/an-example-of-combat.html).

That is pretty similar to a simplified Harnmaster.

Quote from: GreyICE;841979Liked one system I saw where you had a small number of wounds but gained power when you took them, and I really like that "HP as buffer, wounds once HP runs out" system above, but in general hate that "wounds make everything suck" thing.

Huh? In what My Little Pony corner of reality do wounds not suck? They're a bad thing... make it harder to concentrate and get stuff done. They're not gold stars that you collect and spend on a power-up.

Quote from: Simlasa;842013Huh? In what My Little Pony corner of reality do wounds not suck? They're a bad thing... make it harder to concentrate and get stuff done. They're not gold stars that you collect and spend on a power-up.

The corner of "I like my combat systems to let my players have a legitimate back-and-forth fight instead of having the outcome practically predetermined by the first round but last for a while" corner.

I play my games 'cause they're fun, not 'cause they're some sort of OCD reality simulator project.  I happen to rather like systems where you don't I guess "Death Spiral".  If that makes D&D "My Little Pony", well, I'm going to go play with Ponies, you try and work out how the latest kludged together monstrosity works.

Come on guys, there really isn't a wrong way to do this. Just approaches that are wrong for you or your group

Quote from: Arkansan;842020Come on guys, there really isn't a wrong way to do this. Just approaches that are wrong for you or your group

Nope, he's not 'wrong'... just very far off from what I want/expect out of combat, which is danger and a reason to avoid it. Nothing OCD about it.

Wounds as power-up would work great for some genres.

It certainly tracks well to many action movies where the more punishment the hero takes the more badass he becomes for the end fight.

I am mixed on Death Spiral games. I like the "realism", but I really like combat in RPGs and Death Spirals exist to make combat something to avoid.

Quote from: Simlasa;842023Nope, he's not 'wrong'... just very far off from what I want/expect out of combat, which is danger and a reason to avoid it. Nothing OCD about it.

Agreed. I prefer that every combat carry substantial risks, death or permanent injury should be the norm when folks are swinging sharp objects about.

Quote from: tenbones;841996Hey that's pretty nice. I can see how it would work with the regular d20 powercurve while making combat have a real edge.

May have to try that out someday.

The other cool this is that you can use armor, which usually gives a bonus from +1 to around +8, but to do so you cannot add your level to your Reflex Defense. This means that armor really helps low level characters more and the higher you get, the less effective it is because by then your level bonus will outstrip the bonus from any armor you could wear. This would simulate the Conan-type characters who run around without armor on.

An example would be a Level 4 fighter with a 13 Dex wearing a Chain Mail vest (+6). He would have a Reflex Defense of 17 (10+1+6). If that same fighter were level 10, he would substitute his level instead of the armor because he would get four extra points. 21 (10+1+10). If my memory serves me, there is also a feat that allows you to wear the armor and also add half of your level to your Defense score. This would work as a class ability in an OSR game.

Unless you are striving for a particular effect, the vanilla D&D hp/combat system is the best all-around combat system for speed, simplicity, and realism.

Think of two fighters duking it out. No matter how big or bad you are, if you get nailed just right in the groin, the solar plexus, the liver, the side of the chin, etc., the fight is over. Unskilled fighters aren't very good at defending these vital spots, so they can often be taken down in a single round/attack.

But when you get into a fight with skilled combatants, they are trained/experienced in defending these vital spots. In order to land a telling blow against a skilled opponent, you're going to have to wear them out over time, use a combination, set up a rhythm and then break it, explore their reflexes/defenses, etc., in order to land that one blow that will end the fight.

This is exactly how hp and D&D combat works. You can take out a low-level opponent quickly, but it usually takes time to finish off a skilled opponent.

And since it is really that last blow or two that does the real damage, you could realistically have characters fight at full strength until they reach 0 hp, and they can realistically regain many of their hp by taking a short rest after the fight. This is why boxing & MMA use timed rounds separated by short breaks.

But what about deadly weapons, such as swords and guns? Yes, when weapons like these are used, combat tends to get real deadly real fast. This is also approximated in D&D fantasy combat. In D&D, swords and arrows aren't the really dangerous weapons, fireballs and death magic are. So it can take a while to kill a skilled combatant with swords, but a high hp PC can get killed real quick with D&D's "deadly weapons" - a lightning bolt.

Yes, taking real life damage can make you better in combat, it all depends on the nature of the wound, the nature of the person, and their skill/training. Taking wounds can sometimes increase your concentration, your aggressiveness, your strength/power, and so forth. There is nothing inherently unrealistic about receiving combat bonuses for taking wounds.

This is why D&D's combat system has been used by so many other games: it works, it works well, and it works well on many levels.

Quote from: Vanquishing Leviathan;842065There is nothing inherently unrealistic about receiving combat bonuses for taking wounds.

That's a stretch.
I can see an outside chance that getting stabbed or clubbed might enrage a guy to put some extra oomph into an attack... but I don't see it being all that likely to cancel the negatives of damage from an actual 'wound' (more than a minor cut or scratch).
I've been a few situation were I've lost enough blood, quickly, from a relatively small hole, that my head was starting to swim.
Even with the vague possibility of some perk from a wound I don't see it as anything a fighter could rely on.

A system of bonuses like that remind me of the Warriors in WOW that need to get beaten on to build up Rage... it's a video game thing.

Quote from: Simlasa;842087I've been a few situation were I've lost enough blood, quickly, from a relatively small hole, that my head was starting to swim.

I hate to bring realism into a conversation about RPGs, but strictly medically, sudden drop in blood pressure causes that head swimming thing. Also getting punched in the head. I like to watch MMA matches, and they many times end with one good attack landing.

Yay elitest shitstains.

A good video game is better than bad roleplaying.

Quote from: Arminius;842010That is pretty similar to a simplified Harnmaster.

In the sense that both systems don't have hitpoints, and wounds have an effect upon combat, but in the gameplay I think the systems are polar opposites. Harnmaster in many ways looks like Rolemaster, using tables and tracking of effects. Explore is fast and furious - I've run combats with dozens of opponents quite easily.

Quote from: Vanquishing Leviathan;842065Unless you are striving for a particular effect, the vanilla D&D hp/combat system is the best all-around combat system for speed, simplicity, and realism.

I'd agree that it's been very succesfull with good reason, and speed & simplicity are at the core of that. I don't think many people would argue that realism is one of its strong points. I would agree, however, that some "more realistic" systems are not more realistic, and they are often far far far more complex. The weak point  of D&D combat is that results cannot easily be mapped to in-world effects - e.g. was that a miss or was it absorbed by armour; was that an arrow in the leg, or a graze - so it can reduce to a meta-game of hit point attrition.

Quote from: GreyICE;842015I play my games 'cause they're fun, not 'cause they're some sort of OCD reality simulator project.  I happen to rather like systems where you don't I guess "Death Spiral".  If that makes D&D "My Little Pony", well, I'm going to go play with Ponies, you try and work out how the latest kludged together monstrosity works.

The terms "OCD Reality Simulator Project" and "Kludged Together Monstrosity" made me laugh out loud!

Quote from: Moracai;841983That is what I like to call death-spiral effect. Some systems suffer from it more than others, but it is a geniune problem.

It may or may not be a problem, depending on the flavor you want in your games.  If you're going for gritty realism, then a death spiral is generally a better fit than "fight forever at 100% ability, until you fall over dead at 0 HP".

Quote from: Arminius;841984To the idea of getting bonuses as you're wounded: :forge:

Again, depends on what you want your game to emulate.  I've played one game where I thought a reverse death spiral worked well:  Tenra Bansho Zero.  It's based on crazy, over the top martial arts and mecha anime where characters get stronger when they've got a katana through the gut, so a reverse death spiral fit perfectly.  That's not worshipping at the Forge, it's genre emulation.

Quote from: Vanquishing Leviathan;842065Unless you are striving for a particular effect, the vanilla D&D hp/combat system is the best all-around combat system for speed, simplicity, and realism.

Think of two fighters duking it out. No matter how big or bad you are, if you get nailed just right in the groin, the solar plexus, the liver, the side of the chin, etc., the fight is over.

That's a stretch, and putting it bluntly, the same is true for the rest of your conclusions. It might be, or he might be just somewhat impaired, or might not feel it, until later, or the pain might get him angry, giving him renewed vigor in attack, a bonus in RPG terms. The same applies even with clubs, blades or bullets, though results other than losing become less likely.
Losing blood pressure, being unable to breathe and CNS injuries are about the only more or less sure-fire ways to end a fight, and even then an injury that should lead to them might not work immediately, or it migh

A good wank is better than lousy fuck. :idunno:

Quote from: Arminius;841815I would point to Harnmaster but you will sacrifice quite a bit of speed and ease.

You could possibly port the concepts, though, to a much more abstract game. I think from what I've heard about Mutants and Masterminds, and maybe True20, they've done something along those lines.

I played Harnmaster I found it to be quite fast, what slow is character gen. It not particularly slow for a skill based RPG but it is slower than say D&D or a bunch of other system.

But once the character sheet is filled out, HM combat is one of the fastest I played compared to skill based of similar complexity like Runequest, GURPS, etc.

HM Trick is the reference card and the front loaded character sheet.

As for the OP, Harnmaster doesn't have hit points. Instead it tracks injury, and injury acts as a negative modifier to anything you do physically or in combat.

How "bad things" happen (like falling unconscious, stumbling, fumbling, amputation, or dying) is the fact that every time you suffer an injury you have to make what is essence a saving throw. Often by rolling xD6 versus a 3d6 based attribute.

If you fail the bad things happen. Injury by itself doesn't do anything except make subsequent saves more difficult to achieve. It can get to the point where even a 1d6 save resulting from a minor injury can fail because you are adding +15 to the roll.

It works well in play because you have these color coded charts that are nicely designed that tell right there what to roll. The actual procedure is

1) attacker declare an attack
2) defender picks a defense
3) Both sides roll looking for degrees of success either critical miss, miss, success, or critical success.
4) The result is cross-index and the injury is rolled
5) You subtract armor and look up the result on the injury chart for what save you need to make.
6) Roll the save, apply the result if you fail.

You can download the charts from here for free from Columbia Games
http://www.columbiagames.com/resources/4001/harnmaster-combattables.pdf

Character sheet
http://www.columbiagames.com/resources/4001/charactersheet.pdf

Quote from: AsenRG;842130That's a stretch, and putting it bluntly, the same is true for the rest of your conclusions.

Even the baddest professional fighters get dropped with a single punch, which is why their coaches drill into them to keep their hands up and their chin down (see Silva v. Weidman 1).

Right before my eyes, I've seen an out of shape fat guy drop a cocky bodybuilder in one shot by throwing a sucker punch just so. Had they gone toe-to-toe, I'm sure the bodybuilder guy would have kicked fatso's butt (an approximation of D&D's fighter vs. thief/assassin).

The science of adrenaline dump is real. It can cause your heart and brain to race, giving you the perception that everything is moving in slow motion. It can give you tunnel vision, giving you a laser like focus at the expense of your peripheral vision. Taking damage is one of the things that can trigger an adrenaline dump. This is why some fighters are known for becoming more dangerous when they get hurt. No magical ponies, just facts and science.

My point isn't that D&D hp and combat is realistic, or that it's the most realistic RPG combat system, but it is more realistic than most people realize. It is conventional wisdom on RPG forums to ridicule D&D combat that a fighter can be reduced to 1 hp and still fight at full capacity. But this very thing happens in real fights.

Take a UFC fight. The fighters have been punching and kicking each other for several minutes, in D&D terms taking a number of hits over several rounds. Even though multiple blows have been landed, none have done any serious damage. But then one of the fighters drives a toe into the other fighter's liver. Until that kick landed, he was fighting at full capacity, right up until he is dropped to the mat in the fetal position. So here is a real world example of fighting at full capacity until the blow that reduces you to "0 hp."

5e adds some options in the DMG that add some twists to damage.

A recent example of a system that interested me as an alternative was that from the new Metamorphosis Alpha, the System 26 one.

Damage was dealt primarily as fatigue. Too much and you passed out. But really hard hits also did wounds, from which were more serious harm. Too much fatigue though and you went into trauma which could incapacitate you for potentially quite a long time. Performance degraded with the more wounds you took.

Quote from: Vanquishing Leviathan;842263Even the baddest professional fighters get dropped with a single punch, which is why their coaches drill into them to keep their hands up and their chin down (see Silva v. Weidman 1).

Right before my eyes, I've seen an out of shape fat guy drop a cocky bodybuilder in one shot by throwing a sucker punch just so. Had they gone toe-to-toe, I'm sure the bodybuilder guy would have kicked fatso's butt (an approximation of D&D's fighter vs. thief/assassin).

The science of adrenaline dump is real. It can cause your heart and brain to race, giving you the perception that everything is moving in slow motion. It can give you tunnel vision, giving you a laser like focus at the expense of your peripheral vision. Taking damage is one of the things that can trigger an adrenaline dump. This is why some fighters are known for becoming more dangerous when they get hurt. No magical ponies, just facts and science.

My point isn't that D&D hp and combat is realistic, or that it's the most realistic RPG combat system, but it is more realistic than most people realize. It is conventional wisdom on RPG forums to ridicule D&D combat that a fighter can be reduced to 1 hp and still fight at full capacity. But this very thing happens in real fights.

Take a UFC fight. The fighters have been punching and kicking each other for several minutes, in D&D terms taking a number of hits over several rounds. Even though multiple blows have been landed, none have done any serious damage. But then one of the fighters drives a toe into the other fighter's liver. Until that kick landed, he was fighting at full capacity, right up until he is dropped to the mat in the fetal position. So here is a real world example of fighting at full capacity until the blow that reduces you to "0 hp."

I'm not knocking HP or D&D combat but your example doesn't really hold up. What you describe is guys essentially whiffing or grazing then a critical hit landing and ending it in one shot. As someone who has participated in combat sports I can tell you that the idea of fighting at full capacity until the second you drop is pretty silly.

A few half solid jabs to the body slows a guy down, suddenly his gas tank is running low. Three or four solid kicks to the outside of the leg leaves you dragging on that side a bit, you find it harder to commit to your shots because well it hurts to load up on that side. Taking shots wears you out, missing shots wears you out, hell even landing enough shots wears you out. All the while you are getting less effective, just because it isn't drastically so or immediately noticeable doesn't mean it isn't happening.

Now that's just in unarmed combat, imagine what it does to you if someone buries the tip of a blade half an inch into you. Or if that mace cracks a few ribs through your plate.

HP and D&D combat is great for what it is, quick, simple, and kind of cinematic (at least past level 3 or so). What it isn't is realistic, at all. Unless you assume that every loss of hit points up to the final one is just a glance. However the wording given in most edition of the rules makes it explicit that isn't the case.

Quote from: JoeNuttall;842105In the sense that both systems don't have hitpoints, and wounds have an effect upon combat, but in the gameplay I think the systems are polar opposites. Harnmaster in many ways looks like Rolemaster, using tables and tracking of effects. Explore is fast and furious - I've run combats with dozens of opponents quite easily.

I don't know if you took my comment as a jibe or criticism but I meant it as exactly the opposite. What you described is what I was suggesting earlier in the thread--a way of getting some of the benefits of HM without the detail and complication.

Although I just realized that I've been forgetting the HM skirmish wargame system, Battlelust, which may not go quite as far in terms of simplification but does at least do away with hit locations iirc.

Quote from: Arkansan;842277HP and D&D combat is great for what it is, quick, simple, and kind of cinematic (at least past level 3 or so). What it isn't is realistic, at all. Unless you assume that every loss of hit points up to the final one is just a glance. However the wording given in most edition of the rules makes it explicit that isn't the case.

And the rules on natural healing contradict the glancing blow theory.

Quote from: Vanquishing Leviathan;842263Even the baddest professional fighters get dropped with a single punch, which is why their coaches drill into them to keep their hands up and their chin down (see Silva v. Weidman 1).

Right before my eyes, I've seen an out of shape fat guy drop a cocky bodybuilder in one shot by throwing a sucker punch just so. Had they gone toe-to-toe, I'm sure the bodybuilder guy would have kicked fatso's butt (an approximation of D&D's fighter vs. thief/assassin).

The science of adrenaline dump is real. It can cause your heart and brain to race, giving you the perception that everything is moving in slow motion. It can give you tunnel vision, giving you a laser like focus at the expense of your peripheral vision. Taking damage is one of the things that can trigger an adrenaline dump. This is why some fighters are known for becoming more dangerous when they get hurt. No magical ponies, just facts and science.

My point isn't that D&D hp and combat is realistic, or that it's the most realistic RPG combat system, but it is more realistic than most people realize. It is conventional wisdom on RPG forums to ridicule D&D combat that a fighter can be reduced to 1 hp and still fight at full capacity. But this very thing happens in real fights.

Take a UFC fight. The fighters have been punching and kicking each other for several minutes, in D&D terms taking a number of hits over several rounds. Even though multiple blows have been landed, none have done any serious damage. But then one of the fighters drives a toe into the other fighter's liver. Until that kick landed, he was fighting at full capacity, right up until he is dropped to the mat in the fetal position. So here is a real world example of fighting at full capacity until the blow that reduces you to "0 hp."

If your point is that it might happen like this, yes, yes it might. It's just that there are several other options which aren't covered by the D&D paradigm.
Possible? Yes. Happening every time? It starts to ring false after a while, unless the enemies are mostly 1HD with a smattering of stronger enemies.

And your UFC example is mostly one of a fighter finally getting a critical in and applying stun. Against most people the losing fighter could probably take it from there, recover and win. He's not fighting those people, though.

Quote from: estar;842164I played Harnmaster I found it to be quite fast, what slow is character gen. It not particularly slow for a skill based RPG but it is slower than say D&D or a bunch of other system.

But once the character sheet is filled out, HM combat is one of the fastest I played compared to skill based of similar complexity like Runequest, GURPS, etc.

HM Trick is the reference card and the front loaded character sheet.

As for the OP, Harnmaster doesn't have hit points. Instead it tracks injury, and injury acts as a negative modifier to anything you do physically or in combat.

How "bad things" happen (like falling unconscious, stumbling, fumbling, amputation, or dying) is the fact that every time you suffer an injury you have to make what is essence a saving throw. Often by rolling xD6 versus a 3d6 based attribute.

If you fail the bad things happen. Injury by itself doesn't do anything except make subsequent saves more difficult to achieve. It can get to the point where even a 1d6 save resulting from a minor injury can fail because you are adding +15 to the roll.

It works well in play because you have these color coded charts that are nicely designed that tell right there what to roll. The actual procedure is

1) attacker declare an attack
2) defender picks a defense
3) Both sides roll looking for degrees of success either critical miss, miss, success, or critical success.
4) The result is cross-index and the injury is rolled
5) You subtract armor and look up the result on the injury chart for what save you need to make.
6) Roll the save, apply the result if you fail.

You can download the charts from here for free from Columbia Games
http://www.columbiagames.com/resources/4001/harnmaster-combattables.pdf

Character sheet
http://www.columbiagames.com/resources/4001/charactersheet.pdf

That actually seems pretty decent...

Quote from: Arkansan;842277I'm not knocking HP or D&D combat but your example doesn't really hold up. What you describe is guys essentially whiffing or grazing then a critical hit landing and ending it in one shot. As someone who has participated in combat sports I can tell you that the idea of fighting at full capacity until the second you drop is pretty silly.

A few half solid jabs to the body slows a guy down, suddenly his gas tank is running low. Three or four solid kicks to the outside of the leg leaves you dragging on that side a bit, you find it harder to commit to your shots because well it hurts to load up on that side. Taking shots wears you out, missing shots wears you out, hell even landing enough shots wears you out. All the while you are getting less effective, just because it isn't drastically so or immediately noticeable doesn't mean it isn't happening.

Now that's just in unarmed combat, imagine what it does to you if someone buries the tip of a blade half an inch into you. Or if that mace cracks a few ribs through your plate.

HP and D&D combat is great for what it is, quick, simple, and kind of cinematic (at least past level 3 or so). What it isn't is realistic, at all. Unless you assume that every loss of hit points up to the final one is just a glance. However the wording given in most edition of the rules makes it explicit that isn't the case.

Having seen pretty serious shots landing without a fighter noticing, I wouldn't say it's impossible. It's just not what happens every time.

Quote from: Bren;842297And the rules on natural healing contradict the glancing blow theory.

Savage World's actually does the glancing blows things, though. And BoL had after combat recovery which suggested the same, not sure if it's in the latest edition.

But overall, I agree, the best damage system I've seen is indeed in Blue Planet v2, although it still needs houseruling to cover getting angry as a result of a shot.

Quote from: Bren;842297And the rules on natural healing contradict the glancing blow theory.

Yeah they kind of do. I mean I could see it either way, you could say that you are healing up the bruises and minor cuts etc caused by these blows. However like you said I still feel like the implication is some sort of substantial damage.

I actually think OD&D without any supplements, at first level, has HP making the most sense. With all weapons doing d6 damage and all level one folks having 1d6 hp it means that just about anyone could be killed in an instant in combat and it makes it seem like all HP lost implies serious physical damage.

However it breaks right down at level 3 at the latest as most folks could take at least one or two flush hits of a d6.

Either way you get into it HP just sort of breaks down if you look too deep into it. I think it works best as a quick and dirty measure for games that aren't focused on minutiae.

Quote from: Arkansan;842312I actually think OD&D without any supplements, at first level, has HP making the most sense. With all weapons doing d6 damage and all level one folks having 1d6 hp it means that just about anyone could be killed in an instant in combat and it makes it seem like all HP lost implies serious physical damage.

However it breaks right down at level 3 at the latest as most folks could take at least one or two flush hits of a d6.

That's why one of the common house rules or variant level based games changes was to split hit points into Body and Fatigue (or words to those effects) where normal hits affected Fatigue first until you ran out and then hits affected Body. Damage from critical blows (and sometimes missiles or even surprise attacks) went straight to Body. Body reduced to 0 and the character is down and bleeding to death despite having some Fatigue left.

Quote from: Bren;842315That's why one of the common house rules or variant level based games changes was to split hit points into Body and Fatigue (or words to those effects) where normal hits affected Fatigue first until you ran out and then hits affected Body. Damage from critical blows (and sometimes missiles or even surprise attacks) went straight to Body. Body reduced to 0 and the character is down and bleeding to death despite having some Fatigue left.

That's pretty well what I do when playing D&D. I saw it for the first time as Vitality and Wound points in Star Wars D20, and have been using it ever since.

Now what I do is allow players to spend their Fatigue/Vitality points. Every 1 spent provides a plus one bonus to an action. At low levels it can make or break a fight, but spending the points then whiffing often means you are in a bad state.

I also typically do a -1 penalty to all rolls made when Vitality points are at 0.

Quote from: Arkansan;842277I'm not knocking HP or D&D combat but your example doesn't really hold up. What you describe is guys essentially whiffing or grazing then a critical hit landing and ending it in one shot. As someone who has participated in combat sports I can tell you that the idea of fighting at full capacity until the second you drop is pretty silly.

A few half solid jabs to the body slows a guy down, suddenly his gas tank is running low. Three or four solid kicks to the outside of the leg leaves you dragging on that side a bit, you find it harder to commit to your shots because well it hurts to load up on that side. Taking shots wears you out, missing shots wears you out, hell even landing enough shots wears you out. All the while you are getting less effective, just because it isn't drastically so or immediately noticeable doesn't mean it isn't happening.

Now that's just in unarmed combat, imagine what it does to you if someone buries the tip of a blade half an inch into you. Or if that mace cracks a few ribs through your plate.

HP and D&D combat is great for what it is, quick, simple, and kind of cinematic (at least past level 3 or so). What it isn't is realistic, at all. Unless you assume that every loss of hit points up to the final one is just a glance. However the wording given in most edition of the rules makes it explicit that isn't the case.

Professional fighters can and do get get dropped, not just after wearing them down (as I've pointed out before, see below), but it can also happen while they are still fresh. So yes, some real fights play out like D&D - going from full fighting ability to completely out in the span of a single hit. The very thing you call "pretty silly" and "isn't realistic, at all."

QuoteIn order to land a telling blow against a skilled opponent, you're going to have to wear them out over time, use a combination, set up a rhythm and then break it, explore their reflexes/defenses, etc., in order to land that one blow that will end the fight.

Quote from: Vanquishing Leviathan;842370Professional fighters can and do get get dropped, not just after wearing them down (as I've pointed out before, see below), but it can also happen while they are still fresh. So yes, some real fights play out like D&D - going from full fighting ability to completely out in the span of a single hit. The very thing you call "pretty silly" and "isn't realistic, at all."

Yes some fights do, but it's more akin to a critical hit finishing someone off than the standard D&D combat where two trade shots until one suddenly drops. D&D practically treats each hit as a landed blow but has most of them doing nothing of substance.

Most often a flush shot has consequences for a fighter, ones that often reduce his effectiveness. I had my nose broken in a sparring match, swallowing my own blood and having to breath out of my mouth made me less effective. I carried on but it point blank diminished me. D&D doesn't really model something like that, the same shot would have chipped a few HP off but changed nothing at a practical level.

Quote from: Arminius;842295I don't know if you took my comment as a jibe or criticism but I meant it as exactly the opposite. What you described is what I was suggesting earlier in the thread--a way of getting some of the benefits of HM without the detail and complication.

Sorry for giving that impression, I didn't take it as either - thanks for pointing out the similarities. I was only clarifying because the comparison might give the impression that Explore isn't a lightweight game.
I've been trying to interpret that combat table estar posted the link to!

I'll try to describe HM1's hit/injury system as clearly and succinctly as I can. 3e, which the chart is probably from, is simplified but I know it less well.

I'm also going to leave out detail that's not too relevant to the discussion, and if we're lucky that will also make the charts intelligible--there's just one 1e-specific element I'm going to mention, I think.

1. Attacker and defender roll appropriate skills and compare the degree of success/failure on a matrix. (Exact matrix depends on the type of attack/defense chosen.) A hit result tells you how many dice to roll and add to your weapon's impact rating.

2. Subtract armor from impact to get effective impact.

3. On another table, cross-index effective impact with the hit location. This gives you the effect. The general severity of the hit (the color) tells you how many dice to roll for wound points. (This is the 1e thing but I forget how 3e does it.) You keep track of each distinct wound, but instead of draining a general pool of HP, the cumulative wound total just acts as a penalty for skill rolls and saving throws.

4. The exact code and any symbols of the hit tells you its immediate effect. Like it may be a knockout, a dropped weapon, a bleeding wound* (gain more wound points every round), something chopped off, or outright death. Basically you have to make a saving throw to avoid the effect. The number in the code tells you how hard the saving throw is. (Mechanically you would roll that many dice, add 1/10 your total wounds, and try to get under the relevant attribute, usually Dex or Con, I believe.)

So you can see if you really wanted to simplify this down, aside from not using hit locations, you could also simplify the method of getting the effective impact into a single roll modified by various attack and defense factors. Then there's also no real need to roll for wound points--you can just use effective impact if you scale wound effects properly. And finally you just have a single set of thresholds for wound effects against which the victim must save.

*EDIT: Not that it really matters for an overview, but the bleeding effect might be what happens if you make your save against a killing blow, or what happens in addition to an amputation.

Quote from: Simlasa;842013Huh? In what My Little Pony corner of reality do wounds not suck? They're a bad thing... make it harder to concentrate and get stuff done. They're not gold stars that you collect and spend on a power-up.

Wounds tend to spurt rather than suck. Unless it is a chest wound. (Thank you ever so much for teaching me that elementary school!)

Quote from: Bren;842297And the rules on natural healing contradict the glancing blow theory.

DMG explains HP as mostly stamina and gradually degrading ability to dodge as you wear down. The last few hits may be the actual meat of the character.

Recovering from total exhaustion could take a while all on its own. and any incidental nicks and cuts.

Quote from: Arminius;842408So you can see if you really wanted to simplify this down, aside from not using hit locations, you could also simplify the method of getting the effective impact into a single roll modified by various attack and defense factors. Then there's also no real need to roll for wound points--you can just use effective impact if you scale wound effects properly. And finally you just have a single set of thresholds for wound effects against which the victim must save.

Columbia Game's Field of Daisies has a simplified version. There is only four hit locations for example. They managed to pare the system down to just 18 pages including character gen.

Quote from: Omega;842431Recovering from total exhaustion could take a while all on its own. and any incidental nicks and cuts.

I've been exhausted. Recovery from that doesn't take weeks. Recovery from real  injuries does. But those sorts of injuries do physical damage and also degrade your ability to act. I recovered much faster from post marathon exhaustion (a few days) then I did a badly separated shoulder (a few weeks and counting) or several cracked ribs (a few months). All three significantly decreased performance at the time and during recovery. (Who knew that walking down stairs backwards after running 26.2 miles would be easier than walking downstairs the normal way.)

D&D is fine as a game, but realism was never the intent nor it's strong point.

Quote from: Bren;842466I've been exhausted. Recovery from that doesn't take weeks. Recovery from real  injuries does.

Have you seen someone exhausted enough to hospitalize or kill them? I have.

But as said, HP represents skill, stamina, luck, meat.

Quote from: Omega;842430Wounds tend to spurt rather than suck. Unless it is a chest wound. (Thank you ever so much for teaching me that elementary school!)

Sure feels like it's sucking when you're trying to pull your spear out of the guy you just impaled.

I liked how Earthdawn did it, with lesser damage that didn't impede and wounds for damage that did. Lesser damage was easier to heal but having wounds made even that harder. Our PCs would often have a wound or two on them that stuck around several sessions... like a curse.

Quote from: Omega;842492Have you seen someone exhausted enough to hospitalize or kill them? I have.

But as said, HP represents skill, stamina, luck, meat.

And all HPs those hit points recover at the same rate. That of something considerably longer than a little exertion or stamina loss and a lot less than muscle tears, sprains, cracked or broken bones, slashes, and punctures actually take to heal. In D&D the 5 HPs lost by the 6 hit point first level character take exactly as long to heal as the 5 HPs lost by the 60 hit point higher level fighter. Tell me again what those 5 HPs represent when healing and why they heal at the same rate?

Quote from: Bren;842504And all HPs those hit points recover at the same rate. That of something considerably longer than a little exertion or stamina loss and a lot less than muscle tears, sprains, cracked or broken bones, slashes, and punctures actually take to heal. In D&D the 5 HPs lost by the 6 hit point first level character take exactly as long to heal as the 5 HPs lost by the 60 hit point higher level fighter. Tell me again what those 5 HPs represent when healing and why they heal at the same rate?

My bet is that they heal with the same rate to avoid calculations and to make potions and temples useful.

Quote from: AsenRG;842508My bet is that they heal with the same rate to avoid calculations and to make potions and temples useful.

I'd substitute clerics as a class rather than temples, but yeah, sure. Simplicity and game balance would be my guesses. Level-based hit points work as a fairly simple, game-able mechanic, but the gamey, unrealistic aspects don't work for me and is one of the three main reasons I switched from D&D and D&D-like games to Runequest.

Quote from: Bren;842515I'd substitute clerics as a class rather than temples, but yeah, sure. Simplicity and game balance would be my guesses. Level-based hit points work as a fairly simple, game-able mechanic, but the gamey, unrealistic aspects don't work for me and is one of the three main reasons I switched from D&D and D&D-like games to Runequest.

Yeah, same here, though it was GURPS first in my case, and then lots of others. I've started experimenting with D&D-style mechanics again, but only recently, courtesy of the OSR.

Still, HP does what it's expected to do. It's just not meant to be realistic, so it doesn't do realistic!
When Old Geezer said HP represents HP and losing it means you're low on HP, I had no reason to roll for disbelieving him. That's exactly how the mechanic works best, as an abstract Stress-like resource, and IMO any attempt to graft realism on top of it are better served by a different mechanic!

Quote from: AsenRG;842526That's exactly how the mechanic works best, as an abstract Stress-like resource, and IMO any attempt to graft realism on top of it are better served by a different mechanic!

That's basically how I've come to see it... and a big part of how I've been able to enjoy OSR games after years of hating on anything D&D. Embracing the abstract nature of it rather than trying to hammer it into something it's not.

Quote from: Bren;842504And all HPs those hit points recover at the same rate. That of something considerably longer than a little exertion or stamina loss and a lot less than muscle tears, sprains, cracked or broken bones, slashes, and punctures actually take to heal. In D&D the 5 HPs lost by the 6 hit point first level character take exactly as long to heal as the 5 HPs lost by the 60 hit point higher level fighter. Tell me again what those 5 HPs represent when healing and why they heal at the same rate?

In AD&D HP recovered fully after X time no matter.
You regained 1 HP per day - CON penalty at the end of a week. Got your CON bonus at the second weel and fully recovered no matter the damage at the end of 4 weeks.

Going to negative HP was where the real meat damage happened. You were out of it a week, period. And if you took enough damage you could suffer "horrible scars".

I prefer the Stun/Body mix used by HERO/Champions to any Hit Point system.

It basically turns combat from "to the death" to "to the knockout".

Allow me to complicate this discussion...

When flesh is hit by a sword, dragon bite, 9mm bullet or plasma beam...what happens?

How much of that wound is fatigue vs. blood loss vs. meat loss?

How much resting time or medical skill rolls heals the fatigue vs. the blood vs. the meat of that wound?

Quote from: Spinachcat;842764Allow me to complicate this discussion...

When flesh is hit by a sword, dragon bite, 9mm bullet or plasma beam...what happens?

How much of that wound is fatigue vs. blood loss vs. meat loss?

How much resting time or medical skill rolls heals the fatigue vs. the blood vs. the meat of that wound?

Putting it so broadly makes the question so broad as to be meaningless.

After rediscovering crit tables via Dungeon Crawl Classics, I really like using them. It gives the simplicity of the hit point system, with the occasional crit giving a specific wound type and going into more detail.
I've thought of maybe just using crit results, and ditching hit points as an experiment, but never got around to it.

The longer I game, the more convinced I am that there's no really great alternative to hit points.

Quote from: Spinachcat;842764Allow me to complicate this discussion...

When flesh is hit by a sword, dragon bite, 9mm bullet or plasma beam...what happens?

How much of that wound is fatigue vs. blood loss vs. meat loss?

How much resting time or medical skill rolls heals the fatigue vs. the blood vs. the meat of that wound?

There are 2 ways to "explain" HP

i) The blow that kills a lesser man injures our hero based on the % of their HP it deals. So a blow of 3 damage to 6 HP blacksmith would be equivalent to a 20 point blow to a 40 HP knight.
A blow can be a mix of fatigue, blood, etc
If we followed this through to its logical conclusion Hits that do over a certain % of your HP in one blow should lead to some sort of "death spiral" and healing should be based on % of maximum HP (cure light wounds now recovers 20% of your max HP).

ii) The blow that kills a lesser man can be rolled by our hero in the way a boxer rolls with a punch, so it connects but does no real damage.
If we do this then HP are basically a combat skill that increases with level as you get better at rolling with blows.
If you follow this through logically then underneath HP you need some sort of Wound mechanic that counts the actual cuts and bruises and damage. thus we get a Wound/Stamina mechanism.... for me the best one of these was the one published in V&V 1st edition where HP / Power was the split and Power was also the battery for your other abilities.

The first of these options is a bugger to manage in actual play and leads to complex bookkeeping.
The second is simple to administer in it's most basic form..... ie  after you loose all your HP you have a small number of "wounds" akin to a normal 0 level human (1-6 ish) . You can then add nuance like a critical hit does 1 automatic wound, death spiral etc etc . This sytem works fine in D&D and means you don't need to make any changes at all

Funny, the longer I play, the more I'm persuaded in the opposite.

Quote from: RPGPundit;843975The longer I game, the more convinced I am that there's no really great alternative to hit points.

The Harnmaster method works very well. Treating injury as saving throws and conditions. With the conditions, for the most part, making your injury saves harder to make.

With that being said, GURPS uses hit points, D&D uses hit points, Traveller uses hit points. All of these are favorite of RPGs of mine. What I don't like are condition tracks aka Fudge/Fate/Savage Worlds etc. Sure they are different but what the amount too in play is a really small back of hit points. If I am going to that route I rather do it like GURPS.

Quote from: Spinachcat;842764When flesh is hit by a sword, dragon bite, 9mm bullet or plasma beam...what happens?

You need to make a injury related saving throw for example shock. And you have a condition imposed on you that will have an ongoing effect for example bloodloss. And it is likely that the condition will also make subsequent injury saves more difficult to achieve.

If the designers goes this route, the devil is in much detail you go. How many different types of saves you will need to know about. How many different types of conditions will you need to track.

In Harnmaster you write down every injury you take, and there is one ongoing condition (bloodloss) that is an optional rule. The rest is taken care by using a single page chart (it more of a graphic really) It works well. It is fast as anything I seen for a RPG with detailed combat.  But it is more work than just deducting some points from a total.

Quote from: estar;844003The Harnmaster method works very well. Treating injury as saving throws and conditions. With the conditions, for the most part, making your injury saves harder to make.

With that being said, GURPS uses hit points, D&D uses hit points, Traveller uses hit points.

Ahem, GURPS uses "wound points", because unlike D&D they represent actual injury. The only similarity to D&D is in the name.
And Traveller doesn't have HP, either, it has ability points.

Quote from: RPGPundit;843975The longer I game, the more convinced I am that there's no really great alternative to hit points.

I agree.

There might be some good alternatives, depending on personal taste, campagign style, etc... But no "great" ones, which is why most systems still use HP.

Like I mentioned in the other thread, a simple and cool alternative for D&D players that want to add more effects to HP loss, is to roll a d% whenever you lose, say, 20% of your HP at once (or in the same round, to favor fighters with multiple attacks), with a failure meaning some setback, maybe worse if you roll doubles.

This is inspired by the Perrin Conventions (1976)... So, yeah, nothing new to see here...

Quote from: Eric Diaz;844349I agree.

There might be some good alternatives, depending on personal taste, campagign style, etc... But no "great" ones, which is why most systems still use HP.

Like I mentioned in the other thread, a simple and cool alternative for D&D players that want to add more effects to HP loss, is to roll a d% whenever you lose, say, 20% of your HP at once (or in the same round, to favor fighters with multiple attacks), with a failure meaning some setback, maybe worse if you roll doubles.

This is inspired by the Perrin Conventions (1976)... So, yeah, nothing new to see here...

On 1st level, this rule means "whenever you lose 1-3 HP" for fighters, "whenever you lose 1-2 HP" for clerics and maybe thieves, and almost certainly "whenever you suffer HP damage" for Wizards;).

Quote from: AsenRG;844354On 1st level, this rule means "whenever you lose 1-3 HP" for fighters, "whenever you lose 1-2 HP" for clerics and maybe thieves, and almost certainly "whenever you suffer HP damage" for Wizards;).

Nobody said I was a merciful DM! :D

(joking aside, one of the things I like about this is that I wouldnt interrupt a spell if a wizard suffered less than, say, 10% of HP loss in around. and if youre using wound and whatnot you can be a bit more generous about intial HP, I guess...).

Quote from: Eric Diaz;844407Nobody said I was a merciful DM! :D

(joking aside, one of the things I like about this is that I wouldnt interrupt a spell if a wizard suffered less than, say, 10% of HP loss in around. and if youre using wound and whatnot you can be a bit more generous about intial HP, I guess...).

Well, the good thing is that NPCs would suffer the same fate, and most of them are 1HD in a typical setting:D!

Hit Points work fine as long as they don't increase with experience and have some method to distinguish fatigue or unconsciousness from killing. Hit Points in D&D are incredibly abstract and counterintuitive and seem to be misapprehended frequently to mean "how many hits I can take before dying."

Golden Heroes had two sets of HP called Hits to Kill and Hits to Coma, which worked pretty well except for the odd random generation that sometimes resulted in a hero very easy to kill but hard to knock out.

Traveller's method of subtracting points from attributes was pretty good.

DC Heroes' Body stat worked very well for me.

Champions had Stun and Body points separated and worked okay except for there being Endurance and Recovery and too many things for me to bother tracking.

Quote from: RPGPundit;843975The longer I game, the more convinced I am that there's no really great alternative to hit points.

Yeah but you haven't gamed that long. ��

Quote from: Matt;844471Yeah but you haven't gamed that long. ��

Yeah... just closing on 30 years...

Quote from: RPGPundit;844863Yeah... just closing on 30 years...

Well, obviously you need more time before you truly appreciate the superiority of non-HP mechanics...:)
But don't worry! I'm deducing, based on your drinking and smoking habits, which you share in your posts, that you'd have enough time;).

Yes. You can get exhausted (from very heavy work) so badly that you get hospitalized (I've done that twice) but I got out after a night i bed in both times. One time I also got back to my feet after few hours of sleep in a pool of gasoline in back of a truck...

My current "ideal wounding system" is that if character is hit, a fate roll is made. 1-2 of 1D6 from any bullet, 1 of 1D6 in any shell and 1 in 1D20 from fragmentation means death...

Like I said, I've tried lots of non-HP damage mechanics, and none has convinced me of being superior to HP.

Quote from: RPGPundit;845219Like I said, I've tried lots of non-HP damage mechanics, and none has convinced me of being superior to HP.

The system I put above is very fast if you divide end states into dead, seriously injured (need transport) and lightly injured (can move on her own). Thus it works well if you wish to have "real weapons" in your game. Making the system roll 1D20 or 1D100 with real numbers for different modern weapons is trivial (I use WW2 German army statistics quote in Textbook of Military Medicine, Part I, Volume 5, Table 2-4 and others). It works well if you wish to have a "realistic damage" for people who get hit by "realistic weapons".

However, the real question of any table top RPG combat system really is: "how fragile you wish your player characters to be within the game?" Answering that gives you the combat system you want (and thus should) have in your game.

Quote from: RPGPundit;845219Like I said, I've tried lots of non-HP damage mechanics, and none has convinced me of being superior to HP.

Are we supposed to be surprised?

Reminds me of miniature gamers who self fulfill their own preconceived notion of the worthiness of a unit.

Quote from: RPGPundit;845219Like I said, I've tried lots of non-HP damage mechanics, and none has convinced me of being superior to HP.

Worse yet. Many of the so-called non-HP "fixes" in games are just more complex book-keeping systems and/or pretentious re-namings of HP.

The best I have seen so far is the one in the new Metamorphosis Alpha. The Fatigue/Wounds/Trauma aspect. A successful hit does at least fatigue damage + the weapons damage. So 3 successes with a club does 3 fatigue + 1 more from the club. But 5 successes would do 5 fatigue + 2 wound + 1 fatigue from the club. Whereas a hand axe does 1 wound instead.

You could probably mirror that in 5e with the fatigue condition.

Quote from: Omega;845584The best I have seen so far is the one in the new Metamorphosis Alpha. The Fatigue/Wounds/Trauma aspect. A successful hit does at least fatigue damage + the weapons damage. So 3 successes with a club does 3 fatigue + 1 more from the club. But 5 successes would do 5 fatigue + 2 wound + 1 fatigue from the club. Whereas a hand axe does 1 wound instead.

I'm trying to deduce a formula (since anything that isn't complex should have a simple formula).

   Club: S+1 fatigue and [S-3] wounds where S is the number of successes.
   Hand axe: the formula is undeterminable as the meaning of "a hand axe does 1 wound instead" is unclear; maybe S fatigue and 1 wound or S fatigue and [S-4] wounds?
I assume in the formula [S-3] that wounds inflicted cannot be negative.

Quote from: Bren;845612I'm trying to deduce a formula (since anything that isn't complex should have a simple formula).

   Club: S+1 fatigue and [S-3] wounds where S is the number of successes.
   Hand axe: the formula is undeterminable as the meaning of "a hand axe does 1 wound instead" is unclear; maybe S fatigue and 1 wound or S fatigue and [S-4] wounds?
I assume in the formula [S-3] that wounds inflicted cannot be negative.

Damage type. The club does 1F, the handaxe does 1W. This on top of whatever else you get from the attack.

Say Im wearing cloth armor and have a melee skill of 4 and am using a sword. (2W) The other guy has leather, melee 5 and a axe(1W). I attack, get 4 successes. That would be 4 fatigue and 1 wound + 2 more wounds from the sword. But leather reduces the damage down to 2F and the +2W from the sword. (actually an additional 2 more wounds as I got an enhancement due to extra successes.) The other guy attacks me with the handaxe. gets 1 success only, my cloth armour reduces the damage to nothing because he could not get more successes than the armour.  

Base Fatigue and Wounds is 10 each. Plus for having any die in two stats.

Basically skill is the main factor of combat. More skill = more potential damage, or if you are a dodgy sort, less potential damage taken. But the two step damage system works pretty well. Either deplete their fatigue to KO them, or whittle down their wounds to kill them.

Quote from: Omega;845788Damage type.

Thanks, that's more clear. Though as a system it doesn't sound any simpler than splitting hit points into fatigue and body as done by some alternate versions of level based play.

Is simpler actually better though?

What is the purpose of Critical Hit systems besides trying to add back some of the complexity and depth behind the idea of Hit Locations?

HERO is a seemingly complex system that tracks 3 meaningful stats during combat: Stun, Body and Endurance.  

Endurance can be used to Push an ability (ex: Strength, Running, casting a 'spell', firing an 'energy blast') to be more powerful than it normally is.  This usually burns a LOT of Endurance.  There are also optional rules for tracking Long Term Endurance which basically reduces the character's maximum END total after continuous heavy exertion over time.  

A character who has used all of their Endurance begins to burn Stun in its place. At that point every action they take is literally painful.  

A character who is out of Stun is Knocked out and at the mercy of any Coup de grâce moves (ex: a blade to the throat) which can do lethal Body Damage with ease.  It is also possible to have a death by a thousand cuts by taking many smaller Body wounds during a battle (especially if the optional Bleeding Rules are used).

Note that HERO is very customizable.  Some HERO GM's opt for simpler as well and don't even use Endurance in their games.

Quote from: Bren;845804Thanks, that's more clear. Though as a system it doesn't sound any simpler than splitting hit points into fatigue and body as done by some alternate versions of level based play.

It is probably the easiest to go yes. Ive seen one or two others that do that as well in non-level based RPGs. It is what I used in mine and that was essentially a level-less system. There were levels. But they did not actually do anything. It was only a gauge of how much skill a character had accumulated.
In retrospect I realized the level system was redundant.:o

Fatigue and Wounds, or however you want to name it, works.

Quote from: Hyper-Man;845863Is simpler actually better though?

What is the purpose of Critical Hit systems besides trying to add back some of the complexity and depth behind the idea of Hit Locations?

With an abstract life system like D&D, simpler is the best.

Criticals as we currently know them did not appear till what? 2nd or 3rd ed? They were not in O, A or BX. A 20 was just an automatic hit. And even in its current form criticals are a damage boost mechanic. Not a HP or alternative HP one. Irrelevant to this discussion. A 10 damage crit is no different from a 5 damage regular hit other than the amount. Other games though turned crits into all sorts of weird things.

Quote from: Omega;845894Criticals as we currently know them did not appear till what? 2nd or 3rd ed?

Round about Grayhawk or Blackmoor D&D added Thief and Assassin classes. The Assassins had kill attacks and I think they both had an ability to do extra damage when back stabbing. Those are each a kind of critical.

A backstab is just a damage boost. It is not an extra HP system.

Blackmoor. Had the hit location and HP system.

It allocated HP to body locations based on your total HP score. The head had 15%, the chest 80% the abdomen 60%, Arms 20% Legs 25%. Depleting the head or chest was a kill. Limb damage could cause DEX loss, etc.

Quote from: Omega;846206A backstab is just a damage boost. It is not an extra HP system.

Blackmoor. Had the hit location and HP system.

It allocated HP to body locations based on your total HP score. The head had 15%, the chest 80% the abdomen 60%, Arms 20% Legs 25%. Depleting the head or chest was a kill. Limb damage could cause DEX loss, etc.

D&D Assassination is a alternate wound system for sure. Bypass HP go directly to jail ... etc...
Weird that a sneak blow from an assassin can do that but a wizard can't replicate the effect with uber powerful magic....

Assassination properly applied only could happen if the opponent was completely unaware and the assassin was essentially unimpeded.

Bypassing HP in combat would be more like the poison rule.

Anyway, a nice thing about fatigue/damage rules (not sure if already mentioned) is it lets you use fatigue for spellcasting, and also you can do as in Dragonquest and have characters lose fatigue for strenuous activity such as forced marches while heavily encumbered.

The only thing I don't care for with the fatigue systems I've  seen is that they tend to use damage rolls for both "how fatiguing it is to get out of the way of X" and "how much it hurts to be hit by X". Maybe that makes sense under some abstract model but I don't find it intuitive.

On the other hand merely subtracting 1d6 fatigue per normal hit, and then full dice for a "real hit" isn't especially satisfying either.

Possibly it would be better to forget variable damage dice and go back to the weapon v. armor charts concept (which someone convincingly argued derive from Chainmail). (While you are at it, you can re-evaluate the need for hit dice and variable damage. Just have "fatigue" go up by a fixed amount per level, and successful attacks subtract either 1F or an amount equal to the amount by which they succeed, unless a crit occurs. A crit, or any damage beyond 0F, produces a roll on a wound table modified by target CON.)

(Caveat: deskchair warrior.)

Quote from: jibbajibba;846234D&D Assassination is a alternate wound system for sure. Bypass HP go directly to jail ... etc...
Weird that a sneak blow from an assassin can do that but a wizard can't replicate the effect with uber powerful magic....

Not in OD&D. It is a poison system which either insta-killed, or did bog standard HP damage. There was no extra wound system attatched to it. But the book did note that monks and assassins should use the alternative combat and HP system. The HP system was the one I noted above. It just spread the HP around to hit locations and replaced the standard HP system rather than adding a new layer.

Quote from: Hyper-Man;845863Is simpler actually better though?

For this, generally yes.