>Sleeping character >Coup de Grace >Automatic kill

>>48118840
How would you propose surviving someone sneaking up and beheading you in your sleep?

>Evil psychotic evil character with summons bound to it's life force wrecking having with no armor and has had protective magic dispelled
>Still have to stab them 20 times missing 5 of them rolling damage dice.
>This took 2 minutes
>evil fucker is still alive didn't do enough damage
Why are people OK with this?

>>48118840
What painting/which artist is this?

>>48118904

I remember a book about games got into this a bunch. The example they used is when Hamlet stabs and kills his friend (he thought it was just an intruder) through a curtain, and how that wouldn't really work with TTRPG logic because he definitely had enough HP to survive a single sword stab.

>>48118840
Yup

>>48118972
Polonius.

>>48118958

If I had to guess, I would say Judith Beheading Holofernes by Caravaggio (1590-1599)

It's a bandaid to help the system handle its retarded levels of HP bloat.

>>48118918
because hp is an abstraction representing both the life of a character but also their will to survive, luck, etc.

Fuck this is the same reason 4e had the "bloodied" mechanic, because it tried to get people into the mindset of "two hits and they're down" rather than "I stabbed the wizard 20 times XDDD"

You know what happened in that scenario? 20 of those attacks pushed him onto his back foot, or was a near hit that drew blood but didn't wound him, or he barely dodged out of the way, but finally his luck ran out and you stabbed the fucker right in the whatever.

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>>48118840
The root of the problem is absurd hp scaling.

In shadowrun, if you have a decent gun and shoot a guy while he's unarmored and not able to defend himself, he's fucking dead. Everyone only has like 9 to 14 of the game's version of hit points, and most of a person's survivability, much like RL, comes from not getting shot in the first place, not getting hit by bullets, and wearing copious amounts of armor just in case.

>>48118972
in D&D you can argue that it's a coup de grace, since the target didn't know hamlet would stab him, he was essentially helpless and failed his fortitude save vs instant death (since a dagger in D&D usually won't kill someone outright even with crit)

Coop dee grass

>>48118840
Yeah, what is this bullshit, he might survive all those bullets hitting his cranium from 6 inches away.

>>48119067
And then he fell off the tower and took 10d6 worth of "near hits" before chugging a magical elixer and asking his buddy to call upon the divine will of the gods for a miracle that mends flesh and sets bones. Because that definately makes sense. Also, lets not forget that big weapons set on fire eat up more luck and near misses for reasons unknown.

HP bloat is dumb; you can try and disguise it however you want, but HP are designed as meat points and it's retarded that the system lets them get that high in the first place. Keep HP in check and suddenly you don't have to bend over backwards to validate them.

>>48119236
you know people can survive falls from rather high heights right? In that case that wasn't a near miss that was a solid hit they took, and their ally healed their wounds with MAGIC

If HP HAS to mean one specific thing and you can't narratively explain what happens in a fight then you're pretty autistic

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>>48119236
HP means multiple things at once, and you get to choose what it represents both at the moment of taking damage and also at the moment of healing.

pictured: The 1e DMG.

There's nothing wrong with doing the OP

>>48119143

This, however, is totally unacceptable

>>48119310
Or I can just play a system that doesn't have retarded HP bloat and has consistent explanations rather than requiring case-by-case justifications how *this* actually means *that*.

And he would still need MAGIC to totally-not-heal him after getting near-missed over and over.
And a near miss from a greatsword counts more than a near miss from a dagger.

>>48119236
>WHY IS THIS FANTASY GAME WITH MAGIC NOT REALISTIC REEE

are you the same guy who bitches about people not taking "bleed damage" after getting stabbed or bitching about why your firebolt doesn't set someone on fire for fire damage x per turn?

I'd bet you are

>>48119478
>There can only be one person that dislikes any aspect of D&D, and they must dislike them all to a retarded degree.

Nigga you can still be a hardcore knight pulling off badass impossible moves and slaying dragons without also being able to be dropped off three cliffs in a row before continuing on your merry way. Other systems manage to do it. If you want to argue that D&D is meant to emulate mythic fantasy where characters can literally fall from the sky to the pits of Hell and shrug it off like it ain't no thang, first I'd laugh in your face, then I'd point you to literally every other part of D&D.

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>>48119707
>fighting dragons
>works with wizards that can fly and shoot fireballs
>dies falling off a building

okay.jpeg

>>48119821
>Just falling off a building
>Not letting him catch himself on an outcropping
>Not letting him j-j-j-jam his sword into the wall to slow his descent
>Not letting them bounce off an awning into a room across the alleyway, bringing the fight to a new and interesting location.

Nah, you're right, why let fighters live by their wits and skill and strength of their sword arm? Just give them a bigger pool of HP you can whittle away at; now when they fuck up you can just mark off the HP and get back to more important things, like what the wizard's doing.

>>48119916
>I'm so autistic I can't use those as explanations unless the player rolls for them

>>48120135

oh shit wrong thread

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>>48120135

>>48120149
There is no right thread for that.

>>48120167

It's alright i got rid of it. I fucking hate you have to wait like 5 minutes to delete a post....

>>48118972

>A human commoner has 4 HP at most.
>A kobold can have 5.
>A basic orc has 10 average.
>A guard 11 hp.
>A leprechaun has 24.
>And a pxie described as being "physically weak by human standards" has 32.

For the commoner, one could argue that you aren't supposed to run into too many level 1 pure commoners that aren't literally children, but all the others, especially the way fey are statted (their survivabilty is supposed to come from their Sanic-level Dex and magic) make me shake my head at times.

>>48118840

The problem with HP is that you get too much while at the same time, giving weapons less consistent damage.

Back in OD&D, you didn't even get a bonus to something unless it was like 16 or higher, so you were generally down to whatever you rolled for your class's HD.

That, and martial classes like the Fighter got to swing multiple times per turn, which multiplied the potential damage they could do per hit, which worked since most creatures rarely had more than 100 at best.

Nowadays though, you can fall off a cliff, get stabbed, get set on fire, poisoned, shocked, frozen, fall off another cliff, and still fight just as well at almost dead as you can at full health.

That and martials can't hit multiple times for shit anymore.

>>48118840

Once, long ago, I was playing some AD&D, back before we had "editions".

And our lowish level adventuring group had been contracted to deal with this giant that had been extorting tribute out of several villagers. It was too tough to take on directly, but long story short, we managed to drug it and knock it out with a deer full of crap.

And then the fighter goes

>Well, he's out. I slit his throat.

And our ref is flipping through the book, and there's no rule that says you can do that. You just attack and get the +4 bonus for him being prone and no ex bonuses. Now, he houseruled it in that we just killed the guy, but it's entirely stupid to think you can't do something devastating to someone who isn't able or willing to defend themselves.

Besides, RAW, Coup de Grace isn't quit an auto-kill, although it's pretty bad.

>>48120669
5E makes a lot more sense where a human Thug has 32 HP, a Veteran has 58 HP, a Knight has 52 HP, and a Gladiator has 112 HP. Even Nobles have 9 HP.
Basically, the people who have 4 HP are not trained for battle whatsoever; that's like fighting a seamstress or elderly scholar.
People who actually train for battle become beefy, fast.

>>48119361
I kinda wish less games would lead on this excuses and just take 'meat points' to their logical conclusion.

Just stay outright a level 20 fighter really could just shrug off an antitank round to the face and everything that implies. verisimilitude be damned.

>>48120669
>kobold
>pixie
>leprechaun

>all have a higher HP than a human commoner

This is why I completely abandon HP based damage and use it as a guide-line in my games to try and translate it into literal damage and injury.

>>48120855
That makes even less sense.

Training with a sword and shield somehow makes you able to be stabbed more than the average commoner?

>>48119361
>that explanation

Uh-huh....And uhhh, what about this right here?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzsfyxACV7M

>>48121228
Aquilles is such a piece of shit. If he wasn't best buddies with the DM and he allowed called shots I bet he wouldn't be so smug.

>commoner brought back from the brink of death to full with a weak healing spell
>same spell barely affects a high level warrior

Even if you don't equate D&D-style hit points to meat points, there's a lot of shit that breaks versimilitude. It's just one of those things you can't think very hard about.

>>48120855
Your setting doesn't have battle seamstresses?

>>48121339

There's Symbaroum, in which most humanoids (PCs and NPCs) are of the same scale of toughness, roughly 11-12 toughness on average from what I can tell. Armor can do a great deal, but armor is always a roll on a single dice (unless you've got helpful armor skills) so there's the possibility of saving only 1 damage from an attack. Given that a basic sword strike from an opponent is 4 damage, an unlucky armor save can eat a quarter of your toughness in a single strike. Healing magic is limited in scope, and its overuse causes corruption on the magic user, which you usually don't want on any character.

There's also Call of Cthulhu, where the weakest enemies, cultists, are on-par with PCs and everything else is mostly too powerful to be taken out by a small squad of even the most armed combatants humanity can muster.

>>48121339
Cure light wounds will have the exact same effect on a heavily wounded levelled fighter as a commoner. They both have the same amount 'Metanarrative protection'. It means the difference between dying and not dying.

That's same I do agree heals should scale. Just for the sake of playing.

>>48118840
But it's not an automatic kill, and that's what makes it a good rule. A level 1 peasant is never going to be able to kill a level 20 barbarian with a coup de grace.

>>48121500
>but it's not an automatic kill

"As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target. You automatically hit and score a critical hit. If the defender survives the damage, he must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + damage dealt) or die."

>>48121548
That's not an automatic kill especially with a commoner doing it to a level 20 barbarian, like that anon already pointed out.

>>48121548
so it's not an automatic kill, cool

Depends on the level of the character. If they're level 5 or less, I'd probably allow it, assuming the character failed a perception check to awaken and avoid it. If they're above level 5, you start treating the characters as outright superhuman. If you stabbed a level 20 Barbarian in the chest with a knife while he was sleeping, I would tell the would-be assassin that his knife crumpled up like a cartoon accordion against his abs.

>>48121197
>That makes even less sense.
>Training with a sword and shield somehow makes you able to be stabbed more than the average commoner?

HP IS AN ABSTRACTION

IT IS NOT THE LITERAL AMOUNT OF PHYSICAL HITS YOU TAKE BEFORE DYING

HP IS, AND ALWAYS HAS BEEN, THE CUMULATIVE FACTOR OF ALL TRAITS A LIVING CREATURE USES TO AVOID DEATH, DEPLETING AS THE BATTLE GOES ON TO REPRESENT NOT ONLY PHYSICAL INJURY, BUT ALSO FATIGUE AND MENTAL STRESS.

A PERSON WHO LOSES HP HAS NOT NECESSARILY BEEN STRUCK DEAD ON WITH A SWORD. THEY HAVE SPRAINED THEIR ARM BLOCKING, TAKEN A GLANCING BLOW, LOST THEIR BREATH IN THE ACT OF PARRYING, OR OTHERWISE BEEN DISADVANTAGED IN A WAY THAT THEY WOULD NOT HAVE IF THEIR AC HAD NOT BEEN MET AND THE HIT NOT LANDED.

ONLY WHEN - AND LET ME REITERATE - ONLY WHEN A CHARACTER'S HP HITS ZERO HAVE THEY SUSTAINED A FATAL WOUND. ONLY WHEN THE HP HITS ZERO DOES THE PERSON ACTUALLY GET *STABBED,* INSTEAD OF CUT, BRUISED, FATIGUED, OR SCRAPED.

TRAINING WITH A SWORD AND SHIELD DOES NOT MAKE YOU ABLE TO BE STABBED MORE THAN A COMMONER

IT MAKES YOU ABLE TO SUSTAIN YOURSELF IN COMBAT LONGER BEFORE YOUR OPPONENT IS ABLE TO LAND A FATAL BLOW

HP

IS

AN

ABSTRACTION

WE HAVE BEEN EXPLAINING THIS SHIT TO YOU AND PEOPLE LIKE YOU, OVER AND OVER, FOR LITERAL FUCKING DECADES

HP

IS

AN

A B S T R A C T I O N

>>48120855
He's gonna be a pretty shitty scholar if he's low enough level that he only has 4hp.

>>48121607
This except I would add as corollary that a portion of HP is outright meat points, so yes, training with a sword does make high level characters physically more durable than the average man.

This is especially obvious with falls from a great height, and area effects. If you stand in the middle of a fireball spell, you got hit by a fireball. Rather than autistically trying to find obscure reasons every single time this happens for a knight to survive, its much easier to simply admit the knight is superhuman, and being dowsed once in dragonfire isn't going to kill him.

>>48121575
>>48121578
>but it's not an automatic kill

It technically is, since the character is "automatically dead" if they fail the fortitude save.

Why the hell would anyone ever think that "doing a coup de grace" would be a no-strings-attached instant success auto kill, or imply that OP thought it meant that?

>never going to kill a level 20 barbarian

If a peasant rolls a 24 with a long-spear on his crit (does 1d8x3 damage), he can make it so that the 20th level barbarian would be required to roll a 20 in order to success, since his Fort bonus is on +12 at level 20.

Dumbass.

>>48121607
Cool.

Capslock is cruise control for cool.

>>48121197

>>48119478
>are you the same guy who bitches about people not taking "bleed damage" after getting stabbed or bitching about why your firebolt doesn't set someone on fire for fire damage x per turn?
But some games do have exactly these rules, those aren't unreasonable requests at all. Jesus christ stop playing so much fucking D&D, there are other systems out there.

>>48121668
>stop playing so much D&D

But why? A good DM would understand that the rules are meant to be bent, broken, abstracted, or enhanced based on the basic DM Guide teachings, and add such things in the first place.

>>48118840
If they manage to sneak up to the sleeping person, weapon ready - then yeah, of course.

>>48119029
What a crazy guess, I wonder how you figured it out. If only people used clear file names.

>>48121653
You are a retard, as expected of a tripfag

You don't know what 'technically' means.

A level 20 Barbarian is not going to have Con 10, and I guarantee you he's going to be wearing magical gear that improves his save (which he would wear to bed, don't pretend to be even more retarded than you are). A +24 total Fort save is far more likely.

A smart man would have used a scythe in their example. 32 damage for a DC of 42 would be a lot more likely to kill him.

But it still isn't an automatic kill.

>>48121445
Coc is probably the only game where your hit points pretty much translate one to one to meat points.

Unless you have some sort of mystic protection, you're about as likely to survive as real life, and don't even bother to ask about getting those points back in this session.

>>48121548
Hmm, I totally forgot the damage is this added to the difficulty check.

Hell I forgot about the fort save to be honest.

Personally speaking I'm dead against save or dies. You shouldn't be able to just 'skip' the payer's hit points. There needs to be some sort of damage roll even if there's no way they can survive it.

Even if you don't care about trying to seem fair any time you introduce an instant death situation in the game some crafty player is going to find a way to use it against you. Just look at the magic crown in tomb of horrors.

>>48121607
That guy is right.

>>48121607
>IT MAKES YOU ABLE TO SUSTAIN YOURSELF IN COMBAT LONGER BEFORE YOUR OPPONENT IS ABLE TO LAND A FATAL BLOW
Isn't that what your weapon skills and traits and every aspect of the character are supposed to represent?

Could most of this be solved by giving HP a subcategory like "Mortality Points", which counts toward HP total and decreases at a ratio of "(level-1)dmg:1MHP", but can be GM specified damage taken that would affect anyone pretty equally such as falling from a great height, getting Nearly-Headless Nick'd, or having a god damn meteor fall on you? Could we just use the Constitution or other equivalent stat as this HP?
>>48121653
You conveniently left out the Barbarian's Con modifier, the peasant's relevant attacking stat mod which could easily be either a positive, negative, or neither, and the fact that the peasant conveniently rolls max damage. If he gets a piddly 2x3 that's a mere 16 DC to someone with a base +12 to save, not counting relevant mods. If the bastard is optimized to even 16 Con then he's golden, not even considering whatever magic items a level 20 Barbarian would have.

>>48121607
Naw, it's literal.
>but the fighter is more skilled at dodging blows
Characters take the same amount of damage from a hit that lands whether they were defending against an attack or even unconscious. In 3.5 a 20th level fighter WITH NO MAGIC who rolled at least average on all his HD and has a 14 CON can survive a fall from any height (if you include massive damage rules he live 19/20 times). The max damage isn't enough to kill him. He can fall from the upper atmosphere and walk it off. How does that mesh with your worldview that characters aren't getting more physically resilient as they level up?

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>>48121744
>Could most of this be solved by giving HP a subcategory like "Mortality Points",
swd20 does this
you get two types of health - 'vitality points' and 'wound points'
your vitality points are rolled with hitdice like normal character health, and are more or less your character's plot armour
wound points start out directly equal to your CON score and can only be improved by improving your CON or through special means

it's pretty interesting, and there's some neat interactions with the system in stuff like force powers - which require you to use up vitality points to cast spells, making you weaker - and crits letting you bypass vitality entirely and strike directly at somebody's wounds.

>>48121719
>every aspect
yes
which conveniently includes HP, anon

unfortunately D&D doesn't seem to let you represent this very well, although i expect there's feats similar to combat expertise in some editions of D&D (a swd20 feat that lets you take a penalty to your attack up to your BAB and add that directly to your DC until your next turn, representing more careful, defensive fighting)

systems like GURPS handle character skill in combat better, with stuff like defenses based directly on your weapon skill

>>48121719
I can't believe I'm letting myself get pulled in...

In DND you don't get harder to hit as you level: I'm sure you'd agree a matter swordsman is harder to hit than a novice.

This is part of the HP abstraction. Those extra HP represent that extra level of defense. The longer you dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge the harder it becomes.

Is it a perfect abstraction? No. There are plenty of cromulent complaints about the system. This isn't one of them.

>>48121764
Because a level 20 fighter is supposed to represent a superhuman demigod ala Hercules, not your average joe. HP is still an abstraction, but you have to take into account how mythically powerful your PCs are going to become over the course of the campaign.

>>48121764
There is such a thing as terminal velocity. Height doesn't matter once you reach that, and such falls are survivable even to people in real life.

>>48121815
I've run swashbuckling style games using wounds and vitality. It's awesome for low magic settings, making out of combat healing a breeze so the adventure doesn't drag.

The problem you start running into is when everyone starts going full crit boat and combat turns into whomever rolls a 12 first wins

>>48121685
Because others systems can be good too. Even better.
A good driver can use a shitty car with no problem and adapt, but he would be even better with a good car.

>>48121825
Except that his HP pool doesn't get smaller when he's unconscious or not actively defending himself so that doesn't make sense. It's just physical toughness. There's literally no reason in the rules to think otherwise. The spell that restores HP is called "cure light wounds". There's no reason to argue otherwise than
>muh realism
>it wouldn't make sense

>>48121815
>add that directly to your DC until your next turn
fug, meant AC
DC is a different thing entirely, and speaking of;

>>48121825
>DND you don't get harder to hit as you level:
i was about to contradict that, but it seems like you're largely right
while in swd20 each class gets a 'defense bonus' that adds to their AC, this doesn't seem to be the case in 3.pf
not sure about further editions of D&D

>>48121850
yeah that's the big problem with that crit rule
personally i'd see if i could tweak it a little, if not change it entirely

>>48121847
[citation needed]

>>48121848
Not 19/20 times. He's just plain tougher than normal humans. Or are you suggesting that a master swordsman is many multiple of degrees better at surviving falls at terminal velocity than the average soldier? He's just more skilled? Does he tuck an roll when he creates a crater in the ground?

>>48121874
And when you're struck with a poisoned weapon, you're poisoned. But it's an abstraction alright, you dodged the blow or some shit and the poison spilled into your mouth.

I prefer system with less abstraction and more lethal blows myself, but I can get that some people don't like that

>>48121910
>And when you're struck with a poisoned weapon, you're poisoned. But it's an abstraction alright, you dodged the blow or some shit and the poison spilled into your mouth.

You're making ridiculous allowances for their viewpoint to work. It's literal. Everything in the rules supports this. It's just headcanon to think otherwise.

>>48121848
I'm glad someone remembered. It's also hugely depended on size, weight and wind factors despite what primary school taught you.

>>48121925
When you're poisoned or bleeding, you take HP damage. It screams meat point for me.
When you're in fire because of some spell, or you take continuous damage because of some spell, it screams meat point aswell. Especially when the definition is "your target is on fire"

You can say it's an abstraction, the system can say it's an abstraction, but it sure doesn't seems like one, that's why so many people complains about "meat point"

>>48121925
Maybe you got a shallow cut from the blade. That happens a lot in fights.

>>48118840
Wasn't it like that in 2nd edition AD&D? Been a while but pretty sure it was.

I'm fine with it.

>>48119419
>And he would still need MAGIC to totally-not-heal him after getting near-missed over and over.

Actually, the Warlord was a corebook class that defied that. He got people fired up and inspired to get them back and fighting.

>>48121956
Nothing in the rules supports it being anything other than meat points. You can make half-baked justifications for your headcanon all day long but it won't change facts.

>>48121339

4e did a good job of fixing that with Surges. So a healing ability almost always restores 1/4 of your max HP (Plus a little bit depending on the exact healer)

>>48121925
>>48121952
>>48121986
Well, we're on the same point
My ridiculous allowances was ironic, hard to convey on text

>>48121956
So, as long as you have a weapon who can do damage over time, you make shallow cut every fucking time
But if you don't, then opponent dodge the blow and it's really tiring

Come on

>>48122004
Gotcha. My apologies, I'm drunkposting.

>>48121445
There's also Burning Wheel, when when you take damage you take a wound, and depending of the damage you did, it can just a graze or a brutal disembowelment.
If you want to survive, you have to get some armour or a shield to deflect blows

>>48122044
where when*

>>48122015
Have you ever watched or participated in a swordfight? The vast majority of sword swings made aren't serious, commited deathblows. Most swings are made to keep your opponent at bay, provide security while moving between guards, or to take a quick cut at an exposed limb or other target of opportunity.

That's not to say that D&D is realistic by any stretch, but still.

>>48122062
Have you ever watched or participated in a real swordfight with actual swords?
If you're unarmored, the shallow cut won't be so shallow.

And you're not even arguing with my points.
Why when you have a poisoned weapon you can make a shallow cut everytime and that's not the case when you don't?
Because they are meat points.

>>48122104
>Why when you have a poisoned weapon you can make a shallow cut everytime and that's not the case when you don't?

What's saying the unpoisoned weapon isn't making shallow cuts also? The poison does not affect the amount of slashing damage the sword does.

>>48122121
So that's meat points.
You're making shallow cuts until your opponnent has just the right amount of HP so you can hit him with a real blow.

This is fucking stupid

>>48122062
>>48122104

Oddly enough, LOTW covers this exact situation with it's system.

If you have a poisoned weapon you make an attack with the weapon and an attack with the poison separately.

If you get the weapon through but not the poison? You likely didn't get enough poison in the wound or you gave him a nasty impact, not a cut.

If the poison gets through but not the weapon? The actual cut itself was negligible or you flicked poison from the blade into an existing wound or such.

But then, all hits in LOTW are negligible stress and tiny wounds until you get hard enough to make injury rolls.

>>48122141
I'm just here for the sake of arguing, to be honest.

But consider: A commoner and a soldier have roughly the same amount of meat, but different HP.
The soldier is better at rolling with blows and fighting through the pain of shallow cuts. Both can and will still die to a good hit, but the soldier tends to take a bit of effort to wear out or set off balance.

>>48118840
depends on the character. Magicguy or carpet wearing floozie? Instakill.

High level martial character or monstroes PC, heavily injured but allowed to survive the initial blow.

>>48122200
>A commoner and a soldier have roughly the same amount of meat, but different HP.

In the D&D universe the more experienced you are the tougher your meat is. It's a little bit silly but that's how all the rules portray it. The abstraction argument is just people trying to fit a square peg in a round hole because they don't like how the round peg looks.

>>48122251
Call it half and half. While it's entirely thematically appropriate for the party barbarian to walk out of a fight with two dozen arrows and three spears stuck in them, the fighter probably took the same amount of damage in the form of bruises, pinpricks from stabs that almost got their joints, and pommels to the helmet.

>>48121901
Dnd characters past like level 5 perform feats way beyond any real human, level 20s are literal demigods hence their ability to perform superhuman feats like I don't know, surviving a terminal velocity fall.

>>48122251
"Hit points are a combination of actual physical constitution, skill at the avoidance of taking real physical damage, luck and/or magical or divine factors. Ten points of damage dealt to a rhino indicates a considerable wound, while the same damage sustained by the 8th-level fighter indicates a near-miss, a slight wound, and a bit of luck used up, a bit of fatigue piling up against his or her skill at avoiding the fatal cut or thrust. So even when a hit is scored in melee combat, it is more often than not a grazing blow, a mere light wound which would have been fatal (or nearly so) to a lesser mortal. If sufficient numbers of such wounds accrue to the character, however, stamina, skill, and luck will eventually run out, and an attack will strike home..."

-Gygax

>>48122375
>Gygax
>relevant
But fine, if I must address it... so what? The books say similar things. The point is that everything in the rules blatantly contradict that. That's what we've been talking about. There may be a paragraph describing it as metanarrative plot armour but the rules always portray it as meat points.

>>48121687
>If they manage to sneak up to the sleeping person
This. If they are stealthy enough and the character is unaware enough, and no one is on guard, or whoever is on guard missed the assailant, then its perfectly realistic to kill someone in their sleep.

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>>48122299
Yes, the barbarian's meat will be, on average, 1 point tougher per level than the fighter's.

>>48118840
How about you actually read the rules? It's fort save vs death, with the damage inflicted by the coup de grace added directly to the DC.

>>48119361
>Damn, I have almost been hit by that giant thrice. Time to drink that LUCK potion again to replenish my hit points.

All of this is just blatant rationalization of a blatant gamist device: hit point bloat. It's a mechanic that makes you feel strong and powerful. Large hit points, such as in D&D, are about gamism, nothing more. Anybody who claims otherwise is not being honest with himself.

>the metaphysical peak of 95 hit points
>le cringe

>>48119133

Almost all systems do it this way.

D&D is just retarded with it's HP system.

>Sleeping mods
>Pointless shitpost thread

Are people really ok with this?

>>48119478
>there is magic in this game, therefore anything goes/is equally valid

Jesus, this is the argument of a complete moron. Seriously. You are a literally a retard. Fantasy role-playing is about playing in a kind of mythical medieval europe setting. The resulting story-telling, if it is to be good, has to be within the limits of these constraints. You can't introduce cowboys with peacemakers without breaking the genre either. And large hit points do not reflect that mythical reality with any great accuracy. They are a very rough abstraction. Large hit points, as in D&D, are nothing but a gamist device, to make the players feel powerful.

Anybody who claims differently is either a liar or a fool.

>>48119821
>be legendary medieval king
>fall from horse
>drown

stuff of legends, dude

>>48122200
Both die equally from a rear attack. Oh, but I know: the soldier has that magical sixth sense to protect him. Laughable.

>>48122375

Gygax used that reasoning for earlier additions when there was no such thing as 6 pounder guns dealing 10 (8d6+1/×3) damage, or PCs that can shrug off said 6 pounders point-blank without magical protection for the matter.

At the end of the day, I just take the Final Fantasy route and describe it as a quirk of that particular plane's laws of physics, or rather a bunch of otherwise obscure narrative gods from an unseen planet like manipulating the universe's laws at a minute's notice to make things more entertaining, like superpowered angels.

>>48122636
Actually the 'endless HP bloat' is fairly unique to DnD and it's derivatives.

Most system you just give you some extra skill points. Extra HP either has to be brought for if at all.

>>48122375
>>48122405

Even more so, the hit point system, if we accept its metaphysical side (which is still laughable), provides no guidance on how lightly or heavily a character got wounded.
I have 100 hit points and just took a massive 45 point loss from a dragon. Is that a scratch? Or are my guts spilling out? It's like whatever, handle it anyway you want, it makes no difference anyway.

Large hit points are simply a bad abstraction, no matter how you look at it. Just be honest with it, deendeers: it's a fun gaming mechanic for you, that's it. It's not realistic, it's not a good abstraction, it's just gaming fun.

>>48121764
Didn't aragorn literally fall off a cliff in LOTR and live because fuck you. I'm pretty sure that's a good example.

>>48122354
>perform superhuman feats like I don't know, surviving a terminal velocity fall.

Or getting stabbed 80 times with a broadsword.

Because HP are meat points.

>>48121874
Except when you're unconscious or not actively defending yourself, you tend to LOSE much more hp then when your character is prepared.

Because you're either getting coup de grace'd or your AC is lower meaning your chance of losing hp goes up.

>>48122777
Time to drink another heal.... errr.... luck potion.

>>48121653
... so it's not an automatic kill. Ignoring the blatant lack of CON, he has a 1 in 20 chance of surviving what is probably a direct strike at his throat. That's a hell of a lot better than real life.

>>48121874
You're not arguing against anything I said. "I don't like it" isn't an argument.

And when you're unconscious, you use coup de gras rules, which are there to deal with that very i issue

>>48121952
You can bleed from non-fatal wounds.

You can be poisoned from non-fatal wounds.

>>48122647
>Fantasy role-playing is about playing in a kind of mythical medieval europe setting.
No it's not anon. It's about roleplaying in a fantastical setting. Or is Pathfinder not fantasy roleplaying because it has asians in it?

>>48118840
Yep, though if the victim can roll double 1's with 2d100'2 I'll let them live somehow.

>>48121910
That's essentially why you get a save vs poison. If you make the save, you didn't get any poison in you. If you fail, the "minor cut" that is explicitly explained in the description of hit points is enough. Stop being willfully obtuse and wrong on purpose

>>48120123
Yeah man it's not like every edition of D&D already has some other mechanic for Saving yourself via quick Reflexes (or Saving yourself from pitfall Traps, depending on the edition).

And it's not like most editions of D&D also have existing mechanics for catching yourself on a fall.

Nope, pile of HP is definitely the answer.

>>48122797
What if cure light wound potions were just luck potions?

>>48121952
Continuous damage: that SHALLOW CUT bleeds a lot less than a deep wound would have. Your PLOT ARMOR means your sleeve caught fire instead of your everything.

Jesus, the asperges is strong with you

>>48122810
>His argument referenced that 90% of fantasy games and 99% of D&D games are vague not!Europe!
>Time to ignore the actual point being made in favor of pedantic bullshit!

>>48122841
Sure, 90% of fantasy games are in not!Europe. Does that mean it's literally impossible for a fantasy game to not be in fantasy Europe? Of course it bloody doesn't. If anything "90% of fantasy games are Europe so anything not european means it's not fantasy!" is even more bloody retarded. But sure, let's call pointing out that his one point "All fantasy games are Europe" pedantic. Doesn't make me any less right.

>>48122826
Then it's time to change 30-odd years of established naming conventions. Good thing the fanbase is known to handle change well.

Also, potions would no longer be administerable to people wounded and on the verge of death, since a luck potion is unlikely to mend their lacerated flesh and splintered bones. Why, you'd need some sort of HEALING potion or spell for that.

>This is how the system covers things abstractly.
>Your ABSTRACTION doesn't provide perfect realism
Fucking retards around here

>>48122810
>No it's not anon. It's about roleplaying in a fantastical setting. Or is Pathfinder not fantasy roleplaying because it has asians in it?

No. Having an asian or two is in line with mythical europe. Individual or small groups of foreigners are not anathema to mythical europe. As for Asia, there has been trade via the silk route, so it is conceivable. The core of fantasy role-playing is mythical europe.

And, yes of course, plenty of fantasy games expand this BASELINE setting with regional splatbooks, etc. Because
a) they need to sell more stuff
b) some player groups want to venture outside of mythical europe, see what lies beyond in that world. (Compare Conan stories.)

But that doesn't detract from what I have said above. And that's why it is also impossible to bring more racial diversity into CLASSICAL fantasy. It's inherently white/euro-centric. Shift the focus away from that and you don't have classical fantasy anymore.

>>48122872
Well LUCKILY your body just starts to heal faster when you're dying and you drink a healing potion. I mean, that's pretty lucky don't you think.

>>48122864
You're admitting your little episode here has no real bearing on the discussion at hand. The thread is about coup de grace, HP bloat, and meat points. The post that triggered you was about how just because it's a fantasy game you don't need to throw all sense of plausibility out the window, and also that most fantasy games, especially D&D, are meant to emulate a genre. The inclusivity of the hypothetical settings is a nonissue.

>>48122826
Then they cannot heal any wounds that the players have taken. But healing potions do both: they can restore physical and metaphysical, aka luck, health (lol).

It's just absurd. It's blatant reationalization of a gamist device.

>>48122864
Classical fantasy is euro-centric, period. You can have regional modules, etc. But if the baseline setting is not euro-based, it's not classical fantasy.

>>48122873
>there are no bad abstractions
Quality of abstractions are dependent on purpose. If the purpose is to provide a game mechanic that makes players feel powerful, deendee HPs are a good abstraction. If they are meant to model "mythical reality", they are terrible and its defenders are morons.

>>48122911
While a distraction from the actual issue, I am happy to respond to his aside objections as well.

Man, all this crying about magic healing... it's a good thing 4e fixed the issue with surges, which you same fagots cried about.

Choke on dicks

>>48122916
>But healing potions do both: they can restore physical and metaphysical, aka luck, health

Yeah sure, why not?

>>48122885
>The core of fantasy role-playing is mythical europe.
It's really, really not. Look up the definition of 'fantasy'. The majority of fantasy settings being vaguely European (Remember, European=/=Has white people) doesn't mean that all of them must be or they're not 'real' fantasy settings. Hell, look at Exalted if you want another example of a fantasy setting that isn't fantasy Europe.

Arguing fantasy settings not in pseudo-Europe aren't fantasy is like arguing sci-fi isn't real sci-fi if it's not in space. And that's dumb.
>>48122911
>If you show someone's wrong you're sperging out
Where do you think we are?
>>48122916
>Classical fantasy is euro-centric, period. You can have regional modules, etc. But if the baseline setting is not euro-based, it's not classical fantasy.
A brief google tells me classical fantasy is about greek/roman myths, not medieval Europe.

>>48122873
Namecall all you want, but the sheer bloat and inconsistency makes D&D HP a pretty shitty abstraction.

>>48122927
True, it's not like this thread's ever going to get any better. Better a pedant than a retard I suppose.

>>48122916
Nice straw man, dick holster.

The entire argument is retards going lolmeat and attacking the abstraction for being an abstraction, and pointing out far less abstract systems as better models. You're ignoring the intended purpose of the abstraction as well as any attempts at trying to add fluff to the abstraction to help people who truly don't understand wrap their heads around it.

You prefer less abstract systems? Good for you. Not everyone wants to play gurps and rune quest. The DND hit point system is built to create a simple abstraction that allows for growth through progression. It does what it wants to do just fine.

>>48122939
That's mostly a problem with D&D's scaling.

>>48122959
I mean the situation is pretty clear: bloated HP are a pure gamist device. It's obvious that its defenders don't want to have to admit that it's a shitty abstraction beyond that because that might diminish their beloved deendee.

So the discussion has no chance of going anywhere, as reason collides with desire.

>>48122939
>This abstract system is inconsistent with multiple wide ranging scenarios
>Abstractions should aim for true realism
>STILL DOESN'T FUCKING UNDERSTAND WHAT AN ABSTRACTION IS

I have vastly underestimated the number of dicks it will take for you to choke

>>48122991
It's not the degree of abstraction, it's the quality of it. Call of Cthulhu uses the same degree of abstraction: hit points. However, here hit points are pure meat and it's a better abstraction because it doesn't mix two entire different concept (luck and damge capacity) so inseperably that they become indistinguishable.

So you get hit by that dragon for 45 damage. If you survive that, does it mean you survived because you are so tough? Or because you are so lucky? DnD has no clear answer to that. Their hit points are a bad abstraction.

>>48123021
>DnD has no clear answer to that.

The GM does.

>>48122873

Why can't you D&D babies just admit that other systems do it better?

High lv warrior combat in D&D is pretty much auto hit, then remove some HP from enemy's 100+ HP pool.

Systems where you actually have to work to hit, but when you do that hit really matters are MUCH better.

And look 10 times more similar to movies and books.

>>48123008
I am sorry but I am quitre familiar with modeling theory. An abstraction is a *purposeful* reduction in complexity.

Therefore some abstraction MAY aim at the highest possible degree of realism, at the expense of playability. A simulation might do that. That is possible. Other abstractions may disregard realism entirely, if the purpose is providing an interesting game mechanic.

Our objection is that the abstraction chosen by DnD throws realism out of the window to a fair degree. Other games come up with better abstractions while still maintaining playability.

>>48123021
In Call, your meat points are no longer an abstraction. You get stabbed and lose 4 HP? You got stabbed for 4 HP. Nothing abstract about it.

>>48123074
It's highly abstract. Exactly as abstract as DnD.

You do not determine where you get stabbed and if the wound has any special effects, like bleeding, disability of limb, etc. Compare to Harnmaster, for example. Harnmaster models such and because of it's "lower loss of compexity" it has a less abstract wounding system.

>>48122830

Okay, you're still being cut/poisoned/burned and you're still losing HP because of it.

That's meat points.

>>48123008

An abstraction should be able to reduce the complexity of the subject while at the same time making sense for what you want it to represent.

In older editions, the most you rolled for HD was a d8/d10 and weapons rarely dealt more than maybe a d10/d12 per swing.

Getting hit for 4 damage was a big deal because most classes didn't have the luxury of just tanking that hit, if you were hit by 4 damage, you were effectively screwed unless you had a potion or a cleric on hand.

Nowadays though, you have weapons that can deal three times the amount of a weapon in OD&D yet are still weaker due to PC's quickly gaining more and more HP than the weapon could consistently deal.

4 damage nowadays is peanuts, even a level 1 wizard could survive this hit if they rolled above average on their health roll at character creation, (assuming you roll for it at all) or invested in a +2 CON modifier.

And because of this, you run into silly situations like being able to fall off of buildings without so much as a scratch (since damage doesn't lead to penalties), having house cats being capable of murdering an entire village of peasants, or the Rogue being unable to murder an unaware, sleeping opponent because they couldn't deal enough damage and the enemy made their Fort save.

On that subject, how would "luck" allow someone to not die after having their throats sliced open in their sleep? Because there are creatures that are much stronger/tougher/faster than a human yet still fucking die if you slice their neck open.

Overall, it fails as an abstraction because it just leads to confusion and causes more questions than it answers.

>>48123382

>On that subject, how would "luck" allow someone to not die after having their throats sliced open in their sleep? Because there are creatures that are much stronger/tougher/faster than a human yet still fucking die if you slice their neck open.

Well, if you've ever seen an old master in a kung-fu movie, they tend to get out of the way of any killing assassin blow (Even if barely) even when unaware/asleep. So generally it's a damn close call if they failed to die.

>>48123382
>On that subject, how would "luck" allow someone to not die after having their throats sliced open in their sleep?
Because what it translates to is that the assassin DIDN'T successfully slit the guy's throat fully. The guy was lucky/good at surviving enough that he woke up as soon as the knife cut, and pulled his head away. I'd say that's pretty lucky.

>>48123567

Thing is, dodging is handled by AC.

Which becomes much lower since most people take off their armor before sleeping and goes down even lower since they're flat-footed/helpless.

So if "luck" is what prevents them from getting their neck sliced open because of kung fu bullshit then I have to ask, why do you still take damage?

Also, why does it take so much damage to slice a dude's neck open and kill them?

>>48121607
Thank you Pepe

>>48123665
>Thing is, dodging is handled by AC.
Fully dodging is covered by AC. HP is more like heroic plot-armor a lot of the time.

>>48123624

You do realize that if someone has a sharp blade against your neck, the last thing you should be doing is jerking your neck away, right?

Seriously, if anything, you just coup de grace'd yourself in the process of trying to save yourself.

Not to mention, the assassin would also probably have his full weight on top of you as he's slicing your neck open as well, so you probably won't be able to dodge it as effectively as well.

>>48123714

So it's not so much luck, it's meat points.

>>48123746
>So it's not so much luck, it's meat points.
That's literally the opposite of what I'm saying. Learn reading comprehension.

>>48123720
>if anything, you just coup de grace'd yourself in the process of trying to save yourself.
Which brings us back to the point that HP is partly a measure of luck and survival ability. The 10 HP guard ends up killing himself accidentally from a low sneak-attack assassination. The 50 HP barbarian hero doesn't.

>>48123771
You're saying they're not meat points then explaining how they totally are.

>This crayon is not green! It's a combination of blue and yellow, that makes it purple! How many times do I have to explain it? Stop calling it green!

>>48123771

You called it plot armor man.

That's literally what meat points are.

>>48123795
>You're saying they're not meat points then explaining how they totally are.
I'm explaining why they're luck points+meat points repeatedly, and you keep hearing what you want to hear. And a high-HP heroic character is at that point, mostly going on luck points.

>>48123810
>You called it plot armor man.
>That's literally what meat points are.
Holy fuck you are an idiot. "Plot armor" is a literary term for when something that should kill a character is survived due to narrative luck. I repeat NARRATIVE LUCK.

>>48123792

Which doesn't make sense since the Barbarian only becomes marginally tougher if he's raging.

Which brings up another issue, is the Barbarian able to survive because he's tougher or does he survive because he's luckier?

And how does killing goblins cause one to become luckier anyways, or able to survive attacks for that matter?

>>48123847
>Barbarian able to survive because he's tougher or does he survive because he's luckier?
Barbarians have larger hit dice than other equally levelled characters because barbarians are hardy. He has that about of hit dice because of experience. Number of hit dice - luck/survival experience
larger hit dice - greater natural toughness.

>>48123847
>how does killing goblins cause one to become better at surviving attacks
Gee, I can't imagine how.

>>48123834

[citation needed]

Also, that still doesn't explain how every other PC can take more hits than Rasputin without getting slowed down even a little bit.

>>48123887
>Also, that still doesn't explain how every other PC can take more hits than Rasputin without getting slowed down even a little bit.
Wow. An actual meaningful criticism of the system after 20 minutes of shitposting. Color me impressed.

>>48123865
>>48123878

Even then, a spear to the chest should be something that you'd avoid as much as possible, yet for the average PC, you can take multiple stab wounds and still be just as good as when you started.

Not to mention, how this factors into how AC is supposed to work.

"Oh, you miraculously dodged a deadly blow, even though the attack got through your AC, which already represents your ability to dodge the attack, except it's only the first half of your dodge...that you failed to dodge before so you dodge...twice? I guess?"

It's abstraction over abstraction that breaks down if you apply any degree of logic to it.

File: kung fu wake-up.png (47KB, 598x144px) Image search: [Google]

47KB, 598x144px

>>48118904
it's a pretty common cliche for a character with a fine-tuned sense of danger to wake up at the last moment to dodge or otherwise foil an attack (or even to defend themselves unconsciously while still half-asleep).

>>48123933
>"Oh, you miraculously dodged a deadly blow, even though the attack got through your AC, which already represents your ability to dodge the attack, except it's only the first half of your dodge...that you failed to dodge before so you dodge...twice? I guess?"
Glancing blow.

A level 6 fighter (40 HP) is ambushed by a group of exceptionally tough thugs. In the struggle, two of them manage to grapple and pin the fighter and the third starts aerating his liver with a dagger.

The fighter is obviously at a disadvantage and unable to move, but not to the point of a coup de grace.
The dagger still deals 1d4, taking at least ten, on average sixteen, and at most 40 thrusts to the chest to take him out.

There is no way to justify this via close calls or nicks and scrapes or whatever.

>>48123945

Which still doesn't work when you're taking damage that's a solid fraction of your total HP.

A Barbarian taking six hits from a cave dragon and suffering 50 points of damage is not a "glancing blow" by any stretch of the imagination, especially when you realize that a long sword deals only 1d10+STR for comparison's sake.

>>48118840
That's not how coup de grace works in Pathfinder, at least.

Hit points are an abstraction.
Hit points being an abstraction does not make a game good or bad, in isolation.

DnD's system works perfectly well for DnD, and the arguments against always just boil down to "it's called cure wounds" and "but poison" and "but fall damage" and ignore the 90% of generalities where it requires no justification and works perfectly fine.

Meanwhile, location and wound systems like in Runequest and Reign also work well there, where even a single hit is something you want to avoid and dodge.

Lastly, unrelated:
Most RPing in the DnD vein fits notions of early 1900s Asian fantasy fiction, rather than European fantasy fiction. In fact, DnD hews very closely to traditional ideas of jianghu and wuxia, where:

>a storied, semi-mythic realm of taverns and inns where our heroes drink and form fast bonds of friendship, temples where wise or wicked monks bestow scrolls of great wisdom or great evil on the wuxia, caverns where potent swords or talismans lie secreted across the centuries, mountain bandit lairs where the righteous gather to justly uphold honor against a corrupt dynasty, palaces where virtuous but ass-kicking maidens fan themselves coyly behind silk screens, and market squares where epic martial arts battles unfold.

>>48123935

That is handled by passive Perception checks. You do not need to change the Coup de Grace rules to accommodate that situation because it is already covered by the skill system.

>>48119370
Better than insisting the last C is silent.
It's not a strike of fat.

My biggest issue with all these explanation as to what HP actually is is that they *all* overlap with existing mechanics.

>They're dodges!
That's what AC is for.

>They're glancing blows!
That's what a low damage roll is for.

>They're lucky breaks!
That's what dice rolls in general are for.

>They're fate!
Most editions of D&D have feats, backgrounds, traits, or other character aspects that cover fate; none of those add to HP.

>>48123997

>ABSTRACTION ABSTRACTION ABSTRACTION

The entire point of an abstraction is reduce complexity while maintaining verisimilitude in the world that it's used in.

If your explanation causes more questions than answers, it's not a good abstraction.

>>48123967
>Which still doesn't work when you're taking damage that's a solid fraction of your total HP.
No it isn't. As you get more and more HP, that static number becomes a smaller and smaller fraction of your total HP.
>A Barbarian taking six hits from a cave dragon and suffering 50 points of damage
depends what level barbarian you're talking about. I feel like I've explained this several times already, and you're still not fully wrapping your head around it. I think it's because you've never actually played the game, seeing as there's no such thing as a "Cave dragon" in it.

>>48124014
>You do not need to change the Coup de Grace rules to accommodate that situation because it is already covered by the skill system.

it's already been changed. an attack to a sleeping opponent in 5e is just a critical hit, no instant-kill or whatever.

you only need to roll a perception check if it's something you can't do reliably (you don't need to make a passive perception check to notice a rhino charging toward you). so it's entirely possible that waking up to fend off an assailant is easy enough for a high level character that it requires no roll.

>>48124029
>>48124138

>No it isn't. As you get more and more HP, that static number becomes a smaller and smaller fraction of your total HP.

Listen, I know people who have been trained in the military since they were in their 30's and I've yet to see any of them take a stab wound to the chest and keep walking like it never happened just because they've served in desert storm or something.

That still doesn't make much sense, because it means that the further along you go, you just stop giving a fuck about getting stabbed because you have so much HP that it just becomes "non-lethal" damage overall.

Under this logic, a commoner with levels in commoner becomes more capable of surviving a guard stabbing them in the gut, even though their dirt farmers who have never picked up an actual weapon or received any training to warrant their survival.

>depends what level barbarian you're talking about. I feel like I've explained this several times already, and you're still not fully wrapping your head around it.

Because your explanations are shit, your logic is flawed, and your arguments hold no water once basic logic is thrown into the works.

>seeing as there's no such thing as a "Cave dragon" in it.

>http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/dragons/dragon/dragon-cave-kp/dragon-adult-cave-kp

>>48121629
HP includes divine protection, which could be things like the Cloak Of Athena from Greek Mythology. Athena would drape a portion of her cloak over favored heroes to protect them from harm. Mechanically, that would be an increase in AC and HP.

>>48124165
>http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/dragons/dragon/dragon-cave-kp/dragon-adult-cave-kp
>Midgard Bestiary for Pathfinder RPG, (c) 2012 Open Design LLC;
>Pathfinder

> I've yet to see any of them take a stab wound to the chest and keep walking
No one is even arguing that taking a direct stab to the chest and walking it off is what taking damage at high hit points means. Did you miss my earlier points about it being partly an abstraction of luck/rolling with a blow, or are you just being intentionally dense?
>

>>48124203
Really now? Most cleric spells that fall under protection give +AC and +Saves, not temporary HP. The one cantrip that does give temporary HP explicitly says it pumps you with "life energy"; nothing about the protective will of the gods as far as I can see.

>>48122611
Mor like that giant got glancing blows that may have bruised and battered you or cracked bones, and you are exhausted from running around in heavy armor and that magic potion heals those minor wounds and reinvigorated you, letting you fight on.

>>48124255
I was giving an example of divine protection. Things like AC boosts would also represent Divine Protection, as Divine magic is providing a barrier that acts like another layer of armor, or helping you withstand that poison/shrug off that spell/dodge the dart trap.

>>48124203

If that were true then the bulk of divine protection spells wouldn't grant a bonus to AC/Saves.

The only spells that grant temporary HP explicitly states that you're either pumped full of life energy or you steal life energy from someone else.

>>48118840
I use all kinds of narrative kills, honestly.

>PC sneaks up on a guard
>decides to come up from behind and slit his throat
>grapple check succeeds, guard dead

>PC with a sniper rifle wants to ping off a HVT who isn't an armed/armored target or otherwise an active combatant
>does all his checks, makes the shot
>chunky salsa, fuck dice damage

Anything where "his meat points absorb the attack" detracts from the fun of the game's story, really.

>>48124165
Don't bother. These people are happy in their deeandee bubble and they refuse to look at anything any other way, going so far as to ignore actual points in favor of being pedantic and ignoring whole posts they disagree with if they can't find some nitpicky thing to latch onto instead of an arguement.

>D&D doesn't have HP bloat! It has eighteen different justifications, all of which overlap with existing mechanics!
>THIS IS NOT A SIMPLE EASY-TO-FIX PROBLEM ALMOST NO OTHER SYSTEM HAS YOU GUYS ARE JUST AUTISTS REEEEEEE

>>48124225

I fail to see how the cave dragon coming from PF makes it exist less.

Also, you're the one arguing the HP stands for

>luck
>dodging
>plot armor

Among other fucking stupid abstractions that are either already covered by a mechanic or have no bearing to how they work in practice.

>>48118840
I would let the character roll for stealth and then for the attack, if something is at stake (like the sleeping guy, alerting his bodyguards who are waiting outside). Depending on the attack roll, the kill will be instantly (successful attack), or the sleeper will still have time to should before dying (regular failure), or the attacker will fuck up badly (critical failure) like only injuring the sleeper, waking him up, having the sleeper shouting like a butchered pig, and getting his weapon stuck in something.

>>48123200
Or maybe you're getting worse at defending yourself because you're getting light headed from blood loss/becoming sluggish as the poison moves through your veins/trying to put out the fire that is spreading on your sleeve.

>>48124307

See >>48124293

>>48124362

Yet you take no penalties beyond having less HP to "defend yourself with."

If what you are saying is how it's supposed to used, then there should be a system where you take a penalty to your rolls based on how much damage you've taken at once and over a period of time.

Your attack bonus and AC remain the same whether you're at 100 HP or 1 HP, which by the way are mechanics that already exist to show how well your character performs during combat.

>>48124347
>Among other fucking stupid abstractions that are either already covered by a mechanic
I'm all ears. AC factors in dodging, what about the other two? As far as I can tell, HP IS how D&D implements those things mechanically.

A clumsy DEX 4 schmuck that can't do anything even remotely graceful engages in combat with some horrid beasty. He is also unarmored; cloth breeches and that's it. A dragon swipes his claws at him and, wouldn't ya know it, he manages to get out of the way just in time. Man, what a close call for someone that normally struggles to avoid cutting himself shaving. And wow, look at that, he's doing it again! And again! And a fourth time, wow this guy is the Muhammad Ali of dragonslayers despite everything saying he really really shouldn't be!

>>48124410
Read the fucking thread.

>>48124293

Yet that still has nothing to do with HP or how it's supposed to not be meat points.

>>48124410

>luck

Rolling dice

>dodging

AC

>plot armor

Meat points

Also, you can find other explanations by reading the thread.

>>48124427
It you mean
>Most editions of D&D have feats, backgrounds, traits, or other character aspects that cover fate; none of those add to HP.
That's exceedingly vague, and not even necessarily true.

>>48124495
>Meat points
Maybe you can explain more fully why you think "plot armor" means "meat points".
>luck
>Rolling dice
No, that's variation. I mean in-game fortune being on your side.

>>48123961
Bleeding out isn't instant, especially when adrenaline is going. You keep stabbing until the fucker stops moving, even if he's already essentially dead.

>>48124497
So tell me then, what background option or feat or whatever would I take to represent a character fated for something grand?
Does it give me extra fucking HP?

>>48124528
"Plot armor" is the excuse they use when they've run out of other justifications. If they can't say it's near miss or glancing blow or lucky break or whatever, it still takes away to same amount of HP. It's fucking meat points for people that can't admit D&D uses meatpoints.

Meat points aren't even a bad thing; tons of system use HP for meat points. They just don't let them get stupidly fucking high to where you can dance a jig with half a dozen swords jutting though their chest.

>>48124579
Bleeding out only exists at negative HP. You need to stab him that many times before him bleeding out is even an issue.

>>48124646
>thinking that the mechanics and the fluff have to be chained at the hip
ok

Remember kids, consistency is of the Devil! If you hear someone saying they want consistent tone, consistent power levels between party members, consistent resolution mechanics, or a consistent explanation of what it means to lose HP, scream "Autist" at them until they leave you alone, then contact the nearest D&D grognard to comfort you with half-remembered stores of that one time he rolled two 20s and decapitated a dragon.

>>48121695
>Unless you have some sort of mystic protection, you're about as likely to survive as real life, and don't even bother to ask about getting those points back in this session.
1 word: regeneration.

>>48124528

>Maybe you can explain more fully why you think "plot armor" means "meat points".

Because they're both shitty conventions used to explain why a dude taking multiple stab wounds to the chest is still capable of fighting someone when all basic logic stipulates that he should be fucking dead, or at least critically injured.

That and it takes the bite out of an encounter because the audience (in this case, the players) knows that nobody is going to fucking die no matter how many times they get dealt "lethal" wounds and if they do come close to dying, a deus ex machina or big damn heroes moment will save them at the last moment so the story (campaign) doesn't end before we actually see the end of the story.

>>48124718
>the audience (in this case, the players) knows that nobody is going to fucking die no matter how many times they get dealt "lethal" wounds and if they do come close to dying, a deus ex machina or big damn heroes moment will save them at the last moment so the story (campaign) doesn't end before we actually see the end of the story.
That sounds more like Dungeon World-style narrativism to me. In D&D, you very well might die before the end of the story if you fuck up, but you wouldn't know anything about that, because you've shown multiple times in this conversation that you've never played the fucking game.

>>48124678
You're right, D&D has a proud tradition of caring fuck all about making the fluff agree with the crunch.

>"Fighters are elite warriors and the rogue's skills are necessary to a party's survival in the dungeon!"
>Fighters tend to be ass unless they hyperspecialize in a single aspect, which they will still tend to not be great at, and rogues are useless by time the wizard gets access to third level spells and a decent amount of gold.
>"Monks are contributing memebers of the party"
>Pfffft haha no.
>"Wizards must be wise and calculating with their spells."
>CAST CAST CAST CAST ROPETRICK

>>48124748
>I can't disagree with what he's saying, so I'll attack his credibility on an anonymous imageboard.
Please just do the world a favor and kill yourself.

>>48121815
S.D.C. and H.P. system from Palladium.

>>48124820
I told you why what you're saying is wrong. I've explained it several times. "multiple swords sticking out of your chest" is a shitty way for the DM to fluff the loss of many hit points at high levels, and the game designers certainly don't expect that. 10 hp of damage to a weak character is going to look a lot different than 10 HP of damage to a high-level one.

>>48124748

Unless you're fighting a creature that can deal at least half the Fighter/Barbarian's health in one turn, nobody is going to feel threatened by some thug wielding a dagger.

A battleax, one of the strongest martial weapons you can buy at character creation, "only" deals 1d12+STR with every strike.

A character swinging three times with said axe will be adding a BAB of +11/+6/+1, which means that they're going to be missing more often than hitting past their first swing.

Even then, if we assume that you hit every single time and roll max damage, with a STR of +5, you'll only be dealing 51 damage per turn.

Now, let's compare this to a level 11 Fighter with +2 CON and a Barbarian of equal level and CON.

If the the Fighter only rolls average for their health (6)+CON, they'd still have (88) HP. If he rolls max for his health, he's rocking (132) health.

The Barbarian who rolls average (7)+CON would have (99) HP, with a max roll of (154) HP.

So against a battleaxe that hits all three times, they'd still be able survive with over 30 HP if they only roll average for health each level, which is shit once you realize that this supposed to be one of the strongest melee weapons in the game, yet you'd need to hit these fuckers like 6-10 times while rolling max on your damage roll to take out them out.

This is also why combat is such a slog and why magic is hands down the most efficient means of ending an encounter, because it basically comes down to standing in lines and trading blows like a shitty JRPG until either one side dies or the mage gets a spell off.

It's shit.

>>48124804
I'll take "honestly thinks 3.X is the only edition" for $500

>>48118972
Sounds like a retarded book. Read better books.

>>48124895

You didn't adequately explain why that is though.

It's certainly not luck because if it was, spells that grant/restore HP wouldn't reference life force or wounds.

It's certainly not your ability to survive/dodge because that's what AC is supposed to be there for.

It's certainly not plot armor because you're insistent on it not being meat points.

It's not divine intervention because clerical spells that fall under that line grant bonuses to AC/Save, not HP.

So what is it, aside from meat points?

>>48123567
>ITT D&D characters are old kung-fu masters

>>48123624
Enjoy your shoe-horning an implausible narrative into a flawed mechanics game.

>>48123665
Just... don't... ask. Ask yourself instead: do you really want to hear more of these rationalizations? Personally, I can stand only so much cringe.

>>48124804
>ROPETRICK
I never got how this spell is useful.

>>48124962
>This is also why combat is such a slog
Fucking THIS. If you want to argue about the verisimilitude or the tone or whatever, fine. At the end of the day, none of that changes the fact that what should be badass intense fights inevitably turn into boring slogs of people trading blows until they sponge up enough damage that they die. There's no fucking tensions unless the GM ignores the system and works outside it, and at that point what's the use of the system?

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>>48124990
>I'll take "honestly thinks 3.X is the only edition" for $500
There's a lot of that going around in this thread.

>>48124990
3.PF is the most popular edition of D&D, especially on this board, and the one with the stupidest amount of HP bloat, so of course it's going to dominate the thread. Fuck, there was already discussion about how the bloat was handled by 4e and 5e in implied comparison to 3.PF.

Why are you itching for an online argument so badly?

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>>48121685
>using the homebrew defense unironically

>>48125169
>3.PF is the most popular edition of D&D, especially on this board
That's mostly inertia at this point. It's slowly shifting away from that.

>>48125073

>ITT D&D characters are old kung-fu masters

By the time they get to the level where a coup-de-grace has a reasonable chance of not killing them?

Yeah, they kinda are.

Coupe de grace is an automatic crit with a save or die = 10+damage dealt. So a guy getting his throat slit is generally gunna fail unless the guy doing the stabbing is incompetent or just damn unlucky.

>>48125096
Rope Trick lets you hide the entire party from patrols, and by eighth level it lets you do so long enough for your casters to meet their rest requirements.
Needless to say, any DM who has enemies in a campaign be familiar with Detect Magic and Dispel Magic gets to be known as That DM for eternity, no matter how much sense it makes or how retarded Rope Trick abuse gets.

>>48121607
But that's retarded. Abstracting HP or HP equivalent is stupid, a hit should a be a hit. That's what AC should be for, how hard you are to hit. Either make a wounds/vigor/defense system or go full blown abstract like Fate.

There are a lot of reasons to like or dislike dnd. But I sperg out at HP as an abstraction.

I am angrily typing this while drunk and pooping.

>>48125226
Guy you're responding to here. Thank god for that. Until it hase been fully dethroned, though, it's going to be the assumed case for a lot of examples (such as this one)

>>48125245

>Yeah, they kinda are.

No, they really fucking aren't.

The only way that this retardation makes sense is if your character is either

1) A monk
2) A character with a +20 perception.

Anything else is just retarded head-canon nonsense.

>>48121607
But
But if only the last hit matters.
What about poisoned blades? I'm at full HP, so I block, but I still got poisoned?
What.
What if I, say, cut myself to fuel a spell with my blood? Am I dodging THAT blade?

What if people don't know the knife is coming? Kinda hard to explain exerting yourself dodging a blow aimed at the head you didn't see. And I didn't wear a helmet or anything, so it's not my armour worsening or something. I straight up ate that barrage of bullets right in the noggin, but I'm alive.
Or did i expend 100 hp to subconsciously bullet curve a dozen rounds away?

And falling damage.

And environmental damage.

Or being caught, without cover, in an explosion. Did I shimmy on the spot so hard that, whilst exhausting, formed a telekinetic barrier that shielded me from the blast?

Am I a wizard? Are all characters wizards? Is that how we do it?

>>48125245
Daggers do 1d4. The crit multiplier is x2, so that's a crit of 8 damage for a Fort DC of 18. A level 1 fighter with bog-standard 10 CON has a 20% chance of survival. The more common CON 14 or even 16 boosts the chances to 30% or 35% respectively; I'd say that's a resonable chance of survival.

A level one fighter built sensibly is an old kung-fu master by your logic.

>>48123997
>DnD's system works perfectly well for DnD

This is a bit misrepresentation. Does it work? Yes. Does it work perfectly? No. If you say that it working is good enough - fine. No accounting for taste.But let's be clear: it works well as gamist device. Not as a narrative or simulationist device. And gamist roleplayers ITT who try to sell the rest that the mechanic isn't unrealistic (a bad abstraction from the pov of simulation) are preposterous.

>>48124203
>shoe-horning

>>48124264
But if they are minor wounds a healing potion could only restore a fraction of the actual HPs lost. Man, this shoe-horning of narrative into bad mechanics is terrible.

>>48124678
Enjoy your shoe-horning an implausible narrative into a flawed mechanics game.

>>48125245
>yes, the are old kung-fu masters

Enjoy.

>>48125494
Daggers may do 1d4, but I also have a strength modifier.
16 strength, by no means the highest strength a level one character can achieve, means I'm probably doing about 6 more in that crit, making the DC 24, or, reducing chances of survival by 30%.

>>48125505
>Enjoy your shoe-horning an implausible narrative into a flawed mechanics game.
I'd say enjoy whatever system it is you play, but I'm not sure you are even physically capable of experiencing enjoyment.

>>48125422

Not every old martial arts master would be a D&D monk. Heck, only 1 of the 5 traditonal weapons of chinese martial arts are monk weapons. Let alone the ones that wear armour or the entire concept of a Youxia.

>>48125494

30% is not really reasonable. That's a 1/3 chance of survival. If being attacked by the weakest of all options. You add a strength mod or make that a short sword and stuff gets much less likely.

>>48125621

Monk is literally martial arts master...in theory.

You cannot give me an explanation that justifies a character with like no WIS or perception waking up just in time to dodge an assassin slicing their neck open...as their neck is being sliced open.

At best, you can say that it was possible due to a NAT 20 but that's all you can use to justify it.

>>48125565
So now it's not "avoiding getting assassinated in your sleep with a typical assassin weapon," but instead "avoid getting decapitated by one of the strongest men in the city"? STR 16 isn't common.

>>48125686
Also it's harder to dodge a mace than a dagger?

>>48125686

Said Very average guy with a very weak weapon still kills the fighter 2/3 times. If he's a level 1 rogue (He's assassinating a guy), it jumps a lot.

>>48125807
That doesn't change how your logic falls apart. If we're talking about kung-fu monks avoiding assassination in their sleep (not via a Perception roll or ability or anything else that already covers avoiding assassintation in your sleep, but strictly though HP), and how a big guy with a big hammer is harder to "dodge" because the STR bonus and higher damage dice eat up more HP. A young thug with a dagger is something Mr. Myagi can avoid with a bit of luck, but slap some muscles on and give him a bigger weapon and suddenly the same unskilled thug is ensured to paint the walls with your brain matter.

And speaking of rogues, how does "HP as close calls" handle rogues? They are less accurate and deal more damage when they hit, but the extra damage is through precision. They are both less likely to hit you and more likely to hit you.

>>48125630
30% isn't a reasonable chance of survival? I'm not saying I like those odds or would want to be in their shoes, but they're far from impossible. If you slit the throats of ten level one fighters in their sleep, three would get up and start kicking the crap out of you.

>>48118972
Polonious wasn't Hamlet's friend

>>48125592
Look, I can also just roll a d6 for everything and make up some kind of story around that too. It's not my idea of fun though.

>>48125945

Well, 3 would manage to roll init at 'Single stab away from gone' HP.

Dear D&D friends,

maybe I can explain it to you this way: Suppose I start with a fighter at level 1. He has... 12 HPs or whatever. When he reaches level 5, he has, say, 50 HP.

Now here's my problem:
I would like to know how many of these 50 HPs are down to my PC having grown stronger/tougher, how many of them are due to increased skill in evading tough blows and how many of them are down to divine favor/luck.

Your beloved system lumps all of that into one statistic. This isn't great. This isn't satisfying. If you don't mind - more power to you but it's not for me.

>>48126047
And this is at level 1 before the bloat actually kicks in. Level 2-3 fighters don't have better Fort saves, but they do have lots more HP; they really could roll out of bed and start whooping ass with impunity.

>>48126081
D&D isn't meant to be realistic, 50 hit points just allows low level creatures to fight you but not be a big deal.

If you want to play realistic, where a dog can always bite your hand and take a finger even after you are conquering the other planes of existence go right ahead. I'd rather use my imagination but still have a feeling of improving and being better than just the common people.

Now excuse me I'm gonna go have fun.

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>>48126081

This particular D&D friend answers thus: all of HP represents your ability to take hits and survive. Real hits, not almost-hits. This is reflected by all the rules, from the varying damage values of weapons to poison and other "on-hit" effects to how AC works to how healing works and so forth. Luck exists in this game: there are luck bonuses and luck re-rolls, this is not HP. Evading also exists in this game: there is touch AC (that is, AC before armour bonuses) and Reflex saves.

This does of course mean that high-level D&D characters are made out of some alien putty rather than human meat and bone, but such is the nature of the system.

>>48126188
>This does of course mean that high-level D&D characters are made out of some alien putty

It sis called either divinity or magic, depending on the gm. What do you think demigods are made of, flesh and blood?

>>48126095

Yes but damage dealt jumps much faster than fort saves. You make that a level 3 rogue and all of a sudden a fighter of equal levels is very unlikely to make the save.

>>48126187

So you basically want to play out a power fantasy with the depth of a puddle?

Because honestly, most people want challenge in their games so that the levels and spells and bonuses actually matter beyond being arbitrary numbers on your character sheet.

>>48118904
Just rolling a "lucky die".
You fail you die.
You pass and get to do a saving throw and if you pass that one then you stay alive.

>>48126293

Things can be challenging without being realistic.

>>48126548

True but the way HP is handled here, it's neither realistic, challenging, nor fun. It's just a tedious slog where everyone is a damage sponge who can take a balista bolt to the chest (seriously, http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/other-rules/siege-engines) while ending up no worse for wear, save for having less HP than they started with.

Unless you like standing opposite of your enemies, doing nothing but trading hits like a shitty tabletop JRPG until either one side drops or the wizard pops his SoL/SoD spell(s).

>>48124027
>That's what AC is for.
No.

An AC successful roll is when you avoid a hit completely without breaking a sweat. A hit to your HP may also be that you parried the blow but still took a beating and are now exhausted.

>>48126548
I can also roll d6, on 4-6 I win combat and on 1-3 I lose. But that's not appealing to me.

>>48126774
Well, what do you think where shitty JRPGs got their inspiration from?

>>48127608
>I can also roll d6, on 4-6 I win combat and on 1-3 I lose. But that's not appealing to me.

Then perhaps you shouldn't play D&D. It's never been a realistic game.

>>48126784
Does anyone in practice narrate it that way? Seriously, when have you ever said "I hit the orc, but he parries some of the blow, depleting his luck a bit" at the table?

>sneak up to a sentry in a 40k rpg
>press a knife against his throat
>npc chuckles "it's like what, 1d5 damage? I can soak it"
>proceeds to beat the hell out of me

>>48127655
It once was the most realistic role-playing game in existence.

>>48127733
More importantly, the other anon is wrong about AC too. AC represents the difficulty of inflicting damage. Giants and dragons are not difficult to hit but they are difficult to hit in a meaningful way. That's why high Strength makes hitting easier.

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>>48127795
>D&D was the first ever rpg
When will this meme end

>>48122804
>you're unconscious, you use coup de gras rules

That's not true. Attacking an unconscious character uses the same rules as attacking a prone flatfooted character. You have to spend a full round action to coup de gras.

>>48121607
>A PERSON WHO LOSES HP HAS NOT NECESSARILY BEEN STRUCK DEAD ON WITH A SWORD. THEY HAVE SPRAINED THEIR ARM BLOCKING, TAKEN A GLANCING BLOW, LOST THEIR BREATH IN THE ACT OF PARRYING, OR OTHERWISE BEEN DISADVANTAGED IN A WAY THAT THEY WOULD NOT HAVE IF THEIR AC HAD NOT BEEN MET AND THE HIT NOT LANDED.
But a ton of the things you name there are already represented by another mechanic, suggesting those are actually not what HP represents.

Your arm being damage by blocking gives you a penalty on things using that arm or use of that arm can be taken away all together.

Losing your breath is represented by conditions like being Exhausted, Fatigued, or Staggered.

HP almost has to straight up be the amount of hits you can take because anything else that might happen is covered by other things.

>>48127914
Prove me wrong.

>>48127914
i mean... it WAS the first commercially available rpg

>>48127914
But that's a true fact

Or are you counting Chainmail as an RPG?

>>48127608

D&D wasn't always about shitty combat.

Also, in a JRPG, you aren't arbitrarily fucked for choosing the "wrong" build since 3.X is (thankfully) the only game with outright trap options.

>>48128324
>>48128565
>>48129922
>only USA made rpg
The first RPG, Oszukałem cię, was released in Poland in 1969

>>48130496
DnD was built out of a shitty combat wargame.

That all said, DnD as it exists is a different game than DnD as it was. DnD-as-it-was is basically Etrian Odyssey, the DS game (as a later example - naturally, there are many older examples).
You have 'the dungeon'. You go into the dungeon to get loot, which adds to your score (XP). When you are not in the dungeon, you are in 'the town'. In town, you spend money on supplies and rest up. Then you go back to the Dungeon.

>>48130496
DnD5e has plenty of trap options.
Being a Champion fighter is mathematically outright worse than Battlemaster.
Being a Berserker Barbarian is getting a shitty class feature compared to everything Totem gives you.
and stuff like the PDK in the SCAG is downright awful.

>>48130906

The exceptions, not the rule.

Plus, martials can still contribute to combat without being shat on by the rules like they are in 3.X

>>48131096
Yeah, the problem with most martials in DnD5e is just basically "they're not the Paladin".

The paladin is a cool guy with cool abilities able to keep up with full casters, partially because of his superhigh saves like the 2e fighters of old.
The other beefy guys... not so much.

Rogue is basically obsolete as a class since everything besides Sneak Attack is done better by a Bard.

>>48131273

Even then, you can still play something like a Fighter or a Monk without getting immediately shat on by the rules for not using magic to sidestep it.

Don't get me wrong, there are some things that makes it flawed but the flaws are at least manageable to the point where the GM isn't forced to balance encounters around two different weight classes.

Overall, it's a step in the right direction, even if it's still a long way from a perfect system.

>>48118972
Or maybe polonius doesn't have character levels.

>>48130739
>1969

So shortly before Al Gore invented the internet. Kudos!

>>48121607
this

meat points are your con bonus to HP (so a lv. 4 wizard with 14 con is just as beefy as a level 14 barbarian with 14 con)

Class bonus is everything else (the barbarian is going to be a lot better at physical battle from training, why wouldn't he have more luck/whatever)

>>48132427
*lv 4 barbarian with 14 con

>an assassin is more likely to kill you if he tries to slit your throat with a long sword instead of a dagger

Everyone of these threads

>let me pull evidence of why I hate your system from 6 different systems

other side

>let me scream at you for hating my system by not providing proof or screen captures

>>48121063
This. Magic is a Thing That Exists in most fantasy settings; wizards can fly and shoot fire out of their fingers and lightning out of their beards, but the second some guy with a sword gets stabbed a couple times and doesn't immediately perish, everyone loses their minds about realism. You cannot have both. Either magic and superhuman feats exist, or they don't. You can't loosely recommend one reality to casters and then bound the fighters to a different one just because they adventure differently.

>>48132503
>An assassin is more likely to kill you if he rams a sword through your throat compared to slitting it
No shit Sherlock.

>>48134329
He's not, though. Ramming a sword into someone's throat is not appreciably different from ramming a knife. His neck isn't three feet thick, so unless you're hacking through his spinal column they're both doing the same thing.

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I think it is perfectly reasonable that Coup de Grace can insta-kill, and I really do not see what is supposed to be wrong with that.

You're asleep. If you hadn't woken up before the attack, then there really isn't anything stopping him from just killing you.

>>48134329

Unless you're slitting a giant's throat, raming a sword through someone's neck and slicing it leads to the same outcome.

I mean, there's a reason why surgeons use scalpels, rather than broadswords when slicing through human tissue.

>>48120817
Coup de Grace is an auotmatic kill for most common folk, but heros and legends aren't common folk, they are the characters of the story. I think 3E had CoupdeGrace as automatic critical hit and con-save or die. Likely to kill but not always. However, if you survived it, it doesn't mean you took a cleaver to the neck, woke up and said "Fucking ow mate" and stood up.

It represents that your unconscious character woke up at the last possible second as the gleam of metal flicked over his face, and immediately threw his body off the bed to avoid getting beheaded. He still lost loads of HP but it wasn't due to getting chopped, it was due to him only avoiding the blade by the skin of his teeth, exhausting his luck and stamina to scramble back to his feet.

The best way to explain this to kids/idiots is "Don't think of HP as Health points, think of them as Hero points. You're guy isn't becoming less healthy as the fight drags on, he is becoming tired and less heroic, eventually his luck will run out and only then will he suffer a truly serious blow."

>>48137000
See >>48128141

>>48137224
Losing your breath = Health loss.
Losing your breath exceptionally = Staggered.

There is a difference between a blow putting the fighter on the back foot tired, and putting the fighter on the ground wheezing tired.

>>48137371
Those are some high level sematics, brah.

Either way it makes no sense to have a whole spectrum of conditions clearly covering the effects tiredness and then go on to say that HP somehow represents them also.

>>48137000

Which doesn't work, as mentioned many times earlier ITT.

1) The rules for coup de grace makes it so that characters like the rogue, that are built around assassinations, becomes worthless due to the fact that the bulk of opponents that he'd use his techniques on can basically go "ow mate" anytime he tries to slit their throats.

2) It creates a weird situation where you fail to dodge the hit...but still "dodge" a hit because you have some arbitrary amounts of points that simultaneously represents you being lucky, tough, and skilled in surviving attacks.

3) It means that a character that has only 8 WIS is just as adept at noticing deadly attacks as they're happening as a monk or a character with 14+ WIS, which is stupid since it means that under this explanation, a guy who can barely notice a neon sign at midnight can feel a knife going across his neck just in time to stop it.

4) If HP represents you "barely" moving out the way of a hit then why do spells like "cure wounds" explicitely reference damage as you suffering a wound or injury?

5) If HP represents stamina then why are you just as adept at striking at half health as you are at full health?

6) "Hero Points?" And you call other people childish and moronic?

7) If this is called "Hero Points" then how exactly does that factor into to monsters and people with a neutral/evil alignment? I mean, you wouldn't call a vampire or a necromancer heroic would you?

I really don't understand why people like you refuse to call them meat points when that's basically what they are. It certainly makes the most sense out of any other explanation in this thread and it is how it works out in practice.

>>48137371

Except, again, you're performing just as well at half health as you are at full health.

>>48137703
>The rules for coup de grace makes it so that characters like the rogue, that are built around assassinations, becomes worthless due to the fact that the bulk of opponents that he'd use his techniques on can basically go "ow mate" anytime he tries to slit their throats.

>It creates a weird situation where you fail to dodge the hit...but still "dodge" a hit because you have some arbitrary amounts of points that simultaneously represents you being lucky, tough, and skilled in surviving attacks.
Not the guy you're replying to but the Save or Die atleast covers that.

In Pathfinder atleast, the is Save DC 10+Damage. Unless maybe if you optimalize towards Fort, I dont see anyone being fat enough to reasonably make a Save against 10+Crit Damage+Xd6.

>>48137872

Except for most of the bestiary past CR 6 and classes like the Fighter/Barbarian/Paladin who either gain bonuses to Fort and gain the most returns off of having high CON.

>>48137967
Better double that CR and get some 15+ Class Levels too and a Rogue of the same level would still ruin thier shit on an average roll.

>>48118904
No Defense Pool, Shadowrun style. All net hits count as increased damage.

>>48137872
So it's adding a bad mechanic to fix a previous bad mechanic, instead of disposing the first bad mechanic? No accounting for taste.

>>48139755
What's bad here? If something's helpless, unless its crazy out of your CR, you can up and murder it. Like you ought to be able to. Are you triggered because it came from Pathfinder?

>>48139820
>What's bad here?

HP Bloat.

>>48137703
>2) It creates a weird situation where you fail to dodge the hit...but still "dodge" a hit because you have some arbitrary amounts of points that simultaneously represents you being lucky, tough, and skilled in surviving attacks.
Again, you are using this retarded argument. There is a difference without dodging an attack without breaking a sweat and dodging it but being bruised/exhausted. The fact that your other points are literally you grasping at straws and wording in some of the rules of a play pretend game show that you probably aren't cut for TTRPGs.

>>48140678
But again, your HP being lowered has no effect on your on your ability to fight, the way that being bruised/exhausted would. Now over here we have a couple combat conditions, one of them literally called Exhausted, that do actually affect combat abilities. This abstraction argument is bullshit.

I'd also argue that in a world of magic, its not even that farfetched to assume that some people just become physically tough enough to where attacks hurt them less. A body strong enough to where attacks without enough force behind them only causes superficial cuts, bruises, and burns. It's certainly more believable than HP being an abstraction for things like being tired, cripplingly wounded, or scared while HP doesnt represent that and we have other mechanics that do.

>>48141037
Bullshit or not, it's what's in the PHB or DMG for almost every edition.

If you prefer, think of it this way:
Any form of damage that either gets past, or totally bypasses, your AC is potentially fatal.

You spend your hit points to actively say "Nuh uh" (as opposed to saves and AC, which are passively saying "nuh uh").
You can always choose not to spend HP, if you want to allow yourself to be knocked out, or die.

>>48141037
>But again, your HP being lowered has no effect on your on your ability to fight, the way that being bruised/exhausted would
Because not every blow has a direct effect on your combat abilities.

If you don't have the mental capacities to understand some levels of abstraction, you should stay away from TTRPGs because it is clearly frustrating you.

>>48141076
>Coming up with more bullshit to rationalize the bullshit
I understand that this is what's in the books, I just dont agree and I dont think that in practice, reality does either.

AC crearly takes your ability to avoid being hit into account with your DEX and Armor bonuses. Pretty much everything except you being actually wounded is already firmly represented by something else.

>>48141080
But this way, literally NO normal blows effect your ability to fight. There is no mechanical difference between you being at 200 HP and you being at 2. No difference between you having taken no hits or dozens.

There is however, a difference between you being hit by attacks made specifically in order Fatigue, Frighten, or Blind you.

HP cant be the representation for things that are already represented by other mechanics, especially if it does NOTHING to the effect of what you say it's supposed to be an abstraction for and those other mechanics do.

>>48141273
HP can't be meat points because you don't recover from a gut stab in one nap.

HP are basically Fate Points. As long as you have some left, you get to come up with some bullshit excuse for why you aren't dead. This setup is at odds with D&D's obsession with everything having a default fluff explanation.

>>48141296
Apparently, in 4e and up(?), you do. Healing powers? Inherent magic? I dont know and I bet it's not very well explained because it doesnt make much sense either way.

>>48141377
4e and up also cares a lot less about having convoluted rules for everything.

>>48141377
>and up(?)
not in 5e.

>>48141076
Here's the thing. You're arguing about how there is an explanation for it.

But just because it can be explained or is explained as being some stupid magical luck or becoming tired or last second dodging, it doesn't mean that it isn't a stupid explanation.

It's the same issue I have with armor class making someone harder to hit. Sure, it can be explained as "well it means that even if you do hit them you're less likely to hit something vital, so it makes it harder to hit them meaningfully. Also it represents dodging". It's an abstraction. And yes, it is explained. But it's still stupid that it's called "armor class" when it doesn't really have to do with armor. Like it doesn't make sense to try and hit someone, and then be able to say that you didn't hit them because they have armor on. The mechanic should be that you can still hit them, just it might not do damage. And yes, I know the end result is the same, that some of your attacks don't deal damage. But it's a pointless abstraction. It shouldn't be called armor class if it's really more represented by dodging ability and whatever. I mean, wearing better armor doesn't make it harder for me to hit you with a sword. It just makes my sword do less or no damage.

>>48141296
Except that's literally how the game works. And why is that a problem? Because it's not realistic? Seriously?

Why make up ridiculous bullshit about hero points and fate points and dodging attacks after you already failed to dodge them and being fatigued even though it doesn't have any fatigue effect. Its a game where the other guy in your party wiggles his fingers and shoots fire out of them. Why can't it be expected that a warrior who is the equivalent of Hercules or Achilles can't literally absorb more damage from weapons? Or heal serious wounds just by resting?

>>48141708
>Why can't it be expected that a warrior who is the equivalent of Hercules or Achilles can't heal serious wounds just by resting?
Because all characters, including the lvl1 commoner, can do the same ?

>>48141681
>Like it doesn't make sense to try and hit someone, and then be able to say that you didn't hit them because they have armor on
I agree with you on the whole but I feel like that's pretty much exactly what armor is for. To prevent the wearer from getting hit.

>>48141681
>Implying that a sword will do jack shit to plate or chain

Armour is actually the most realistic part of D&D. If you roll a hit it means you stab them through the visor or something.

>>48141404
Yes in 5e.

You fully heal on a long rest (and regain half your HDs)

>>48140678

>There is a difference without dodging an attack without breaking a sweat and dodging it but being bruised/exhausted.

Except that's not how it works, at all.

Otherwise, there would be an effect for being at 1 HP, 10 HP, 50 HP, and 100 HP.

>>48141076

>Any form of damage that either gets past, or totally bypasses, your AC is potentially fatal.

Yes, because having enough HP to soak multiple Balista bolts to the chest is TOTALLY going to kill a dude with over 100 HP.

Hell, a sufficient leveled wizard can survive 3d8 damage to the chest, and these are supposed to be the weakest members of the goddamn party.

>>48141080

>Because not every blow has a direct effect on your combat abilities.

The issue is, a blow has NO effect on your combat abilities.

You could take half your total in one turn and still keep swinging just as hard and accurately as you could at the start of combat.

>>48141296

Except that is how it literally works.

And it works like that because they're meat points that are a poor representation of battle damage.

>>48141708

>Why can't it be expected that a warrior who is the equivalent of Hercules or Achilles can't heal serious wounds just by resting?

Because the effect is a global mechanic.

Your badass swordsman has the same healing powers as a level 1 commoner with no class levels, a common housecat, and even a newborn baby.

Which is fucking stupid.

>>48141817

Except that if that was the case then there wouldn't be mechanics for called shots to specific areas of the body.

>>48141296
>HP can't be meat points

But they are, they are just unrealistically done, so the designers had to make up some bullshit rationalization why it's good, fine and acceptable.

And, you know, because it's D&D, gamers suck that bullshit up. Don't get me wrong: Bloated Hit Points are good enough for 1986. They are no longer a good mechanic in 2016.

>>48141365
>HP are this, HP are that

HP seems to be whatever you want it to be. Great design. /sarc

>>48141681
>But just because it can be explained or is explained as being some stupid magical luck or becoming tired or last second dodging, it doesn't mean that it isn't a stupid explanation.

This.

>>48141817
No, it means whatever you make up it means. Some realistic mechanic indeed.

>>48122790
And spell slot and mana are lie points because people cant really do that. So might as well get rid of that.
Everyome is as durable as normal people and that ranges from dying from a cut like a hemophiliac or to being a little girl who survived multiple gunshot wounds including those to the head.
How best to represent that spread of durability?
Even if you use wounds, vigor, strain or anything else its all "meat points" just the amount of times you can be hit before you die.
You fucking spergs just have to hate anything because you're sad people

>>48141935
Every system has points to determine how many timez you can be hit or continue to be hit before you die.
Only faggots like you are bitching about HP being the problem.
>I use wounds
Still meat points
>I use strain
Still meat points
>I use HP
Still meat points
The mechanics of a game are designed to be used. If you feel its gaming to build stats then ttrpgs arent for you. Go sit around a campfire and tell stories as a group then jump in because you should die for being this stupid.

HP isn't even supposed to be some vague abstraction. It's literally just there to be gamey, it's not at all supposed to be justified and any attempts to do so are poor. It's a gamey system, it's not meant to simulate real world whatevers, it's meant to be a game. You don't complain when a video game gives you loads of HP, do you? Think of D&D as a video game where you have a little more choice in your action.

>>48143158
The issue isn't that they are meat points. The issues is that they're meat points with a stupid amount of bloat. Plenty of systems use meat points, but because the devs don't have their head quite so far up their own asses, it avoids all the stupid bullshit of deeundee

>>48143158
>Every system has points to determine how many timez you can be hit or continue to be hit before you die.

That is not in dispute. What is in dispute is that hit point bloat is a good mechanic.

>>48143176
That's what I have been saying the entire thread. But Deendeefags need to come up with bullshit rationalization why blated HPs are a good representation of mythical heroes after all.