Hello, We played the playtest on Saturday, a full 8 hour session. There were serveral issues, some addressed already by other feedback. The thing which bugged us most was healing. First of all healing was to unreliable, one d8 for the healing potion and a player easiely healed less damage then a single hit by an enemy. The one hit dice was mostly pointless. It was restricted to out of combat healing, where it nearly had no effect, and the party's ressources were spent after a single encounter(the bugbears guards and a patrol.) While I understand that it was not the intention of the dungeon to tackle it in one go, it is no fun to turn and run after 1-2 fights. On the other hand healing was to readily available, nothing prevented the cleric to bring back a player from 0 hp several times in one fight. In theory a big enough supply of healing poitions would keep a creature standing forever.
I will not look into later levels as they are out of scope of the playtest and I have no idea what is planned in this regard. I'm aware that there will arise further issues however.
We did like the mechanic of healing surges from 4 e. And we felt the hit dice should achieve the same. So in conclusion: - healing more reliable ( a fixed value part, like d8+3) - more hit dice in lower levels - Any healing costs/uses a hit dice. No matter if it is a potion or a healing spell.
Rather than focusing on the details of mechanics, what do you want healing to achieve? You've said you don't like having to rest after 1 or 2 fights, so that's one goal. You also don't want them to be able to heal themselves indefinitely. So... what do you want, exactly? How many fights are you willing to allow them to have?
Personally, I'm fine with the party being forced to rest after 1 or 2 fights, if their choices lead to them getting hurt a lot. I'm also fine with them being able to heal themselves indefinitely, if they choose to invest their resources that way. But that's what I like.
What healing should achieve is a good question. During combat healing should keep the group fighting. Keeping players in the game that took big hits. This may either be by design ( defender role) or as emergency (handle tactical errors and allow for a small amount of failure on part of the PC's). During combat healing should not be reduced to a "no-brainer" or just a matter of wealth and preparation time. It should feel limited and valuable. What I like to see achieved is that a mortal body can only take a limited amount of stress and pain. Even with magic. (For the exception there will surely be feats)
In the long run my personal opinion is, that the party should be able to fight about 4 fights in a row with only short rests in between. At the same time I'm no friend of a long rest replenishing all ressources of the party, but I feel that's ok and important to keep it fun and a game. The perfect solution in my humble opinion would be if the party has enough ressources to barely last through one session and can replenish this fully between game sessions.
Indeed, there have been a number of posts on this very topic; please read my thoughts at the bottom of the page HERE>
I think that testing the rules as written is very important but I also don't see a problem looking ahead. As it stands in the rules that we have, Hit Die healing seems quite weak at low levels but seems like it would be very stong at higher levels. Since these new rules have much flatter math/scaling from what we've seen so far, I would highly recommend that it be made stronger AND maybe not advance so far, so fast.
Furthermore, I think that as you adventure and take short rests that you should have a declining ability to regain Hit Points. That is built in, sort of... as you use up Hit Dice, you can heal less each time. My idea has a reverse scaling math, "use 3d12 first time, 3d10, 3d8, etc, etc" this is for characters a little more advanced but the point is, IMHO the old Healing Surges in 4E, while cool, granted too much. Hit Die healing in D&D Next seems underpowered to me... and there's always the ability for the party to take that Long Rest once per game day.... DMs can just hand wave to pass the time if the party is someplace safe. I also want the CON bonus to be put into the mechanic; this always made it a desired ability score for all the classes.
I really don't like the "bandolier of healing potions" standard that is returning to the game. Further, as someone who always got "stuck" playing the Cleric (because no one else wanted to heal) in 1st and 2nd edition, I'm not thrilled with the return of "I can heal or..." nor am I thrilled with the return of:
"Okay, the Cleric is out of heals. Time to rest." "But we just started?"
There is a happy medium somewhere, I'm just not sure where.
Aehrion, your idea is interesting, but it feels cumbersome. What my players proposed after our Saturday playtest session was to allow have healing kits allow you to, once per short rest, regain your Constitution modifier in hit points if you have no more Hit Dice to spend. This way you're getting back some healing, and have the option of pushing forward even if the Cleric is out of heals.
Hi, Aehrion, I read your post (and the thread). Some mechanic of declining efficiencie of short rest would be interesting and could solve some issues. However, i am sure it would need to be heavily streamlined to appeal to most consumers. Most people like simplicity.
Taikishi, that is basically the same thing that I do not want to see again as well.
To look deeper upon the hit dice as presented in the playtest, a little math: The formula for hit points seems to be (Constitution Score) + (Level) * (Half hit dice) If you roll your hit dice the estimated result is (half hit dice) + (Constitution Modifier) + 0.5 And the formula for the Modifier is ((Constitution Score)-12 / 2) For level 1 this leaves a gap of ((Constitution Score)/2 +5.5) hit points you usually don't regain during a day, for example 12 hit points if you have a constitution of 13. Your hit dice doesn't matter. For level 20 this leaves (9*(Constitution Score) -110) hit points you usually can regain during a day, after you already healed yourself fully once. These are merely 7 hitpoints with a Constitution of 13.
This means, that no matter the level, you would roll ALL your hit dices during a short rest, if you have been down to 0 hp. For level or Constitution score of 14+ you would gain slightly more out of it , but basically with the rules as shown that's it. This means if a party revolved (without any other healing) through their hit points twice they are dead. I assume this is intended.
And I think this a great spot to apply the modularity 5e claims. DM's could adjust the length of their groups working day by choosing the hit dice system that fits best for them.
(and just to keep this point standing, healing potions and spells should use up hit dice as well)
Hello, We did like the mechanic of healing surges from 4 e. And we felt the hit dice should achieve the same. So in conclusion: - healing more reliable ( a fixed value part, like d8+3) - more hit dice in lower levels - Any healing costs/uses a hit dice. No matter if it is a potion or a healing spell.
With kind regards, Athistaur
Healing Surges in 4e were a good idea. But it wasn't implemented across the board. Only players had surges. If the players have them so should the monsters, after all if the monsters weren't heroic, why have heroes fight them?
In regards to the playtest; -Yes, healing needs a reliable mechanic IN ADDITION TO the randomness of HD recovery, potions and cure spells. Just a simple thing like recover 2hp per HD kind of spell, ability, or effect; not the 3/3.5e Cure (Light, Moderate, Serious) Wounds xd8+y.
-More HD for more lower levels doesn't make sense. Starting characters, while exceptional compared to everyday examples of their race and professions, are NOT the heroes of myth and legend. That is what they are trying to become (accidently in most cases, as most PC's don't actually WANT to be heroes, but just want to Kill! Maim! Burn! Loot!...frikkin hate one dimensional parties). A 1st level fighter, while able to take damage, still isn't as adept at shruging off a near death experience as a 20th or even 5th level fighter with the same stats. Some lessions can only be learned the hard way.
-Finally, using HD for healing because of an outside effect is a terrible idea. With surges it worked because everyone could heal themselves at least once in combat on their own and was capable of surviving two combats to gain an action point if needed to be able to heal (a standard action to take a deep breath and focus IS kind of extreme). Even in 4e though there were spells and effects that allowed healing with out using surges and those abilities became manditory in the campaigns that I ran, because only healing using surges HURTS the party.
Reading through playtest again though highlights a something I nearly over looked. Herbalism is awesome. Anyone can now make an energy drink, I mean healing potion. That's nice; it prevents clerics from being scroll caddy/ brewmaster for the party. In addition it looks like it doesn't require any special materials just the common cost of 25gp. No magic needed.
I personally don't like rolling for HP and I prefer more encounter-style healing, but I'm going to try to offer an idea.
What if your CON mod decided how many HD you had to spend in one day (add 1 for each point of CON mod, maybe remove the minimum roll mechanic) and then at leveling, you get to roll that many HD and pick the high?
This does two things: 1. You have a bit more mundane healing so that when your clerics run out of heals (they will on most days) you can still be bandaged after a fight. 2. Those with more CON are shown more adequately to be much tougher.
Looking at the play-test characters: Moradin Cleric: Rolls 2 HD to determine first level HP by taking the high result, 2 HD to spend during the day, and at level 2 will roll 3 die and take the high to determine HP gained, and can spend 3 HD per die. Pelor Cleric: Same Fighter Dwarf: 3 HD to determine HP, take the high, 3 HD to spend at level 1, level 2 roll 4 take high for HP, spend 4 throughout the day. Rogue: Same as clerics. Wizard: Same as clerics.
So unless you invest in CON, it doesn't give you a huge advantage. I do see how it might be a problem in later levels when you have a lot more HD, but if they scale damage and HP the way they are indicating instead of scaling accuracy (Bounded Accuracy article) then I think it might be fine.
Honestly, I'd rather just have encounter-style healing back, or have healing abilities not take the same slots as spells. I really like the concept suggested on the forums to use your CD uses for healing spells.
Help make Combat Mastery happen: If you like the idea of Combat Mastery, as outlined below, for fighters copy it onto your signature and add interesting combat maneuvers to the list. Two new examples could be throat punch or spit in eye.
Combat Mastery: When a Fighter performs combat maneuvers such as bull rush, disarm, sunder, trip, hip toss, eye poke, ball kick, hair drag, blind with sand, slide down banister, swing on chandalier, walk on barrel, use enemy as shield, interpose self in front of arrow trying to kill wizard, intimidate, pick up kobold by the neck, etc, the minimum die result is 10.
Fighter Combat Maneuvers: On a given round the fighter can bull rush, disarm, sunder, trip, hip toss, eye poke, ball kick, hair drag, blind with sand, slide down banister, swing on chandalier, walk on barrel, use enemy as shield, interpose self in front of arrow trying to kill wizard, intimidate, etc, in place of his/her move action. This is a nonattack action that might cause the fighter's opponent to be rendered prone, unarmed, blind for a round, etc, or otherwise grant the fighter advantage or his/her opponent disadvantage as the Fighter sees fit.
