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I've been using some sort of Damage threshold in various games since 2e   It works very nicely.  HP can then be "vitality," representing all sorts of abstract things--footing, stamina, ability to endure getting knocked around some, etc.  HP can be recovered quickly, even like the 5e rules.  But fix it with real "Wounds" that cause impairments. 

In 4e, the first time you got bloodied, I figured that was a Wound.  Your Damage Threshold for other attacks was (neatly enough) your Healing Surge value.  If you drop to 0hp, that's 2 Wounds.  Wounds are most simply represented by -1 penalty to all rolls for each one, explained however you wish.  They are harder to heal, and what the real magic is for (Ritual healing spells).

Jun 27, 2012 -- 10:36AM, Ranger-of-Cormyr wrote:

Actually I'd forgotten about the "bloodied" mechanic - that's another 4th edition concept that I liked!

I'd be quite happy to bring that back too - when dropped to 50% health you're "wounded" and have some penalties to attack or whatever, which then stay until you have a full night's rest (even if the short-rest healing thing does bring you back up to +50% ). That way, it'd simulate a real wound, that you can bind or whatever in the field, but you still feel the effects of it until you've managed to rest properly and sleep it off.

Yeah, sounds good.  Conditions would be even easier to track if there were an action economy they could feed off of, but that would require a big restructuring of D&D (Movement Points/dice and Action Points/dice that you use to conduct your actions each round and represent part of your success chances, so that taking them away with conditions represents impairments to your ability to function).

I always hated how, in D&D, you were either "at full capacity to fight at your very best" or "dead", there was no in-between

x1,000.  Anything that helps address this should be on the table.

I think a lot of people (including me) don't want more to keep track of in the game, but it would be nice if there was a more concrete moment when a PC or creature actually gets wounded.  People are also afraid of "death spiral."

If there is a wound system, there will have to be a "death spiral" of some sort.  

In my 4e campaign, I'm applying a Wound (-2 to all actions until magically healed or weeks of rest) only when a PC or creature is critically hit.  This adds a level of concrete wounding to my games, but doesn't require a wound track.   It also happens 0-2 times per session so it gives flavor, but doesn't become too annoying.

With critical hit systems, the Natural 20 usually favors the monsters because they will be rolling more vs. the PCs in any given session, but since the Wound in my games can be healed by healing, it gives the PCs a fighting chance.  Many times, the monsters don't have access to healing, so in that regard they are at a disadvantage.

If people want, this Wound rule could also be applied if a PC drops to 0 hp and is revived.  That could simulate a more serious injury.

Perhaps "Wounded" could just become a condition, and it could be applied through critical hits and when a character is revived from dying.  There may also be other ways to get "Wounded".  Perhaps special monsters have horrible attacks that can "Wound."  Magic items may be enchanted so that they can "Wound."  Poison can "Wound," etc.

Just a thought.

 

Jun 28, 2012 -- 9:56AM, Gurka wrote:

I'd been thinking about something similar as well.

My initial thought was that perhaps in-combat healing, or short-rest healing can only bring you up to the nearest multiple of your Con score. Once your HP drops below one of the numbers on th list below, it can't be healed past that until you're out of a fight and have long rest or out of combat ritual-style healing.

I like that idea...though I think the majority of players won't, because it creates more complications, and most players seem to want to simplify the rules for combat.

Though it's not really the same type of Threshold you're talking about above, the other mechanism which I used in some games previous, was to make your Con score equal to the threshold of damage you can ignore. It's not the same as DR however... If you take damage =/< your Con bonus, you can ignore it (so between 0 and 4 pts for most characters), but if you take damage > Con bonus, you lose HP as normal for the full amount of damage.

That's a good idea too. I quite like the idea of a con bonus helping to absorb damage - another thing that Warhammer does.

Anyway, I think there's a lot of food-for-thought here, for WotC to come up with something - either hardcoded or as an optional add-in - to make the wounds/dying/death system more interesting than "Watch as I fight my very best and...oh, no. Sorry. That last rat bite did me in." :D

If the damage threshold is set up to avoid taking damage entirely, like some form of damage reduction unless it is exceeded, it still nullifies the threat of lower level monsters ("minions" at higher levels)--something that WotC was trying to avoid.

By that type of threshold, if I'm 1st level with CON 17, I can ignore most Goblins and Kobolds, even if I'm vastly outnumbered by them (their average damage is around 3).  If I'm swarmed by 10 Kobolds, I could just wade through them to get to the real baddie in the room.

I'd much prefer it if 10 Kobolds swarming my 10th level character could rather easily pull me to the ground and shiv me to death.  Then I have to watch out and do something about them instead of scoffing and stomping through them.


As has been mentioned, any system has to be low on math and low on tracking.  Conditions are a problem because they require a lot of tracking.  A LOT.  While they may be realistic, I'm not much a fan of conditions for that reason.

It's also easier to add modifiers than subtract (which is why ability damage went the wayside in 4e).  If there were an action economy in D&D, where you spend movement or action points to conduct your actions (and these points contribute to your success rolls), it would be easy to just cut back on action or movement points as part of being wounded or fatigued.  But I'm not sure that would "feel D&D" enough for people.


What's wrong with the "death spiral," btw?  If you don't want 100% fighting ability at 1hp, and dead at 0, then whatever effect you have from being wounded necessarily creates a "death spiral" of some sort.  So what?  That's the point.  That's much more tactical and realistic.  You have to actually care about getting hurt.

In a combat, if I get a bad cut on the arm or the leg, you better believe I'm in a lot more danger, a lot more vulnerable to getting killed and less likely to hurt my opponent than when I started fresh.