Community

Part of me wants this be an enormous post with detailed ideas on how to further abstract combat, but I don't have the time I wish I did and I'm sure it needs to be enormous - part of the appeal is that it isn't that hard.

Abstract(er) Combat in D&D

Okay, so combat is already pretty abstract. (What are hit points, anyway? Go read about 500,000 posts on the subject to not find out.) Armor decides whether you get "hit," not whether you get "hurt." And so it goes.

The minor change on my mind is to replace hit points with simple "hits." When a PC hits a monster, the DM records a hit against that monster. With the fifth hit against a monster, the PC gets to decide what happens to that monster - the mage's lightning fries it to a crisp, the fighter knocks it out cold, or the rogue sneaks up behind