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| #1Cyber-DaveJul 02, 2014 18:49:29 | I thought I would help people out by explaining how the baseline assumption of the rules treats hit points in this edition of D&D. To do so, I am going to use an analogy: the quantum. The quantum is the smallest unit currently known to man. The quantum is the subject of quantum theory. The quantum acts as both a wave and a particle. Most importantly, the quantum is subject to Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. This principle states that we can measure either the speed or the trajectory/position of a quantum wave-particle. The other quality is necessary unknowable, can be calculated only probabilistically, and will only resolve itself with any specific certainty after some even causes the wave-particle to decohere. The term decohere refers to the moment in which an event specifies the uncertain element of the quantum, thus allowing us to know both the speed and position of the quantum at some moment after its fact of occurrence. One can never know both with certainty before such a fact of occurrence. In other words, the speed and position of a quantum are not proportional and cannot be predictably calculated (simultaneously) in advance of a wave-particle's decoherence.
This is how hit points work in D&D. Think of what a hit point IS as its position. A hit point can be positioned as one’s physical well being, as their luck, as their stamina, as their magical and/or divine providence, or any other host of physical or metaphysical possibilities. The only thing we can be certain of is a hit point’s velocity. Namely, all hit points move in a direction either towards (when you lose them) or away from (when you heal them) the act of going unconscious and dying. Any event that causes you to gain or lose a hit point decohere’s that hit point, at that moment in time, as some specific thing on the basis of whatever makes the most sense at that moment in time. Your current hit points do not necessarily reflect your current cosmetic bodily appearance. You might be at full hit points but have a number of open gashes on your body. You might be at almost zero hit points but only appear to be a little winded. You will have the appearance that best fits the moment of narrative your table is going through.
In other words, hit points are always defined relative to the moment in which they are used at a table. Use them as a narrative tool, not a simulational straight jacket.
This baseline assumption, of course, will not appeal to all tables. If some element of this baseline assumption bothers you, look to the DMG for various options to help you modify those assumptions in a manner that best befits your table’s desires! Remember, the rules are just suggestions. All elements of the rule are up for modification on the basis of any given table’s needs.
All the best, and good gaming! |
| #2NimlohJul 02, 2014 19:18:16 | I not sure decoherence and other quantum effects are helpful concepts to bring into a HP discussion.
HP is just an abstraction that measures a characters capacity to survive threats to his life. HPs exist so that some measure of tactical play emerges in cambat giving players a chance to defeat their enemies. We really don't need to go deeper then that. |
| #3Keyboard-ScribeJul 02, 2014 19:44:46 | It's an apt analogy, but I'm a fan of quantum strangeness. I've always approached HP from a narrative standpoint, and there could be more done with it. We are bound by the mechanics thus far by making the Armor Class a combination of armor, Dex, and sometimes Wis, in most cases. Why not give the paladin or cleric an AC bonus because of divine providence? Let the player write it down; it could be a conditional bonus the deity gives the character so long as she keeps her word to her deity or acts accordingly to the doctrine. Let the rogues or bards get luck bonuses if they work for it in the game. Plus, what's a cleric without her righteousness or a rogue without pinache?
A +2 luck/divine AC bonus would work just the same as any armor but to account for spell failure and Dex limits and such in game plot devices could easily balance it out. |
| #4Sands666Jul 02, 2014 20:20:08 | I like the ideas presented. I've been considering some ways to present a narrative for combat that reflects damage dealt and hit points.
A loose rule I'm going to try using when I DM will be to consider all damage dealt during a combat as non-lethal until you get down to about one hit die worth of your own hit points (ie for fighters it would be once you drop to 12 hit points).
So if you hit someone with your long sword and they have say, 50 hit points with d10s as hit dice, and you deal 10 damage and drop them to 40 hit points, then I would describe the attack as "hitting their armored shoulder and bruising them" or something else non-lethal. Then if you dropped the opponent all the way to 10 hit points I would describe how battered they looked, with bruises and cuts. If you hit the opponent now then the damage is going to be describes as lethal. For example, "the long sword now pierces through the opponents chest".
This is something I want to try since it gives me a measurable way to define things in the game. What do you guys think? |
| #5FoxfaceJul 02, 2014 20:37:44 | Generally, I subscribe to the quantum model. But when I want to get specific, I have meat HP equal CON. Of course, I make sure that 1st level PCs have CON score + whatever (as determined by edition). In 5e, that would mean that the HP gained every level represents the non-meat portion.
Generally speaking, I narrate all damage as non-meat until totals drop below CON score.
And again, that's only when I want to get specific. Most of the time, I let HP be whatever I and my group need to be, for the story. |
| #6Cyber-DaveJul 02, 2014 20:39:53 |
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| #7akaddkJul 02, 2014 22:39:25 | What are hit points is, by far, the dumbest question to have ever plagued D&D in its entire history. There is no room for debate and even posing the question is ridiculous. This issue has been settled by the creators of the game. Every edition has very clearly and indisputably described exactly what hit points represent. Arguing or even posing the question is like saying that 1 + 1 = 3 simply because you believe it to be so.
You can do whatever you want at your table, I really don't care, you can change the definitions and rules however you wish. But continuing to debate this subject as if there is any question as to what D&D hit points are in the rule books is beyond absurd.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkfGwfpGd4A#t=2650 |
| #8RamzourJul 03, 2014 0:50:32 | I don't think you understand quantum theory very well. This is not quite how it works. That's okay....not many people do understand it. But, I get the analogy that you're trying to make. Unfortunately, it simply doesn't apply here. You're confusing Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle with an Abstraction between the Narrative and Mechanics. They are not the same thing and the analogy is not very accurate.
The properties of a quantum particle are not an abstraction. They obey different laws of nature than the macroscopic, Newtonian things we see in our daily lives. So while a quantum particle's properties might appear somewhat arbitrary, they are very much NOT so. They are, in fact, well defined by the laws of physics.
But I get what you're trying to say at least. You're saying that the things hit points represent are not very well defined at the small scale (i.e. when you look at them closely and in detail). You only know that you gained or lost hit points, but not what each specific hit point represented (meat, luck, vitality, stamina, etc.). That's because Hit points are an Abstraction. The Abstraction comes into play because the resolution of the gaming system does not specify where an individual hit point came from. Whatever makes more sense in the story is what happens. The numerical representation of your Hit Points is a bulky approximation to describe what happened in the story. The thing about the Abstraction is that you should never think too hard about it. And indeed, what you are doing here is making the fatal mistake of thinking about hit points too hard.
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| #9UchawiJul 03, 2014 4:52:18 | Hit points are the Higgs boson of particle physics. |
| #10Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 5:38:07 |
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| #11BoldItalicJul 03, 2014 5:22:58 | Here in the UK, there's an everyday analogue of hit points called Driving Licence penalty points.
Every driver starts with a provisional licence (no experience required) and 6 hit points. After training, they level up to a full licence and get 12 hit points.
If a driver commits a traffic offence (speeding, parking in the wrong place, crashing into things and so on) the courts can apply penalty points to his licence. That corresponds to wounds. As long as the driver doesn't get down to zero points, he can continue to drive unhindered but if he gets down to zero, he's banned from driving. That corresponds to unconscious in D&D.
Penalty points are not "meat" -- losing 3 points doesn't mean the driver loses the front left wheel of his car -- they just represent the closeness to getting banned. They're meant to be a warning so the driver will maybe wise up.
Penalty points expire after a few years so that doesn't really correspond to D&D healing, but healing in D&D is a different topic.
I would venture to suggest that more UK drivers understand about penalty points, than understand quantum mechanics.
Probably.
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| #12FinarvynJul 03, 2014 5:29:23 | I'm a physicist and the quantum model for hit points just seems a bit bizarre to me, but I think I get what you're trying to say.
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| #13Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 6:09:26 |
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| #14CelticPaladinJul 03, 2014 6:21:35 |
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| #15jaelisJul 03, 2014 6:21:59 | The point is that hit points can mean lots of different things, and you don't know what any given point means until the story tells you. Analogous to the way a quantum particle can be in a superpostion of many states, until a measurement collapses it into a single one. It is not a terrible analogy, and if it helps people get their head around how hp are used, great! |
| #16RamzourJul 03, 2014 7:37:59 |
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| #17FinarvynJul 03, 2014 7:45:53 |
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| #18RamzourJul 03, 2014 7:49:23 |
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| #19RamzourJul 03, 2014 7:52:18 |
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| #20thespaceinvaderJul 03, 2014 7:57:16 |
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| #21Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 8:22:12 |
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| #22RamzourJul 03, 2014 8:22:37 | So basically you're saying any analogy is apt if you think it is. And if anyone disagrees with your analogy then they're wrong? |
| #23Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 8:25:58 |
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| #24Shadow_FrogJul 03, 2014 8:36:48 | Hit points are combination of the physical and metaphysical (stamina, luck, skill, etc); if divided into the simplest divisible unit no one factor is exclusive. A further complication in this abstract model is that the proportion of the combination is different from creature to creature. Regardless of the proportion, healing works the same. The rate of healing is really the area of contention with inflation being a second.
I look at a hit point pool like a glass of water in which there is no way to differentiate a single drop of water from another. Taking this analogy further, consider the "meat" portion of hit points to be salt. With this in mind, hit points could range anywhere from sea water to saline. Two creatures could have the same hit points but if one is a high level fighter and the other is a dinosaur, the fighter is one on the saline end while the dinosaur is closer to sea water. Objectively, both appear to be the same in a glass. |
| #25RamzourJul 03, 2014 8:55:15 |
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| #26Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 9:07:12 |
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| (Reply to #25)Shadow_Frog |
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| #28Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 9:24:38 |
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| #29RamzourJul 03, 2014 9:28:49 |
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| #30RamzourJul 03, 2014 9:34:19 |
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| (Reply to #28)Shadow_Frog |
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| #32Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 9:59:44 |
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| #33Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 10:01:35 |
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| #34Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 9:58:18 |
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| #35RamzourJul 03, 2014 10:07:21 |
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| #36RamzourJul 03, 2014 10:08:29 |
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| #37Cyber-DaveJul 03, 2014 10:27:25 |
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| #38RamzourJul 03, 2014 11:15:04 | Actually, no, I wasn't wrong in that previous discussion. If you recall, it turned out that we were using different definitions for things. We were essentially saying the same thing, but describing them in different ways. As a result of the misunderstanding, we were calculating things differently. That's why our numbers did not match up previously. Neither of our numbers were being calculated wrong, but our comparisons were off. Unfortunately, it took something like 10 pages of arguing to figure that out. Oh well.
Also, and I think you'll agree with this, it was kind of silly of us to argue about the difference between 10.43 damage and 10.64 damage (example numbers I just made up). Since the smallest measurable damage is 1 point, debating about fractional damage is mostly pointless. And even over enough trials, the variations in playstyle will obscure any meaningful fractional damage number. So when calculating DPS or anything like that, I think it's far better to just round to the nearest whole number. |
| #39BecDeCorbinJul 03, 2014 11:32:53 | Okay...so let's say Schrodinger's cat has 3 hit points... |
| #40Keyboard-ScribeJul 03, 2014 17:33:13 | Correction: Schrodinger's displacer beast! |
| #41Sands666Jul 04, 2014 15:58:10 |
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