I've wanted to have a little more "grit" in my campaign - but none of the ideas I've seen so far have felt right.
Here is a simple idea:
Persistent Damage
Any time a character takes damage, they incur one point of "Persistent Damage" for each die rolled against them.
This damage is part of (not in addition to) the normal hit point damage they take and needs to be kept track of separately.
Each point of Persistent Damage reduces the character's maximum hit point total by one.
If the total of Persistent Damage equals the character's total hit points, they die.
Magical healing (except for Healing Word) restores one point of Persistent Damage for each die rolled.
Hit dice rolled after a Short Rest has no effect on Persistent Damage.
A Long Rest restores ONE point of Persistent Damage.
Example: Bob, a first level Wizard, has six hit points. He is hit by a Goblin's Scimitar and takes 5 points of slashing damage. He now has one remaining hit point and one point of Persistent Damage. Carol, the Bard, casts Healing Word on Bob and restores 5 hit points. Since Healing Word does not remove Persistent Damage, Bob now has 5 hit points (his new max) and still has one point of Persistent Damage. Another Goblin hits Bob with a Shortbow attack and inflicts 5 points of piercing damage. Bob now has zero hits points (and is unconscious) as well as TWO points of Persistent Damage. Ted, the Cleric, casts a 1st level Cure Wounds on Bob and rolls 6 points total. One point of Persistent Damage is removed by the spell and Bob ends up at 5 hit points (his new max), but still has one point of Persistent Damage. Bob takes a long rest and is back to normal.
Some notes: A dagger and a Longsword each do ONE point of Persistent Damage. This may not make much sense but fits with the 5th edition "simpler is better" philosophy. Meanwhile, a Great Sword does TWO points of Persistent Damage, a 1st level Magic Missile does THREE, and a Fireball does EIGHT. I am going to encourage my players to describe their injuries. A point of Persistent Damage from a Goblin's Scimitar would be different from the points incurred from an Acid Splash cantrip. This system rewards Cure Wounds during combat - making Clerics more useful perhaps? And yes, I'm one of those people who dislikes Healing Word. Can you tell? There are almost certainly some rules corners where this system might not work - but it feels like a good start to me.
Does this *really* reward healing in combat? This seems like it further discourages healing in combat. After all, if the enemy survives one more turn because you cast cure wounds instead of attacking, you’re taking at least 1 persistent damage in exchange for healing 1. This is worse than just healing out of combat.
Additionally, recovery is massively skewed to magical healing. Long rests restoring only 1 needs to change somehow. It should either be more at base, or scale with some combination of level, max health, hit dice, proficiency bonus, and Constitution.
This also makes some attacks surprisingly more deadly. An attack that deals 4d4 is weighted almost the same by the designers as something that deals 1d12+4, but this system is would greatly punish the flavor-based smaller dice. Not sure what to do about it, but keep it in mind, and consider adjusting certain attacks and spells to be less damaging to max health.
Yeah, maybe I misspoke about healing in combat. What I'm really after is to make the effects of combat more *lasting* and this seemed better than the "Gritty Realism" section in the DMG.
I'm not sure this will achieve the result that you hope it will. Then again, I get a bit lost in the abstract of having to keep up with two piles of HP without having run through your described model personally. My lizard brain is strong today (and is currently struggling with the complexity of how to get more coffee...).
HP and the concept of hit points are, in my experience, arbitrary things that we use as a metric to determine how much more our heroes can endure before succumbing to death. It's a tool that helps us build drama and tension in the game. If you find magical healing, or the concept of it, to be too mundane in the game that you are trying to build, I would look into removing it or limiting it. You can make the healer's kit more desireable as adventuring gear than it is currently. Maybe healing potions don't exist in your world? I might suggest that having two different piles of HP that everyone now has to track is overly cumbersome, as is the idea that you would then have two different piles of HP that you needed to heal.
TL;DR is: You and your players are the only people in the absolute world that can determine what is fun for your group. Run the idea past them, put together a one-shot with this ruleset and see how it works. Playtest it a bit. If your group loves it, polish it up and throw it back up. I will always welcome a fresh view on something, but this doesn't seem to be a new take. At least not from my perspective.
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“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad
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I've wanted to have a little more "grit" in my campaign - but none of the ideas I've seen so far have felt right.
Here is a simple idea:
Persistent Damage
Example:
Bob, a first level Wizard, has six hit points.
He is hit by a Goblin's Scimitar and takes 5 points of slashing damage.
He now has one remaining hit point and one point of Persistent Damage.
Carol, the Bard, casts Healing Word on Bob and restores 5 hit points.
Since Healing Word does not remove Persistent Damage, Bob now has 5 hit points (his new max) and still has one point of Persistent Damage.
Another Goblin hits Bob with a Shortbow attack and inflicts 5 points of piercing damage.
Bob now has zero hits points (and is unconscious) as well as TWO points of Persistent Damage.
Ted, the Cleric, casts a 1st level Cure Wounds on Bob and rolls 6 points total.
One point of Persistent Damage is removed by the spell and Bob ends up at 5 hit points (his new max), but still has one point of Persistent Damage.
Bob takes a long rest and is back to normal.
Some notes:
A dagger and a Longsword each do ONE point of Persistent Damage. This may not make much sense but fits with the 5th edition "simpler is better" philosophy.
Meanwhile, a Great Sword does TWO points of Persistent Damage, a 1st level Magic Missile does THREE, and a Fireball does EIGHT.
I am going to encourage my players to describe their injuries. A point of Persistent Damage from a Goblin's Scimitar would be different from the points incurred from an Acid Splash cantrip.
This system rewards Cure Wounds during combat - making Clerics more useful perhaps?
And yes, I'm one of those people who dislikes Healing Word. Can you tell?
There are almost certainly some rules corners where this system might not work - but it feels like a good start to me.
Thoughts?
Does this *really* reward healing in combat? This seems like it further discourages healing in combat. After all, if the enemy survives one more turn because you cast cure wounds instead of attacking, you’re taking at least 1 persistent damage in exchange for healing 1. This is worse than just healing out of combat.
Additionally, recovery is massively skewed to magical healing. Long rests restoring only 1 needs to change somehow. It should either be more at base, or scale with some combination of level, max health, hit dice, proficiency bonus, and Constitution.
This also makes some attacks surprisingly more deadly. An attack that deals 4d4 is weighted almost the same by the designers as something that deals 1d12+4, but this system is would greatly punish the flavor-based smaller dice. Not sure what to do about it, but keep it in mind, and consider adjusting certain attacks and spells to be less damaging to max health.
Yeah, maybe I misspoke about healing in combat. What I'm really after is to make the effects of combat more *lasting* and this seemed better than the "Gritty Realism" section in the DMG.
Ref: https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/dmg/dungeon-masters-workshop#RestVariants
I'm not sure this will achieve the result that you hope it will. Then again, I get a bit lost in the abstract of having to keep up with two piles of HP without having run through your described model personally. My lizard brain is strong today (and is currently struggling with the complexity of how to get more coffee...).
I personally don't see the purpose of creating more rules to achieve the effect of Injuries (DMG), Slow Natural Healing (DMG) and Gritty Realism Rest Variant (DMG). Also, you can limit the occurence of magic, it's level cap, how accepted spellcasters are, all of that with the Magic In Your World (DMG).
HP and the concept of hit points are, in my experience, arbitrary things that we use as a metric to determine how much more our heroes can endure before succumbing to death. It's a tool that helps us build drama and tension in the game. If you find magical healing, or the concept of it, to be too mundane in the game that you are trying to build, I would look into removing it or limiting it. You can make the healer's kit more desireable as adventuring gear than it is currently. Maybe healing potions don't exist in your world? I might suggest that having two different piles of HP that everyone now has to track is overly cumbersome, as is the idea that you would then have two different piles of HP that you needed to heal.
TL;DR is: You and your players are the only people in the absolute world that can determine what is fun for your group. Run the idea past them, put together a one-shot with this ruleset and see how it works. Playtest it a bit. If your group loves it, polish it up and throw it back up. I will always welcome a fresh view on something, but this doesn't seem to be a new take. At least not from my perspective.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” - Mark Twain - Innocents Abroad