I got my start in old-school RPGs like Final Fantasy I. If you dropped to 0 hp, it was bad, and there was a significantly increased chance you'd TPK. Reviving a party member from 0 hp required a more powerful spell, and only brought the character to 1 hp. There was a good chance they'd get dropped again and you'd be no better off next round. The challenge for the healer was to keep all characters healthy to minimize the chance of getting dropped.
Contrast with 5e, where healing spells actually work better on unconscious characters. If a character starts with 10 hp and then will take an attack for 15 hp and a heal of 20 hp, it's better if they take the attack first, then the heal, and end up at 20 hp. If they take the heal first, they'll end up at 15 hp. There's a chance they'll miss a turn, and then you're probably overall worse off, but it's not worth the risk of pre-emptively healing one character only for a different one to take the hit.
I've been toying with the idea of house-ruling healing in some way to make the impact of dropping to 0 hit points more significant.
One thought is to make healing abilities less effective or more difficult on unconscious characters. For example, decrease the hp regained by one die when applied to an unconscious player. L1 Cure Wounds would give hp equal to just the caster's spellcasting mod, with no dice rolled at all. L2 would be 1d8 + mod. This wouldn't really change the flow of play that much, as often an L1 healing spell will not give the player enough hit points to survive the next attack. It just becomes a matter of canceling each monster attack one for one with a L1 healing spell (which kind of makes L1 spells really powerful). But it might negate the penalty for pre-emptive healing.
A more radical idea is to make healing spells take effect at the start of the target's turn, and the caster must maintain concentration until then. Or even at the end of their next turn, so that going unconscious is always at minimum a one-turn penalty. There'd be a significant danger of failing to revive the fallen party member if the monsters target the healer to break their concentration.
Another idea is to require a spell component with a small cost when healing a player from 0 hp. Something much less than Revivify. Maybe a semi-precious gem worth at least 25 gp. It's minimal enough, but you need to stock up on them before you head out adventuring, and you need to economize your stock and not get into situations of reviving unconscious players unnecessarily.
All of these ideas nerf healers, so I think there would need to be a compensation to avoid underpowering them. For the idea of reducing the healing dice, the answer seems obvious. Also increase the healing dice for casts on conscious players. L1 Cure Wounds on a conscious player would be 2d8 + mod. For the other ideas, I think it would take a lot of playtesting to figure out the right balance.
The last idea doesn't nerf healers at all. Instead, when you drop to 0 hp, any additional damage, divided by 2, is deducted from your max hp until a short / long rest. This is more smooth than the other options, which impose a pass / fail penalty for failing to keep your allies above 0 hp. If you take damage exactly equal to your hp or 1 higher, there's no extra penalty at all. If you get reduced just a little past 0, you'd take a minor hit to your max hp. If you're nearly insta-killed, you are now at nearly half-hp even after being fully healed. This also feels like a reasonable simulation, as getting knocked unconscious repeatedly is probably going to diminish your fighting spirit. It'd be worthwhile to avoid it, especially if you're slogging through a long dungeon and are going to have a number of fights ahead of you. Your party might have to adjust its tactics, rotating fresher troops into the front line position as your tank gets worn down. But in the boss battle, you can still go all out and take that big hit that nearly kills you outright, at least once.
What do you guys think? Are any of these ideas balanced? Do you have alternative ideas? Did other editions handle this better, or was there something in other editions that wasn't working, and that's why 5e made it like this? Does healing work fine as is? I feel like, as it is, cleric tactics are kind of boring. If someone is down, you use a healing ability. Otherwise do damage or a buff every turn. The only tough decisions come if multiple party members are down.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I got my start in old-school RPGs like Final Fantasy I. If you dropped to 0 hp, it was bad, and there was a significantly increased chance you'd TPK. Reviving a party member from 0 hp required a more powerful spell, and only brought the character to 1 hp. There was a good chance they'd get dropped again and you'd be no better off next round. The challenge for the healer was to keep all characters healthy to minimize the chance of getting dropped.
Contrast with 5e, where healing spells actually work better on unconscious characters. If a character starts with 10 hp and then will take an attack for 15 hp and a heal of 20 hp, it's better if they take the attack first, then the heal, and end up at 20 hp. If they take the heal first, they'll end up at 15 hp. There's a chance they'll miss a turn, and then you're probably overall worse off, but it's not worth the risk of pre-emptively healing one character only for a different one to take the hit.
I've been toying with the idea of house-ruling healing in some way to make the impact of dropping to 0 hit points more significant.
One thought is to make healing abilities less effective or more difficult on unconscious characters. For example, decrease the hp regained by one die when applied to an unconscious player. L1 Cure Wounds would give hp equal to just the caster's spellcasting mod, with no dice rolled at all. L2 would be 1d8 + mod. This wouldn't really change the flow of play that much, as often an L1 healing spell will not give the player enough hit points to survive the next attack. It just becomes a matter of canceling each monster attack one for one with a L1 healing spell (which kind of makes L1 spells really powerful). But it might negate the penalty for pre-emptive healing.
A more radical idea is to make healing spells take effect at the start of the target's turn, and the caster must maintain concentration until then. Or even at the end of their next turn, so that going unconscious is always at minimum a one-turn penalty. There'd be a significant danger of failing to revive the fallen party member if the monsters target the healer to break their concentration.
Another idea is to require a spell component with a small cost when healing a player from 0 hp. Something much less than Revivify. Maybe a semi-precious gem worth at least 25 gp. It's minimal enough, but you need to stock up on them before you head out adventuring, and you need to economize your stock and not get into situations of reviving unconscious players unnecessarily.
All of these ideas nerf healers, so I think there would need to be a compensation to avoid underpowering them. For the idea of reducing the healing dice, the answer seems obvious. Also increase the healing dice for casts on conscious players. L1 Cure Wounds on a conscious player would be 2d8 + mod. For the other ideas, I think it would take a lot of playtesting to figure out the right balance.
The last idea doesn't nerf healers at all. Instead, when you drop to 0 hp, any additional damage, divided by 2, is deducted from your max hp until a short / long rest. This is more smooth than the other options, which impose a pass / fail penalty for failing to keep your allies above 0 hp. If you take damage exactly equal to your hp or 1 higher, there's no extra penalty at all. If you get reduced just a little past 0, you'd take a minor hit to your max hp. If you're nearly insta-killed, you are now at nearly half-hp even after being fully healed. This also feels like a reasonable simulation, as getting knocked unconscious repeatedly is probably going to diminish your fighting spirit. It'd be worthwhile to avoid it, especially if you're slogging through a long dungeon and are going to have a number of fights ahead of you. Your party might have to adjust its tactics, rotating fresher troops into the front line position as your tank gets worn down. But in the boss battle, you can still go all out and take that big hit that nearly kills you outright, at least once.
What do you guys think? Are any of these ideas balanced? Do you have alternative ideas? Did other editions handle this better, or was there something in other editions that wasn't working, and that's why 5e made it like this? Does healing work fine as is? I feel like, as it is, cleric tactics are kind of boring. If someone is down, you use a healing ability. Otherwise do damage or a buff every turn. The only tough decisions come if multiple party members are down.