I was thinking of adding a new feat for all my level 1 players in the next game (it will be Curse or Strad or Homebrew not sure yet.) I personally hate how easy it is to kill players at level 1 from high roll hit and many time start them at higher levels because of it. It made me think about making a feat that add 10 hp to all the Heroes and bosses at Level 1. Any spell that deturmes its affect on the person would be calculated as if they have 10 less health. What do you all think about this as a soliton vs starting them at level 2 all the time?
Heroic Health
When you take this feat you add +10 hp to your max hp stack with anything else that raised your HP. When you use your hp as part of a calutlation you count as 10 points less.
Example: If after this feat you have 18HP and some one cast a sleep spell you count as only 8 hp for the spell.
Characters are supposed to be easy to kill at level 1. You just need to use level appropriate monsters and even if they die, is it a big deal? Most characters will level up after a couple of hours of play.
Do they keep it when they hit level 2? If not, then they get weaker by levelling up.
This seems overly complicated and doesn't make sense as they increase in level. Why does a Sorcerer have 16 hp at level 1, and a max of 12 (+con) at level 2?
Just run your PCs through a single combat at level 1 against weak enemies before levelling them up. In my latest campaign I had mine fight against mud creature that had +0 to hit, dealt 1d4 damage per attack, had 6 hit points and AC10. They can handle those fairly safely at level 1, while learning how to play the game. If the players are veterans then just throw the regular Bandits and Goblins at them and they'll enjoy the danger. Nobody should be super attached to their character at level 1 unless your players are crafting highly detailed and complex backstories and personalities before the game begins, in which case you probably won't ever kill them (in which case, abandon dice rolling in combat altogether because there's no point to it, and just narrate fights however you want. Fighting is supposed to be dangerous, giving the characters a big hp boost to ensure you don't kill them even at level 1 signposts that they don't really have to worry).
Each character needs to kill the equivalent of 4 Goblins each to reach level 2 solely on monster XP.
No this would be keeped for all level so the weaker at level 2 will not hit it. If it was not for this website not going into negatives (players track on here) i would have just said they can stay up till -10 instead of 0.
I started thinking about this as many spots say death house in Curse is too deadly at level 1.
This is just free 10 hp. I realize that you put in a situation but that seems like it defeats the point of having the extra HP in the first place. Having a situation where you can say, ' you have 10 extra HP, except for any situation that counts your HP for anything other than damage ' Is, um, bad.
If you are that worried you, as the DM, can simply pull your punches and actively not try to kill their characters, or give them some special starting equipment that gives them extra AC like a ring of protection, or let them choose one item of uncommon rarety or lower to give them a little bit of an extra choice within the game.
If you feel you MUST make a feat to give them something extra, perhaps have your feat give 10 temp hp after a long rest. At level 1 none of them have any way to generate temp HP anyway so it won't interfere with any temp hp abilities like Armor of Agathys or some of the druid stuff.
Having an additional 10hp will throw out the challenge calculations for every level thereafter, since at some point you'll have characters with access to 3rd level spells but better hit points than a 7th level character of their class should be able to have.
If you are really that concerned about 1st level characters dying, and you don't believe in killing characters then you could start each character with a Vistani necklace that gives 10 temporary hit points, and when the hit points run out it breaks and crumbles to dust.
Having an additional 10hp will throw out the challenge calculations for every level thereafter, since at some point you'll have characters with access to 3rd level spells but better hit points than a 7th level character of their class should be able to have.
I doubt it would be all that big of a deal after Tier-1, after all, any Wiz or Sorcerer with a Con of 14+ will get at least 5 HP or more per level-up anyway. It would be no worse than as if one rolled above average on HP instead of taking the fixed amount for the first tier of play. In the campaign I’m DMing currently there’s a 12th level Fighter with the same HP as the Barbarian because that player doesn’t know how to roll low. 🤷♂️ I tell them to roll and that their fixed average is their guaranteed minimum specifically to beef their HP more the higher their level so I can go bananas on them on the days I run combat. (About 1 adventure day out of 3 is combat heavy, the rest might not have any.)
I was thinking of adding a new feat for all my level 1 players in the next game (it will be Curse or Strad or Homebrew not sure yet.) I personally hate how easy it is to kill players at level 1 from high roll hit and many time start them at higher levels because of it. It made me think about making a feat that add 10 hp to all the Heroes and bosses at Level 1. Any spell that deturmes its affect on the person would be calculated as if they have 10 less health. What do you all think about this as a soliton vs starting them at level 2 all the time?
Heroic Health
When you take this feat you add +10 hp to your max hp stack with anything else that raised your HP. When you use your hp as part of a calutlation you count as 10 points less.
Example: If after this feat you have 18HP and some one cast a sleep spell you count as only 8 hp for the spell.
I spell Goodly.
Characters are supposed to be easy to kill at level 1. You just need to use level appropriate monsters and even if they die, is it a big deal? Most characters will level up after a couple of hours of play.
Do they keep it when they hit level 2? If not, then they get weaker by levelling up.
This seems overly complicated and doesn't make sense as they increase in level. Why does a Sorcerer have 16 hp at level 1, and a max of 12 (+con) at level 2?
Just run your PCs through a single combat at level 1 against weak enemies before levelling them up. In my latest campaign I had mine fight against mud creature that had +0 to hit, dealt 1d4 damage per attack, had 6 hit points and AC10. They can handle those fairly safely at level 1, while learning how to play the game. If the players are veterans then just throw the regular Bandits and Goblins at them and they'll enjoy the danger. Nobody should be super attached to their character at level 1 unless your players are crafting highly detailed and complex backstories and personalities before the game begins, in which case you probably won't ever kill them (in which case, abandon dice rolling in combat altogether because there's no point to it, and just narrate fights however you want. Fighting is supposed to be dangerous, giving the characters a big hp boost to ensure you don't kill them even at level 1 signposts that they don't really have to worry).
Each character needs to kill the equivalent of 4 Goblins each to reach level 2 solely on monster XP.
No this would be keeped for all level so the weaker at level 2 will not hit it. If it was not for this website not going into negatives (players track on here) i would have just said they can stay up till -10 instead of 0.
I started thinking about this as many spots say death house in Curse is too deadly at level 1.
I spell Goodly.
This is just free 10 hp. I realize that you put in a situation but that seems like it defeats the point of having the extra HP in the first place. Having a situation where you can say, ' you have 10 extra HP, except for any situation that counts your HP for anything other than damage ' Is, um, bad.
If you are that worried you, as the DM, can simply pull your punches and actively not try to kill their characters, or give them some special starting equipment that gives them extra AC like a ring of protection, or let them choose one item of uncommon rarety or lower to give them a little bit of an extra choice within the game.
If you feel you MUST make a feat to give them something extra, perhaps have your feat give 10 temp hp after a long rest. At level 1 none of them have any way to generate temp HP anyway so it won't interfere with any temp hp abilities like Armor of Agathys or some of the druid stuff.
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That is a good idea thanks.
I spell Goodly.
Having an additional 10hp will throw out the challenge calculations for every level thereafter, since at some point you'll have characters with access to 3rd level spells but better hit points than a 7th level character of their class should be able to have.
If you are really that concerned about 1st level characters dying, and you don't believe in killing characters then you could start each character with a Vistani necklace that gives 10 temporary hit points, and when the hit points run out it breaks and crumbles to dust.
I doubt it would be all that big of a deal after Tier-1, after all, any Wiz or Sorcerer with a Con of 14+ will get at least 5 HP or more per level-up anyway. It would be no worse than as if one rolled above average on HP instead of taking the fixed amount for the first tier of play. In the campaign I’m DMing currently there’s a 12th level Fighter with the same HP as the Barbarian because that player doesn’t know how to roll low. 🤷♂️ I tell them to roll and that their fixed average is their guaranteed minimum specifically to beef their HP more the higher their level so I can go bananas on them on the days I run combat. (About 1 adventure day out of 3 is combat heavy, the rest might not have any.)
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