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Mostly a though exercise; not in use or in playtest at the moment.
These are a variation on Evil Lincoln's Strain-Injury rules. If you are not familiar with them, here they are. Otherwise, these rules work under the same postulate: most damage should be seen as tiresome parries, dodges, degrading equipment, luck etc. Therefore, hp could regenerate quickly without the need of magic. From times to times, characters get actually injured, which takes time, skill and magic to heal. This variant also aims at the same goals of removing the reliance on magical healing with the least impact of the Rules as Written.
Make a "Wounded" box at the top of your character sheet. Calculate the 50% threshold (rounded down) of the character's hp. Mark it beside your hp total.
Characters recuperate all their hp after a full night of sleep. After a quick rests and refit, all characters recover 50% of their hp. This replaces the normal rules on natural regeneration of hp.
When your character receives a critical hit, fails a saving throw causing damage or is dropped below 0 hp, check the "Wounded" box on your character sheet.
As long as the "Wounded" box is checked, a character may not regenerate hp above the 50% threshold. Do not drop a character to 50% hp when wounded; that character simply cannot recover more hp than this threshold.
If a wounded character receive a successful Heal (long-term care) check, or receive a cure, heal, regeneration and similar spell, un-check the "Wounded" box and immediately apply the effect of the spell (if applicable).
Otherwise, stat blocks and damage remains the same as seen in the Bestiary and RaW. Poisons, bleed effects and other secondary damage effects are unaffected. Nonlethal damage is RaW, except that sources of nonlethal damage never cause the "wounded" box to be checked.
Stay tuned for the slightly more elaborated variation.
'findel
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This variant uses a condition track instead of a wounded? yes/no question. It also includes damage penalties; badly affected characters are encourage to adopt a different strategy.
As with the previous variant, character recover 100% of their hit point after a night of rest, and 50% after a quick rest and refit period in a calm and non-threatening environment.
Instead of one "Wounded" box, make fours.
One "Lightly Wounded" box, one "Moderately Wounded" box, one "Seriously Wounded" box and one "Critically Wounded" box
Inscribe a penalty next to each box, raging from -1 to -8, as such:
[] Lightly Wounded (-1)
[] Moderately Wounded (-2)
[] Seriously Wounded (-4)
[] Critically Wounded (-8)
These act as a condition track. Whenever the character receives a critical hit, fails a saving throw (from an effect causing damage) or is dropped below 0 hp, check the topmost box. Further critical hits and failed saves (or passing out below 0 hp) worsen the character's condition by one step. Once a character is critically wounded, its condition cannot worsen regardless of the number critical hits or failed saves it receives. At this point, the character is probably close to death anyways...
Every condition implies a penalty. Penalties apply to all d20 rolls (attack rolls, skill checks, saves etc), spell save DCs, and it also affect the character's hit points maximum. The character's hit points maximum is reduced by the associated penalty for each level the character has attained. To not adjust the character hit points to this new maximum; this merely indicates the new hp maximum the character can have after a night of rest or a rest and refit period.
cure spells improve a character's health condition. A cure light wounds spell completely heals a lightly wounded character, or else improves its condition by one step. A cure moderate wounds spell improves the character's condition by two steps, and so forth... Cure spells can be use consecutively to clear a character's condition track completely. A heal spell instantly clears a character's health condition in addition to the spells benefits.
Since the hit point maximum is only relevant after rest, apply the appropriate amount of hp gained for cure spells regardless of the character's new hit point maximum.
Similarly, a wounded character's condition improves by one step for each day spend under the care of the healer with a successful Heal check (see long term care).
'findel
Life is already hard for a 1st level adventurer taking on a critical hit, failing a save vs an effect causing damage or being dropped below 0 hp. I'd say that a 5th level character caped at 20ish hp is equally in trouble.
So yeah, a character capable of casting cure light wounds at 1st level is still useful.
This houserule is not meant to totally invalidate the usefulness of the cleric; just to remove the party's total dependence on constant castings of CLW in the form of spells or wands.
I think -1/-2/-3/-4 may be better (then again I like lower tier and tend to hover around low to mid level).
As I said, not tested, not even thought-out that thoroughly.
I originally had -1/-2/-3/-4 (nice linear progression) and then moved to -1/-2/-4/-8 (nice logarithmic progression) to put more stress on how serious and how critical a seriously wounded or critically wounded character should be.
The crux of this variant was to cap max hit points based on condition, and at -4 hp/level, I didn't think it was "critical" enough. But rational thinking doesn't always equate to "good in actual play".
How do you see 'Heal skill' and the Cure Deadly Wounds part of the skill playing out?
I always forget about this one.
Quick like that, I'd say increase Max hit point threshold by the amount healed with Heal (treat deadly wounds) check by RaW during rest and refit.
I was more thinking removal of one condition - the hour needed compared to the instant gratification of CLW would be appropriate.
...or the improvement of one condition on the track, indeed.
If using the simpler, yes/no variant, I'd hesitate to make it that trivial to remove the wounded condition without magic, but otherwise you are right, a DC 20 skill use is usually within the power level of a 1st level spell.
I actually like the first one better.
Been playing a lot of Mouse Guard/Torchbearer of late. In that game, injury is just a condition, not a coordinate on a spectrum leading to death.
The penalties from the second are interesting, but I have a hard time reconciling the need for such things. Is it realism? Is it for balance? Please take a moment and outline your design objectives very specifically for us.
Applying the penalty to spell save DCs is an interesting direction. My approach was usually to force a concentration check, but that left a lot to be desired also.
Again, spell out the design objectives, i.e. how do you want the end result to feel vs. how things feel now. Then it's a lot easier to tell if you're hitting the mark. Without such objectives clearly stated, it is WAY TOO EASY to drift into new rules for the sake of modeling reality, which makes for unnecessary and confusing rules.
Please take a moment and outline your design objectives very specifically for us.
So you're telling me I should listen to the same advice I usually give about other people's houserules? Good point :)
I must say I was mostly thinking out loud and throwing ideas to the wind, see what comes back.
But your Strain-Injury variant made me realize three things,
I made peace with hit points as a measure of "how long one can last in a fight", but I don't like to see them solely as a measure of one's health (because it makes my brain hurt). HOWEVER, damage also should implies injuries of some sort. IMO, hit points by RaW don't reflect that dichotomy very well. Thus houserules.
Unlike Vitality/Wounds (which I like on a conceptual basis), Strain/Injury proved that the issue could be tackled from the hit points' recuperation perspective leaving damage, hit points and other published values mostly intact. As far as this houserule goes, keeping published values intact is crucial.
This is one of the Strain/Injury strongest components IMO; both on a narrative and mechanical approach, the conditions for injuries are simple and easy to identify, and are well integrated parts of the core game engine regardless of class, level or abilities.
Evil Lincoln's strain/Injury variant addresses all of the points above and from now on, I will assume that the reader is familiar with those houserules. So after a few recent games using the Strain/Injury rules, I realized I was asking my players "did you take injury damage?" followed by (if the answered was yes) "how much?". The question wasn't really in two parts (more something like "how much injury damage did you take?") but in my head, it started with a yes/no question, then I would process the amount.
So it dawned to me that perhaps I could keep it as a yes/no question. Making "being wounded" a condition could simplify thing even further. This could even trigger damage penalties, which I was thinking of introducing somehow.
It's very interesting to me, but I have to note that: "Is anyone hurt?" (yes) "How bad is it?" are really evocative questions that are often asked after real battles. That's not an argument to realism so much as something I like to hear in roleplay. It's nice when the rules and the RP script align like that.
So you'd say that making injury a yes/no question was a goal, that's doable. Whence all this damage penalty business?
...I have to note that: "Is anyone hurt?" (yes) "How bad is it?" are really evocative questions that are often asked after real battles.
I was expecting that too; but the ease with one can be healed often makes that moot. Or perhaps my GMing style doesn't stress on that part. Perhaps the question will arise once I remove injury damage as a measurable amount. As I said; not play-tested yet, it has not even been discussed with other players yet.
Whence all this damage penalty business?
Mostly musing and thinking aloud. A wounded condition could bring a penalty. the game offers four "levels" or wounded-ness based on four cure X wounds spells. At this point I'm being led rather than leading, but I'm rolling with it.
I'm not sold on the necessity of damage penalties in a high-magic pulp-action type of game (like the one I'm playing at the moment), but it does have its place in a darker high-fantasy setting or gritty low magic setting, both of which could be served well with a rule diminishing the reliance on magical healing for D&D/Pathfinder. It puts more emphasis on the fact that heroes can lose or win at great costs in a world where gp are not the only measure of a character's success. Damage penalties encourages a style of play where players adapt their strategies, reconsider their options and seek more non-violent alternatives. The second version of the houserule was aimed toward that type of game.
Ah, I see what you mean about GM style. I choose to look at it like this: wands of healing exist. They behave as they ought to. If I want a setting to be grittier, I'll get rid of the healing magic, rather than making it so weak that it feels like it isn't even there.
... and like 75% of my houserules discussed on these boards, this one might never get used. But the process is fun, the discussions are constructive and the exercise sometimes lead to a breakthrough in a completely unrelated part of my life.
I didn't mean to kill the conversation, really! I just wanted to tighten it up a bit... specific goals, etc.