Injury Resistance


Homebrew and House Rules


DISCLAIMER The following is a super rough first draft of an idea I came up with at work, and wrote really quickly during a short break.

Alright, so I'm trying to get away from expendable resources in the game (spells per day, for example). In exchange, I'm trying to create additional mechanics that allow for the chance of a good or bad roll of the dice to create similar limits to player ability. The following is an idea I've had to replace HP.

Obviously, the following mechanic will require a massive retooling of how much damage certain creatures, abilities and spells cause. For now, let's assume 1st level.

Injury Resistance

Whenever a creature takes damage, they need to roll an Injury Resistance roll with a DC of the damage taken + 1 per previous successful attack made against that creature this combat (Successful attacks are those that exceeded the character's AC, not just those that cause an injury). The roll for this save is 1d20 + CON bonus (if any) + BAB + any DR the creature possesses.

If the creature fails the IR roll, the creature takes an injury. Roll a second d20 to determine the location and effect of the injury. Severity of the effects increases by 1 for every 5 the result of the IR roll was below the DR.

01-03 - Head -1 penalty to all mental stats
04-11 - Arms -1 penalty to Str & Dex
12-16 - Body -1 penalty to Con & Str
17-20 - Legs -1 penalty to Str and lose .5 squares of movement (only count each whole square of penalty)

Penalties remain until the character can rest for 8 hours.


So your getting rid of HP all together? That's a bold move HP is one of the most sacred of cows, a whole lot of the pathfinder base system is dependent upon HP you will basically end up needing to write a new system which could be fun but would not be easy.

Have you considered a wounds/vitality system, there are a bunch around the internet. Here is the old one from Unearthed Arcana.

I think this type of injury would couple well with whenever the character takes a wound they roll to see if they avoid an injury. That way they don't need to roll on every hit as that would get tedious (unless you rebalance attacks and AC which is again difficult)

Other Thoughts in no particular order:
Consider making it a fortitude save rather than introducing a new type of roll, easier for the players.

Will this apply to NPC's and monsters as well? how will you do that?

If you are getting rid of spells per day consider using a spell point system (or better yet spheres of power) and making them recharge or use the spell recharge mechanic laid out again in unearthed arcana.

Edit there is also an Injury system in Unearthed arcana that might be a good place to look for inspiration.


Thanks for the advice. I know HP is a big one to tackle, but I've been delving deep into retinkering and using different mechanics, so I thought I'd give this a try. Not easy at all, but very fun.

I am planning on rebalancing attacks and AC. Additionally, I was thinking of using a defense/DR mechanic as introduced in Ultimate Combat, though adding DR/armor to this idea might be too much.

Right now, I was planning on making it apply to NPCs and monsters.

As for magic, my current goal is to apply a WFRP-esque risk factor to casting. Though I do have the spheres of power PDF and am really getting into that.


Oh, kind of forgot a big part (again, rough first idea):

When the injury penalties to a body part equal the creature's con score, the next attack to that area the creature fails an IR roll against causes a critical injury. Critical injuries do 2 points of ability damage to the stats listed in the IR location table, plus an additional two for every 5 the IR missed the DC by. Reducing any stat to 3 or lower incapacitates the creature. Reducing any stat to 0 is death.

Ability damage heals as written in RAW. Additionally, they heal 1 point per stat per die of healing from a healing spell (i.e. Cure Moderate Wounds would heal 2 points per stat of the target). Ability penalties are healed as HP in RAW.


Bardarok wrote:
Edit there is also an Injury system in Unearthed arcana that might be a good place to look for inspiration.

That's way more elegant. I think it's back to the drawing board for me.


I know d10 is very different from d20, but my personal favorite system regarding character health is World of Darkness:

Everyone has 7 HP. damage is rolled against Stamina (or in the case of pathfinder, Fortitude). Certain abilities grant bonuses to damage or Stamina. If Stamina rolls better, no damage is taken. If damage rolls better, the one attacked takes damage equal to damage's success minus Stamina's roll. The less HP a creature has remaining, the higher penalties to most rolls that creature makes.

For this to work for Pathfinder, damage would need a serious nerf at higher levels, but I think it's do-able.

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