I know this may seem obvious, but sometimes we forget this. Let me give you a sense of scale.
A typical unskilled laborer in Pathfinder earns 1 sp per day. An unskilled laborer working in the modern day, real-life setting might be working two jobs a day, for 16 hours a day earning maybe $100 (which figures at around $6 for minimum wage, which isn't far off from the truth). So, for the "working poor" in Pathfinder, 1 sp = $100. As 10 sp = 1 gp, 1 gp = $1000. We'll use this as a conversion factor for our comparisons.
A first-level adventurer typically starts out with about 150 gp on average. This would be $150,000 worth of gear. For people who regularly put their lives on the line for fame and fortune, this sounds like a fair amount.
Let's move up the power level a bit. An 7th-level adventurer would have gear worth around 6,000 gp, or $6,000,000. This is about how much it costs for a modern M1/A2 Abrams Main Battle Tank.
Moving up the power scale to 11th level, they have around 16,000 gp, or $16,000,000 in gear. This is comparable to an F-16 American jet fighter.
A 20th-level fighter would command about 160,000 gp worth of gear, or $160,000,000 in modern terms. A group of six adventurers would have just about $1,000,000,000 in wealth, which is approximately the price tag of a space shuttle.
Comparatively, a billion dollars is greater than the GDP (or entire national income) of any of the ten smallest countries in the world. However, to think about it there are many businesspeople who have more wealth than this -- Bill Gates has about $40 billion in wealth, and Warren Buffet has about $30 billion. This means that each of them could probably equip a couple dozen ultra-heroic adventurers in case the Tarrasque ever gets wished to Earth! There's also a fair chance that either of them probably have some pretty mondo-cool magical artifacts kicking around in their attics.
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Now, let's talk about hit points. This discussion depends on a few assumptions about how hitpoints work -- namely that "hit points" represent the ability to absorb damage and wounds. This assumption may be off to many DMs and designers, but many people certainly interpret it in this way.
Take a typical commoner, or in other words a run-of-the-mill common person running around today. Let's say that we stab them with, say, a dagger. Typically, they will fall on the ground and lose consciousness within a few seconds. This means that any serious attack with a dagger or a knife will result in all of a 1st-level commoner's hit points to become exhausted to the point of unconsciousness. Let's say that we're talking about 3 hp, which seems pretty reasonable. There certainly are some people who are stabbed and can run for help, or if they received only a flesh wound.
Now, let's compare this to our 7th-level adventurer above. This fighter, let's say, has a +2 Con bonus, which would result in him getting 7d10+14 hp, or on average 49 hp. This means that a dagger (1d4 damage, average 2.5) could hit a fighter 20 times before he passes out from loss of blood. Or in other words, you could stab a fighter 20 times before he's in any serious danger.
Now let's hit up our 20th-level superhero. He would receive 20d10+20 hp, or on average 120 hp. This means that our dagger-wielding thug could stab our hero 48 times before the fighter drops from blood loss.
Let's suppose that we take our heroes and stab them in the eyes repeatedly (i.e. a crit each swing). A critting dagger does 2d4 damage, or on average 5. This means that you could repeatedly stab a 7th-level fighter in the face 10 times before the fighter is in any significantly worse shape than when he started our venture. Similarly, a 20th-level fighter could be stabbed in the face or in the chest 24 times before he starts to bleed out.
Just imagine a PC exploring how long it'll take him to die if a peasant is stabbing him in the face. He thinks nothing of it, since his cleric best friend is standing right there to keep him from actually dying (or if he dies, to raise him right then and there). For the 7th-level fighter, this will take the commoner a full minute of stabbing him in the face to actually do that much damage. For our 20th-level friend, it'll take about two and a half minutes for our peasant friend to start killing the hero.
Thoughts? Other things that show that adventurers are abnormal?
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Hit points are abstraction of heroic durability, not scientific representation of human physical resistance. It's not about "how many daggers can you stick in my body compared to a lvl 1 Commoner", it's more about said Commoner dying to a dagger blow, while a heroic character being above such fates by the virtue of being larger-than-life, hence he can survive n swings before the last one brings him down. Think Achilles vs. nameless mooks.
D&D economy is out of whack and with no attempt to be realistic. Also, you're comparing modern wages to medieval-ish ones, which is not really a good base.
For the first part, the only major issue I can see is that there's no real way to convert between gold pieces and actual money without just pulling it out of your rear end to one extent or another, no offense meant.
As for the second half, HP generally works better/more realisticly if you assume the guy getting stabbed isn't just standing there letting his kidneys get turned into a reddish-brown goo. Besides, stabbing a guy in the eye seems more like a coup de grace that a regular critical hit.
As for other superhuman stuff PCs can do, a high enough level Ranger with appropriate favored terrains can literally stand in front of a brick wall, not hiding behind anything, and still not be noticed by all the commoners that happen to pass him by.
Oh, come on -- you two are taking this entirely too seriously.
This also relates to the old chestnut about a PC arguing with his DM that he could survive the falling damage from falling off a mountain. "I don't care how many hit points you have, you're not going to survive that!"
lol
Funny stuff!
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This also relates to the old chestnut about a PC arguing with his DM that he could survive the falling damage from falling off a mountain. "I don't care how many hit points you have, you're not going to survive that!"
Well, to be fair, there have been the rare cases where people have fallen out of airplanes and survived... barely. Terminal velocity is terminal velocity.
I liked the Star Wars explanation of HP, (as well as their system in general):
Hit points, or Vitality, is your ability to avoid being seriously hurt. If a gun was shot at you and didn't crit, it meant it either grazed you, or possibly did not hit at all, but you lose the points because the effort of dodging it tired you out.
Wound Points were equal to your Con score. If a crit happened, it wasn't multiplied, but rather it skipped the vitality and chewed on your wounds(-10 still kills you). This added a sense of realism, because a level 20 person could stick around a lot longer than a low leveler, but a crit could be equally damning. (A lightsaber kills Obi-Wan in one strike because he allows a crit). It should also be noted that non-heroics did not have vitality scores, but merely their wound points.
/tosses Boxy310 off the mountain
I like what Lord of the Rings Online did: hit points was essentially your will to fight.
As you got banged up, your courage faltered. 'Healers' would be minstrels or leaders, who would inspire those around them to rise to the challenge.
Finally, your will would fail and you would fall, to be dragged away and roused later.
It's a beautiful way to avoid some of the head scratching with normal hit points, though it requires a certain cinematic element; you aren't actually bleeding or having your arm ripped off and checking ticks off a box, you are NEARLY having your arm ripped off and getting bruised up.
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PCs are not normal folk... after about 4th level. At around 4th level they are the equivalents of modern day sports stars or war heroes, world champion athletes and the like. At 5th level, they're about once in a generation people, and the world will start to recognize them as such. At around 6th to 12th level, they're the stuff of legends, Conan and Sephiroth and Beowulf all fit into this category. At 13th level and beyond, they are ready for extra-planar adventures, and the God and denizens of those realms will start to take notice of them. Finally, at 20th level, PCs are veritable demi-gods, able to take out whole armies by themselves.
So no, most PCs after 4th level are not "normal folk" but between 1st and 4th, they are, just cream of the crop kind of normal folk.
If you look into the way the mechanics work for things like jumping and crafting, most people we know can be represented by 1st level characters, with almost no exceptions. We will be lucky if we know someone that equivocates to 2nd level. Very fortunate if we know a 3rd level somebody, and so on.
There's a fun article on some website that describes this stuff, done much better than I.
This is one reason I like the idea of E6 games (short form: stop leveling at level 6, gain an additional feat every 5000 xp).
Level 6 characters, level 6 characters with extra feats, are heroes without being demigods.
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I'll throw one of my many dapper hats in on this discussion.
PCs are, in no uncertain terms, das ubermensch of any given game world. They're special. I don't personally buy into the idea that they're born heroes, but I do believe that they are capable of nothing short of Herculean deeds when they so desire.
What kills me are the DMs who question the ludicrous things a player wants to do with their character, firstly, a quote from a source I've long-forgotten: "If you can't imagine a 1st level character that some day might change history then you're never going to tell an epic tale. If a GM isn't willing to allow players to affect the setting in a real way then you are condemned to sweeping out dungeons."
The reason I bring this up is: in another thread on these boards someone had expressed concerning [in the Council of Thieves AP] it seeming a bit off that a group of 1st-2nd level PCs could make the Hellknights, an elite group of Cheliaxan military men, look like a bunch of fools; thankfully the obvious response came up: "Of all the people in Golarion, of every single living, breathing being on the entire planet there are only four to six PCs; why wouldn't they be able to make the Hellknights look like fools?" Going a step farther, if I'm a half-crazed barbarian warrior who can do a standing long jump across a twenty foot chasm, swinging my axe at whatever happens to be at the end of my jump, and has gotten into a fistfight with no less than twelve Horned Devils, and won - why wouldn't I be able to jump off a mountain and live?
Consider the speed at which PCs advance: A well-known NPC wizard, let's say an Elf, might be a five-hundred year old, 11th level Diviner with a reputation as a successful adventurer, explorer, soothsayer, and alchemist. If you were to roll your minimum possible age as an elf wizard, you'd be one-hundred and twenty years old; follow an adventure path all the way through using the medium experience advancement, and you end at about level 16, the time line progressing between a few months, or a few years, making you roughly 120 & 1/2, to 125 years old. Most of the Pathfinder modules list some 4th-12th level Guard, or Army Captain moving well into his fifties or sixties, PCs might take lessons or advice from these people initially, but inevitably, given the opportunity, they meet, and then surpass the levels and skills of their former mentors in a mere fraction of a fraction of the time it took those same NPCs to reach the point they're at.
It goes without saying that the lives the PCs live are deadly, and full of risk and danger, but the ones that make it through relatively unharmed will come out the other end of the dungeons/adventures they enter with literally world-shattering magic, near-limitless wealth, and ludicrous power.
So, for what it is worth, I very much agree with the OP and his assessment that PCs are not normal folk.
The money side of D&D has never really balanced well or made much sense. After all why would any sane person who had just made 2000gp, which is enough to set you up for life, go off and fight BBEGs. You could use that 2k in gold and buy yourself a good business and live well for the rest of your days. When you think about this you realise that adventurers are mentally impaired because why risk being eaten by a dragon when you could sit back and be a wealthy business owner?
The starting gold in gear would represent hand me downs from the family and things that have been acquired over years. It still doesn't make sense when you play a character with a peasant background running about with 100+ gp in gear. If your struggling family was to sell that 100gp in gear they'd have 50gp which is the equivalent of 500 days of income. Realistically they'd have done that to try to set the family up for a better life before you ever got to grow up to use it. Personally I think they need to dump copper pieces and up the amount that npcs earn.
As for the hit point side of things I think you can't treat hit points as life force/blood or the ability to absorb physical punishment. Your hit points represent your ability to roll with the punches as well as your life force/blood. Even parrying blows would sap at your energy. Maybe the dagger doesn't pierce the skin but the force behind the blow takes the wind out of you a bit. Using your example:
The commoner is untrained in defending himself and doesn't know how to take the sting out of blows. He jumps in and out of the way of attacks which leaves him exposed so when struck the dagger pierces the skin into the vitals.
The mid level fighter has been trained to defend himself and not leave himself exposed, but she still has much to learn. Like a boxer in the early stages of her career she still has some flaws, but does know how to take the sting of hits that pass through her defenses. When the dagger gets past her defenses the blow doesn't strike a vital, but it might cut across the ribs or the arms or something like that. Its not a lethal hit, but as she takes more she starts to slow up and tire. As this happens she leaves herself open to strikes at her vitals (the hit that drops her HP below zero).
The high level fighter has spent years perfecting his craft. He's tested himself against many different opponents and over time worked out the flaws in his technique. He is capable of keeping the opponent at a distance and parries most attacks. Parrying is tiring as your absorbing the strength of a blow so as battles go on his arms tire and he gets a little slower leaving himself open. Thanks to his experience and technique the blows that are sneaking past his guard strike at his arms and legs, but as these start to stack up he gets slower again leaving himself more exposed. Eventually a blow gets past his guard and into a vital.
Please note that the D&D prices are from the times before mass production and industrial revolution. It means that a good horse or masterwork sword had the value of three throps coplete with fields houses and people working them. Then throw magic, dragon hoards and unbelievable riches (Conan-esque golden floors, marble columns ans arabesques of high quality rubies) and you get wherte the impossible prices on highlevel items comes from.
Aside from extremely low magic settings the economy is just "It works cuz it's *magic*!"
All those who say the Economy has never been the strong suit of Dungeons and Dragons, tell that to the wealthy traders who lost everything after the 10-ft-pole-10ft-ladder futures bubble burst.
10ft pole is actually a highly sophisticated contraption that can be collapsed to 2ft segments. The same can't be said about the common ladder ;)
I know this may seem obvious, but sometimes we forget this. Let me give you a sense of scale.
A typical unskilled laborer in Pathfinder earns 1 sp per day.
Unskilled labor shouldn't be the yardstick for earning power, IMO. Why not? Because unskilled labor isn't going to be the average wage (that would probably be farmers, who have Profession: Farmer), and modern unskilled labor is paid FAR MORE than it was (relatively speaking) than it was in ye olden times - we have things like minimum wages and child exploitation laws and such. 1sp per day is subsistence level income - you get to eat and maybe rent a room in some dump and that's about it.
Instead, try someone with an actual skill at 1st level. For example, someone with 1 rank of Craft/Profession and +1 ability bonus, taking 10 on their weekly income roll, generates 7.5gp per week. So the 1st level adventurer with 150gp of gear has 20 week's income worth of gear, or 2/5ths of a year's worth of entry level income.
If we assume (wild guess) that the entry level of a professional income is $40,000, you get an amount equal to $16,000. That makes adventuring gear the equivalent of a fairly low-end new car (or nicer used car). Or some guns, ammo, body armor and a motorcycle.
My point being, adventurers are not hyper-equipped at 1st level. It looks more like they saved up some cash from a couple years of hard (professional) work before investing in their new career, much like any small business owner might do.
As for later on, yes, they have gear worth large amounts of money, but by my measure it's 1/10th of what you're predicting. There are plenty of multi-millionares and even billionares in the modern world, but they're the exception not the rule. Just like adventurers.
(PCs are not normal folks) I know this may seem obvious, but sometimes we forget this. Let me give you a sense of scale.
And, yet, the system treats the PCs like any normal folks, and normal folks are build on the same frame as PCs. True, there are the (less optimal) NPC classes, but still, the universality of the rules put everyone on an equal footing. This has a lot of goods things about it, and a few not so good things as well.
Personally, I prefer games where PCs ARE normal folks OR system that acknowledge that PCs are exceptional and give them exceptional rules.
'findel
For what it's worth, a while ago, in the time of AD&D, Dragon Magazine gave the "exchange rate" of 1gp = $20.
It is not really possible to evaluate the actual value of gold in D&D, as it's about gold resources and rarity, economics of several kingdoms, but mostly because it's a game and it's not supposed to be realistic.
I still personally use this conversion rate, not for valuables, but for the average of mundane things, such as inn rooms, food and drink...
Me too.
One thing to remember is that modern economics do not apply universally to a pseudo-medieval economy. 1sp = $100 is not necessarily true. For example, a labourer earns 1sp a day in cash but may have other perks thrown in: for example, he may get free food and board in some circumstances, or have access to facilities that help him in other ways. At home his wife may well be tending a goat for milk and chickens for eggs (and occasional meat), and their home may have a small vegetable garden. Medieval society was largely agrarian, and largely self-sufficient. Money was only used for occasional trade and taxation. To liken this to modern economics just isn't accurate.
When we look at money in the modern world, with exchange rates between currencies, etc., it gets confusing, quick.
I prefer to keep gp values intentionally abstract. The value of PC treasure is enough to attract hordes of thieves trying to rob them everywhere they go.
That would assume, however, that the thieves know the hero is carrying a +3 bane sword, that his backpack is actually a magical closet, and that his fancy cloak lets him walk through walls of fire and live.
Even if they know what the items are, and their value, fencing stolen magic items requires a wealthy, willing buyer. Not likely in a hamlet.
The PCs are the heroes of tales a commoner may not even believe. I don't like the idea of a "magic shoppe," but players usually have pretty specific ideas of what they want. It's not really fair to deny them things that they need to be effective, or just want for the "cool factor."
In short, their economy is quite divorced from most folks'. They usually know a few "patron" NPCs who have the connections to get them what they want after a week or two. They can barter for what they can afford by the time the wizard has acquired and copied new spells, and the cleric is done making some new item or serving in the temple.
Some people prefer to roleplay it to the hilt; find the master swordmaker and talk to him, etc. My group prefers to get their goodies and move on to the next big adventure.
The PCs are like millionaires. Hey, so is Batman! He's more believeable, though. XD
The AD&D system is roughly built on the roman and british system.
1 SP a day is from biblical sources and it refers to 1 denarius of the Roman empire. Most current estimates conclude that the purchasing power of 1 denarius is roughly $20-25. Thus a common laborer is making $20-25 a day x 120-150 days of work a year medieval labor worked less than we do is earning the equivalent of roughly $2400 - $4000 a year.
Further
The British system (pre-decimalization) is built on following system:
240 penny(denarius) = 20 shilling = 1 pound sterling
Looking at the bottom of the charts you can see that a master carpenter might make 3d a day. A thatcher (someone who repairs roofs) would make 2-2.5d a day while his mate (apprentice laborer) might make 1d a day. A mercenary men-at-arms would be making 1s or 12d a day.
A cheap workable peasant's sword would cost 6d but plate armor was comparitively expensive.
Clothing is expensive (no industrial looms means cloth is labor intensive).
Gold Coins such as the noble were worth 1/3rd of a pound sterling, or 80 SP = 1 GP. Apparently gold is a lot more common in D&D world ;)
Of course Gygax and company were influenced by Howard and Tolkein and Smaug had wealth that would beggar a kingdom. As a result adventurers deal in big big sums of money. Gygax justified the prices he came up with as being reflective of the vast sums of money that an adventurer might bring to bear on the local economy, ie gold rush mentality where a single egg might cost 1 SP, etc.
So yeah in short the D&D economy is fubar. Basically in order to correct it you'd need to research historical values and then guesstimate how much additional wealth would be generated as a result of magic and other races.
Why thank you, vuron, that was an incredibly insightful post and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I sincerely hope that nobody is taking this thread too seriously, but my point was that high-level adventurers do many things that are more than heroic, but rather superheroic, and that any adventurer worth his salt is probably a millionaire. Not bad for a treasure-hunter constantly putting his life on the line, going to new places to meet interesting and exotic things -- and killing them.
Read Beowulf and tell me that's not super-heroic, then. Thing is, heroic in this case means mythic-heroic, and mythic-heroic (Hercules, Beowulf, King Arthur) and super-heroic are just different terms for the same thing, really.
I sincerely hope that nobody is taking this thread too seriously,
Not at all! I enjoy reading what people think.
You see, I think that PF fans are a cut above the rest; smart, imaginative, and very heroic, if only in our imaginations. If I ever sound condescending or insulting, please forgive me, as that is never my intent.
I learn a lot here, and visit almost every day. Good stuff!
I had a big discussion with one of my players about the "value" of a D&D gold piece. My position was that of the old magazine article; namely, that the gp was worth about $20. This also fit in well with the idea that in America (for one) we have a "$20-dollar gold coin," which is one ounce.
My friend argued that this coin, being 1 oz, is now worth over $1200, and so the values are different. He would say that a PC with 10,000 gp in stuff (about 5th lvl) is already a millionaire in today's terms. I countered that there were no gold commodity markets mucking up the numismatic values, so the PC in question still had only $200,000.
Regardless, he's filthy rich.
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I think the best way of think about pcs is that they are the equivalent of Professional Athletes and high paid celebrity actors of their days. They do work that requires them to live up to almost impossible standards for every day people but they do it for ridiculous awards. The only real difference is that they are constantly being threatened with death, and they can (eventually) bend space and time.
PC's are nowhere near normal. a huge potion of this power comes from enchanted gear and it's related bonuses. but PC's have so much wealth, they are among the few that buy it, the suppliers don't really care, as they are set for life after selling a +1 magic item or even special material armor. and technically pc's do not start with all this cash. most of it is actually a gear allowance.
this is off topic but
the legacy items are a nice supplement, but you have to do it ala carte, and some of the table aren't sufficiently balanced against thier intended class. any smart custom legacy item uses table 4-1 and just pays the bigger gold cost hat it comes with. i would encourage pcs to use the custom legacy items.
sorry for the threadjack.
if you want to talk about pc's are not normal folk, i think you really got to look at spell casters. I mean, after what, 6th level, spell casters start doing things that rival modern superheroes in every way. Clerics are literally miracle workers, druids are wild-shaping titans of nature, and wizards, well they are lesser deities, warping space, time and reality to suit their goals.
Meanwhile, fighters, barbarians, paladins and especially monks could season their food with arsenic without serious concern. (monks are immune eventually and how often do you think barbs and paladins fail saves vs basic poisons at later levels? Given that alcohol is a low dose poison, a high con, high level barbarian might have to drink his body weight in ale before getting drunk.
"PCs are not normal folk" dose how ever needs to go on a t-shirt or tattoo
The money side of D&D has never really balanced well or made much sense. After all why would any sane person who had just made 2000gp, which is enough to set you up for life, go off and fight BBEGs. You could use that 2k in gold and buy yourself a good business and live well for the rest of your days. When you think about this you realise that adventurers are mentally impaired because why risk being eaten by a dragon when you could sit back and be a wealthy business owner?
Something to be considered that is often forgotten. PCs aren't normal folk by any stretch of the imagination mentally as well as physically. We're talking about people who after a few levels could retire and live (as noted) filthy rich if they so desired. They could retire and become major business leaders. Why then do they continue to risk life and limb against beings that can slaughter normal individuals and even trained warriors in mass?
The fact of the matter is that most PCs are (or should be in terms of fluff) mentally damaged individuals. Whether they're thrill seekers, driven by pure heroism (e.g. the someone has to do it), or simply not satisfied with what they have already there should be a reason they adventure within their background.
The whole "I'm an average Joe looking for adventure and wealth" doesn't cut it after level 4-5.
For my part my last three PCs were, in order:
An Elven wizard and former ranger in the elven border guards who was outcast from his family for 'causing' the death of his brother. Traveling without a past he was out to do good with what was left of his ruined life.
A human noble who was an embarrassment to her entire family who was acting out against her upbringing at first, but who eventually was driven to continue because she developed a deep sense of responsibility for the welfare of others, and without her actions others would face death. In short, she was forced into being a hero and didn't know how to stop.
An exceptionally complicated human wizard/sorcerer on the run from exceptionally powerful beings with a deep craving for power so that he might return one day to challenge said beings. A risk taker, gambler, and man with nothing to lose except his life, which he cares for only so that he might some day take his revenge.
You forget the 'forced hero' concept, where retirement isn't an option because of enemies that pursue the adventurer, or events that drive them far beyond their ability to avoid it. There are many other reasons that a character may choose not to retire, or may appear to do so without actually doing so - for example, at 5th level one party I'm a member of has established a stronghold and settled, but because of their oath of loyalty to a local ruler are still adventuring - he is sending them on missions for him instead of on their own initiative.
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Me too.
One thing to remember is that modern economics do not apply universally to a pseudo-medieval economy. 1sp = $100 is not necessarily true. For example, a labourer earns 1sp a day in cash but may have other perks thrown in: for example, he may get free food and board in some circumstances, or have access to facilities that help him in other ways. At home his wife may well be tending a goat for milk and chickens for eggs (and occasional meat), and their home may have a small vegetable garden. Medieval society was largely agrarian, and largely self-sufficient. Money was only used for occasional trade and taxation. To liken this to modern economics just isn't accurate.
Extremely true.
And even taxes were mostly not paid in gold or copper but in chickens or cows or whatever they had.
I don't think D&D is meant to be realistic in terms of economy & cash.
Medieval economics
Indeed it was very interesting, Veron.
However i have difficulties to believe that a middle age peasant would be able to make $20 a day.But the study is interesting nevertheless.
As far as the damage sustained: I watched a show just last night call something like how I survived ect... In it there was a man who was shot four times twice in the legs and twice in the HEAD. one at point plank range. He still had the power to run to his neighbor's house to ask for help all the while the person who shot him was pistol whipping him in the back of the head. This was just one of the stories that was told (there were three in total and one had a woman who had been stabbed 28 times in the face and chest and stayed in a ravine for a night before finding help) PC's are not as tough as some ould think.
For what it's worth, a while ago, in the time of AD&D, Dragon Magazine gave the "exchange rate" of 1gp = $20.
This isn't too far off my own made up conversion rate. I have used an exchange rate of 1sp = $1 US in my past games (which equates to 1gp = $10 obviously). It gives me an easy way to place value on mundane items/services (food/drink, clothes, rooms, etc.). For me, at least, it has worked out well enough.
As far as the damage sustained: I watched a show just last night call something like how I survived ect... In it there was a man who was shot four times twice in the legs and twice in the HEAD. one at point plank range. He still had the power to run to his neighbor's house to ask for help all the while the person who shot him was pistol whipping him in the back of the head.
Yeah, don't use a .22 to try to kill someone.
As far as the damage sustained: I watched a show just last night call something like how I survived ect... In it there was a man who was shot four times twice in the legs and twice in the HEAD. one at point plank range. He still had the power to run to his neighbor's house to ask for help all the while the person who shot him was pistol whipping him in the back of the head.Yeah, don't use a .22 to try to kill someone.
it was a .38
Its not that Adventurers are mentally challenged or anything, but some enjoy the thrill of battle, thirst for knowledge in undiscovered tomes, and the persuit of accomplishment. Some want to go down in history as the greatest of there generateration.
As for the gold, why would a character continue to risk his life? Simple, greed, no matter how you put it, PC's are greedy, they want the best gear, and there is no such thing as not enough gold, Paizo says that in several printed adventures I believe. Also the way me and my friends work out the 'exchange':
Copper = penny
Silver = Dime
Gold = One dollar (loonie I'm Canadian)
Platium = 10 dollars
Also another way I believe PC's are not normal people is that they are fearless, unless a spell or special ability causes them to feel or being paniciked, a commener with a knife is not going to scare the PC's like a guy with a knife would if he came into rob you, PC's would just laugh and cut him down to size or worse. PC's are also dumb, as mean as the sounds the offen over look the simplest method and usually end up in a midst of pain as a result :)
PCs do have ay least some kind of disorder.
all pc's are manic sociopaths with a lust for power, a desire to kill, intense avarice, a constant need for thrills, too much free time, an unrivaled arrogance, sadism, sadomasochism, a need for glory, a desire to be remembered for eternity to come, intense sexual urges, extreme suspicion of every living thing, an intense personal image of self they have to maintain in various ways, a phobia or bathing, sleeping, or any other act that would involve removing thier magical gear, a fear of constant pursuit, intense depravity, a constant need to keep a powerful cleric with them at all times, a feeling of inadequacy, and godlike levels of megalomania. a pc may have additional disorders as well.
PC's are not normal at all, in fact commoners would see them as depraved, sociopathic, avaricious, lunatics who have come to kill the king, urinate on his corpse, hang his severed head on a spearhead, enslave all of his daughters and violate all of his concubines.
meaning alignment doesn't matter, since all pc's are effectively chaotic evil, no matter what 2 words you place on thier sheet.
PCs do have ay least some kind of disorder.
all pc's are manic sociopaths with a lust for power, a desire to kill, intense avarice, a constant need for thrills, too much free time, an unrivaled arrogance, sadism, sadomasochism, a need for glory, a desire to be remembered for eternity to come, intense sexual urges, extreme suspicion of every living thing, an intense personal image of self they have to maintain in various ways, a phobia or bathing, sleeping, or any other act that would involve removing thier magical gear, a fear of constant pursuit, intense depravity, a constant need to keep a powerful cleric with them at all times, a feeling of inadequacy, and godlike levels of megalomania. a pc may have additional disorders as well.
PC's are not normal at all, in fact commoners would see them as depraved, sociopathic, avaricious, lunatics who have come to kill the king, urinate on his corpse, hang his severed head on a spearhead, enslave all of his daughters and violate all of his concubines.
meaning alignment doesn't matter, since all pc's are effectively chaotic evil, no matter what 2 words you place on thier sheet.
Erm, exactly where do you play? Because I'm not sure I EVER want to go there!
Seriously, though, I have known a lot of players whose characters acted like this, it by no means sums up all of them. I prefer my PCs to be relatively normal people, though, and tend to play them as such. In the five games I am playing in right now, I can only think of one in which the character is directly involved in the adventure 'for it's own sakes' so to speak - and she's a former slave with iconoclastic ideas toward the system that enslaved her in the Counsel of Thieves adventure path. All the other characters have perfectly rational (or at least understandable) reasons for being where they are and doing what they are doing. Toward the people they meet they are general polite, respectful and follow the norms of behaviour. Only one is paranoid, and that's because 'they' really are out to get them.
PCs do have ay least some kind of disorder.
all pc's are manic sociopaths with a lust for power, a desire to kill, intense avarice, a constant need for thrills, too much free time, an unrivaled arrogance, sadism, sadomasochism, a need for glory, a desire to be remembered for eternity to come, intense sexual urges, extreme suspicion of every living thing, an intense personal image of self they have to maintain in various ways, a phobia or bathing, sleeping, or any other act that would involve removing thier magical gear, a fear of constant pursuit, intense depravity, a constant need to keep a powerful cleric with them at all times, a feeling of inadequacy, and godlike levels of megalomania. a pc may have additional disorders as well.
PC's are not normal at all, in fact commoners would see them as depraved, sociopathic, avaricious, lunatics who have come to kill the king, urinate on his corpse, hang his severed head on a spearhead, enslave all of his daughters and violate all of his concubines.
meaning alignment doesn't matter, since all pc's are effectively chaotic evil, no matter what 2 words you place on thier sheet.
Erm, exactly where do you play? Because I'm not sure I EVER want to go there!
Seriously, though, I have known a lot of players whose characters acted like this, it by no means sums up all of them. I prefer my PCs to be relatively normal people, though, and tend to play them as such. In the five games I am playing in right now, I can only think of one in which the character is directly involved in the adventure 'for it's own sakes' so to speak - and she's a former slave with iconoclastic ideas toward the system that enslaved her in the Counsel of Thieves adventure path. All the other characters have perfectly rational (or at least understandable) reasons for being where they are and doing what they are doing. Toward the people they meet they are general polite, respectful and follow the norms of behaviour. Only one is paranoid, and that's because...
i never experienced this personally
Edit. i just had a stroke of enlightenment.
there will always be a group of players, and a dungeonmaster, no matter whether it be direct human analogue, streams of numbers controlled by artificial intellegence. there is always the dm, and they always need players. God may be a dungeon master transcending our world, and each of us, a player avatar in his campaign. a game needs both, a world needs both. to exist, is to be an avatar of player or dungeon master running the world. our fates, bound to the result of dice roll in the plane beyond. our reincarnation is but the player's next avatar.
i never experienced this personally, but how else do you justify the existence of player characters? greed only goes so far.
they have to have some kind of sick disorder.
There are a lot of reasons for being a hero that don't involve mental illness. You seem to be assuming that all adventures are straight up dungeon-crawls where the PCs are just killing things and taking their stuff. They aren't, many campaigns are based around a cause, a quest, a prophecy.
For me, creating a sane reason a character is on an adventure (as opposed to a dungeon crawl) is an integral part of the character creation process. The Campaign is very often one with an underlying trend. For example, the Counsel of Thieves AP is concerned about the oppression of Westcrown ... in that, I have a character who is a scion of a deposed noble house and an escaped slave: they have an axe to grind, a cause to die for and nothing to lose - all perfectly understandable if not entirely rational reasons to take up arms and go on quests.
Adventurers are like modern 'achievers' - they have a stronger drive to do what they do than others around them, they exploit the opportunities they have, but that doesn't make them insane or sick. It's their environment and tools that are different, is all.
i never experienced this personally, but how else do you justify the existence of player characters? greed only goes so far.
they have to have some kind of sick disorder.
There are a lot of reasons for being a hero that don't involve mental illness. You seem to be assuming that all adventures are straight up dungeon-crawls where the PCs are just killing things and taking their stuff. They aren't, many campaigns are based around a cause, a quest, a prophecy.
For me, creating a sane reason a character is on an adventure (as opposed to a dungeon crawl) is an integral part of the character creation process. The Campaign is very often one with an underlying trend. For example, the Counsel of Thieves AP is concerned about the oppression of Westcrown ... in that, I have a character who is a scion of a deposed noble house and an escaped slave: they have an axe to grind, a cause to die for and nothing to lose - all perfectly understandable if not entirely rational reasons to take up arms and go on quests.
Adventurers are like modern 'achievers' - they have a stronger drive to do what they do than others around them, they exploit the opportunities they have, but that doesn't make them insane or sick. It's their environment and tools that are different, is all.
thank you for the enlightenment i couldn't see clearly until now, i placed a stroke of it in the post above you.
heres a copy of that piece.
there will always be a group of players, and a dungeonmaster, no matter whether it be direct human analogue, streams of numbers controlled by artificial intellegence. there is always the dm, and they always need players. God may be a dungeon master transcending our world, and each of us, a player avatar in his campaign. a game needs both, a world needs both. to exist, is to be an avatar of player or dungeon master running the world. our fates, bound to the result of dice roll in the plane beyond. our reincarnation is but the player's next avatar.
This also relates to the old chestnut about a PC arguing with his DM that he could survive the falling damage from falling off a mountain. "I don't care how many hit points you have, you're not going to survive that!"Well, to be fair, there have been the rare cases where people have fallen out of airplanes and survived... barely. Terminal velocity is terminal velocity.
I liked the Star Wars explanation of HP, (as well as their system in general):
Hit points, or Vitality, is your ability to avoid being seriously hurt. If a gun was shot at you and didn't crit, it meant it either grazed you, or possibly did not hit at all, but you lose the points because the effort of dodging it tired you out.
Wound Points were equal to your Con score. If a crit happened, it wasn't multiplied, but rather it skipped the vitality and chewed on your wounds(-10 still kills you). This added a sense of realism, because a level 20 person could stick around a lot longer than a low leveler, but a crit could be equally damning. (A lightsaber kills Obi-Wan in one strike because he allows a crit). It should also be noted that non-heroics did not have vitality scores, but merely their wound points.
The 'terminal' in 'terminal velocity' has nothing to do with death. 'Terminal velocity' is a term applied in physics to any object falling under certain conditions. I think we just tend to assume that it means death because falling from a great height often results in death.