Are hit points necessary?

[BYC]

vidmaster wrote:

a certain superhero rpg had an alternative to hp it was damage saves you rolled your save aginst damage and if you took it it gave you a penalty on your next damage save if you failed by like 10 or more you were unconscious. it worked because sometimes you save and the bullet bounces off like your superheroness lets it. but you could still get a lucky shot with a bad save and be 1 hit ko'd

Mutants and Masterminds. The system also gave Hero Points that prevented rolling a 1 at a horrible time. I like it alot, but it works within that game's engine. Other engines wouldn't be able to fit that in as easily.

[Kais86]

Hit points are a very good system for quantifying damage and the like. I've played in several systems that don't use it, or something remotely like it, and I have to say that HP is one of the best ways to simulate actual combat. Mutants and Masterminds has some serious gameplay issues, on more than one occasion I've brought down a "powerhouse", basically a super strong and super tough guy, with a single strike because the GM rolled a 1 on the save and never gave the villain any hero points. Then we would spend the next 3 hours fighting the supposedly much more frail energy projector, relatively fragile but full of blam, that was teamed up with the powerhouse.

Systems like CthulhuTech and White Wolf with their damage categories also tend to have very large flaws: really good hits can kill even the toughest of targets this includes tanks, battleships, and eldritch abominations. Especially when the dice are open ended, a great example I have is when I was playing a game of White Wolf and I rolled more 10s than I had dice, as with those systems the dice are open-ended, I oneshot the big bad boss monster that the GM threw at us, everyone was shocked and horrified, me included.

[Laurefindel]

voska66 wrote:

I've always though of Hit Points as being battle skill. Actual phyical damage does happen till you run out of hit points. So when you take a hit for 15 damage that 15 damage you managed to avoid having harm you physically. A less person with less battle skill might take that damage dropping them to negatives.

Now a little house rule I use which is basically just fluff is you don't get physically hurt till hit points are reduced to equal or below you con stat. So if you have 15 CON and 30 hit points the you don't get blood till you hit points are 15 or less remaining. The rest of you hit points are you just avoiding taking the hit. It basically just fluff description as it has no impact on the game mechanics though.

That's how I would like to envision HPs too, but my gripe isn't much about the definition of HPs, it's about the definition of Healing.

If HPs are supposed to represent the fighter's ability to dodge in extremis and absorb blows in such a way that they aren't lethal - in other words if HP are an abstract concept - why is healing limited to cure spell and first-aid treatments? Or yet, if a 10th level fighter is a mightier warrior than a first level commoner, why does it take 10 times the amount of magic to "refill" his battle skills?

I'm not sure if I like the way 4th ED goes with its different sources of healing, but at least they are consistent in their "abstraction" of HPs. I that regard I can sympathize with the OP; HPs as written are not fully doing their job IMO.

'findel

[Kais86]

Laurefindel wrote:

If HPs are supposed to represent the fighter's ability to dodge in extremis and absorb blows in such a way that they aren't lethal - in other words if HP are an abstract concept - why is healing limited to cure spell and first-aid treatments? Or yet, if a 10th level fighter is a mightier warrior than a first level commoner, why does it take 10 times the amount of magic to "refill" his battle skills?

I'm not sure if I like the way 4th ED goes with its different sources of healing, but at least they are consistent in their "abstraction" of HPs. I that regard I can sympathize with the OP; HPs as written are not fully doing their job IMO.

'findel

I think it's an accurate representation of him regaining his energy, so he can actually use his full skills, technically every swing he avoids costs him energy, each spell revitalizes him, and fixes any injuries he may have accrued. Even if they are really minor.

[SmiloDan]

I think I'm liking my negative level idea more and more. It scales with level, so it doesn't cripple low level heroes, and can significantly affect higher level heroes. This encourages them to avoid taking minor wounds and makes moderate wounds significant. Now, losing 20 of your 100 hit points is actually kind of a big deal...it means you're taking at least a -2 on all rolls and you lost 2 of your highest level spells.

It also affects more than just combat effectiveness, so it (almost) equally penalizes tanks, skill monkeys, and spellcasters.

It can be tweaked a bit to affect level-based attacks (like most supernatural abilities and some extraordinary abilities) by changing the DC of saves to 10 + 1/2 current virtual level + ability modifier. So basically, if a dragon takes 2 levels worth of hit points of damage, the save DC of its breath weapon decreases by 1.

[Kais86]

SmiloDan wrote:

I think I'm liking my negative level idea more and more. It scales with level, so it doesn't cripple low level heroes, and can significantly affect higher level heroes. This encourages them to avoid taking minor wounds and makes moderate wounds significant. Now, losing 20 of your 100 hit points is actually kind of a big deal...it means you're taking at least a -2 on all rolls and you lost 2 of your highest level spells.

It also affects more than just combat effectiveness, so it (almost) equally penalizes tanks, skill monkeys, and spellcasters.

It can be tweaked a bit to affect level-based attacks (like most supernatural abilities and some extraordinary abilities) by changing the DC of saves to 10 + 1/2 current virtual level + ability modifier. So basically, if a dragon takes 2 levels worth of hit points of damage, the save DC of its breath weapon decreases by 1.

The big issue is that it makes initiative king, whoever goes first wins, assuming otherwise similar rolling. I also think it's more bookkeeping than is really necessary, at that point I'd want a program that did all that work for me. Plus the paladin is already a very mighty class, it would be even better with this, as they could spend lay on hands to put them back to the next category, or keep themselves out of the next category with temporary hp.

[SmiloDan]

No doubt there is a horrible bookkeeping tax.

That is why the current rules don't have hit points affect other rolls.

It's a huge headache. Definitely more realistic, but really, really annoying.

[default]

that negative level thing runs into a similar problem the clix system had. first shot can completely swing a battle. some units could counter this by getting better a couple clicks into their dial, but this meant if they don't get hit...

anyways, as far as that percentage based penalty system, why not give them an extra 1-time shot of HPs? 4E used the characters con score, or you could go with everyone getting 10. This means that 12 hp fighter would jump to 22 or 30, and that 7 hp would only put him in the -1 or -2 brackets instead.

[wynterknight]

SmiloDan wrote:

No doubt there is a horrible bookkeeping tax.

That is why the current rules don't have hit points affect other rolls.

It's a huge headache. Definitely more realistic, but really, really annoying.

I really like your negative-level idea, but the constant math required is daunting. I'm pushing for a similar but (hopefully) simpler version of this idea for my group, where at 1/2 hp you become fatigued and at 1/4 you become exhausted, but we haven't gotten around to trying it yet. And as 1st level characters, I'm sort of afraid of how crunchy it might make us, but the joy of playing with your friends is that you can change things on the fly if they suck.

Edit: Err, if things suck, not if your friends suck lol

[SmiloDan]

Maybe make easier to use conditions. I think 4th Ed. has a bloodied condition, which kicks in when you are at half hit points. Maybe just make it a -2 on all rolls?

[bugleyman]

Necessary? No.

Highly functional? Yup.

[pobbes]

Alright, so you could write a book about this. I will write a few things and try to separate them with spoiler tags to save space and organize my thoughts. In talking about existing alternate systems, I would like to mention both the Seventh Sea system which had an interesting variant on hp, and Deadlands which has a very gritty wounds system. So, in an as organized fashion as possible, my thoughts:

HP as Feel:

Alright, so Hit Points as a design mechanic take a great part in designing the "feel" of a game. In terms of representing reality, one has to look at D&D over time. It started as basically a more complicated chess, evolved into a storytelling game, moved to a very "organic" system that was highly focused on realism, and chose to become an epic fantasy game. The final step is the one Pathfinder is built upon, and is the result of the plethora of variant RPG systems in the marketplace. D&D has its niche, one Pathfinder lives in, and that is of epic fantasy. The game mechanics of PF exist to simulate fantasy films (LotR, Conan, Narnia, Adventures of Sinbad) not reality. The HP system is built so fights are epic, climatic, and that an individual fight with a "lesser" enemy is not a serious threat. The game is designed with this feel in mind, and other systems do generate other feels. So, to answer a question asked earlier, if you changed the hp system you are not playing Pathfinder. You have changed it, and therefore the feel, therefore player interaction with the world. This isn't to say developers did not expect that or that they did not want that, but it is not what they designed. It is common for players to want to apply various settings to rule systems they understand, but they doesn't change the feel of the system. Call of Cthulu would be horrible setting to play in regular Pathfinder because ultimately the old gods would have stats, and could be defeated in regular combat. Also, someone noted this above, but changing the system changes not only the feel, but the way some classes interact with the game. Someone altering the game in such a fundamental way should be willing to work progressively with players to continue to modify rules until the game functions in a way that feels fun and fair to all playing (including the DM).

HP as a mechanic:

HP in PF is an abstraction of a creature's ability to interact with the game world in an effective way. Basically, so long as a creature has hp it acts to further its goals within the constraints of any ongoing conditions. Without hp, the character gains a condition which inhibits it from interacting with the world leading to its death which marks permanent end of interaction for that creature (note: ghosts are separate creatures with their own hp, which follows this rule). HP works because it is simple to track over multiple targets. It is also a simple mechanic to target. The majority of effects in the game world have an effect on hp, and it is a simple resource to interact with. It is also simplifies healing, and environmental factors. In a point more tied to the "feel" I described above, HP also severely reduces the threat of environmental hazards and survival of the long term. That is to say that hunger, thirst, heat, and cold are actually relatively small threats to survival. PF focuses its drama and danger into small compact chunks we typically call encounters. HP helps emphasize that dramatic encounter feel to the game. HP also lends itself to long epic struggles at higher levels something which lends itself to the "tiered" class system as certain classes can ignore the HP mechanic that makes those epic slugfests. Again, others have also mentioned how hp works as a means of judging somethings approximate difficulty in combat.
So, the final question in this section is the most important. What do you lose if you stop using HP? The main thing you lose is simplicity. No system is really as basic and straightforward as hp. You also often lose persistence or endurance. HP allows for fights where you can throw everything and the kitchen sink at something and it still hunts you down with frightening efficiency. In fatigue based systems, the later stages of combat become longer and slower as combatants become less efficient. In vitality/wound systems, there can be a dichotomy of "useful" and "useless" actions that is often a complaint in current PF as the character who does 80 vitality damage really didn't contribute anything to defeating the BBEG as the one who did 17 wounds, especially when the enemy has vitality points remaining. Similarly, this dichotomy applies to static wound systems like WhiteWolf or Shadowrun where most attacks are negated by skill checks until that one ability truly "connects". It can in some instances be slightly detrimental to team play as the team doesn't really all contribute to wearing down the foe so much as the singe effect the foe succumbs too or is unable to mitigate. That isn't to say that those systems aren't fun and enjoyable, but their effect on game play needs to be considered when suggesting changes.

HP as cinematics:

So, a major question with the hp system is how it applies to cinematics and description. This is a difficult subject to tackle, and this issue is much more a matter of personal choice than existing game design. PF is an imaginative game, and, therefore, cinematics are the responsibility of the DM. A DM can include as much or as little cinematic description as they want. For my regular group, they do not prefer much cinematic description. They prefer small amounts of description to inform them of the effectiveness of various actions, the source of various threats, and the condition of various creatures. They accept fluff description both as informative description and misleading distraction, but they metagame fairly heavily from that perspective. Not that they haven't been surprised when fluff they thought was misleading to have been informative, and vice versa. They just simply don't enjoy an excess of cinematic fluff. However, that doesn't mean I can ignore that some people want more cinematic description in their games. So, I will explain my process when I find cinematics to be necessary or requested or just plain fun. Since hp is an abstraction, representing how damage is actual affecting a creature depends on the creature and what the hp abstraction represents.
For me, most players and NPCs of a humanoid race treat hp as an ability to fight. Therefore, when fighting a humanoid most attacks are described by terms such as being absorbed/impacting (for taking damage) or deflected/missing (did not hit). This represents that most attacks aren't doing significant physical trauma so much as fatiguing, bruising, or superficially wounding their opponent. Critical hits are often described as being the only attacks to really connect and leave a visual wound as NPCs who have received critical hits collect those scars as visible markers. The only other wounding attacks are the ones which put characters into negatives or death.
Other creatures with strange anatomies require different cinematics when discussing hp damage. For example, a swarm taking hp damage from a swung torch could look like this, "You hear the the sizzling and popping of small insectoid bodies as you swing the torch through the swarm cloud. You wish you could make out the dead from the living flies, but the roiling mass persists in its invasion of your every orifice." Hp is such an abstract concept to things like swarms it needs to be handled uniquely.
As a last example, I will talk about things immune to critical hits like golems and undead. With creatures like these, hp actually does reflect the amount of physical trauma necessary to stop the creature from functioning. In this case, all attacks could be described in a manner similar to critical hits for humanoids under the concept that such wounds are essentially somewhat superficial to the creature until completely broken down. Therefore gouges, dents, deep cuts, and cracked bones can be described frequently since it doesn't counteract the functioning of the gameplay. I mean a shattered rib cage means very little to a skeleton or a zombie.
Again cinematics is a much more personal subject would it comes to relating the effects of the hp mechanic, but it is worthy of discussion. I hope more that if you read this section it gave you some inspiration or ideas, but there is no black and white in this area.

HP as realism:

I will do my best not to simply restate older points, but I fear some repetition is inevitable. HP is not a system that lends itself to realism except in very specific circumstance like a boxing match or an MMA fight. HP just cannot be "gritty". Gritty systems that utilize hp often include additional mechanics such as a wound system or a condition track to make individual combats more crippling or deadly to balance out the hp mechanic. So, I guess I should point out here that if you want a more realistic system than hp is not the mechanic for you. that isn't to say the mechanic cannot be adjusted in manners suggested by others, but every mechanic has a limit to its effectiveness. HP's effective limitation comes at higher level realistic representation of physical trauma. The system just doesn't do it. Though, as I mentioned in my "feel" section, hp does not want to do it, so attempting to make this work is actual designing against the mechanics strengths so expect difficulty. Could a system be more realistic than the hp system? Easily. Should PF get away from the hp system? Not unless they wanted to change the feel of the game or wanted combat more realistic. Can I suggest a more "realistic" system? Deadlands had a very realistic wounds to body parts system. I am just going to mention that Deadlands contained a completely metagame aspect during combat where one could simply prevent wounds from happening. This balance existed in part that the wounds system was so realistic that it had to be cheated to be fun.

an alternate system I toyed with:

I was at one point thinking of working on a system that contained an hp alternative. The purpose of which was to encourage party cooperation in defeating opponents similar to the hp mechanic, and allow for greater endurance during and through combats. The system featured three pools, a resolve pool (very similar to hp), a physical health pool (similar to a condition track), and a mental health pool (also, similar to a condition track). The simplest form of combat attacked a creature's resolve until it was all gone at which point the creature loses the will to fight or resist. This could represent surrendering, cowering, falling unconscious, or running, but, ultimately, put the creature without resolve at the mercy of the victorious group. Resolve would be a mechanic easy to refill out of combat or in combat (like hp), and at higher levels could be extremely difficult to overcome. Cinematically, resolve represented a mix of both physical and mental toughness allowing a character to continue fighting.
The physical and mental health pools both worked towards resolving conditions. Both pools grew with levels, but at a much slower rate, they are more difficult to restore, and were more variable by class (warriors with bigger physical pools and casters with bigger mental pools). Effects which sought to inflict a condition either dealt physical or mental damage and the strength of the inflicted effect depended on the remaining points in the respective pool. For example, a petrification effect would deal an amount of physical health damage. If a large amount of health remained, the effect would be minimal perhaps slowing the target as a small part of their body petrified. At lower levels of health the effect would be more impeding with roll penalties and further speed penalties as more of their body succumbed to the effect, and if the petrification effect did enough damage to completely empty the physical health pool, then the target turned to stone. Draining the pool completely is the only way to completely remove a creature from combat. Empty health pools represented being knocked out, dying, petrification, and incapacitation form things like poisons or diseases. A fully drained mental pool included suffering from things like domination, possession, madness, catatonia, and incapacitating delusions.
The benefits of this system included:

• No instant removal from combat. Everything has a defense pool to protect them to some extent from harmful effects except in cases of extreme power differences.
• Capping effects at two. One of the ideas was that only one effect from each pool could effect a creature at a time. This was almost the most detrimental effect. So, when new damage is dealt to a pool, and a more powerful inhibiting condition it became the only effect tracked for that creature. Care and healing which restored the most damaging effect would be sufficient to treat the lesser effects which had been inflicted on the character.
• Teamwork and stacking effects still works. All characters would have some method of attacking any pool if they so desired. Since damage to a pool always stacks and helps future attacks. To us a PF example, the barbarian intimidating a creature still deals a small manner of mental damage which later helps the wizard dominate him. Sure, the intimidate effect is no longer active, but the damage it dealt still helps the wizard be more effective. This way the group is always capable of helping overcome an enemy in each method.
• Both survival and epic aspects exist on some level. Sure, resolve has that epic feel, can be refreshed easily and keep players in the fight. However, over the long run, physical and mental damage would have to be carefully monitored and managed to avoid entering combats where a single spell could bring down a party member. The system also allows for a warrior to be at huge physical damage and still have the resolve to continue fighting. Alternately, a problem does exist where a player could have no physical or mental damage and stop fighting due to a lack of resolve. I didn't say I finished the system, and they are still flaws in the design.

Needless to say, the system is much more in-depth than what I described here, but I hope you can get a comprehensive feel for what I intended.

Whew, I feel like i just wrote a college term paper. Anyway, I hope I have helped in this discussion. At the very least, I hope I gave you something to think about. If you read everything beneath all those spoiler tags: Thank You for you time.

[Doc_Outlands]

Pobbles, that was a very well-reasoned and well-presented term paper. ;) Thank you for taking the time to put that together and share it with the rest of us - particularly with me, as I'm the OP. Definitely a lot in there for me to think about.

Your system looks interesting, too - it would be interesting to see how easily & quickly it works in play. I really like the "resolve" aspect where if you take enough "damage," you basically give up - built into the mechanics rather than being an arbitrary tactics decision by the GM.

[Evil Lincoln]

I'm still searching for the magic bullet HP rule. Something simple I can plug in to the HP system that will solve my descriptive problems as a GM in a giant-heavy campaign. S&*# be Ridiculous.

[Freesword]

Evil Lincoln wrote:

I'm still searching for the magic bullet HP rule. Something simple I can plug in to the HP system that will solve my descriptive problems as a GM in a giant-heavy campaign. S&*# be Ridiculous.

Emphasis mine. +1

A medium sized humanoid getting hit with a huge (size category) greataxe just standing there all "That all you got?" requires epic levels of suspension of disbelief.

It does however make the invisible guy flying around tossing balls of fire and bolt of lightning seem a good bit more credible. He at least has some vague excuse (magic) for what he's doing.

[TheRedArmy]

Sorry if someone mentioned it, but I read several posts and didn't see it, so I decided to throw this in.

Shadowrun is a RPG taking place in the future with magic, guns, and a pseudo-internet system called "The Matrix". The system for tracking health is the same for everything as well. Everyone has a statistic used in the calculation called "Body".

Basically, everyone has two separate damage tracks - Physical and Stun. Attacks do various types of damage based on several factors - Guns do Physical damage all the time unless you use special bullets or your damage does not exceed the opponent's armor value against bullets. Stun batons do stun.

This system is measured in "boxes". Everyone has a number of boxes equal to 8 + (1/2 your body), in both physical and stun tracks. As you take wounds, you apply a negative modifier to everything you do. Your boxes do not increase unless your body increases. At 1 box, you take a -1 penalty to everything you do. At boxes 4, 7, 10, etc, the penalty increases by 1. Stun and Physical penalties stack with each other, so 7 stun damage and 2 physical damage is a -4 penalty (3 from stun, 1 from physical).

If you take physical damage beyond your boxes, you are bleeding to death. If you have 3 more boxes than you have health in damage, you die. For stun, once you match your boxes, all stun damage become physical.

This is another system in use for a successful RPG that is very successful - a single bullet can kill if it hits the head, but if they're all in the leg, you can take 3 or so, and keep going, but worse than you were before.

D&D uses HP for several reasons - and several people have already stated many of them. A system to balance the classes without using HP could be devised, but it would be difficult. Also remember the channeling energy, cure spells, fireballs, etc, that also get affected.

[R_Chance]

Freesword wrote:

Evil Lincoln wrote:

I'm still searching for the magic bullet HP rule. Something simple I can plug in to the HP system that will solve my descriptive problems as a GM in a giant-heavy campaign. S&*# be Ridiculous.

Emphasis mine. +1

A medium sized humanoid getting hit with a huge (size category) greataxe just standing there all "That all you got?" requires epic levels of suspension of disbelief.

It does however make the invisible guy flying around tossing balls of fire and bolt of lightning seem a good bit more credible. He at least has some vague excuse (magic) for what he's doing.

Just peeked in and thought "really"? The first level guy stands his ground and is hit full on. Mushy paste. The tenth level guy drops a shoulder, ducks, slides his shield around to deflect it and takes a glancing blow causing bruises and scrapes. Same number of hp done. Different description / result. Just think of hp done to a first level character as "real damage". Divide the targets level into the hp they take and do your description based on that. Twenty points done to a first level and he is dead with a capital "D". Twenty done to a tenth level is like 2 to a first level. Bruises and scrapes, maybe a nasty cut, or a dislocation.

[Laurefindel]

Freesword wrote:

Evil Lincoln wrote:

I'm still searching for the magic bullet HP rule. Something simple I can plug in to the HP system that will solve my descriptive problems as a GM in a giant-heavy campaign. S&*# be Ridiculous.

Emphasis mine. +1

A medium sized humanoid getting hit with a huge (size category) greataxe just standing there all "That all you got?" requires epic levels of suspension of disbelief.

HPs do work in this regards if you consider them solely as the resources spent to avoid being hit by the huge battleaxe. What doesn't work IMO is the present ruling on healing*. And if HPs represent that "dodging resource", then something else should represent health. Its the abstraction of both physical health AND combat ability that makes me wince about HPs.

*One could envision cure spells as some mystical positive energy that replenishes this resource rather than healing the flesh, but many other elements would be a bit counter-intuitive to this view (bleeding damage etc).

'findel

[R_Chance]

Laurefindel wrote:

HPs do work in this regards if you consider them solely as the resources spent to avoid being hit by the huge battleaxe. What doesn't work IMO is the present ruling on healing.

One can envision cure spells as some mystical positive energy that replenishes this resource, but many other elements are a bit counter-intuitive to this view (bleeding damage etc).

'findel

My assumption has always been that there is more than just a physical element to healing spells. Maybe a spiritual element or a "luck" factor as well as physical healing.

It's funny to see this discussion come around yet again. I've been playing D&D since 1974/5 and it's been around from pretty much the beginning.

*edit* You hit it on the head about "bleeding damage", unless, again, it's also a matter of more than physical damage (and blood has certainly had a mystic connection in a lot of fantasy settings).

[Enpeze]

Savage Worlds is without the usual HP. Every creature has just 1 HP. PCs and Bosses have 3 HP. Thats it. Works perfectly for the most genres. Small is beautiful.

[Freesword]

Ah the mental gymnastics of rationalizing.

Personally, I just write it off as an expediency of game play and try to ignore the fact that it doesn't make sense.

(at least until I can come up with something better)

[pobbes]

Doc_Outlands wrote:

Pobbles, that was a very well-reasoned and well-presented term paper. ;) Thank you for taking the time to put that together and share it with the rest of us - particularly with me, as I'm the OP. Definitely a lot in there for me to think about.

Your system looks interesting, too - it would be interesting to see how easily & quickly it works in play. I really like the "resolve" aspect where if you take enough "damage," you basically give up - built into the mechanics rather than being an arbitrary tactics decision by the GM.

You are very welcome. I am just glad someone read all that. :)

As for the system, it was a rage fueled project spawned after months of reading the press releases Wizards put out for 4e, and then seeing the finished product. I honestly thought I could just make a better system. It ended up just a hot mess of original ideas that I knew would take a lot of work to make coherent in a single system. However, I also attempted to address issues apparent in a fantasy system like D&D such as dump stats, HP, XP, even Weapon Superiority. The resolve system itself was a permutation of how I understood the mechanic 4e later made hp and healing surges. The physical and mental health pools existed as an answer to the SoS/SoD spell dilemma in party combat. Maybe I should go dig through my archived computer files and see if I can find that project again.

[kikanaide]

In summary of this thread:

HP is a system that typically avoids one-hit kills and thus produces epic-length, if not epic, battles. It can produce "squishable" enemies that simply can't challenge PCs overmuch, because they die in one hit while the PCs don't. It is also simple, because you aren't required to do any (more) math on the fly.

Many other systems exist to counter, well, every part of the above, and a lot of them have been mentioned here. Vitality and Wounds is an attempt to put the "I might die in one hit" back into play above first level - crits go straight to wounds. Hence I enjoy it (level 1 is my favorite level). d6SW did fairly well at allowing one-shot deaths, or occasionally a character could be slowly mangled until useless. White Wolf/etc tends to produce "gritty" (aka you might die) combat. All of the above, and most of the alternatives, are more mathematically complicated, but arguably more "realistic." However, introducing realism may change the nature of the game.

For what it's worth, if you want to introduce some of the "realism" into Pathfinder without a lot of overhead (or the work of creating a new system) - try using enemies or attacks that cause conditions. Staggered, shaken, etc. You could have large damage automatically cause some of the conditions, if you wanted to be in house-rule land.

There are some great ideas about describing damage in this thread, though. Kudos to the guy who only describes "damage" when HP is below Con.