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At low levels, small animals can kill you with frightening regularity. At higher levels you can take a dozen+ sword strikes to the face without falling over. Or how a cure light wounds could cure a peasant to full health from deaths door, but it would just close a paper cut on a lvl 16 juggernaut of a fighter.
I think part of the issue you might be having is the flavor. The 12 hits is often, but not always, a result of magic. The other thing is that 12 hits to the face is flavor not a rule. I was always under the impression the default flavor was that only crits and attacks that incapacitated someone were supposed to be full on hits, and the rest were glancing blows, flesh wounds, etc. Any mechanic can sounds stupid if you apply dumb flavor.
On the subject of a defense bonus, I think it should be more based on whether or not that class focuses on dodging in combat.
Fighters in heavy plate tend not to be so worried about getting out of the way as much as they rely on the plate effectively stopping attacks. Now, you could still add to AC by saying they've learned how to react and turn the plate so it deflects blows, but it shouldn't be a huge bonus.
Rogues and monks, on the other hand, rely almost entirely on dodging attacks rather than soaking them up. They deserve (and in some ways need) a bonus to AC, since they're particularly skilled at dodging attacks. Rangers could go either way, though I see them sticking with rogues and monks more than fighters and barbarians and paladins and such.
Wizards and such, though relying on dodging far more than armor, really shouldn't get a huge bonus. They're not supposed to be in combat.
I agree with dunelord3001 that you seem to be having some issues with the flavor and abstract identity of hit points. Maybe just use the Wounds and Vitality system if you don't like how abstract hp are?
At low levels, small animals can kill you with frightening regularity. At higher levels you can take a dozen+ sword strikes to the face without falling over
Part of the issue here is that mundane animals are exceptionally over-statted compared to their real-world counterparts. Don't try to apply real-life logic here; these animals are designed with gameplay and not realism in mind.
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If you're having trouble with hit points being unrealistic, how do you justify magic at all? I'm not asking this to flame you, I just think that if you're having trouble with one aspect of the game, you may be having (or be going to have) trouble with others. Perhaps, rather than scrap one of the core tenets of the game, you'd be happier either with a shortened lifespan (think E6 or the like), or perhaps a system that tries to be realistic (GURPS or the like). Pathfinder and it's predecessors, while born of a mass-combat system that moduled realism, are not themselves in any way realistic, nor do they pretend to be.
You'r going to break all the math. +5 AC at level 10 for free means nothing will hit you ever with any type of armor + shield. And having 5d10 hp at level 10 means that a single firebal can KO you. Bottomline is, this ain't even houserule territory. What you are asking is a different game.
BTW flagged, this should go into homebrew, not advice.
You'r going to break all the math. +5 AC at level 10 for free means nothing will hit you ever with any type of armor + shield. And having 5d10 hp at level 10 means that a single firebal can KO you. Bottomline is, this ain't even houserule territory. What you are asking is a different game.
I'd agree to this and advice you to look out for other RPG systems, if you don't like the flair of the abstract HP-Bubble(which can admittedly seem a bit unrealistic at times). There are lots of game systems with a more realistic and less heroic approach like the Dark Eye or Rune Quest.
Otherwise you'd have to change lots and lots of things. What are you going to do to spelldamage? What's with monsterstats?
Since you already have to everything start from the scratch you could also make your own game system uing some D&D basics. However this might not necessarily be a thing if you have fun doing so, just lots of work.
IF YOU WANNA PLAY PATHFINDER WITH YOUR SYSTEM HOWEVER: I would add some Parrying rules. Since the characters can get K.O.ed really fast they need some way to avoid getting hit.
I would allow PCs and NPCs to roll for their defense score from Armor as DR
--> Defense = D20 + shield bonus + Dexterity modifier + other modifiers (including armor's enhancement bonus, but not armor bonus or natural armor bonus)
I would also consider adding Bab to their Defense. Now they got a Defensebonus equal to or slighty higher than their Attacks, alowing character to avoid like 60% hits by blocking them.
As someone pointed out... Don't think of hit points as the amount of damage you can take. Think of it more as your endurance. How long you can continue to duck and weave to avoid the real hits... Which are anything that takes you negative HP or causes bleed or some other condition.
However, if you truely don't like the HP concept (ill admit to prefering systems with health levels myself), feel free to change it. Just keep in mind that spells beyond 1st level will become MUCH more effective if you limit HP. To the point of game unballancing. So you will need to limit the damage output (and healing factor) as well. Maybe even standardize damage for all spells of the same level (single Target spells should do more damage than multi-target spells).
Then of course, if you do that, then resistances to energy types become more powerful if spells deal less damage, and DR becomes overpowered... You might end up rewriting a significant portion of the game, as each change has a butterfly effect on everything else.
Instead of rewriting a core mechanic like HP, I suggest looking for the D20 Game of Thrones RPG (not the current one in print, the out of print one), which did pretty much what you are describing. Characters got 1-3 HP when they leveled, based on their class. Of course, magic is far less common in Westros, so you don't have to worry about a TPK from a single fireball.
Just to add a different way to flavor the default HP system: if you think of HP as your connection to the positive (or negative) energy plane, then each time you get injured that connection prevents you from dying but grows a bit weaker. A high level character has a strong connection. This explains why even damage sources like falling or lava don't kill everyone equally. (Just an opinion/option though.)
There are alternate rules in the Ultimate Combat book for wounds and vigor that you might like.
You might also want to look at Strain-Injury, which is a variant of wounds and vigor.
I've been thinking about minimum HP as a somewhat simpler solution. Do the math on your PCs HP as you normally would, and if it is less then 15 take 15. No long term boast and fairly simple change. Also make commoners tough enough to take out your average dog or cat.
Frankly, it's absurd.
I actually think that your proposition is absurd and it hurts the game's realism far more than it helps it.
First, remember that Hit Points are an abstraction. They're not meant to be an accurate scale of measurement to how many wounds you've taken or how fast you're bleeding out. It might be a better way to look at it like this:
Okay, let's establish a baseline. At 50% you've taken a wound grievous enough that you're well on your way to dying. 4th Edition called this the "bloodied" condition, which simply meant half of your hit points were gone.
So a Commoner might have 6 hp and becomes bloody at –3 while a 7th Level Fighter might have 50 hp and becomes bloody at –25. This means that it takes enemies 22 more hit points to actually bring the Fighter to the point where he's wounded and starting to look bad. In other words, the Fighter is better at avoiding the bloodied condition (and subsequently the dying condition) because he's more experienced. Loosing hit points in this sense can also be thought of expending your personal energy trying to block attacks and keeping yourself alive.
Is it a perfect way of looking at it? Absolutely not, but considering how much harder a Fighter would be able to push himself over a Commoner, all of those extra charges of cure light wounds start to make sense.
So, you might be wondering why I said that your idea hurts realism? Well ...
Shocking, I know. If I was to drop you alone in the woods with nothing but some farming implements, surrounded by a pack of wolves (remember, wolves are not solitary critters) or a hungry bear, then yes, it will kill you. Also remember that the "little" animals that could theoretically kill you in several turns will not probably do so until you're well on your way to starving to death. The fox doesn't bite you because it wants to eat you, the fox bites you because it feels cornered and attacking you is its last option for survival.
With all this in mind, let's look at the real reason your suggestion does not work. Human vs. Human combat.
If I were to pick up a sword and decided that I wanted to kill you, statistically I probably could. A 1st Level Commoner would have an average of 3 Hit Points and a Short Sword deals an average of 3 damage (both are d6s, of which the average is 3.5. Rounded down, 3.) This is assuming that we are both average humans and I am not specialized in things like Power Attack. Between low-leveled, inexperienced characters the weapon does most of the work, and even an inexperienced person can kill another relatively inexperienced person by way of sword-stabbing. But for higher-leveled adventurers, they would know how to avoid the blade better (higher Dex), how to adjust their bodies so the blade doesn't do as much damage (higher HP), or be able to hold on longer before they pass out and bleed out (higher HP again). Likewise, higher-leveled characters know how to use weapons better and can rely on more than just the weapon itself to harm an opponent.
To make it clear, your idea doesn't work because 4 free HD makes your average commoner far too durable. Because whether you like it or not, it is incredibly easy to kill a non-heroic person.
You could just give everyone (adults anyway) a free level in an NPC class, and call that adolescence. It's the trade everyone was taught by their parents or guardians while growing up. No one teaches their kid to be an adventurer.
With this method, your average NPC would end up with 2 HD, and the PCs might think its cool to take a rank in aristocrat (comes with some minor title or official govt appointment), or warrior or adept (for the combat advantages). Some might even select expert for the skill bonuses.
Of course, more HP to start still doesn't solve your problem at higher levels.
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Those surprised that a cat can kill a commoner clearly has never owned a cat ;)
On advantage of AD&D 2E was how you rolled your HP only until level 10 or so and then just got a few HP a level. This kept the HP more reasonable.