It seems strange that if a person polymorphs into a Fine-sized fly, and sits on a table where someone swats him with a hand he doesn't die, because he has his original Hit Points.
The same is when, lets say, a mountain caves in on you while you walk in some caves. What is the rules that stop you from just taking Hit Point damage and just plain dying instead?
I am specifically looking for help to design a House Rule that would make sense if my characters are ever totally squashed by something, and it wouldn't make sense to survive when you have been reduced to 1/50th of your height by the attack.
I am thinking of using the Massive Damage optional rule in some modified way. The save should reflect the chance of some dumb luck, and just taking damage instead of outright dying. Any ideas?
One... the standard polymorph spells don't allow going down to Fine size, so you're in houserule territory already. so the question to be asked first, is are you the GM really looking to make your game that extreme? Because if you do, the farther you go from the baseline, the more problems like this you're going to bring on yourself.
Two... unless the fly being swatted loses all hit points down to negative con, it means he wasn't squashed.
Hit Points aren't meant for simulation, they are an abstractive game mechanic.
Pathfinder doesn't have a Chunky Salsa Rule. The closest it has is the optional massive damage rules. That said, it's your game, but I hope your players know what they're getting into. The cave-in rules are already extremely dangerous.
Blahpers' suggestion of the cave-in rules is an excellent one.
If this seems like it'd take too long to die, consider that most real-life humans aren't anywhere near as tough as a PC, and yet people survive for hours or days after buildings collapse on them with some frequency. The problem is locating and rescuing them in time before they die.
As to your Jeff Goldblum problem, well, a Wizard did it. Perhaps his exoskeleton is super-sturdy or something.
Still, for a house-rule for squashing - consider using the drowning rules. If squashed suddenly and unexpectantly, the player is considered to be out of breath. Either they immediately begin making Constitution checks, or you could say they skip those and immediately begin to suffocate (1st round KO, 2nd round dying, 3rd round dead).
I know I am pretty far out with this one. You all have some good points though. It's not that I want to kill off my PC's at all. I am just a sucker for rules.
I know hit points is an abstraction. You could say that the fly evaded some of the smacking, or was saves by a crack in the table or something like that. I should really use my imagination more. But still, I like the massive damage optional rule. It just doesn't make sense that you have to lose 50 hp minimum, when you are a rat being stomped by an ogre for 1d4+8 or something damage.
For boulders, beams, and other individual parts of a cave-in, there is also the Falling Object rules.
Glacier87 wrote: I know I am pretty far out with this one. You all have some good points though. It's not that I want to kill off my PC's at all. I am just a sucker for rules.
I know hit points is an abstraction. You could say that the fly evaded some of the smacking, or was saves by a crack in the table or something like that. I should really use my imagination more. But still, I like the massive damage optional rule. It just doesn't make sense that you have to lose 50 hp minimum, when you are a rat being stomped by an ogre for 1d4+8 or something damage.
but you are NOT a rat.
you are a trained human warrior(for example) polymorphed into a rat.
While you take the new form, you still remain the original beeing.
The same way, if a squishy mage polymorphs into a small giant(huge), he still is squishy.
See it as a way of "condensing" your character for becoming smaller and vice versa for larger.
A warrior condensed down and shape-changed into the form of a fly would make for a pretty damn though fly. In other words, if you take the fluff of polymorph a bit different, it can become a lot easier to stomach that "squatting" the fly or "stomping" the rat just won't be as effective as against a normal speciman. Basically that ogre could be stomping on another ogre, only that the second one was "concentrated" into the form and size of a rat. Know what i mean?
Aside from that, both the "drowning"/"suffocation" rules and the cave-in rules were already provided...for such a case, i'd probably go with suffocation if i wanted to do it.
Thanks mordred. That's a really good way to look at it actually. Sometimes it is better and easier to change the way you understand things than to change the thing in question.
Glacier87 wrote: I know I am pretty far out with this one. You all have some good points though. It's not that I want to kill off my PC's at all. I am just a sucker for rules.
I know hit points is an abstraction. You could say that the fly evaded some of the smacking, or was saves by a crack in the table or something like that. I should really use my imagination more. But still, I like the massive damage optional rule. It just doesn't make sense that you have to lose 50 hp minimum, when you are a rat being stomped by an ogre for 1d4+8 or something damage.
If you're looking for a game that makes sense, ground all your dragons, because they're way too heavy to fly with those pitifully small wings.... Or just stop playing Pathfinder now. Even better, give up on heroic fantasy altogether, and look into a military simulation game. Don't even think about going for those story based games like White Wolf and Cubicle 7. Or as a compromise, look up the E6 rules and follow them strictly. Then you don't have to worry about fantastic "unrealistic" magic effects.
Seriously, playing a game like Pathfinder means letting down the anal-rententive obsession with details, at least every once in awhile.
HP isnt how tough you are. Its more how skilled and lucky you are. You die when your luck runs out. So all you are is a very lucky fly.
LazarX wrote: Glacier87 wrote: ...It just doesn't make sense that you have to lose 50 hp minimum, when you are a rat being stomped by an ogre for 1d4+8 or something damage. ...give up on heroic fantasy altogether, and look into a military simulation game... Seriously, playing a game like Pathfinder means letting down the anal-rententive obsession with details, at least every once in awhile. Geez, LazarX, why so cranky? The guy just wants advice on a special situation that he feels would ignore hit points - something not much different than the suffocation rules, really. When people annoy me by thinking strictly in terms of numeric advantages, I don't tell them to get out of my hobby and go do some trigonometry instead. ;)
At least one version of massive damage rules adjusts the threshold by 10 for each size category from Medium (you might start down from Small, to avoid overly penalizing). That puts Fine massive damage at 10 or 20 (still a pretty hard hit).
However... how many times have you stomped on an ant and not killed it? Sometimes being so small makes it *harder* to hurt.
Glacier87 wrote: I know I am pretty far out with this one. You all have some good points though. It's not that I want to kill off my PC's at all. I am just a sucker for rules. Rules are tools, and as I see it, your thread is asking for help creating a new tool for a situation you don't think your toolbox can cover. I see absolutely nothing wrong with that - and I wouldn't worry about LazarX's comment; as long as you know when it's appropriate to use rules and when it's not, it's all good.
To quote the eminent Rich Burlew on a similar matter: "In short, I want tools to use in the game, not a blank check to do what I want. I can already do what I want."
[(Double the weight a character can push/drag) x (current size)*] + [25lbs x Con Mod] - [(Number of feet object falls)/2]** = [Character is squished]
*fine = 1/8, diminutive = 1/4, tiny = 1/2, small = 3/4, medium = 1 large = 2, huge = 4, gargantuan = 8, colossal = 16
**Maximum number subtracted from falling is 100
So let's say an average human (strength and constitution scores of 10 are crushed by an object of 800lbs. That sounds like an auto-death to me. From here, you could add in a Fort/Ref save to halve the calculated "weight".
Renen wrote: HP isnt how tough you are. Its more how skilled and lucky you are. You die when your luck runs out. So all you are is a very lucky fly. That's not true, you just made that up.
Elephants have around 90+ hitpoints, and I'm pretty sure that's not because they're skilled and lucky.
Sauce987654321 wrote: Renen wrote: HP isnt how tough you are. Its more how skilled and lucky you are. You die when your luck runs out. So all you are is a very lucky fly. That's not true, you just made that up.
Elephants have around 90+ hitpoints, and I'm pretty sure that's not because they're skilled and lucky. It's both.
PRG 12: "Hit points are an abstraction signifying how robust and healthy a creature is at the current moment."
It means whatever it needs to mean. If Jeff Goldblum has 52 HP and gets swatted for 10, then clearly he didn't get hit hard enough to kill his fly-body.
To bring in a reality check, so to speak, a high-level character doesn't actually get tougher (barring change to Con) - if you puncture his heart, he'll probably die. An attack with a rapier that deals 15 damage to a character with 10 HP (max) hits a major organ, and he begins to die. If that fighter is higher level and has 30 HP, his combat experience means that he twisted in time, or "rolled with the punch", and the stab wasn't lethal.
This breaks down once you bring magic into it, especially things like a dragon's fire, but again, abstraction. It's a game mechanic and it means whatever it needs to mean.
Bizbag wrote: Sauce987654321 wrote: Renen wrote: HP isnt how tough you are. Its more how skilled and lucky you are. You die when your luck runs out. So all you are is a very lucky fly. That's not true, you just made that up.
Elephants have around 90+ hitpoints, and I'm pretty sure that's not because they're skilled and lucky. It's both.
PRG 12: "Hit points are an abstraction signifying how robust and healthy a creature is at the current moment."
It means whatever it needs to mean. If Jeff Goldblum has 52 HP and gets swatted for 10, then clearly he didn't get hit hard enough to kill his fly-body.
To bring in a reality check, so to speak, a high-level character doesn't actually get tougher (barring change to Con) - if you puncture his heart, he'll probably die. An attack with a rapier that deals 15 damage to a character with 10 HP (max) hits a major organ, and he begins to die. If that fighter is higher level and has 30 HP, his combat experience means that he twisted in time, or "rolled with the punch", and the stab wasn't lethal.
This breaks down once you bring magic into it, especially things like a dragon's fire, but again, abstraction. It's a game mechanic and it means whatever it needs to mean. I should have bolded the part where he said that it's not toughness, which what I saying he was wrong about.
Con does make you tougher, which you did mention, but higher level characters do get tougher even without the con change. If you coup-de-grace a 20th level fighter with a revolver used from an average person when the fighter has 20 con, great fortitude feat, with the +12 base fortitude save (total of +19 fort), he has a very good chance of surviving. Take away the base fortitude save of +12 and his chances are very slim (assuming the damage roll was average for both cases for a fort DC of 26).
I fully understand that the game is abstract, but even that has its limits.
Like I said, it does start to break down once you get into specifics like coup-de-grace, magic attacks, yadda yadda yadda. The point is, it means what it needs to mean depending on the situation. Fighters are extraordinarily tough, and the polymorph spell also confers some sort of protection on your new form (or not, if you're bigger). It's not that the game is abstract (though it often is), it's that Hit Points are particularly abstract, even compared to other rules.
They always have been, but it's just one of those necessary systems. I've yet to see a game fundamentally alter hit points - even systems that focus on body parts and such, like Deus Ex, basically boil down to a more complicated Hit Point System (each of your limbs have HP, losing it does more things, etc.), or just have more rules for combat penalties as you lose health (White Wolf games, Left 4 Dead). Instant-death games are just 1 HP games.
Recent threads in Rules Questions
|
