Good Afternoon Fellow Gamers,
I play in, and run, campaigns that allow the player to choose a static # for their hit points when they level up, or choose to roll if they are feeling lucky.
Now I kind of like the idea of static hit dice, but I have a couple options that I would like to bounce off of you:
STATIC OPTION 1 (current method)
Based off of your Hit Dice
d6 = 4+CON Modifier OR Roll HD + CON Modifier
d8 = 5+CON Modifier OR Roll HD + CON Modifier
d10 = 6+CON Modifier OR Roll HD + CON Modifier
d12 = 7+CON Modifier OR Roll HD + CON Modifier
STATIC OPTION 2
Based off of your Hit Dice:
d6 = 4+CON Modifier
d8 = 6+CON Modifier
d10 = 8+CON Modifier
d12 = 10+CON Modifier
Random Option 1
Based off of your hit Dice
d6+4+CON Modifier
d8+5+CON Modifier
d10+6+CON Modifier
d12+7+CON Modifier
(These all apply to both PCs and Monsters)
What do you think? Which one do you think will make the players most happy, while still keeping the monsters threatening?
(Just as an aside: All monsters get max HP for their first HD, and max HP for their first level in a PC class (if any))
Very Respectfully,
--Bacon
our group uses a system similar to option #1
we roll the HD dice, and if the roll is lower than the low side of half, you take half
so minimum rolls
D4=2
D6=3
D8=4
D10=5
D12=6
in all cases you add your Con modifier to the end.
I like your static options, but the problem we were trying to fix, was a 'frontliner' character with middling con that rolled a 1 at lvl 2 and a 2 at lvl 3....
Meaning at level 3 his hitpoints were so low he couldn't effective participate in combat (the mage had more hps than he did).
This was causing a player to want to dump his character entirely, which I think means a weakness in ruleset, so we amended to what we have above, so none of the players are completely hosed by a couple of bad rolls.
Right,
Which is why I'm looking at static option #2
A fighter with middling CON (+1 Mod), would have a minimum of 9hp/level.
It keeps the frontliners in the front.
Very Respectfully,
--Bacon
I tend to go with #1, but I honestly would prefer just making it option #2 or thereabouts. Still, I have a couple players who prefer rolling, and since it doesn't hurt anyone else's character, I let them. The issue is that, playing in low-mid levels (though mostly this is a problem in the lower end of the scale), is where you see the most statistical variance in the hitpoints of PCs who roll HP, and also where the game is most lethal. I don't like having to toe around killing the party fighter at second level, because he rolled a 1 on his 1d10, and suddenly has less HP than the party Wizard.
Definitely #2. I don't believe any part of character creation or advancement should be randomized.
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i saw an idea on the boards where a character's Hit Dice are maintained whereas Hit Points are rolled anew each morning.
so, Better with Bacon, your 5th level 'middling CON' fighter might have 5d10+10 Hit Dice (because he put his favored class bonus in hit points), netting an average of 42 Hit Points (if we max the first die, rolling 4d10+20) every day - close to your 9 HP x 5 figure.
i'd be interested to see how Heal and Cooking and other skills might interact with this...
I use your static option 2 for a year and a half now and it works fine for my group. They added Constitution score at the start of the game, though and I let them create characters using 25 point pool so they are quite powerful for their level letting me use more powerful monsters.
If you wanted some randomness but not the full dice range worth you could just have everyone roll d4's and add a mod based off the original dice (so d6=d4+1, d8=d4+2, d10=d4+3 & d12=d4+4). Fighter could still roll lower than the wizard but that is way less likely to happen.
I use Option 1 for all my games. Rolling HP is usually very un-fun for everyone involved.