Comments on: d20 Hit Point Piles

By: Catprog

Catprog — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 13:41:12 +0000

@Toren Atkinson

The problem you are looking at is simple

Most RL people would be L1.
L5 are people like Einstein.

By: DeadGod

DeadGod — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 15:21:16 +0000

I’ve been playing a lot of 4ed lately. I read this post and started thinking about healing surges and the “bloodied” state and it gave me a wonderful idea. Instead of tracking a pile until death, track it in 1/4 HP. Once the pile hits 1/4 HP of an enemy, reset the pile to zero and place some sort of a wound token next to the enemy on the map. The fourth wound token on an enemy drops it.

In this way you add a little granularity to the pile so players can spread damage around. It also provides a visual element to the table so players can gauge how injured an opponent looks. This also resolves the AoE issues, because you can place wound tokens on enemies inside the target area.

By: JM the GM

JM the GM — Tue, 06 May 2008 15:37:38 +0000

I might try it… however my current system (21st century hightech method) is having a spreadsheet on my laptop. It is not as hard as one might think – I would say 9.5 times out of 10 I am able to pin point which baddie has how many hitpoints by keeping notes in the cells next to the HP total.

I ran several high numbered battles… the last one I would say had between 45 and 55 (4 to 6 HD) bad guys with 3 super-villans (lvl 10 & 12) pitted against a party of 5 x 10th level PCs & 1 x 12th lvl NPC.

One pitfall I see with the stacks is high level players that go for the Improved Cleaving characters… it renders that feat almost useless as it is very unlikely you will down more than one baddie in a round.

A good cleaving PC will come in, try to engage 3 or more targets – hit them all at least once and then on round 5 go for the cleave all around him with his power attack/ impr. cleave.

Stacking renders this tactic almost unplayable.

Also there is area affect spells. I see several issues with that as a high level mage can scorch easily for 400 points of damage with one fireball (8d6 (avg = 24) x 10 targets = avg of 240 HP of damage combined). If your threashold is 100 HP, the fireball will fall 4 targets and leave 6 ‘unscathed’.

I know fighters would much rather fight 10 half wounded bad guys than 6 ‘healthy’.

System is not perfect, but it sounds useful for random encounters and lower level fights.

The outcome of my last big battle was a victory for the PCs, but at great cost. They rescued the general but their 3 big fighters, a Samurai, a barbarian and Heroic fighter all fell. The party is left with a bard, sorcerer and a Rapier bearing fighter.

By: Chris Olson

Chris Olson — Sat, 03 May 2008 18:02:08 +0000

I use a pile-per-character approach. Each character has thier own pile…

… works great for me! Simple and smooth!

By: The zen DM - part 2: focus

The zen DM - part 2: focus — Sat, 03 May 2008 05:31:00 +0000

[...] will use hit point piles instead of micro managing each [...]

By: FonnParr

FonnParr — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 09:25:02 +0000

Area effect damage can be modelled by reducing the maximum pile value by the damage points
For example, if each gnoll starts with 13 hp the battle could go like this

7 damage (sword) — > pile = 6 out of 13
4 damage (club) –> pile = 2 out of 13
6 damage (mace) –> pile = 13 out of 13 (one down 19 to go)
4 points (fireball) –> pile = 9 out of 9
1 point (caltrop) –> pile = 8 out of 9
11 points (sword) –> pile = 9 out of 9 (two down 18 to go)

By: Mike

Mike — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 02:38:01 +0000

I love that idea. I think you could track low-level guys with just a die – maybe use that D12 that is so neglected.

I have some big battles coming up, I’ll try it out.

By: valminder

valminder — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 02:09:18 +0000

I really like the idea, and I’ll use it next game.

By: gwynfrid

gwynfrid — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 01:46:18 +0000

Clever idea, I like it. Especially with the two piles variant – it keeps players guessing. Even better, it makes it look like the monsters don’t all have the same hit points. It works just as if you had been individually rolling their hit dice.

Now, a question: how do you handle area spells ? I guess you need to add damage to the pile for each enemy that gets hurt.

By: Toren Atkinson

Toren Atkinson — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 19:49:39 +0000

” in the real world a bunch of knights don’t surround one enemy on the battlefield at a time”

Well the real problem here is the hit point system in general. In the real world if I get hit by a sword just one time, I’m on the ground. And that’s usually how it works in Call of Cthulhu, but it’s just not as fun when you’re on the receiving end!

By: Micah

Micah — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 17:19:02 +0000

This is an excellent idea. I just hope I can remember it long enough to use it in our next session.

By: Nonstop Pulp Action, HP Pile and Cartography - Treasure Tables

Nonstop Pulp Action, HP Pile and Cartography - Treasure Tables — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 14:44:58 +0000

[...] d20 Hit Point Piles: Always one to take rules in different directions, ars ludi author Ben Robbins proposes that [...]