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I'd be fine with allowing for both sets of mechanics, or even combining the two and saying that four minutes gets anyone to max.

Brett, part of the conceptual difference here comes from the idea that a "Life Point" represents a uniform amount of health or essence. If you envision it as a measured, independent quantity than for a high LP character to replenish their pool in the same time frame they must be regaining it at a faster rate.

There is, however, another valid conception that says Life Points do not represent a quantity that is uniform across characters, but are proportionate depending on the total fitness of each character. This version uses max health as a constant across characters and uses the number of LP divisions within as representative of their improved health.

To illustrate the difference, think of health as money. If LP are uniform across characters then the high LP character has an inherently larger pool than the low LP character. To refill that pool you have to "pay" the high LP character more, and for them to fill at the same rate you have to "pay" the high LP character faster.

The other conception has both characters having the exact same pool, but having damage "cost" much more for the low LP character. This is distinct from combat reflexes in that it is resistance to damage because of the physical resiliency of the body, not avoidance of Damage through reflexes. Chris uses the example of a boxer "rolling" with a punch, which, by my reckoning, is closer to CR than LP. The fact that the boxer has trained to take hits and endure punishment is a better representation of LP. A hit against a trained boxer costs him less than the same hit against someone less hardy.

Just so it's understood, neither one of these conceptions is inherently right or wrong. They differ from each other and each creates a set of ramifications for the metaphysics for the game world, but choosing between them is exactly that: a choice. My interest is in making the dimensions of each choice clear and making sure the mechanics of the system are as representative of the in-game experience as possible.

i get both points, but i think think the idea of a warrior or someone being able to heal faster because the have seen alot of combat or have alot of life should be represented in another skill altogether.

"Healing Amplification" (thank you DDO) from all your time spent under the healers hand after long combat you have come to learn how to best help yourself. staying still while they work, not twitching under the pain.
any healer working on you cuts the time it takes to heal you in half.

could be a perk, swap out skill, whatever. i dont think its needed, but the option is there.

bu as i see it every time your cut that cut takes a speicific amount of time to heal, as represented in heal/sec. a warrior has 10 life, a rogue has 5. life only effects how much you can get cut on, a warrior can get cut 10 times, a rogue 5, but the healer has to mend each cut with the same amount of time.

i understand the logic behind half/full but i think this way seems more realistic (yeah fantasy i know) and more interactive.

David thanks again for explaining the other side of this debate. You are correct that my example was more akin to combat reflexes.

One thing I would like to make clear is that Mike and I are not wrong when it comes to how LP's are currently conceptualized. We were both there at the creation of the game and healing is the way it is because of how we conceptualized LP's. Now as David has mentioned neither idea is wrong, but we are talking about a change in the conception from where it is today, and there are some very good reasons to change it. We know this because of the raging out of control debate we had at the beginning of this game.

Another point of clarity is that I am not advocating that people with more life heal faster I was only using it as an example for why both low life and high life characters heal at the same rate.

I will use another example: lets take me versus Ndamukong Suh. We can all agree that Suh would have to be hit with a much harder force to break some random bone his body. Mechanically, he has more life than I do. Now lets say we both break the same bone in our body. My question is who heals faster? Do I heal faster because I have less life than Suh or does Suh heal faster? Do we heal at the same rate?

that depends? does he have regen? how many times does he have it? is he in a stressfull situation? can he use skills?

i get your point chris. but i think total life and rate of life regen/healing should be two seperate skills.

life point total
life point regen

for instance, wolverine may not have that much max life, but hes got so much regen, can regen in the negitives, and regen whilst in combat, that it really does not matter.

One thing I would like to make clear is that Mike and I are not wrong when it comes to how LP's are currently conceptualized.

I would like to make one thing clear, I didnt say you were wrong about how you and mike did anythiung at the inception of the game, becaue what I responded to wasnt commentary on what happened way back whenever. I responded to this:

Honestly a person with more life should take less time to get well.

There is just no way a 15 hp warrior and a 5 hp empath should heal to full at the same rate, since all that does is give one more combat advantage to a path that doesnt need another.

I get your contention that a 3 LP wound is different things to PCs with different LP totals, but thats just rationalizing to support a game mechanic you like, and essentially double dipping the advantages in favor of the warrior.

I get that the healing was designed the way it was because the initial GMs were looking to make simple blanket rules with rudimentary mechanics, everyone healing form 0 to full in the same time period, while true to what the games initial goal was, its a flawed skill in the games current incarnation and out dated based on the evolution the game has gone through.

lol Brian I was a GM who supported healing 1 LP at a time. Also, the make it clear comment was not directed toward anyone as I honestly wrote it based on a collective feeling I got reading all the posts, and I have no recollection as to what any one person said.

30 seconds per life point is a rudimentary simple mechanic so unsure what point you are trying to make here in comparing it to the current rudimentary mechanic. It is just based on a different view of life points.

The fact that a warrior is getting a double helping of awesome and does not need the extra advantage is a very good point.

Is there anyone against the idea of simply offering both systems to healers and allowing them to choose how they want to heal? If no one has an objection then there is no need to debate this, but if people want to replace the current system then I will need to hear a lot more comments than the chosen 5.

i dont really support the idea of picking the way you want to heal, makes the rules seem unfinished. i think a decision, public or private needs to be made regardless of what system is used.

however i supose if all healing type skills were brought in line with allowing both systems to be used, it would make it look better.

Heal: choose 1 of the following, permenant after creation
1- heal 1 life point every 30 sec.
2- heal half life in 2 min, full life in 4.

Regen: choose 1 of the following, permenant after creation
1- heal 1 life point every 60 sec. (further regen cuts time in half)
2- heal half life in 4 min, full life in 8. (further regen cuts time in half)


yes im bringing regen into the discussion, i think all healing skills should be brought into line.

I see the merits of both sides, and the arguments for them. However, we don't consider Health to be a percentage stat - attacks don't knock you down 25% of your HP, they do 3 damage. If we did consider percentage points (10%, 10%, 10% ) it would be a different story entirely. Healing a broken bone or a stab wound would take the same amount of time whether it's Chris or Suh (to use his example). Maybe Suh would get up and back into the fight faster than Chris, but it would be before the injury fully healed, that's about it.

More HP means you can absorb more punishment before you can go down sure, but I would imagine that if both a 20 HP warrior and a 5 HP empath both got knocked down to zero, it would not take the healer the same amount of time to patch both of those injuries up. They've both been beaten to within an inch of their life, but the warrior took quite a few more attacks before he went down, maybe even attacks that would have completely destroyed the possibility of the empath surviving.

So yes, the warrior takes longer to heal. But that's the way it should be, IMO.

And I totally agree Regen should work the same way as Healing.

Why would healing two different ways make the rules seem unfinished? We have an entire heroes and villains expansion that allows people to customize their characters.

30 seconds per life point is a rudimentary simple mechanic so unsure what point you are trying to make here in comparing it to the current rudimentary mechanic.

I wasnt coparing the 30/+1 to anything. I was simply stating the old system was general and basic and bland. The new one is not even in the same catagory, and isnt as bad. Thats all.

Is there anyone against the idea of simply offering both systems to healers and allowing them to choose how they want to heal

?

I am opposed to it. Different methods of healing means that the in game magics work different for different PCs. The staff needs to decide on how the magic/energies/in game physics work and set in stone how thier world works, and then make mechanics that support that so the PCs can explore it and learn about it without thier being no cannon that the GMs can dish out info form.

Make the world.

Make the mechanics.

Invite the players in to explore and learn and experience.

Stop changing it every year.

Let the players that dont like it vote with thier feet.

I am perplexed why you are willing to ask the players using the healing systems what they want and make your decision based on thier feedback, but the players that were using the alchamy and arcane system didnt get the same. It was just changed and they had to just like it. Period.

Some consistency would be nice.

I am perplexed why you are willing to ask the players using the healing systems what they want and make your decision based on thier feedback, but the players that were using the alchamy and arcane system didnt get the same. It was just changed and they had to just like it. Period.

Well when we did that, we got all of this criticism because we didn't consult the players who actually played these disciplines. A little consistency would be nice.

Incidentally, we did talk with arcanes and alchemists while creating the rules as well as others, just not all of them and not publicly like this. We do apologize for trying to create rules that take into account the feelings of the players who play the game. What were we thinking?

The point of all of this is that it is surprising, considering we had this very discussion at the time of game creation, Don't presume to know either who was in favor of what or the reasons because you've been wrong every time. When we initially discussed it, there were VERY strong feelings about it, strong enough to change opinions of people who everyone mistakens for stubborn.

We are all very glad that the playtest has gone well. I believe the decision is to continue that playtest for another year as these rules have only had a few events to really be appreciated. In that time, we will continue to collect your feedback on the skills and their conceptualization and then we will decide, based in large part upon your feedback because we care about creating games that people enjoy, which healer system we will use henceforth.

As for this statement:

Stop changing it every year.

Couldn't agree more.

And that is why we are doing this now, most every "Change" we have made this year is either a Clarification, or fixing a Break... nothing really has changed other than wording.. The only exception to this is the Building and Doors construction rules because that system was broke, and needed the fix..

Other than that, we are just clearing up the wording on all the skills so there will no longer be the discussion of "in the spirit of the rule", the rules will be written so you know how they are designed to work, not how you interpret them.

lol my entire reluctance on the healing change is based on not wanting to change rules every year. I am confused with an argument to change healing because the old system is outdated while at the same time telling us to not change rules. Currently I have a very clear idea how LP's work from a meta/magical physics and RP perspective. I like the way it is now. That said I like the LP's per point on a fun level which is probably more important. I know Brian you feel your opinion on how it should work is clearly superior to my idea and I am not denying your awesomeness, but others tend to believe both ideas are equally valid, and I don't want to deny them either.

On a side note part of me is thinking that changing rules all the time might be the better approach. Heck WOW does it.

Go, Go Gadget: Wall of Text!


Here's my take on the new healing rules that were/are being playtested. During the time I have played a full healer using them (with a fiancee that's used both new and old versions of the skills), a higher soak character being healed by them, and could at anytime play a warrior with one of the highest LP totals of the game.

As a Healer:

- I actually love the new rules, and I can say that Dani does too as Fionna(and she was a healer the old way for nearly four years- Level 90). I like how it takes a higher LP character longer to heal, as you actually are healing more cuts and broken bones, because they were able to take so much more than a "weaker" person before they became incapacitated. Some of use like that as it helps get deeper into the roleplaying. Some other points I have seen while using the new skills:

-I don't think a single healer kept the old way of using healing skills, and that was made clear as a viable choice. All of us seem to like them unanimously.

-It also makes it easier to "top off" a character. If a person lost two life points, it used to take four minutes to heal them, the same as a guy who looks like he went through a meatgrinder and then got shat out by a troll.

-Also, as far as I can tell with the rules, we now have a cool way of representing a "triage team" getting to one person and healing them faster, because three healers now heal a person three times faster. A cool way to show benefits of teamwork.

-With a properly prepared group of healers in a mass battle(as is, given 30 seconds time to prepare), a warrior low on life can run by and instantly get 4 life back from a line of 4 healers, more if any are level 50+. I would be hard-pressed to find a warrior that would have a problem with the new rules allowing that, lol.

-I personally have never had a high-soak character complain to me that the new rules specifically suck because they take longer. The only complainers are exactly the same people/characters as complained about it taking four minutes with the old "Are we done yet?", in an exasperated sigh because they want to get back out and be the badass but can't. Never because their 9LP character now takes 30 seconds longer than the old way of 4 min.

-The same anxious characters as above can blast off with three life after a minute and a half to go fight some more- it's their risk.

-I have actually had people with even one level of Regen run me off saying "go 'way, I can Regen myself", and that still takes longer than the new "bigger bucket" analogy unless they somehow have 16 LP! And double regen warriors have actually threatened me if I break their Regen time. So they must be just fine on their own, huh? Especially as (most) warriors now have at least one level of regen.

----------------------------
As the Warrior and a Empath with 10 LP:

-As the immediate above statements. Rhul has 14-15LP depending on Sage involvement. He also has Regen/1. Even with the new way of healing, a healer takes a full minute less to heal me than for me to Regen myself. I have no problem with it taking seven minutes, as I was able to stay out longer than my/others' characters less than that. Until I hit 16LP, it's still faster than I can do on my own, so I'll gladly hit up a healer that's not occupied.

-Armor repair. It now takes a 10LP character the exact same time to be healed as to throw armor to a character to be repaired. Even with the old way, most wise warriors in the same situation stuck around the extra minute after healing to get the benefits of the armor repair.

If anything, the things that Steady Hand now allows me to do seem cheesy, like walk and hold a charged heal, walk around and heal myself or others, or (the most feeling of cheese) to use first aid or surgery on a fellow that is being carried by another character away from battle. The rest? Nope.

Also, I detest having playtests that can never be brought into reality if they work because we don't want large rulebook changes. Now, sweeping changes over multiple things? I don't like them. But a single path isn't that big a deal, as we just recently added an entirely new path into the game.

(I also want to say this as an observation to the GM's. Not very many people can be complaining about how healing takes too long, as they really aren't being healed at all. As a Healer who is eager to use my skill so I always vocally ask how people are doing, I am healing a dramatically and disturbingly small percentage of the combat-oriented characters at any given event. For instance at the last one-day, I healed exactly three characters, and one of them was another master healer that I was doing surgery on! Dani says she healed only one character. We both made up about 50% of the master healers at the event that had 20 or so players.)

I would also be in for just simply continuing the healer playtest for this entire season. See how things are in the next winter if GM's truly want a season;s events to sample data from.

Healers could continue to choose to use either version (in full, obviously).

If after this entire season, all the healers are using the "new" way, and even new healer characters that come in even choose it over the old way (like me, for instance), there's your answer, really.