Upgraded Damage and Healing
Introduction
These set of rules are meant to expand on the rules for Damage and Healing on PHB pg. 196-198. It also changes a few other rules, in order to adjust to these expansions.
When you play the game with this supplement, core rules all apply unless stated otherwise.
When should you use these rules?
These rules are designed with games in mind, that are looking for a more gritty tone, with the feeling of the main characters constantly pushing themselves to the limit.
Note that using these rules characters (both PCs and NPCs) are harder to die in a single combat, but are much likely to enter a death spiral if they go on fighting too long without proper resting.
What makes these rules unique
These rules give a design for Damage and Healing that introduces more stages of being wounded and worn out by battle.
Instead of the binary (has hit points/has not hit points) system of the PHB, this ruleset provides a system in which characters can wear themselves out from all fine, trough little hurt and completely useless to eventually dead.
While killing a character takes more effort, than normal, defeating takes about as much as in the vanilla version of the game, and a defeated character is fairly exposed to its opponent, being easy to kill or capture.
How to use this document
This document goes over various sections of the core rules, and gives adjustments or expansions where needed. I highly recommend that you read it trough once before you start using it in your game.
Damage and Healing
The following passages mean to expand end replace the rules on PHB pg. 196-198.
Hit Points
Hit Points are used to measure damage and healing, but characters do not have Hit Points to gain or loose. They have Endurance Points and Vitality Points instead.
Endurance Points represent a character's ability to keep on doing things that are draining for them. This includes any kind of destitution, as well as minor wounds such as sprains, bruises and sratches.
Vitality Points represent a characters ability to take serious wounds, such as damage to main blood vessels or vital organs.
If any rule, that is not covered in this document refers to a creature's current or maximum Hit Points, it should be regarded as if it was reffering to the creature's current or Maximum Endurance Points.
Determining Maximum Endurance and Vitality Points
You determine a creature's maximum Endurance Points and Vitality Points the same way you would determine their maximum Hit Points. This, in many cases will mean that a creature hsa the same amount of maximum Endurance and Vitality Points. If you use rolling dice to determine a creature's Endurance and Vitality points, you can use a separate roll for each, or the same roll for both.
Damage Rolls
Damage rolls are made as normal. Damage dealt to a character reduces their Endurance Points, unless stated otherwise.
Critical Hits
When a character scores a critical hit, they can choose to loose all the extra dice they would get to their damage roll. If they do so, the damage they deal with their attack reduces the target's Vitality Points instead of their Endurance Points.
Damage Types
There are the same damage types as normal.
Damage Resistance and Vulnerability
Resistance, immunity and vulnerability works as normal.
Healing
Healing works a bit differently using this supplement. For rules on how characters heal during rests, see the Resting section further down in this document.
When a creature is healed by a magical method or similar feature (such as the cure wounds spell, a potion of healing or the Healer Feat) work with the following rules:
- As long as a creature has any missing Endurance Points, the healing is applied to those. The creature regains a number of Endurance Points equal to the amount of Hit Points the healing effect would restore.
- If a creature's Endurance Points are at their maximum and they have no levels of exhaustion when they are targeted by magical healing, they restore a number of Vitality Points equal to one quarter (rounded down, but at least 1) of the Hit Points the healing effect would restore.
Dying
Using these rules the only real way for a character to die (besides special, instant kill effects, such as power word kill) is to increase their exhaustion level to 6.
This means that normal rules for Instant Death, Falling Unconscious, Death Saving Throws and Knocking a Creature Out do not apply.
This means that it is harder for a character to die than using vanilla rules, as it has to loose all its Endurance Points a total number of six times.
Not that this process can be quickened. Effects that cause exhaustion normally (going without food, forced march etc.) still apply. Also, the bleeding out condition (imposed by loosing all Vitality Points) causes creatures to loose Endurance Points rapidly until it is removed.
Dropping to 0 Endurance Points
When a creature drops to 0 Endurance points, they have temporarily lost its ability to go on at all, and have severely drained itself. They suffer the following effects:
- The creature instantly gains one level of exhaustion. If that kills it, further steps do not apply.
- It gains the fainted condition, which it automatically looses after 1d4x10 minutes.
- Its Endurance Points are reset to their maximum.
- If there is any damage remaining from the blow that have reduced it to 0 Endurance Points, it applies that damage to its now regained Endurance Points. If that reduces its Endurance Points to 0 again, it should repeat these four steps until there is no more damage remaining, or it dies.
Dropping to 0 Vitality Points
When you drop to 0 Vitality points, you gain the bleeding out condition.
Stabilizing a Creature
When a creature has the bleeding out condition, they are likely to die quickly unless they are stabilized.
In order to stabilize a creature, one must use an action to administer them First Aid. They must make a DC 10 Wisdom (Medicine) check. On a success, the target creature looses the bleeding out condition, and gains the desperate condition, which is automatically removed if the creature regains any Vitality Points, and cannot be removed otherwise.
Temporary Hit Points
Temporary Hit Points become Temporary Endurance Points and they otherwise work as normal.
There is no way to gain Temporary Vitality Points.
Resting
The following rules replace the rules on PHB pg. 186.
Using this supplement, adventurers can take three kinds of rests. Short Rests, Long Rests and Deep Rests. Short rests are done during the day, while long are done at the end of it (typically in the form of a night sleep). Deep rests are extended periods of resting that heal more severe wounds.
Short rest
A short rest is a period of downtime, at least 1 hour long. A creature can spend a short rest doing nothing, or with light activity. It gains the benefits of the Short Rest either way.
A creature can spend any number of their remaining hit dice at the end of a short rest to gain back Endurance points. When a Hit Die is used in this way, the creature must roll it and heals a number of Endurance Points equal to the number rolled plus their Constitution modifier. (At least one Endurance Point.) A hit die spent this way is expanded, and cannot be used until it is regained. (Which can usually be done during a long rest.)
Additionally, a creature regains any resource if it is noted to be regained upon a short rest (Such as Ki points) as normal.
A creature cannot take more than three short rests between two long rests. If a creature has already had three short rests since its last long rest, it must complete a long rest, before it can start a new short rest.
Long Rest
A long rest is a period of downtime at least 8 hours long. Normally a creature has to spend 6 of those 8 hours sleeping. If a creature is noted not to need sleep (such as warlocks with Aspect of the Moon) or need less sleep or sleep-like activity (such as elves) that overwrites this rule. A creature must spend the part of the long rest it doesn't spend sleeping with light activity. A creature cannot complete a long rest under 8 hours in any case. If the long rest is interrupted by anything that doesn't qualify as light activity – running, fighting, casting spells, at least 1 hour of walking or any similar adventuring activity – the creature must start the 8 hours all over again. A characcter that has the **bleeding out** or **fainted** conditions cannot take a long rest.
At the end of a long rest, a creature regains all missing Endurance Points. It also regains a number of expended Hit Dice, up to a number of dice equal to half of the character's total number of them (at least one die).
If a character starts a long rest with none of its Endurance Points missing, they regain 1 Vitality Point at the end of their rest.
A character also regains all resources that are noted to normally be regained upon the completion of a long rest. (such as spell slots)
A character cannot benefit from more then one long rest in a 24-hour period.
Variant Rule: Going without a Long Rest
A creature has to take a long rest daily in order to remain healthy. If 25 hours have passed since a creature finished its last long rest, and the creature has not started long resting again, the creature must make a DC 10 Constitution saving throw. On a failure, the creature gains one level of exhaustion. A creature must repeat this saving throw each hour, with the DC increasing by one for each consecutive saving throw, until it starts a long rest.
Deep rests are treated as if they were long rests for the sake of this variant rule.
Deep Rests
Deep rests are extended periods of downtime that creatures use to fully regain their health. For that reason, completing a deep rest has many conditions:
- A deep rest must lasts of a number of 24 hour periods (the exact number varies as noted below) during which the resting creature cannot undertake any activity, not even light activities. (Except taking in the food and water it needs.)
- The deep resting creature must not have the bleeding out, desperate, diseased, fainted or poisoned conditions.
- The deep resting creature must be lying on a bed, bedroll or something of equal comfort for the entirety of the rest.
- If the deep resting creature is exposed to heat, cold, or any other kind of environmental hazard during any point of the rest, the rest automatically fails and must be started all over again.
- The deep resting creature must take in the amount of food and water it needs per day (1 pound of food and 1 gallon of water for player characters) during the rest.
A deep rest lasts until the resting creature has regained all of its Endurance Points, Vitality Points and Hit Dice and have lost all levels of exhaustion it had.
If a deep rest fails before that by breaking the above conditions, the resting creature immediately gains a level of exhaustion and looses half of its current Vitality Points (rounded down). Any other benefit gained from the deep rest so far remains.
A creature can be healed by magic as normal during its rest, which can potentially make the rest finish sooner.
Upon successfully completing a 24 hour period of a deep rest, a creature can choose one of the following benefits. Some benefits have prerequisites and penalties as noted. A creature must meet the prerequisite and suffer the penalty tied to a benefit in order to gain it.
- Benefit: The creature regains all missing Endurance Points.
- Benefit: The Creature Removes one level of exhaustion. Prerequisite: The creature must not have any Endurance Points missing. Penalty: The creature's number of current Endurance Points is reduced to 1.
- Benefit: The creature rolls one of its Hit Dice, and regains a number of Vitality Points equal to the number rolled plus their Constitution Modifier. (Doing so doesn't expire the hit die. Prerequisite: The creature must not have any levels of exhaustion. And must not have any Endurance Points missing.
Upon completing a deep rest, a creature also regains all expandable resources that are normally regained upon the completion of a long rest.
Variant Rule: Medical Attention During Deep Rests
A creature can give medical attention to another creature that is deep resting.
In order to do so, the attending creature must spend 8 hours with the deep resting creature at the end of which it must make a DC 15 Wisdom (Medicine) check. If the attending creature has access to a herbalism kit, and they are proficient with it, they can add their proficiency bonus to that check, even if they do not have proficiency in Medicine, or add it doubled if they do. They can gain advantage on the roll by expanding one use of a healing kit.
On a failure, the deep resting creature gains no benefits from their current 24 hour period. If the result of the check is 5 or less. The deep rest immediately fails.
On a success the resting creature can choose two benefits at the end of the current 24 hour period instead of one. The two benefits are treated as if they are coming one after the other. So the character must meet the prerequisite of the first benefit when they finish the 24 hour period, and must meet the prerequisite of the second benefit after gaining the first benefit and suffering its penalty.
Conditions
The following passages mean to expand the rules on PHB pg. 290-292.
Additional conditions
The following conditions are added to the game:
Bleeding Out
- A creature must be at 0 Vitality Points in order to have this condition. If a creature regains any Vitality Points by any means, they instantly loose this condition.
- A creature that is bleeding out is incapacitated, restrained and cannot take bonus actions.
- At the end of each of its turns, it must roll one of its highest hit die (single class characters only have one kind of hit die) and loose an amount of Endurance Points equal to the number rolled plus their Constitution modifier (at least one Endurance Point). This damage cannot be prevented or reduced by any means.
Bleeding Doesn't Have to be bleeding
Though the conditions is called "bleeding out" a creature under this condition doesn't necessarily has to be portrayed in the game as bleeding.
The only certain thing is that they are eventually dying (and are doing so quickly) because their vital organs (or body parts equal to that for characters who do not have vital organs) have taken too much damage.
You can get creative on how that manifests in game based on the type of damage that has reduced the bleeding creature to 0 Vitality Points.
Desperate
- A creature usually becomes desperate after it is stabilized from the bleeding out condition. A creature must have 0 Vitality Points in order to have this condition. If they regain any Vitality Points by any means, they loose this condition immediately.
- A desperate creature has its speed halved, cannot take reactions, and can only take either an action or a bonus action on its turn.
- If it suffers any damage, it looses the desperate condition, and gains the bleeding out condition.
Fainted
- A fainted creature is unconscious and cannot regain Endurance Points by any means.
- A fainted creature can be woken up before their faint expires by having the greater restoration spell (or a similar healing effect of equal or greater power) used on them. A fainted creature cannot be woken early by any means.
Exhaustion
Exhaustion is gained trough all the ways that are noted in the core rules and impose negative effects as normal.
A creature cannot lose any levels of exhaustion by completing a long rest. The only way for loosing exhaustion levels is to have a deep rest (as noted above). A creature can also reduce its exhaustion level by 1 by having the greater restoration spell (or a similar healing effect of equal or greater power) used on them.