Yakk
2009-07-14, 10:23 AM
This is an attempt to keep con important to HP after the low levels in 4e.
At level 1, your HP is roughly (4*PerLevelAmount)+(2*ConBonus), plus or minus a few points. So one way to do it would be to grant ConBonus to HP every even level.
However, in 4e your Con climbs to extremely high levels. I don't want the con-lock to have stratospheric HP compared to the sword-fighter, as that could step on roles.
In addition, we run into the problem that a HP inflation in other character renders "low con" characters more vulnerable.
So after tweaking the numbers a bit, I ended up with:
At level 4, 8, 14, 18, 24, 28, you apply your Constitution Bonus to your HP. Improvements to your Constitution apply retroactively.
In addition, at level 11 and 21, you add your Constitution Score to your HP.
---
I used a "Con 8 Wizard" as my baseline. The HP ratio of a character at level 1, and at level 30, remains relatively stable. If you fail to invest stat points in Con, the ratio decays to a certain degree towards 1 (down about 10% to 20%). If you do invest in stat points at every chance, the ratio goes up (about 10%-20%) compared to level 1.
Even 8 con characters get a few moer HP under this system. By Epic, your con is average (so you get no penalties from the 4/8/14/18/24/28 levels), and you have added 20 extra HP at level 11 and 21.
The most extreme case would be a level 30 wizard with 30 con.
Before, she would have 156 HP. After, she would have 276 HP (77% increase).
A 30 con level 30 warden:
Before 250 HP.
After 370 HP (48% increase).
For this to not break the game, you'd also have to increase the damage output of enemies. And there would probably be some power bias towards "con builds" because of the extra HP such builds generate.
Inferno and Vestige warlocks, in particular, become quite tanky.
A 30 con level 30 warlock has 307 HP instead of 187 HP.
To be fair, at level 1 that Warlock had 32 HP, while the Warden had 37 HP -- at level 1, the warlock is 86% of warden, and at level 30 the warlock is 83% of warden under this system. Under the RAW rules, the importance of con fades -- by level 30 the warlock has fallen to 75% of the Warden's HP.
A more typical case might be a 14 con fighter. Starting with 29 HP, under the RAW rules the fighter ends up with 205 HP, and under these rules the fighter ends up with 255 HP.
I also played with an even smaller impact system -- where you get Con bonus to HP at level 4 8 14 18 24 28 and no extra HP at 11/21. It results in "HP ratio decay towards the mean" unless you invest every attribute increase in constitution. Which might not be a bad thing.
Thoughts?
At level 1, your HP is roughly (4*PerLevelAmount)+(2*ConBonus), plus or minus a few points. So one way to do it would be to grant ConBonus to HP every even level.
However, in 4e your Con climbs to extremely high levels. I don't want the con-lock to have stratospheric HP compared to the sword-fighter, as that could step on roles.
In addition, we run into the problem that a HP inflation in other character renders "low con" characters more vulnerable.
So after tweaking the numbers a bit, I ended up with:
At level 4, 8, 14, 18, 24, 28, you apply your Constitution Bonus to your HP. Improvements to your Constitution apply retroactively.
In addition, at level 11 and 21, you add your Constitution Score to your HP.
---
I used a "Con 8 Wizard" as my baseline. The HP ratio of a character at level 1, and at level 30, remains relatively stable. If you fail to invest stat points in Con, the ratio decays to a certain degree towards 1 (down about 10% to 20%). If you do invest in stat points at every chance, the ratio goes up (about 10%-20%) compared to level 1.
Even 8 con characters get a few moer HP under this system. By Epic, your con is average (so you get no penalties from the 4/8/14/18/24/28 levels), and you have added 20 extra HP at level 11 and 21.
The most extreme case would be a level 30 wizard with 30 con.
Before, she would have 156 HP. After, she would have 276 HP (77% increase).
A 30 con level 30 warden:
Before 250 HP.
After 370 HP (48% increase).
For this to not break the game, you'd also have to increase the damage output of enemies. And there would probably be some power bias towards "con builds" because of the extra HP such builds generate.
Inferno and Vestige warlocks, in particular, become quite tanky.
A 30 con level 30 warlock has 307 HP instead of 187 HP.
To be fair, at level 1 that Warlock had 32 HP, while the Warden had 37 HP -- at level 1, the warlock is 86% of warden, and at level 30 the warlock is 83% of warden under this system. Under the RAW rules, the importance of con fades -- by level 30 the warlock has fallen to 75% of the Warden's HP.
A more typical case might be a 14 con fighter. Starting with 29 HP, under the RAW rules the fighter ends up with 205 HP, and under these rules the fighter ends up with 255 HP.
I also played with an even smaller impact system -- where you get Con bonus to HP at level 4 8 14 18 24 28 and no extra HP at 11/21. It results in "HP ratio decay towards the mean" unless you invest every attribute increase in constitution. Which might not be a bad thing.
Thoughts?