Damage and Hit Points compared to previous editions

[RenaldoS]

Hey guys,

I was doing some work converting some classic modules to 5e play and one of the things that surprised me was how small monster HPs used to be. A patrol of Gnolls might be listed with HPs 7,5,3, 8 whereas the by-the-book gnoll in 5e's monster manual has 22. For monsters such as gnolls I can just swap in the new statblocks, but sometimes there were unique monsters or monsters not yet statted in 5e.

Is there any rule of thumb for converting? For reference I'm converting old 1e modules and B/X modules. Ac values I can more or less use as is (inverting to ascending AC of course) but HP conversion has made me feel like I'm just making stuff up.

Thanks for any help.

[Demonic Spoon]

There are guidelines in the DMG for estimating the CR of a creature given some basic information like hitpoints, damage per round, etc.

You can't do any kind of direct conversion from 3.5, but if you know what abilities a creature should thematically have and how challenging they should be, it's pretty easy to re-create them in 5e.

[Ninja_Prawn]

There are guidelines in the DMG for estimating the CR of a creature given some basic information like hitpoints, damage per round, etc.

Yep, the DMG guidelines can seem complicated and daunting, but they're actually really easy once you get your head around them.

The reason HP numbers are so large is down to bounded accuracy. Since high-CR monsters have (broadly speaking) the same AC as low-CR monsters, there has to be something that makes them tougher. In 5e, that's HP. They could have done it the other way around, keeping HP numbers low and inflating AC, but there's probably reasons why they didn't.


You can't do any kind of direct conversion from 3.5.

I get what you're saying here, but I'm gonna dispute it. I've done a few conversions now, and as long as you completely ignore HP, conversion is easy and fairly direct. You can certainly preserve CRs, ability scores and most of the skills/traits.

[Kryx]

You can't do any kind of direct conversion from 3.5
I disagree here as well. I made a PF to 5e converter that is incredibly accurate based on a google doc that had guidelines.
The doc also had guidelines for 3.5

So far the results have been really close to what I expect.

[RenaldoS]

I appreciate the answers guys, but the original question was about 1e Ad&D and B/X, not 3.5.

[MaxWilson]

Hey guys,

I was doing some work converting some classic modules to 5e play and one of the things that surprised me was how small monster HPs used to be. A patrol of Gnolls might be listed with HPs 7,5,3, 8 whereas the by-the-book gnoll in 5e's monster manual has 22. For monsters such as gnolls I can just swap in the new statblocks, but sometimes there were unique monsters or monsters not yet statted in 5e.

Is there any rule of thumb for converting? For reference I'm converting old 1e modules and B/X modules. Ac values I can more or less use as is (inverting to ascending AC of course) but HP conversion has made me feel like I'm just making stuff up.

Thanks for any help.

From looking at regeneration rates and spell damage, my rough impression is that an AD&D HP is worth between 2 and 3 HP in 5E. E.g. Trolls now regenerate 10 HP instead of 3, and they have about 84 HP instead of 33. A 10th level wizard used to have 25 HP and a 10th level fighter had 55 or 60; now the wizard has about 60 (IME) plus sometimes additional 15 or so temp HP and the fighter has about 80. Vampires regenerate 20 HP per round instead of 3 (6x inflation), which is more than the 3x inflation I've predicted, but then they also have 144 HP instead of 35 (4x), so I think they've just been made tougher.

There's some swing there, and not everything maps precisely, but inflating HP by x3 is a good place to start your conversion.

[some guy]

Is there any rule of thumb for converting? For reference I'm converting old 1e modules and B/X modules. Ac values I can more or less use as is (inverting to ascending AC of course) but HP conversion has made me feel like I'm just making stuff up.

Thanks for any help.

What I usually do is compare the unique monster to other ones. If an unique monster in 1e is comparable to, say, a 1e umberhulk, I give the 5e version of the unique monster comparable hp to a 5e umberhulk. Or if I want to spend less time, I just double the hitdice and add a Con bonus to hp (for low CR monsters, I use a 1,5 or 1,3 modifier for for cr's of 2+).

[eastmabl]

I appreciate the answers guys, but the original question was about 1e Ad&D and B/X, not 3.5.

Let's be fair now - you said that it was about previous editions. Yes, you mentioned classic modules, but there are some classic modules from 2e and 3e (Sunless Citadel, anyone?).

[Firechanter]

Hey guys,

I was doing some work converting some classic modules to 5e play and one of the things that surprised me was how small monster HPs used to be. A patrol of Gnolls might be listed with HPs 7,5,3, 8 whereas the by-the-book gnoll in 5e's monster manual has 22.

Yes that's true, but it's also the case that low-level PCs do a lot less damage in earlier editions. I'm not sure about 1e but I can compare to AD&D2: most PCs would have no Str bonus to speak of, or maybe +1 to dmg, rarely more. Lowlevel monsters (like Goblins and Orcs) would have an AC around 6. With your THAC0 of 20 at level 1, that meant that you had to roll a 14 or better to hit, and do something like 1d8 or 1d8+1 damage.
So in other words, your typical DPR vs AC6 was something like 1,575.

[Of course, if you were extremely lucky, you'd roll an 18 for Str and get a good % roll, which could gain you sizable bonuses To Hit and Dmg -- but those simply are not the norm.]

Compared to that, in 5E your level 1 attack bonus is gonna be +5, no more, no less, while lowlevel monster AC varies between 12 and 15 (and Orcs are already pretty tough at CR1/2), so let's say average 13. Which means your To Hit chance is not 35% but 70%. And your damage output will be something like 1d8+5 (assuming Sword&Board).
So your 1st-level DPR in 5E is more on the order of 6,65. That's about 4x the output of an average 2e character. So it's no big deal that monsters have more HP.

Still, when converting old modules, you need to think carefully if 1:1 conversions wouldn't be a bit much. So you also need to look at the expected DPR of the monsters, and compare that to the durability of the PCs.

By and large, I have a feeling that 5E Hordes tend to be smaller than pre-3E ones as I remember them. In our last AD&D game, I remember for instance one fight where our party was ambushed by roughly a hundred Ghouls, we were around level 10 if memory serves (but you can't really compare 2E to 5E levels 1:1). It was not a trivial fight, but most of us (except one who got paralyzed) got out of there relatively unscathed.

[Raimun]

Standard 3.5. (and Pathfinder) Gnolls, taken straight out of the Monster Manual have 11 hp. That's because they all have 2 HD. I'm pretty sure that would be quite normal in most editions for creatures with 2 HD.

But why do the 5e Gnolls have 22 hp? Beats me but I guess it is likely that they just needed a mook-type monster that's above an orc but won't be an ogre. It's all pretty arbitrary like most numbers in 5e.

[MaxWilson]

By and large, I have a feeling that 5E Hordes tend to be smaller than pre-3E ones as I remember them. In our last AD&D game, I remember for instance one fight where our party was ambushed by roughly a hundred Ghouls, we were around level 10 if memory serves (but you can't really compare 2E to 5E levels 1:1). It was not a trivial fight, but most of us (except one who got paralyzed) got out of there relatively unscathed.

You can still have the Gold Box feeling in 5E. I've done it and it is a blast. There's nothing like cutting through a swarm of hundreds of enemy soldiers while enemy Black Mages bombard you from the back ranks.

...Okay, I haven't yet actually combined Black Robe Mages specifically with enemy hordes, but I have done dozens of umber hulks supported by siege weaponry and a neogi wizard, and I've done forty hobgoblins without any magical backing. It's easier to justify a platoon of low-level enemy troops than it is to justify high-level individual enemy NPCs.

[Firechanter]

But why do the 5e Gnolls have 22 hp? Beats me but I guess it is likely that they just needed a mook-type monster that's above an orc but won't be an ogre. It's all pretty arbitrary like most numbers in 5e.

"Because they 5 HD."

Of course, that's about as helpful as "Winter comes from cold weather".

5E monsters generally are bigger bags of meat that their 3E counterparts, while at the same time the damage output of all combatants is lower. It's all part of the design decision to make fights last a bit longer. 3E fights eventually devolved into Rocket Tag -- you win initiative, you end the encounter - often with a single spell, but melee characters could easily be optimized to one-shot a Great Wyrm. 5E wants to get away from that, that's pretty much the entire reason why monsters have more HP.

[Malifice]

You can't do any kind of direct conversion from 3.5.

I disagree wholeheartedly. Ive been running an AoW campaign (3.5) and converting it largely on the fly to 5e.

Its working a treat.