Maximized HD?

[Firechanter]

Recently I've seen this pop up here and there -- there seems to be a trend towards giving PCs always maximum HP (i.e. as if they always rolled max number on their Hit Die).
I'd like to talk about the matter with my group, and for that, I'd be interested in your thoughts why / under what regime it's a good idea (or why not, if you wish).

I've played in games where we kind of had a "50%+X" rule, i.e. for example a Fighter would roll a D5 (half a D10, rounded up) +5; or on another instance any roll below 6 (on a D10) would count as 6. (The expected results vary a but -- first method produces a 8.0 average, second one 7.0).

[Stealth Marmot]

This means you will have characters with more hitpoints than normal, essentially giving them several instances of Toughness for free.

It might make combat a little easier for them so you might want to beef up the monsters a little. Not a lot though, maybe give them an extra hit die here or there, or give them a slight damage bonus.

If you want an alternative to rolling (if you have a player who cant roll over a 2 to save their life) then you could just take the averages. On a d10 hit die for example, you alternate between 6 and 5 hit points as their roll. You can also give the player the option to take one or the other (and that option becomes permanent, no swapping back and forth between levels).

[Dekion]

We use max hit points per hit die for everything...PCs, NPCs, animal companions, summoned creatures, monsters...Everything. It stemmed from a discussion of the random high roll for a low HD class vs the random low roll for a high HD class, where the group's primary melee had less HP than the arcane caster, and we all thought that was a little problematic. We play a pretty high-powered campaign and discussed dropping low rolls or using the alternating half HD then half HD+1 and finally settled on just going to max as it was simple and seemed to create the right basis for the kind of combat we were looking for. In hindsight, it gives the PCs a huge advantage in some encounters, and it has taken some time to adjust the encounter difficulty to compensate, but it has worked out so far.

[daremetoidareyo]

We do max hp for the first three levels. Roll hp for the next three levels but drop anything less than half of the hp those hd give you. Then roll normally for levels 7-20

[Aetis]

Do you also use it for npcs and monsters?

[Firechanter]

Ah right, I also did the "3 levels max HP, then take average" or similar variants. I think I got that idea from Neverwinter Nights 1.

Normally we always play with a level-by-level choice of roll or median - and most players opt for the median most of the time.
(Note: median of D10 is 6, not 5.5)

[sleepyphoenixx]

Average hp values are good as they are imo. Personally i just give my players 1/2HD+1 instead of rolling hp (3 for d4, 4 for d6, 5 for d8, 6 for d10, 7 for d12) +con.
That removes any luck from the equation and makes it easier to account for players expected toughness for me.

Giving players max hp/level just turns any fight that relies on monsters doing hp damage into a farce. It's already one of the less threatening things to face, and i'd rather not make it any worse.
If a player want more hp he can damn well built for it.

Not to mention that there are some classes/templates/monsters that get max hp/HD as one of their benefits. Making it universal takes that pretty sweet benefit away from them.


This means you will have characters with more hitpoints than normal, essentially giving them several instances of Toughness for free.

It might make combat a little easier for them so you might want to beef up the monsters a little. Not a lot though, maybe give them an extra hit die here or there, or give them a slight damage bonus.

If you're just going to increase damage values there's not really any point in increasing player hp, is there?

[Flickerdart]

The consequences of max HP for PCs are relatively low compared to what I've seen most often (average HP per level) - they take a little longer to die, high HD matters a little more. But the difference between max HP and roll for HP is huge because now you don't have unlucky folks who keep getting screwed over by bad HP rolls dying left and right.

The consequences of max HP for monsters are that SoL/D/S wins the day and mundanes suck - monsters tend to have inflated HD compared to CR, and maxing them out adds a serious chunk of meat. Joe Stabsfoes now has to land twice as many attacks, while Willy Wavesfingers doesn't care, except insofar as his undead, constructed, called, and summoned minions die less often, so he can have more of them.

[Zanos]

We do max HP at all levels. It makes squishy characters a little less likely to get killed in one hit. 46.5 vs 60 on a 14 con wizard at level 10. It makes a bigger difference for characters who have hit points as a major combat resource and have big HD. 90.5 vs 140 for a 10th level 14 con barbarian. So it makes most mundane classes quite a bit beefier.

One thing to watch it for for both players and creatures is constructs and undead. Since these types don't have con scores they tend to get a lot of their hitpoints from raw hit dice, so maximizing their HD can pretty easily result in close to double hit points. And many undead creatures were already fairly beefy. As an aside, there's actually a 9th level spell that can create max HP zombies/skeletons, which is pretty funny.

[NOhara24]

I've always let my characters choose - they can either take the average of their hit dice + CON or they can roll and add their CON like normal. I present this choice every time they level, btw. Through 2 campaigns and 8 different people, they chose to roll their HP probably a good 95% of the time.

[TheIronGolem]

I do max HP all around. Reasons:

Hit dice shouldn't be a thing at all; it should just be X HP per level depending on class/monster type. This is one of the very few things I will admit 4E did right and every other version did wrong. Randomness has no place in character generation or advancement.
If you're playing a high-HD class, getting a high amount of HP should be a given. There's no excuse for a Barbarian having fewer hit points than a Wizard of equal level. It's weird that the classes that most rely on HP as a defense are also the ones who stand to lose the most HP from rolling for them. You can try to mitigate this with further rules like half-HD-size-minimum, but then you're just admitting that the problem exists without really fixing it.
I don't like combat ending in 2-3 rounds; stretching things out a little gives more room for things like in-combat buffing/debuffing to be viable alternatives to simply alpha striking everything. It also gives players who have a bad run wit the dice early on to turn things around later on. This does increase the need to speed up the pace of combat, but I think that's important to do anyway, independently of how many rounds a given combat lasts.
Statting out NPC's and monsters is faster when you don't need to roll a bunch of dice and add them up.

[Zanos]

I do max HP all around. Reasons:

Hit dice shouldn't be a thing at all; it should just be X HP per level depending on class/monster type. This is one of the very few things I will admit 4E did right and every other version did wrong. Randomness has no place in character generation or advancement.
If you're playing a high-HD class, getting a high amount of HP should be a given. There's no excuse for a Barbarian having fewer hit points than a Wizard of equal level. It's weird that the classes that most rely on HP as a defense are also the ones who stand to lose the most HP from rolling for them. You can try to mitigate this with further rules like half-HD-size-minimum, but then you're just admitting that the problem exists without really fixing it.
I don't like combat ending in 2-3 rounds; stretching things out a little gives more room for things like in-combat buffing/debuffing to be viable alternatives to simply alpha striking everything. It also gives players who have a bad run wit the dice early on to turn things around later on. This does increase the need to speed up the pace of combat, but I think that's important to do anyway, independently of how many rounds a given combat lasts.
Statting out NPC's and monsters is faster when you don't need to roll a bunch of dice and add them up.

For 4: 3.5 monsters use average hit points per hit dice by default. You can see this in any printed monster's stat block.

[Hurnn]

I do max at 1st then average rounded up, I know it favors the lower dice guys a little bit but they are the ones that general need the extra anyway.

[Elkad]

My current game is max HP for players.

It isn't written down anywhere, but I pretty much give bosses max HP as well. Mooks get average HP.

I've also doubled the dice for all healing spells.

[Gruftzwerg]

Our groups tend to play with altered HD rolling rules too as others mentioned. The DM rolls something over 50% what is possible depending on class HP dice.

But I am always for buff the enemies first. (unless you play with new D&D players with no experience and no optimization). We are 7, that makes 6 PC and 1 DM. Which leads to high dmg output/round. Especially when prioritized enemies get focused.

Depending on your group situation and if you don't like the rocket-tag feeling on higher lvls, I would highly recommend HP adjusting homebrew rules. Just talk to your group and give it a try for a session and talk about the results and how you all feel about it.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Our groups tend to play with altered HD rolling rules too as others mentioned. The DM rolls something over 50% what is possible depending on class HP dice.

But I am always for buff the enemies first. (unless you play with new D&D players with no experience and no optimization). We are 7, that makes 6 PC and 1 DM. Which leads to high dmg output/round. Especially when prioritized enemies get focused.

Depending on your group situation and if you don't like the rocket-tag feeling on higher lvls, I would highly recommend HP adjusting homebrew rules. Just talk to your group and give it a try for a session and talk about the results and how you all feel about it.

It depends on how optimized your players are. I'm generally pretty happy with the amount of damage my monsters do to pc's, but if your players like to optimize for damage increasing monster hp can be useful.
Just be careful that it's not too much or you'll just make non-damage magic comparatively stronger. And it's already strong enough.

The better option for a higher than standard number of players is generally to increase the number of enemies. Optimizing the enemies for defense and debuffs can also help if your players do too much damage.
I like giving intelligent enemies cheap one-shot defense items or scrolls if i want to make them tougher to kill.
And nothing foils players like giving your BBEG a Ring of Nine Lives with 2-3 charges left.:smallbiggrin: Doomwarding weapons work too - or really anything limited use that has just enough charges left to soak up the parties alpha strike but not leave any loot.
Those can make encounters last longer without showering your party with loot or you having to do too much extra work, and it targets the players more equally than just raising hp.
As another plus stuff like Doomwarding or the Ring of Nine Lives help mitigate bad luck with your rolls in a dramatic boss battle.