Broken Limbs and healing hitpoints

[icthius]

Okay, let's say you've got a character who jumps down a pit to help a friend and rolls a natural 1 on the check, failing it horribly. As flavor or fluff, the character breaks thier leg. Obviously, magical healing would mend this right up, but what if the character tried to heal naturally? They get thier level in hit points back. In a couple of days, they'll be up and running again, which obviously doesn't make sense given the broken limb. Are there different rules for a broken limb (or can you suggest an interesting house rule to use), or is this just one of the ways D&D requires suspension of disbelief?

[bluish_wolf]

Technically, severed and broken limbs are handled separately from HP. There's no way to track them, you just have to remember.

[leperkhaun]

For DnD i would say supension of disbelif.

Or you could give him a penalty. He would still be at full hit points, but can only move at half speed, moving at full speed can be done, but inflicts subdual damage.

the other option is to revamp the system and add a way to track wounds and such.

[RoboticSheeple]

You house ruled an injury, now you have to house rule how it's handled if you want it to make sense.

Basically if you break the rules (or break from the rules if you will) then don't expect everything to make sense (as if DnD does anyway) when you put it back together.

[LibraryOgre]

2nd edition's Combat and Tactics had a rule for Broken Limbs that you might be interested in:


Broken bones run the gamut from minor fractures that don't hinder a character at all to life-threatening compound fractures. Generally, the previous two injury categories are considered to include minor breaks or cracks; this category is reserved for severe fractures. Broken bones can be mended by a cure serious wounds spell that is devoted just to knitting the bone; unlike grazed, struck, or injured, the character regains no hit points from a spell used in this way. Broken bones heal naturally as if they were 20d6 lost hit points, so bed rest in the care of a proficient healer is a really good idea if the injured character is planning on resuming his adventuring career anytime soon.
Broken arms reduce a character to 75% of his normal hit points. Broken ribs or legs reduce a character to 50% of his normal hit points. Any other broken bones reduce a character to 25% of his normal hit points.