estus??

So I was playing elden ring for the third time and then I went and played god of war ragnarok and I noticed how annoying it was that I didn't have estus. Sure god of war has a different combat framework, but I realized that estus has a number of powerful effects on the game.

1. you can pace yourself during combat, if you have lots of estus left you can push forward aggressively and vice versa, if you're low on healing you can fall back and play defensively

2. you can choose fights based on how much healing you have left

3. you're rewarded for fighting well -- you can engage further fights from a resting spot with more healing left

4. enemies can deal huge amounts of damage, but the player can recover from near-death fairly quickly, meaning fights look very swingy, and feel very threatening.

If you're not sure how estus works, here's the basic run-down:

The player has a dedicated healing potion with a limited number of uses, which are restored when the player rests at a checkpoint. It usually takes a significant amount of time to use during combat, enough to leave a player open to an enemy's attack. It heals somewhere between one half and a complete healthbar. In some games the number of uses of the estus is static (20 for bloodborne, 5-15 for dark souls 1), in other games the number of uses starts small but increases over time, usually as the player finds special items spread throughout the game.

I love estus. It's such a simple and intuitive mechanic that has a powerful effect on the game, and empowers the players to make intelligent choices. So what what would this look like in a d&d game?

In some ways, d&d (especially fifth edition has a similar healing framework to soulslikes.  Resting completely restores your health and abilities. You have a limited number of self-healing during the day, which increases as you progress through the game. There are healing spells and items, which are generally of limited use. However, there is no dedicated self-healing mechanic, except for short rests, which results in some scenarios that feel a little boring to me --

As players have little way to self-heal in combat, they have to reserve their powers and abilities specifically for healing, and often have to hold off using more interesting powers because they have to save it for healing.

Oftentimes, a group of players requires at least one of them to be the healer. Sometimes, being the healer can feel a little boring. (see: holding off on using interesting powers) Furthermore, if the healer doesn't show up that day, combat suddenly feels much more threatening and taxing. A difficult combat that might be easy to recover from with the healer around becomes fatal, or too dangerous to consider engaging. A group of two fighters need to tip-toe around doable fights, simply because healing afterwards is too risky.

When they want to self-heal, they have to bandage up over the course of an hour. This is fine, but the players don't usually have a full awareness of how dangerous it might be to take an hour to rest, and it feels like a confusing or vague gamble. The upside is it gives me opportunities to attack them, but it gives them a little less control over combat pacing.

Another difference from estus is that the d&d self-healing mechanic is generally limited to one full heal per day, maximum, whereas estus gives the players the ability to heal from near-death to almost full many times, depending on their max hitpoints, the power of their estus, and the number of flasks they have.

One advantage though is that d&d is a team game ... players have to cooperate to survive, they can't simply rely on their own abilities. Maybe I shouldn't underestimate this.

But so, what would estus look like?

1. We would remove healing via hit-dice entirely. 

2. Each player has an ability that self-heals for a significant portion of their hitpoints, at least half. Maybe it varies by class.

Maybe it makes sense for it to just be a roll of your hitdice. A level 1 fighter rolls a simple d10, a level 1 wizard rolls a simple d4.

 The amount that it heals increases as your level up, but also so do the number of uses. Maybe at level 1 you get 3 uses, and it increases every other level, so you end with thirteen uses or something at level 20.

3. Using estus takes a significant amount of time. An entire action might be prohibitive? Or it might be appropriate. It means you wouldn't want to do it unless you were safe, and you would have to give up helping a team-mate. 

It might make sense to let players have a free estus heal if they take an hour to bandage up. That way there's still an advantage to resting, but if they get caught in a fight, they still have their estus to fall back on.

4. Taking a long rest would restore your estus as well as all your hit-points. There's probably justification in some games to do partial hitpoints on a long rest, depending on their circumstances, like if they're really sleeping in the rough. In my homebrew rules, players restore 1/4 hitpoints and 1/2 their hit-dice if they sleep in the rough. I'm not sure where I could fall on this. I might bump it up to 1/2 hitpoints and all estus.

5. We would need to fictionally justify the estus somehow. fromsoft always does a remarkable job tying the estus system into the world. in elden ring, the flask is filled with the divine sap that pours from the erdtree. in sekiro, the gourd is filled with the healing waters that ashina kingdom is special for. In dark souls, the estus itself is fire from the bonfires, which is how it is refilled when you rest. In designing this system, I might want to go that route, since the phrase "second wind" or "healing potion" is dry and overdone. We would also need to somehow justify the idea that players can't feed each other their estus.

6. enemies would need to be a little more threatening. especially at high levels, enemies would need to be capable or dealing much higher amounts of damage, since every player would be able to quickly recover. At level 24-25, enemies are beginning to rarely be able to dish out enough damage in one round to one-shot a character from full health. This feels pretty fair, since my players have lots of high level mitigation and full heals, but it's still really scary. I've found that low level enemies (at least in fifth edition) are actually pretty threatening, and I've had plenty of character deaths in the homebrewed low level games I've run for friends -- as a result, I might not want to adjust low level enemies.

7. healing spells and abilities I would probably leave as is. 

8. the DM could award players bonus uses to their estus during a session. for instance, whoever gets the killing blow on a certain enemy. or for clearing a tough enemy group. or a god's blessing, etc. 

9. also this opens up for items giving you bonuses to estus healing, or negatively impacting it. An item that increases total hitpoints but nerfs your estus, or an item that buffs your estus but takes up an inventory slot you might prefer to use otherwise. 

10. a DM who doesn't like XP might prefer to award more estus shards as rewards for doing big quests, exploration, or other milestones. I like how in fromsoft games they are generally rewards for exploration, though in elden ring, bosses and quests rarely give them as well. I think it is simpler and more reliable to just increase them over time as you level up in d&d, but it could be helpful to have those amounts as a goal-marker to compare your players to, and then if they are lagging behind, hide an estus shard in easier-to-find places.

So what is the estus??

1. prayer to the gods

2. flask made from the player's own blood

3. liquid starlight 

4. natural resolve and combat training (this actually makes a lot of intuitive sense)

5. troll-eye juice

6. cursed gift of a wizard

7. ancient technology (??)

8. a self regenerating nano-salve

9. secret rite of royal blood

10. flask that collects dreams?? (regenerates while you sleep)

questions, thoughts?? what do you think??

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