- published: 30 Aug 2012
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Health is a game mechanic used in tabletop role-playing games and video games to give value to characters, enemies, NPCs, and related objects. This value can either be numerical, semi-numerical as in hit/health points, or arbitrary as in a life bar.
Hit points, also known as health points (or HP), damage points, heart points, or just health (among other synonyms), is a finite value used to determine how much damage (usually in terms of physical injury) a character can withstand. When a character is attacked, or is hurt from a hazard or fall, the total damage dealt (which is also represented by a point value) is subtracted from their current HP. Once their HP reaches 0, the character will be unable to fight. In role-playing games, health is often abbreviated by two letter initialisms such as HP.
In some role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, a player character's hit points are determined by character level. The hit points of monsters are decided by rolling "Hit Dice". Characters with high constitution will have an advantage when hit points are assigned. A character whose hit points are reduced to zero is considered dead or incapacitated. Other games sometimes lack levels, hit points, or both.