Calculating starting hit points

[NeonNecromancer]

Interesting! I agree with you, the original formula is not ideal.

Its been a while since I was tinkering with this, but isnt the HLT stat supposed to be optional?

I am a little puzzled that DEX is involved at all, but that is of course in the official rules as well.

-Havard

Nope, HLT is required; STA (Stamina) is the optional one. That's why the original is so odd in my mind: it uses an optional stat while simultaneously ignoring the required stat that seems like the most obvious one to use.

However, I did just remind myself that Constitution is listed as a synonym for Stamina in a couple places. My current hypothesis is they originally used CON (like in D&D) originally but split STA and HLT into two separate stats later. While editing the text they naively replaced CON with STA everywhere when they should have used HLT in the formula.

I can kinda see DEX being used in the formula (as well as being the one that contributes the least to it) because it is still one of the "physical" stats along with STR and STA/HLT. If hit points is simply how physically healthy you are, it makes sense DEX might factor in.