Armour and EP

[CmdrBond]

This might be a silly question, but I have just finished FftD and was lucky enough to purchase a helmet (+2EP) and chainmail waistcoat (+4EP) whilst in Holmguard.

My presumption is that the EP bonus is added to your base figure as opposed to your current figure that can never go above the base. To me this makes sense as armour is protecting and not healing.

My only issue is in the paragraph at the front of the book that says your EP can never go above the starting figure.

if you do say that the armour bonus is an addition to your base score - do you then lose items of armour when your EP falls? If so do you lose your armour as soon as you lose enough EP, or when you are nearly dead?

i.e. you have an EP of 29 and an EP Bonus of 6 giving an EP Total of 35.

Do you lose your EP from the armour first (cannot be recovered) or your life first (can be recovered)

You receive say -8 EP, if you take the damage on the armour first then you would in theory have destroyed your helm and chainmail and lost 2EP from your own life, of which healing will only restore 2EP. As opposed to losing 8EP of your life, all of which can be restored and you only start to damage the armour towards the end.

 

[Zager Krahl]

Armour items usually state 'Increases current and MAXIMUM Endurance by N when worn'. In no way does it differentiate between life and armour Endurance - both are lumped together.

E.g.
- Lone Wolf has EP of 23/28
- LW acquires a Chainmail Waistcoat (+4 EP)
- LW now has EP of 27/32
- LW battles a Giak, losing 3 EP; LW now has EP of 24/32
- LW falls in a river and has to discard his Chainmail Waistcoat
- LW now has EP of 20/28

Remember, the system is intended to be simple. Don't over-complicate it by thinking about it too much and trying to treat it like something from D&D, which has special rules for everything... If the text says 'Increases current and MAXIMUM Endurance by N when worn', then that's how you treat it.

 

[Random Code]

I think those questions in the OP are all prefectly valid and can be answered in more detail if you're looking for more detailed house rules but what Zager says above is the correct interpretation of the Lone Wolf RAW.

 

[WritingWolf]

True - then again, the Kai power of healing could extend to your armour too!

But yes, if you think about it too much you will reach the point where either LW is dead, but his armour is holding him alive, or he has armour but it's so ripped to shreds it's useless.

I'd use the current rules and assume that LW gets his armour repaired at the end of each adventure or as he goes about his quest.

 

[Random Code]

Off the cuff, If you wanted more detail you have a couple of high-level options:

1) Go with some kind a damage reduction for armour as a replacement to the bonus EPs way of working. If you went with this you'd need to look at offsetting it with damage bonuses to weapons.

2) Keep the EP bonuses of armour but separate out its EPs from the character's EPs so that they can be tracked separately. Then you can go with different options as to how to handle these - eg, the armour EP could refresh after each combat if the PC takes time to maintain it, etc.

Both add varying degrees of complexity which may be more agreeable to some gamers. There are other options aswell with but those are the two I'd consider to start with.