[CONAN] A Swimming Question

[Supplement Four]

One part of the rules I don't understand the reasoning behind is listed in the Water & Drowning section of the 2E rules (page 221). There, it says that in fast moving water, a character takes 1d3 Non-Lethal damage IF HE DOES MAKE HIS SWIM CHECK.

Huh?

If the drowning rules are easy, this rule will kill a character (drown him) unrealistically quick. Think about it. If you get in fast moving water, you'll be unconscious in a matter of minutes, averging 15 points of non-lethal damage per minute.

Somebody help me understand that.






Secondly: I've got this swimming obstacle coming up in my game tomorrow night. This is the first time I've used the Swim rules. I want to make sure I've got it "right".

Here's the situation: The PCs are chasing an NPC, and the NPC will (hopefully) make it to a rope (vine) and swing down into a river.

The river is 315 feet wide, and it's a rushing river. Rapids. Picture rocks and tremendous rushing water ending in a large mountain waterfall not too far down stream.

So, by the rules, I've declared the Swim checks to be made against DC 15.





The NPC, Gerald, has a STR 16 (+3), CON 10 (+0), and no ranks in Swim. Speed = 30.

He's barefooted and not wearing anything but a shirt, kilt, and some equipment (weapons and such) that keep way into the light encumbrance zone.

Therefore, Gerald is +3 on his Swim checks.





When Gerald starts to swim across the rapids, he rolls d20 +3 against DC 15 to swim 15 feet.

If he rolls a total of 11-14, then he does not move at all. I guess he treads water.

If he rolls 10 or less, then he goes under.

When Gerald goes under, he can stay under, easily for 10 rounds. On the 11th round, Gerald can still stay under, holding his breath, if he makes a DC 10 CON check. This CON check increases by 1 point until each round until the check is failed, at which point Gerald will be drowning and will be dead in three rounds (considered at 0 HP on that first round of drowning, -1 HP on the second round, and dead on the third round).

This means that it will be very hard for Gerald to drown even though he's not a great swimmer and he's swimming in water he has no business being in.

Gerald can roll 9 failures on his DC 15 Swim check, then can finally make his 10th check and be fine. (This would indicate that Gerald went under for 54 seconds--9 rounds--then popped up, caught his breath, and swam for 15').

Chances are, Gerald is going to take a long time crossing the river, being under a large part of the time but never taking any damage because he'll pop up eventually and swim his 15 foot segment.

That's how it works, yes?

 

[Mach5RR]

One part of the rules I don't understand the reasoning behind is listed in the Water & Drowning section of the 2E rules (page 221). There, it says that in fast moving water, a character takes 1d3 Non-Lethal damage IF HE DOES MAKE HIS SWIM CHECK.

Huh?

If the drowning rules are easy, this rule will kill a character (drown him) unrealistically quick. Think about it. If you get in fast moving water, you'll be unconscious in a matter of minutes, averging 15 points of non-lethal damage per minute.

Somebody help me understand that.

It has a bit to do with fluid dynamics. Water does not flow at the same rate in every spot. It actually moves slower closer to land as well as the deep parts. Pockets form of slower moving water due to temperature shifts. As a swimmer attempts to cross, he crosses those various pockets and streams, getting manhandled in the process. This is where they talk about getting sucked down by an undertow. So yeah, think of it as crossing an environment that is beating you every moment you're in it.

This happens in slower moving water as well but is not as noticeable, and is much easier to respond to.

Secondly: I've got this swimming obstacle coming up in my game tomorrow night. This is the first time I've used the Swim rules. I want to make sure I've got it "right".

Here's the situation: The PCs are chasing an NPC, and the NPC will (hopefully) make it to a rope (vine) and swing down into a river.

The river is 315 feet wide, and it's a rushing river. Rapids. Picture rocks and tremendous rushing water ending in a large mountain waterfall not too far down stream.

So, by the rules, I've declared the Swim checks to be made against DC 15.

Chances are, Gerald is going to take a long time crossing the river, being under a large part of the time but never taking any damage because he'll pop up eventually and swim his 15 foot segment.

That's how it works, yes?

Except you've described rapids and rocks. Thats not even 1d3 stun damage, thats 1d6 LETHAL for every round he's getting raked over them.

 

[Spectator]

Well in real-life, assuming the strongest of us 8-10 hp, No one would last a minute. Whereas realistically if we could swim 1/2 way we would at least be able to float down the river rapidly until hypothermia or a boulder took us out. SO YES YOU ARE RIGHT, it is broken.

That being said, not all rivers can be swum across.

is that a correct verb tense (my head is translating from German)?

The failed dynamic of the system is that it may be more beneficial for you to don full armor and gear and walk on the river bottom until you get to the other side. Kinda silly, but I think your research pointed that out!

This is where you make a house rule over-riding the incomprehensible.

I just bought the 2ed finally, so what are difference besides the Temptress class?

 

[Supplement Four]

Our session lasted until 4:30 am last night. I am way too old to be playing that far into the night (or next day...). But, man, we had a cool session. My Cimmerians ventured into the Blood River Basin, where they found the Witched Wood.

People don't think of Cimmeria and sorcery in the same thought, but this little part of the barbarian domain is truly witched. There are these large trees, called Thicket Trees, that have long, large limbs that grow into each other, where the trees all support the other. You can cross much of the Basin by walking upon the limbs, climbing up the vines that grow on the trees here and swinging from hangin vines to another limb there.

But, on the ground, things are different. The ensorcerled place affects perception. When you can use the trees to move across the length of the Basin to the Blood River in much less than an hour, it's an 8 or 10 hour walk by foot (all day). People have been known to go into the area and get lost. They think they are traveling West, but after a day, they realize they've been traveling Northeast the whole time.

It's a strange sorcery. Unexplained.

I got the idea from the part where Conan enters the Red Wastes in Michael Stackpole's novelization of the new Conan movie. I thought it neat, and the sorcery fit the Conan universe well. I also populated the Basin with Chakans (from the Beastiary), which the Cimmerians view as another tribe or clan. They scare their children with tales of the Chakan, and amongst themselves, they say that men mated with beasts to create the clan.

In reality, the Sorcery of the area has muted and warped the development of humans that survived the Great Cataclysm. These guys devolved somehow--but the Cimmerians don't understand that. The idea that a man mated with a beast to create the race is easier to swallow.

In any event, during my game last night, amongst all these elements....they never even got to the Blood River where I was going to have them cross the harrowing river. I never try to rail road my players, and when they didn't go the way I had planned, I had to do some ad-libbing the last 3 or 4 hours of the game.

It turned out really cool, though, as one of the PCs were captured by the Chakans, and they traded him to another Cimmerian clan. The other PC went after him but got lost in the Basin due to the sorcerery. After 4 days wandering around, living off the land, the PC finally ran into the Chakans and was able to persuade the half-man beasts to lead him to where the other PC was being held--the camp of the rival Cimmerian clan.

The one PC waited for the cover of darkness to sneak into the camp. He kill two Grath warriors while they were sleeping, and the third ran off, into the edges of the Blood River (much clamer at this section of the River), then slammed a hunting spear into this back, disabling him.

So, we'll pick up next game with the PCs and their prisoner who has 0 hp.

Man, it was a good game.