Utgardloki
Mongoose
I think it would be better to just roll D20 less than or equal to your CON. It's the same result as rolling D100 vs CONx5%, but it avoids the multiplication.
Damage and Resilience
- Thread starter Quire
- Start date
I think it would be better to just roll D20 less than or equal to your CON. It's the same result as rolling D100 vs CONx5%, but it avoids the multiplication.
Utgardloki said:
Sure it would. Just like in RQ2/3 it would have been much simpler just to roll a d20 for the resistance table, but we didn't.
The idea here is that someone can take a stock character sheet and fill in the Resilience skill with CON x 5% then play the game straight without any other changes in mechanics. Also, resilience gets used in a opposed checks for poison and disease, so you need it around to be used for those too.
iamtim, let me know how it goes. I got berated over at rpg.net for suggesting these houserules without playing the game straight out of the box for an extended campaign first....apparently it's impossible to judge rules by just reading them, but one must use them in play to really grasp them!
Someone posted that they thought of a serious wound to the head as a decapitation (too tired to check whom.)
For me, a serious wound to the head means either coup-countercoup injury with hemorrhage and swelling, or exposed gray matter, or both.
A lot of how one thinks of these things can be in how one perceives the labels.
For me, a serious wound to the head means either coup-countercoup injury with hemorrhage and swelling, or exposed gray matter, or both.
A lot of how one thinks of these things can be in how one perceives the labels.
A shift toward Pendragon
It always struct me as odd how BRP and MRQ keeps the 3-18 ratings rather than having 1-100 ratings for attributes - not really an issue just an observation - just seems it was clinging to D&D attributes.
But then damage die follow the same legacy...
ho hum...
Paul
simonh said:
This is still a problem though. You almost have to start thinking about game theory in RPGs to see why, bit it's a biggie.
When you play RPGs long enough, you'll find that many game mechanics that seem "fair" really aren't. Not because they don't apply things equally, but because the very nature and focus of the game doesn't make all things equal. The impact of different things in RPGs vary based on what they are and who they occur to.
The most apparent of these is damage types. For the most part. Poison, disease, and "bleeding" effects are meaningless when applied to NPCs. That's because from the players perspective they don't exist unless/until they're interacting with them directly. If they are interacting with them directly, they're either fighting them or *not* fighting them. If they're not fighting them, then those things are all at best plot devices used by the GM. If they are fighting them, then the combat wont last long enough (or the players wont wait anyway) for those things to matter.
How many players would *ever* use poison in RQ2/3? None? How about joining malia and defeating their opponents with disease? No? Why not? Ok. In the case of Malia because that's icky, but also because from a players perspective, it's just vastly faster, easier, and typically more satisfying to simply kill the opponent by hitting him with something. You defeat enemies by beating on them with weapons, spells, etc. Why should I apply a slow acting poison to my blade when 99.99999% of the time I'm going to have to defeat the guy I poison with it long before the poison will kill him (in "self defense" if nothing else).
If I'm in combat with someone I'm typically going to have to keep fighting him until he stops (typically when he dies, right?). Thus, direct damage and death is all that matters. If I have a choice between hitting an NPC with an effect that'll lower some of his stats a few points for a few months and doing damage to him, which one do you think I'm going to pick? Yup. Damage. Everytime. Because I don't really care if that NPC is laid up sick for a month after we fight. But I do care if my character is sick. Thus, stat losses, illness, poison, etc are really things that only matter when they are applied to PCs. By their very nature then, those things are not "balanced", so game mechanics that tip in their direction will favor NPCs, not players.
And by that token, the resiliance rolls really hurt players. As much as it seems intuitive to say that the older RQ hp mechanic was "brutal", it also meant that players could defeat opponents quickly and move on quickly. Even the most brutal RQ campaign is going to have a PC to NPC kill ratio in the tripple digits, so "fast death" clearly helps players more then NPCs. As several people have pointed out, when fighting something with a high resiliance, you're going to be spending round after round applying meaningless damage to a foe that's already "dead", but hasn't failed the resiliance roll to make it official yet. Thus, only the PCs are really affected by those things. After all, the PC is going to care that he's got a clock ticking and must get healing before expiring. The GM can always make more NPCs...
I agree with the resiliance subtration idea. What I'd do is simply add up all damage to any location in excess of that location's total. Apply that as a -5% per hp modifier to any resiliance roll.
And for those trying to scale damage to the HP chart or something. It's not really needed. You get 1 hp in every location for every 5 points of size or con, right? You also get 5 resiliance for every 5 con (or pow, but typically we're going to see larger ranges of con, not pow). So, we can say that 1 hp in a location is *exactly* equal to 5% worth of resiliance skill. It automatically scales. No need to do any extra math.
Deleriad
Mongoose
Well it seems to me that the problem, as always, is extreme cases. In 99 times out of 100, normal stuff happens. But one time in a 100, something extreme happens. The problem is that we always remember the one time in a 100 so it seems to dominate. On the basis that offering alternatives is always more fun than complaining then...
As with a lot of people on here, I suspect, I'm taking mRQ and running with it. I've added in the concept of minor/major/death wounds and slightly tweaked the descriptions of what happens when a location is in certain states. Basically, I'm separating out the actual state of the location from the severity of a wound because one location may be suffering from multiple different wounds.
Basically,
an incapacitated location is one that is on negative HPs
a destroyed location is one that is on negative HPs that exceed its normal HPs.
Incapacitated locations general Each location that is incapacitated but not destroyed bleeds 1HP at end of each round. This will eventually cause the location to become "destroyed"
Incap limb: as per rule book.
Incap abdom: falls down, can't use legs. Resilience at moment of injury and end of each combat round. Once failed, unconscious and no more resilience rolls. Can move at 1M, can use defensive reactions at -60%. Cannot attack.
Incap chest: as abdom except can't use arms for anything other than to crawl at 1M.
Incap head: character falls and is helpless. Make resilience rolls as above. If successful, character can do nothing but crawl at 1M per round semi-conscious.
Destroyed location:
It's almost the same as the book, just more deadly.
Effects:
I've separated individual wounds (minor/major/death) from states of location because in theory you could be killed by taking 1HP of damage every round to the head until you reach "destroyed".
I have yet to properly test these formulations. They should prevent too much "it's only a flesh wound" oddities. They also give a slight advantage to slashing weapons which can match impaling.
As with a lot of people on here, I suspect, I'm taking mRQ and running with it. I've added in the concept of minor/major/death wounds and slightly tweaked the descriptions of what happens when a location is in certain states. Basically, I'm separating out the actual state of the location from the severity of a wound because one location may be suffering from multiple different wounds.
Basically,
an incapacitated location is one that is on negative HPs
a destroyed location is one that is on negative HPs that exceed its normal HPs.
Incapacitated locations general Each location that is incapacitated but not destroyed bleeds 1HP at end of each round. This will eventually cause the location to become "destroyed"
Incap limb: as per rule book.
Incap abdom: falls down, can't use legs. Resilience at moment of injury and end of each combat round. Once failed, unconscious and no more resilience rolls. Can move at 1M, can use defensive reactions at -60%. Cannot attack.
Incap chest: as abdom except can't use arms for anything other than to crawl at 1M.
Incap head: character falls and is helpless. Make resilience rolls as above. If successful, character can do nothing but crawl at 1M per round semi-conscious.
Destroyed location:
- destroyed limb: as per rulebook.
destroyed chest/abdom: Unconsious. Make resilience roll at moment of injury. Fail = die. Make a resilience roll at end of each round or die. After combat rounds = to CON+POW: die anyway. Cannot take any actions or reactons.
destroyed head: Unconsious. Make a resilience roll. Fail: die instantly, success: roll 1d4 - die at the end of that number of combat rounds - including this one.
It's almost the same as the book, just more deadly.
- A minor wound is any damage effect that does damage equal to an amount less than the location's HPs.
A major wound is any damage effect that does damage equal to or exceeding an amount equal to the location's HPs.
A death wound is any damage effect that does damage equal to or exceeding an amount equal to double the location's HPs.
Effects:
- minor wound: nothing.
Major wound: Character loses next 1d4 combat actions. If location is now incapacitated or destroyed then also apply relevant effects.
Death wound: Character knocked unconscious and:- Limb: If blow was with a severing weapon or ferocious natural weapon (claws, teeth), location is severed/torn off. Apply "destroyed" effects.
Chest/abdom/head: If blow was with a severing weapon or ferocious natural weapon (claws, teeth), location is severed/torn off; character makes resilience roll. Fail = die; success = die at end of combat round. Otherwise, apply destroyed effects.
- Limb: If blow was with a severing weapon or ferocious natural weapon (claws, teeth), location is severed/torn off. Apply "destroyed" effects.
I've separated individual wounds (minor/major/death) from states of location because in theory you could be killed by taking 1HP of damage every round to the head until you reach "destroyed".
I have yet to properly test these formulations. They should prevent too much "it's only a flesh wound" oddities. They also give a slight advantage to slashing weapons which can match impaling.
