Open Day Folks!
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waiwode said:
Yup. I was going to mention that that is one of the problems when fighting animals. They just lack the good sense to lie down and die when they get hit. It also why there were weapons like boar spears-to hold an injured animal away until it finally dropped.
It is also why the bow is such a great hunting weapon-wound tan animal and wait for it to drop from blood loss.
I see no problem with portraying that in an RPG. I think it adds flavor, excitement, and realism. It just means that fighting animals isn't going to be easy.
In Pendragon, a game where animals have a tendancy to fight on after they have taken a major wound, most of my players were more afraid of hunting than fightng a battle. With good reason too, more PCs died in hunts than in any other activity.
andakitty said:
I really hope that is the case. Because that I could live with. It would be very much like the luck roll you make in Stormbringer in order to not permanently lose Characteristic points from a major wound.
Another question: Did I understand it correctly, you keep track of the total points of damage a character has sustained (adding them together), not just HPs per hit location?
Shadow Queen
Mongoose
I loved it and as i e-mailed Mat im putting it tob the next rpg for the club
Archer said:
The other part of my argument was the more important one. A character shouldn't fall unconscious (or die!) without the gamer getting to roll some dice. Much more satistying and dramatic.
Of course sometimes the damage is massive enough that there is no point in rolling (or not even the chanse) but it's no fun getting just enough damage to cross an abstract threshold and falling unconscious.
In those situations speed is not of the essense. Also one usually only needs to roll for critical injuries, so it's hardly "every time you take damage".
I hope Mongoose has fixed the other cardinal sin of RuneQuest.
People die all too easily! It should be more usual to wound your opponent to the point where he is unable (or unwilling) to fight on, than to kill him cleanly in the fight.
In RQ (and D&D) people fight with full capability, until a dramatic hit drops them, at which point they are maimed or dead (or in D&D, just dead).
That did a lot of harm to my RPG-groups gaming when we were impressionable youngsters. I wish I'd had Hârnmaster then.
People die all too easily! It should be more usual to wound your opponent to the point where he is unable (or unwilling) to fight on, than to kill him cleanly in the fight.
In RQ (and D&D) people fight with full capability, until a dramatic hit drops them, at which point they are maimed or dead (or in D&D, just dead).
That did a lot of harm to my RPG-groups gaming when we were impressionable youngsters. I wish I'd had Hârnmaster then.
I think it is hit point location only...you treat each location as a separate 'entity'. There will likely be some sort of 'bleed over' rule as well. Or 'bleeding out' rule, or both. The system does work, and work well. Whatever they have tacked on, one guess is as good as another. But when I first tried this type of hit point location system (Fifth Cycle) I kept thinking, 'but you HAVE to have a hit point pool'. Now, after running a game without one I say 'why'. Oh, and I think this is going to be disable at 0 hp on a location, maim/kill at twice hp on a location. Someone who played at the open house on Saturday posted a short description, I believe it is here on this forum. This is based on what he said, but it is getting less speculative, anyway. It is beginning to look like a really clean game system.
Adept: Rolling for critical injures is ok, rolling for each damage you take is not (in my book).
andakitty: Why I asked the question is that the person who hade participated in the open day test, wrote a text about damage, explaining it in such a way that I percieved it as if you added all damage together, just to make Resistence checks against it, and see if you got unconscious etc.
I know it works to just use Hit location HPs only. I used and played with the very same modification to EDD for many years, before I found the preference to do otherwise.
I know it easily leads to the punching bag syndrome (and we even used special critical hit effect charts for locations to alleviate some of the problems). "Yes he hit me in the left leg, it is already disabled beyond ever being useful and can take no more damage, so I am ok after all.".
You can not just treat the arm, the leg, the head, the torso as being independent and unaffected by injuries to other parts of the body. No living being works that way.
A mechanic to handle overall damage (accumulation of damage in all body parts) is needed, to account for chock and bloodloss. Obviously MRQ has such a system, the question that remains is just what it is.
The person who did the playtest never said what it was, that is why I asked if I understood him right, that what drops a character is the accumulation of damage in all body parts, not just damage in the individual body parts.
andakitty: Why I asked the question is that the person who hade participated in the open day test, wrote a text about damage, explaining it in such a way that I percieved it as if you added all damage together, just to make Resistence checks against it, and see if you got unconscious etc.
I know it works to just use Hit location HPs only. I used and played with the very same modification to EDD for many years, before I found the preference to do otherwise.
I know it easily leads to the punching bag syndrome (and we even used special critical hit effect charts for locations to alleviate some of the problems). "Yes he hit me in the left leg, it is already disabled beyond ever being useful and can take no more damage, so I am ok after all.".
You can not just treat the arm, the leg, the head, the torso as being independent and unaffected by injuries to other parts of the body. No living being works that way.
A mechanic to handle overall damage (accumulation of damage in all body parts) is needed, to account for chock and bloodloss. Obviously MRQ has such a system, the question that remains is just what it is.
The person who did the playtest never said what it was, that is why I asked if I understood him right, that what drops a character is the accumulation of damage in all body parts, not just damage in the individual body parts.
Yeah, Time Lords also did away with hit points, and just tracked wounds. THe theory, and it makes sense to me, is that it really doesn't matter much if you got a scratch on your cheek if someone just cut your hand off.
In TIme Lords, damage would be companred to a "Body" score, a realtive masure of how well a form for absorb punishment, and it was based upon the mass of the target. THe higher the ratio of damage to Body Points the greater the severity of the injury.
The sustem also had some special rules, like head hits counted as double damage, except the first two points (skull soaked them up) and other adjustments to the damge depending on where you hit. In a way, the final effect was similar to RQ's differnert HP In each location.
One thing that was nice about Time Lords, and that would fit in with RQ was that it was very difficult to kill someone outright, but very easy to inflict an injury that would eventually be fatal. For instance, you could hit someone and do a wound that would cause them to die in 2 minutes, 2 hours, 2 days, or even 2 months-without treatment. It also had people getting stunned and knocked uncnscious from injuries.
THe net effect of this was that that combat actually became a bit lesss lethal, simply becuase characters could be taken out of a fight by injuries that were not instantly fatal. Such character could recieve medical care, and recover, or be killed by the enemey while helpless-depending on the curcumstances.
In TIme Lords, damage would be companred to a "Body" score, a realtive masure of how well a form for absorb punishment, and it was based upon the mass of the target. THe higher the ratio of damage to Body Points the greater the severity of the injury.
The sustem also had some special rules, like head hits counted as double damage, except the first two points (skull soaked them up) and other adjustments to the damge depending on where you hit. In a way, the final effect was similar to RQ's differnert HP In each location.
One thing that was nice about Time Lords, and that would fit in with RQ was that it was very difficult to kill someone outright, but very easy to inflict an injury that would eventually be fatal. For instance, you could hit someone and do a wound that would cause them to die in 2 minutes, 2 hours, 2 days, or even 2 months-without treatment. It also had people getting stunned and knocked uncnscious from injuries.
THe net effect of this was that that combat actually became a bit lesss lethal, simply becuase characters could be taken out of a fight by injuries that were not instantly fatal. Such character could recieve medical care, and recover, or be killed by the enemey while helpless-depending on the curcumstances.
atgxtg: That is why I put forth the idea for tresholds before. A quick comparison of the damage dealt with the Unconscious and Dying treshold, after having deducted HPs from a hit location would be quick and easy, and tell you if the character is down and out, or if he on his way to the afterlife (however long that may take).
waiwode said:
Hehe, Boars are dangerous no doubt. They were amongst the most feared creatures by my previous Warhammer Fantasy Role-play group. Hard to kill, reasonably fast, dealt a lot of damage, coult take a lot of damage, and it was 10 feet high (boars in WFRP are larger than normal boars).
What is needed is a rule that can handle both animals and people being injured, not outright killed, but still suffering from it.
Only game I know that really does this well is Legend of the Five Rings. In L5R you have several wound levels (Hurt, Incapacitated, Down, Out etc.). Each represents having taking X amount of damage, and when you have done so, you get a penalty to succeed on your actions due to the injuries.
Whilst most 3rd edition L5R combat is finished with one blow, few people actually die (they lie down unconscious, and will probably die if unattended).
Beyond that, any combat that drags on with people dealing small amount of damage, usually ends up being decided with a lucky blow, or by either side fleeing or surrendering (both latter options not being good for a Samurai's honor), due to the penalties you get when injured.
This is the way it is supposed to work.
L5R certainly isn't the only game with a Death-spiral, complete with "now I lay down and sleep" stage. Death Spirals, where the character gets worse and worse as they get injured, are pretty common.Archer said:
And in a way, RuneQuest, predating the Death Spiral by over a decade, sort of did it first. Sure, you don't fight worse as you get injured. But lose all the HP in your arm (if notr actually loosing the arm) and you are basically out of the fight, lose all your leg or any central area HP? Time to have a nice lie down.
Facing intelligent and possibly somewhat compassionate opponents and surrender becomes a pretty good choice if you don't have any friends to pull your *ss out of the fire (and even Lunar hoplites are likely to take prisoners if your Orlanthi rebel yields), although admittedly no one in their right mind surrenders to Broo.
Even Pendragon had something similar, with Major Wounds and Knockdown ... and if you were knocked down by an uninjured knight it's time to throw up your visor and cry "Pax!"
In the modern dungeon context surrender seems like the worst option (and I'm certainly not rushing off to the world's hot-spots to volunteer as a hostage) but in a role-playing game the escape from captivity can be a great adventure in itself. Or securing ransom for your friends. Or rescuing your friends from captivity. There's a lot of ways a minus can be used as a plus in this regard.
Doug.
Archer said:
It is quick. THe sillouette syste does just that. The big problem though is that the real effect is more more a "sue you will to resist the effects" thing that a "opps too many points" thing.
Another option, and one I've seeen in games like ICON Trek and Usagi Yojimbo is to make the character unable to act after taking a serious injry for a round. UY has a gilft that gives the characters a roll to avoid this though GURPS idid something similar with the oaction peanlty follwing taking a wound.
Persoanlly, I loved the Pain Resistance rolls that characters had to make when they were injured in thre Bond RPG. "Stopping Power" was something that I got used to, and missed when I was playing other RPGs. In Bond, part of your defensive ability is the capability to prevent retaliation by putting your opponent into wound-shock. Hitting a foe with a couple of .357 magnum rounds might not kill or incapacitate him, but it almost always stops them from returning fire.
If the roll mechanics are kept simple, then they should not slow the game down. The reduction in speed for the shock roll should be countered by the increased speed by having combanntants drop sooner. For example, if you run your spear through someone's shoulder and they drop to their weapon and cluth the wound. By the time they can act again, you could have them "covered" with your spear-tip right under thier chin.
True. I think one of the true strengths of the old RQ (we'll have to see if MRQ is the same), is that the vast majority of what made your character effective was, well, your character. Compare that to Dungeons and Dragons, where at higher levels, it's often more a question of what sort of neat toys (magic items) you have.
In that sort of scenario, getting captured and losing all your stuff is a fate worse that death. In some of the Living RPGA D&D Campaigns I've been involved in, many players take the position that they'd rather die and lose a level than lose their gear. :shock:
There is something very awkward about a game structure that promotes that position, methinks...
waiwode said:
I think you hit upon the real problem there. Most gamers are used to GMs that do all sorts of nasty things to their characters if they surrender or get captured. Most of the gaming groups I know, prefer to die fighting than to get captured, enslaved, tortured, gangraped, sacrificed at the altar, or any of the other horror stories I've heard of.
I have had big problems trying to get players to "unlearn" that surrender is bad. Esepcially in games like Bond, where surrender is often the best way to advance the plotline and discover just what the villian is up to.
RQ was always a game that encouraged surrender with it's ransom rules. Characters were encounraged to set up a stash of lunars that could be used to ransom the character if (more like when) they got captured.
Even Rurik Runespear got captured!
SteveMND said:True. I think one of the true strengths of the old RQ (we'll have to see if MRQ is the same), is that the vast majority of what made your character effective was, well, your character. Compare that to Dungeons and Dragons, where at higher levels, it's often more a question of what sort of neat toys (magic items) you have.
In that sort of scenario, getting captured and losing all your stuff is a fate worse that death. In some of the Living RPGA D&D Campaigns I've been involved in, many players take the position that they'd rather die and lose a level than lose their gear. :shock:
There is something very awkward about a game structure that promotes that position, methinks...
Spot on! Especially in AD&D. THe structure of the system sort of meant that all characters of the same class and level were sort of identical, aside from thier magical items. In AD&D "character improvmenet" was as much a factor of what you carried (upping that +1 sword to +2) as it was who you were.
So I guess taking away a high level character's magic is like robbing them of thier skill scores and personality.
Thanks, Steve. Very revealling idea.
atgxtg said:
Yeah, I recall all too many games where the Sword +3,+5 vs Dragons was the only thing that really distinguished that particular L28 fighter from the other L28 fighter in the party who had the Sword +3, +5 vs Orcs. (aka "Dragonslayer guy" and "Orcslayer guy"...
)RQ wasn't immune to this, however. Why use just a sword, when you can use this here sword with a Bladesharp 2 bound to it? That's as old as RQ itself.
But that wasn't the worst of it.
Witness both Shamanry and Sorcery. You could slam a matrix into a staff. You could build it in a ring, you could craft an eagle- feather token that hung your hair.
Or.
You could get a tattoo. A magic tattoo. When these things started rolling out adventuring parties began to look like the back-stage crew at Monster Garage. Because outside of torturing your players' characters with knives or acid or something gross like that, you (the GM) couldn't take away those 5 point INT spirit and 5 point POW spirits that Pwyll of Orange County just inked into his skin.
Doug.
But that wasn't the worst of it.
Witness both Shamanry and Sorcery. You could slam a matrix into a staff. You could build it in a ring, you could craft an eagle- feather token that hung your hair.
Or.
You could get a tattoo. A magic tattoo. When these things started rolling out adventuring parties began to look like the back-stage crew at Monster Garage. Because outside of torturing your players' characters with knives or acid or something gross like that, you (the GM) couldn't take away those 5 point INT spirit and 5 point POW spirits that Pwyll of Orange County just inked into his skin.
Doug.
