Wounds/Vitality too Deadly?

[Kalthanis]

So when it came out, I was a big fan of the Wounds/Vitality system. I tried to experiment with applying it to D&D even, but found that there were too many disadvantages to it. One was that weapon flair was diminished (since some of them had to lose their higher threat-range to make them viable). Another was that I couldn't use any high damage monsters.

I'm thinking about modifying a 3.5 game (or who knows, maybe a 4th ed game) to incorporate a more deadly system in a low magic, lower powered world (99% of opponents would be other humans). The goal is to always have some way to harm the PCs, I don't want them to ever think they are capable of taking on an entire town, as backwater as it may be (something that can happen in current rules). Basically I'm looking for a grittier d20.

In people's opinion, is the Wounds/Vitality system too deadly when critical hits are involved?

[kitsune9]

Originally Posted by Kalthanis

So when it came out, I was a big fan of the Wounds/Vitality system. I tried to experiment with applying it to D&D even, but found that there were too many disadvantages to it. One was that weapon flair was diminished (since some of them had to lose their higher threat-range to make them viable). Another was that I couldn't use any high damage monsters.

I'm thinking about modifying a 3.5 game (or who knows, maybe a 4th ed game) to incorporate a more deadly system in a low magic, lower powered world (99% of opponents would be other humans). The goal is to always have some way to harm the PCs, I don't want them to ever think they are capable of taking on an entire town, as backwater as it may be (something that can happen in current rules). Basically I'm looking for a grittier d20.

In people's opinion, is the Wounds/Vitality system too deadly when critical hits are involved?

It can be once that critical hit is confirmed and the person who is dishing damage is does 20+ damage. If you want a more deadly system, use the threshold system from the Black Company game setting. I don't have the book in front of me, but I think essentially if you take more hp in damage than you have Con, you have to make a Fort save or go to 0 hp and start dying or die outright. Given that there is virtually no practical magic in the setting, death is a frequent event.

[Kalthanis]

Well you would have to alter how Criticals work, just normal damage but goes directly to CON. But a Fort save against more damage than CON sounds like a neat mechanic. Black Company game setting? I'll have to check it out.

Thanks!

[Obryn]

I think it probably is too deadly for a standard high-heroic-fantasy 3.5 game.

I love it for my d20 Call of Cthulhu game, though.

-O

[kitsune9]

Originally Posted by Kalthanis

Well you would have to alter how Criticals work, just normal damage but goes directly to CON. But a Fort save against more damage than CON sounds like a neat mechanic. Black Company game setting? I'll have to check it out.

Thanks!

I had picked it up because I'm a big fan of whatever Green Ronin writes and they turned me onto reading the books. The campaign setting is deadly, but while there is a lot of magic, much of the magic isn't practical.

[Dagredhel]

Old One-Eye's special chicken and herb soup will fix you right up. (Someone go steal a chicken already!)

On topic, I'd favor equal amounts of "Vitality" and "Wound" points. Have them recover at different rates to represent 'flesh wounds' versus real injury. Don't change weapon damage, just have the extra from crits apply to Wound Points directly. Maybe require a Fort Save to remain conscious if Wound damage received exceeds CON.

Sooo... I don't favor it as-is, but would go for something *like* it.

(That hopefully doesn't taste like spoiled cabbage... as One-Eye described his own soup.)

[ronin]

Originally Posted by kitsune9

It can be once that critical hit is confirmed and the person who is dishing damage is does 20+ damage. If you want a more deadly system, use the threshold system from the Black Company game setting. I don't have the book in front of me, but I think essentially if you take more hp in damage than you have Con, you have to make a Fort save or go to 0 hp and start dying or die outright. Given that there is virtually no practical magic in the setting, death is a frequent event.

I didn't know about the Black Company game setting but we do something similar in our D20 Modern game. If you take damage equal to your CON you must make a DC 15 fortitude save or drop to zero vitality and begin dying. Characters also regain vitality back at a rate of their level plus their CON per hour.

It has worked well so far. Characters can make it thru multiple encounters but any good shot has a chance to drop someone. Once their Fort saves get a little higher it really won't matter too much. In a game with alot of role playing (roughly 70/30) this system seems to work well.

[rgard]

Originally Posted by Kalthanis

So when it came out, I was a big fan of the Wounds/Vitality system. I tried to experiment with applying it to D&D even, but found that there were too many disadvantages to it. One was that weapon flair was diminished (since some of them had to lose their higher threat-range to make them viable). Another was that I couldn't use any high damage monsters.

I'm thinking about modifying a 3.5 game (or who knows, maybe a 4th ed game) to incorporate a more deadly system in a low magic, lower powered world (99% of opponents would be other humans). The goal is to always have some way to harm the PCs, I don't want them to ever think they are capable of taking on an entire town, as backwater as it may be (something that can happen in current rules). Basically I'm looking for a grittier d20.

In people's opinion, is the Wounds/Vitality system too deadly when critical hits are involved?

Maybe consider not reducing vitality for each 1-2 wound damage point incurred.

Treat the constitution score and the wound points as separate items. Crit damage goes directly to wounds, but doesn't impact the constitution score and therefore doesn't have the knock on effect of reducing vitality on top of the wound damage.

We used this method in a Star Wars Revised edition campaign. I don't remember if this was RAW or a house rule. This was still really lethal.

Thanks,
Rich

[eyebeams]

The main problem is that it doesn't scale with level, but damage does. You need some way to either limit Wounds damage to a figure that never goes up or give the character a level based bonus, Examples:

* All Wounds damage from critical hits is 1d6 for x2 weapons, or 2d6 for x3, in addition to standard Vitality damage. No modifiers or anything. This is true until Vitality runs out, in which case crits do bonus damage equal to this amount.

* Alternately, when you take a crit roll a Fort save. Reduce incoming Wound damage by your result-10 (minimum 0). Thus, you have a level-based way to mitigate Wound damage.

[Dagredhel]

Originally Posted by eyebeams

The main problem is that it doesn't scale with level, but damage does. You need some way to either limit Wounds damage to a figure that never goes up or give the character a level based bonus...

Great point. Making 'Vitality Points' and 'Wound Points' *both* equal to normal hit points also leaves you with Wound Points that increase linearly by level.

(Forget negative hit points. Losing all Vitality renders a character unconscious, losing all Wound Points means death.)

[Kalthanis]

Originally Posted by eyebeams

The main problem is that it doesn't scale with level, but damage does.

True on a standard campaign. I'm not really looking to scale damage though, as 99% of their opponents will be human. But you're right, in a normal campaign as the amount of damage taken creeps up and up, those CON scores don't rise to match. Or at least not quickly enough.

I was thinking something along the lines of not going with Wounds, but instead going with Damage over CON requires a Fort check, DC is half damage taken, miss and you drop to 0 hit points. Or some other formula. Basically something that was suggested earlier, instead of Wounds, a Fort Defense or drop after taking a bunch of damage.

I just couldn't get it to where I wanted without over complicating the formula, in order to make it work on both ends of the spectrum, level 1 and level 25+. Not that I think this campaign is making it that long.

[kitsune9]

Originally Posted by Kalthanis

True on a standard campaign. I'm not really looking to scale damage though, as 99% of their opponents will be human. But you're right, in a normal campaign as the amount of damage taken creeps up and up, those CON scores don't rise to match. Or at least not quickly enough.

I was thinking something along the lines of not going with Wounds, but instead going with Damage over CON requires a Fort check, DC is half damage taken, miss and you drop to 0 hit points. Or some other formula. Basically something that was suggested earlier, instead of Wounds, a Fort Defense or drop after taking a bunch of damage.

I just couldn't get it to where I wanted without over complicating the formula, in order to make it work on both ends of the spectrum, level 1 and level 25+. Not that I think this campaign is making it that long.

A way to scale the threshold rule would be to add level to the Con score before Fort Saves have to be rolled. For example someone who has a 10 Con and 1st level has a threshold of 11. Take more than 11 hp (assuming you're still standing), you got make a Fort save or go to 0 hp or dead (depending upon how deadly the game is).

For a character who is 10th level and has a 20 Con, that threshold is now 30 so someone has to do 31 points of damage to hit that Fort save. Given that at higher levels, people can do 31 points of damage on a single hit, it still scales in that characters won't have to roll Fort saves all the time.

Of course, the trick is--what do we do for a Fort save DC? Should it be a static DC like 15 or 20 where death is guaranteed at lower levels but at higher levels, only people with low Fort saves will still be sweating? Or can we scale it too by making it a base DC 10 or 15 plus x modifier (like maybe 1/2 BAB rounded down)?

Happy Gaming!

[Remathilis]

Here is the problems of wound/vitality.

The current system (vit is treated like hp, wp = con score) is that it creates a slow whittling-down effect excentuated by 20=death rules. Once the group gets mid level (5-10) they have enough vitality to withstand a typical attack (lets say, 3d8) but not enough wound to survive a critical. So combat becomes a game of Russian Roulette; the first guy to roll a 20 wins.

This means that while any potential fight is "deadly", its not for the right reason. It means (roughly) that 5% of all attacks end in death (or disablement). And since PCs will absorb many more attacks than a typical NPC monster/goon will, there is a much better chance of a crit-kill on a PC than against any foe. I believe Rodney Thompson (designer of SWSaga) determined that over the course of 20 levels, that 2/3rds of a typical group of four will die and be replaced. (Or, there is roughly a 33% chance that the PC you started with will be the PC you end with, based soley on critical hits).

Any attack that isn't an auto kill critical doesn't do enough damage to bother vitality (IE: 1d6 points of damage vs. 200 hp fighter) and any attack doing enough damage to threaten a PC's vitality KILLS him in wound.

You might as well rule a natural 20 = a massive damage threshold save (DC 15 fort or die) since that's usually what V/W ends up being.

[Kalthanis]

Basically what I guess I'm trying to do is add back System Shock. Thinking something like this.

Take more damage than your Fort Defense minus 8. Will be your System Shock number.

Make a CON check, DC is the amount taken. This won't work for every campaign, but please remember that in this one, 99% of the opponents are human. On failure, the creature is Dazed (save ends).

However I'm also thinking of allowing this condition to "stack". Dazed first. Then Stunned. Then Unconscious.

[Kalthanis]

Originally Posted by Remathilis

So combat becomes a game of Russian Roulette; the first guy to roll a 20 wins.

Yeah, that's the conclusion I arrived at. I wanted Combat to be grittier and harder. But not a game of "Well, you might as well bring already made back up characters for WHEN your main dies."

[Obryn]

Yep, Remithalis has the right of it, overall... Of course, there's some mitigating factors depending on what rules you use - but it ends up working much better in my CoC game than it would in a normal D&D game. Some of those factors are...

(1) It's Call of Cthulhu. Lethality is expected!
(2) A lot of damage rolls are a simple 1d10, with nothing added to it. Even when rolling 2d10 or 3d6, results of 11 or lower are pretty common.
(3) In the rules I'm using, VPs are very low; 6+Str Mod at level 1, and 4 per level, unmodified, after that. So going from VP to WP can happen very quickly, and most investigators will have more WP than VP for quite a long time.
(4) The saving throws. First off, anyone taking any WP damage needs to make a fairly easy Fort save or essentially lose the next round. Anyone at 0 WP gets to try and make Fort saves in order to keep from dying. So, just because you're at 0 WP doesn't mean you're necessarily dead.

But for D&D... It's a nice idea, somewhat, but in practice it really just means insanely swingy combat.

-O

[Vigilance]

To me it isn't the grittiness that makes me dislike WP/VP, it's the randomness.

A system that was uniformly gritty, like say, everyone gets fewer hit points to amp up combat, would suit me better.

With WP, there's basically a random chance of severe injury or death with every attack roll.

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

The problem is the randomness mostly for me, too. Deadly is not the issue. As a player or as a DM, you can't come up with good tactics or clever thinking to overcome this type of deadliness. You can't even run away from it, like if you face a monster too powerful for you, since it applies in every combat situation. Of course, you can just run from every combat, but that doesn't sound like aparticularly exciting result of the rule.

If you want to keep basing it on a lucky 20, reduce the impact. Deal less damage against wound points, something less likely to kill you the first time. But if you take wound damage, you are dazed/stunned/knocked prone or something like that. I would probably suggest something around 1d6 points of wound damage to go along with that. (If you feel the need, introduce feats that increase this damage, but probably far better would be to increase the effect of "wounding" someone - like normal it's a daze, now it's a stun.)

You can take the gloves off when vitality points are gone - then a hit can deal full damage. Players already know that if they are down to 12 hit points, any hit can kill them, and they can plan around this situation. (Not saying their plans will be good or work. ).

Rules Idea

Wound Points:
A character has a number of wound points equal to his constitution score. If the wound points are reduced to 0 or less, the character dies. A character normally only takes damage to his wound points when his vitality points are reduced to 0.

Whenever the character takes damage to his wound points, he must roll a Fortitude Save DC 10 +1/2 the attackers level. If he fails, he drops prone and is staggered/dazed (can only take one standard action on his next turn).


Critical Hit: On a critical hit, you deal maximum damage the target additionally takes 1d6 points of wound damage, regardless of weapon. If you score a critical hit against a target without vitality points, you just deal maximum damage.

Feat or Talent Ideas:
Brutal Critical:
Prerequisite: Wis13+, BAB 6+
On a critical hit against an enemy, roll two d6 and take the higher result, and the opponent adds your Wisdom Bonus to the DC to resist the effects of the critical hit.

Bloody Critical:
Prerequisite: Wis15+, BAB 11+
On a critical hit against an enemy, the target takes 5 points of vitality at the start of its turn and immediately rolls a Fortitude Save DC 10 + 1/2 your level + Wisdom bonus. If he fails, repeat this at the start of his next turn. A successful Treat Injury Check or wound point healing ends this effect immediately.

[kitsune9]

So with the Wounds/Vitality becoming a Russian Roulette game (quite accurate), then we know where the weakness of the system lies. Now, all we need to do is patch that part and we're golden?

Of course, there is thought process--how to mitigate that aspect so that there is more survivability? Fate or luck point mechanic? Maybe instead of a crit going straight against your Con, it just takes away 50% your vitality or all of it and you drop to 0. Or we scale the Con score with level.

For example, we know that a crit takes away Con. However as you increase in level, you get a damage resistance against crits. So maybe we set it +1 for every level. So if you have a Con of 20 and you're 5th level, if someone hits you with a crit of 10 points against your Con, you only lose 5, because you're 5th level. Now at higher levels, we could end up becoming impervious to crits because we're 20th level, so the question is would this work for your campaign or should that "DR" be capped somewhere? Or maybe scale it down a bit to +1 for every 2 levels

Just some ideas to toss out there.

Happy Gaming!

[Ahnehnois]

I made wound damage go down into negatives like regular D&D hit points, so characters are easy to drop but harder to actually kill. The system also requires a number of other interpretations (healing magic, crits, polymorph, etc.). That said, I don't think it's too deadly and I like the flavor a lot better than the conventional system (i.e. not too deadly IMO).