Realism, Heroism, and Abstract Hit Points

Plane Sailing said:

Very interesting information, nice to it presented together like this.

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Thank you, Plane Sailing.

I think you're right that a Damage Save plus Conviction (Action Points) gets what I'm aiming at -- although I'm sure there's plenty of room to fine-tune it.

Plane Sailing said:

I remember Champions used to have an attribute called "Presence" which you could use in combat for just this kind of thing. Most heroes I played with didn't use it much, but my main hero had quite a lot of presence, and it could prove very effective in combat.

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Yes, Champions was perhaps the first game to run with the idea of truly potent intimidation, and I'd love to see more games give it a try.

Plane Sailing said:

I remember Champions used to have an attribute called "Presence" which you could use in combat for just this kind of thing. Most heroes I played with didn't use it much, but my main hero had quite a lot of presence, and it could prove very effective in combat.

Cheers

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Oooooo... I'm going to be making a Champions character this weekend, and Presence may be just the ticket for him...

Ruin Explorer said:

I'm kind of interested, now, in how a more realist-life-style game would do mechanics such that "pros" wiped the floor with "amateurs"...

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There's another element that's quite important for both modern troops and fantasy skirmishers. If you've ever been in a chaotic situation, the fog of war is very real, and you can't really see anyone or anything except whatever you're dealing with right then. It might be reasonable to ask for a spot check simply to attack someone new, especially if they aren't attacking you.

I read a piece by a retired Spec Ops soldier, Paul Howe, called Training for the Real Fight or Avoiding Fantasy Gunfight Training, and he makes the point that vision and scanning are more important than flat range firing:

mmadsen said:

It might make sense to make Intimidate checks against the target's Intimidate skill -- and redefine Intimidate to mean Posture, in the sense used by Grossman: convincing oneself of one's prowess while daunting one's enemy.

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And barbarians (rage) would have a huge intimidation bonus - at least to any not supernatural enemy.

Plane Sailing said:

I remember Champions used to have an attribute called "Presence" which you could use in combat for just this kind of thing. Most heroes I played with didn't use it much, but my main hero had quite a lot of presence, and it could prove very effective in combat.

Cheers

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One of my favorite Spirit of the Century characters was a peerless martial artist who always led with an Intimidation attack that had a high chance of inflicting what was, for all intents and purposes, a debilitating injury on his opponent. It was a very fun combat option, and I'd love to see something like it available to D&D characters.

mmadsen said:

There's another element that's quite important for both modern troops and fantasy skirmishers. If you've ever been in a chaotic situation, the fog of war is very real, and you can't really see anyone or anything except whatever you're dealing with right then. It might be reasonable to ask for a spot check simply to attack someone new, especially if they aren't attacking you.

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Or, on the flip side, to NOT attack an ally who runs up to cure light wounds when you are focused on the people trying to kill you. I recall an old thread where an invisible PC moved 30 feet to grab another PC and dimension door him out of a fight. The DM described it to the grabbed PC's player as being attacked by an invisible enemy, and the players thought this was the dumbest, meanest thing ever. But, really, the hyperawareness of everything in line of sight of you and metagamed cooperation between PCs no matter how much they should know about each other's status is more damaging to my sense of realistic combat than even the weirdest vaugeries of hit points.

As I mentioned before, under the current rules, a successful intimidate check leaves the target shaken for 1 round, when it should probably leave them shaken indefinitely, potentially frightened, and even panicked.

For reference, I thought I'd include the SRD's rules for those fear conditions.

Shaken
A shaken character takes a -2 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.

Shaken is a less severe state of fear than frightened or panicked.

Frightened
A frightened creature flees from the source of its fear as best it can. If unable to flee, it may fight. A frightened creature takes a -2 penalty on all attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks. A frightened creature can use special abilities, including spells, to flee; indeed, the creature must use such means if they are the only way to escape.

Frightened is like shaken, except that the creature must flee if possible. Panicked is a more extreme state of fear.

Panicked
A panicked creature must drop anything it holds and flee at top speed from the source of its fear, as well as any other dangers it encounters, along a random path. It can’t take any other actions. In addition, the creature takes a -2 penalty on all saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks. If cornered, a panicked creature cowers. A panicked creature can use special abilities, including spells, to flee; indeed, the creature must use such means if they are the only way to escape.

Panicked is a more extreme state of fear than shaken or frightened.

Heroes of Horror recommends redefining frightened to get around the problem of forced fleeing and to increase the distinction between frightened and panicked. Instead of having frightened mean -2 to rolls and you must run away, it can instead mean -4 to rolls.

This actually ties in with one of the Meta-Mechanics Worth Stealing, Grim Tales' fight or flight mechanic: Also, it probably wouldn't come up in D&D as much as in a modern game, but I might make those to-hit penalties multiply over range increments, to reflect the fact that a shaky hand is devastating to firearm accuracy.

Considering that the 4e Pit Fiend has a couple of fear related things

Aura of fear - if you are affected you have -2 on your attacks

Point of terror - if you are affected you have -5 on your defences for 1 round

I think that abandoning the 'run away' result from fear and panic and so forth and replacing it with various penalties to attack and defences will be a good way to go forwards. Someone who is panicked and, for instance, ends up with -5 on all attacks and defences (made up values) is much more likely to say "blow this for a game of soldiers, I'm off" and run away... or at least seriously consider it. This avoids the 'run away for 6 rounds takes you out of the combat for 12 rounds' problem while having the meta-game effect of 'you really don't want to get scared'.

I don't know what the whole thing will look like, but I've got hopes for this.

nb IMO combat Intimidate was useless in 3e because you use a standard action to make someone shaken for a round... and then they come out of it before you get to act again! It was even worse than a monks stunning fist in that regard, because it was never any use for you personally. Other party members might benefit from the target being shaken, but you (the person that initimidated them) never get any direct benefit !

Cheers

RPGs are bad at how and when the moment of death follows the wounding.
In real life it can take seconds, minutes or years to die from a wound. What one does and can do between the wounding and death varies greatly.
I know a gentleman who was at D-Day and wounded pretty early on by a machine gun round thru the abdomen, he pressed on and was intstumental in the destuction of 2 machine guns and a small bunker , he was shot 11 times over an hour or so (including the first shot) but was in all likelihood actually lethally wounded by that first shot and was regarded as a hero by the men of his unit for fighting on in his conditon (as per the letters I read).

One wound can kill anyone but the time between the wounding and death can be full of a lot of action beyond knocking a figure over on a battlemat and waitign for a res spell if one cared for a realistic representation of combat.

mmadsen said:

Grim Tales' fight or flight mechanic:

When faced with something that provokes a horror check, characters have a choice -- flee, and then face an easier check, or stand their ground and risk the consequences. The kicker is that each player decides in secret, and everything is revealed at once. Watching one guy stand his ground while his comrades flee is just priceless.​

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Although I never used Grim Tales in earnest, and I didn't like the idea of using the (bad) turning mechanic to handle horror, I *did* like the idea of the secret "fight or fright" resolution. I bet a version of it could be used to good effect in a Call of Cthulhu game, for instance.

Cheers