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Combat thesaurus (or 101 ways to say "You hit for 3 damage")
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<blockquote data-quote="redrick" data-source="post: 6389288" data-attributes="member: 6777696"><p>It's a good point that I hadn't really thought about. By trying to describe combat too much, am I just drawing all of our attention to just how little the abstract combat rules actually model reality. Too many close-ups on the giant, rubber and foam shark which is just never gonna look real, so better to use it as sparingly as possible.</p><p></p><p>Anyway, for my game is it is right now, I'd say that's not the main thing dragging the immersion down. And, for smaller combats, or for just the major creatures in a given combat, I can even keep track of the narrative damage in my head such that the wounds carry over somewhat consistently into the rest of the combat. Easier for NPCs, obviously, because they're either going to be dead, unconscious or fled by the end of the combat, or the players won't be alive to ask them how they're performing all those acrobatic actions with their broken shinbone poking out of their trousers.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000">This, for instance, could be really fun with an NPC who lives to fight another day. Less fun for the player character who has to factor his toothless grin into all his social interaction. (Though, for a cooperative brawler type character, I could see the fun of taking some teeth out of a PC in a noteworthy combat. Hockey players do great things with false teeth! A gnome in the Cherny Mountains is rumored to make spectacular dental prostheses.)</span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000">It's a fair point, and if I were to really work this out in detail at the table, I would try to think of high damage, medium damage and low damage as a percentage of remaining hit points as opposed to some independent "15 damage = brain splatter, 10 damage = blade cuts through to bone, 5 damage = deep bruise," etc. After all, that minimal damage dagger wound could finish off the mighty giant, and, to wade into the HP are not meat debate, low combatant health is a statement of total vulnerability as much as it is pints of blood loss, number of bones broken or number of fingers chopped off.</span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000">thanks for all y'alls input.</span></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="redrick, post: 6389288, member: 6777696"] It's a good point that I hadn't really thought about. By trying to describe combat too much, am I just drawing all of our attention to just how little the abstract combat rules actually model reality. Too many close-ups on the giant, rubber and foam shark which is just never gonna look real, so better to use it as sparingly as possible. Anyway, for my game is it is right now, I'd say that's not the main thing dragging the immersion down. And, for smaller combats, or for just the major creatures in a given combat, I can even keep track of the narrative damage in my head such that the wounds carry over somewhat consistently into the rest of the combat. Easier for NPCs, obviously, because they're either going to be dead, unconscious or fled by the end of the combat, or the players won't be alive to ask them how they're performing all those acrobatic actions with their broken shinbone poking out of their trousers. [COLOR=#000000]This, for instance, could be really fun with an NPC who lives to fight another day. Less fun for the player character who has to factor his toothless grin into all his social interaction. (Though, for a cooperative brawler type character, I could see the fun of taking some teeth out of a PC in a noteworthy combat. Hockey players do great things with false teeth! A gnome in the Cherny Mountains is rumored to make spectacular dental prostheses.)[/COLOR] [COLOR=#000000] It's a fair point, and if I were to really work this out in detail at the table, I would try to think of high damage, medium damage and low damage as a percentage of remaining hit points as opposed to some independent "15 damage = brain splatter, 10 damage = blade cuts through to bone, 5 damage = deep bruise," etc. After all, that minimal damage dagger wound could finish off the mighty giant, and, to wade into the HP are not meat debate, low combatant health is a statement of total vulnerability as much as it is pints of blood loss, number of bones broken or number of fingers chopped off. thanks for all y'alls input.[/COLOR] [/QUOTE]
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