Forked Thread: Alternatives to mountains of hit points

[WayneLigon]

I don't know enough about the crunch of these to know how well they work. I will take a look at the basic rules and see how it works.

Toughness save
Roll 1d20 + Con* + Feats + Armor - any injury penalties **

Your DC is typically 15 + the amount of damage in an attack.

* It's your Constitution score but in True20 you only have a number typically -1 - +4; ie, it would be the equal of your Con Modifier in 3.5

** The injury penalties mean that if you keep getting injured, you will eventually fail the roll big enough to be crippled or dying.

The big thing here is that it matter very much just how badly you miss the roll. Typically it's: Fail = Wounded, Fail by 5 = Stunned + Wounded, Fail by 10 = Staggered + Wounded, Fail by 15 = Unconscious or dying.

The other big thing is that barring a couple feats, it never gets any better unless you get better armor or your Con goes up. There are optional rules to have it increase, though.

So, yes, you can roll poorly enough and get dropped by the first hit (Thankfully, there are fate points to keep that from being as common as it might otherwise be), or keep on going long past your fellows.

The result is generally a much more deadly combat but I would really need to play it longer to form a good opinion.

 

[Reynard]

Generally speaking, "wound" systems require a great deal of care designing and implementing. If the system causes penalties to further rolls, disabilities or other negative mechanical effects, it can quickly become a "death spiral" -- characters who get wounded are less effective, getting more wounded, becoming even less effective, and then die. While hit points aren't a perfect solution to modeling "cinematic" combat, they do avoid this problem: the only "penalty" for only having a few hit points remaining is that the next blow might be your last. You still have a chance to pull it out in grand John McClane fashion.

 

[Galloglaich]

I think hit points are ok as long as you don't have too many of them. Damage tracking, hit location wound effects etc can end up becoming a lot of arithmetic, though there are good systems which deal with that on a fairly high level of abstraction.

What gets to be a problem to me is when your higher (even low/mid-level) players and their respective foes are all like Jason Vorheez who can't be really killed or hurt except with repeated hacking away for hours of actual playing time. Maybe some people like to play out a combat for three hours but I personally think it should be fairly short, dramatic, and interesting for the people involved in it.

G

 

[Corinth]

Fixed HP by Con, modified by Size.

 

[Derro]

If you want increased lethality use the Massive Damage rules.

My own tinkerings have led me to a condition track/reserve point hybrid. All but the most negligible hits result in some manner of wound effect until the character recovers with his reserve. This takes some sort of action during combat.

I only apply these rules to PCs and named NPCs. Mooks and henches just get a wound track (i.e. 1, 2, or 3 hits).

It sort of works. I'm still not totally satisfied with the wound track scale.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

What do you want to matter in your game?

If you want tactics, maneuvering around, combatants testing enemy defenses, you want a lot of hit points. Or at least a mechanic that ensures that nobody dies fast. (You could theoretically have a combat system that resolves most fight in 3-6 game world seconds, but resolving this found takes 6 combat rounds in which people feint, make particularly "dodge" movements or thrust movements, until they finally have accumulated enough "maneuver points" to kill the opponent - basically a "bullet time" combat)

If you want just to get over with, the more deadlier your combat, is, the faster it can be. The guy with the least armor or the lowest initiative loses. That's it. Combat is exciting because every attack directed at you might kill you, and you want to minimize being hit and maximize being able to hit. The game will be more "strategic" - you want to ensure you have the best starting position, lying in ambush, having the better equipment (none of this "lightly armored Duelist nonsense"), fighting from greater range, and all that.

---

In Torg, damage is split into "shock points" and "wounds", and conditions "Knockdown" "K" and "O". A lucky hit can kill most characters, but you can spend a possibility to reduce the damage after the effect - you have to decide what exactly you reduce - wounds, shock points, Ks or Os. There is a subtle tactical compoment here - if you have to many shock points, you drop unconscious. If you have a K and a O (regardless the number of shock points), you drop unconscious. A Ks stay, Os go away after a round. If you take 4 wounds, you're dead. So you have to find the right approach reducing damage to avoid dropping unconscious or taking too many wounds (risking dying and a threat to you that carries on after the combat.
Additionaly, the Possibility Points can also be spent for your offense and on skill checks, and between adventures possibilities are used to improve skills or attributes.

"Mooks" (basically everyone but a few villains and the heroes) don't have possibilities, so a good hit takes them out, and focusing fire on them will drop them soon even if you're not that great at dealing damage. Most of them will drop unconscious, not die, though, and certain initiative events can come up to remove shock points and get people back into the fight.

 

[Galloglaich]

What do you want to matter in your game?

If you want tactics, maneuvering around, combatants testing enemy defenses, you want a lot of hit points. (snip)

Thats a good point about the issue of Time focus or bullet time ala "The Matrix", this is another thing you can play with in a combat system. If you ever watched a Kirasawa Samurai flick, most of the (very realistic) fights are resolved extremely quickly, but a lot is actually happening there. This is what a real sword fight is like with unarmored opponents, with armor it will last a little longer of course but we are still typically talking minutes not hours!!!

But I think your two versions of how to do combat are somewhat of a false dichotomy, these are two variations on how to do it, but certainly not the only two. We gamers tend to approach these kinds of issues from a binary / dialectical mindset, it's wise to remember one can always look at it another way. You can actually limit hit points and still have all kinds of maneuvers and testing enemy defenses etc.

I think for DnD we obviously want PC's to have a decent chance of survival, but we also want fights to be interesting. When combat really sucks is when it's slow, tedious, and the players have few options (like that scenario somebody mentioned of the two all defensive fighters who needed 18 to hit each other). I think we have all sat through combats like that in DnD.

If you give the PC's (and NPCs) the ability to allocate their dice freely to attack, defense, saving throws, damage whatever, effectively people can fight cautiously, in which case fights will last longer, or more aggressively, in which case they will be more decisive. And whenever a fight isn't balanced, (one side outnumbers the other) fights can get very dicey, because if you don't have to worry too much about your defense (due to your opponent being distracted) you can concentrate all your dice on a lethal attack. These situations (people being ganged up on) can change fluidly and allow for yet another layer of tactical options for players.

---
In Torg, damage is split into "shock points" and "wounds", and conditions "Knockdown" "K" and "O". A lucky hit can kill most characters, but you can spend a possibility to reduce the damage after the effect - you have to decide what exactly you reduce - wounds, shock points, Ks or Os.

This sounds like a good system, if a little complex. Like I said, I think if you limit the hit points to reasonable level (one or two times their Con score) you can still have fairly interesting, realistic combat. With the Codex what we do for KO is if you score a critical hit with a blunt instrument, you roll the extra damage as a KO threat instead of more damage. (Many bludgeoning wepaons do a little more regular damage to compensate for this)

So for example if you get a critical hit with a mace, roll 7 regular damage, then roll an 8 for your crit "damage", this instead is combined into a KO threat of 15, which is the DC for the targets Fort save against being knocked out. Alternately you can have it cause cumulative non-lethal damage. This way say a Sap can actually function as a weapon, rather than a mere adornment on the equipment list that nobody actually ever uses.

In the Codex mooks will typically have no Martial Pool (only one dice to play with) so they can't control their luck like PC's can, and it's much easier to get them, but they can still get lucky so you can never completely write them off, which is better than having completely harmless mooks which are boring IMO.

Another way to keep players alive (besides armor) is for them to arm themselves with good defensive weapons. In the Codex a shield always gives you a 'free' dice on Active Defense. A staff has a very good defense bonus which applies to your Active Defense rolls. So a character who is a wizard with a low Str but a decent Dex can at least defend themselves pretty well with a staff.

What I learned from many years of martial arts, and a certain amonut of semi-recreational fighting in bars and etc., is that real fights are usually interesting, at least to the people involved, even if they are short. A relatively even fight is often very dramatic if you look at what is really going on. This is what I wanted to bring into RPGs.

G.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

An interesting side question: What works for melee, does it also work at ranged combat? Are their equivalents of feints, counter-maneuvers and so on there? Any paint-ballers around?

 

[Galloglaich]

An interesting side question: What works for melee, does it also work at ranged combat? Are their equivalents of feints, counter-maneuvers and so on there? Any paint-ballers around?

I'm sure there are, quite afew of us were in the military as well People forget how many gamers are in the Armed Forces. (That reminds me gotta go find that donate game books to soldiers thread, I've got a few to send...)

But actually it works essentially the same with ranged weapons. If you have played paintball you know one of the key dynamics of it is suppression, people hide behind cover, then emerge to take shots. People under fire or potential fire will behave much more cautiously, people taking a shot without themselves being under threat can take more time to aim etc.

Using the same Martial Pool mechanic as for melee combat, it mimics this dynamic ... if you are under threat of attacks by other missiles, you use a lot of dice for defense (to duck behind cover etc.) if you aren't facing this threat, you use more dice to attack with or move. Like when your enemy is pinned down because your pal is shooting at him.

So you also use dice to scurry from cover to cover. Each dice you expend from your pool allows you to move your normal rate, so for example if your move rate is 30' you could shoot, use two dice to move 60', then one dice for defense when you get shot at as you arrive at your next tree. If you use all four dice you are running flat out but can't attack.

You can also move around in a melee the same way of course, and from melee to ranged fire ranges etc.

G.

EDIT: One interesting question you raised is how could you do a ranged-attack feint. With paintball or in the modern military this is suprressive fire, when you are shooting not so much to hit them but to keep their head down. You could do this easily with the Martial Pool per above... but Meideval weapons don't have a very high rate of fire generally, is there any way you could use bluff, it seems to me just pointing a weapon at someone might keep their head down as well.... or maybe another way to feint would be to feign vulnerability, stick your head out to lure a shot, (or put a helmet on a stick) and get them to loose an arrow at you ineffectively.... food for thought..

 

[Herremann the Wise]

EDIT: One interesting question you raised is how could you do a ranged-attack feint. With paintball or in the modern military this is suprressive fire, when you are shooting not so much to hit them but to keep their head down. You could do this easily with the Martial Pool per above... but Meideval weapons don't have a very high rate of fire generally, is there any way you could use bluff, it seems to me just pointing a weapon at someone might keep their head down as well.... or maybe another way to feint would be to feign vulnerability, stick your head out to lure a shot, (or put a helmet on a stick) and get them to loose an arrow at you ineffectively.... food for thought..

I think the main issue with ranged weaponry in D&D is that they do not reflect how deadly a bow or crossbow can be. A hero (lots of hit points) would not be affected by supressing fire as a successful attack is almost inconsequential. Hell, what's the point of cover even when you can march up and start wailing with the sword? If however, bolts and arrows represented a realistic threat, then I think the "ranged" side of combat would be more dynamic than just simple sniping.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise