House rule: Knockouts and the Average Joe

[JPL]

Just to keep things interesting:

Change unarmed non-lethal critical to x4.

On a reeeelly lucky shot, an untrained Joe can do enough nonlethal damage [up to 12, assuming average strength] to KO another average Joe [assuming average constitution].

Just a quick fix to the often-cited scenario of two girly men flailing at each other ineefectively for days until one of them starves to death.

 

[Mistwell]

But the answer to the flailing for days is always the same - someone decides to do lethal damage instead, taking the -4 to attack, and knocks the opponant out that way in a minute or two.

 

[JPL]

Granted --- but they need to slowly whittle each other down to death's door --- and someone could get killed.

A K.O., on the other hand, is quick and clean and does no lasting damage.

It's not a huge problem, in my opinion --- any good action hero should take Brawl or Combat Martial Arts --- but in the event that the 15th level professor has to square off against a mugger, I'd rather see Prof score a KO [a lucky shot] than actually beat a man to death with his bare hands.

Maybe x3 is more reasonable, though --- so you need to be at least slightly stronger than average to get up into the typical KO range of damage [10 or higher].

 

[Skanth]

What's wrong with using subdual damage?

 

[Forcegypsy]

My fix

I've been playtesting the following house rule with my group...

Non-lethal damage results in a Fort save (DC 15) to avoid knock-out under the following conditions:

1- non-lethal damage equals or exceeds current Con score

2- non-lethal damage equals or exceeds current hit points;

No muss, no fuss, no extra calculations and gives the desired movie-style takedowns of low level mooks.

Feel free to use it and let me know how it went... oh, and comments critiques are welcome.

 

[JPL]

What's wrong with using subdual damage?

Too much hassle, tracking two kinds of HP loss.

Forcegypsy, I like that "non-lethal damage equals or exceeds current hit points" rule. Very nice.

When I played a few weeks ago, I had a hard time knocking PCs unconscious --- and I didn't want to take them all the way down to zero HP the hard way. This would help --- once most of the fight has been taken out of the heroes, the bad guys try to club them into unconsciousness. Very nice.

 

[jonrog1]

I like that rule too. When I read the non-lethal rules in D20Modern, it did give me the sneaking suspicion that whoever wrote that section's never been in a bar fight. If you get hit multiple times, the damage does accumulate, and you do ... get ... sleepy ... must lie ... down .. over there. You ... win. THUMP.

 

[Forcegypsy]

jonrog1,

Just to clarify, in case you have the wrong impression...The non-lethal damage in my house-rule doesn't accumulate. If someone does enough non-lethal damage in one attack roll to exceed the target mook's current hp then it forces the save to remain concious. The save works exactly like the one forced by the first condition (non-lethal exceeding current Con).

All it is designed for is the cinematic takedown of the low level mook or the worn out hero. So far so good.

 

[Mistwell]

What's wrong with using subdual damage?

If done with the Brawl chain of feats, it makes that chain way overpowered.

 

[JPL]

The lesson to be learned: either take Brawl or carry a large blunt object.