How drunk do I get? - need rules for intoxication

[TheLordWinter]

Don't forget that having a fruity frilly cocktail drink reduces your intimidate by 2...

This creates the greatest mental image ever. Imagine Conan (the barbarian, not the late-night host) sitting in a bar, growling at someone leering at him and then lifting up a scorpion bowl, moving the huge paper umbrella and knocking it back.

 

[CAFRedblade]

Why not represent Drinking as a Disease condition track?

Each drink or maybe every 5 drinks cause an endurance check.
DC either starts at 5 +1 per drink, or 10 +1 per drink.
Failure means you drop one spot from the left to the right; going perhaps from:
Normal <--> Mildly drunk <--> Drunk <--> Badly Intoxicated <--> Alcohol Poisoning
Each negative step adds a -2 to all saving throws, attacks, and skill checks.
On Drunk you may not recall events of the evening the next morning if you fail and progress to Badly Intoxicated.
On Badly intoxicated you have the chance on a failure to pass out by failing the check by more than 10.

To start back up the ranks from right to left requires a full rest, and successful Endurance check. ( or at least 6 hours without drinking) New checks may be made once every 2 hours, or once every hour with an allies heal check. ( they can aid another to give bonus to the check) represented by aspirin, holding head over latrine for throwing up, etc...

Harder drinks may add additional penalty numbers to the DC.

Just a few thoughts.

 

[Terwox]

G'day guys,

Has anyone nutted out some rules to handle intoxication in DnD4e? I am not after some big table just some fast and dirty rules to handle intoxicated characters. Seems some of the KotS party I'm DMing like to drink. A lot.
Would be fun to show them the errors of their ways.
Reebo

P.S. This is a serious rules question. I am not having a laugh.

What I would use is -1 for tipsy, -2 for drunk, and -4 for falling down drunk. Falling down drunk would also automatically grant combat advantage to an opponent.

You could make a single feat counteract all of that.

Assuming you want some bonuses for drunkenness, it can also grant you temporary hit points equal to your constitution bonus (if any,) times the negative effect of drinking. (x2 for paragon, x3 for epic, I'm sure you can flesh it out more if you like it. I do not.)

For drinking contents, endurance checks are good. If you're needing to know how drunk people are compared to others *in combat*, then a system as detailed above would help. I don't see that coming up very often though.

 

[Jhaelen]

Using Endurance checks for drinking makes sense to me. Though, for a prolonged night of drinking, why not make it a Skill Challenge?

As for the effects of being drunk, I'd say "Dazed" is appropriate if you're completely smashed. Otherwise, a blanket -2 to all attacks and skill checks may work for Tipsy or Hung Over conditions.

Seconded.

 

[Tellerve]

Why not represent Drinking as a Disease condition track?

Each drink or maybe every 5 drinks cause an endurance check.
DC either starts at 5 +1 per drink, or 10 +1 per drink.
Failure means you drop one spot from the left to the right; going perhaps from:
Normal <--> Mildly drunk <--> Drunk <--> Badly Intoxicated <--> Alcohol Poisoning
Each negative step adds a -2 to all saving throws, attacks, and skill checks.
On Drunk you may not recall events of the evening the next morning if you fail and progress to Badly Intoxicated.
On Badly intoxicated you have the chance on a failure to pass out by failing the check by more than 10.

To start back up the ranks from right to left requires a full rest, and successful Endurance check. ( or at least 6 hours without drinking) New checks may be made once every 2 hours, or once every hour with an allies heal check. ( they can aid another to give bonus to the check) represented by aspirin, holding head over latrine for throwing up, etc...

Harder drinks may add additional penalty numbers to the DC.

Just a few thoughts.

I was thinking about a disease progression as well, since poison works too quickly, but obviously dwarves should get their poison resistance bonus factored in here.

I also really like the idea of a skill challenge drinking contest

 

[BendBars/LiftGates]

1. Now that hit points don't mean some stuff and do mean other stuff, it doesn't seem entirely out of line for even a poison such as alcohol to deal some minor damage. It does certainly take you down a notch.

2. No way that the Endurance DCs should be based on the type of alcoholic drink you're imbibing. No one (really) drinks a beer stein full of liquor, so it's silly to make the system assume that you're downing a standard volume of liquid. It's much more logical to make the assumption that you're downing a standard volume of alcohol. It's the substance in question and it's what people do in the real world to compare alcohol doses.

3. Absolutely true that dwarves should get their poison bonus against alcohol. They're the ultimate heavyweight drinkers. But other abilities that are valid against poison should also reasonably kick in against alcohol. So, just say that it's a Poison effect.

4. I think the rules for drunkenness should involve the standard combat conditions. Dazed, slowed, etc. all seem reasonable. And a penalty to skill checks and defenses. Certainly Will and Reflex. When you're really hammered maybe you have to spend a Minor action each round to avoid automatically falling prone.

5. As for hangover rules, I'd suggest ignoring them. Hangovers can be purely roleplaying icing. The penalties for drunkenness last until you reach a milestone for a lesser intoxication (good enough for a couple of scenes of urban roleplaying encounters) and until you take an extended rest for a really bad bender. After that, the penalties go away. If you can wake up the next day fully recovered from a sword through the chest you can wake up the next day fully sober. I have no problem with that reasoning.

 

[erik_the_guy]

If you are going to do a system for getting drunk it should involve saving throws so that dwarfs get their +5 racial bonus.

 

[Ahglock]

I'd make it an attack on there fort defense, with being trained in endurance giving you a +5 to fort vs alcohol. I'd make it a flat roll for most drinks that aren't supposed to be super potent drink on a dare drinks. For each drink past that I'd add +1 to the attack roll.

If I were to use rules for alcohol I'd prefer its effects to be on the surprise side to the PCs, so an attack roll not a skill success check.

I might even have them make intuition checks to see if they are noticing they are getting drunk.

 

[Tenniel]

Drinking contest skill challenge

Has anyone thought of a Skill Challenge to simulate a drinking contest.

I would just like to point out in case our Prime Minister is reading this thread that I don't think in real life that drinking contests, binge drinking or alocpops are a good idea

 

[Tellerve]

Yep, certainly a poison, but I think modeled on the Disease chart perhaps. I mean, alcohol is a poison, just a delicious one at that

I like the idea of having dazed, slowed, etc. I also like the idea of using minor action to steady yourself. I even like the idea of possibly some sort of rage/belligerant drunk effect, but maybe that's best suited for rp'ing instances.

And finally, I think hangovers should be dealt with by loosing a healing surge or two depending on how bad the hangover is, or perhaps none at all.

Which sorta makes me think this whole thing should be a bit of a skill challenge. I downloaded the Obsidian Skill challenge, which is sadly I don't recall which member's new take on the skill system. I believe it was there that I first saw the loss of healing surges, but maybe it was in the dmg as well.

I might have to work on this tomorrow

Tellerve