Its Official: I HATE Vitality/Wound. You?

[HeapThaumaturgist]

Sounds like SC2 would solve alot of my problems with VP/WP. Surprisingly close to Grim Tales' method of handling things, even though they're HP vs. VP/WP systems.

Suggests that it's just good design.

--fje

 

[Gundark]

I could see a DM hating VP/WP. In Spycraft 1.0 the PCs were quite safe from Critical hits. Minions (about 80% of what they fought) couldn't critical. The player in turn usually (in my game) outnumbering the non-minions (ones who could critical). Thus the PCs were more likely to score a critical. You could make the non-criticaling minion rule a rule in any game that uses VP/WP...cuts down on PC death.

 

[Ranger REG]

I noticed the additional stuff that is needed for SpyC 2.0 VP/WP system. I swear that product is becoming a simulation game, not a RPG.

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

Is the Star Wars version the same as found in Unearthed Arcana?

 

[GlassJaw]

Is the Star Wars version the same as found in Unearthed Arcana?

It's pretty close but SW seems more "complete" to me. I've always got the impression from UA that a lot of the rules were just thrown in there rather hastily.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Is the Star Wars version the same as found in Unearthed Arcana?

If I remember UA's version correctly...nope. Especially with the 'little' details that Star Wars adds on, such as armor as DR(again, different than UA due to how Defense works) and the Force(which is powered by Vitality).

 

[wingsandsword]

Sadly, never played those. Just D&D, d20, WEG d6, and Storyteller 1st edition.

If you played WEG d6, you should know about one-hit-kill lethality.

A 2D Strength character (a typical non-combat-heavy PC) that got shot with a blaster rifle or blaster pistol (5D) could be seriously injured, and quite possibly killed by a direct hit, even a highly experienced character was one bad Dodge roll (or one really good Blaster roll) away from a direct hit, and it wasn't hard to seriously harm a character with that one hit, and certainly not infeasible to kill them. Character Points and Force Points could certainly boost that, but if they were depleted, then even long-running characters could die in one lucky hit. Not very common, but then again a critical hit that drops a character from 10+ wound to -10 isn't very common either generally.

I didn't see it often, but I did see advanced PC's die in d6 from a really unlucky shot from a generic mook, which is something that just can't happen in D&D's Hit Point system. Even in d6 a single blaster shot could kill a PC if they weren't careful or really unlucky, with HP that's just not possible once you get above the maximum damage that can be rolled on a crit, while in VP/WP it's still possible (but a little more likely than with d6).

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

My thoughts:

The anticipation of knowing your character can die at any time is great.

Characters actually dying at any given time is not great.

Yeah, especially when there's not really any major threat of death unless a crit happens. Then death is virtually guaranteed. So you're superman, until someone happens to fire a kryptonite bullet. Why not just roll a bunch of d20s at the beginning of combat and kill off a character for each 20 rolled? It'll have the same effect in the long run and take less time.

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

What's the name of the Star Wars book with the rules for VP?

 

[Aeric]

What's the name of the Star Wars book with the rules for VP?

The Star Wars Roleplaying Game (i.e. the main book).

They may also be in Unearthed Arcana...I don't have the book handy. I know the "Armor as DR" and the Defense Bonus rules are in there, though.