Making falling more like lava

[Kzach]

Falling

Falling causes the person to land in a square, Prone. Anyone trained in Acrobatics automatically avoids falling Prone if the distance fallen is 20 feet or less.

The first 20 feet of any fall causes 1d10 damage and they suffer a healing surge loss of 1d4. A successful Acrobatics check against DC 20 negates the damage and healing surge loss entirely. The person does not have to be trained in Acrobatics to make this check, however this check can only be made if the fall is of 20 feet or less. Falling more than 20 feet means that no amount of skill or luck is going to reduce the damage taken.

For every 20 feet fallen beyond the initial 20 feet, the character suffers their base healing surge value (minus any bonuses to this value from feats or racial or class abilities) in damage plus one-quarter of their healing surges (rounded down) are lost for the day.

Losing more healing surges than the character currently has means the character is dead.

Therefore, a fall of 100 feet is generally lethal for most characters and, in general, they can’t recover from it, or at the very least, they can’t recover quickly from it.

Falling is like lava. It’s bad, mmm’kay?

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

I think falling does need to be a bit more lethal, but there are issues with it, like the whole low movement = removed from combat problem...


I like your idea, but its a bit complex for my tastes. How about a much simpler:

Each 10' of fall inflicts 1D6 damage.
If you succeed at an Athletics or Endurance check with a DC equal to the distance fallen in feet, you can reduce the number of damage dice taken by 1 for every 5 points over the DC.
If you roll a 6 on any damage dice, you also lose a healing surge {in game twisted ankle or some other longer lasting injury}.

As with the usual rules, if you do not have a healing surge to lose, you lose hit points equal to your surge value.

 

[El Mahdi]

...Each 10' of fall inflicts 1D6 damage...

The only problem I have with this (if one is looking to add a sense of reality to falling), is that kinetic energy increases exponentially the further you fall...not a flat amount. Also, in the real world, 30 feet is the point at which most falls are fatal (with the percentage increasing the higher you go).

I also use a critical hit chart, but that part can be ignored easily if you don't.

I use something more like this:

10 ft. = 1d10 (roll D20 - crit on natural 20)
15 ft. = 2d10 (roll D20 - crit on 15-20)
20 ft. = 4d10 (roll D20 - crit on 11-20)
25 ft. = 8d10 (roll D20 - crit on 6-20)
30 ft. = 16d10 (Automatic Critical)
35 ft. = 32d10 (Automatic Critical)
40 ft. = 64d10 (Automatic Critical)
and so on...

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

My apologies for the previous post.. I had to run out of the house and hadn't finished thinking about it.

Actually, still haven't finished thinking about it.... but here is some more thoughts on the topic!

In order to make falls more level-ignorant in regards to lethality, I think the proper approach is to have them deal healing surges instead of hit point damage. NPCs and most monsters would die from the loss of 5 healing surges and PCs generally die from the loss of 15 healing surges, so the question becomes at which point should falling be generally lethal in a heroic style game?
If we pin it at 1 HS loss per 10' of fall beyond 20'... it would take a 70' drop to kill most NPCs and Monsters, and 170' drop for most PCs... not quite what I am looking for!
If instead we go with Kzach's idea of 1D4 healing surge loss, pin it at a per 20' range and allow Acrobatics or Endurance vs DC the distance of the fall to reduce the damage by half... a 60' drop could deal from 3 to 12 healing surges, enough to make it a nasty impact on either a NPC or a PC.

With this, you could keep the classic 20' pit even at higher levels.. keeping the distance close enough for PCs to return to the fight relatively soon, while still being something to avoid.

Down side, falling would also be a much better choice against bloodied bad guys, as even a 20 drop could finish them off.

El Mahdi, not saying I don't like the increasing dice of damage.. that is something I used back in 2e.. just looking for something a bit easier and less level-dependant to use.

 

[Kzach]

I like your idea, but its a bit complex for my tastes. How about a much simpler:

Heh, no offence, but I think my idea is actually simpler than yours

With mine, most of the math is done for you. It's a healing surge value worth of hit points lost. That generally equates to 1/4 of the PC's hit points (rounded down), and is already calculated on most PC's sheets. The only time math comes in is if you need to reduce the amount by Toughness because I didn't think it fair that a character should take more damage from this system if he's gone to the effort of taking Toughness as a feat. If anything, it should help him survive the fall, which it does if he's lucky.

And calculating 1/4 healing surges isn't exactly hard.

The math for a 60' fall would be 2 healing surge value hit points damage plus 1/2 the character's total healing surges lost plus 1d10 and 1d4 respectively. If this occurs after a few fights, that's a lethal fall for even most PC's, regardless of level, because of the healing surge loss possibly meaning death.

 

[El Mahdi]

...falling would also be a much better choice against bloodied bad guys, as even a 20 drop could finish them off.

Absolutely!

El Mahdi, not saying I don't like the increasing dice of damage.. that is something I used back in 2e.. just looking for something a bit easier and less level-dependant to use.

Not a problem! 4E has a bit more resources to play around with in order to simulate such major damage. There's some pretty cool ideas here, even as short as the thread is. Not that one has to, but if a more "real world" impact of falling is desirable, remember the 30' rule. Any fall over 30 feet is almost certainly fatal, with varying percentages of survivability below.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

I have been thinking about how to improve on this... and my newest thought is this:

The first 20' deals 1D10 hp and 1D4 surges. Each 5' beyond that adds another 1D4 lost healing surge.

Charcters can make a skill check vc dc 15. Each 5 points over the dc allows them to trade dice; the D4 to a D10, or a D10 for nothing. Usable skills include acrobatic, athletic, or endurance.

A 30' pit would normally deal 1D10 hp and 3D4 healing surges.. generally lethal to non-heroic characters.

Skilled characters can make the fall somewhat safer..but noone will want to fall too far.

A dc 35 skill check negates all damage from a 20' drop.... something a 17th level character is pressed to get.

Sent from my SPH-M900 using Tapatalk

 

[Alex319]

kinetic energy increases exponentially the further you fall

How do you get that? Neglecting air resistance, the kinetic energy at the bottom is going to be equal to the potential energy you started out with at the top (because of conservation of energy) and potential energy is a linear function of height.

 

[El Mahdi]

Because one of the determiners of force is acceleration, and velocity is determined by acceleration over time, and increases exponentially over time (distance). The average effect of earths gravity on the acceleration of a falling obect is 9.8 m/s2 (per second per second), or 32.18 ft. per second per second. Over the time of a fall, velocity increases exponentially, not linearly - such as after 1 second of falling, a body would have approximately* travelled 32.18 ft; after 2 seconds, 128.77 ft; after 3 seconds, 289.62 ft. etc. - up to the teminal velocity of the object in the specific medium (in average atmosphere, after about 15 seconds - at higher altitudes, a little longer - but terminal velocity is determined by the point at which drag equals gravity, causing acceleration to cease and velocity to remain constant - *the distance travelled isn't exact since drag increases as velocity increases and acts as a damper on acceleration).

The equation for force is: F=ma (or Force equals mass times acceleration).

Not exact numbers, but enough to get the idea:

The force of a 100kg person on impact after a fall of 10ft (approximately 1/2 second falling time), is approximately 245 newtons (or joules).

After 1 full second (32.18 ft.), the force at impact is now approximately 980 newtons (joules).

After 2 seconds (128.77 ft.), the force at impact is now approximately 3,920 newtons (joules).

So, Force is determined by mass and acceleration, and acceleration is exponential over time (per second per second) - thus Force increases exponentially over time (not linearly). This also shows why 30 ft. is a pretty good cut-off point for survivability, as the force at impact is almost certain to be catastrophic.

 

[marli]

how about.
roll 1d20+athletics/acrobatic everytime you roll a 20 add an addition d20 roll.
if you roll more than the distance fallen you take minimal damage.
else you take 1 surge per 2 feet damage
it means that all falls can be survived but over 10 feet it get hard and over 30 feet it gets really hard.

simple maths.
really nerve racking rolling.
really fatal.
miracals also possible.
100 foot fall...0.00003125% chance of survival