Savage Worlds - Hit Point System?
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nerfherder
Explorer
Hmm, I did some searching when I had a free moment, and couldn't find anything. I'll look again later.
<edit> Here's something, although I'm not sure if it's the article I was thinking of: http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=481533
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Stormonu
Legend
The damage track of SW is one of the things I really like, as is. You can take all kinds of nicks, scratches and near-blows and really only have to worry about those hits that REALLY nail you without tracking hundreds of HP. I also like the "death spiral" to D&D's "Your perfectly fine or your dead" approach.
However, if you want to have hit points, just assign a number of HP to each of the tracks, say like 3HP or 5HP for each SW hit point. Or, perhaps HP/SW wound level equal to the character's Vigor die*, and change the target number to 4 to cause a HP of damage (each raise would do +1 damage). You could remove the effect of shaken for PCs and NPCs and keep the damage system/shaken effect for normal enemies so the GM doesn't have to do so much tracking.
* Someone with a d6 Vigor would have 6 HP per wound level, or 18 hit points. A person with d8 Vigor would have 8 HP pre level or 24 HP total. If that's too much, you could do 1/2 Vigor die, 1/2 Vigor die + 2 or any such combination depending on how tough you want characters to be.
However, if you want to have hit points, just assign a number of HP to each of the tracks, say like 3HP or 5HP for each SW hit point. Or, perhaps HP/SW wound level equal to the character's Vigor die*, and change the target number to 4 to cause a HP of damage (each raise would do +1 damage). You could remove the effect of shaken for PCs and NPCs and keep the damage system/shaken effect for normal enemies so the GM doesn't have to do so much tracking.
* Someone with a d6 Vigor would have 6 HP per wound level, or 18 hit points. A person with d8 Vigor would have 8 HP pre level or 24 HP total. If that's too much, you could do 1/2 Vigor die, 1/2 Vigor die + 2 or any such combination depending on how tough you want characters to be.
Just Double it.
Since Toughness is mostly the deciding factor on whether a character takes a wound or not, I'd say the best thing to do would be to just double the wounds a Wild Card can take before becoming Incapacitated. Give All Wild Cards 6 wounds and only count every other wound as a penalty to Trait checks (2 wounds = -1, 4 wounds = -2, 6 wounds = -3, and 7 wounds = Incapacitated).
Since Toughness is mostly the deciding factor on whether a character takes a wound or not, I'd say the best thing to do would be to just double the wounds a Wild Card can take before becoming Incapacitated. Give All Wild Cards 6 wounds and only count every other wound as a penalty to Trait checks (2 wounds = -1, 4 wounds = -2, 6 wounds = -3, and 7 wounds = Incapacitated).
ValhallaGH
Explorer
We can cobble together an HP system pretty quickly. We just need a few questions answered.
One: Do you want wound penalties (and their associated death spiral)?
Two: Do you want to keep Soak as an option?
Three: Shaken, or similar effects? If not, what's the Raise benefit for Tricks and Tests of Will?
Four: How lethal do you want it to be?
Five: When do you want Wild Cards to die?
Off the cuff, I'd just multiply non-armor Toughness by 3. Attack, hit, roll damage, subtract armor from damage, reduce hp. Extras multiply by 1.
I find myself really liking the effects of giving all my PCs Hard to Kill under the current rules. They ignore wound penalties for Incapacitation, which means a lot of "Six wounds! A Raise! He's still up and fighting, barely fazed by the seemingly devastating attack!" Recovering from Shaken is still an issue, but they can spend a benny to automatically act.
One: Do you want wound penalties (and their associated death spiral)?
Two: Do you want to keep Soak as an option?
Three: Shaken, or similar effects? If not, what's the Raise benefit for Tricks and Tests of Will?
Four: How lethal do you want it to be?
Five: When do you want Wild Cards to die?
Off the cuff, I'd just multiply non-armor Toughness by 3. Attack, hit, roll damage, subtract armor from damage, reduce hp. Extras multiply by 1.
I find myself really liking the effects of giving all my PCs Hard to Kill under the current rules. They ignore wound penalties for Incapacitation, which means a lot of "Six wounds! A Raise! He's still up and fighting, barely fazed by the seemingly devastating attack!" Recovering from Shaken is still an issue, but they can spend a benny to automatically act.
Adoamros
First Post
Hate to bump old threads but this may be useful to someone in the future. My group and I also disliked the shaken/wound system RAW in savage worlds. I designed a solution, it's still green in play-testing but seems to work very well:
I took a similar approach because I love wounds in SW, just not how much shaken comes into play. It's downright annoying at times, due to it being able to take PCs pretty much out of action and make hitting and damaging enemies unsatisfying if they recover the next round (this is meant to be blanketed by GM description). It seems to actually slow down play for us, because we like seeing actual incremental results on a damaging hit.
Creatures are no longer shaken when they get hit in combat. If a hit surpasses toughness they're immediately wounded. This wound can be anything from a bruise to a severed head (generally reserving the more gruesome descriptions for extras and minions and heavy hits).
I made this formula for Wild Cards. Each PC has a certain amount of 'wound slots', depending on certain variables.
Wound slots = 1/2 vigor + 3
Wounds now look like this (each [] = one wound slot):
(Incap) [-3] [-2] [-1] [ ] [d4] [d6] [d8] [d10] [d12]
Wild Cards also gain an additional wound slot every time they gain a rank (up to 4 additional wound slots at Legendary). They can also take an edge to get a wound slot (I called it 'Meat Shield' and gave it Novice, Spirit d8+ req's). Max. wound slot amount is 14 (vigor d12, legendary, meat shield edge). Although you don't have to include that edge.
Example: Azara is a seasoned character with a vigor of d8. 1/2 her vigor is 4. Adding 3 she has a base wound slot amount equal to 7. She also gained another wound slot when she became a seasoned hero. Azara has a total of eight wounds she can take before becoming incapacitated.
This system makes PCs more durable, which I think caters more to a D&D style of play. It also increases the power curve slightly as characters gain ranks. I'm undecided on whether or not I want to put raise caps on damage, we'll see how it comes into play.
For NPC's and monsters, I've created a new tier and modified the extras.
Extra/minion: This creature only has one wound slot. Once it's hit, it's incap'ed.
Elite: This creature is a bit more advanced than an extra. It has a number of wound slots equal to 1/2 its vigor die. 'Elite' doesn't necessarily mean it has received more training or is gifted, it merely means the creature is tougher and needs to be concentrated on more than an extra.'
Wild Card: These creatures and NPCs use the same formula for wound slots as the player characters. They can also use bennies.
Hope this post helps a bit.
I took a similar approach because I love wounds in SW, just not how much shaken comes into play. It's downright annoying at times, due to it being able to take PCs pretty much out of action and make hitting and damaging enemies unsatisfying if they recover the next round (this is meant to be blanketed by GM description). It seems to actually slow down play for us, because we like seeing actual incremental results on a damaging hit.
Creatures are no longer shaken when they get hit in combat. If a hit surpasses toughness they're immediately wounded. This wound can be anything from a bruise to a severed head (generally reserving the more gruesome descriptions for extras and minions and heavy hits).
I made this formula for Wild Cards. Each PC has a certain amount of 'wound slots', depending on certain variables.
Wound slots = 1/2 vigor + 3
Wounds now look like this (each [] = one wound slot):
(Incap) [-3] [-2] [-1] [ ] [d4] [d6] [d8] [d10] [d12]
Wild Cards also gain an additional wound slot every time they gain a rank (up to 4 additional wound slots at Legendary). They can also take an edge to get a wound slot (I called it 'Meat Shield' and gave it Novice, Spirit d8+ req's). Max. wound slot amount is 14 (vigor d12, legendary, meat shield edge). Although you don't have to include that edge.
Example: Azara is a seasoned character with a vigor of d8. 1/2 her vigor is 4. Adding 3 she has a base wound slot amount equal to 7. She also gained another wound slot when she became a seasoned hero. Azara has a total of eight wounds she can take before becoming incapacitated.
This system makes PCs more durable, which I think caters more to a D&D style of play. It also increases the power curve slightly as characters gain ranks. I'm undecided on whether or not I want to put raise caps on damage, we'll see how it comes into play.
For NPC's and monsters, I've created a new tier and modified the extras.
Extra/minion: This creature only has one wound slot. Once it's hit, it's incap'ed.
Elite: This creature is a bit more advanced than an extra. It has a number of wound slots equal to 1/2 its vigor die. 'Elite' doesn't necessarily mean it has received more training or is gifted, it merely means the creature is tougher and needs to be concentrated on more than an extra.'
Wild Card: These creatures and NPCs use the same formula for wound slots as the player characters. They can also use bennies.
Hope this post helps a bit.
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A
amerigoV
Guest
(I'll admit, I cringe at making SW more D&D-like. I find SW as it is runs more like the old 1e games I remember from my youth (fast, hard hitting) than 3.x or 4e, but that aside).
Did you pull out the Bennie/Soak system on the damage side? It seems to me escalating wounds plus soaking would make PCs nearly invincible.
Did you pull out the Bennie/Soak system on the damage side? It seems to me escalating wounds plus soaking would make PCs nearly invincible.
Adoamros
First Post
Understood, I've created this house rule since I run savage worlds a bit differently than how it is usually played, among the other reasons I listed.
I haven't removed the soak rule since I've established this mechanic. My players usually spend bennies on failed trait checks (more often than not all in one go <__>). But, I see your point. I may limit soaking to once per session, meaning only one benny can be spent on soaking. I'll see how it plays out.
I haven't removed the soak rule since I've established this mechanic. My players usually spend bennies on failed trait checks (more often than not all in one go <__>). But, I see your point. I may limit soaking to once per session, meaning only one benny can be spent on soaking. I'll see how it plays out.
A
amerigoV
Guest
There was a recent thread on Pinnacles forums about how to run a more gritty game. One idea (among many good ones) was you needed 2 bennies to soak. That might tie in well with the expanded number of wounds (although I would only charge 1 bennie to reroll a failed soak).
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