[Star Wars] Saga Edition's New Damage System

[Frostmarrow]

Saga Edition's New Damage System

What do you think? Something that can be used in D&D? Something for 4th Edition?

I kind of like it, although all those penalties would drive me nuts.

 

[MerricB]

It's the Massive Damage rule that doesn't cause death, it cause conditions!

Cheers!

 

[delericho]

I'm very glad they've dropped VP/WP in favour of HP - in practice I found the former to have exactly the opposite of the desired effect (for Star Wars).

I'm very wary of this Condition Track. In theory it's a nice idea, but then again so were VP/WP in theory. And it sounds a great deal like a 'death spiral' system, which I don't like. (That said, I may have misjudged them.)

I do like the consolidation of all conditions onto that track, which sounds nicely simplified, and very suitable for Star Wars. I would prefer they didn't implement something similar in D&D 4e, though, and have no intentions of doing anything like that in my D&D games.

(Since D&D is the game I play 90% of the time, I'm very used to the rules. As such, I don't mind it being rather more complex than other games... and I prefer the current arrangement where different types of conditions do different things. In effect, then, D&D has multiple condition tracks, which I quite like - although they could probably benefit from being expanded.)

 

[RedFox]

It's the Massive Damage rule that doesn't cause death, it cause conditions!

Cheers!

S'what it sounds like to me. I don't personally see that as being very Star Wars. Straight-up hit points fit better in my opinion. Hopefully it'll be as easy to rip out the condition track (at least as far as damage is concerned) as it is to insert massive damage into D&D. i.e. completely trivial.

 

[RedFox]

I'm very glad they've dropped VP/WP in favour of HP - in practice I found the former to have exactly the opposite of the desired effect (for Star Wars).

I'm very wary of this Condition Track. In theory it's a nice idea, but then again so were VP/WP in theory. And it sounds a great deal like a 'death spiral' system, which I don't like. (That said, I may have misjudged them.)

I do like the consolidation of all conditions onto that track, which sounds nicely simplified, and very suitable for Star Wars. I would prefer they didn't implement something similar in D&D 4e, though, and have no intentions of doing anything like that in my D&D games.

(Since D&D is the game I play 90% of the time, I'm very used to the rules. As such, I don't mind it being rather more complex than other games... and I prefer the current arrangement where different types of conditions do different things. In effect, then, D&D has multiple condition tracks, which I quite like - although they could probably benefit from being expanded.)

I'm with you up to the point of not wanting a consolidated condition track in D&D. I'd love the simplicity of that, myself. Then again, I'm just really getting into D&D so I don't have years of experience with the system with which to have familiarized myself with all the myriad conditions.

 

[Frostmarrow]

I'm very wary of this Condition Track. In theory it's a nice idea, but then again so were VP/WP in theory. And it sounds a great deal like a 'death spiral' system, which I don't like. (That said, I may have misjudged them.)

Well they do have Action Points which might allow you to step out of the spiral, don't they? -They'd better...

I wonder if this means that conditions (in the old sense) like Blindness will affect the Condition Track too. E.g: "You've gone completely blind and drop one step on the condition track too!"

 

[EricNoah]

I used a threshold system as part of my house rules for Arcana Unearthed. If you took more than x amount of damage in a single blow, there was a risk of a Mobility Injury (movement rate halved, -2 to attacks and other actions involving movement). This was all folded in to additional house rules about blunt attacks causing subdual damage, an expanded list of things you can do with the Heal skill, and expanded herbalism rules. I loved the flavor. Remembering to do it was often a challenge.

 

[ColonelHardisson]

It reminds me very much of the way damage is handled in Decipher's Lord of the Rings RPG. Very similar in concept.

 

[Klaus]

It reminds me very much of the way damage is handled in Decipher's Lord of the Rings RPG. Very similar in concept.

Now they just have to add a rule from the West End d6 Star Wars that allows you, once per session, to replace a "dead" condition with "unconscious and severe permanent injury", to reflect all those "cutting the hand/arm off" moments of Star Wars.

I used it in my first d6 SW session, on a Jedi PC. He lost his arm, and later had a droid arm adapted for him, which looked like a full-plate arm-and-shoulder.

 

[rgard]

Now they just have to add a rule from the West End d6 Star Wars that allows you, once per session, to replace a "dead" condition with "unconscious and severe permanent injury", to reflect all those "cutting the hand/arm off" moments of Star Wars.

I used it in my first d6 SW session, on a Jedi PC. He lost his arm, and later had a droid arm adapted for him, which looked like a full-plate arm-and-shoulder.

We HR'd that for our WotC Star Wars. If the character got whacked down to -11 wounds, the player had the option of losing a limb (randomly determined d4) to remove -10 wounds making the character unconscious at -1 wounds.

I actually let one character who was sent to -25 wounds, lose 2 limbs to get back to -5 wounds.

Thanks,
Rich