Some miscellaneous questions about combat

[dra]

1/2 ST (rounded down) + DR + MOS - 1/2 SM (rounded down) - AV

Yes, probably closer to realism. Most definitely less elegant, "dead" scores and all.

What's unelegant about it and what's dead score?
I'd say it's way more elegant. You do include difference in body types and sizes of different people, yet you do not let it be main decider in case of knife in the belly you just mentioned. There is the same amount of math included, it doesn't create a new attribute, roll, modifier , doesn't take any more space on character sheets. It does not make a combat difference in relation to deadliness and so on. It makes armor and skill of swordsman more important.

If this is what you aim for, you could do this with Edge (Tough - all wounds reduced by 1) and Flaw (Fragile - all wounds increased by 1). No math, no "dead" scores for Stamina and Strength. Maybe Tough should require the Large Edge, so this whole thing has more impact and is more expensive, instead of becoming a no-brainer for every fighter.

After some consideration...
Forget it. Such an Edge (Tough) should rather be integrated in the existing Large. Just now instead of "Strength and Stamina are less expensive for you", you apply this damage reduction. Should be good.

But why create an asset out of it and loose some nice other mechanics?
I have a need for Large asset for a race of giant ppl

[Korbel]

What's unelegant about it and what's dead score?

This is what happens when you halve the scores... Let's say you create a character and buy this fifth dot in Stamina (and it's more expensive than the fourth). But then you realize the score of 5 gives you not so much benefit, because after halving and rounding down the effect on wounds is the same, as was for Stamina 4. So you start thinking: "oh my, oh my, why did I spent those precious points for such an useless thing", and you can't stop thinking, become depressed, lose the focus on the fights, make a mistake and die - that's a dead score.

[thirtythr33]

In blade you also have stats 1-5 and this system works there great. Would you risk an opinion that blade does not emulate fiction fantasy?

Blades goes up to 8 at character creation and up to 9 after you level up. p17 reads: "In addition, no character should start with any Attribute at the unique level of 9. This level should be reserved for development during play with others."
Blades emulates Sword & Sorcery. Sword & Sorcery is full of shirtless barbarians who tank sword blows with their big muscles.

Anyway, I think we are talking in circles now. The answer you have gotten is "BoB isn't trying to be that realistic and it's not overpowered". If that isn't convincing for you, I suggest you play the game with the rules as they are written and then if you find during actual play that the Naked Dwarf Syndrome persists that you let us know about the experience. Because, in my experience playing some actual games, it has not been a problem.

[Agamemnon]

I have a bad habit of writing two-thousand-word responses in forum posts on these sort of things. It's a useful one for the sake of being thorough, but I think people would unanimously prefer that I instead put that time and energy into the current draft rewrite. If I've been absent a bit lately, you'll know why (it's chugging along, by the way. Just about all of the major changes Higgins and I had in mind have been nailed down and the pieces are being bolted back together as we speak).

With that in mind, instead of responding item by item to everything that's come up, I'll just throw some bullet points into the discussion.

• At the risk of invoking the contentious specter of GNS theory, we are a game that straddles the line between simulation and narrative. We have a very specific agenda, on that. We started from an extremely simulationist base. The first draft of Song of Steel had something like sixty maneuvers and a couple hundred weapons, many of which had multiple stat-lines for how you were holding them. Armor had multiple ratings based on damage type in addition to the tags it had now and had some complex mechanisms for how they were layered. The list goes on. As we further developed the game, we realized what an unwieldy beast we had born. Not only would the thing be extremely demanding to run (let alone teach to a new player), but that kind of detail was unnecessary for the kind of stories we actually wanted to tell with it. The longer we've worked on it, the more we realized we were interested in the stories. When simulation and narrative are in conflict we try to compromise as best we can, but ultimately we tend to lean towards the narrative.
• We are emulating fiction, but we also talk about the kind of fiction we are emulating. The very first paragraph of the first chapter of the book names some of our references. I won't re-iterate them here. We're interested in creating character-dramas set in historical fiction or dark-and-gritty low-fantasy or Swords and Sorcery settings.
• We're also history nerds and HEMA nerds and we wanted to get the bits right for the way weapons and armor actually worked because that's a thing that to which few games do justice.
• Stat guidelines exist for a reason. If your GM is playing fair, then the overwhelming majority of combatants are Strength/Stamina 3. Really physically imposing characters have 4s. A 5 isn't something that isn't casually thrown around. It's practically the defining feature of that character. 1s are children or cripples, generally, and 2s are generally not people who are physical by nature. The majority of fights between trained combatants are going to be 3s and 4s fighting 3s and 4s. You're most commonly going to get a +1/-1 difference. To get anything more than a +2/-2 (which is what dra seems to want) you're either having the equivalent of a sedentary office worker fighting a professional strongman, or a champion athlete fighting a little kid (2-5 or 1-4, respectively). In either case, I'm okay with this discrepancy warping a bit.
• The rebuttal to this would be "Hey! I'm a sedentary office worker, and I'm pretty sure if I hit Halfthor Bjornson with an axe, he'd be just as dead!" which is a possibility, sure, but under what circumstances are you going to actually do that? If it's a fist-fight, chances are you're dead anyway. As a sedentary office worker, you have negligible combat training. In real life, people who have combat training tend to also have a decent amount of strength and stamina because training for hand-to-hand combat actually builds strength and stamina. You're still looking at 3s instead of 2s. If someone has gone out of their way to make a Strength/Stamina 2 character with a huge CP, then they are doing so on purpose and intentionally want their character to be that way. This isn't D&D or the like where your character was 3d6 down the line. So when would you actually get to hit poor Bjornson with an axe? From an ambush, where even your meager die-pool is going to generally give you enough dice advantage to overcome his prodigious stamina and hulking form.
• If a player went out of their way to bump themselves up to a 5 (or went tier 5 to get a 6), then they are dedicating a hell of a lot of character resources into making this a cool thing about themselves. They are explicitly stating that they want to be a tough sumbitch and that this is a defining feature about their character. I don't see a problem with this particularly compared to what they could have purchased instead.
• With all of the above in mind, remember that we're essentially arguing about an MoS or two difference in a game where the protagonists can routinely get +5 dice to their combat pool because they actively care about the thing they are fighting for, to say nothing of the extra +4 dice you can get with a dagger or a spear if you are at the appropriate range, or the fact that your opponent is at half-CP if you get the drop on them.
• If it still itches your craw, feel free to house-rule or homebrew it to your taste. We tell you in the first chapter that the book is a toolkit. We even have a section on the forums that is intended for people to discuss their house-rules and levers, and the complete book will have a bunch of the common ones listed in it.

There. That's... 944* words so far, counting formatting. I made it under a thousand. Success. I should stop typing now, though, or I'll ruin it. Ahem. Back to the draft!

*948, after I edited it for wording. Oops. Technically, this is 992 overall. Cutting it close!

[dra]

What's unelegant about it and what's dead score?

This is what happens when you halve the scores... Let's say you create a character and buy this fifth dot in Stamina (and it's more expensive than the fourth). But then you realize the score of 5 gives you not so much benefit, because after halving and rounding down the effect on wounds is the same, as was for Stamina 4. So you start thinking: "oh my, oh my, why did I spent those precious points for such an useless thing", and you can't stop thinking, become depressed, lose the focus on the fights, make a mistake and die - that's a dead score.

And if it was only instance of using this particular attribute , that would be an issue. Since it has more uses than just damage modifiers, I'd say it would not matter.

In blade you also have stats 1-5 and this system works there great. Would you risk an opinion that blade does not emulate fiction fantasy?

Blades goes up to 8 at character creation and up to 9 after you level up. p17 reads: "In addition, no character should start with any Attribute at the unique level of 9. This level should be reserved for development during play with others."

I stand corrected.
So bascially it's -9/+9 in vanilla TROS, -5/+5 in BoB, -3/+3 in Blade and -2/+2 with my patch

Blades emulates Sword & Sorcery. Sword & Sorcery is full of shirtless barbarians who tank sword blows with their big muscles.

Maybe in fluff side of things, in actual hard system mechanics, it's less S&S than BoB and it might be more realistic in fight handling (weapons are not so flat). For example, most of SAs additional functions from BoB are handled only by DRAMA Passion.

Anyway, I think we are talking in circles now. The answer you have gotten is "BoB isn't trying to be that realistic and it's not overpowered". If that isn't convincing for you, I suggest you play the game with the rules as they are written and then if you find during actual play that the Naked Dwarf Syndrome persists that you let us know about the experience. Because, in my experience playing some actual games, it has not been a problem.

I will of course play the way it's meant to be played (at least at first) and judging by characters that were created, we won't run into Naked Dwarf Syndrome. As i wrote before: it will not affect 90% of players.

[dra]

I have a bad habit of writing two-thousand-word responses in forum posts on these sort of things. It's a useful one for the sake of being thorough, but I think people would unanimously prefer that I instead put that time and energy into the current draft rewrite. If I've been absent a bit lately, you'll know why (it's chugging along, by the way. Just about all of the major changes Higgins and I had in mind have been nailed down and the pieces are being bolted back together as we speak).

(...)

And that's something I can relate to.
"We wanted to make a game as realistic as it gets. Than we looked at it and decided it's too rules heavy. We streamlined. Simplified. Some pieces became less realistic in process but we want to avoid complications at all cost."

And I can only say here, my proposal is not a complication. It works within the frame.

Second thing is:
If someone wants to make a character larger than life, why not let him.

And it's allright. I can understand that. Shit, I even came here for it. I am one of those people who came to tros for combat system but stayed for a SAs which could be firing at 5x5 extra pool.

Still...It kinda bogs me.

[dysjunct]

Dra,

From a game design perspective, there are only two possible valid criticisms:

1. This mechanic has an effect, possibly non-obvious, which is contrary to the design goal of the game.
2. This mechanic, even though it is in harmony with the design goals, is not fun in play.

Everything else is an aesthetic argument, i.e. a matter of opinion and thus outside the scope of objective discourse.

For #1, an example would be the botch rule in first edition Vampire. As your skill went up, so did your chance of critical failure, so an expert was more likely to critically fail than a complete novice.

For #2, I guess you'd have to play and find out.

I don't see how your criticism of the soak mechanism falls into either of these. The designers have stated their design goal, which is to be primarily narrative and based on a particular type of fiction, but with some simulationist parts to ground the narrative and shape player choice. The soak rules as written do not contradict this goal. It might not be your goal, but then again it is not your game.

Regarding #2, it doesn't appear that you have actually played the game. You are reading it and basing it on a comparison to other games with a soak mechanic. But this has little to do with BoB. Many games look bad on paper, but play well, and vice versa.

As such, I think your criticism and proposed solution are properly the realm of a house rule.

[dra]

Dysjunct,

Consider this: in what of those 2 points "naked dwarf syndrome" has brached game design of WFRP? Was it contrary to the design goal of the game? Hell no. Was it not fun to play? Funny enough, I'd say it did not make it unplayable in any way. How come when I say "naked dwarf" everyone here understands exactly what I am talking about? Because it became a world-wide symbol of failure in game design even if it was not in any way breaking the game. It was just astethics you mentioned. Somehow in the world where you can conjure demons, stroll through countryside with magical swords and fight with steam tanks, one warrior with many attacks could kill off entire city watch garrison without breaking a sweat, it was considered UNREALISTIC.

Somehow this purely aestethic thing became proverbial and virtually every wide known rpg since tried to avoid this mistake, that skin is tougher than armor.

You mentioned W:M and botching rule. Did you notice, that in 2nd ed and in Requiem and in any pool game released afterwards, designers avoided this mistake? It became as big part of game mistakes lore as naked dwarf. This is supposed to be beta game, right? From what I understand this word it means it's supposed to pan out some mistakes. Well, I just registered one. And arguments to fight this off were kind of suprising to me.

It's not game breaking because it's not unrealistic, because you can grapple, you can get 50 knights and 200 thieves and release can of whoopass on sta6 character, that being immune to damage is ok since it only saves us 3 SAs and finally it suppose to emulate fiction (understandable) and we want characters that have iron skin. I could as easily declare that in WFRP you could always use magic sword, gang up on fella, conjure some OP demon or 40-60 skeletons to deal with the problem and it is not an issue since it only saves me some Destiny Points. Only argument regarding what characters we want in our stories is unbreakable. The only person who even put in his mind what I was talking about into mechanic perspective was Korbel. He proposed a thrust into belly with MoS 3 of priest and soldier veteran and found out that same quality dagger thrust was instakill for priest, yet mearly a giggle for a soldier. And he just took relative low and avarage scores of 2 and 4. My main problem is with characters with 6 attribute. But same argument can work out with grizzeled veteran (4) and unhuman bastard (6). What about 2 vs 6? This is just consequence of the fact, that some characters have skin endurance higher than a chainmail.

It is true that I am going to play it for first time this weekend and bar some test fights to memorize manouvers better I have not aquired any bob experience yet. However, I played few rpgs (tros included) and desgined few customs and can see poor rule where I see it. I even stated that for 90% players this will not be an issue. As was it for 90% of wfrp players. Yet somehow, naked dwarf syndrome became something to be avoided in rpg industry (for example, in W:M you mentioned). And funny enough, after characters creation, when I described to my players how the system works, one of my players asked : so my chainmail has less AV than my stamina? And when I said apparently so, he asked if I really want to play this game. Granted, he may be one in thousands who noticed. Yet he did. Call it just aestethics sense.

As such, I think your criticism and proposed solution are properly the realm of a house rule.

And as I stated in my first post I would most likely mix a bit of blade and a bit of BoB. I will run few heavy combat games first to see how it's handling in reality (so to speak) before I make any changes so I can assess results better. Designers ask for feedback. I gave feedback. Having natural soakage higher than armor is unrealistic and is imho mistake during game design. Whole system is like a premier league top club, running for championship every year, competing in champions league. They have great keeper, superb central defenders, great, strong striker, fast, explosive wingers...and than left back is dude from sunday league level. And that's my opinion. I tend to agree with it so when I state it and someone says I'm wrong I also tend to defend it.

The only argument that I think is unbeatable is "We want our characters to be like that". I can't change someone aesthetics but I don't remember characters who have some iron plate under their skin in :

" Joe Abercrombie’s First Law trilogy and Andrzej Sapkowski’s Witcher, by the fast-paced swashbuckling of Alexandre Dumas’s Three Musketeers and the obsessive revenge of The Count of Monte Cristo, by the political intrigues of George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, and the intimate tragedies at the heart of Hamlet and Macbeth. ".

I do remember characters who sometimes bleed their guts out but yet somehow manage to keep going. But maybe my memory does not serve me right or I got different inspirations.

[Benedict]

First of all I'd like to apologize to everyone for the huge wall of text that follows.

1. my level of english is poor which I apologize for but does not render my case invalid

True. You don't have to apologize for it though. Just practise more if you feel you can't communicate because of this.

Your case is rendered invalid by your train of thought, which I believe has nothing to do with your level at English.

2. you did not read what I wrote really, which might be the case since I answered some of those points above.

I did read what you've written already. In no way you answer any of the points above, you just keep talking in circles.

I admit I might have missed it because of sense of shock after seeing that STAMINA soaks so much damage. I mean, it's kinda "armored dwarf fallacy" from 90ties's wfrp. If one person picks stamina as priority atribute and has it @ 6 and attaking character has ST of 2 (quite reasonable for non-meele ppl) it seems to me
that bare skin has more armor value than chainmail (descriptions and special attributes of armours aside). It is even more shocking that this fallacy was well known and most homebrew rules resorted to either toughness canceling out only ST damage (even if it was higher) or doing it BLADE's way of dividing attributes in halves. Of course one
might argument that it is up to players to not overuse such cheesy tactics, yet there should be no reason to set up game for some OP builds.
Unless I did not read it carefully enough again.

You are right on one thing here.

You did not read it carefully enough. Again.

I'll explain, so read on.

I played few rpgs (tros included) and desgined few customs and can see poor rule where I see it. I even stated that for 90% players this will not be an issue. As was it for 90% of wfrp players. Yet somehow, naked dwarf syndrome became something to be avoided in rpg industry (for example, in W:M you mentioned). And funny
enough, after characters creation, when I described to my players how the system works, one of my players asked :
so my chainmail has less AV than my stamina? And when I said apparently so, he asked if I really want to play this game. Granted, he may be one in thousands who noticed. Yet he did. Call it just aestethics sense.

To put things into place. When you answered "apparently so" it makes you a bad GM. Because you have not read the rules thoroughly, you do not understand basic functions, you juxtapose rules from similar rulesets to your convenience based upon your limited experience (I played few rpgs tros included) and high idea of yourself (desgined
few customs and can see poor rule where I see it).

The honest answer to your player should be that you don't know and you will look it up, the correct one should be that armor is superior to stamina because of its additional properties. So, no, its not an issue of aesthetics. Its an issue of you assuming you know something when you don't.


youtu.be/7rr88Szc5q0

I guess you take "naked" a bit too litterally. If every character with 6 stamina run naked, it would not be a problem. Problem arises when stamina 6 pc or npc runs in proofed plate. That's a moment when it stops being silly and starts being annoying

Third, and probably most importantly, the special attributes of armor is one of their most important functions.

I said armor properties aside

This is good example and I guess math is right. It also touches surfaces of the subject. It is not as bad as in WFRP, it is better than in tros, yet problem still exist. Do not pick a naked dwarf for example. Pick a dwarf with same armour as his opponent. Therefore he gets both advantages. He converts damages to blunt, has rigid
property yet still his "natural AV" is extreme.

I also mentioned chainmail not proofed plate. Please do not cherry pick data
So we have a not - naked dwarf with stamina 6 and chainmail 3. He can always get better gear but stamina stays with him. So an avarage human being swings at him with ST 2...He needs some serious luck in dice throw to even catch dwarf's attention.

And here you start running around in circles. Who's cherry-picking data? Does armor properties matter or not? And please, decide what the example is.
1. A SM6 unarmored character?
2. A SM6 toe-to-head clad in maille armor character?
Btw, there's no such thing as chainmail in the rules. Do your homework.
3. A SM6 wearing a proofed plate full suit character?

Good example of fallacy: You disregard character creation in its entirety. Priorities.

Fallacy : a failure in reasoning which renders an argument invalid

To have SM6 you must invest 5 ranks in Attributes leaving you 10 ranks for the other Priorities.
To have SM6 and full maille armor you need Attributes 5 and Class 2. 8 ranks left.
To have SM6 and full proofed plate you need Attributes 5 and Class 4. 6 ranks left.

I gotta admit, I never read grappling. First of all I want to learn how to walk, memorize manouvers and than use that extra special flavour bits in system.

So yeah, let's pretend there is some vauge silly point in rules.
Ok, there are tactics to work around that and if you are experienced players and know your manouvers and grappling and can choose equipment every time fight arises, you can live with that.
My question is : why bother if it can be corrected at basic level.

My point is why create a fallacy and work around it using advanced mechanics if you can avoid it at all. From this point I keep repeating : from my perspective, Soak advantage of 4 or 5 is way to high for contest-based combat pool game.

As you correctly googled and copy-pasted. a fallacy is a failure in reasoning that renders an arguement invalid.

Claiming that grappling maneuvers are "advanced techniques" when you haven't even read them, or saying that SM6 soaks better than AV3 Metal armor are both fallacies.

A bad rule is not a fallacy. A bad rule is a flaw that needs to get fixed. A rule is not an arguement, it is a statement. Open up a dictionary to see the difference.

How do you know that grappling maneuvers are "advanced mechanics" when you haven't even read them? Not only that, but you continue to pontificate instead of reading the rules, then simply suggest that "grappling is OP than", just because they render your arguement invalid. Last time I checked they are basic maneuvers, not advanced, and
grappling is an essential part of any game simulating melee combat at any extent.

I went to the gym at age 17 and I had problems bench pressing just olimpic bar (20kg). I never tried powercleaning than but seriously, it would be rather doubtfull in my case. Even lifting 63kgs off the ground (dead lift) which is ST2 requirement would most likely be a painfull failure. Powerclean of 63kgs would most likely kill
me outright. So even if I was slightly stronger than ST1, I was deffinetly not ST2 material. Now after decade and a half dusting off gym equipement I would do deadlifts (OB3) with ST 6 weight IN SETS. My point?
I could of course kill a man with axe now. But as easily I would do the same with ST 1. I was not some disabled kid, I run a lot, played football, snowboard and as every normal boy of this age beat the shit (and get beaten shit out of) of other boys. I could chop wood with an axe just as easily as now. Same goes to slabs of meat and
bone (animal of course). There is no way that if I decided to throw an axe into Andre The Giant I would just "piss him off". Sure, I would not cut his head off but he would deffinetly not shrug it off
Why?
Because axe is sharp. And dredfull. And has center of mass that allows me to greatly enhance my own strenght. And I never used a sword on meat but than again, I assume that weapon that become very popular in different ages and different parts of the world didn't become so because of lack of deadliness.

As a 17 year old ST1 character I could kill anyone to splinters with axe if he had no armor

And here come the rumblings. With all due respect, not only you have zero fighting experience, you pressume that you know too. If you came with an axe upon anyone with average combat experience, the most probable outcome would be you hacking your leg. Or him breaking your arms. The least probable would be you killing him.

This is represented in the game by CP pools and grappling ruleset.

his high stamina is deadlier than if he had in comparison to smn with low stamina

youtu.be/Nnmo1hrMuxQ

As someone with STR6 compared to STR2, AGI6 vs AGI2, etc. So what?

In my opinion there is a serious failure in reasoning in considering human skin so tough against attacks

Why then a ST6 Brawl11 warrior who breaks a full proofed plated opponent in half is no issue? Are human hands tougher than steel armor? I don't hear you complain about that. As you said, its your opinion. See Metallica song above.

1/2 ST (rounded down) + DR + MOS - 1/2 SM (rounded down) - AV

1. It's simple

No, it adds another level of calculation.

2. It does not affect any math in game

It does, see above.

4. The only thing it does is make game more realistic in places where it matters...

In your mind maybe.

5. ... and fix some inbalances.

Some imbalances that also exist in your mind. Go do some testing first, then come up with numbers to prove their existence.

In addition it creates an imbalance that is not there: Dead Levels.

I don't care if it affects one roll or every roll in the game. Dead Levels is the easiest way to enforce minmaxing in a game. I want to play a game, not play accountant.

The only person who even put in his mind what I was talking about into mechanic perspective was Korbel. He proposed a thrust into belly with MoS 3 of priest and soldier veteran and found out that same quality dagger thrust was instakill for priest, yet mearly a giggle for a soldier. And he just took relative low and avarage scores of 2 and 4. My main problem is with characters with 6 attribute. But same argument can work out with grizzeled veteran (4) and unhuman bastard (6). What about 2 vs 6? This is just consequence of the fact, that some characters have skin endurance higher than a chainmail.

And here we come full-circle to the start. Really? Only Korbel took the time explaining the rules?

The naked dwarf has STAM6 and the armored weakling has STAM1 and munitions plate with AV4. From a first glace, it would appear the dwarf's AV6 is better than the weaklings AV5, right?
But look what happens when you see how an actual attack is resolved. Say someone lands a MOS4 swing at the ribs with a Glaive (2c) and STR3. The Glaive has Drawcut.

Against the dwarf, this is a level 5 Cutting Wound:
Weapon is lodged in the chest. Death is imminent. KO3, Impact 10, BTN 10

Against the weakling, this is a level 3 Blunt Wound:
Knocks out the wind. Bad bruising. Taking deep breaths is going to be painful for a while. Impact 6, BTN7

That's three days ago. The same post he gave you ranged weapons stats. Of which you quoted and thank for. It strikes me as odd that you missed that part. Maybe because it nullifies your "iron skin" obsession?

Most of the 50 knights or 200 thieves are kinda narrative effects. It all comes to what GM rules as of results of the test of how he structures story. Sure, you can have 50 knights but what help are they if you are captured at the battlefield and plan an escape? Do you travel with 50 of them? Perhaps only few armsmen? And what
if anyone wants to further the plot by trying to assasinate you on some hunting expedition? Would he do it as a lone fighter or would he bring overpowering group? And your retainers are hold up in a fight and than? And than it's good to have 6 stamina
Seriously, many times I had players who were very influential in game world and never had I encountered problems regarding their status. In fact it only made stories richer. Especially in TROS since it's so holywood in style of mass combat. I however had encountered problems with iron skin in systems where it was possible.

Finally, as thirty33 rightly points out Sta6 is useless against a host of knights. Or a thieves guild. Or the orator with Social6 who convinces you that his well being is your highest priority.

And I already answered that there is nothing unrealistic in that. Yet can be remedied if a story requires.

In case you haven't noticed, this is not a GM story driven game.

It's the exact opposite.

If you want to narratevily get rid of player assets because it suits your story you can do it, you are the final arbiter as GM after all. But you won't be playing BoB in this case. You'd be playing DnD with BoB's ruleset at best. If you claim though that your version is BoB, that makes you a douchebag of a GM and a douchebag of a person. Because
you'd be discrediting the creators and cheating your players.

And no, you don't have to tell me I can work around 50 knights or stamina 6. I read carefull "Listen up dumb screwups" 40 times over . Was my favoruite literature at some stage.

- My players are getting too strong. What to do?
- Send an elephant.
- My players killed an elephant!
- Send another elephant. I have plenty of elephants

Nothing in games, that system supports heroic fantasy type adventures. It is even sought after. Realism does not play to game there, often it is distruptive.
In games where simulationist part is very heavy , it is playing against system strenght.

What you fail to understand isn't that YOU can get around SM6. What you fail to understand is that PLAYERS can get around SM6.

To put it simply. It's not YOUR game. It's everybody's game. If you don't like it play something else.

[EinBein]

Guys guys, calm down. I thought maybe it's too late to join the discussion, but I see there are still open wounds to be treated...

First off: I can understand bra's concern. But only because the reasoning regarding fictional realism hasn't been explained in its full consequence yet. See my take below. But first, I'd like to comment on two proposed workarounds:

• I don't share bra's opinion that halving attributes is a good idea. Like Korbel and Benedict, I think this is very detrimental to character building, even though it "only" affects one aspect of each attribute (an important one to many players, I would think). D&D is a very good example of the dark side of this approach, and I think it is as bad or even worse than naked dwarves...
• I first liked 33's proposal of a +1/-1 mod to DR if you have relative higher/lower Str than Sta of the opponent. But this requires that we talk about the attribute values and compare them before being able to calculate the damage, which is interrupting the flow of combat too much. We used a similar system in our hoembrew TRoS/Blade hybrid, and scrapped it quickly. In basic rules, the attacker can calculate his DR independently from the defender, who in turn only needs to subtract a certain amount, with no need to talk about the constituting elements.

Personally, in light of the discussed alternatives, I would stick to the current solution but add a paragraph that explains the reasoning and consequences of fictional realism. Like in the following example:

Sansa Stark attacks the Mountain with a dagger from behind a curtain, hits him with full force, and... after some dice rolling, her damage is mechanically reduced to 0 due to her Str of 2 and his Sta of 6 ...the dagger ends up fully buried into the Mountain's back. Anyways, after a short tense pause that seems to stretch forever, the Mountain just turns around, smirks devilishly and crushs Sansa's head with his bare fist... Afterwards, he pulls out the dagger with no sign of pain and ignores any possible effects such a serious wound would normally be able to inflict.

This is what I understand what "focussing on fiction rather than reality" means: Even though rules-wise, Sansa's dagger would have bounced off the Mountain's skin, in the fictional description it hits its target, but with no gameplay effect. That's the kind of badassdom that you can ask for, if you took attributes at Prio 5 and Sta at 6.

[Benedict]

Guys guys, calm down.

I'd like to apologize for my previous outburst to everyone. But I believe that dra is missing the picture here, even if I got rude. I could be polite and stretch that "debate" to 8 pages. Imho there's no reason to waste time like this.

[Korbel]

example of fictional realism wrote:Sansa Stark attacks the Mountain with a dagger from behind a curtain, hits him with full force, and... after some dice rolling, her damage is mechanically reduced to 0 due to her Str of 2 and his Sta of 6 ...the dagger ends up fully buried into the Mountain's back. Anyways, after a short tense pause that seems to stretch forever, the Mountain just turns around, smirks devilishly and crushs Sansa's head with his bare fist... Afterwards, he pulls out the dagger with no sign of pain and ignores any possible effects such a serious wound would normally be able to inflict.



This is what I understand what "focussing on fiction rather than reality" means: Even though rules-wise, Sansa's dagger would have bounced off the Mountain's skin, in the fictional description it hits its target, but with no gameplay effect. That's the kind of badassdom that you can ask for, if you took attributes at Prio 5 and Sta at 6.

I can visualize such a scene very easily and if this the kind of effect you want from the game, I believe it's great.
But if you want more "realism"... Let's say your player (playing "Sansa") says: "hey, but he's got a dagger in his back, no way he can ignore that!". What are you going to respond? Of course, this "barbaric vitality" or luck or anything can be used when you're playing S&S, or something - but what if you want a more deadly, scary game? Where a dagger in your gut will kill you, no matter how hard you are, or how weak your opponent is? If you can get killed by Sansa with a knife, it is a whole different game.

The majority of fights between trained combatants are going to be 3s and 4s fighting 3s and 4s. You're most commonly going to get a +1/-1 difference.

ACtually, between +1 and -1 to damage, that's two wound-levels of difference (that's gonna happen if a charcater with 4s in STR and STA fights a guy with 3s). And two levels is 40% of the damage table, because there are five levels. That's really significant already.

I could be polite and stretch that "debate" to 8 pages. Imho there's no reason to waste time like this.

And how being rude is supposed to help you end the discussion quicker?

[Benedict]

And how being rude is supposed to help you end the discussion quicker?

True, I'll give you that.

I have no problem with someone not understanding something, even if I consider it the most simple thing in the world.

I have a thing tho with talking around in circles, cherry-picking, opinion-forcing, and veiled insults. Being blunt ends it there and then.

but what if you want a more deadly, scary game

Stabbing your mortal foe with a knife in the back believing he's dead meat and he just shrugs it off and grabs you by the throat is not deadly and scary?

[Korbel]

Stabbing your mortal foe with a knife in the back believing he's dead meat and he just shrugs it off and grabs you by the throat is not deadly and scary?

Yup, it is. But I suppose it is the players who will be blessed with high scores. Or at least they will expect such a result when assaulting their foe. OK, for the first time they might be surprised, but later?
What I mean is... if your high Stamina does not provide you an AV 1:1, you must respect your opponents more, even if their Strength is not so great. Even a relatively unskilled woman with Strength 2 can ambush you and murder with a dagger. So in this scenario there are more opportunities for paranoia, suspicions, and all.

[EinBein]

Now don't continue the argument Korbel. It's fine, Sansa can kill the Mountain with her dagger in the current rules. That's what exploding dice are for. It's just not very likely