Some miscellaneous questions about combat

[hector]

The only game I can think of that separates manual dexterity and agility is HarnMaster, which for all that its dedication to absolute realism is interesting to read, I have trouble imagining this game in play. This game also has separate stats for eyesight, hearing and smell.

[dra]

So to recap... will power is the only realistic attribute decreasing effects of strain of combat (not actuall damage to organs, blood loss or wounds)

Congratulations on redefining the meaning of the word willpower.

Keeping up with what needs to be done during serious pain is not "controlling your thoughts and mind" according to you? Regardless, I used Will Power here because it is only attribute related to that in the system.

Because this

For example they pick up a tree trunk and hold it above head in freezing ocean

sounds as a combination of ST, SM, and WP.

True.

ROTFL
Low level of MoS meant low wound level, "no organ or arterie damage". Pure luck.

So, the shark rolled 1s, I stand corrected. [/quote]

So shark got like 7 succesess but teenager got like 5. Lucky as hell
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wm0ywsD9V88

Haven't played a single WFRP session, just some 40k ones. In my mind Warhammer Fantasy was and is a war game, not an rpg, but that's me.

If memory serves me right.

1st Edition:
Movement, Weapon Skill, Ballistic Skill, Strength, Toughness, Wounds, Initiative, Attacks, Dexterity, Leadership, Intelligence, Cool, Willpower, and Fellowship

2nd Edition:
Weapon Skill, Ballistic Skill, Strength, Toughness, Agility, Intelligence, Willpower, Fellowship

Yeah, right.

1st edition Dexterity is manual dexterity. Combat agility is weapons skill. All kind of fancy acrobatics were often rolled with Initiative

cyberpunk

Is that Cyberpunk2020? Which edition?

CP2020/Interlock:
Intelligence, Reflexes, Cool
Technical Ability
Luck, Attractiveness
Movement Allowance, Empathy

CP2020/Fuzion
Constitution, Strength, Body
Intelligence, Willpower, Presence (or Personality, or Cool)
Technique, Reflexes, Dexterity
Movement

So, only Fuzion fits the bill (Reflexes, Dexterity). Or does it? Is Reflexes Agility?

Reflexes responded to Agility in combat. Most rolls in combat were reflex related. In 1st edition there was truly no dexterity, most cases scenario tech was used for small , precise actions.

What do we have in BoB?

Agility is a measure of a character’s nimbleness, balance, and hand-eye coordination.

So we throw in same attribute for rock climbing, fighting, riding a horse as for picking locks, performing surgery or ledgermain. Which makes dudes who grow up swinging swords, than worked for a living swinging swords and than became famous for swinging some more swords ideal candidate for thievery. Can we live with that? Sure. Does it allow broader range of characters to create? Arguable. Does every petty thief has to be decent fighter as well? Not necessarily.

Speed represents the character’s ability to project fast-twitch muscle force and how quickly their body responds to and can carry out commands.

Btw. fast twitch muscles have nothing to do with definition. Difference between slow and fast twitch is when they are activated regarding Time Under Tension. So if you work out for about 40-60 seconds, mainly fast twitch will activate. When you prolong exercise most work will be taken by slow twitch.

What should be written here is ability to recruit as many muscle motor units as possible as well as speed of synapses running from brain > muscles. That is what makes body responds faster and move quicker.

[Korbel]

Do you expect Sansa Stark to do as much damage with a kitchen knife as a 1200lbs grizzly bear?

Of course not, her CP will be much smaller. But under some very favorable conditions, she will able to deal a very nasty wound. And this is fine. A dagger in your stomach can kill you as readily as a bear with his claws.

If you're still on the fence, should there be a difference between 100lbs Sansa punching you in the face and a 395lbs Hafthor Bjornson punching you in the face?

Definitely should be. Well, just do the same trick as with Stamina - make Large/Tough characters (Bjornsson, bears, ogres) deal one level higher wounds in melee, and Fragile (Sansa, goblins, scholars/wizards) - one lever lower. Simple.
And Bjornsson can take Striking emphasis (quite inlikely for Sansa)... so now his punches deal wounds which are three levels more severe. Good.
Most of the time, regural men will face regular men - which means: no modifiers to damage. Does it make the game less fun? Well, maybe? But at the same time you must focus more on getting higher Margins of Success (using better tactics) or maybe more suitable weaponry, not just relying on your high Strength to deal a game-changing wound. Which is what I like.

[dra]

Show me a statistic giving a significant chance of instant, fight-stopping death from a low-caliber wound to the foot. Otherwise, I'm going to have to assume those deaths are due to complications from the injury, and not the injury itself, which is entirely beyond the scope of this discussion.

Man, that was ages ago. Yet, if you are willing to wait couple of days, I will google some. At the moment I took too much on my plate.

If you're going to argue that strength impacts damage, then you can't also argue that the strength 1 or 2 person should be as deadly as the strength 5 character,

Which I never did.

nor can we argue that someone who is 90lbs can take as much physical damage as a three hundred pound linebacker.

Which I never did.

If you're going with absolute realism as the bar, (...)
Someone else is welcome to come up with such a system. We'll even host it on the forums somewhere as an optional rule. For my part, however, I'm not interested in designing or playing with such a table. We've got too many fiddly bits as it is.

Ultimate realism is not my goal.
If we have an unrealistic rule in some game, we gotta ask ourselves how that can be remedied. Take WFRP and dwarf for example. If some home-rule said we had to use some extra tables to check twenty other attributes, it was unnecessary slow-down. If there was a rule redefining entire damage system, it's too much hassle. If we can however devise a solution, that does not change a lot in game system, does not add require us to add more rules and exceptions to the existing one and yet make game more realistic - why not.

Example of dealing with WFRP naked dwarf problem was for example changing damage dice from d6 to d8 or d10 and multiply armor values by 2. It was however a lot deadlier changing balance a lot.

Another example was dealing with WFRP explosive d6 dice during damage calculation. Virtually every group that played for extended period of time had a story to share regarding that. The funniest I heard was one PC playing halfing argued with another PC, great dwaren warrior regarding who went where. Halfing got pissed off and threw a rock from a distance at dwarf. He knew this particular dwarf was very tough and had a lot of armor. But GM asked for damage resolution and halfing threw 6. Than he rerolled and rolled 6. And couple of more times so his final damage count was in high 30ties. Dwarf used destiny point in order not to die.

So solution?
Dice explode only once.
Simple. No clutter. No extra layers of rules.

That would be my goal in tros based games. Have something deadly enough but still running as smooth as possible. I believe we are on the same note here?

I'd say animals should have different rules than humans, that's correct and does not clutter game.

Your definition of "clutter" is different than mine. The more individual sets of rules I have to have in a game to represent a situation, the more cluttered it is going to be to me.[/quote]

Ok than, how are you going to present a fight with giant scorpion, giant snake with current set of locations?

For me clutter is something I need to look for in heat of the moment. For example tros rules of stealing initiative were kinda hard to memorize for somethng happening quite rarely. You take this attribute, take this of other player, add dice but only that and that amount. BoB solutions is way more ellegant.

Prepering a fight before a session and reading some extra rules regarding monster is not a clutter for me.

At a certain point, you have to define the scope of what you care to model. When you try to break down "everything that attributes can model" the chart comes up something like this
Right now everything in that left-most cluster is a function of either Agility, Speed, or a combination of one of those with something else. As it stands, I'm probably folding Speed into Agility again. Is it worth it to split Dexterity out of Agility? Coordination/control is either stat, which is not great design. Manual dexterity is obviously dexterity.. but everything else int hat is either agility, or a product of agility and some other stat. Is it worth it to add an attribute whose only use is "add to lockpicks, pickpockets, and maybe some trade skills?"

I agree with that. Key word being certain point. If we go to extremes, we can have 3 attributes: Physicality, Mentality, Social. If we go to other extremes, we have some useless attributes. Key point I think is what it brings to the game. Question is as you stated: is it worth adding attribute just for lockpicks, pickpocketing and trade skills? As a GM who likes rouge characters who and another layer they add to a game, I'd answer yes.

For a similar reason, I've been considering throwing Strength and Stamina into one stat as well simply because.. well. Look at the chart. Out of all the things listed, Strength represents exactly one of those - Physical strength. By quirk of the rules, however, it doesn't even govern that. You are required to have Stamina to use Strength for strength-based rolls anyway, but I digress.

And I'd agree. Stamina has a purpose if we have fatigue mechanics that are easy to implement and changing fights.

Something ridiculous that isn't how our game is written. It is beyond the scope of my power, influence, responsibility or even interest level to help you in situations where your GM may or may not do something that isn't how we've written the game to be played.. which brings us to:

Ergh.
I stated it does not relate to any game. Or any GM. Just general rpg problems. Not in order to talk about certain mechanics but in order to let another participant of discussion imagine an example.

[nemedeus]

*If people are wondering, my other 7 changes would be
1) Fix the Karma table to be closer to what I suggested in the advancement thread. Dying shouldn't get you more character points.
2) Add combat penalties to Weapons and Shields, just like there is for armor. Up to 2CP penalty for 2h Flails or Tower Shields.
3) Add a few paragraphs specifically dealing with how Social Skills work against players.
It is dealt with rarely in other games, so I think it needs to be elaborated better than what can fit in the sidebar on p40.
Also, the sidebar doesn't clearly explain other social skills like Command or Intrigue work and gives unclear ruling on how Edges/Flaws work.[...]
4) Increase cost of Wrap to 2. Wrap is much better than precision thrust (more likely to hit location and ignores Favoring) and costs less.
5) Disengage is too strong. It resests all 3 temporary disadvantages in combat (impact, reach control and initiative).
Add a positioning roll to "Corner" which prevents disengagement, and have disengage force you to roll white if engaged on in the next round.
6) Add a rule or maneuver that lets you ignore armor with a dagger in grapple by jamming it between the layers. Can only be thrust and has very high AC of 3.

I fully agree with all of these (and also I don't want Speed to be Merged with Agility).

It also doesn't explain what a players recourses are if they fail. Can I agree to a manipulation, and then not follow through as soon as I leave the room?

I think that last is easy: just use the Temptation mechanic. As in, if you follow through with it, you get a SA point, and you have to pay a SA point if you don't follow through with it.

I've expressed my overall dislike of FATE before, but that one mechanic is easily the greatest contribution to RPG design ever made, in my mind. It's just so versatile and applicable.

7) Fix beat. It doesn't work how it is advertised. Right now its only good for preempting and restraining not setting up followup attacks.
I don't have any suggestions for how it could be fixed though.

I know you have explained that somewhere else, but could you run that by me again?

[Benedict]

*If people are wondering, my other 7 changes would be
1) Fix the Karma table to be closer to what I suggested in the advancement thread. Dying shouldn't get you more character points.
2) Add combat penalties to Weapons and Shields, just like there is for armor. Up to 2CP penalty for 2h Flails or Tower Shields.
3) Add a few paragraphs specifically dealing with how Social Skills work against players.
It is dealt with rarely in other games, so I think it needs to be elaborated better than what can fit in the sidebar on p40.
Also, the sidebar doesn't clearly explain other social skills like Command or Intrigue work and gives unclear ruling on how Edges/Flaws work.[...]
4) Increase cost of Wrap to 2. Wrap is much better than precision thrust (more likely to hit location and ignores Favoring) and costs less.
5) Disengage is too strong. It resests all 3 temporary disadvantages in combat (impact, reach control and initiative).
Add a positioning roll to "Corner" which prevents disengagement, and have disengage force you to roll white if engaged on in the next round.
6) Add a rule or maneuver that lets you ignore armor with a dagger in grapple by jamming it between the layers. Can only be thrust and has very high AC of 3.

I fully agree with all of these (and also I don't want Speed to be Merged with Agility).

I second that.

Regarding point 6, I had an idea for quite some time.

Change the Emphasis of Daggers from

Reach Control: +4 CP instead of +2CP when you have Reach Control
to
Close Quarters: Gain +2CP when engaged in a grapple and you have Initiative, or when you have Reach Control. This stacks with Reach Control bonus.

That approach would require some tinkering with Spear Emphasis too, and I haven't thought anything yet.

[nemedeus]

I forgot to add, i think it would make sense to have an actual weight system that ties Strength into CP penalty.
It's more bookkeeping, true, but it's something i think makes sense, AND! the bookkeeping is fairly front-loaded.

So how would i implement that?

If your CP penalty exceeds your Strength attribute, it applies double.

As in, I think it makes sense to say that, if your weapon is too heavy for you to wield it, you can't really make up for that with technique alone (currently, proficiencies do exactly that, which i find... not a problem, but kinda weird).

[EinBein]

[...] Large/Tough [and] Fragile [...]

Korbel...imho, this is no good idea. It creates a mandatory edge to be taken by any serious fighter and a useless flaw that will never be taken by anyone because it doesn't really add to the character played...

If we have an unrealistic rule in some game, we gotta ask ourselves how that can be remedied.

Seriously? No. Not in a game of fantasy characters which draws heavy inspiration from fiction.

I would say yes, if the "unrealistic" rule was also a game breaker. But over the course of the last six pages, it was clarified that ...
(1.) the way damage is calculated was indeed consciously designed in order to balance 95% of all fights between humans, monsters and animals in a satisfactory way, ...
(2.) when the question of realism vs. playability had to be answered while writing the rules, the authors chose playability and ...
(3.) several adjustments have been proposed but were dismissed because they were either more complicated (required rules-exceptions), destroyed the balance for certain settings (shift of DR and AV) or harmed other parts of the game (for example character creation with Korbel's edges or the originally proposed halved Str/Sta).

Please correct me if I'm wrong or forgot promising proposals.

I think 33's nice list should be discussed in another thread...

[Korbel]

Korbel...imho, this is no good idea. It creates a mandatory edge to be taken by any serious fighter

Just like the way it's mandatory to take decent (at least) Strength and Stamina scores under current rules.
If this "wound reduction effect" is only available through investing in a Large Edge, you must make a decision. You need Tier 3 in Edges/Flaws to get a Major Edge. You need more money (armor is more expensive when you're big), so you probably want Tier 3 in Social Status (as 96 skillings from Low Freeman might not be enough to buy reasonable protection). So now your options for Stats, Profs and Skills are limited... Hey, but you probably wanted to take advantage of cheaper ST and SM - to get 5s in them, you need reasonably high Tier for this, otherwise your other statistics will suffer...
And your Large Edge makes you really stand out, under some circumstances it might be really annoying (being the preferred target, always drawing attention, etc).
So, is this Edge a no-brainer for every fighter? Maybe you would prefer to buy a better armor, take Striking emphasis and live your life as a regular-sized man?
Under the current rules, the Large Edge grants some really nice bonuses already - yet only one (I believe) player here on forums picked it. If I ever discover that it has become more popular after my alternative rules, I'll just tone its power down (ST and SM will not be cheap, no +2 CP bonus, or something). Simple.

[dra]

If we have an unrealistic rule in some game, we gotta ask ourselves how that can be remedied.

Seriously? No. Not in a game of fantasy characters which draws heavy inspiration from fiction.

Well, if that's the case...
Why did they fix wfrp naked dwarf and explosing d6 in next editions?
Why did they fix botch rules in wod in next editions?
Those mistakes didn't really break any gameplay. It was just aesthetics.


Please note, I wasn't the guy who picked up the topic again
Mearly responding.

[Benedict]

I believe we've already concluded that a line between playability vs realism must be drawn somewhere, and I also favor playability over realism.

On defense of the 100% percent hardcore realism simulator lovers out there though I have to say this.

So having STR 6 character swinging harded than STR 2 character is not unrealistic.
Having AG 6 chracter swingin faster and better than AG 2 character is not unrealistic.
Having STA 6 character breaking knifes with his abs is however

Qiqong Iron Throat Technique #1

youtu.be/PoIcUUnpdec

Qiqong Iron Throat Technique #2

youtu.be/4uUfnqMzdLo

I believe both of these displays are good examples of what a really high SM score achieved through hard training looks like, or to put it into context even more, the contribution of high SM to AV.

However the statement "Having STA 6 character breaking knifes with his abs is unrealistic" if it is to be taken into account with the previous two statements about STR and AGI it should be rephrased to "Having STA6 character suffering less from a knife wound than a STA2 character is realistic".

[Agamemnon]

Worth noting that part of the reason I tried to hold off on chewing too thoroughly on the subject of stamina reducing wounds is because we've been thinking about some changes to attributes and skills as a whole:
http://www.grandheresyforums.com/viewto ... ?f=4&t=262

[Benedict]

Now that's great news!