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Champion
 
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| Been trying to tie down some simple combat rules for Dark Times, that allow characters who want to play combatants to have a reasonable advantage, but avoiding things like damage calls (keep the atmosphere). Would appreciate any thoughts. Dark Times is a "realistic" low-fantasy event, probably having around 10 players, with combat being a fairly minor part of it. This is just a summary atm. So.... Health Charcters start with 4 Life point. If a limb is hit, then you lose that limb. If the chest, back or head are struck you lose 1 Life, are knocked out cold, and are on a countdown. Every 5 minutes you lose another 1 Life. At 0 Life you're dead. You may get floating hits from weapons skills, armour and maybe things like blessings and charms. These are depleted first. Once these are gone then you're going to take hits to the body. Weapons skills. All Skills have levels. (Untrained, Novice, Journeyman, Expert) Untrained means that you can use the weapon and do "single". Novice give you an extra floating hit for that combat. Journeyman gives you two, Expert gives you four If you swap weapons you get whatever extra hits that you'd get less whatever you'd used before i.e Bob has Journeyman Large Melee and Novice Small Melee. He has 2 additional hits from the armour he's wearing. He gets into a fight and draws his sword. So he now has 4 hits. He takes 2 hits before he accidentally drops his sword, so he pulls out a dagger. He would normally have one additional HP with his dagger, but has already used the extra ones he got whilst he was fighting with his sword, so doesnt gain any advantage There's no special calls (i.e Crush etc) and no damage calls (so no shouting SINGLE, SINGLE, SINGLE, SINGLE etc) Floating hits re-set at the end of the combat scene. i.e. once everyones stopped fighting Armour. Will reduce the likelihood of you being injured. Assume 7 locations (head, chest, back, 2 arms, 2 legs) More than 4 locs of the body covered with light armour (padded, furs leather etc) gives an additional 2 HPs. 4 or less than 4 = 1 HP More than 4 locs of the body covered with Medium armour (brigandine, chain) gives an additional 3 HPs. 4 or less than 4 = 2 HP More than 4 locs of the body covered with Heavy armour gives an additional 4 HPs. 4 or less than 4 = 3 HP Armour hit points re-set after each combat scene i.e. Dave has Journeyman Large Melee, and a long sleeved chain shirt (4 locations covered by Medium armour). So he has 2 Hits from his weapon skill and another 2 from the armour. So has 4 hits before he takes damage. Ranged Combat All bows and crossbows ignore weapon skills and armour. All hits from ranged weapons hit the body. Thrown Weapons Thrown weapons count as normal damage. Could say that you get the armour bonus, but not the weapon bonus but thats just too complicated. Thrown weapons could technically be deflected by someone who's skilled enough, so I'm not going to worry too much about it Healing Field Surgery will stop a critical characters countdown, and restore a injured location with bandages / splints etc. The number of bandages that can be applied to a location is dependent upon the surgeons Skill level (i.e Expert Field Surgery means that you can put 3 bandages on each loc, Novices can only put 1 on) Characters can remove 1 bandage and restore 1 Life point overnight Medicine will restore an additional 1 Life point overnight / cure poisons etc Staunching will halve a characters countdown. ( i.e instead of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, etc, its 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5)
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- Brighton Below : Organiser
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Wag
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Hey that’s any interesting idea that different weapons give you extra hits when used. Never seen that one before. A couple of rules ideas I’d think of using: - Trained fighters go by the one second rule. Untrained folks have to go by a 5 second rule. This means trained fighters are faster.
- Trained fighters can keep hitting the same location on a target, untrained fighters have to hit a different location on each hit. Slows down non fighters.
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Heroic Knight
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| When you say that your looking to write "simple" comabt rules, at what poitn are you looking for them to be simple? During the fight? In the the rules pre-ceeding thefight? Don't get me wrong I quite like some stuff in there but I'm not sure at what point you are intending them to be simple and so therefore not sure whether or not you have achieved what you want them to do if you see what I mean?
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and Minimeister
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Trez (5/24/2007)
"realistic" low-fantasy, around 10 players, with combat a fairly minor part.Well, if they know each other I suppose you could just go with freeform? If a limb is hit, then you lose that limb. If the chest, back or head are struck you lose 1 Life, are knocked out cold, and are on a countdown. Every 5 minutes you lose another 1 Life. At 0 Life you're dead.
I'd recommend that if you get hit in either leg you have to drop to the floor. Anything else is a bit Monty Python. You may get floating hits from weapons skills, armour and maybe things like blessings and charms. Floating hits? Like a sort of "Global" shield? Interesting. If you swap weapons you get whatever extra hits that you'd get less whatever you'd used before If combat is a minor part, simplify the game, have "melee" and don't bother with "large" or "small". Floating hits re-set at the end of the combat scene. i.e. once everyones stopped fighting 5+/7 / 4-/7 Locs split with light = 2/1, Medium = 3/2, Heavy = 4/3
Armour hit points re-set after each combat scene
i.e. Dave has Journeyman Large Melee, and a long sleeved chain shirt (4 locations covered by Medium armour). So he has 2 Hits from his weapon skill and another 2 from the armour. So has 4 hits before he takes damage. [quote] So floating, in fact, means global. Body hits locational, armour hits global. Cool. Sort of a "shields up effect"? Accepting that since it's a simplification of actual fighting (no physical contact etc) that where you hit someone doesn't matter that much? [quote]All hits from ranged weapons hit the body. You mean they automatically knock you out? Got a "protection from arrows" charm in there?  Thrown weapons count as normal damage. Could say that you get the armour bonus, but not the weapon bonus but thats just too complicated. Thrown weapons could technically be deflected by someone who's skilled enough, so I'm not going to worry too much about it You could also say that they teach you to dodge and lunge in weapons training. Either way, all counts. Field Surgery will stop a critical characters countdown, and restore a injured location with bandages / splints etc.
How long does this take? Or are you just going with r/p? (In which case consider the role of "staunch" below.) The number of bandages that can be applied to a location is dependent upon the surgeons Skill level (i.e Expert Field Surgery means that you can put 3 bandages on each loc, Novices can only put 1 on)
Seems like an unnecessary complication perhaps? If you get knocked out in a fight, you're not going to want to get into another one the same day! Perhaps roleplay "debilitation" meaning that you don't want to get into a fight and then you can, but probably collapse afterwards (wounds reopening, have a ref draw from a bag?) at the end of the scene? (That could be a bit "lower" then you want tho') Characters can remove 1 bandage and restore 1 Life point overnight Again, if you want a "low" feel than perhaps have medicine help remove the bandage? Medicine will restore an additional 1 Life point overnight / cure poisons etc Staunching will halve a characters countdown. ( i.e instead of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, etc, its 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, , 5, 5) How long does field surgery take is the important thing? Currently you have about 20 minutes of lying on the floor waiting to die unless someone picks you up. That's a fair old time (dunno how realistic it is). Also, would recommend that if someone goes for a deliberate "Coup" then you're dead, dead, dead.
There is only overconfidence and terror.
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Champion
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| Shelford - We thought that giving people extra hits just evens up the odds of them winning which probably should happen if they're trained. Kinda represents that theyd be better at parrying etc. And no damage calls Fatelf - They're reasonably simple in practice. You know that you've got 3 hits if you're using a sword, and 2 hits if you're using a staff. We wanted people who do want to play combat characters to have an advantage over non-combattants, so we needed to put enough in there to make it worth their while. Coff. Thanks for response. In reply..... 1) We did consider doing it a completely freeform system, but decided that it would be better to have something there, but keep it fairly simple 2) The "Floating Hits" thing is essentially to keep it simple. I don't like having to remember that I've got 3 hits to my body, 4 hits to left arm cos its armoured, 1 to my right cos its not and 2 to each leg. So we've done global hits but once they're done then its location damage 3) True. Currently we've got about 8 different weapon classes that could probably be condensed to about 4. Will fix that 4) Arrows if they hit you on the body will automatically take you down, as they did / do in real life. A well trained archer is lethal (Welsh bowmen anyone?) No protection from arrows other than a sheild. The drawback is that you have to actually hit the person in question, and you've got limited ammo 5) Field surgery should take at least a minute. Staunching wounds can be done by anyone (but not on yourself) but you can't do anything else apart from staunch, and if you stop then the counter goes back to normal speed 6) Yeah. Medicine is meant to be more like a "nursing" type thing, where is someone is bandaged up, then by checking / changing them, applying more salve etc then the healing process speeds up. Will put something in that the higher Medicine Skill the faster the healing 7) 20 minutes might be a bit long. Will chop that back I think 8) Yeah. Coup de grace will finish you immediately 5)
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- Brighton Below : Organiser
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Champion
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| How can you ever need more than one bandage on a location? One hit and it's broken. That is to say, one hit that really hits it, not counting the ones taken by the armour or parried/dodged due to a weapon skill.
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Champion
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| One "actual" hit and its broken, but Field Surgery will get it working again. However theres a number of times you can fix it which is limited by the number of bandages you can have on each location. So you get stabbed in the leg (once your floating hits have gone) and you lose your leg and can't walk on it. A Novice Surgeon comes over and fixes up your leg so you can walk again, and ties a bandage on to show its been tended to. You get stabbed later that day in the same leg (after all your floating hits have gone), so you lose the use of it again. The first Surgeon has only got Novice level, so can only apply one bandage to each location, and theres already a bandage on it (the one they applied earlier) so can't tend to it. A Journeyman Surgeon can do two bandages per loc so could apply another one, so you can walk again
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- Brighton Below : Organiser
- Serenity: Capt Tom Crowson
- RL: Simon / Trez
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and Minimeister
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| Just to clarify: What Shelford said about the weapon skills giving you extra hits. That is innovative and I will be intrigued to hear if you feel it gave you the effect you were looking for. Trez (5/25/2007)
2) The "Floating Hits" thing is essentially to keep it simple. I don't like having to remember that I've got 3 hits to my body, 4 hits to left arm cos its armoured, 1 to my right cos its not and 2 to each leg. So we've done global hits but once they're done then its location damage
3) True. Currently we've got about 8 different weapon classes that could probably be condensed to about 4. Will fix that
4) Arrows if they hit you on the body will automatically take you down, as they did / do in real life. A well trained archer | | | |