Determining when a damage passes through/continues on

[Manic Typist]

Reviewed the Vol 2 rules but for the life of me couldn't find it.

 

What rules/guidelines do you use for determining when an attack passes through a piece of terrain and continues on as a viable attack?

 

I have a PC with a 12d6 blast in a Heroic Fantasy game, so I figure there will be times when the cover that people expect to stop a musket ball doesn't stop that can of pain.

 

Going to go check the Breaking Objects rules now...

[mrinku]

Firstly, depends on the special effects and some modifiers. Most No Knockback attacks probably shouldn't damage anything except the original target since they're not meant to have any momentum. Other attacks are clearly only going to affect their stated target, no matter how powerful (For example, a disintegration spell). Others, like a cannonball, are likely to smash through weaker cover and hurt.

 

Assuming the situation allows for strikethrough damage, I think the rule of thumb is that the attack loses 1DC for each point of defense and body in the object destroyed. 

[DasBroot]

I think the rule is that the wall adds its PD/ED and body to the target behind it IF the attack is enough to overcome the wall in the first place.

 

You would think that would be somewhere under Wall in Champions Complete but it's actually under Barrier (which the text say function as regular walls... maybe it's repeated in 6e under Walls or taking damage?).

 

 

Attacks treat Barriers like real walls (see Breaking Things,

page 142), so attacks that fail to penetrate a Barrier don’t

continue beyond it or pass any damage through to targets on the

opposite side.

 

 

and

 

A Ranged attack that does enough damage to create a hole all the way through a Barrier continues on through the opposite side, and can hit and damage a target there. However, the damage of the attack is reduced by the defense + BODY of the Barrier – in effect, the Barrier provides the target with some extra defense.

 

 

So a mook (2 ed) hiding behind a 4 ed/4body wall will take nothing from an attack that inflicts 6 body and 18 stun (though the wall will) but will take 2 body and 26 stun from Captain Awesome's 12 body, 36 stun 12d6 energy blast (and that wall is toast). 

 

 

 

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

What gets more complicated is if you put people in the mix.  Does a 12d6 blast go right through a goblin if you kill him instantly, hitting the next one behind him?  Like mrinku notes, special effects and modifiers will answer some of that, but there really aren't rules for damage penetration on living subjects, only inanimate objects.

 

You could use the same rules: goblin with 6 body and 2 resistant PD takes 8 damage classes off that attack and the blast keeps going, dealing the remaining 4 to the next object in line.  It is technically realistic to do this (although not likely with a pistol such as in this Indiana Jones bit; Spielberg later used to much less comedic effect in Schindler's List with a rifle).

[mrinku]

As far as penetrating living targets... it's just not part of the original Champions superhero genre. Knockback handles the aspect of powerful blows that might affect a second target, but people remain intact.

 

And in realistic settings, it doesn't come up enough to be worth a regular rule IMHO. Bullets do all sorts of bizarre things once they enter a body and hit bones (even soft tissue will affect the trajectory...) and continuing on in a dead straight line is NOT guaranteed.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Bullets do all sorts of bizarre things once they enter a body and hit bones (even soft tissue will affect the trajectory...) and continuing on in a dead straight line is NOT guaranteed.

 

 

 

I agree, if you want a power that goes through targets and hits the next guy, buy area effect or autofire, something to represent that.

[mrinku]

Or the special effect of an area effect. One thing that could reasonably do it would be a self-propelled missile that's continuously adding thrust and not just losing energy when it hits things.

 

Worth noting too that even a 12d6 Blast isn't likely to do any significant strikethrough on a defense 2, 10 BODY target

[DasBroot]

Even less when you add the +10 body needed to kill said target (22 total to 'destroy'.  People are a LOT tougher than most walls in Hero ... they're actually tougher than most vehicles. A city bus (12.5 tons), a private jet, yacht, and any non-armored car all clock in at less than 22 body + pd (with most cars coming in at 17-18).

 

Mitigated in most games by 'faceless mooks die at 0 body unless the heroes actively try not to kill them' but not by the rule as written.

[mrinku]

Well, people ARE tough. It's FAR easier to smash though a typical wall than a body... and a matter of leverage. Cars have thin metal and glass walls and are actually very easy to overpenetrate, despite the total mass of the chassis (tip: hide behind the engine block).

 

But you are going to get very different results depending on effects. A Flamethower is going to set a car alight, and likely get stopped until it literally burns to a shell, while anti-tank rifle can pretty much ignore the car as far as shooting through one door and out the opposite one as far as energry loss goes (but it would provide soft cover).

[Vanguard]

Probably late to the party but 5th Ed Dark Champions, pg 192, has "Blowthrough"  rules in it.

[Greywind]

Common and dramatic sense trump.

[mrinku]

Probably late to the party but 5th Ed Dark Champions, pg 192, has "Blowthrough"  rules in it.

 

Yeah. Just had a look at that. Specifically for bullets - you'd need to be careful applying it in general.

[Manic Typist]

Thanks all. Great food for thought, and it looks like the Barrier rules had the most relevant RAW for the particular scenario I was envisioning.