Hitting Versus Damage

[Guest taxboy4]

Hitting versus Damage

 

Got to say the thing I really loved about Role Master was the combat system's take that the better you hit the more damage you did.

 

I GM but it grots me off in Fantasy Hero you can shoot someone with a bow and roll a 5 to hit but then roll 1 point of Body and it bounces off. Sure using aimed shots can help but if you hit really well - esp in hand to hand shouldn't the damage be linked.

 

Anybody modified the rules to do this?

 

I tried a minimum damage table by Damage Class based on how much you exceeded your level to hit (PCS only - else too dangerous for the PC's!!!)

 

Thoughts and / or commets?

[arcady]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

Take the maximum damage of any attack, and figure out half of that, one fourth, and three fourths.

 

If an attack hits use one of those four values depending on how much it hit by.

 

If you want damage to continue to be about as effective as it would be without this system, you'd have to do a lot of work to make half damage the most common entry and the fourthings to be about equally common to each other.

 

If you don't care about damage being the same, because however you adjust it it will adjust for everybody, just do something simple - make the roll and get one fourth, make it by two and get half, make it by four and get three fourths, make it by six or more and get full.

[Turin]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

In my campaign I increase the damage dealt by 1DC for every 3 points that a attack hits by. So if you need an 11 to hit and roll a 5 that would increase the damage of the attack by 2DCs. It seems to work fine.

 

In my friends campaign he has you increase the DC by 1 for rolling half of what you needed to hit and by 1 more DC for every point under half rolled. So in the above example with a roll of 5 against a target of 11 you would increase the damage dealt by 2DCs. If the character rolled a 4 it would be increased to 3DCs and 4DCs for a roll of 3. This also works well so far in his campaign.

[lazarus]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

Alternity had a nice way of dealing with this - Marginal, Ordinary, Good, Awesome (MOGA). Basically, each type of success did something better than the last. Marginal is also failure. Ordinary is just under the target. Good is under half. Awesome is under a quarter.

 

This could probably be easily applied to HERO.

 

Laz

[Yesman]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

I had a house rule for dealing with this kind of thing in a GURPS game I ran a few years ago. The systems are close enough for it to work with a little tweaking.

 

pretty much every attack die 'rolled' the amount the attack was made by +1 (with a maximum of 6 on each die of course...).

 

example: Thrax Axor hits Dirk the Dark with his mighty hammer (2d6 damage). Thrax has an OCV of 5, Dirk's DCV is 3. Thrax needs a 13 or less to hit Dirk. Thrax's player rolls an 11, beating the roll he needs by 2 points. His mighty hammer does 6 points of damage.

 

There's more to it under the Tim's house rules for damage at http://www.smarmybastard.com/spellslingers/rules/combat.htm if the server's up...

 

If the server isn't here's pretty much all of it:

 

Basically the damage done by called shots will be dictated by how well the governing combat skill was made. The die rolls will be replaced with a variable directly related to the amount of success in the attack. The formula breaks down as follows:

 

D=((S+1)*A)+M

 

Key:

D = Damage of the attack.

S = Success, or the amount by which the skill involved in the attack was made.

A = Amount of dice involved in the damage of the attack.

M = Modifiers to the dice involved in damage.

 

Notes:

 

1. If S is a value higher than 5, S should be amended to 5 for purposes of this formula.

2. To avoid confusion, dice with multipliers should be converted to a straight number of dice.

3. The success of the skill should be figured after all applicable modifiers are applied.

 

This only applies to called shots. The following situations are examples of when an attack is random enough to necessitate randomly rolled damage.

 

Excluded attacks:

 

1. Any attack rolled randomly for hit location.

2. Called shots that miss, but hit some other location.

3. Burst fire.

4. Wild Swings.

5. Area affect attacks not centered on the victim.

 

To simplify things, in any aimed attack (read called shot) the amount rolled on all dice is considered to be the amount by which the attack was made plus one, up to six points of damage per die. Normal pluses and minuses to damage are handled the same way they always were, as are all modifiers for the type of wound.

[Gunrunner]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

I also have similar house rules as the above posters. I however don't have a "maximum damage" for players, since it would be practically impossible for a thief with average strength and a knife to kill, even with a well-placed stab.

[Old Man]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

So what does all of this do to the hit location chart?

[Guest taxboy4]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

I also have similar house rules as the above posters. I however don't have a "maximum damage" for players' date=' since it would be practically impossible for a thief with average strength and a knife to kill, even with a well-placed stab.[/quote']

 

Hmmm, well I'll use a bowie knife and i bet i could kill a person easy enough

 

[Legendsmiths]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

Use critical hits. If you make your roll by less than half (i.e. a 13- = 6 for a crit), you do max damage. If you needed a 5 to hit the target, then possibly rolling a 1 on damage seems an acceptable outcome.

 

You could also use a min damage threshold. Each 2 pts of success steps it up 25%: 13- to hit, roll a 11 = 25% min, 9 50% min, 7 75% min. You still roll, but unless you get greater than the minimum you do the minimum. On a 2d6K attack, 25% would be 3, 50% 6, 75% 9.

 

Combine the 2 and you got it made.

 

Also, I allow STR or Skill to modify beyond double DC, but the damage max doesn't change. A STR 20 character with 2 CSLs put to damage using a knife (STR min 5 and 1/2d6K) would do 2d6K damage, but with a max of 7 (1d6+1 is the max for a knife). This makes sense to me that the man logically is so strong that he rarely if ever does not apply the knife in the most effective manner possible. You could also allow this for bowman, even though STR does not normally increase bow damage. So a STR 20 bowman using a STR 10 bow (at 1d6+1) would roll 2d6 damage with a max of 7. You could also allow the purchase of STR, only for increasing damage probability -2, does not affect figured characterisitcs -1/2, reduced END 0 END +1/2 = 2 pts for +5 STR. To keep things simple then for 2 pts you can add +1 DC only for purposes of increasing damage probability, but not actual damage or damage max regardless of things like AP, PEN, or any other advantages.

 

As for the backstab issue: a stilletto does 1d6+1K with Skill/STR/Haymaker (it only takes 2 bonuses in DC to make this happen). Attacking from surprise out of combat puts the target at 1/2 DCV and 1/2 Hit Location. They also take x2 STUN. If they are unarmored, they are pretty much toast. Targeting the head or vitals is then only -4 and they are at 1/2 DCV which means the backstabber will most likely succeed. Assuming a hit, the target will be taking 10x STUN, averaging at 45 pts (1d6+1) and 2x BODY, averaging at 9. That will take a normal man and effectively kill him on an AVERAGE roll. Add Deadly Blow for 7 points (backstab), now he is doing an extra 1d6K, or +2 DC if AP. With the attack above now he is doing 2d6K AP (stilletto), averaging 70 STUN and 14 BODY. If the target has 6 PD and 6 DEF, he stops 3 (AP), taking 7 - 3 = 4 *2 = 8 BODY and stops 6 STUN (AP), taking 70 - 6 = 64 STUN. Even a tough guy with 40 STUN is no recovering on a minute by minute basis only, but taking 2d6 bleeding every TURN. I'm not sure what your definition of dead is, but that armored high STUN fighter just got taken out of the fight, and the normal man is 2 BODY away from death, suffering 3d6 Bleeding per turn and in a coma. Should they be dead outright? On average no. Maxing out without Deadly Blow gets the same result as an average Deadly Blow; maxing out with Deadly Blow will kill just about anything, doing 120 STUN and 24 BODY. That works for me.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

Another alternative which would not make combat more lethal overall would be to allow players to buy "Deadly Blow - only if to hit made by at least half".

 

The problem with any form of critiucal hit system is it eventually comes back to bite the PC's in the rear. PC's have more combat rolls made against them than any 100 adversaries.

 

It's funny how fats "What a gyp! I rolled a 5 and my attack bounced off the Orc's shoulder plate" turns into "What do you mean, the Orc rolled a 5 and hit my character for max damage in the head? Why are you looking up the impairing/disabling wounds rules?"

 

Higher riskl to your opponents also means higher risk to your characters (unless we want to just heap advantages at the feet of the PC's with no balance for the opposition). Set Risk at the level desired for the game and proceed.

[Legendsmiths]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

In our setting, we do not recommend that scrubs (simple common regular ugly badguy) get critical hits. We don't even allow them to make hit location rolls. Unless a called/placed shot is made, it is always a chest shot. This allows players to "game" the armor system, and just wear heavy armor on their chest. It also makes combat move extremely fast.

 

SCRUBs

Do not recover

Do not get crits (as an optional rule on a crit they get to roll location and normal damage but no max damage)

Do not roll hit location

Do not have hit location rolled against them

 

So, the Orc Chieftan and Shaman would be Villains, but the orc guards would be SCRUBs.

 

I do like Deadly Blow with the only on crits limitation. Although I think Deadly Blow is too cheap relative to martial arts DCs. In our campaign we recommend a cost of 2/4/6 per DC (with martial arts DCs being 4) for the same levels (4/7/10) of Deadly Blow. It keeps things a little more manageable, since for 14 points someone can be +2d6K with a weapon type or circumstance (e.g. backstab) which seems too cheap for that much damage. Only on a crit would essentially halve the cost of Deadly Blow, making it 1/2/3 per DC.

[Yesman]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

So what does all of this do to the hit location chart?

 

I wouldn't think that determining damage from skill would have to alter the hit location rules any.

 

It does open up a nasty combo for sneak attacks though. In the last FH campaign I ran, I used the made-by-less-than-half-does-max-damage rule. One of the characters developed an OCV of 8 (I think) with crossbows, and also bought off 8 points worth of hit location penalties with the crossbow. Most of the enemies they fought had CV's around 3-5, which became 1-2 when unaware of incoming attack (happened a lot, the party put great emphasis on stealth and recon). The result was about 1 in 4 opening-shots doing 26 points of body and 260 stun (x5 for the head, x2 for a surprise attack), with the other 3 in 4 averaging around 16 bod and 160 stun. Granted this was with suprise, no other penalties to OCV, and takes no armor into account.

 

It got to the point where I'd feel bad for any sentry-types that a scenario might call for.

[Legendsmiths]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

How did you get to 26 BODY? That seems gratuitous.Penalty skill levels to offset hit location are a good idea, but I don't allow more than 4 PSLs for anything.

[Yesman]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

ooops, you are correct. The medium crossbow did 2d6-1, not 2d6+1. Head shot damages would've been 22 bod, 220 stun on a surprise critical; and 12 bod 120 stun on a normal surprise head shot.

 

oh, limiting the PSLs to 4 wouldn't have helped in the above example, all penalties for hit location are halved in a surprise situation as well..... Oddly enough, only one other character bought PSLs for hit location and that character didn't buy more than 3 or 4.

 

It is a bit gross, however the campaign had run for a year or so by the time that character had the OCV and PSLs of the earlier post. And the character's were meant to be rather fearsome Special Ops troops for an elite mercenary company... and situations were rarely as optimal as that last post.

 

as an asside here's how the character looked at the start of the campaign:

http://www.smarmybastard.com/fshero/kfront.pdf and http://www.smarmybastard.com/fshero/kback.pdf

here's how he looked 18-20 months later (I can't remember when we updated it last): http://www.smarmybastard.com/Lion/characters/RobinKerr.HTML

[Legendsmiths]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

Unless you are using a house rule, only STUN is x2 during surprise, not bod. So, 11 bod, 110 stun is the result of a surprise critical. Still a lot of stun, but not 220. Body would be doubled due to head shot, separate from STUNx, and only after armor. Assuming a massive helm of 11 DEF, the target would take 0 Body but still take 99 STUN, minus his personal PD. You were effectively applying a x4 STUNx for surprise. Too much.

[Yesman]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

Oops again, I confused myself. The body x2 is from the head shot location, not surprise. In all of the above examples I gave the body should have been 22 (not counting armor of course, which would subtract from body before the x2 multiplier).

 

Double oops, I was applying the head shot mod to bod before the stun multiple... The damage on a surprise head shot critical should only be 22 bod and 110 stun (assuming again, no rpd). I don't think I actually made that mistake when running the game... but it's been awhile and I'm rusty.

 

moral of the story: "helmets save lives".

 

maybe we should start a new thread on this? I'm feelin' we might be drifting from the original topic a little bit.

[NuSoardGraphite]

Re: Hitting Versus Damage

 

Using the Critical Hit rules (from the UMA) definately remove the "I rolled a 3 to hit....but a 2 for damage. Damn!" problem.

 

Remember that no matter what the characters "to hit" number that a roll of "3" (all 1's) to hit is ALWAYS a Critical Hit.

 

In additon to maximum damage, I give bonuses for a natural "3" on the To-hit roll, depending on the weapon/attack and situation. My default is a free AP effect (1/2 Def) but the effects could vary from additional Stun Multiplier (normally for blunt weapons like Maces or Hammers) to specific impairment (blindness, increased bleeding etc). The options are almost limitless.

 

Against SCRUBs, a critical hit always equals Instant Death no matter the weapon/attack used and type of armor they're wearing. Thats the disadvantage of going into combat wearing a "red shirt".