This one might be a little wacky...

[tinman]

...but bear with me. Have you ever been frustrated when you roll and hit that hard-to-hit-someone really well, and then roll crappy damage? Try this:

 

First, take the alternate hit-roll rules whereby you roll OCV+3d6 and compare it to DCV+10. Next, modify them so that the target is now DCV+8.

 

Now take the number of dice of damage you would roll if you hit (figured as though a killing attack, so that 3 damage classes equals 1 die), and multiply that by the amount that you exceeded the target number by. So if you were shooting someone with a 3d6 RKA and you had OCV 7 and they had DCV 6 you would do it like this:

 

OCV+3d6 (rolls, gets 11) = 18

DCV+8 = 14

18 - 14 = 4

3d6 RKA = 3 dice

3 dice x 4 = 12 body

standard effect stun = x3

Attack does 12 body and 36 stun to the target (killing).

 

If you were using a 10d6 N punch and had OCV 5 and they had DCV 4 (but also dodged) you would do it like this:

 

OCV+3d6 (rolls, gets 12) = 17

DCV+8+3 (dodge) = 16

17 - 16 = 1

10d6 N = 3 dice +1

(3 dice x 1) + 1 = 4 body

standard effect body = x3

Attack does 12 stun and 4 body to the target (normal).

 

You could do the same thing with ECV-based attacks. The only part where it breaks down is for hit-only attacks (drains) and area effect attacks (unless you use the hit-roll vs. the hex, which would probably be appropriate). It makes it harder to rely on a high DEX or levels to keep from getting hit, but even if you are tagged chances are your high DCV will ensure that it's only a glancing blow.

 

It reduces an attack from two dice rolls to one, and it makes the amount of damage done a function of how well the attack roll was made. If both characters have equal CV and the attack would have succeeded by 1 under the standard system, this way it succeeds by three and results in average damage.

 

Thoughts?

[Sean Waters]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

So if you were shooting someone with a 3d6 RKA and you had OCV 7 and they had DCV 6 you would do it like this:

 

OCV+3d6 (rolls, gets 11) = 18

DCV+8 = 14

18 - 14 = 4

3d6 RKA = 3 dice

3 dice x 4 = 12 body

standard effect stun = x3

Attack does 12 body and 36 stun to the target (killing).

 

..so if you'd rolled 12 or better you'd be doing maximum damage? Seems a little excessive...

 

If you were using a 10d6 N punch and had OCV 5 and they had DCV 4 (but also dodged) you would do it like this:

 

OCV+3d6 (rolls, gets 12) = 17

DCV+8+3 (dodge) = 16

17 - 16 = 1

10d6 N = 3 dice +1

(3 dice x 1) + 1 = 4 body

standard effect body = x3

Attack does 12 stun and 4 body to the target (normal).

 

You are hitting where normally you'd miss, so a carrier attack, like a poison dart, would become far more effective.

 

It reduces an attack from two dice rolls to one, and it makes the amount of damage done a function of how well the attack roll was made. If both characters have equal CV and the attack would have succeeded by 1 under the standard system, this way it succeeds by three and results in average damage.

 

Thoughts?

 

I like the idea in principle. There's a diceless combat article in one of the Digital Heros with a similar idea. Trouble is you'd wind up with extreme damage far more often under this system than you would in reality: you're putting all damage on the 3d6 bell curve; in fact it is an even smaller curve than that, so I'm not sure how well it will work in practice. Have you tried it out?

[tinman]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

Good points. I haven't actually tried it yet, so I don't know how it plays.

[Sean Waters]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

Good points. I haven't actually tried it yet' date=' so I don't know how it plays.[/quote']

 

Give it a go, but I'd leave it at DCV+10. Does mean, if you need a 3 to hit, you're only ever going to do mimimun damage...

[tinman]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

Give it a go' date=' but I'd leave it at DCV+10. Does mean, if you need a 3 to hit, you're only ever going to do mimimun damage...[/quote']

 

 

I can try DCV+9 as a compromise as well.

 

(I never actually promised I'd stop testing weird house rules on my players...I merely nodded and smiled during the intervention...)

[Doc Democracy]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

Give it a go' date=' but I'd leave it at DCV+10. Does mean, if you need a 3 to hit, you're only ever going to do mimimun damage...[/quote']

 

Which is realistic in its own fashion - if you only manage to hit once in every 216 goes then it is very likely that you're never going to land much more than a glancing blow...

[BNakagawa]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

makes 2 point levels awfully attractive...

[BNakagawa]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

Makes martial artists uber. Totally nerfs bricks.

[tinman]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

makes 2 point levels awfully attractive...

 

Yikes, that never occurred to me. And my players LOVE levels...

[Black Rose]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

I agree that the 1/3 jumps might be a little too much, but what about this? Use the "flip-over" alternate to-hit rules; OCV+10-3d6=DCV hit (I find this somewhat more elegantthan both the standard method and the alternate mentioned above, and it lets you hide the exact DCV from your players). Take the total DC and divide by three (12d6 EB equals 4d6, 2d6 KA equals 1/2d6); this is now one "increment" (or chunk, or level, or whatever). If the to-hit roll is missed by one, you do one increment of damage. Make the roll exactly, and you do two increments; make the roll by one, and you do three increments. This covers the mild-decent-solid hit range.

 

Now, for every +2 by which you make the roll, you may add another increment to the roll. If this is too extreme (forex, if the OCV/DCV levels you're playing with are too high), make it every +3. If the dice totals you're playing with are larger than the 12-14 DC range, you might consider making the increments smaller; perhaps one-quarter or one-fifth.

[BNakagawa]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

The concept is fine - good rolls ought to generate better damage than bad rolls.

 

The problem is the implementation.

 

There is/was a game designed by TSR called SAGA in which cards replaced die rolls.

This, in and of itself presented some meta-game issues which I disliked. But that wasn't why SAGA sucked.

 

SAGA made one stat govern:

A: How much damage you did in a melee hit (damage classes)

B: How much damage you ignored from a hit (defenses)

C: How accurate you were with attacks. (OCV)

 

While another stat governed

A: How hard you were to hit. (DCV)

 

In SAGA, all stats were orthogonal, in that they cost the same. Problem is, a 20 STR guy with 10s for the rest of his stats was ALWAYS going to annihilate a DEX 20 guy with 10s for the rest of his stats...

 

What you are proposing accomplishes the same thing in reverse. Now, it is useless to be a high str, low CV type and overpowering to be the inverse.

 

If you want to give bonuses for good rolls, go for it. Don't penalize people for being on the wrong side of the CV curve. It's hard enough to be there already...

[tinman]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

I don't know that this would make it worse for low CV types. For example a roll under the normal system that would miss by 2 would hit for minimal damage this way. If you're a brick minimal damage might be quite serious against a martial artist.

 

The Martial Artist has a much higher chance of doing max damage, but then that might provide an excuse to do away with some of the martial artist designs whereby they do as much damage with a flesh and bone punch as a brick might do with a steel-hard fist that can lift 100 tons.

 

This way bricks with 12 DC's would be doing minimal damage to martial artists and martial artists with 6 DC's would be doing maximum damage to bricks. And you could have two martial artists fight and hit each other multiple times without the fight being over because their damage scale would be lower against each other.

 

But so far it's just theoretical. I need to run some sample combats between multiple types of combatants using both methods and see what happens.

 

The concept is fine - good rolls ought to generate better damage than bad rolls.

 

The problem is the implementation.

 

There is/was a game designed by TSR called SAGA in which cards replaced die rolls.

This, in and of itself presented some meta-game issues which I disliked. But that wasn't why SAGA sucked.

 

SAGA made one stat govern:

A: How much damage you did in a melee hit (damage classes)

B: How much damage you ignored from a hit (defenses)

C: How accurate you were with attacks. (OCV)

 

While another stat governed

A: How hard you were to hit. (DCV)

 

In SAGA, all stats were orthogonal, in that they cost the same. Problem is, a 20 STR guy with 10s for the rest of his stats was ALWAYS going to annihilate a DEX 20 guy with 10s for the rest of his stats...

 

What you are proposing accomplishes the same thing in reverse. Now, it is useless to be a high str, low CV type and overpowering to be the inverse.

 

If you want to give bonuses for good rolls, go for it. Don't penalize people for being on the wrong side of the CV curve. It's hard enough to be there already...

[Doc Democracy]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

This way bricks with 12 DC's would be doing minimal damage to martial artists and martial artists with 6 DC's would be doing maximum damage to bricks. And you could have two martial artists fight and hit each other multiple times without the fight being over because their damage scale would be lower against each other.

 

But so far it's just theoretical. I need to run some sample combats between multiple types of combatants using both methods and see what happens.

 

I have done something similar in the last few games I have run - the damage scales with success of the to-hit roll. It does allow me to have high CV martial artists with low defences go toe to toe with low CV, high damage high defence bricks.

 

To me it maintians the credibility of the classes.

 

It does also mean I have to pay much more attention to combat balance when planning the games. I haven't yet managed to work out a reasonable rule of X that I can hand out to the players so I put in a lot of work to get what I want.

 

 

Doc

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

So, my Entangle - Takes no Damage becomes even MORE useful since the 0 DCV target will not only be hit every time, but will take max damage.

 

The problem with any "damage depends on how much you hit by" approach is that it adds even more benefit to having a high OCV or DCV, and oenalizes low CV's eve more. Under your system, why should I buy +2d6 EB for 10 points when, for the same price, I could buy +5 OCV with EB, and pay no END?

 

Your system is not, IMO, unworkable. However, it creates serious ripple effects which will change the relative values of many abilities in the system (always a risk in tinkering with the system).

[Doc Democracy]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

So' date=' my Entangle - Takes no Damage becomes even MORE useful since the 0 DCV target will not only be hit every time, but will take max damage.[/quote']

 

Wouldn't you expect that?

 

Would you expect to do more damage to a man standing up ready to fight you or that same man tied to a chair where you can simply hit him as hard as possible?

 

The system reflects that.

 

The problem with any "damage depends on how much you hit by" approach is that it adds even more benefit to having a high OCV or DCV, and oenalizes low CV's eve more. Under your system, why should I buy +2d6 EB for 10 points when, for the same price, I could buy +5 OCV with EB, and pay no END?

 

Your system is not, IMO, unworkable. However, it creates serious ripple effects which will change the relative values of many abilities in the system (always a risk in tinkering with the system).

 

Yeah - there is a definite need for a more careful eye on balance - one reason I was trying to come up with a good Rule of X. Under his system the advantage of the extra damage is that static objects will feel the benefit of that damage.

 

It also releases the dice from the tyranny of probability - the greater the number of dice you roll the less chance of seeing extreme results.

[Agent X]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

Wouldn't you expect that?

 

Would you expect to do more damage to a man standing up ready to fight you or that same man tied to a chair where you can simply hit him as hard as possible?

 

The system reflects that.

 

 

 

Yeah - there is a definite need for a more careful eye on balance - one reason I was trying to come up with a good Rule of X. Under his system the advantage of the extra damage is that static objects will feel the benefit of that damage.

 

It also releases the dice from the tyranny of probability - the greater the number of dice you roll the less chance of seeing extreme results.

The way the regular rules reflect being able to do more damage to a guy in an entangle is that you can haymaker. You don't need to spread an attack. You can put combat skill levels into damage classes.

 

I think the concept can work. I think it's too much work to alter the Hero System though. If you're going that far, you might as well build an independent game system.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

Yeah - there is a definite need for a more careful eye on balance - one reason I was trying to come up with a good Rule of X. Under his system the advantage of the extra damage is that static objects will feel the benefit of that damage.

 

YIKES! I hadn't thought of inanimate objects. Given a Force Wall, Entangle or vault door is pretty much always DCV 0 (if not worse), will this system mean all shots to escape an Entangle or burst through a barrier will do max damage?

[tinman]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

YIKES! I hadn't thought of inanimate objects. Given a Force Wall' date=' Entangle or vault door is pretty much always DCV 0 (if not worse), will this system mean all shots to escape an Entangle or burst through a barrier will do max damage?[/quote']

 

Hmmm. I like the idea of being able to do more damage to sundry set pieces (vaults, walls, etc.) but the effects on Entangle and Force Wall bear thinking about.

[BNakagawa]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

And an Area of Effect NND is really, really cost-effective...

[tinman]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

And an Area of Effect NND is really' date=' really cost-effective...[/quote']

 

It might be better to Standard Effect powers which don't target a specific individual. Of course that has it's own negative aspects...

[BobGreenwade]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

You could always take a look at the Diceless Hero article in Digital Hero #1. The focus is on no-dice (or nearly no-dice) games, but a variant on the system makes the amount of damage done proportional to the to-hit roll. It should be an easier starting point than what's being shown here.

 

Trust me -- the author knows what he's talking about. He's brilliant, and a certified HERO System guru.

 

He also has some swampland in northern New Mexico you might be interested in.

[tinman]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

You could always take a look at the Diceless Hero article in Digital Hero #1. The focus is on no-dice (or nearly no-dice) games, but a variant on the system makes the amount of damage done proportional to the to-hit roll. It should be an easier starting point than what's being shown here.

 

Trust me -- the author knows what he's talking about. He's brilliant, and a certified HERO System guru.

 

He also has some swampland in northern New Mexico you might be interested in.

 

I'll check it out, thanks.

 

New Mexico, eh? That sounds mighty tempting from where I sit at this time of year...anything's better than that wooded glen I bought in Inuvik last year...

[Doc Democracy]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

It might be better to Standard Effect powers which don't target a specific individual. Of course that has it's own negative aspects...

 

Yeah - that was my take. For autofire as well - seeing that there is already a mechanic using the to hit roll for that.

 

 

Doc

[BNakagawa]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

You could always take a look at the Diceless Hero article in Digital Hero #1. The focus is on no-dice (or nearly no-dice) games, but a variant on the system makes the amount of damage done proportional to the to-hit roll. It should be an easier starting point than what's being shown here.

 

Trust me -- the author knows what he's talking about. He's brilliant, and a certified HERO System guru.

 

He also has some swampland in northern New Mexico you might be interested in.

 

So the better your attack roll, the worse the damage?

 

ugh.

[Doc Democracy]

Re: This one might be a little wacky...

 

So the better your attack roll, the worse the damage?

 

ugh.

 

I don't understand what the problem with that is.

 

Isn't it simply an abstract way of doing what the hit location chart does? Shouldn't accuracy be rewarded in some way when the hit location chart isn't being used?

 

As I said it means in my games I have martial artists happy to go about with very low damage attacks as they know that against the slower moving bricks they will often be delivering maximum damage to their opponents and thus still be competitive.

 

I also have slow moving bricks happy to know that they can load up their damage to do huge amounts to inanimate objects and even if they're only getting glancing blows against the martial artists it is a significant amount relatively. They knew that the martial artists would not possess heavy defences.

 

For the first time I was getting characters submitted that fit the stereotypes. I got light, fast moving martial artists that could not punch out a vault door but were still competitive toe to toe with slower, mega defence monsters that could topple buildings.

 

More work for me but worth it in terms of genre simulation.

 

 

Doc