Knockback "realistic"?

[SSgt Baloo]

In another thread there is a debate over how unrealistic knockback is. Setting aside the notion that knockback is as realistic as someone hoisting a full-sized car and then throwing it any distance at all, I can see where some folks don't like knockback. Personally, I've only used Knockback in superhero campaigns. It just doesn't belong anywhere else (except in a tooniverse, where it should be even more unrealistic).

 

In my own opinion (and in my own campaigns) attacks which do not impart kinetic energy to the target (lasers, heat rays, etc.) did not do knockback. Killing attacks that rely on making small holes in the target (arrows, cmall-caliber bullets, stillettos, piercing swords: epee, foil, rapier for example) would do less KB than a normal attack.

 

If you agree that knockback needs "fixing" how would you do it? Would it take into consideration that heavy objects (or heroes) striking lighter objects might impart more motion than the reverse? Tell me. How would you reconstruct knockback?

[ghost-angel]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

Since I'm pretty sure my comment set off the "discussion"....

 

I wouldn't.

 

Knockback works great as is. If you're going to use it, and you're going to use Comic Book Physics - we have people shooting laser beams out of their eyes and insanely power-efficient and form-fitting armor than can fly - then Use Comic Book Physics.

 

Knockback, by nature, isn't realistic, to begin with as it's handled. Unless you're going to go into the description of how the initiating force also absorbs all that energy without themselves getting knockedback a couple meters.

 

Mechanically Knockback works fine, it simulates Comic Book Physics and it's easy to manage in game.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

For starters its frequently overlooked that Knockback is an Optional Rule, and also completely under the GM's discretion. That means that GM's have final say on what does and does not cause Knockback.

 

Also even if KB is used the GM can also decrease or increase KB by a variety of factors. Several factors are predefined as doing less KB (such as Killing Attacks) or more KB (attacks vs. people not on a stable surface), but the GM can add to (or remove from) that list if they see fit.

 

 

As far as it only being appropriate to supers or toons, I also disagree with that. I've used it to good effect in numerous different genre's. It naturally scales based on the amount of damage dice being rolled; if you find yourself with big dice effect attacks, then you are already not playing a "realistic" game and KB if used merely reflects that.

 

I prefer KB over Knocked Down (though I've used both and continue to use either one in specific campaigns based upon what seems a better fit), as I find it more fun and easier to deal with. It's an interesting and useful aspect of the mechanics and its a good option to employ in settings where you want dynamic combats.

 

YMMV, etc.

[Doc]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

As far as it only being appropriate to supers or toons' date=' I also disagree with that. I've used it to good effect in numerous different genre's. It naturally scales based on the amount of damage dice being rolled; if you find yourself with big dice effect attacks, then you are already not playing a "realistic" game and KB if used merely reflects that. [/quote']

 

I also agree with KS about this. My first Hero System game of all was a heroic type, manga style martial art one wich used knockback instead of knock down. First, it was more fun and second, it was clearly appropriate even though characters were relatively normal (but still, quite powerfull).

 

I'm not sure if I wrote that correctly or if it is clear enough. Sorry, english isn't my first language and it's been a hard work day.

[braincraft]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

If the attack 'logically' wouldn't do KB, buy it with the Limitation "No KB".

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

If the attack 'logically' wouldn't do KB' date=' buy it with the Limitation "No KB".[/quote']

 

It is important, however, to differentiate 'doesn't do KB' and 'won't do KB to a person'. An attack that does no KB exerts no pressure whatsoever. A pistol shot isn't likely to send someone flying, but it can press buttons and knock over tin cans (for example).

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

I expressed myself poorly in the OP. Most of the "but..." examples given where KB is used in a non-super, non-toon setting are applications I can agree with. Heck, in some western settings, knockback is almost mandatory.

 

I was just asking how you'd modify KB if you thought it was necessary to do so.

[Maur]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

What westerns use knockback? All the ones I've seen would use something more akin to knockdown than knockback. Guy charging at our hero gets shot by his .44 and his feet keep going forward while his torso comes to a halt... lands flat on his back...

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

I expressed myself poorly in the OP. Most of the "but..." examples given where KB is used in a non-super, non-toon setting are applications I can agree with. Heck, in some western settings, knockback is almost mandatory.

 

I was just asking how you'd modify KB if you thought it was necessary to do so.

 

Well...like anything else it depends on what your desired result would be. A mechanic is just a means of expressing an intent and accordingly it is difficult to posit a mechanic minus such an intent.

 

What exactly is it that you want KB to do or not do?

[Kenn]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

What westerns use knockback? All the ones I've seen would use something more akin to knockdown than knockback. Guy charging at our hero gets shot by his .44 and his feet keep going forward while his torso comes to a halt... lands flat on his back...

 

The kind that have saloon brawls where it possible for someone to get punched solidly and get knocked out the double swinging doors. The relatively low number of DCs of the fighters (2 DC - 4 DC), and the typical roll s on 2d6 will keep knockback from occurring often, but the occasional good roll will send someone back a game inch or so.

 

I've used knockback in Fantasy Hero more than I've used knockdown. The weapon damage, and the KB rules for killing attacks kept people from going flying, but an ogre with a club would send people flying.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

What westerns use knockback? All the ones I've seen would use something more akin to knockdown than knockback. Guy charging at our hero gets shot by his .44 and his feet keep going forward while his torso comes to a halt... lands flat on his back...

 

Almost all of them?

 

Knockback doesn't have to mean "lifted off his feet and launched backwards" it could mean "blasted so hard he staggers backwards a good ways."

 

Find a Spaghetti-Western where the guy nearly tosses himself out a window or doorway after being shot. That's an inch of Knockback.

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

Well...like anything else it depends on what your desired result would be. A mechanic is just a means of expressing an intent and accordingly it is difficult to posit a mechanic minus such an intent.

 

What exactly is it that you want KB to do or not do?

 

Actually, I'm fairly satisfied with knockback as it is. I just noticed in the other thread that a lot of folks had some interesting (if somewhat complex) takes on alternative ways to implement knockback. I started this thread mainly to improve the signal-to-noise ratio in favor of the knockback discussion.

[archermoo]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

It is important' date=' however, to differentiate 'doesn't do KB' and 'won't do KB to a person'. An attack that does no KB exerts no pressure whatsoever. A pistol shot isn't likely to send someone flying, but it can press buttons and knock over tin cans (for example).[/quote']

 

Well, the actual rule says "In mast cases". So it depends on the SFX of the attack, and what the player and Ref agree to.

[Vondy]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

Its an optional rule, and genre dependent, so I don't have a problem with it.

 

What's more, knockback is really an option for superheroic games where its genre appropriate and realism isn't a big concern.

 

As for knockback being appropriate to settings like westerns, I think that's interpretive.

 

Knockdown can still result in someone going back a few feet (just not hexes), which is sufficient to knock someone through saloon doors, or out a window with a shot, etc.

 

Hexes are fairly abstract and where exactly you are standing in the hex, or whether you and your opponent are sharing a hex, or are standing on the edge of adjacent hexes is open to interpretation.

 

As such, most cinematic effects that aren't from hiwire fu flicks or superheroic genre norms, could also be simulated with knockdown.

 

The exception might be explosives, but since its an optional rule, knockback can be applied as needed.

 

I think its a matter of taste.

[Maur]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

Almost all of them?

 

Knockback doesn't have to mean "lifted off his feet and launched backwards" it could mean "blasted so hard he staggers backwards a good ways."

 

Find a Spaghetti-Western where the guy nearly tosses himself out a window or doorway after being shot. That's an inch of Knockback.

I guess I saw the guys falling through windows or out the doors as the effect of a stunned person more than an idea of knockback. Knockback sounds more like what Supes does when he slugs a guy and he skids back into/through a wall and not under his own power.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

Knockback, like most of the Hero System, is interpretive once you leave the Mechanical Level and apply it to a game.

 

Like "Legsweep" doesn't have to be a legsweep, it could just as easily be a hard shove to the ground.

 

Knockback could be someone flying backwards but otherwise conscious and aware (a superhero who isn't Stunned but still Knocked Back), or someone stumbling backwards through a door, off a porch, and into the street dead (a gunslinger shot dead by Clint Eastwood).

[MorpheousXO]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

In the vein of other ways of doing knockback (and a note, I've not checked out the other thread so I dunno if this was mentioned), I'll take a hit from Exalted (this is where I've seen it done this way) and say that instead of taking damage based off of how far you've been thrown back, it's instead based on how far you should have been thrown back but wasn't due to the obstacle, assuming I have knockback do damage at all outside of landing on spiky things!

 

example: get a knockback of 10", but a solid wall of some sort is 3" behind you, instead of taking damage as for travelling 3", you'd take damage for 7" because the energy that would have carried you that far doesn't break through the wall, thus you get the ouchies.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

In the vein of other ways of doing knockback (and a note, I've not checked out the other thread so I dunno if this was mentioned), I'll take a hit from Exalted (this is where I've seen it done this way) and say that instead of taking damage based off of how far you've been thrown back, it's instead based on how far you should have been thrown back but wasn't due to the obstacle, assuming I have knockback do damage at all outside of landing on spiky things!

 

example: get a knockback of 10", but a solid wall of some sort is 3" behind you, instead of taking damage as for travelling 3", you'd take damage for 7" because the energy that would have carried you that far doesn't break through the wall, thus you get the ouchies.

 

You should read Knockback Damage again.

 

You take 1D6 for every inch you've been Knocked Back, not every inch you've traveled due to Knockback.

 

If you get Knocked Back 10" and 3" later his a wall you take 10D6 Normal Damage. There is a cap on the Damage = BODY + DEF of the object hit, and then you keep going if you have more inches (subtracting the BODY+DEF from the total Inches Knocked Back).

 

And I checked it was the same in 4E. Steve even used the same example in 5E that was used in 4E.

[archermoo]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

You should read Knockback Damage again.

 

You take 1D6 for every inch you've been Knocked Back, not every inch you've traveled due to Knockback.

 

If you get Knocked Back 10" and 3" later his a wall you take 10D6 Normal Damage. There is a cap on the Damage = BODY + DEF of the object hit, and then you keep going if you have more inches (subtracting the BODY+DEF from the total Inches Knocked Back).

 

And I checked it was the same in 4E. Steve even used the same example in 5E that was used in 4E.

 

As anote, my read on what MorpheousXO wrote wasn't that he thinks you should take 10d6 if you get knocked back for 10" but hit an obstacle in 3". But that you should take 7d6 of damage (10" KB - 3" already travelled).

 

Personally I prefer the Hero way.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

OK, yeah. Had to read it a few times to get that. I see it now.

[Kdansky]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

By the way: "No Knockback (-1/4)" is really chaotic in pricing. If you have 2d6 KA (str inluded), you will more or less never see any KB at all (max body 12, minus 3d6) and get a handful of points for not being able to do so at all. If you have a 15d6 EB on the other hand, you will rob yourself of about 5-10" knockback on any hit. Not doing knockback is totally rare (requires you to roll no sixes but 3+ ones on 15 dice, PLUS rolling 12 on the two KB dice), but you only get a -1/4 limitation for it. Now for 30d6, you lose a major damage factor (you will usually do about an extra 23 extra dice of KB damage), and it's still only 1/4. In fact, on infinite dice, you basically get a free second hit in.

Very rarely the Hero Limitation/Advantage System does fail at this, since usually a disadvantage gets bigger if the power gets bigger too. Similar things can be said about Double Knockback, although that scales so bad it's marked with a CAREFUL sign already...

[archermoo]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

By the way: "No Knockback (-1/4)" is really chaotic in pricing. If you have 2d6 KA (str inluded), you will more or less never see any KB at all (max body 12, minus 3d6) and get a handful of points for not being able to do so at all. If you have a 15d6 EB on the other hand, you will rob yourself of about 5-10" knockback on any hit. Not doing knockback is totally rare (requires you to roll no sixes but 3+ ones on 15 dice, PLUS rolling 12 on the two KB dice), but you only get a -1/4 limitation for it. Now for 30d6, you lose a major damage factor (you will usually do about an extra 23 extra dice of KB damage), and it's still only 1/4. In fact, on infinite dice, you basically get a free second hit in.

Very rarely the Hero Limitation/Advantage System does fail at this, since usually a disadvantage gets bigger if the power gets bigger too. Similar things can be said about Double Knockback, although that scales so bad it's marked with a CAREFUL sign already...

 

If you don't feel that it is reasonable to get points back for attacks that would rarely do knockback anyway, reduce it to a -0 limitation in those circumstances. If you feel that there are circumstances that it is worth more than a -1/4, make it worth more in those circumstances. The given value for Limitations and Advantages are good starting points, but that doesn't mean that they work in all circumstances in all campaigns.

[Kenn]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

Knockback sounds more like what Supes does when he slugs a guy and he skids back into/through a wall and not under his own power.

 

Except for the fact that in most Superman stories from the 1950s and 1960s, when Superman was actually fighting opponents that he could actually engage in true combat with (mostly rogue Kryptonians), his attacks rarely did knockback. Heck, even in a Curt Swan drawn L.E.G.I.O.N. '90-something Annual, and Superman was fighting Lar Gand and they weren't doing knockback.

[Hyper-Man]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

Except for the fact that in most Superman stories from the 1950s and 1960s' date=' when Superman was actually fighting opponents that he could actually engage in true combat with (mostly rogue Kryptonians), his attacks rarely did knockback. Heck, even in a Curt Swan drawn L.E.G.I.O.N. '90-something Annual, and Superman was fighting Lar Gand and they weren't doing knockback.[/quote']

 

And neither of their attacks were usually missing either.

 

It could be argued that since both knew how hard the other was hitting they were both Bracing for Knockback!

[archermoo]

Re: Knockback "realistic"?

 

And neither of their attacks were usually missing either.

 

It could be argued that since both knew how hard the other was hitting they were both Bracing for Knockback!

 

Or the Ref/Writer decided against using Knockback in that campaign/storyline...