Killing Damage in Jolrhos

[Christopher R Taylor]

OK I've been on the fence a long time about this and have finally come to a solid conclusion.  I'm going to do killing damage differently in Jolrhos products than the official rules.  I know this makes my books less immediately useful for people who don't follow the same system but the transfer is very simple.

 

The idea is that you use normal damage rolls for normal and killing attacks, instead of special rolls for killing.  The defenses are based on the type of attack.  It costs a +¼ advantage to turn a normal attack into a killing attack.  Thus, a 6d6 blast and a 6 damage class (formerly 2d6) killing attack is now 6d6 killing.  After very extensive number crunching (formerly posted on this site) the ¼ advantage gives the most numerically appropriate effect against defenses.  The end result is slightly very less body in some narrow ranges and roughly the same stun.  The payoff is easier learning curve and play.  The killing/normal damage thing really does confuse new players.

 

Transferring this back into old school KA damage is simple: just treat it as damage classes.  The math for builds won't be perfect but it will act closely enough. 

 

However this brings up a few questions.

 

Hit Locations

How should the stun damage be handled on hit locations?  At present there are two columns for stun, STN and nSTN.  Should the restructured killing damage simply use normal stun now and eliminate that designation? Or do something else entirely?  And according to the rules, for normal attacks you calculate the stun damage with location modifier after any defenses.  With killing attacks you calculate the stun damage with location modifier before any defenses.

 

I'm inclined to just use normal multipliers and treat all attacks as normal for hit locations.

 

Increased Stun Multiples

This is a really neat mechanic that I don't care to get rid of, because it helps differentiate between certain weapons (hammers vs swords, for instance).  It has interesting effects in combat such as increasing the multipliers in hit locations slightly.  The problem is that it is illegal for fairly obvious reasons to buy stun multiple increases for normal attacks: it would bloat the stun to gargantuan numbers, particularly with hit locations. 

 

How to resolve this I'm still unsure about.  Possibly just extra dice for killing attacks based on the purchase (like 2d6 per +¼ or something -- although that scales poorly).

 

Penetrating

This mechanic is built around normal dice.  For each body rolled on the dice (even if rolling killing damage), you get one penetration through defenses.  Now, with killing you're rolling far fewer dice than normal (about 1/3rd) so this mechanic may be really messed up or overpowered if all damage is done with penetration (for example, a 2d6 KA might get 4 points of penetration but in this system it would turn into 6d6 and up to 12 points).  One possible resolution is to make penetration only ever work with stun damage on KA and Normal attacks.

 

There may be other issues I haven't considered as well.

 

What say you all?

[Doc Democracy]

40 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Increased Stun Multiples

This is a really neat mechanic that I don't care to get rid of, because it helps differentiate between certain weapons (hammers vs swords, for instance).  It has interesting effects in combat such as increasing the multipliers in hit locations slightly.  The problem is that it is illegal for fairly obvious reasons to buy stun multiple increases for normal attacks: it would bloat the stun to gargantuan numbers, particularly with hit locations. 

 

How to resolve this I'm still unsure about.  Possibly just extra dice for killing attacks based on the purchase (like 2d6 per +¼ or something -- although that scales poorly).

 

Well, if you like the whole idea of STUN multiples, why not allow a STUN multiple to roll up the value of the attack.

 

With 1 STUN multiple, all 1s become 2s.

With 2 STUN multiples, all 1s and 2s become 3s.

With 3 STUN multiples, all 1s, 2s and 3s, become 4s.

 

This really buffs the attacks, you slowly ramp up the STUN, you also get a bit of a BODY lift with the first multiple but nothing thereafter until you hit 5 multiples where you essentially do MAX damage all the time.

 

You could, of course, say that rolling up the 1s only affects STUN. not BODY...

 

Doc

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

Hit Locations: A quick-and-dirty fix that comes to mind would be shift hit locations to "general multiplier" and "specific multiplier".  The general multiplier is always no higher than 1 and applies to all damage, the specific multiplier is always no lower than 1 and applies to STUN for normal attacks and BODY for KAs.  Thus, a hit to the head with a normal attack would deal more STUN but no extra BODY, but the reverse for a KA.  A hit to the foot would do less STUN and BODY always. 

 

Increased Stun Multiple: I'd suggest reworking this into something more along the lines of attack 8d6 + 2d6 (Adds STUN only -1).  Add extra dice of STUN or BODY as appropriate to skew the desired outputs. 

I'm aware that STUN only is normally -0, but that's because it fully nonlethalizes an attack.  Partial nonlethalization is nowhere near as useful. 

 

Penetrating: Why not just divide penetrating BODY by 3? 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

 

Well, if you like the whole idea of STUN multiples, why not allow a STUN multiple to roll up the value of the attack.

 

With 1 STUN multiple, all 1s become 2s.

With 2 STUN multiples, all 1s and 2s become 3s.

With 3 STUN multiples, all 1s, 2s and 3s, become 4s.

 

 

I really like that mechanic and have used it as a house rule for ages (I can't remember what it is called) because its useful for weapon enchants, for instance.  Not sure it has the same flavor as stun multiples but I'll have to think about it

[Gnome BODY (important!)]

1 hour ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

 

I really like that mechanic and have used it as a house rule for ages (I can't remember what it is called) because its useful for weapon enchants, for instance.  Not sure it has the same flavor as stun multiples but I'll have to think about it

The math is not kind to it, and I imagine few players would voluntarily take it.  The first purchase adds 1/6th of a point of STUN per die at the cost of +1/4.  Further purchases improve more, but are always less efficient than just adding dice. 

A 60 AP attack averages 42 STUN.  A 60 AP attack with +stun multiplier under this system averages around 30-35 STUN (it varies, but is in the ballpark).  That's less STUN and BODY for the same cost. 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Well lets crunch some numbers.  I'll do three die ranges, to give a feel for how it might work at various levels.

WARNING: DRY NUMBER DATA AHEAD

 

3d6 (1d6 KA old system):

normal stun range: 3-18

normal average stun 10.5

+1 stunx stun range: 6-18 (active cost 19)

+1 stunx stun average: 11

for 19 points you could have purchased 3½d6, with an average of 12 and range of 4-21 stun

 

+2 stunx stun range: 9-18 (active cost 22)

+2 stunx stun average: 12

for 22 points you could have purchased 4d6, with an average of 14 and range of 4-24 stun.

 

+3 stunx stun range: 12-18 (active cost 26)

+3 stunx stun average: 13.5

for 26 points you could have purchased 5d6, with an average of 17.5 and range of 5-30 stun.

 

The value diverts pretty rapidly, and while it is really nice to not ever worry about a low roll, its really not worth buying for character points because you're robbing yourself of a higher average and much higher maximum rolls.  The minimum roll increase is pretty nice, adding 12 points at the +3 level (so you're never going to roll poorly) but probably still not worth the cost where you have just bought more dice and gotten an 11 point maximum damage increase.

 

8d6 (2½d6 old system)

normal stun range: 8-48

normal average stun 28

+1 stunx stun range: 16-48 (active cost 50)

+1 stunx stun average: 29

for 50 points you could have purchased 10d6, with an average of 35 and range of 10-60 stun

 

12d6 (4d6 old system)

normal stun range: 12-72

normal average stun 42

+1 stunx stun range: 24-72 (active cost 75)

+1 stunx stun average: 44

for 75 points you could have purchased 15d6, with an average of 52 and range of 15-90 stun

 

Things only look worse the more die you get because of how multipliers work.  The multiplier of +¼ and the adder of 5 points per d6 diverge pretty rapidly.

With that in mind, what if its an adder rather than an advantage?

 

In this case the numbers would be the same, but the active cost would shift. 

 

5 point adder for one level of +1 minimum stun

3d6: 20 active points (average of 11 and range of 6-18 stun), could have bought 4d6 (average of 14 and range of 4-24 stun)

8d6: 45 active points (average of 29 and range of 16-48 stun), could have bought 9d6 (average of 31.5 and range of 9-54 stun)

12d6: 65 active points (average of 44 and range of 24-72 stun), could have bought 13d6 (average of 45.5 and range of 13-78 stun)

 

So as you go up in price, the divergence is less problematic, but the return is still pretty minor.  Again, the more you purchase, the  more you could have been buying extra dice at an exact rate: 2 levels = 2d6 you could have bought instead.  But is the difference significant with more of an adder?

 

15 point adder for three levels of +1 minimum stun

3d6: 30 active points (average of 13.5 and range of 12-18 stun), could have bought 6d6 (average of 21 and range of 6-30 stun)

8d6: 55 active points (average of 29 and range of 16-48 stun), could have bought 1d6 (average of 38.5 and range of 11-66 stun)

12d6: 75 active points (average of 44 and range of 24-72 stun), could have bought 13d6 (average of 52 and range of 15-90 stun)

 

The range difference is greater at the high end, but the average closes up a lot more and the low end is a notable advantage at 12d6.  Just knowing you'll never, ever roll badly is worth quite a bit, but probably not enough to pay this kind of price for it.  for 60 points you can either get a +3 stun multiple for 9d6 (average 40.5 stun, range 36-54) or a 12d6 attack (42/12-72).  Even using an adder to streamline the two mechanics, it probably isn't going to be worht using.   You're almost always better off going with more dice and trusting on averages than going with fewer dice and relying on no low rolls. 

 

CONCLUSION
This isn't a good build for purchase by players in most circumstances. However, the mechanic is really handy for special items such as an enchanted sword that never gives low hits, and is worth considering for builds of that nature by the GM.

[Toxxus]

I feel like abandoning traditional killing damage attacks is a bad idea.

 

The variability on smaller dice pools is a big part of what makes killing attacks scary.  The odds of larger dice pools substantially drifting up or down in BODY count is very low.  6d6 very consistently does between 4-8 body.  12d6 even more consistently is in the 10-14 range.  A 2d6K or 4d6K can with much greater probability generate dangerously high or harmlessly low numbers.

 

I know that the difference between normal and killing damage is a point of confusion for new players, but it's not a big one.  If that one thing is what chases them off of HERO system and not the umpteen combat maneuvers and dozens of situational OCV/DCV modifiers or sectional armor or....  It goes on.  The system offers incredible flexibility at the cost of crunch.

[TranquiloUno]

I seems easier to just explain it to new folks.

I'm not sure that changing a core mechanical difference in the game because new folks have to spent a little time figuring out how it works is beneficial.

 

Many systems have two tiers of damage that work roughly the same (given they are different systems) and I never hear folks complaining that new people are confused by Stun vs Lethal, or MDC vs SDC, or Normal and Aggravated, or regular damage and damage that doesn't heal until you take a Long Rest, or Slashing and Impaling and so on. Are folks confused by PD\ED or Body\Stun?

 

Like...the benefit to this is that instead of confusing the very small group of folks that have never played Hero and just can't wrap their heads around different damage types you'll confuse all the experienced Hero folks.

So on the one hand if you are planning on selling Jolrhos to new folks\non-gamers then maybe avoiding the confusion (is this REALLY an issue?) of new folks will be beneficial.

On the other hand if you figure the market for Hero settings\products is...you know, basically us old jerks that are set in our ways and enjoying posting about rules minutiae on the internet then maybe changing the way the rules have worked for many many years would not be beneficial.

 

Certainly if somebody were to publish a Hero setting I was supes interested in (Draegera, Wild Cards, I dunno, pick your fave)...but then also changing the stats in weird ways (from the standard rules) I would be much less likely to buy it.

Same as I don't buy Heroes Unlimited supplements to get NPC ideas. Not that I can't. Or that the other system sucks so bad I can't get any benefit. Just that...why would I?

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

There are four main reasons to do this:

 

1) the two different types of damage is a matter of confusion to new players, and with Hero's rep as "its too HARRRRDDD!!" the less confusion, the better, I feel.

2) This reduces the stun lottery effect, smoothing it out to work similar to normal damage.  This has long been a complaint and I think a valid one, and the d3 change for 6th edition is only a minor improvement.

3) It makes character builds more streamlined to have only one system to learn for damage and math in building, which is the most complicated portion of the game.

4) Damage Classes confuse the heck out of even experienced players.

 

As I noted, the conversion to old style KA is easy enough; treat it as a damage class.  Nuff said about that.

I'll take a look at the numbers of buying 1d6 with a limitation and see if its worth buying or not and at what level some time when I'm less wore out.

[Doc Democracy]

20 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

Well lets crunch some numbers.  I'll do three die ranges, to give a feel for how it might work at various levels.

WARNING: DRY NUMBER DATA AHEAD

 

CONCLUSION
This isn't a good build for purchase by players in most circumstances. However, the mechanic is really handy for special items such as an enchanted sword that never gives low hits, and is worth considering for builds of that nature by the GM.

 

I looked at a three level version instead.  +1/4 to convert 1s and 2s to 3s.  +1/2 to have only 5s and 6s and +3/4 to have max damage.  I thought it was interesting in how it came out compared to additional dice of damage.

 

At 1 level of increased STUN, you get a mean STUN of 42 (varying between 30 and 60) rather than a mean of 42 (varying between 12 and 72).

At 2 levels of increased STUN you get a mean of 52 (varying between 50 and 60) rather than a mean of 52 (varying between 15 and 90).

At 3 levels of increased STUN you get 60 STUN rather than a mean of 61 (varying between 18 and 105).

 

This actually works in point sense - you sacrifice the potential of higher results for guaranteed lower ones.  It also suggests that +3/4 is a decent value for maximum STUN damage (it also works if you also added in BODY - full damage delivers 20 BODY as opposed to 18).

 

I had never considered an advantage to deliver full damage before and would (ad hoc) have come up with at least +1 if not higher...

 

Doc

[Brian Stanfield]

Have you seen Ron Edwards’s Champions Now project? He started with the concept of eliminating killing damage, and then adding modifiers to normal damage like you suggest. He has a lot of videos where he talks out his thinking on his issue and how it affects other issues in the game mechanics. The early beta versions of his text are freely available, so you may want to look at what he’s doing. 

[Doc Democracy]

I have had all the emails but never dug out the time to go looking at the videos.  Maybe I should.

[Brian Stanfield]

11 hours ago, Doc Democracy said:

I have had all the emails but never dug out the time to go looking at the videos.  Maybe I should.

 It might be worthwhile. It’s at least interesting to hear him talk things out right from the beginning. I don’t agree with all of his changes, but he is good at explaining why he is doing what he does. 

[Christopher R Taylor]

OK let's look at stun multiples using extra dice.  I don't like this mechanic very much because it doesn't feel very elegant, isn't easily controlled, and is more awkward to resolve, but here goes.

 

The concept is to allow people to add d6 (does no body) to the killing attack with a limitation to represent that they only do stun.

Ordinarily "stun only " is considered a -0 limitation (a rule I dispute, but that's the official rules).  But, as Gnomebody Important notes, 

 

Quote

Partial nonlethalization is nowhere near as useful. 

 

That is, making an entire attack not do lethal damage can often be an advantage, but making only part of an attack nonlethal is always a limitation: it necessarily makes the power less useful.  However, there are limits to how limiting this really is; having half your damage do no bod is roughly the same as doing no bod in many campaigns, because the defenses will likely bounce the body dealt.  So its worth something, but not very much, since almost all the arguments for -0 "stun only" attacks apply here as well.  Again, this varies by campaigns. If most of your fighting is against zombies, doing no body is a pretty big drawback, for instance.  If you're a street level superhero, you really would rather not do body.

 

I'm thinking -¼, and with a really good argument and the right kind of campaign maybe a -½.

 

So 1d6 at -¼ limitation makes it cost 4 points per die.  At -½ its 3.33 repeating.  That's a pretty small reduction in real cost overall, but it can matter in some campaigns and at higher levels.

The result would be slightly cheaper damage than without the "stun only" but a moderate reduction in body damage.  Each d6 added of no stun is a max body reduction of 2.  Its worth noting that it takes more dice of "stun adder" to make much difference as well.  Even 3d6 isn't that significant a difference on average.  Since the average roll on a d6 is 3.5, it takes quite a few to really matter whereas stun multipliers stacked up very rapidly -- the one being linear and the other a multiplier.  I'd figure you need at least 5d6 to really make a difference in most cases (adding 17 stun on average and a potential 30). 

 

I started to do this big spreadsheet then realized that all its doing is reducing body slightly and real cost slightly; active cost is the same between a 4d6+4d6 (stun only) and 8d6 and everything else but body is identical.  Even a comparison between stun multipliers and adding stun is kinda pointless because the dice used are so different (KA damage classes and just normal dice) and the comparisons are not very helpful.

 

The biggest drawback to this method is keeping track of which dice are stun only, since you don't want to count the body on them.  That means either rolling more than once or rolling with two different colored dice, usually an option for most people.  Mechanically just adding some more dice is easier than upgrading minimum damage, of course.  It feels clumsier and messier, but it accomplishes roughly the same role and if I cannot come up with something more elegant as a mechanic I'll probably have to use it.  Anyone have any other suggestions?

[Doc Democracy]

Have you considered STUN multiples making 6s count double?  That removes the additional dice but every six thrown does 12 STUN, or 18 STUN or more depending on the multiples bought?  Much more useful when rolling lots of dice than small numbers as it is more likely that sixes will appear.

 

EDIT:  adding a bit of crunch to the suggestion.  Each STUN multiple in this scenario would increase average damage per die by 1.  So 3D6 would average 13.5 STUN rather than 10.5 STUN with one STUN multiple and 19.5 STUN with three multiples.

 

A 12D6 attack (60 AP) attack does an average of 42 STUN, 12 BODY with a range of 12-72.

 

An 8D6 attack with two STUN multiples (as above) averages 44 STUN, 8 BODY with a range of 8-96.

 

You sacrifice BODY for the chance of mega STUN and average slightly increased STUN for no extra cost...

 

Doc

[Doc Democracy]

On 2/2/2019 at 3:37 PM, Doc Democracy said:

Have you considered STUN multiples making 6s count double?  That removes the additional dice but every six thrown does 12 STUN, or 18 STUN or more depending on the multiples bought?  Much more useful when rolling lots of dice than small numbers as it is more likely that sixes will appear.

 

EDIT:  adding a bit of crunch to the suggestion.  Each STUN multiple in this scenario would increase average damage per die by 1.  So 3D6 would average 13.5 STUN rather than 10.5 STUN with one STUN multiple and 19.5 STUN with three multiples.

 

A 12D6 attack (60 AP) attack does an average of 42 STUN, 12 BODY with a range of 12-60.

 

An 8D6 attack with two STUN multiples (as above) averages 44 STUN, 8 BODY with a range of 8-96.

 

You sacrifice BODY for the chance of mega STUN and average slightly increased STUN for no extra cost...

 

Doc

 

I am now wondering whether killing attack should double BODY damage for sixes rolled.

 

12D6 normal damage (60 AP) delivers an average of 42 STUN, 12 BODY.  BODY range 0-24, STUN range 12-72.

8D6 killing (x2) (60 AP) delivers an average of 28 STUN, 13 BODY.  BODY range 0-48, STUN range 8-48.

 

It slightly boost average BODY but massively increases the range of BODY damage possible and significantly reduces STUN delivered....

[Christopher R Taylor]

I can't find the thread and it might not survive the cleansing but I ran a lot of numbers and the best mathematical match for turning normal damage to killing is a +¼ advantage, so a 9½d6 KA is 60 active points.