This is a site for discussing roleplaying games. Have fun doing so, but there is one major rule: do not discuss political issues that aren't directly and uniquely related to the subject of the thread and about gaming. While this site is dedicated to free speech, the following will not be tolerated: devolving a thread into unrelated political discussion, sockpuppeting (using multiple and/or bogus accounts), disrupting topics without contributing to them, and posting images that could get someone fired in the workplace (an external link is OK, but clearly mark it as Not Safe For Work, or NSFW). If you receive a warning, please take it seriously and either move on to another topic or steer the discussion back to its original RPG-related theme.

Galaxies in Shadow Damage System

Started by David Johansen, May 15, 2009, 09:47:42 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

David Johansen

Okay, so Barren and Desolate stars is coming but I snagged up a bit on vehicle design and moved on to Galaxies in Shadow until the road block clears a bit.

Now, I've got a couple issues with my damage system.  And I'm trying to decide if it's needing a redo.

Currently a marginal success halve your damage and an exceptional success doubles it.

Every every doubling of the weapon's range halves the penetration.

Every time your armour is greater than or twice the attack's penetration it halves the damage.

If the damage is greater than an eighth of your Strength you take a minor injury,  If it's greater than a quarter you take a major injury, greater than half: a crippling injury, and greater than the full value you lose the hit location entirely.

That's four calculations.  Those who can't manage one don't worry me this game isn't for them.  Also, you can build data blocks that record the numbers and save you from doing the math twice if it bothers you.  Even so, I worry that it might bog down or be confusing.

Now here's the real problem: Joe has a Strength of 55 and is hit on his arm for 56 damage.  Well there goes his arm.  One point less and it'd just be broken.  However even just adding a d10 to the damage makes data blocks useless.  I don't really want to put in a lot of dice rolling.  Currently you just roll to hit.

Oh and yes Clash it really is coming.  In fact, I'm running a playtest on Tuesday.
Fantasy Adventure Comic, games, and more http://www.uncouthsavage.com

flyingmice

Quote from: David Johansen;302496Okay, so Barren and Desolate stars is coming but I snagged up a bit on vehicle design and moved on to Galaxies in Shadow until the road block clears a bit.

Now, I've got a couple issues with my damage system.  And I'm trying to decide if it's needing a redo.

Currently a marginal success halve your damage and an exceptional success doubles it.

Every every doubling of the weapon's range halves the penetration.

Every time your armour is greater than or twice the attack's penetration it halves the damage.

If the damage is greater than an eighth of your Strength you take a minor injury,  If it's greater than a quarter you take a major injury, greater than half: a crippling injury, and greater than the full value you lose the hit location entirely.

That's four calculations.  Those who can't manage one don't worry me this game isn't for them.  Also, you can build data blocks that record the numbers and save you from doing the math twice if it bothers you.  Even so, I worry that it might bog down or be confusing.

Now here's the real problem: Joe has a Strength of 55 and is hit on his arm for 56 damage.  Well there goes his arm.  One point less and it'd just be broken.  However even just adding a d10 to the damage makes data blocks useless.  I don't really want to put in a lot of dice rolling.  Currently you just roll to hit.

Oh and yes Clash it really is coming.  In fact, I'm running a playtest on Tuesday.

It's been a looong time since I read the old version of GIS you sent me. How does damage work? A brief overview will refresh my memory and clue in those who haven't ever read it.

-clash
clash bowley * Flying Mice Games - an Imprint of Better Mousetrap Games
Flying Mice home page: http://jalan.flyingmice.com/flyingmice.html
Currently Designing: StarCluster 4 - Wavefront Empire
Last Releases: SC4 - Dark Orbital, SC4 - Out of the Ruins,  SC4 - Sabre & World
Blog: I FLY BY NIGHT

David Johansen

urk!  That was a brief overview!  Methinks this bodes ill.

Okay, weapons have a penetration and damage value.

Armour has an armour value.

If the distance to the target is greater than the weapon's range there's a -10 to hit and the penetration is halved.

If the attack's Success Level is
   marginal (rolled 1-10) then damage is halved
   normal then damage is normal
   exceptional (rolled doubles) then damage is doubled

If the penetration is:
   greater than armour then armour is useless
   greater than half armour then damage is halved
   greater than quarter armour then damage is quartered
   etc

If the damage is:
   greater than target's strength then the hit location is destroyed
   greater than half the target's strength then the hit location is crippled
   greater than a quarter of the target's strength then the hit location is wounded
   greater than an eighth of the target's strength then the hit location is injured

   There's a few odds and ends like bleeding and stuns that are linked to damage levels, armour penetration, and injury levels but that's not where there's problems.

   The real problems come in with using one handed weapons and punching people.  Currently a strong guy is immune to any unarmed attack  by a weaker guy unless an exceptional success is achieved.  There's also the sub issue that given the exponential scale, doubling and halving Strength is really x4.  Since the entire point of Galaxies in Shadow is the consistent substructure this is really a problem.

My current favourite solution is to have a slightly larger margin of success system.  And allow a half measure between /2 and /4 etc.

Marginal (rolled less than 1/4 of chance of success)
Ordinary (rolled less than 1/2 of chance of success)
Good (rolled less than 3/4 of chance of success)
Exceptional (rolled more than 3/4 of chance of success)

If you didn't like the math you could just roll a percentile or even a d4.

The main effect would be that some attacks would do double damage on a good roll and exceptional roll and some would do half damage on an ordinary and marginal roll.

But then, that's just one more calculation...

Not that I'm afraid of calculations, there's plenty of roots and exponents floating around in the design rules but there's a point where they bog down play.
Fantasy Adventure Comic, games, and more http://www.uncouthsavage.com

David Johansen

#3
If you're wondering why there's so much multiplication, it's because adding never scales up properly and one of my design objectives is no scale shifts.

Just a simple example:

1d10 +1

1d10 +5

In the first case the 1d10 is a far larger portion of the possible result than in the second.

By the time you reach 1d10 + 100 it's truely ridiculous.

As I mentioned before you can build data blocks that get the math out of the way.

Suppose you've got the following weapon

Range 36
Penetration 34
Damage 53

                   x1   x2    x4     x8    x16    x32
Range           36   72   144   288   576   1152
Penetration    34   17     9      5      3       2

Damage          x2   x1    /2    /4     /8      /16
                   103  53    27    14     7        4

Guy With Strength 56

Natural Armour 7
Destroyed   56+
Crippled      28+    
Wounded    14+
Injured        7+
Fantasy Adventure Comic, games, and more http://www.uncouthsavage.com

David Johansen

Sigh 52 views and nothing new.  Oh well here's a bit of something that's percolating in my head right now.  It's a thing I suggested to ICE that they turned their noses up at.  It would have used the Lord of the Rings Adventure game mechanics but instead it'll use the rules from "among the beautiful creatures".

Obscure and Untravelled Paths a game of Transitional Fantasy

London is the crown jewel of the mighty British Empire.  Ships laden with goods from marvelous and distant land bring wealth from the four corners of the earth. Throngs pass through her streets hemmed in by sagging buildings of stone and brick choking on the sulferous air.  Criminals and killers walk among the throng.  Victoria is queen, Sherlock Holmes dwells on downing street, Jack is about his business in White Chapel, and a strange nobleman has just arrived on the wings of a hurricane driving him out of Transylvania like the wrath of God.

But this story is not about London.  Many of its paths cross or open there but this is a story about other places, no less real than this London which is not our own but more familiar than the actual place.  This is the story of Dannor, the land between, where the world is slowly unravelling as ancient tribes clash with conquerers from a fractured empire.  It is the story of the naked warriors of a distant and dying world where the sands sweep through the forgotten ruins of Hryash and the Larnesh empires.  It is the story of the founding of Nandria and the dawn of an industrial age on an endless expanse where there is no night.  It is the story of a magical kingdom where everyday objects prophesy with mathematical equations and rhyming couplets.  It is the story of the ordinary people who wander out of their dismal lives into other worlds following obscure and untravelled paths.
Fantasy Adventure Comic, games, and more http://www.uncouthsavage.com

David Johansen

Ah well I've worked it out.

I've added a scratched damage result and moved destroyed to Strength x2, which makes it less likely for a gunshot to totally take your arm off.

I've also set fist damage at 1/6 Strength leaving kick at 1/4.  Penetration in either case is 1/8 Strength and natural armour for humans (with the thin skin racial trait) is 1/16 Strength.  Really, given the square root scale on things this is pretty close to what I wanted as the square root of two is 1.4 and change.  The result is that somebody has to be significantly stronger than you to shake off a punch with a sneer or allow you to flatten the other guy.  Previously one point would do it.

Barren and Desolate Stars is also making some good headway.  I still have no idea how to balance spells that let you reach back in time and put the things you forgot into your back pack.  Causality at least, I'm thinking should be sheltered if not preserved.  For instance you could then learn that joe saw it on the counter and put it in the pocket before you left.  Alternately there might be huge karmic rewards for balancing causality.
Fantasy Adventure Comic, games, and more http://www.uncouthsavage.com

David Johansen

Here's a few more thoughts on the obscure paths thing.

Ships come to this London from everywhere.  Indeed, this particular London doesn't have a world of its own.  Oh there's a nice English countryside and some uncouth place called Scotland out there, but if you get on a ship from the harbour or board a train you're actually leaving the world.  That's why the folk working the docks seem inhuman and strange.  They aren't just from Africa or China.  They come from farther afield and even those from Africa come from a primal land where English lords can get raised by apes or the Chinese from an ancient and mystical land where kungfu stops bullets.

Player characters might be children or ordinary people, I think I'll need a mechanism where anyone special or noteworthy has to be insufferable and idiotic to maintain the particular feel of the setting.  This will mean a shift from the more physical abilities in abc to skills.

It might be possible to play strange beings from other worlds.  Certainly players coming into the game after the first session or two could just as easily be from where ever the PCs are.  But as the main theme of the game is transitional fantasy in which people from our world (or in this case the other London) cross into fantastic places.  Even time machines should go to places stranger than our present day.  Perhaps in the distant year of 2009 mankind has ascended and become pure and radiant.  One skin colour, one hair colour, one church, no wars, no police, no poverty.  Or again perhaps 2009 is an age of great artists and generals who fight wars with swords and spears due to powerful kinetic shield projectors.  Or it might be an age where there are no adults, only timeless children playing in gardens manicured by strange and silent mechanical nannies.

Overall, I'd like the normality of the characters to contrast with their vibrant and fantastical surroundings.

One thing I need to work into it is protection from dark and brooding loners with hidden knives and such.  Gamers are very prone to this type of thinking and I'm of a mind to prevent this game from being about that.  Sure if you wind up on the expanse a child character is going to become insanely powerful, but I want there to be a strong advantage in play relating to who the character is that goes beyond specific setting elements.

Another important matter will be setting the rewards to match the play style I'm aiming for.  If you get experience for combat it will be for moments of personal growth and development like Peter killing the Wolf in the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe not tallying the number of half hit dice kobolds you slaughtered.

Yes I'm wandering on the edge of what Pundit calls a swine game.
Fantasy Adventure Comic, games, and more http://www.uncouthsavage.com