I'm up for this again! I'll have to think about equipment a little.
I agree that the randomness crushed a lot of strategy last time. I think we had a pretty good group, though. People managed to have some fairly distinct emerging strengths even without them being so firmly outlined mechanically, which was great.
Good to have you back!
I noticed that too and I want to keep it that way, I don't like the idea of forcing someone to build a character that is most effective when played in one style, I'd rather characters remain rather flexible while the player decides what kind of style they want to play.
That being said I do plan to hand out a few specialized bonuses.
Also! Everyone, here's a draft of the new mechanics.
Mechanics:Rolling is for combat. NPCs are going to be diverse in interest and reasonableness so you’re going to want to try to understand them and leverage what you learn about them during dialogue.
Combat is basically always a two roll deal. One roll to ‘hit’ one for ‘effect.’ Rolling to hit is augmented by your skill, rolling for effect is usually augmented by your weapon of choice. Not always though. Sometimes you shoot and yell just to scare the enemy or what nots. A loud MG is going to give you a bonus there. If you are exceptionally skilled rolls for effect can be modified.
NOTE: Both positive and negative and negative modifiers exist and will be also distributed based on situation (damage, cover, etc etc) there are a lot of situational modifiers. Most will be derived through application of common sense.
The general rule is a 1-2 fails 3 passes but with a different than intended effect and a 4-6 passes (to degrees based on the roll), natural 6 on hit convers a +1 to effect, a natural 6 on effect is just fucking awesome and you’ll not only likely kill that goon but also paint the walls. If you roll a 6 to ‘hit’ a 5 for ‘effect’ will count as a natural 6. A natural 1 means -1 effect but
if and only if it still hits because of modifiers.
In a combat turn you can choose to take one action at +3 hit +1 effect or exactly two at +2 hit. Any more actions than that will be taken at normal values. Most NPCs will actually have negative modifiers; the world is a lot more lethal to them. When I say actions I’m really only taking about attacks. You can move freely while taking actions unless you want to go into a full on dead sprint or some shit.
NOTE: ‘Dodging’ is not a separate roll instead dodging or rather being fast, attentive and evasive means that the attack will suffer a penalty on their hit.
An action does not cancel if you roll low to ‘hit,’ a low ‘hit’ but high ‘effect’ means collateral. And inversely if you roll high to ‘hit’ but low ‘effect’ you’re a just a sad chump. I guess there was no real catch for the second case.
AUGMENTS AND COMBAT:
I will rarely allow augments to directly effect rolls. They will help in the sense that they give you access to actions others cannot take. What I mean is a poisoned blade (See ‘venomous’) is not giving you +1 on effect. Instead it will take effect based on the effect roll and then likely apply its own modifier.
There are some exceptions.
SHOOTING FOR A PURPOSE:
You can and are highly encouraged to embellish your actions beyond the tried and hackneyed “shoot them.” You can shoot to suppress, aim for specific body parts (this will help against stronger NPCS), start fucking screaming while shooting to scare NPCS; be creative.
The most common form of this embellishment will be aimed shots for specific body parts or suppression. Suppression will allow you to cover allies that want to get close without taking fire (enemy MGs are a big target for this action) also stop enemies from spreading out and also you can also advance while suppressing them.
NOTE: Suppression is an attack. It can generate casualties. The main deference is that during suppression you'll expend a lot more ammo and generally higher degrees of success will not translate to more slaughter but instead more of them moving less. In extreme success cases they might panic.
CLOSE COMBAT:
In close combat I want players to take embellishment to an extreme. Are you keeping distance and making yourself harder to hit? While popping out high powered kicks? Or are you grappling and wrestling them to confer modifiers and restrict their movement? Or are you a fucking acrobatic ninja? Please say yes and write cool attacks.
Also if you have less than 5kg of gear on you get one re-roll in CQ that is used on your first failure or lowest success (picks higher success or failure for result).
NOTE: close combat is going to be a lot more lethal. It’s going to be easier to land aimed attacks and to inflict specific wounds on your enemy. We'll call this the commando benefit.
STRENGTH-SPEED AND COMBAT:
This will be represented in combat. Bear with me here, this is going to be how it works:
1-4 is considered very very strong, like I said in OP you are still much much faster than regular people, however in this range you have taken strength to a new level. If you are faster than someone in your bracket (higher number) -1 to their hit rolls against you and +1 to your to hit rolls. If you are stronger than them +1 to your effect roll.
5-10 is considered very fast. The same rule applies here: If you are faster than someone in your bracket (higher number) -1 to their hit rolls against you and +1 to your hit rolls. If you are stronger than them +1 to your effect roll.
Now if you are in the speed bracket you get -2 to attackers to hit roll and a +2 to your own to hit roll against someone in the strength bracket. While if you are the stronger one you get a +2 to the effect roll and -1 to an attackers effect roll.
Before you complain about how this system is weighted remember that generally effect rolls are what actually confer damage, so woo hoo your more accurate and harder to hit but if you’re not rolling high effect rolls your effort is wasted.
Strength-Speed utility: you might want to run somethings by me. Strength or speed can give you advantages not represented by numbers, say if you are very very strong, I might let you, say, crush weapons or other things.
NOTE: Normal NPCS you’ll just be faster and stronger than, you’ll get flat bonuses against them.
ALSO NOTE: You might fight someone that is just on an entirely different level than you. You can expect penalties if that is the case.
FUCK THAT SHIT ABOUT STRENGTH-SPEED (over activation):
Over activating your muscles is a good way to fuck someone over or to get that one nice shot you wanted. This confers +2 effect, +2 to hit and also the tasty -2 to their hits; however notice it does not weaken their effect roll. This stacks with your strength-speed and normal modifiers except you count as being in the same Strength-Speed bracket as your opponent.
You can expect to very hungry and maybe have damaged your own body by using this. Generally the greater the ‘effect’ roll the more you hurt yourself.
This also confers utility, so you may want to use it in a way that doesn’t necessarily modify your rolls.
TRYING TO NOT GET HIT:
You can focus your attention on an actor or grouped actors to try to avoid getting hit. This is an action for the purposes of deciding what bonuses your actions will confer. The selected actor/s will get -1 to hit against you. Group is ill specified here, but generally count heavy weapons separately (MGs and shit) and closely deployed people with similar weapons as a group.
NOTE: if the group is really big don’t expect modifiers.
Taking cover is not an action, moving into cover will give you a good modifier.
HEALTH AND COMBAT:
If you are without any major wounds and are not starved or shit you get one reroll that applies to your first 'failure' of the turn. If you still fail I'll choose the higher failure.
THE AWESOME FACTOR:
If something you attempt is awesome or I think will advance the plot in an unexpected and interesting way I'll reroll that shit if it RnG decides to screw you.
Only one re-roll per case and also you are absolutely not allowed to make any appeals before the action is made or after it resolves. You can try to meta game this, but trust me it won't work. The reason I give it to you might be for you crushing plot in an awesome way that you couldn't possibly have known or I might decide that what you want to do is just too badass not to do.
Think grit.
SUPPRESSING PLAYER CHARACTERS (This one is important)
Suppressing is generally a warning, before an action in a heated firefight you'll want to note whether or not you will allow yourself to be suppressed. If you chose yes and the enemy rolls high on their effect roll then you might cancel an action to not get a mean lead spanking.
If again, they roll high and you said no they will, having succeeded their action, instead hurt you.
What I mean by this is I don't want suppression against players to be beyond their control. However, the main way ranged normal sensible NPCs will try to engage you is with overwhelming fire. This is generally going to be their best option as they aren't as good at hitting you purposefully and efficiently so instead they'll just lay down as much fire as they can and try to interrupt your actions which they see as a great threat.
If you think an action is important and objectively sound, then I encourage you to purposely ignore suppression and take the hits.
INVENTORY AND NON-COMBAT MECHANICS:
You need bags, belts and straps. And lots of them.
I will give items in your inventory a generalized mass. You can carry 50kg (+5 for every 1 less speed-strength you have under 5) without losing combat effectiveness, any more than that and you'll lose combat effectiveness. However a common sense rule comes in play, if your items cannot be reasonably secured to your body (bags, belts, straps) you will need to use your arms and thus will need to drop things to fight (I mean. I guess you could just kick...) and will also lose the utility of having available arms.
You'll also want to stock up on food.
NOTE: Artillery (referring to any ranged firepower) is a great advantage. You may want to tolerate the debuffs so that you can in turn make massive munition expenditures into your foes. Also why not just drop extra gear when you reach combat? This is a respected and sensible move.
Also, the more gear you carry the more likely that something will get hit when you do. I'm not beyond making belts, bags and straps break in combat.
FEXIBILITY:
This system is purposely flexible for me. Don't be afraid to suggest something in combat. If, say, you're in close quarters and you're very very strong and you want to just drop an awesome two handed haymaker on their skull but the mechanics don't really feature that kind of move, I'll give it some mechanics like say, +3 effect -1 to hit, only action for the turn does not stack if one action bonus.
The rules are common sense.
You can suggest stats these abnormalities but you have to do it in the post with the action as to not slow down the pace of the game or spawn long mechanical debates. Also don't be over insistent on appealing or suggesting.
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Topic: HEAVY DAMAGE: Brutal Combat. Interest checkNew/old players wanted 5/6! Goto p15 (Read 26215 times)