size class

[xalabin]

Why overlap kg?

 

[RosenMcStern]

A very big hobbit is larger than a small human. And a huge human may well be bigger than an undersized female bear. Rather than changing the size class for peculiar individual - which can still happen for some big monsters, but is definitely less convenient for the average adventurer - it is better to state explicitly that the extremes of the interval overlap.

On a mathematical base, the extremes are designed to overlap, too. A STR 18 human is +2 to Might and Toughness, and +4 to Strike Rank. In combat it is as effective as a STR 10 creature of Large size class.

[Zit]

At the very begining (2nd sentence) of the Size chapter, you mention the Size rank. You meant Size Class, I guess.

[RosenMcStern]

Yes. Leftover of old version.

[xalabin]

So, a big human with str 18 and 150kg of muscle still is weaker than a undersized str 11 female bear of 100kg?

[RosenMcStern]

An undersized bear is not STR 11. If you look at the boundaries, a 100 kg creature is the lower limit for the Large Size Class, which means STR 3. If you add 10 to the STR to make it comparable with the lower class values, you obtain 13, much less than your STR 18 human. A STR 11 Large creature is in the median between 100 and 240, which means 170 kg.

This is also reflected by the statistics given for bears in Chapter 7. Females have an average STR of 10 (20 on the human scale), which means you can still brawl them if you are Tyson. Males have STR 14 on average (24 on the human scale), beyond the reach of any human being (with the exception of those affected by gigantism, which is a genetic mutation under all aspects and should not be included in the stats).

The Bear example you made is actually really intersting. If you check, both the BGB and the new Mythras Imperative give you an equivalent STR/SIZ range for brown bears (between 20 and 24) with a +10 for polar bears and big kodiaks. Revolution provides exactly the same ranges for these creatures, but does so by assigning Class L to medium sized bears and Class XL to the biggest ones.

[xalabin]

So for calculate the size class you can get the mass and fit on the scale?

A Board of 80kg has Size class M (50-120kg), str 9,  an a giraffe of 5m, 1200kg, size XXXL (1000-2000kg),  str 6?

An animal of size L, 100kg, has str 3, so can brawl with an other animal size m, 100 kg, str 13?

It implies that if you are a human size m, str 10 you must be at least +-85kg of mass...

[RosenMcStern]

You have quoted some extreme examples (the giraffe is a typical example of linear size in excess of mass) but I would say more or less yes. Also remember that boars have a huge size variability depending on their geographic origin: specimens of 200kg are not uncommon. I would give them size class M in Southern/Western Europe, L in Northern/Eastern, with STR 3d6 for females and 4d6 for males.

However, the main point is that being able to compare sizes is useful, but in most games knowing Toughness and Might for a beast is more than enough. It is rather uncommon to wrestle with something of a size class bigger than yours, so the need to make maths to reduce all STR values to the same scale will arise in a limited range of cases.

85 kg of mass is not far from the average (male) human. Geographical origin, again, counts a lot here.

[xalabin]

Al this maths are just for understand the system (my own understanding) and made easy conversions from other d100 system to RD100 and vice versa.

[soltakss]

For most situations, having a Size Class works well enough. Does it really matter than some people are a bit bigger/smaller than others? For people such as Little John, I simply give them one Size Class higher.

Personally, I prefer having the SIZ characteristic, but that also causes problem when dealing with height and mass, which is why I use LEN and MAS in my RQScifi rules. But Size Class works well enough as an abstract concept.

 

[xalabin]

If you give a size class L to a human it will be mechanical implications so it is not a light decision.

For little Jhon and RD100 rules, i will prefer use a narrative description and a proper STR value with size class m.

Size class are ok if you don't like high numbers on str and size characteristic for things like mechas or Godzilla.