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Damage >= Double the Location's HP


Mechashef

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So...

The way I read it is: A limb can take up to double it's total HP an no more in a single hit. However, if the damage total happened to be higher than three times the HP total, the limb is severed, even though those extra HP are not removed from any totals. 

It also seems like the Double and Triple damage has to be from a single hit to cause the extra complication.

This leads me to wonder why we track individual body part HP at all. If its not total damage, but simply One, Two, or Three times the amount that matters, then why keep track of body part HP? If we do track it, what is the effect? It seems like a body part could easily be whittled down to negative the amount of total character HP pool and have no extra effect.

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2 hours ago, Grimmshade said:

Just read the damage section thoroughly and have a few questions:

1) The general HP won't take more than twice what a limb can take in a single limb hit, but what about the limb? Do you track the entire damage total in the limb?

RuneQuest 3 stated specifically that damage to a limb could not exceed double the HP, and that this was also the maximum amount of damage that can be done to General HP via damage to that limb.

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1 hour ago, Grimmshade said:

So...

The way I read it is: A limb can take up to double it's total HP an no more in a single hit. However, if the damage total happened to be higher than three times the HP total, the limb is severed, even though those extra HP are not removed from any totals. 

It also seems like the Double and Triple damage has to be from a single hit to cause the extra complication.

This leads me to wonder why we track individual body part HP at all. If its not total damage, but simply One, Two, or Three times the amount that matters, then why keep track of body part HP? If we do track it, what is the effect? It seems like a body part could easily be whittled down to negative the amount of total character HP pool and have no extra effect.

Cumulative damage also matters, multiple injuries to a body part that reduces it's HP to zero or less will make that limb useless. If your total MP falls to 2 you PC is unconscious, and dead at zero. Also First Aid is limited to once per injury - if you have three light wounds you can try 3x First Aid attempts.

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26 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Actually I think it does make sense. Everything in the "exceeds double" is correct, a 4-HP location can't take more than 8 off your general HP, any extra damage above that is ignored, except that if a single blow inflicts 3x the HP, then it is severed.

But what if it takes double, and then takes more damage?

So a 4HP arm takes 9 damage. Arm is now at -4, and general HP is at (total-8). Now the arm takes 5 damage. Does the arm actually take any more? Does your general HP?

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32 minutes ago, Grimmshade said:

But what if it takes double, and then takes more damage?

So a 4HP arm takes 9 damage. Arm is now at -4, and general HP is at (total-8). Now the arm takes 5 damage. Does the arm actually take any more? Does your general HP?

There is no such thing as negative HP.

Example: 4 HP arm, lets say 14 total HP. 9 damage -> Arm drops to Zero and Total HP 14-8=6 - arm is useless and this incapacitates our hero. Next round, same arm takes 3 damage - arm still at Zero but Total HP drops to 3. last round same arm takes 5 damage - arms still Zero but Total HP drops to 0, PC is dead. 

No lets assume that the third and final wound didn't happen. Our PC has a useless arm with two wounds, one wound at 4 damage and one at 3 damage. These could be healed with First Aid (one attempt per wound) or Magic. A triple damage score maims a limb which can only be healed with a 6 point Heal,

Edited by Psullie
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16 minutes ago, Psullie said:

There is no such thing as negative HP.

Example: 4 HP arm, lets say 14 total HP. 9 damage -> Arm drops to Zero and Total HP 14-8=6 - arm is useless and this incapacitates our hero. Next round, same arm takes 3 damage - arm still at Zero but Total HP drops to 3. last round same arm takes 5 damage - arms still Zero but Total HP drops to 0, PC is dead. 

No lets assume that the third and final wound didn't happen. Our PC has a useless arm with two wounds, one wound at 4 damage and one at 3 damage. These could be healed with First Aid (one attempt per wound) or Magic. A triple damage score maims a limb which can only be healed with a 6 point Heal,

These are the kind of examples I need! Thanks for the explanation.

So, what if first attack arm takes 5 damage. Arm is at 0 and now useless. HP is at 9. Arm now takes 8 damage. Arm is still at zero, HP is at 1, character falls unconscious due to 1 HP, but would also be incapacitated due to arm taking double HP if general HP was still above 2?

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2 minutes ago, Grimmshade said:

These are the kind of examples I need! Thanks for the explanation.

So, what if first attack arm takes 5 damage. Arm is at 0 and now useless. HP is at 9. Arm now takes 8 damage. Arm is still at zero, HP is at 1, character falls unconscious due to 1 HP, but would also be incapacitated due to arm taking double HP if general HP was still above 2?

that's how I play it

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1 hour ago, Psullie said:

There is no such thing as negative HP.

Example: 4 HP arm, lets say 14 total HP. 9 damage -> Arm drops to Zero and Total HP 14-8=6 - arm is useless and this incapacitates our hero. Next round, same arm takes 3 damage - arm still at Zero but Total HP drops to 3. last round same arm takes 5 damage - arms still Zero but Total HP drops to 0, PC is dead. 

No lets assume that the third and final wound didn't happen. Our PC has a useless arm with two wounds, one wound at 4 damage and one at 3 damage. These could be healed with First Aid (one attempt per wound) or Magic. A triple damage score maims a limb which can only be healed with a 6 point Heal,

P55:

Quote

If an adventurer loses all hit points in a location, that location is typically useless.  The hit points of a hit location can go negative - if it goes too far enough negative, that location may be maimed or even severed!

 

However, Psullie, I really do like the approach you use and it appears to clear up some of the other questions I have on my list.  That does seem to be how it was intended to work (at a guess).  This is why I ask these questions.  I never thought of interpreting it that way.  Thanks.

Edited by Mechashef
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How can one small and very important section be so full of questions.

Personally, I don't see how going into negative HP is worth tracking, unless it's in the tracking of individual wounds I guess.

Actually, the way that section is worded makes it sound like if a limb goes to -3X even with multiple hits it is severed. 

Edited by Grimmshade
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I think the RQ3 system (as we use it; honestly I don't know where canon is anymore) is simple and consistent:

- every location is disabled at anything below 0 hp.  At 0 hp in a location, you can make a CONx1 roll to keep it functioning at the start of each round.  Obviously, for head or chest, that means you are down and out.  Abdomen, you're coughing up blood, prone, unable to do anything but heal, parry, or dodge for the next 2 rounds.  If you're still below 0 (or at 0, failing the CONx1 attempt), you die.

- every location can inflict a maximum of 2x it's hit point against body hp.  After that, you're just chewing up ground meat.  

- if at any point you do 3x the location's hp in a single blow (and you're not using a thrusting or blunt weapon), it's severed.  We also rule that to sever, you have to also cut through 2x the enemy's armor in the same blow.  So if you have a 3hp arm, with 4hp of armor, a single blow would have to do either 9hp on a crit (which ignores armor) or 17 (9+8) on a normal hit.

So Billy has 3hp in his arms.  Mary strikes him for 4 hp to his right arm; he drops his weapon (he's right handed) and the arm is disabled.  Billy deducts 4 hp from body, and is at -1 in his arm.  Later, she hits him for 8 points in that same arm (wow!) ...as he's already at -1, he can only take 2 more from his body hp (his total body hp are now down to X-6), the rest of the damage is effectively wasted.

We make severing count because you CAN still hit (meaninglessly, except for knockback and/or severing) a maimed limb.  Once it's severed, any subsequent roll on that location is REROLLED.  For particularly ... durable ... enemies we've found that this 'dead hit locations' can amount to actually pretty substantial defensive armor when that awesome crit you were counting on...is wasted on an dead limb.

I think RQG's "an adventurer so damaged from a single blow (to 0 hp in the location) is functionally incapacitated: they can no longer fight until healed and are in shock" radically alters the balance of power against 4 legged and multilimbed animals certainly, and makes combat needlessly lethal for PCs.  I also think it disregards the recognized effects of adrenaline; there are numerous accounts of men (and women) whose limbs are disabled and are able to continue functioning, certainly in a combat context.

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59 minutes ago, Grimmshade said:

How can one small and very important section be so full of questions.

Easy to do when the rules you are "writing" are simply copied from a less-refined original set and concepts from later, more refined sets of rules are ignored.  (Not that later rules are always better, but usually they are better explained, at least.)  RQ veterans will chop and change and house-rule everything to suit the way they've always played, but I don't envy people with no experience with the system at all, trying to make sense of this first draft.  I'm sure that the (hypothetical, but inevitable) RQG, 2nd edition will iron most of these bugs out.

 

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2 hours ago, BWP said:

Easy to do when the rules you are "writing" are simply copied from a less-refined original set and concepts from later, more refined sets of rules are ignored.  (Not that later rules are always better, but usually they are better explained, at least.)  RQ veterans will chop and change and house-rule everything to suit the way they've always played, but I don't envy people with no experience with the system at all, trying to make sense of this first draft.  I'm sure that the (hypothetical, but inevitable) RQG, 2nd edition will iron most of these bugs out.

 

Yeah.

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It is very difficult to write clear rules. It sounds easy but it isn’t. 

 

I write and run training courses and things that seem so clear to me are often ambiguous to new people.

 

It can be very challenging to understand how much your prior knowledge affects your understanding of the rules.  When you know the intention of the rules (because you created them) it is easy to overlook how they can be read in different ways.

 

The material in RQG about Glorantha is very good (and as I’m not a big fan of Glorantha, take that as a real compliment).

 

Some of the game mechanics are less well written but part of that is the base version was also not written especially clearly.

 

I understand that their play testing included some people who had never played RQ before.  I wonder if that included a group completely of new people who read and played it without the assistance of experienced people and the designers?

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11 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

Hmm, there's a slight contradiction between the "exceeds double" and "exceeds triple":

This implies that the "Exceeds triple" is not possible. Clearly that is incorrect. Also, both sections talk exclusively about "in a single blow", it is unclear what happens if a limb is whittled away by more than 3 times its HP.

Given the old formula that these hit locations (head, chest, abdomen) had 0.33 or 0.4 times the general hit points, this looks like an academic problem to me - if you have received 3 times the damage that location can sustain, you are out of hit points.

Edited by Joerg

Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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One tweak I've considered (not tried, but it isn't actually contradicted by the original RQ2 rules), is a way to avoid the bookkeeping on locations, but keeps the rules pretty much the same:

- The location HPs are viewed as thresholds. Any damage to them comes off general HP as normal, but you DON'T track/reduce the location HP. You DO still track wounds in locations and also blows doing double or triple damage. e.g. Arm has 4 HP. If hit for 3-, that comes off general HP, if 4+, arm incapacitated and you note a wound (up to 8 HP max) and lose general HP, if 12+ arm severed.

If nothing else I think this would be useful for GMs, and it's not actually that different from how things currently work.

 

Always start what you finish.

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1 hour ago, PhilHibbs said:

I think this is actually very simple.

  • A limb can only take up to double its location HP in damage to general HP, after which it is maimed. This can be a single hit or multiple hits.
  • A limb is severed if it takes a single hit of 3x its location HP.

 

Is that how you think it should work, or how you think it does work according to the current RQG rules?

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1 hour ago, Mechashef said:

Is that how you think it should work, or how you think it does work according to the current RQG rules?

I think that's pretty much how RQG is supposed to work. There's some odd wording in 2x about "in a single hit", so it's unclear what happens if you get to -2x in more than one hit, but I'm ignoring that. I think -2x is -2x whether in one hit or multiple. The GM Pack charts don't mention "in a single hit".

Edited by PhilHibbs
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4 hours ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

One tweak I've considered (not tried, but it isn't actually contradicted by the original RQ2 rules), is a way to avoid the bookkeeping on locations, but keeps the rules pretty much the same:

- The location HPs are viewed as thresholds. Any damage to them comes off general HP as normal, but you DON'T track/reduce the location HP. You DO still track wounds in locations and also blows doing double or triple damage. e.g. Arm has 4 HP. If hit for 3-, that comes off general HP, if 4+, arm incapacitated and you note a wound (up to 8 HP max) and lose general HP, if 12+ arm severed.

If nothing else I think this would be useful for GMs, and it's not actually that different from how things currently work.

 

This is actually how I was considering playing it. Less bookkeeping overall and still accomplishes the same thing.

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On 10/4/2018 at 1:56 PM, PhilHibbs said:

Just going by my prior experience of RuneQuest, it looks like that example is wrong, he should have taken 9 points to his general HP leaving him on 1. The RQG rules also seem to imply this by stating only that limb damage is limited to 2x.

If they opened up the corrections thread, we could tell them, @MOB!

Unless there's an errata I'm not aware of, it's the same rule as in RQ3.

I just checked Avalon Hill's players book, and it uses the exact same example as RQG to illustrate the rule : limb with 4 HP takes 9 damage, which are reduced to 8 because the limb can't go beyond -4.

RQ3 doesn't mention inflicting 3x base hit points, though : a slashing weapon or a natural weapon such as claw or bite will sever the limb when reaching its negative limit.

Edited by Mugen
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10 hours ago, Joerg said:

Given the old formula that these hit locations (head, chest, abdomen) had 0.33 or 0.4 times the general hit points, this looks like an academic problem to me - if you have received 3 times the damage that location can sustain, you are out of hit points.

Old formula was dispensed with for rqg.  Now it's a set distribution of points per location, that just increments by one for each bracket increment increase of body hp.  So now at high hp, creatures limbs etc are all higher, but only iirc 1hp different from each other.

I haven't done the math but as those proportions skew away from that .4, .33, I think your logic breaks.

Edit: I looked it up, yes, it's broken.  A 9 hp person had 2hp seems, therefore they can take both their arms completely disabled and still be up.  A 19-21 hp person has 6hp per arm, they would be dead long before both arms reach -2x.  So oddly more to results in a way more fragile?  What?

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10 minutes ago, styopa said:

Old formula was dispensed with for rqg.  Now it's a set distribution of points per location, that just increments by one for each bracket increment increase of body hp.  So now at high hp, creatures limbs etc are all higher, but only iirc 1hp different from each other.

I haven't done the math but as those proportions skew away from that .4, .33, I think your logic breaks.

Edit: I looked it up, yes, it's broken.  A 9 hp person had 2hp seems, therefore they can take both their arms completely disabled and still be up.  A 19-21 hp person has 6hp per arm, they would be dead long before both arms reach -2x.  So oddly more to results in a way more fragile?  What?

The old Murphy's Rules effect was not addressed by the departure from the calculated location hit points, only the stats for giants were.

How being able to take more damage on a limb makes a character more fragile is a bit of a non-sequitur. Do you mean survivability when hit by Bigclub's club? Your 9 HP character receives additional damage from being knocked back anyway. One hit, you live with a mangled appendage. Second hit, you're out.

 

Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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