Back to the main page

Mailing List Logs for ShadowRN

Message no. 1
From: Jonathan Hurley <jhurley1@************.EDU>
Subject: Re: Called Shots for specific injures
Date: Wed, 8 Jan 1997 10:23:09 -0500
William Monroe She[SMTP:wma6617@****.TAMU.EDU] wrote:

>My question is simple;
>Consider if a character makes a called shot say to the kneecap. He gets
>enough successes (sp?) to make a serious wound. How do you deal with
>the fact that said NPC is now effectively crippled?

He's crippled. Can't walk, can barely crawl. A +3 general modifier will
take care of the general shock, and a spot ruling can take care of the
rest.

On a related note, I use a cinematic style of hit-location. After the
effects of the wound are determined, I roll 2D6 and use that to determine
what got hit. (I use the Battletech lit location system.) After determining
what got hit, I then decide what it means when a serious(or whatever) wound
occurs to someone's leg (or whatever.) Light wound is usually bruising,
etc. Moderate might be a flesh wound, or a minor wound to a critical area.
Serious wound is usually broken limb, concussion, smashed ribs, etc. Deadly
wounds include artery hits, punctured lungs, shattered limbs, and cracked
skulls.


From a Gateway 2000 manual:
Sucking all the chips off your system board with an industrial strength
wet/dry vac is not covered by your warranty
mailto:jhurley1@******.stevens-tech.edu
Message no. 2
From: Calvin Hsieh <u2172778@*******.ACSU.UNSW.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: Called Shots for specific injures
Date: Thu, 9 Jan 1997 10:42:24 +1100
On Wed, 8 Jan 1997, Jonathan Hurley wrote:

> On a related note, I use a cinematic style of hit-location. After the
> effects of the wound are determined, I roll 2D6 and use that to determine
> what got hit. (I use the Battletech lit location system.) After determining
> what got hit, I then decide what it means when a serious(or whatever) wound
> occurs to someone's leg (or whatever.) Light wound is usually bruising,
> etc. Moderate might be a flesh wound, or a minor wound to a critical area.
> Serious wound is usually broken limb, concussion, smashed ribs, etc. Deadly
> wounds include artery hits, punctured lungs, shattered limbs, and cracked
> skulls.

Don't you find that hit location rolls slow down combat? I mean, you have
your various attack rolls, defence rolls, initiative rolls,
knockback/knockdown rolls, salad rolls, ham and cheese rolls... Adding
another set of die to roll - it kind of reminds me of Runequest, the game
which took an eternity to fight in.

Anyway, I'm just curious as to whether this house rule slows down play
too much or not (or even like MERPS critical hit tables. Ahh... I miss
the critical hit to the groin thing).

Shaman
Message no. 3
From: Jonathan Hurley <jhurley1@************.EDU>
Subject: Re: Called Shots for specific injures
Date: Thu, 9 Jan 1997 12:03:44 -0500
Calvin Hsieh[SMTP:u2172778@*******.ACSU.UNSW.EDU.AU] wrote:
>On Wed, 8 Jan 1997, Jonathan Hurley wrote:
>
>> On a related note, I use a cinematic style of hit-location. After the
>> effects of the wound are determined, I roll 2D6 and use that to
determine
>> what got hit. (I use the Battletech lit location system.) After
determining
>> what got hit, I then decide what it means when a serious(or whatever)
wound
>> occurs to someone's leg (or whatever.) Light wound is usually bruising,
>> etc. Moderate might be a flesh wound, or a minor wound to a critical
area.
>> Serious wound is usually broken limb, concussion, smashed ribs, etc.
Deadly
>> wounds include artery hits, punctured lungs, shattered limbs, and
cracked
>> skulls.
>
>Don't you find that hit location rolls slow down combat? I mean, you have
>your various attack rolls, defence rolls, initiative rolls,
>knockback/knockdown rolls, salad rolls, ham and cheese rolls... Adding
>another set of die to roll - it kind of reminds me of Runequest, the game
>which took an eternity to fight in.
>
>Anyway, I'm just curious as to whether this house rule slows down play
>too much or not (or even like MERPS critical hit tables. Ahh... I miss
>the critical hit to the groin thing).


Heh. I loved Rolemaster's critical hits.

Anyway

Determining location doesn't take any longer because the way I'm doing
things, location has no effect on the damage done. (I'm not kidding.)

What happens is this: the attacker makes a success test; then the defender
makes a defense test. If the attack resulted in a wound (even if the damage
was staged down to nothing by body) I roll 2D6, compare the result to a
chart I have memorized (8 locations, not too hard. As I said, I'm using the
BT hit location chart) and describe how the wound result occurs due to
damage at that location.

IE, a PC attacks, rolls 8 successes on a firearms check with a weapon that
does S damage. The defender rolls 10 successes, only 5 of which were combat
pool. I then roll 2D6 (in this case, say I rolled a 3.) I then say "You hit
in the (whatever) having this effect." (In this case, I would say "You hit
him in the right arm, but didn't penentrate his armor (if the target was
wearing arm armor) (or) your bullet struck a glancing blow across his
forearm (if he isn't wearing armor). He is now favoring that arm.")

Thus, The extra time would still be taken up by describing the hit.


From a Gateway 2000 manual:
Sucking all the chips off your system board with an industrial strength
wet/dry vac is not covered by your warranty
mailto:jhurley1@************.edu
Message no. 4
From: Mike and Jill Johnson <shadow@*****.COM>
Subject: Re: Called Shots for specific injures
Date: Sun, 12 Jan 1997 18:33:42 -0700
At 10:06 AM 1/9/97 -0500, you wrote:

>Calvin Hsieh[SMTP:u2172778@*******.ACSU.UNSW.EDU.AU] wrote:
>>On Wed, 8 Jan 1997, Jonathan Hurley wrote:
>>
>>> On a related note, I use a cinematic style of hit-location. After the
>>> effects of the wound are determined, I roll 2D6 and use that to
>determine
>>> what got hit. (I use the Battletech lit location system.) After
>determining
>>> what got hit, I then decide what it means when a serious(or whatever)
>wound
>>> occurs to someone's leg (or whatever.) Light wound is usually bruising,
>>> etc. Moderate might be a flesh wound, or a minor wound to a critical
>area.
>>> Serious wound is usually broken limb, concussion, smashed ribs, etc.
>Deadly
>>> wounds include artery hits, punctured lungs, shattered limbs, and
>cracked

I don't really feel that you need to go into all the detail. Our group
assumes that a non-called shot generally hits the torso. Called shots use
the standard +4 to target and if successful then a +1 to the damage level.
The effects generally work out the same in game terms as a regular hit.
i.e. if you do a "serious" to someones arm they are going to suffer a +3 to
target numbers due to the pain/immobilizing of the arm.

I tend to base this off of movie effects as to real life effects. Take the
swat team that the terminator took out while leaving the building at the
end of terminator II. All of them were "immobilized" without killing them.
i.e they took "deadly" damage to limbs.

This also has a G.M. side effect as to the fact that if its a charactor
that took the "deadly" arm damage they can still do some minor stuff. Of
course this works for my special NPCs also.

Dr Feelgood
mnj@*****.com
Message no. 5
From: Calvin Hsieh <u2172778@*******.ACSU.UNSW.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: Called Shots for specific injures
Date: Tue, 14 Jan 1997 11:05:57 +1100
On Sun, 12 Jan 1997, Mike and Jill Johnson wrote:

SNIP ANYTHING RELEVANT TO SR
>
> Dr Feelgood
> mnj@*****.com
>
Dr Feelgood! Argh! We have a TV/radio personality here called that - all

she talks about is sex, sex and more sex - blatantly and with no
euphemisms. She's a horror to behold!

Shaman

_________________________________________________________
In Real Life: Calvin Hsieh
In Neo-Arch Real Life: Shaman

Neurological problems 101:
Kluver-Bucy Syndrome.
Occurs with the bilateral removal of the temporal lobe,
including amygdala.
Symptoms: Overattentiveness, hyperorality, psychic
blindness, hypersexuality, absense of emotional response.
_________________________________________________________

Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about Called Shots for specific injures, you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

These messages were posted a long time ago on a mailing list far, far away. The copyright to their contents probably lies with the original authors of the individual messages, but since they were published in an electronic forum that anyone could subscribe to, and the logs were available to subscribers and most likely non-subscribers as well, it's felt that re-publishing them here is a kind of public service.

Thwap!