Re: The Horrors of Realistic Weapons

> I would be interested in hearing how the people on the mailing list have
> reacted to the various combat systems created by GDW, and the modifications
> they have come up with to deal with aspects they did not like.

I'm  probably in a minority here, but I am not much interested in exactly where
a character gets hit. I quite liked the old Striker/Azhanti High Lightning
systems, in which you rolled 2D for damage, modified by weapon penetration and
target armour, and got a result of No Effect, Wounded, Unconscious or Dead. The
only concession to detail I made was that instead of applying those literally,
I used the damage die codes from Mercenary, and applied damage to PC stats. It
may not have been very realistic, but it was quick, and it worked to the extent
that a big tough PC could take more punishment than a little wimpy PC. Instead
of using the original GDW method, I simply added the character's STR and END
together for hit points to unconsciousness, and used DEX as further hit points
before death. Finally, the damage taken was multiplied by a factor depending on
the penetration roll. If the penetration table said "Wounded", the factor was
1; for "Unconscious", it was 1.5; for "Dead", it was 2. The main effect of this
was that even a slight hit from a PGMP now became lethal.

If a location was needed, it'd be referee's discretion, based upon such things
as how good the damage roll was, what would suit the story best, and whether or
not the referee was feeling mean at the time.

Maybe we didn't have characters queuing up in front of the medic knowing just
where they'd been hit; but it meant we could get the fight over with relatively
quickly, and get on with the next bit.

 "Keyboard? How quaint!" - M. Scott

 Adrian Hurt			     |	JANET:  [email removed]
 UUCP: ..!ukc!cs.hw.ac.uk!adrian     |  ARPA:   [email removed]

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