Less tough heros

[groovydave]

A house rule we went to a few months in concerned the Hit Capacity part of the chr sheet. We shifted everything one column, right I think. Whichever direction would make the damage amounts a chr could take a bit more realistic. I'd have to look it up. Any thoughts?

[groovydave]

OK, I looked up what we did. We did away with the 2x multiplier for Critical wounds and made that 1x. Serious then became .5x, Slight .25x and Scratch anything up to .25x. Now, this may seem harsh, but it was based on average damage rolls versus various areas of the body, and the likelihood that any of those parts would survive those amounts of damage. Work the numbers for yourself and you'll see what i mean. Of course, most players are not going to be happy about their hit capacity going down (which it really isn't, just the levels that constitute certain types of damage), but as I always told my players, "it's a dark world".

[Linden]

I can see the logic for it, characters with high STR and CON scores are freakishly tough but...a lot of monsters (Dark Elves, Cobra People, even Weres) can use firearms and they tend to be a great equaliser. Once the lead starts flying about PCs and NPCs get knocked out pretty quick, regardless of how tough they are. I'm content to allow the PC's hit point scores to remain as per the rule book on the grounds that they need all the help they can get, and DC is a far more action oriented, pulpy game than say CoC.

[Zvezda]

We use half the listed hit points for every wound level but additionally we have almost doubled the healing time. Makes campaign gaming somewhat difficult at occasions.

[groovydave]

That's another way to handle it. I think we made the decision based on how many .357 magnum rounds, with average rolls, the average character could take to the head. And it was more than one. My observation at the time was that the system was essentially the same as TW2k, but the theme of the two games were different. One was a military setting where everyone was supposed to be tough and hard to kill, and the other a horror setting where everyone should fear for their lives at all times.
If you find the system fearful enough as it stands, my compliments. I'm just saying we found the survival rate too high, and so made adjustments.