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Thursday, January 3, 2013

The Lone Hero

There's been some discussion in a couple places about an ideal "real swords & sorcery RPG". I'm mulling over some stuff about that, and will be posting more.

But one of the side issues that has come up is the idea of making D&D more amenable to the "lone hero" playstyle. Although it's possible to play D&D as a solitary PC exploring a dungeon (Mike Mornard brags about the time he played a solitary 1st level magic-user in Gary's dungeon,) this kind of play isn't quite like the lone hero we sometimes see in swords & sorcery or sword & planet stories. Solitary heroes usually get struck down quickly.

I think there are a couple changes you could make to D&D's combat and hit point system to make this kind of play easier.
  1. Multiple simultaneous opponents as in OD&D, but: Drop the 1 HD or less restriction; only require one attack roll and one damage roll; deal the same damage to all opponents..
  2. Multiple attackers with the same HD make only a single attack roll against a PC at +1 to hit for two attackers, +1 for each doubling of the numbers. Only roll damage once.
  3. Hit points are now fatigue, not damage resistance. Hits taken are erased after every rest. Hits taken greater than or equal to hit points means the defender drops, unconscious.
  4. Any damage roll of 5+ means physical injury to one body part (penalty when using injured limb.) Bump this up to crippling injury (can't use limb, possible death when aiming at vital organs) unless defender is wearing metal armor on location. Edged weapons actually sever limbs instead of crippling them.
  5. Physical injuries require time to heal. Roll a d6 after a week of recuperation and add your Con modifier; 5+ means all simple physical injuries are healed (7+ means no scar.) Crippling injuries are reduced to simple injuries. On a result of 1, one injury becomes permanent and stops healing.
The last three changes make multiple combat encounters easier to survive, but still carry some risk, even instant death or lost limbs. I'd probably let players choose where they receive an injury, or which injury becomes permanent on a bad recovery roll. I'd probably even let players choose whether to drop unconscious or fight on, with any successful attack against them after that point being an automatic injury.

The first two rules changes means that a solitary hero can fight multiple opponents without a lot of risk. With one attack roll and one damage roll affecting all opponents simultaneously, it's easier to fight your way through hordes of enemies. Taking only 1d6 damage total, regardless of the number of opponents, means that increasing the number of opponents doesn't mean almost certain death.

8 comments:

  1. Hmm, solitary heroes tend to be very unique specimens in their environments, whether physically like Conan or John Carter, or mentally like Maizirin in Vance's story. Perhaps give the hero 1 action per HD which may be used as either an attack or to automatically block a single attack?

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    1. Sounds too much like an action point system to me.

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  2. Why have protracted healing downtime for a Lone Hero? You can simply fast forward to where the hero is healed up except for situations hanging on the passage of time.

    Lone Hero games don't need a change in rules just a change in expectations.

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    1. I guess you're talking about hit points, rather than injury? Recover from injury, even in standard D&D, is always a fast forward, unless a player opts to adventure before fully recovered.

      The recovery time for hit points (fatigue) that I'm suggesting above is basically five minutes. It's not on fast forward because it may be interrupted. Players have to make a decision: rest a bit (and erase all hits) or push on?

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  3. I am thinking about implementing the injury-system presented here to regular D&D gaming. I am not sure, however, if I want it work for 0th-level NPCs (such as common henchmen) as well; I figure it would slow things down too much.

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    1. I think it wouldn't slow things down much, if at all. The roll to see if you are injured is the damage roll. "You take 4 hits, but no significant damage, just bruises and cuts," versus "You take 5 hits and the guard's mace numbs your shield-arm; write down 'injured left arm'." For hordes of mercs, though, you might be right. Maybe treat all 5+ damage rolls as strikes to the head or vitals, knocking them out of the combat or killing them, so that you don't have to keep notes on which NPCs have crippled arms or legs.

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    2. I would certainly use 5+ rolls as killing blows, otherwise I assume they would fall unconscious as well.

      My concern is that it might probably make adventuring much more dangerous as mid or high level characters hit by 1 HD opponents for 5+ damage also receive injuries.

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    3. Yeah, that's going to be a matter of taste. To me, a risk of serious injury regardless of level looks like a plus rather than a minus. The metal armor rule at least prevents insta-death.

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