Vitality/Wound point query [Archive] - Wizards Community

Vitality/Wound point query [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Glacialis
05-11-06, 07:05 PM How does an effect that doubles a weapon's threat range, such as keen, work in this system? I really don't like the expanded threat ranges the system defaults to, what with a critical hit being enough to take down most PCs on a lucky roll, and with the dazing you're looking at one squished PC.

Yes, I'm more worried for my PCs than I am my critters. I love the grittiness of the system, and it's well-suited to the campaign setting I'm using (FFG's Midnight). But even without using VP/WP, the setting is very deadly.

So, what d'ya say to keeping the criticals as they are? Weapons that are x3 or more will be truly devastating, though I might keep them at a lower multiplier and have it be an automatic trip if appropriate, or some other bonus effect like that.

Sure they'll want to kill things, but it's usually because they screwed up and got into a fight.
Darth Sephiroth
05-11-06, 08:16 PM Increases threat range by 1 I'd guess.
starfire311
05-12-06, 11:45 AM I leave keen alone

I have seen some people leaving the crit multipliers how they are, and give the player the option of dealing say triple damage with a battle axe or dealing normal damage straight to wounds.
Baldmeistr
05-15-06, 08:37 PM I adapted the VP/WP rules for use in my Dragonlance campaign, to some very interesting results. I split from UA in one key way:

- Threat range of weapons is unchanged. Crits go straight to WP. Threat multipliers still exist, but are reduced by one. (Therefore, a rapier has a threat range of 18-20, doing normal damage straight to wounds. A Longbow does x2 damage to wounds on a roll of 20.)

I thought this preserved the insta-kill possibilities of the big honkin' weapons a little better, while keeping the feel of the more nimble weapons there, too. You're going to crit a lot more often with a rapier, but one crit isn't (usually) going to kill anybody. On the other hand, if you crit somebody with a greataxe, they're probably done.

I've got two characters in the campaign with sort of reverse combat builds, and they illustrate the differences really well:
- a human swashbuckler/fighter/rogue with a matched pair of elven thinblades and a scabbard of keenness
- a dwarven fighter with Power Critical and a giant warhammer

In the last adventure, we fought off a troop of draconians. They had class levels, so I think each had 44/13 VP/WP, and there were 15 of them. The party schooled them. (With some very nice help from the wizard, who was happily under the effect of all three moons being conjoined, giving him +2 to his spell levels and save DCs. Can you say, "Fireball"?) The swashbuckler, who's optimized for critting and making lots of attacks, rolled 3 crits on his attack string. At that particular moment, we were under the influence of some godly magics, and his swords were heavily enchanted. He killed one draconian in one blow and reduced two others to 1-2 WP, effectively removing them from the fight. (I'm a somewhat realistic DM: in a WP world, if you've only got two left, you're going to try like hell to get out of whatever stink you're in, no matter your VP total!) He did all this in about three seconds, game-time. Bam, bam, bam--one through the eye and two with punctured lungs. Just like that.

The dwarf, on the other hand, usually kills things much more slowly. He's usually got to work through someone's goo (VP), which is of course much more plentiful than WP, and then chew through their WP (which act as 10-13 extra hp in most cases). But on occasion, he can kill dragons in one hit. Natty 20, toss in Power Critical for a +4 to confirm the crit, plus a smidge of 2-handed Power Attack... it's really no problem for him to do 40-50 points of wound damage in one hit.

The VP/WP system is really quite an interesting alternative to hp. I'm still working out the kinks (fortification became VASTLY more useful, for instance, and I upped its cost by one increment, getting rid of heavy fortification altogether), and even after about twelve sessions I still get surprised by how easily some things get dispatched (and how hard golems are to beat...).

The major thing I've noticed is that running away seems like a viable option much more frequently. I had a 17th level character (NPC villain) run from a party of 7th level PCs, just because she was outnumbered. Yeah, she could probably have taken them, but you just never know... those crits can literally mean instant death. Keeps even high-level characters a little humble.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Glacialis 05-11-06, 07:05 PM	How does an effect that doubles a weapon's threat range, such as keen, work in this system? I really don't like the expanded threat ranges the system defaults to, what with a critical hit being enough to take down most PCs on a lucky roll, and with the dazing you're looking at one squished PC. Yes, I'm more worried for my PCs than I am my critters. I love the grittiness of the system, and it's well-suited to the campaign setting I'm using (FFG's Midnight). But even without using VP/WP, the setting is very deadly. So, what d'ya say to keeping the criticals as they are? Weapons that are x3 or more will be truly devastating, though I might keep them at a lower multiplier and have it be an automatic trip if appropriate, or some other bonus effect like that. Sure they'll want to kill things, but it's usually because they screwed up and got into a fight.
Darth Sephiroth 05-11-06, 08:16 PM	Increases threat range by 1 I'd guess.
starfire311 05-12-06, 11:45 AM	I leave keen alone I have seen some people leaving the crit multipliers how they are, and give the player the option of dealing say triple damage with a battle axe or dealing normal damage straight to wounds.
Baldmeistr 05-15-06, 08:37 PM	I adapted the VP/WP rules for use in my Dragonlance campaign, to some very interesting results. I split from UA in one key way: - Threat range of weapons is unchanged. Crits go straight to WP. Threat multipliers still exist, but are reduced by one. (Therefore, a rapier has a threat range of 18-20, doing normal damage straight to wounds. A Longbow does x2 damage to wounds on a roll of 20.) I thought this preserved the insta-kill possibilities of the big honkin' weapons a little better, while keeping the feel of the more nimble weapons there, too. You're going to crit a lot more often with a rapier, but one crit isn't (usually) going to kill anybody. On the other hand, if you crit somebody with a greataxe, they're probably done. I've got two characters in the campaign with sort of reverse combat builds, and they illustrate the differences really well: - a human swashbuckler/fighter/rogue with a matched pair of elven thinblades and a scabbard of keenness - a dwarven fighter with Power Critical and a giant warhammer In the last adventure, we fought off a troop of draconians. They had class levels, so I think each had 44/13 VP/WP, and there were 15 of them. The party schooled them. (With some very nice help from the wizard, who was happily under the effect of all three moons being conjoined, giving him +2 to his spell levels and save DCs. Can you say, "Fireball"?) The swashbuckler, who's optimized for critting and making lots of attacks, rolled 3 crits on his attack string. At that particular moment, we were under the influence of some godly magics, and his swords were heavily enchanted. He killed one draconian in one blow and reduced two others to 1-2 WP, effectively removing them from the fight. (I'm a somewhat realistic DM: in a WP world, if you've only got two left, you're going to try like hell to get out of whatever stink you're in, no matter your VP total!) He did all this in about three seconds, game-time. Bam, bam, bam--one through the eye and two with punctured lungs. Just like that. The dwarf, on the other hand, usually kills things much more slowly. He's usually got to work through someone's goo (VP), which is of course much more plentiful than WP, and then chew through their WP (which act as 10-13 extra hp in most cases). But on occasion, he can kill dragons in one hit. Natty 20, toss in Power Critical for a +4 to confirm the crit, plus a smidge of 2-handed Power Attack... it's really no problem for him to do 40-50 points of wound damage in one hit. The VP/WP system is really quite an interesting alternative to hp. I'm still working out the kinks (fortification became VASTLY more useful, for instance, and I upped its cost by one increment, getting rid of heavy fortification altogether), and even after about twelve sessions I still get surprised by how easily some things get dispatched (and how hard golems are to beat...). The major thing I've noticed is that running away seems like a viable option much more frequently. I had a 17th level character (NPC villain) run from a party of 7th level PCs, just because she was outnumbered. Yeah, she could probably have taken them, but you just never know... those crits can literally mean instant death. Keeps even high-level characters a little humble.