CORPS Skill system
Thomas N. Bagwell
>I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
>conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
>As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
>changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
>with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
I'll agree. When I finally realized the versatility this allowed in
character creation, I immediately started putting a new campaign
together to see if it worked out as well as it looked. It did.
>In addition, there is nothing that requires that the same skill tree be
used
>by all characters. One could come up with a base skill tree, similar
to the
>sample given, and allow players to choose one section of a broader
skill
>tree to use instead. So if you wanted to encourage archetype
characters,
>you could start with the sample High Fantasy skill tree. Expand the
magical
>skills a bit (using, say Chivalry & Sorcery as a guide)
Each character in my campaign has an individualized skill tree. The
ex-Special Forces Captain has a skill tree that bears no resemblance to
that of the Psychologist (who specializes in Isolation Syndrome,
Abberant Psychology, and the Occult) or that of the Stage Magician (who
actually knows real magic), or the Jovian Scoop Pilot (cyber-enhanced),
or the computer security analyst. Common skills are set up similarly,
but other skills may be achieved through totally different primary
skills.
Each player was able to design the skills for his character in a totally
customizable fashion, enabling them to create precisely the character
concept they had in mind, without having to mold it into an existing
framework of skills. They were hesitant at first, until they realized
this. Now, it's something of a hit.
Tom Bagwell
Joshua Macy
>
> I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
> In addition, there is nothing that requires that the same skill tree be used
> by all characters. One could come up with a base skill tree, similar to the
> sample given, and allow players to choose one section of a broader skill
> tree to use instead.
It's also part of the rules that even within a given skill-tree you
can mark skills which can be bumped up from secondary to primary to
better fit the character conception: the example used is
Locksmith
(Lockpicking)
where the parentheses indicate that the skill can be promoted to
primary.
Joshua
Terry Austin
conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
The basic mechanism is that there are primary skills, limited by the
governing attribute, and secondary skills which can be half the level of the
primary skill they are a subset of, and tertiary skills that can be half the
level of the secondary skill they are part of.
Thus, if you have a AGL of 6, you can have Firearms to level 6, Pistols to
level 3, and Browning Hi-Power to level 1 (always rounding down, but you can
always buy one level). This would make the character pretty good with guns,
very good with pistols, and outstanding with his preferred pistol. This
mechanics, by itself, is pretty darned good.
The skill tree is simply a list of skills, grouped by type, with their
secondary, and in some cases, tertiary skills. The real brilliance of the
system lies in the fact that the sample skill trees presented are just that
- samples. If one approaches the skill tree as a game balance mechanism,
things become interesting.
For instance, if one wanted characters to be a little more versatile, one
could take the normal division of skill from:
Firearms
-->Pistols
-->Specific Pistol
to
Combat
-->Firearms
-->Pistols
allowing a character to be well-versed in all combat.
One could even simulate character classes with something like:
Soldier
-->Combat
-->Firearms
(Though I suspect you'd want to really reduce the number of SPs in this
case.)
The best part is, one is in no way compelled to use the same assumption in
all areas of skills. If you wanted characters that are well-rounded in
background skills, but not as much so in combat, you could use the sample
skill tree for combat skills:
Projectile Weapons
-->Pistols
-->Specific Pistol
but broaden the background skills a bit:
Linguist
-->Foreign Language
--->Dialect
(rather than Foreign Language being a primary skill).
This would require some careful limits (and probably some additional point
cost on such broad skills), but would produce a character who could
communicate, at least on a basic level, with almost anyone.
In addition, there is nothing that requires that the same skill tree be used
by all characters. One could come up with a base skill tree, similar to the
sample given, and allow players to choose one section of a broader skill
tree to use instead. So if you wanted to encourage archetype characters,
you could start with the sample High Fantasy skill tree. Expand the magical
skills a bit (using, say Chivalry & Sorcery as a guide)
Fire Magic
-->Type of Fire (normal, smoke, magickal, etc.)
-->Spell (Fireball, etc.)
Water Magic
-->Type of Water (liquid, rain, ice, etc.)
-->Spell (Wall of Ice, etc.)
Black Magic
-->Poisons
-->Spell (Medusa Poison)
However, a Mage Archetype would replace this section with:
Magic
-->Fire Magic
-->Type of Fire
With the addition of a requirement that the spell caster has to study any
spell extensively before being able to cast it, we now have a world in which
anyone would have access to some magic, after a fashion, but the Mage would
have access to nearly all magic.
Comments?
Terry Austin
tau...@hyperbooks.com
http://www.hyperbooks.com
Stephen B. Mann
universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
make me want to buy it?
This isn't intended as an impertinent question, but I'm seriously
interested. I've a number of people praising CORPS in this newsgroup and
others, and would like to know if I'm really missing something or not.
--
Stephen B. Mann sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu
SUNY Learning Network http://sln.suny.edu/sln
Peter Knutsen
>
> I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
> As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
> changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
> with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
>
> The basic mechanism is that there are primary skills, limited by the
> governing attribute, and secondary skills which can be half the level of the
> primary skill they are a subset of, and tertiary skills that can be half the
> level of the secondary skill they are part of.
>
> Thus, if you have a AGL of 6, you can have Firearms to level 6, Pistols to
> level 3, and Browning Hi-Power to level 1 (always rounding down, but you can
> always buy one level). This would make the character pretty good with guns,
> very good with pistols, and outstanding with his preferred pistol. This
> mechanics, by itself, is pretty darned good.
>
> The skill tree is simply a list of skills, grouped by type, with their
> secondary, and in some cases, tertiary skills. The real brilliance of the
> system lies in the fact that the sample skill trees presented are just that
> - samples. If one approaches the skill tree as a game balance mechanism,
> things become interesting.
As a comment to the AD&D Bashing thread (who have deviated significantly
from the original concept) there is one thing which I like being
spoonfed, that is skill. Lists of skills, to be more specific, with
room for additions.
One of the major faults of Fudge (and FFRE) is that there is no real
skill list. Okay, Steffan provides something like 100-200 skill names,
even neatly categorized, but does not provide difficulties. FFRE
provides something like a dozen sample skills, with difficulty,
but neither can be played without the GM or the players making
up some more detailed skill lists first (Fudge can, but then
you have to use the subjective character creation system,
which I don't like).
Apart from the problem with missing skills, it sounds like a good
concept, and I'd like to hear more about CORPS. Especially about
computer-aided character creation for the game.
> For instance, if one wanted characters to be a little more versatile, one
> could take the normal division of skill from:
>
> Firearms
> -->Pistols
> -->Specific Pistol
>
> to
>
> Combat
> -->Firearms
> -->Pistols
>
> allowing a character to be well-versed in all combat.
I think this approach makes more sense, but CORPS allows players
(or GM's) to select the scope of the skills, which is a good
thing (no spoonfeeding)
> One could even simulate character classes with something like:
Good idea (see later on)
> Soldier
> -->Combat
> -->Firearms
>
> (Though I suspect you'd want to really reduce the number of SPs in this
> case.)
that's the problem, how do you give out SP's (which I assume is
Character Creation Points of some sort) to players who have widely
different skill trees?
> The best part is, one is in no way compelled to use the same assumption in
> all areas of skills. If you wanted characters that are well-rounded in
> background skills, but not as much so in combat, you could use the sample
> skill tree for combat skills:
How do you maintain PC balance? I'd really dislike to go adventuring
with
a Gandalf-class PC if all I have is some kind of mercenary or ranger
type.
> Projectile Weapons
> -->Pistols
> -->Specific Pistol
>
> but broaden the background skills a bit:
>
> Linguist
> -->Foreign Language
> --->Dialect
>
> (rather than Foreign Language being a primary skill).
>
> This would require some careful limits (and probably some additional point
> cost on such broad skills), but would produce a character who could
> communicate, at least on a basic level, with almost anyone.
>
> In addition, there is nothing that requires that the same skill tree be used
> by all characters. One could come up with a base skill tree, similar to the
> sample given, and allow players to choose one section of a broader skill
> tree to use instead. So if you wanted to encourage archetype characters,
> you could start with the sample High Fantasy skill tree. Expand the magical
> skills a bit (using, say Chivalry & Sorcery as a guide)
If the value of a SP (charcreation point) isn't fixed, player-group
balance will be lost.
> Fire Magic
> -->Type of Fire (normal, smoke, magickal, etc.)
> -->Spell (Fireball, etc.)
>
> Water Magic
> -->Type of Water (liquid, rain, ice, etc.)
> -->Spell (Wall of Ice, etc.)
I prefer more generic spells, so I'd say
Wizard Magic
Elemental Magic
Fire Magic
> Black Magic
> -->Poisons
> -->Spell (Medusa Poison)
>
> However, a Mage Archetype would replace this section with:
Why would he do that?
> Magic
> -->Fire Magic
> -->Type of Fire
>
> With the addition of a requirement that the spell caster has to study any
> spell extensively before being able to cast it, we now have a world in which
> anyone would have access to some magic, after a fashion, but the Mage would
> have access to nearly all magic.
And would he pay extra SP's for that?
> Comments?
Lots. I'd also like to refer people to the freeware system SAGA,
by Eric C. Garrison which has a quite similair system, only it has
statistic
broad skill
narrow skill
http://members.iquest.net/~ericg/games/saga.html
Eric gives no examples of sub-skills, and has a fixed list of
attributes (stats) which any experienced GM would probably
modify.
SAGA used d6's, and target numbers, for a stat, the target
number is 6, for a skill (broad skill) the target number is 5,
for a sub-skill (narrow skill) the target number is 3. You
can't have a higher value in a skill than in the controlling
attribute, and no higher value in a sub-skill than in
the controlling skill.
The system lacks some examples but I liked the idea when I
read it.
> Terry Austin
> tau...@hyperbooks.com
> http://www.hyperbooks.com
--
Peter Knutsen
The URL to my homepage is:
http://home1.inet.tele.dk/peter.k/
Jean-Michel GOT
>
> Sounds interesting. But then again, I'm satisfied with the IMO
> universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
> make me want to buy it?
> This isn't intended as an impertinent question, but I'm seriously
> interested. I've a number of people praising CORPS in this newsgroup and
> others, and would like to know if I'm really missing something or not.
>
system is its automatic resolution. This is, if your skill is better than the level of
difficulty of the task you try, don't bother throw dice, you have an automatic success.
It's logical, simple and quick and it work in combat too! In combat, the difficulty is
the combat skill of your ennemy minus/bonus manoeuvers. So if you are a beginner boxer
and you want to fight a martial art pro, you'd better try all the defensive manoeuvers
you can thought of, because if you don't raise your defensive combat level, he will hit
you, automatically.
By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the simulation of
heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored as not to be realistically lethal
but CORPS is realistically deadly. It is a question of style of campaign.
Brett Slocum
>I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
>conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
>As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
>changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
>with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
>
>The basic mechanism is that there are primary skills, limited by the
>governing attribute, and secondary skills which can be half the level of the
>primary skill they are a subset of, and tertiary skills that can be half the
>level of the secondary skill they are part of.
I would agree that the skill tree is CORPS major innovation. I like them, I just
don't like creating them.
---
Brett Slocum -- slo...@io.com -- ICQ #13032903
* New Illuminated Sitekeeper for Steve Jackson Games - send neat sites
* GURPS site: http://www.io.com/~slocum/gurps.html
* Tekumel site: http://www.io.com/~slocum/tekumel.html
"Ah'm yer pa, Luke." -- if James Earl Ray was the voice of Darth Vader
Marc Puma Lombart
<sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu> wrote:
> So, what's CORPS got that would
>make me want to buy it?
A better skill system, as has been pointed out. Also, IMO, a
better combat result system. By that I mean the effect of damage on a
person, based on the type of damage and the armour worn.
Of course, if one wants to go through the trouble, one can
adapt both of these to GURPS and HERO.
Marc "Puma" Lombart
Montreal, Canada
http://www.dsuper.net/~katt
Luther, Clay
system, I am very, very unclear how you actually die. Everyone says
CORPS is so deadly, but I cannot quite figure out how you determine when
a character actually dies. There's much discussion about "eventually
lethal wounds" (and these are presented as an option AFAICT), but no
simple "when you reach point X you are dead" kind of rule.
Obviously somebody (Greg Porter, for instance) has grokked this. Can
you share?
Clay
-----Original Message-----
From: Jean-Michel GOT [mailto:jfba...@club-internet.fr]
Posted At: Monday, October 12, 1998 3:57 PM
Posted To: rec.games.frp.misc
Conversation: CORPS Skill system
Subject: Re: CORPS Skill system
Stephen B. Mann a écrit:
>
> Sounds interesting. But then again, I'm satisfied with the IMO
> universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
> make me want to buy it?
Andy Wills
>
> I've read and reread CORPS and, although I appreciate most of the
> system, I am very, very unclear how you actually die. Everyone says
> CORPS is so deadly, but I cannot quite figure out how you determine when
> a character actually dies. There's much discussion about "eventually
> lethal wounds" (and these are presented as an option AFAICT), but no
> simple "when you reach point X you are dead" kind of rule.
>
> Obviously somebody (Greg Porter, for instance) has grokked this. Can
> you share?
Pg. 49--"autokills" optional rule(I personally use it only on
nonimportant NPCs and PCs when they do something stupid), after the
eventually fatal wounds rule. For example, the average pistol(DV 7) shot
to the head is fatal about 5/8s of the time(and eventually fatal 80% of
the time). Rifles almost always kill with a head hit.
-Andy
Andy Wills
>
> I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
> As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
> changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
> with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
<snip explanation>
> Comments?
Yes, it is a nice game-balance mechanism. Broader skills can be balanced
by increased difficulty, like medicine in the sample. The choice of
skills can help shape the campaign's flavor. However, I do not
understand why you would want to give different people different skill
trees. If a player wants only a specific secondary skill, there are
already rules for it in the rulebook. I can't think of an example where
you'd want a different skill tree, barring an extreme like an alien and
a human brought up on different worlds. Cultural limitations can
restrict less extreme examples of that, though.
-Andy
> Terry Austin
Luther, Clay
optional rules, at what point does a character die?
Clay
-----Original Message-----
From: Andy Wills [mailto:an...@olywa.net]
Posted At: Monday, October 12, 1998 5:31 PM
Posted To: rec.games.frp.misc
Conversation: CORPS Skill system
Alan D Kohler
<klau...@get2net.dk> wrote:
>Jean-Michel GOT wrote:
>
>> By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the
>> simulation of heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored
>> as not to be realistically lethal, but CORPS is realistically deadly.
>> It is a question of style of campaign.
>
>If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
>hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
>lethal.
I don't know about that. HERO is my current published game of choice.
But I make that choice recognizing in full that even with some of the
deadlier option, it still falls on the "cinematic" side of the fence,
if only barely.
Alan D. Kohler
(hawkwind@SPAMMERS_MUST_DIE.olg.com)
P. ENGEBOS
On Mon, 12 Oct 1998, Luther, Clay wrote:
> I've read and reread CORPS and, although I appreciate most of the
> system, I am very, very unclear how you actually die. Everyone says
> CORPS is so deadly, but I cannot quite figure out how you determine when
> a character actually dies. There's much discussion about "eventually
> lethal wounds" (and these are presented as an option AFAICT), but no
> simple "when you reach point X you are dead" kind of rule.
>
> Obviously somebody (Greg Porter, for instance) has grokked this. Can
> you share?
In the discussion of Eventrually fatal results, there is also a rule for
calculating Instantly fatal Results.
From page 49 of the rule book - "When
you roll for an injury being eventually fatal, the amount the roll is made
by determines whether or not the would is an "instant kill." Head hids
are Instantly fatal if the roll is made by 3 or more. Chest hits are
instantly fatal if the roll is made by 5 or more, and abdomen or whole
body hits are instantly fatal if the roll is made by 7 or more."
I highly recommend you make a table by hit location and damage up to about
12 or 15 of Impairment Mods, Stun Chance and eventually/instantly fatal
and keep it close to you when you run. It really speeds things up. I
have them from the First Ed. DM's Screen and they really make a
difference.
Peter Engebos <peng...@nmsu.edu>
T'Sarith, Lord deGaalth <tsa...@io.com>
http://web.nmsu.edu/~pengebos/
"Here at Ortillery Command we have at our diposal hundred megawatt laser
beams, mach 20 titanium rods and guided thermonuclear bombs. Some people say
we think that we're God. We're not God. We just borrowed his SMITE button
for our fire control system"
Thomas N. Bagwell
<3621A600...@cnsvax.albany.edu>...
>Sounds interesting. But then again, I'm satisfied with the IMO
>universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
>make me want to buy it?
> This isn't intended as an impertinent question, but I'm seriously
>interested. I've a number of people praising CORPS in this newsgroup
and
>others, and would like to know if I'm really missing something or not.
Well, in addition to other features pointed out in this thread, another
one is that you get the rules in a book of around 140 pages. It has a
Table of Contents and an Index. I don't think I've ever noticed a typo,
and there are color-coded sections to draw attention to various aspects
of the rules. He includes a fair amount of good advice on various
plot-types, things to consider when setting up a campaign, and a variety
of examples. In other words, it's a very well-done rulebook.
Tom B.
Thomas N. Bagwell
> Apart from the problem with missing skills, it sounds like a good
>concept, and I'd like to hear more about CORPS. Especially about
>computer-aided character creation for the game.
There are three sample skill trees given, and I have used them 'as-is'
with no problem. That was before I discovered how handy it was for
characters to have indivualized skill-trees, which is our preferred
method of usage.
>that's the problem, how do you give out SP's (which I assume is
>Character Creation Points of some sort) to players who have widely
>different skill trees?
SPs are supposed to be used towards skills used heavily in a session.
The GM can dictate to each player which skills it can go towards, or he
can trust the player (our choice). The structure of the skill tree
doesn't really matter here.
>> The best part is, one is in no way compelled to use the same
assumption in
>> all areas of skills. If you wanted characters that are well-rounded
in
>> background skills, but not as much so in combat, you could use the
sample
>> skill tree for combat skills:
>
>How do you maintain PC balance? I'd really dislike to go adventuring
>with
>a Gandalf-class PC if all I have is some kind of mercenary or ranger
>type.
As long as the points are roughly even, the characters will be roughly
balanced. As much as they really can be, anyway. When I GM, I don't
pay much attention to actual point totals as long as they are in the
same general ballpark (within 50% or so of each other). I look the
characters over to get a feel for them, their utility, any outstanding
abilities, etc. As long as they 'feel' roughly balanced, that has alway
been close enough.
>> With the addition of a requirement that the spell caster has to study
any
>> spell extensively before being able to cast it, we now have a world
in which
>> anyone would have access to some magic, after a fashion, but the Mage
would
>> have access to nearly all magic.
>
>And would he pay extra SP's for that?
If you like. Either because spells can be rather expensive, and anyone
with a lot of them has obviously spent most of their time studying magic
and little else...and thus would generally be considered a Mage. As
opposed to someone who only knows a couple of spells. If you like, you
could add an advantage 'Mage', but this seems unnecessary.
Tom Bagwell
Thomas N. Bagwell
<3629bed3...@news.dsuper.net>...
>On Mon, 12 Oct 1998 16:52:06 -0500, "Luther, Clay" <cl...@selsius.com>
>wrote:
>
>> There's much discussion about "eventually
>>lethal wounds" (and these are presented as an option AFAICT), but no
>>simple "when you reach point X you are dead" kind of rule.
>
>first edition of CORPS, when it was a Global Conspiracy Role Playing
>Game. Not the generic 2nd ed. So some of the data might be wrong.
>
> It actually is there in plain site, but you have to pay
>attention. <g> Here are the ways you die in CORPS!
>
>1) Getting an instantly fatal injury.
> Anytime you get hit you might get an eventual fatal injury.
>When you make the roll to see, check by how much you made the roll.
>Head wounds are auto kills if the roll was made by 3 or more
>Chest hits are if you made it by 5 or more
>Abdomen if you make it by 7 or more
>Leg and Arm hits are never auto kills
This is the same in 2nd edition.
>2) Bleeding to death
> If you take eventually fatal wound, that does not become an
>auto kill, you now have a bleeder. You roll a D10. That number is the
>number of minutes it takes you to lose 1 point of HLT. Seems, if I am
>reading this clearly, that each further wound doubles the increment.
>Not sure if this means you roll and double, or double the original.
This is resolved with a single die roll. If you roll the d10 and
determine that the wound is eventually fatal, that roll also indicates
the bleeding rate. For instance, a person is shot for 6 pts of damage.
A d10 roll is made to see if it is eventually fatal, which it will be on
a roll of 6 or less. If a 5 is rolled, then the wound is eventually
fatal, and the character will lose 1 health point in 5 minutes, a 2nd
health point in 10 more minutes, a 3rd health point in 20 more minutes,
until the character's health reaches 0. Each lost health point is a
further +1 impairment to all task difficulties.
In the above example, if the character had been shot in the arm, and a 1
was rolled on the eventually fatal check, then 1 health point is lost
after 1 minute, another after 2 more minutes, another after 4 more
minutes, etc. So, the worse your eventually fatal roll is missed by,
the faster you are bleeding. This fits in well with the auto-kill rules
that also are indicated by severely missed eventually fatal rolls.
Tom Bagwell
Brian Newman
>Not really. They give a Colt .45 1d6 of damage. No matter what you do,
you
>*cannot* instantly kill someone, even if you shoot them in the head with
the
>gun pressed against their temple, without using GM fiat.
The book I have here is Champions 4th Edition, copyright 1989.
On p. 200, it lists ranged weapons. A .45 Colt Peacemaker is listed as a
1d6+1 KA; .357 Magnum Colt Python as 1 1/2 d6 KA. A .445 Webley is the only
1d6 revolver. A 9mm Browning auto is 1d6+1; .45 auto is 1d6+1. Let's
assume 1d6+1 KA.
You would have to get a total of 20 BODY damage to instantly kill someone.
A shot to the head does 2x BODY damage; the most you can hope for from a .45
revolver is 14 BODY.
In any case, the person will be long unconscious, if only from the head hit,
losing points of mental characteristics, and bleeding for at least 1 BODY
per round (12 seconds). This person would be lying there functionally dead
for anywhere from 10-66 seconds (depending on how badly they roll while
bleeding) and then would "officially" die. I don't know that that's much of
a functional difference unless you are waiting to do something to their
spirit as it leaves their body or something.
Technically, this is correct.
>Then there's the
>fact that a newborn infant can throw a football more than the entire length
>of a football field,
This is a common misconception or exaggeration of a Murphy's Rule which
didn't read the entire rules in the first place.
Page 133 of my book lists stats for "Small Children" of 3 feet tall with a
STR 0. A football is balanced and aerodynamic and takes -25 STR to lift (p.
173). Therefore, the small child has 25 extra STR to throw it with; making
a running throw would send the ball 20", or 40 meters, or 40 yards. From a
standing throw, they could throw it 10", or 20 meters, or 20 yards (p. 174).
If they pushed their STR, which would nearly knock them out as they used up
all 10 END and 2d6 of their 8 STUN, they cound do a running throw of 28", or
56 meters, or 56 yards, over half of a football field. Yes, a little
unreasonable due to the game system focusing on handling STR above 0, but
read your comic books sometimes and see what small children can do. :)
I would daresay that an infant is not 3 feet tall (at least an average
infant). An example on p. 173 lists a puppy with -15 STR. If an infant had
the same STR, they could lift a one-handed sword with no problem. I'm not
so sure of that, so I might give them a -20 STR at least (-25 is the lowest
that the system can really go). With a -20 STR, an infant could throw a
football 8 meters with a running throw, 4 meters without.
>and a perfectly average person can completely
>disassemble an average automobile with his bare feet in under 5 minutes.
It
>can be made more deadly, but it cannot be made more *realistically* deadly.
Is this based on anything in the game system? The Mechanics skill, which
doesn't mention time taken or modifiers for using your feet, but does
mention that you almost always need tools, which might be hard to manipulate
with your feet? Something under Vehicles? I don't remember it, but that
system is for designing vehicles, not dismantling them with your feet.
Could you please give a reference or at least a hint for this one? I have
no idea where it could be.
Klaus Ę. Mogensen
> By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the
> simulation of heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored
> as not to be realistically lethal, but CORPS is realistically deadly.
> It is a question of style of campaign.
If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
lethal. As far as I remember, many of the rules that makes CORPS combat
realitic and lethal are optional, too, so I don't see much difference
in that respect.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Klaus Æ. Mogensen <klau...@get2net.dk> http://hjem.get2net.dk/Klaudius
The Optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds.
The Pessimist fears that this is so. - James Branch Cabell
Shawn McMahon
<sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu> wrote:
>Sounds interesting. But then again, I'm satisfied with the IMO
>universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
>make me want to buy it?
Let me preface this by saying that I'm just giving you stuff that you
may or may not like. I am *NOT* evangelizing for CORPS here. Many of
the things I list will be exactly the reasons some people will *HATE*
CORPS.
CORPS uses a location-impairment system for damage resolution. This
feels a lot more realistic for some people than a hit-point system.
CORPS codifies rules for "no die roll needed if your skill is higher
than the difficulty of the task". This simplifies and speeds play.
CORPS uses a target-number-based skill system, instead of a modifier
to skill.
CORPS uses a linear progression for skills instead of a bell curve.
CORPS uses a linear progression for task difficulties, which makes it
more intuitively obvious how difficult a task is, instead of modifiers
that affect different characters differently, based on where they are
on the bell curve.
CORPS has a fairly generic "superpowers" system that covers supers,
psi, and cybernetics in a similar manner to GURPS Supers, but in just
a couple of pages.
CORPS does not use random damage rolls for firearms.
CORPS can use 3G3 gun designs with only very minor conversions.
CORPS uses a single 10-sided die for resolution. And, due to the
target-number based system, it's WYRIWYG; What You Roll Is What You
Get.
Again, some people will hate one or more of these points. Others will
love them.
If you like the Timelords system (I.E. Timelords, Warp World,
Spacetime), but feel it's way too complicated, you might like CORPS.
If you like GURPS but hate the way it uses hit points instead of a
location-impairment system, you might like CORPS.
If you like the speed and ease-of-use of FUDGE, but prefer a more
sound mathematical basis for decisions in order to get your mind
around them, you might like CORPS.
If you think Ysgarth needs more stats, you'll hate CORPS. :-)
If you think bell curves are more realistic than linear progressions,
you won't like CORPS.
If you think rounding probabilities to the nearest 10% is too grainy,
you won't like CORPS, but you're pretty much in the soup with GURPS
and Hero too.
Terry Austin
>Stephen B. Mann a écrit:
>>
>> Sounds interesting. But then again, I'm satisfied with the IMO
>> universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
>> make me want to buy it?
>> This isn't intended as an impertinent question, but I'm seriously
>> interested. I've a number of people praising CORPS in this newsgroup and
>> others, and would like to know if I'm really missing something or not.
>>
> Yes, you miss something. That I see as the bigger advantage in CORPS skill
>system is its automatic resolution.
I'd forgotten about that. Yes, I'd agree. It's the only game system I've
ever seen with a system of automatic success that works. A character barely
that has any knowledge of a skill has to roll for even the simplest tasks,
as he should. But someone who has mastered a skill completely need not roll
at all for routine tasks. The character who's never seen a doorknob has to
roll dice to open the door, but the one who grew up around them can *always*
figure out how to work them.
Terry Austin
>Sounds interesting. But then again, I'm satisfied with the IMO
>universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
>make me want to buy it?
> This isn't intended as an impertinent question, but I'm seriously
>interested. I've a number of people praising CORPS in this newsgroup and
>others, and would like to know if I'm really missing something or not.
>
It's got a very simple, clean, elegant system of game mechanics. One d10 is
about all you need, and the exact same mechanic is used for everything.
It's got a reasonably realistic combat system, that is nearly as deadly as
Real Life. But with optional rules (Ass Saving Points) to "correct" this is
you think it's a problem.
Terry Austin
>Jean-Michel GOT wrote:
>
>> By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the
>> simulation of heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored
>> as not to be realistically lethal, but CORPS is realistically deadly.
>> It is a question of style of campaign.
>
>If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
>hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
>lethal.
Not really. They give a Colt .45 1d6 of damage. No matter what you do, you
*cannot* instantly kill someone, even if you shoot them in the head with the
gun pressed against their temple, without using GM fiat. Then there's the
fact that a newborn infant can throw a football more than the entire length
of a football field, and a perfectly average person can completely
disassemble an average automobile with his bare feet in under 5 minutes. It
can be made more deadly, but it cannot be made more *realistically* deadly.
Terry Austin
tau...@hyperbooks.com
http://www.hyperbooks.com
Terry Austin
There are sample skill trees that look like they'd work perfectly well for
modern settings (spies and such), high fantasy, and scifi.
As to computer-aided chargen, take a look at
http://www.hyperbooks.com/catalog/50001.html
>
>that's the problem, how do you give out SP's (which I assume is
>Character Creation Points of some sort) to players who have widely
>different skill trees?
>
Well, if you want some degree of balance, you'd need to be careful about
defining those skill trees. Make sure that the majority of them is the same
from one to the next, but allow a certain number of skills to be under the
broader categories. Or not, if you're not committed to absolute balance.
They give guidelines on assigning Skill Points (SP) and Attribute Points
(AP), but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to play with the numbers. The
"standard, normal person" is 100 APs and 50 SPs. This will get you
attributes that average out to 4 or 5, or one really high and the rest
fairly low. And it will get you either a lot of skills to low levels, or
just a few to medium levels. (Things cost the square of the level you're
buying, i.e., a STR of 1 costs 1 AP, 2 costs 4, 3 costs 9, 4 costs 16, and
so on. Attributes reduce the cost of skills a *little*, but not much.
Needless to say, you can't get more than a level 7 skill for a brand new
character, and you can't get any attribute above 9, and you'll be worthless
at everything else if you do.)
>> The best part is, one is in no way compelled to use the same assumption in
>> all areas of skills. If you wanted characters that are well-rounded in
>> background skills, but not as much so in combat, you could use the sample
>> skill tree for combat skills:
>
>How do you maintain PC balance? I'd really dislike to go adventuring
>with
>a Gandalf-class PC if all I have is some kind of mercenary or ranger
>type.
>
The best way to keep balance is to just have everyone use the same skill
tree. Anything else would require some work, and testing, on the part of
the GM, and a good deal of faith on the part of the players. Which is
always the case when you try something with a game that the designers didn't
really intend.
>> Projectile Weapons
>> -->Pistols
>> -->Specific Pistol
>>
>> but broaden the background skills a bit:
>>
>> Linguist
>> -->Foreign Language
>> --->Dialect
>>
>> (rather than Foreign Language being a primary skill).
>>
>> This would require some careful limits (and probably some additional point
>> cost on such broad skills), but would produce a character who could
>> communicate, at least on a basic level, with almost anyone.
>>
>> In addition, there is nothing that requires that the same skill tree be used
>> by all characters. One could come up with a base skill tree, similar to the
>> sample given, and allow players to choose one section of a broader skill
>> tree to use instead. So if you wanted to encourage archetype characters,
>> you could start with the sample High Fantasy skill tree. Expand the magical
>> skills a bit (using, say Chivalry & Sorcery as a guide)
>
>If the value of a SP (charcreation point) isn't fixed, player-group
>balance will be lost.
Just make sure you have a broader category for every character archetype.
Fighters get Combat, while everyone else gets Missile Weapons. Mages get
Magic, while everybody else gets Fire Magic. Thieves get Thievish Skills,
while everybody else gets Pickpocketing. And so on. It's not what the game
was originally designed to do. It's just better suited to such modification
than most.
>
>> Fire Magic
>> -->Type of Fire (normal, smoke, magickal, etc.)
>> -->Spell (Fireball, etc.)
>>
>> Water Magic
>> -->Type of Water (liquid, rain, ice, etc.)
>> -->Spell (Wall of Ice, etc.)
>
>I prefer more generic spells, so I'd say
> Wizard Magic
> Elemental Magic
> Fire Magic
>
No reason you can't do that.
>> Black Magic
>> -->Poisons
>> -->Spell (Medusa Poison)
>>
>> However, a Mage Archetype would replace this section with:
>
>Why would he do that?
>
Because that's the flavor the GM wants for the game.
>> Magic
>> -->Fire Magic
>> -->Type of Fire
>>
>> With the addition of a requirement that the spell caster has to study any
>> spell extensively before being able to cast it, we now have a world in which
>> anyone would have access to some magic, after a fashion, but the Mage would
>> have access to nearly all magic.
>
>And would he pay extra SP's for that?
There's a mechanism in the system for that, yes. And it's entirely
subjective on the part of the GM. But the safest tools are always the least
useful.
Terry Austin
>Terry Austin wrote:
>>
>> I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
>> conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>>
>> As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
>> changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
>> with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
>
><snip explanation>
>
>> Comments?
>
>Yes, it is a nice game-balance mechanism. Broader skills can be balanced
>by increased difficulty, like medicine in the sample. The choice of
>skills can help shape the campaign's flavor. However, I do not
>understand why you would want to give different people different skill
>trees. If a player wants only a specific secondary skill, there are
>already rules for it in the rulebook. I can't think of an example where
>you'd want a different skill tree, barring an extreme like an alien and
>a human brought up on different worlds. Cultural limitations can
>restrict less extreme examples of that, though.
>
Basically, it lets you do something very like classes. It give you
archetypes, where a Mage is better at magic than a non-mage *can* be, ever.
a Fighter is better at combat than a non-figher *can* be, ever. In games
that do not force this, our group tends to end up with amorphous, shapeless
characters that are all like. One could erase the name, fill in someone
else's, and trade character sheets, and nobody would know the difference.
Obviously, your tastes vary.
Marc Puma Lombart
wrote:
> There's much discussion about "eventually
>lethal wounds" (and these are presented as an option AFAICT), but no
>simple "when you reach point X you are dead" kind of rule.
I'll give it a shot. Now, please not that I am reading the
first edition of CORPS, when it was a Global Conspiracy Role Playing
Game. Not the generic 2nd ed. So some of the data might be wrong.
It actually is there in plain site, but you have to pay
attention. <g> Here are the ways you die in CORPS!
1) Getting an instantly fatal injury.
Anytime you get hit you might get an eventual fatal injury.
When you make the roll to see, check by how much you made the roll.
Head wounds are auto kills if the roll was made by 3 or more
Chest hits are if you made it by 5 or more
Abdomen if you make it by 7 or more
Leg and Arm hits are never auto kills
So, lets say Joe takes a 6 point hit to the head.
You know roll to see the result:
On a 1-3 Joe is auto killed.
On a 4-6 Joe's wound is classified eventually fatal
On a 7-10 It just hurts like hell.
2) Bleeding to death
If you take eventually fatal wound, that does not become an
auto kill, you now have a bleeder. You roll a D10. That number is the
number of minutes it takes you to lose 1 point of HLT. Seems, if I am
reading this clearly, that each further wound doubles the increment.
Not sure if this means you roll and double, or double the original.
EG: You take an eventually fatal wound, roll a D10 and get a
9. That means that every 9 minutes you will lose a HLT point,. When
your HLT is down to zero, you die or blood loss or shock. Of course
medical treatment or first aid [or if in the campaign specific magic,
powers, etc. ] can stop the bleeding.
3) Cut me lose!
If you look at the character sheet you will find a damage
track, one for each part of your body. Every time you take an
impairment [impairment, not damage] to a body part, you must mark it
off on the track. When a track is filled, getting ten or more
impairment points, that area is caput. Arms and legs that have ten or
more impairment points must be amputated. Torso and Head at ten or
more means the character is dead.
So,you see, the game does indeed give you a, "At this point,
the character is dead."
A 6 point chest hit does an impairment of 6. According to the
rules this means it has an eventual fatal chance of 6 or less on a
roll.
Terry Austin
>That still doesn't really answer my question. Assuming I don't use any
>optional rules, at what point does a character die?
>
Page 49, Special Cases:
Eventually fatal wounds:
"The chance of a *lethal* injury being eventually fatal is a 1d10 roll *of*
*the* *damage* *or* *less*, with the reverse of the location impairment
modifier, and, optionally, adding the modifier for the type of attack.
Example:
a) A 2 point hit to the head
b) -2 point of impairment due to location, for a total of 1 point of
impairment.
c) Chance of eventually fatal is 2 (points of damage) *plus* one (the
opposite of the impairment modifier for location), or 3 on a d10.
If you have an eventually fatal wound, go to the bottom of column 1,
Bleeders:
Eventually fatal wounds will cause a decrease in your HLT attribute from
bleeding, at the rate of 1 point per 1d10 minutes (rolled when the wound is
determined to be eventually fatal), and each time this increment is doubled.
--------If HLT goes to zero from bleeding, the character dies from blood
loss or shock.----------
*****
Column 2, Autokills
Some *eventually* fatal injuries have a chance of being *instantly* fatal.
When you roll for an injury being *eventually* fatal, the amount the roll is
made by determines whether or not the would in an "instant kill."
Head hits are *instantly* fatal if this roll is made by 3 or more. Chest
hits are *instantly* fatal if the roll is made by 5 or more, and abdomen or
whole body hits are *instantly* fatal if the roll is made by 7 or more. Arm
and leg hits are *never* instantly fatal. GM's might want to reserve
autokills for NPC's, depending on who lethal they want their campaign.
(Note that the inclusion of autokills is the standard rules, and the not
using them on PC's is the optional rule, not the other way around as
claimed).
Thus:
A 6 point chest hit does an impairment does an impairment of +6, and is
*eventually* fatal on a roll of 1-6. However, a roll o f1 makes the roll by
5 points, and is *instantly* fatal.
Does that clear it up?
Bryant Durrell
Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
Sometimes, Terry, I despair at your lack of imagination.
Give normals a base of 5 in each stat. My Colt Peacemaker does 1d6+1
(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
chance of 5 or more points. Since we're probably using hit locations
if we want a lot of realism, our STUN multiplier is a minimum of 2 --
and most likely 3 or more. Our average character has 10 STUN. He or
she goes unconscious, minimally.
Oh, and since we're using bleeding rules, you can lose more BODY there.
Happy yet? And it was such a minor change...
On to the baby. Ah, that ever-popular baby. Is a baby as strong as,
say, a small puppy? Page 173: "A small puppy isn't very strong; by
the table it only has a strength of -15." But that's a lifting
strength of 3.2 kilos. I don't think a newborn baby can lift that
much, do you? Maybe a pound or so, which would be Strength -25.
Which means the baby can't throw the football at all. Funny how that
works. Just for fun, let's work it out the other way. Your infant is
tossing a football 100 yards. That's around 50 inches. (An inch is
two meters, or about two yards.)
I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you're letting the
infant make a running throw, even though infants can't run. For a
fifty inch running throw, you need to have 65 points of Strength over
and above what you need to pick up the object. A football requires a
mere -25 Strength to pick it up, so your baby must have a 40 Strength.
That's more than enough to pick up a truck. Terry, where the fuck did
you get the "fact" that a newborn infant can throw a football more than
the entire length of a football field?
--
Bryant Durrell [] dur...@innocence.com [] http://www.innocence.com/~durrell
[----------------------------------------------------------------------------]
"If everything seems under control, you're just not
going fast enough." -- Mario Andretti
Thomas N. Bagwell
>I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you're letting the
>infant make a running throw, even though infants can't run. For a
>fifty inch running throw, you need to have 65 points of Strength over
>and above what you need to pick up the object. A football requires a
>mere -25 Strength to pick it up, so your baby must have a 40 Strength.
Out of curiosity...it's been years since I played Hero...how does this
statement apply to an NFL quarterback? True, I haven't seen many 100
yard passes, but I've seen some that have come close. How strong is a
quarterback required to be to make a 70 yard pass, for instance?
>That's more than enough to pick up a truck. Terry, where the fuck did
>you get the "fact" that a newborn infant can throw a football more than
>the entire length of a football field?
Does this mean a quarterback must be able to pick up a car in order to
make a 70 yard pass?
Tom B.
Bryant Durrell
Thomas N. Bagwell <bag...@austin360.com> wrote:
>Bryant Durrell wrote in message <6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>...
>>I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you're letting the
>>infant make a running throw, even though infants can't run. For a
>>fifty inch running throw, you need to have 65 points of Strength over
>>and above what you need to pick up the object. A football requires a
>>mere -25 Strength to pick it up, so your baby must have a 40 Strength.
>
>Out of curiosity...it's been years since I played Hero...how does this
>statement apply to an NFL quarterback? True, I haven't seen many 100
>yard passes, but I've seen some that have come close. How strong is a
>quarterback required to be to make a 70 yard pass, for instance?
Funny -- that was something I started thinking about after I got done
with my post.
If a QB has 20 Str, which is not actually the most a normal human can
have, he can toss the football 36 inches -- over 70 yards. Hm, that
worked out pretty well with your example. If he pushes his strength,
he can get 44 inches, which is 90 yards or so. Plenty.
In practice, if I were building an NFL QB, I'd buy about five points of
that STR as "Only for Throwing Footballs." Or I'd get silly, and write
up a martial arts package which included whatever the appropriate thing
is; I suspect it's covered in Ultimate Martial Artist.
>>That's more than enough to pick up a truck. Terry, where the fuck did
>>you get the "fact" that a newborn infant can throw a football more than
>>the entire length of a football field?
>
>Does this mean a quarterback must be able to pick up a car in order to
>make a 70 yard pass?
Nah. Just a motorcycle.
Thomas N. Bagwell
>In article <3622e...@news1.ibm.net>,
>Thomas N. Bagwell <bag...@austin360.com> wrote:
>>Bryant Durrell wrote in message
<6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>...
>>>I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you're letting the
>>>infant make a running throw, even though infants can't run. For a
>>>fifty inch running throw, you need to have 65 points of Strength over
>>>and above what you need to pick up the object. A football requires a
>>>mere -25 Strength to pick it up, so your baby must have a 40
Strength.
>>
>>Out of curiosity...it's been years since I played Hero...how does this
>>statement apply to an NFL quarterback? True, I haven't seen many 100
>>yard passes, but I've seen some that have come close. How strong is a
>>quarterback required to be to make a 70 yard pass, for instance?
>
>Funny -- that was something I started thinking about after I got done
>with my post.
>
>If a QB has 20 Str, which is not actually the most a normal human can
>have, he can toss the football 36 inches -- over 70 yards. Hm, that
>worked out pretty well with your example. If he pushes his strength,
>he can get 44 inches, which is 90 yards or so. Plenty.
Hmmm. A quarterback with a 20 strength. If he's that strong, how
strong is the defensive and offensive linesmen? Where does a 20
strength fall in relation to the population at large? I dunno... it
seems awful high to me.
>In practice, if I were building an NFL QB, I'd buy about five points of
>that STR as "Only for Throwing Footballs." Or I'd get silly, and write
>up a martial arts package which included whatever the appropriate thing
>is; I suspect it's covered in Ultimate Martial Artist.
I guess it's an example of different types of strength that have popped
up here and there lately.
Looking at CORPS (just to tie the subject to the thread it's in...:), it
depends on the weight of a football. I don't know. I'll look at .5
kg...should be close enough. For .5 kg you would need a strength of 8
to throw it 64 meters. This is 3 above average, but if you take a
physical ad of 'upper body strength - for throwing' which effectively
adds +2 to STR when throwing. This would allow a STR 8 quarterback to
throw a .5kg football 100 m. This seems a bit strong for the average
quarterback, so dropping his strength to 7 still allows him to throw it
81 m, which feels better.
Anyone know what a football weighs?
>>>That's more than enough to pick up a truck. Terry, where the fuck
did
>>>you get the "fact" that a newborn infant can throw a football more
than
>>>the entire length of a football field?
>>
>>Does this mean a quarterback must be able to pick up a car in order to
>>make a 70 yard pass?
>
>Nah. Just a motorcycle.
(Mental picture of Troy Aikman picking up a motorcycle...trying to pick
up a motorcycle...being out for 4 more weeks...:( )
Tom Bagwell
Nightshade
>On Mon, 12 Oct 1998 02:47:28 -0400, "Stephen B. Mann"
><sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu> wrote:
>If you like the Timelords system (I.E. Timelords, Warp World,
>Spacetime), but feel it's way too complicated, you might like CORPS.
I, on the other hand, thought they tossed out a few too many of those
games best features when they went to CORPS.
Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y
Luther, Clay <cl...@selsius.com> wrote:
>That still doesn't really answer my question. Assuming I don't use any
>optional rules, at what point does a character die?
Apart from the fact that autokills/instantly fatal wounds are not strictly
speaking an optional rule (except in the sense that all rules are optional;
it is *not* using them that is an optional rule), here goes:
Assuming you get hit and the wound has been determined to be eventually fatal,
you roll 1d10 (I believe the standard rule is to use the same result as
you rolled on the "fatality check"; I find this somewhat unappealing, and
prefer to roll a separate die). That is how many minutes it takes you to
lose a point of Health; every time this time interval is doubled you lose
another, when Health reaches zero it's curtains (so if your Health is 4 and
the roll was a 2, for instance, you lose points of Health at 2 minutes,
4 minutes, 8 minutes, and 16 minutes -- and after the last one you're pushing
up the daisies). If you've already got some non-lethal impairment to Health,
you only go unconscious when the total impairment brings your current Health
to zero; you don't die until the lethal impairment to Health equals Health
by itself. Remember also that you can be knocked unconscious by taking
damage (this effect is separate from both fatality chances and impairment),
so it's quite common to spend most or all of your final minutes "out of it".
Stopping the bleeding temporarily requires a First Aid task with a difficulty
that depends on the fatality chance the wound had in the first place;
permanently stabilizing a wound so it's no longer a threat and can begin
to heal naturally will often require surgery. Healing takes weeks or months
if you don't have access to magical or ultratechnological cures (mundane
hospital care helps, but only goes so far).
Note that "instantly fatal" might more accurately be termed "nigh-instantly
fatal"; it's supposed to cover all those situations where death (as in
normally-irreversible cessation of function) occurs within a few seconds.
I suppose one might institute a house rule whereby all instantly fatal
results are rolled for again, and if they come up as "eventually fatal"
the second time they're treated as such, only using seconds instead of
minutes (so your artery is severed and your lifeblood is gushing out,
but you made your will check and are still able to keep on your feet for
a few important seconds, hacking away at your enemies to take as many as
possible with you / crawling toward the control panel to defuse the nuke
in the nick of time / folding one last origami figure before you expire).
--
Leif Kj{\o}nn{\o}y | Skyclad: "Life's just a process of delamination,
www.pvv.org/~leifmk| stripping your hopes, dissecting them gently.
Math geek and gamer| I've opened my heart and to my consternation
GURPS, Harn, CORPS | when I peered inside it was small, dark and empty."
Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y
Shawn McMahon <smcmaho...@eiv.com> wrote:
>On Mon, 12 Oct 1998 02:47:28 -0400, "Stephen B. Mann"
><sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu> wrote:
>
>>universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
>>make me want to buy it?
>
>may or may not like. I am *NOT* evangelizing for CORPS here. Many of
>the things I list will be exactly the reasons some people will *HATE*
>CORPS.
[snip]
>CORPS uses a target-number-based skill system, instead of a modifier
>to skill.
Since skills and target numbers are on the same scale, it really doesn't
much matter whether you apply modifiers to skill or to target number (as
long as you remember to add and subtract correctly). IIRC, 1st ed. CORPS
used modifiers to skill (where + is good and - is bad), while this
convention was turned around in 2nd ed. (where - is good and + is bad).
But this is nitpicking.
>CORPS uses a linear progression for skills instead of a bell curve.
I do not believe that the skill progression can be accurately termed
linear -- the point-cost to learn and improve skills is decidedly nonlinear
(and the time-and-money-cost to improve skills by training is even more
nonlinear if you want to do it *fast*); in fact, the only linearity I
can spot is the direct addition of levels of secondary and tertiary skill
to primary skill.
>CORPS uses a linear progression for task difficulties, which makes it
>more intuitively obvious how difficult a task is, instead of modifiers
>that affect different characters differently, based on where they are
>on the bell curve.
Modifiers *do* often affect different characters differently. A base
difficulty of 8, say, would be an automatic success for a skill 8
character, a 50% chance for a skill 5 guy and an automatic failure for
a skill 2 type. Given a -1 modifier, the task goes to difficulty 7,
which is *still* an automatic success for the expert, a 70% chance
for the intermediate character, and now just barely possible (10%)
for the beginner. If that's not different, I don't know what is...
Also, the term "linear" can be rather misleading here; it could be
taken to mean that a task of difficulty 2N is twice as hard (i.e.
50% as likely to succeed for any given character) as a task of difficulty
N, which is manifestly not the general case (and is indeed never the case,
since the chance of success in indeterminate cases is always "roll some
odd number or less on 1d10", and no odd integer is divisible by 2).
>CORPS has a fairly generic "superpowers" system that covers supers,
>psi, and cybernetics
And magic.
>in a similar manner to GURPS Supers,
More similar to the Hero system, I'd say -- at least in spirit (although
it is *much* simpler). It's supposed to be a general metasystem for
defining paranormal powers, which GURPS explicitly does not have. It's
also my least-favorite part of CORPS; in most cases I prefer to make up
magic systems out of whole cloth (or adapt them from some other source)
without bending over backwards to model them in some metasystem in the
service of the Great Delusion of Game Balance.
>but in just a couple of pages.
Rather more than just a couple of pages, actually, but who's counting?
>CORPS does not use random damage rolls for firearms.
Nor for any other form of attack. The randomness of damage, once you've
determined that the attack hit (and where) is all on the "effects on the
victim" side (knockouts, eventually fatal chances). Called shots can
increase the basic damage somewhat, but they are non-random (except that
they make it harder to hit in the first place).
Nightshade
>"Klaus Ć. Mogensen" <klau...@get2net.dk> wrote:
>
>>Jean-Michel GOT wrote:
>>
>>> By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the
>>> simulation of heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored
>>> as not to be realistically lethal, but CORPS is realistically deadly.
>>> It is a question of style of campaign.
>>
>>If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
>>hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
>>lethal.
>
>Not really. They give a Colt .45 1d6 of damage. No matter what you do, you
>*cannot* instantly kill someone, even if you shoot them in the head with the
>gun pressed against their temple, without using GM fiat. Then there's the
Well, yes you can; the 'death on Disable' rule will do it, but I don't
know too many GMs that want to apply that to PCs. Me, I do if they
also fail a CON roll, but then, I'm a bloodthirsty GM by some people's
standards.
Bertil Jonell
Marc "Puma" Lombart <ka...@dsuper.net> wrote:
>3) Cut me lose!
That appears to have changed in 2nd ed to that a DV in excess of
STR*10 is needed to amputate any body part. I don't know how to do
this for cumulative damage, but since CORPS is very un-ablative
I'd guess uou have to do it with one hit, or by GM fiat.
>Marc "Puma" Lombart
-bertil- GM with Fiat.
--
"It can be shown that for any nutty theory, beyond-the-fringe political view or
strange religion there exists a proponent on the Net. The proof is left as an
exercise for your kill-file."
back...@my-dejanews.com
tau...@hyperbooks.com wrote:
> I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
> As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
> changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
> with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
>
> governing attribute, and secondary skills which can be half the level of the
> primary skill they are a subset of, and tertiary skills that can be half the
> level of the secondary skill they are part of.
Skill Trees are undoubtly a good idea - are they original to CORPS? I notice
that they are in FUDGE with the concept of Skill Depth and more points for
Specific Skills than Broad Skills.
--
Wilf K. Backhaus
-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
Bryant Durrell
Yeah, it is really high -- more on that in a moment.
>>In practice, if I were building an NFL QB, I'd buy about five points of
>>that STR as "Only for Throwing Footballs." Or I'd get silly, and write
>>up a martial arts package which included whatever the appropriate thing
>>is; I suspect it's covered in Ultimate Martial Artist.
>
>I guess it's an example of different types of strength that have popped
>up here and there lately.
>
>Looking at CORPS (just to tie the subject to the thread it's in...:), it
>depends on the weight of a football. I don't know. I'll look at .5
>kg...should be close enough. For .5 kg you would need a strength of 8
>to throw it 64 meters. This is 3 above average, but if you take a
>physical ad of 'upper body strength - for throwing' which effectively
>adds +2 to STR when throwing. This would allow a STR 8 quarterback to
>throw a .5kg football 100 m. This seems a bit strong for the average
>quarterback, so dropping his strength to 7 still allows him to throw it
>81 m, which feels better.
Hm, we're on the same page, as it were. Hero certainly supports the
concept of STR only for throwing, so rate the good QB at about 15 STR.
This is twice as strong as the average man on the street, and he won't
be lifting those motorcycles. Then add that +5 STR with the limitation
I mentioned, and we're golden.
Or if you want the 70 yard pass to be a real push, make him a mere 10
STR -- dead average -- with the +5 STR for throwing. Now he'll have
to push and burn extra endurance to get the longer yardage.
Sakura
Don't they have a 10 in all Primary Stats, that being human average?
>My Colt Peacemaker does 1d6+1
>(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
>chance of 5 or more points.
Alternately, the GM could just rule that you do max damage for pressing
your gun up against the target and firing. That's 7 points, with an x2
BODY multiplier for the head. They're going to be dead shortly, even if
you're not using the 'Death at 0 BODY for NPCs' rule that most people use.
>On to the baby. Ah, that ever-popular baby. Is a baby as strong as,
>say, a small puppy? Page 173: "A small puppy isn't very strong; by
>the table it only has a strength of -15."
You know, I also noticed this the other night, and I wonder where Murphy's
Rules ever came up with it?
(Also note: a 'newborn baby' isn't going to be able to make a 'running
throw'. Very few newborns can crawl, let alone run. And since crawling
is 1" Running with Continuous Gestures you obviously can't throw a
football while doing it.)
J
--
Hostes aliengeni me abduxerent. Jeff Johnston - je...@io.com
Qui annus est? http://www.io.com/~jeffj
Sakura
Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>
>I'd forgotten about that. Yes, I'd agree. It's the only game system I've
>ever seen with a system of automatic success that works.
White Wolf seems to have exactly the same autosuccess system - if your
dice pool is higher than the Difficulty (aka Target Number) then you don't
have to roll.
Michael W. Ryan
> Skill Trees are undoubtly a good idea - are they original to CORPS? I notice
> that they are in FUDGE with the concept of Skill Depth and more points for
> Specific Skills than Broad Skills.
No, FUDGE doesn't use a skill tree. The specific versus broad skills
distinction is an overall categorization. It allows you to tailor the
skills to be as broad as you want and then adjust the number of
allowed skills appropriately. Silhouette (Heavy Gear, et. al.) would
be termed as broad-skilled (and would have fewer points for skills),
and Chivalry & Sorcery 3rd would be termed specific-skilled (and would
have more points for skills).
--
Michael W. Ryan | OTAKON Webmaster
mr...@netaxs.com | Convention of Otaku Generation
http://www.netaxs.com/~mryan/ | http://www.otakon.com/
PGP fingerprint: 7B E5 75 7F 24 EE 19 35 A5 DF C3 45 27 B5 DB DF
PGP public key available by fingering mr...@unix.netaxs.com (use -l opt)
Doug Berry
"Luther, Clay" <cl...@selsius.com> said:
>That still doesn't really answer my question. Assuming I don't use any
>optional rules, at what point does a character die?
pg 49, "Special Cases"
Any wound which is eventually fatal will cause a HLY loss from
bleeding, at a rate of 1pt per 1d10 minutes, and each time the
time increment is doubled. When HLT reaches 0, the PC dies.
For example, my PC has HLT 4, and takes an Eventually Fatal
wound. The 1d10 roll is 6. After six minutes, my HLT drops to
3. After 12 minutes to 2, 24 minutes to 1, and a further 48
minutes to 0, where upon I die. So I have an hour and a half to
get medical help. If the 1d10 roll had been 1, I would have died
after 10 minutes.
Hope this helps.
--
+-------------------------------------------+
| Douglas E. Berry dbe...@hooked.net |
| http://www.hooked.net/~dberry/ |
|-------------------------------------------|
| "Hear the voices in my head, swear to God |
| it sounds like they're snoring." |
| -Harvey Danger, "Flagpole Sitta" |
+-------------------------------------------+
Doug Berry
dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) said:
>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat. My Colt Peacemaker does 1d6+1
>(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
>chance of 5 or more points. Since we're probably using hit locations
>if we want a lot of realism, our STUN multiplier is a minimum of 2 --
>and most likely 3 or more. Our average character has 10 STUN. He or
>she goes unconscious, minimally.
*5*? Welcome to Wimp World! The average person in Champions has
10 Body and 20 Stun.
A senior citizen with STR 5, CON 5, and BODY 8 costs -25 points.
Doug Berry
back...@my-dejanews.com said:
>Skill Trees are undoubtly a good idea - are they original to CORPS? I notice
>that they are in FUDGE with the concept of Skill Depth and more points for
>Specific Skills than Broad Skills.
I seem to remember skill trees from as far back as Aftermath!, or
am I hallucinanting.
Bryant Durrell
>In article <6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>,
>Bryant Durrell <dur...@innocence.com> wrote:
>>
>
Yup. This is a change you can make which causes the game to become far
more realistic, is all. Terry was saying it couldn't be done.
The other interesting effect you get with this change is that a simple
8d6 attack becomes lethal. I'm in a campaign with 40 AP limits (60 with
GM approval) and we're very very careful about what we do to normals.
You can't just cut loose any more. Would your PC carry a gun? Hey, we
carry something far more deadly by default.
>>My Colt Peacemaker does 1d6+1
>>(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
>>chance of 5 or more points.
>
>Alternately, the GM could just rule that you do max damage for pressing
>your gun up against the target and firing. That's 7 points, with an x2
>BODY multiplier for the head. They're going to be dead shortly, even if
>you're not using the 'Death at 0 BODY for NPCs' rule that most people use.
That works too.
>(Also note: a 'newborn baby' isn't going to be able to make a 'running
>throw'. Very few newborns can crawl, let alone run. And since crawling
>is 1" Running with Continuous Gestures you obviously can't throw a
>football while doing it.)
*snicker*
Bryant Durrell
Doug Berry <dbe...@hooked.net> wrote:
>If memory serves, on 13 Oct 1998 04:21:23 GMT, Iron Chef
>dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) said:
>>(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
>>if we want a lot of realism, our STUN multiplier is a minimum of 2 --
>>and most likely 3 or more. Our average character has 10 STUN. He or
>>she goes unconscious, minimally.
>
>*5*? Welcome to Wimp World! The average person in Champions has
>10 Body and 20 Stun.
Yes, I know what the average is. This is a change a GM can make to get
the effects Terry wants. It works amazingly well.
back...@my-dejanews.com
mr...@netaxs.com (Michael W. Ryan) wrote:
> back...@my-dejanews.com writes:
>
> > Skill Trees are undoubtly a good idea - are they original to CORPS? I notice
> > that they are in FUDGE with the concept of Skill Depth and more points for
> > Specific Skills than Broad Skills.
>
> distinction is an overall categorization. It allows you to tailor the
> skills to be as broad as you want and then adjust the number of
> allowed skills appropriately. Silhouette (Heavy Gear, et. al.) would
> be termed as broad-skilled (and would have fewer points for skills),
> and Chivalry & Sorcery 3rd would be termed specific-skilled (and would
> have more points for skills).
Well I do believe that the FUDGE Skill depth Chart is pretty tree-like e.g.
animal skill - horse training -quarter horse
Steffan O'Sullivan
>Skill Trees are undoubtly a good idea - are they original to CORPS?
First Edition Paranoia had skill trees - I don't know about later
editions.
--
-Steffan O'Sullivan | "I could a tale unfold whose lightest word
s...@vnet.net | would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young
Chapel Hill, NC | blood, make thy two eyes, like stars, start
www.io.com/~sos | from their spheres ..." -Shakespeare
Steffan O'Sullivan
>back...@my-dejanews.com writes:
>
>> Skill Trees are undoubtly a good idea - are they original to CORPS? I notice
>> that they are in FUDGE with the concept of Skill Depth and more points for
>> Specific Skills than Broad Skills.
>
>No, FUDGE doesn't use a skill tree.
Actually, the Grey Ghost Games version *does* have a skill tree system
in it - one of the few differences between the published and free
versions.
Stephen B. Mann
> It's got a very simple, clean, elegant system of game mechanics. One d10 is
> about all you need, and the exact same mechanic is used for everything.
>
> It's got a reasonably realistic combat system, that is nearly as deadly as
> Real Life. But with optional rules (Ass Saving Points) to "correct" this is
> you think it's a problem.
All right, next question. Does it have a reasonable assortment of
supplements and expansions? I've gotten the impression that many people
use it for a variety of genres. That's good, as long as I don't have to
make it all up myself. If there's some examples of magic, psi, sci-fi,
etc, so much the better.
--
Stephen B. Mann sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu
SUNY Learning Network http://sln.suny.edu/sln
Shawn McMahon
<bag...@austin360.com> wrote:
>(Mental picture of Troy Aikman picking up a motorcycle...trying to pick
>up a motorcycle...being out for 4 more weeks...:( )
As much he's been out lately, he'd probably be out 4 weeks if he
picked up a check.
Shawn McMahon
(Nightshade) wrote:
>>If you like the Timelords system (I.E. Timelords, Warp World,
>>Spacetime), but feel it's way too complicated, you might like CORPS.
>
>I, on the other hand, thought they tossed out a few too many of those
>games best features when they went to CORPS.
A valid point, and I'm sure there are others who'd agree with you.
There are others, including me, who don't.
All of this is why I put in that disclaimer about not evangelizing
CORPS. I'm not trying to sell the system, just give a clear picture
of it.
Shawn McMahon
wrote:
>>CORPS uses a linear progression for skills instead of a bell curve.
>
>I do not believe that the skill progression can be accurately termed
>linear -- the point-cost to learn and improve skills is decidedly nonlinear
>(and the time-and-money-cost to improve skills by training is even more
>nonlinear if you want to do it *fast*); in fact, the only linearity I
>can spot is the direct addition of levels of secondary and tertiary skill
>to primary skill.
I meant in relation to task difficulty. Should have been more clear,
sorry.
>>in a similar manner to GURPS Supers,
>
>More similar to the Hero system, I'd say -- at least in spirit (although
>it is *much* simpler). It's supposed to be a general metasystem for
I think closer to GURPS, in that "telekinesis" always means
"telekinesis", although some things are a little more nebulous, I.E.
"blast" means "any old damage-causing thing at all".
But, there are differences with both. In the end, it's CORPS-like.
:-)
>>but in just a couple of pages.
>
>Rather more than just a couple of pages, actually, but who's counting?
Hey, I got first edition, remember? :-)
George W. Harris
Austin) wrote thusly:
=I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
=conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
=
=As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
=changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
=with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
=
=The basic mechanism is that there are primary skills, limited by the
=governing attribute, and secondary skills which can be half the level of the
=primary skill they are a subset of, and tertiary skills that can be half the
=level of the secondary skill they are part of.
=
=Comments?
Just thought I'd mention that the concept of the skill
tree in RPGs does predate CORPS by quite a bit; oddly
enough, the first place I ever saw it was in 1st (I believe)
edition Paranoia.
=Terry Austin
=tau...@hyperbooks.com
--
I'm not an actor, but I play one on TV!
George W. Harris For actual email address, replace each 'u' with an 'i'.
Andy Wills
>
> Terry Austin wrote:
> > It's got a very simple, clean, elegant system of game mechanics. One d10 is
> > about all you need, and the exact same mechanic is used for everything.
> >
> > It's got a reasonably realistic combat system, that is nearly as deadly as
> > Real Life. But with optional rules (Ass Saving Points) to "correct" this is
> > you think it's a problem.
>
> All right, next question. Does it have a reasonable assortment of
> supplements and expansions? I've gotten the impression that many people
> use it for a variety of genres. That's good, as long as I don't have to
> make it all up myself. If there's some examples of magic, psi, sci-fi,
> etc, so much the better.
Nope...I think most people will agree that's CORPS greatest fault. It
only has a few supplements out for it...most of which are extremely
generic. Myself, I just use GURPS books, ignoring the (few) stats.
-Andy
Andy Wills
>
> If memory serves, on Mon, 12 Oct 1998 18:24:05 -0500, Iron Chef
> "Luther, Clay" <cl...@selsius.com> said:
>
> >That still doesn't really answer my question. Assuming I don't use any
> >optional rules, at what point does a character die?
>
> pg 49, "Special Cases"
Three or four of us have cited this example already...the confusion is
coming from the first paragraph under _Special Cases_ which says,
"The above are the basic rules for damage and injoury. There are a
number of options you may wish to include, either for characters, NPCs,
or both."
-Andy
David P. Summers
> I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
Well, CORPS is a fine system. It don't think it is the ultimate in
gaming that many feel it is, but I would be willing to try if it
wasn't for the fact that all these "that other system sucks (is
broken, etc.)" and "CORPS rules!" kind of posts has turned me off
from it and its players.
A rule of thumb, if you want to attract people in playing your
system, don't try and flame other systems a) it turns people off,
b) you own system will suffer from the flames directed it in
return (there is no system that one can't find things to flame)
Andy Wills
>
> In article <3621505a...@news.artnet.net>, tau...@hyperbooks.com wrote:
>
> > I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> > conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
> Well, CORPS is a fine system. It don't think it is the ultimate in
> gaming that many feel it is, but I would be willing to try if it
> wasn't for the fact that all these "that other system sucks (is
> broken, etc.)" and "CORPS rules!" kind of posts has turned me off
> from it and its players.
I'll admit there are lots of "CORPS rules!" style posts--I occasionally
post one myself. I'm not sure where you're getting this "other system
sucks" bit from, though. Most posts in favor of CORPS seem to be fairly
moderate compared to rec.games.frp.misc as a whole. Sometimes someone
goes off about other games being terrible, but what do you expect from a
newsgroup full of pyros?
> A rule of thumb, if you want to attract people in playing your
> system, don't try and flame other systems a) it turns people off,
> b) you own system will suffer from the flames directed it in
> return (there is no system that one can't find things to flame)
Out of curiosity, what would you flame about CORPS, besides the general
style of the game and its rather generic magic system?
-Andy
Thomas N. Bagwell
<3623A367...@cnsvax.albany.edu>...
> All right, next question. Does it have a reasonable assortment of
>supplements and expansions? I've gotten the impression that many people
>use it for a variety of genres. That's good, as long as I don't have to
>make it all up myself. If there's some examples of magic, psi, sci-fi,
>etc, so much the better.
What types of supplements and expansions? It does give examples of
magic and psi (and superpowers), as these are all covered in the
Paranormal Powers section. You can also do cyberware with these rules.
(Actually, they go into a fair amount of detail on cyberware). It works
excellently in sci-fi. My current campaign is sci-fi, with minor
cyberware, rare psionics, and two different types of magic. I didn't
need a supplement for any of this, although I did decide to use the
'Vehicle Design System' for the spacecraft.
There are two supplements BTRC puts out that can be helpful, but aren't
absolutely necessary. One is 'Guns! Guns! Guns!' (and it's companion '3
Guns! ^3'...I think), which deals with how to construct weapons of all
tech levels and for just about any type of game system. Using it for
CORPS is trivial. It's companion book gives descriptions and workups
for a wide variety of guns for a wide variety of tech levels, all for a
wide variety of gaming systems, including CORPS.
BTRC has also published the 'Vehicle Design System', which is by far the
best such book I've seen. It does require some thought and effort, but
yields very realistic results. Using this book allows you to design
anything from a skateboard to powered armor (or the Terminator) to
Superdreadnought. Heh...you can design a cow if you like. It even
covers magical transport.
The biggest lack in CORPS is that of a bestiary, which Greg Porter is
working on finishing up, I believe.
There aren't really any setting supplements, unless you count
'Dreamtime', which is an aboriginal Australian supplement. I usually
use novels and other sources for setting info if I don't feel like
making it up myself. It's certainly easy enough to grab a GURPS
worldbook and ignore the mechanics.
Tom Bagwell
David P. Summers
> David P. Summers wrote:
> >
> > In article <3621505a...@news.artnet.net>, tau...@hyperbooks.com
wrote:
> >
> > > I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> > > conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
> >
> > Well, CORPS is a fine system. It don't think it is the ultimate in
> > gaming that many feel it is, but I would be willing to try if it
> > wasn't for the fact that all these "that other system sucks (is
> > broken, etc.)" and "CORPS rules!" kind of posts has turned me off
> > from it and its players.
>
> I'll admit there are lots of "CORPS rules!" style posts--I occasionally
> post one myself. I'm not sure where you're getting this "other system
> sucks" bit from, though.
For me it is from attacks on gurps (like one poster who tired to
say that CORPS was designed while GURPS was mearly "written" and
such nonsense).
back...@my-dejanews.com
s...@katie.vnet.net (Steffan O'Sullivan) wrote:
> Michael W. Ryan <mr...@netaxs.com> wrote:
> >back...@my-dejanews.com writes:
> >
> >> Skill Trees are undoubtly a good idea - are they original to CORPS? I notice
> >> that they are in FUDGE with the concept of Skill Depth and more points for
> >> Specific Skills than Broad Skills.
> >
> >No, FUDGE doesn't use a skill tree.
>
> Actually, the Grey Ghost Games version *does* have a skill tree system
> in it - one of the few differences between the published and free
> versions.
While I do have the electronic version of FUDGE I am at present studying the
Grey Ghost Games version which, as Mr. O'Sullivan points out, suggests a
skill depth tree as a way of categorizing skills. -- Wilf K. Backhaus
Terry Austin
>In Mon, 12 Oct 1998 01:33:05 GMT of yore, tau...@hyperbooks.com (Terry
>Austin) wrote thusly:
>
>=I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
>=conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>=
>=As with any point based system, overall power levels can be adjusted by
>=changing the number of points that players get to make their characters
>=with. But CORPS has another mechanism, too: The Skill Tree.
>=
>=The basic mechanism is that there are primary skills, limited by the
>=governing attribute, and secondary skills which can be half the level of the
>=primary skill they are a subset of, and tertiary skills that can be half the
>=level of the secondary skill they are part of.
>=
>=Comments?
>
> Just thought I'd mention that the concept of the skill
>tree in RPGs does predate CORPS by quite a bit; oddly
>enough, the first place I ever saw it was in 1st (I believe)
>edition Paranoia.
>
How versatile a game mechanic is it, just out of curiosity? How difficult
is it to design your own? Do the divisions make intuitive sense?
Terry Austin
tau...@hyperbooks.com
http://www.hyperbooks.com
Terry Austin
>Terry Austin wrote in message <3639bab8...@news.artnet.net>...
>>Not really. They give a Colt .45 1d6 of damage. No matter what you do,
>you
>>*cannot* instantly kill someone, even if you shoot them in the head with
>the
>>gun pressed against their temple, without using GM fiat.
>
>The book I have here is Champions 4th Edition, copyright 1989.
>
>On p. 200, it lists ranged weapons. A .45 Colt Peacemaker is listed as a
>1d6+1 KA; .357 Magnum Colt Python as 1 1/2 d6 KA. A .445 Webley is the only
>1d6 revolver. A 9mm Browning auto is 1d6+1; .45 auto is 1d6+1. Let's
>assume 1d6+1 KA.
>
>You would have to get a total of 20 BODY damage to instantly kill someone.
>A shot to the head does 2x BODY damage; the most you can hope for from a .45
>revolver is 14 BODY.
>In any case, the person will be long unconscious, if only from the head hit,
>losing points of mental characteristics, and bleeding for at least 1 BODY
>per round (12 seconds). This person would be lying there functionally dead
>for anywhere from 10-66 seconds (depending on how badly they roll while
>bleeding) and then would "officially" die. I don't know that that's much of
>a functional difference unless you are waiting to do something to their
>spirit as it leaves their body or something.
Or of you're a trained paramedic and are trying to *save* them. A trivial
task if they're at -4 Body but still alive. And impossible task if they're
*dead*. It is *impossible* to kill someone instantly with a .45, without
changing the rules.
>
>Technically, this is correct.
>
And it's correct in ways that matter, too. A superhero who knows that the
gun the bad guy is holding to the hostages head *cannot* *possibly* kill
them, and that a good paramedic roll will save them, will tend to be role
played poorly. If realism is your goal. (But then, if realism is your
goal, you shouldn't be playing Hero in the first place.)
>>Then there's the
>>fact that a newborn infant can throw a football more than the entire length
>>of a football field,
>
>This is a common misconception or exaggeration of a Murphy's Rule which
>didn't read the entire rules in the first place.
And was based on a previous edition, I believe.
>
>Page 133 of my book lists stats for "Small Children" of 3 feet tall with a
>STR 0. A football is balanced and aerodynamic and takes -25 STR to lift (p.
>173). Therefore, the small child has 25 extra STR to throw it with; making
>a running throw would send the ball 20", or 40 meters, or 40 yards. From a
>standing throw, they could throw it 10", or 20 meters, or 20 yards (p. 174).
>
>If they pushed their STR, which would nearly knock them out as they used up
>all 10 END and 2d6 of their 8 STUN, they cound do a running throw of 28", or
>56 meters, or 56 yards, over half of a football field. Yes, a little
>unreasonable due to the game system focusing on handling STR above 0, but
>read your comic books sometimes and see what small children can do. :)
>
>I would daresay that an infant is not 3 feet tall (at least an average
>infant). An example on p. 173 lists a puppy with -15 STR. If an infant had
>the same STR, they could lift a one-handed sword with no problem. I'm not
>so sure of that, so I might give them a -20 STR at least (-25 is the lowest
>that the system can really go). With a -20 STR, an infant could throw a
>football 8 meters with a running throw, 4 meters without.
>
>>and a perfectly average person can completely
>>disassemble an average automobile with his bare feet in under 5 minutes.
>It
>>can be made more deadly, but it cannot be made more *realistically* deadly.
>
>
>Is this based on anything in the game system? The Mechanics skill, which
>doesn't mention time taken or modifiers for using your feet, but does
>mention that you almost always need tools, which might be hard to manipulate
>with your feet? Something under Vehicles? I don't remember it, but that
>system is for designing vehicles, not dismantling them with your feet.
>Could you please give a reference or at least a hint for this one? I have
>no idea where it could be.
>
It's based on the combat rules. But that, too is from a previous edition,
and they seem to have upped the DEF of normal cars.
Terry Austin
>Terry Austin wrote:
>> It's got a very simple, clean, elegant system of game mechanics. One d10 is
>> about all you need, and the exact same mechanic is used for everything.
>>
>> It's got a reasonably realistic combat system, that is nearly as deadly as
>> Real Life. But with optional rules (Ass Saving Points) to "correct" this is
>> you think it's a problem.
>
> All right, next question. Does it have a reasonable assortment of
>supplements and expansions? I've gotten the impression that many people
>use it for a variety of genres. That's good, as long as I don't have to
>make it all up myself. If there's some examples of magic, psi, sci-fi,
>etc, so much the better.
At this time, no, there aren't a lot of supplements. It's a shame, too. I
suspect Greg would be willing to discuss a license with anyone who wanted to
write, say, a campaign setting, though.
Terry Austin
>In article <6vvs6b$6i2$1...@hiram.io.com>, Sakura <je...@dillinger.io.com> wrote:
>>In article <6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>,
>>Bryant Durrell <dur...@innocence.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat.
>>
>>Don't they have a 10 in all Primary Stats, that being human average?
>
>Yup. This is a change you can make which causes the game to become far
>more realistic, is all. Terry was saying it couldn't be done.
So you argue that the average person cannot, possibly, ever, without
pushing, pick up more than 100 pounds? Hah. Very realistic. Now compute
how long it would take the average person to beat someone to death with
their fists. And compare that to the average time it would take to beat
someone unconscious. (Hint: The latter is longer than the former, because,
on average, you do no Stun unless you do Body, and you have more of the
former than the latter.)
>
>The other interesting effect you get with this change is that a simple
>8d6 attack becomes lethal. I'm in a campaign with 40 AP limits (60 with
>GM approval) and we're very very careful about what we do to normals.
>You can't just cut loose any more. Would your PC carry a gun? Hey, we
>carry something far more deadly by default.
But not realistic.
>
>>>My Colt Peacemaker does 1d6+1
>>>(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
>>>chance of 5 or more points.
>>
>>Alternately, the GM could just rule that you do max damage for pressing
>>your gun up against the target and firing. That's 7 points, with an x2
>>BODY multiplier for the head. They're going to be dead shortly, even if
>>you're not using the 'Death at 0 BODY for NPCs' rule that most people use.
>
>That works too.
As soon as you apply different rules to NPCs than you do to PCs, you are no
longer even attempting to be "realistic."
Terry Austin
>In article <362d847b...@news.wenet.net>,
>Doug Berry <dbe...@hooked.net> wrote:
>>If memory serves, on 13 Oct 1998 04:21:23 GMT, Iron Chef
>>dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) said:
>>>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat. My Colt Peacemaker does 1d6+1
>>>(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
>>>chance of 5 or more points. Since we're probably using hit locations
>>>if we want a lot of realism, our STUN multiplier is a minimum of 2 --
>>>and most likely 3 or more. Our average character has 10 STUN. He or
>>>she goes unconscious, minimally.
>>
>>*5*? Welcome to Wimp World! The average person in Champions has
>>10 Body and 20 Stun.
>
>Yes, I know what the average is. This is a change a GM can make to get
>the effects Terry wants. It works amazingly well.
But not realistically.
Terry Austin
>In article <3639bab8...@news.artnet.net>,
>Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>>"Klaus Ć. Mogensen" <klau...@get2net.dk> wrote:
>>>Jean-Michel GOT wrote:
>>>> By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the
>>>> simulation of heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored
>>>> as not to be realistically lethal, but CORPS is realistically deadly.
>>>> It is a question of style of campaign.
>>>
>>>If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
>>>hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
>>>lethal.
>>
>>Not really. They give a Colt .45 1d6 of damage. No matter what you do, you
>>*cannot* instantly kill someone, even if you shoot them in the head with the
>>gun pressed against their temple, without using GM fiat. Then there's the
>>fact that a newborn infant can throw a football more than the entire length
>>of a football field, and a perfectly average person can completely
>>disassemble an average automobile with his bare feet in under 5 minutes. It
>>can be made more deadly, but it cannot be made more *realistically* deadly.
>
>Sometimes, Terry, I despair at your lack of imagination.
>
>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat.
Now you have changed the system. Which was my point. Now the average
person can lift half as much, do half as much damage, etc. The game is
designed around the average male having an average of 10 in stats. If you
change that, you change a *hell* of a lot of other stuff, too. As I said,
it cannot be made more *realistically* deadly. Not without altering the
mechanics (like upping the damage done).
> My Colt Peacemaker does 1d6+1
>(page 200 of tbe Big Blue Book). Average damage -- 4, with a good
>chance of 5 or more points. Since we're probably using hit locations
>if we want a lot of realism, our STUN multiplier is a minimum of 2 --
>and most likely 3 or more. Our average character has 10 STUN. He or
>she goes unconscious, minimally.
>
>Oh, and since we're using bleeding rules, you can lose more BODY there.
>Happy yet? And it was such a minor change...
The point still remains: The average person, shot in the head at point
blank range, with maximum damage, by a Colt .45 *cannot* die instantly.
Unless you tweak the rules. (Note that I do not consider this a *flaw*.
Hero is not a realistic system. It is a comic book system, and it does that
*very* well. But calling it realistic is just silly.)
>
>On to the baby. Ah, that ever-popular baby. Is a baby as strong as,
>say, a small puppy? Page 173: "A small puppy isn't very strong; by
>the table it only has a strength of -15." But that's a lifting
>strength of 3.2 kilos. I don't think a newborn baby can lift that
>much, do you? Maybe a pound or so, which would be Strength -25.
>
>Which means the baby can't throw the football at all. Funny how that
>works. Just for fun, let's work it out the other way. Your infant is
>tossing a football 100 yards. That's around 50 inches. (An inch is
>two meters, or about two yards.)
>
>I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you're letting the
>infant make a running throw, even though infants can't run. For a
>fifty inch running throw, you need to have 65 points of Strength over
>and above what you need to pick up the object. A football requires a
>mere -25 Strength to pick it up, so your baby must have a 40 Strength.
>
>That's more than enough to pick up a truck. Terry, where the fuck did
>you get the "fact" that a newborn infant can throw a football more than
>the entire length of a football field?
I suspect that particular example was actually based on a previous edition.
They don't list the average strength of a baby any more. Go figure.
So, you've changed the rules (and broken more than you fixed in the
process), stomped the shit out of one point, and ignored the third. Two for
three. Not bad.
Terry Austin
>In article <3621505a...@news.artnet.net>, tau...@hyperbooks.com wrote:
>
>> I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
>> conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
>Well, CORPS is a fine system. It don't think it is the ultimate in
>gaming that many feel it is,
The ultimate in gaming is a matter of opinion, and anybody who says
different is probably trying to sell you something. For me, the ultimate in
gaming is still Chivalry & Sorcery 1st edition. YMMV. I just said it was
good, for a certain type of gaming, and innovative in my experience. In
point of fact, I do think that Greg Porter is a brilliant game designer, but
if he designs games you don't like, it doesn't mean much to you.
>but I would be willing to try if it
>wasn't for the fact that all these "that other system sucks (is
>broken, etc.)" and "CORPS rules!" kind of posts has turned me off
>from it and its players.
Seems like a poor reason to pass up a well-regarded game. But to each his
own.
>
>A rule of thumb, if you want to attract people in playing your
>system,
Not my system.
>don't try and flame other systems
Greg doesn't.
>a) it turns people off,
>b) you own system will suffer from the flames directed it in
>return (there is no system that one can't find things to flame)
Right off hand, so far, this thread has been remarkably polite.
Nightshade
I just was noting that the inverse of your statement could also be
true.
Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y
Shawn McMahon <smcmaho...@eiv.com> wrote:
>On 13 Oct 1998 08:11:50 GMT, lei...@pvv.ntnu.no (Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y)
>wrote:
>
>>>CORPS uses a linear progression for skills instead of a bell curve.
>>
>>I do not believe that the skill progression can be accurately termed
>>linear -- the point-cost to learn and improve skills is decidedly nonlinear
>>(and the time-and-money-cost to improve skills by training is even more
>>nonlinear if you want to do it *fast*); in fact, the only linearity I
>>can spot is the direct addition of levels of secondary and tertiary skill
>>to primary skill.
>
>I meant in relation to task difficulty. Should have been more clear,
>sorry.
Yeah, I see what you mean. On the other hand, I think CORPS task resolution
actually resembles a bell-curve system more closely than the old "linear"
type (as in AD&D or Runequest, where you roll against some target number
-- be it THAC0 or skill, be the desired roll high or low -- on a d20 or
d100 or other linear die roll, and the target number is modified by straight
addition or subtraction to account for difficulty). Like (say) GURPS' 3d6-
based resolution, an extremely skilled character is virtually guaranteed
success except in the most difficult situations, while a total fumbling
beginner is virtually assured of failure except in the most simple of tasks;
similarily, in both cases it takes a lot of modifiers to make a significant
difference. And again similarily, there is a "grey zone" in the middle
where the outcome is significantly uncertain; in this zone smallish modifiers
have a significant effect on the probability of success or failure. The
main difference is that in GURPS you still have to roll the 3d6 even if
your effective skill is above 18 (since there's always a small chance of
failure), while CORPS normally dispenses with these outliers through the
autosuccess/autofailure rules (although CORPS *does* have an optional rule
which effectively allows an open-ended roll to achieve "freak" successes
or failures, and even GURPS has an autofailure rule for tasks where effective
skill is reduced below 3 -- or was it 0, I can't quite remember). Also,
of course, the "meaningful grey zone" has a differently-shaped probability
curve, but on a first-order approximation the two systems are in fact
remarkably similar.
>>>in a similar manner to GURPS Supers,
>>
>>More similar to the Hero system, I'd say -- at least in spirit (although
>>it is *much* simpler). It's supposed to be a general metasystem for
>
>I think closer to GURPS, in that "telekinesis" always means
>"telekinesis", although some things are a little more nebulous, I.E.
>"blast" means "any old damage-causing thing at all".
Ah, you only have the 1st edition of CORPS. The 2nd edition is much
more Hero-like, in that the powers are named for their game-mechanical
effect, and are not necessarily assumed to be based on "psionics" --
slap on a few atmospheric special effects and requirements/limitations
to use them for modelling whatever it is your game world has (psi,
ritual magic, cybernetics, whatever). Actually, to nitpick even more,
"telekinesis" properly means "remote-moving", or "using any old method
(understood to be outside of mundane physics that any jerk can use) to
make stuff move from a distance away"; doesn't necessarily imply that
it has to be a "psychic" power (could just as easily be a magically
conjured force, a summoned demon, or whatever).
>But, there are differences with both. In the end, it's CORPS-like.
Yup.
>>>but in just a couple of pages.
>>
>>Rather more than just a couple of pages, actually, but who's counting?
>
>Hey, I got first edition, remember? :-)
Didn't remember, sorry.
--
Leif Kj{\o}nn{\o}y | Skyclad: "Life's just a process of delamination,
www.pvv.org/~leifmk| stripping your hopes, dissecting them gently.
Math geek and gamer| I've opened my heart and to my consternation
GURPS, Harn, CORPS | when I peered inside it was small, dark and empty."
Nightshade
>>CORPS does not use random damage rolls for firearms.
>
>Nor for any other form of attack. The randomness of damage, once you've
>determined that the attack hit (and where) is all on the "effects on the
>victim" side (knockouts, eventually fatal chances). Called shots can
>increase the basic damage somewhat, but they are non-random (except that
>they make it harder to hit in the first place).
One of the features I dislike about it. While damage to a given area
does tend to land within a certain range given the same weapon,
Warpworld and it's kin recognized there _is_ non insignificant
varience in effect, which CORPS doesn't.
Bertil Jonell
>><sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu> wrote:
>
>>If you like the Timelords system (I.E. Timelords, Warp World,
>>Spacetime), but feel it's way too complicated, you might like CORPS.
>
>I, on the other hand, thought they tossed out a few too many of those
>games best features when they went to CORPS.
Spotting and targetting specific locations was better in TimeLords,
and the damage system was more fine-grained. In WarpWorld there are some
notes on automatic successes but I never managed to get them to work
as well as in CORPS.
(BTW: If you compare SpaceTime, TimeLords 2nd ed and WarpWorld
there is a quite noticable trend towards fewer dicerolls. CORPS is
just the next logical step (and the step after CORPS is/was Epiphany))
WarpWorld style magic OTOH is quite possible to get to work in
CORPS.
-bertil-
--
"It can be shown that for any nutty theory, beyond-the-fringe political view or
strange religion there exists a proponent on the Net. The proof is left as an
exercise for your kill-file."
Terry Austin
>In article <362405...@olywa.net>, an...@olywa.net wrote:
>
>> David P. Summers wrote:
>> >
>> > In article <3621505a...@news.artnet.net>, tau...@hyperbooks.com
>wrote:
>> >
>> > > I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
>> > > conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>> >
>> > Well, CORPS is a fine system. It don't think it is the ultimate in
>> > gaming that many feel it is, but I would be willing to try if it
>> > wasn't for the fact that all these "that other system sucks (is
>> > broken, etc.)" and "CORPS rules!" kind of posts has turned me off
>> > from it and its players.
>>
>> I'll admit there are lots of "CORPS rules!" style posts--I occasionally
>> post one myself. I'm not sure where you're getting this "other system
>> sucks" bit from, though.
>
>For me it is from attacks on gurps (like one poster who tired to
>say that CORPS was designed while GURPS was mearly "written" and
>such nonsense).
That's more a comment on Greg Porter than anything else. He's been called
the only real game *designer* in the business. He's certainly good, and he
most certainly puts a lot of research into his games, and it shows. If you
want realistic, CORPS is worth looking at. As to attacking GURPS, that's a
religious war, and pointless other than as a method of showing one's
manliness. Why is it that people can't just say "I don't like that game."
and leave it at that? Are they so insecure in their gaming ability that
they believe the only reason they wouldn't like a game is because it's
broken?
tgf...@zianet.com
summers@remove_alum.mit.edu (David P. Summers) wrote:
> In article <3621505a...@news.artnet.net>, tau...@hyperbooks.com wrote:
>
> > I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> > conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
>
> Well, CORPS is a fine system. It don't think it is the ultimate in
> gaming that many feel it is, but I would be willing to try if it
> wasn't for the fact that all these "that other system sucks (is
> broken, etc.)" and "CORPS rules!" kind of posts has turned me off
> from it and its players.
>
> b) you own system will suffer from the flames directed it in
> return (there is no system that one can't find things to flame)
>
find. I haven't noticed the posters flaming other systems. At least one
of them has recently stated that he prefers a system other than CORPS for
some settings; at least one poster has expressly stated that he is stating
his own preferences rather than promoting CORPS. Ii may be that you are
thinking of Terry Austin? I do not recall that he posts regarding CORPS very
often.
the posts of CORPS fans usually seem quite judicious, reasonable, and
well reasoned to me.
Tom Merring
another CORPS fan (but not exclusively)
tgf...@zianet.com
> > >
> > > In article <3621505a...@news.artnet.net>, tau...@hyperbooks.com
> wrote:
> > >
> > > > I've been re-reading the CORPS basic rules again, and I've come to the
> > > > conclusion that the skill system is nothing short of brilliant.
> > >
> > > Well, CORPS is a fine system. It don't think it is the ultimate in
> > > gaming that many feel it is, but I would be willing to try if it
> > > wasn't for the fact that all these "that other system sucks (is
> > > broken, etc.)" and "CORPS rules!" kind of posts has turned me off
> > > from it and its players.
> >
> > post one myself. I'm not sure where you're getting this "other system
> > sucks" bit from, though.
>
> For me it is from attacks on gurps (like one poster who tired to
> say that CORPS was designed while GURPS was mearly "written" and
> such nonsense).
>
The quote about CORPS being designed rather than merely written sounds
like a remark from a Michael T. Richter review of CORPS. Did he direct
that statement directly at GURPS?
Tom Merring
Bryant Durrell
Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) wrote:
>>In article <3639bab8...@news.artnet.net>,
>>Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>>>"Klaus Ć. Mogensen" <klau...@get2net.dk> wrote:
>>>>Jean-Michel GOT wrote:
>>>>> By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the
>>>>> simulation of heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored
>>>>> as not to be realistically lethal, but CORPS is realistically deadly.
>>>>> It is a question of style of campaign.
>>>>
>>>>If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
>>>>hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
>>>>lethal.
>>>
>>>Not really. They give a Colt .45 1d6 of damage. No matter what you do, you
>>>*cannot* instantly kill someone, even if you shoot them in the head with the
>>>gun pressed against their temple, without using GM fiat. Then there's the
>>>fact that a newborn infant can throw a football more than the entire length
>>>of a football field, and a perfectly average person can completely
>>>disassemble an average automobile with his bare feet in under 5 minutes. It
>>>can be made more deadly, but it cannot be made more *realistically* deadly.
>>
>>Sometimes, Terry, I despair at your lack of imagination.
>>
>>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat.
>
>Now you have changed the system.
Sure. I've made the system more deadly. You said it couldn't be done
realistically, so I took a stab at doing so.
>Which was my point. Now the average
>person can lift half as much, do half as much damage, etc. The game is
>designed around the average male having an average of 10 in stats. If you
>change that, you change a *hell* of a lot of other stuff, too.
Since you completely flubbed the baby issue, you'll forgive me if I say
I don't trust you on this claim. You're going to have to prove to me
that it breaks a lot of stuff before I believe it.
--
Bryant Durrell [] dur...@innocence.com [] http://www.innocence.com/~durrell
[----------------------------------------------------------------------------]
"So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels
in praise of intelligence." -- Bertrand Russell
Bryant Durrell
>>>In article <6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>,
>>>Bryant Durrell <dur...@innocence.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>Yup. This is a change you can make which causes the game to become far
>>more realistic, is all. Terry was saying it couldn't be done.
>
>So you argue that the average person cannot, possibly, ever, without
>pushing, pick up more than 100 pounds? Hah. Very realistic.
Actually, yeah. It's not like pushing is that big a deal, you know.
Fairly common. It's just extra effort which burns END faster.
>Now compute
>how long it would take the average person to beat someone to death with
>their fists. And compare that to the average time it would take to beat
>someone unconscious. (Hint: The latter is longer than the former, because,
>on average, you do no Stun unless you do Body, and you have more of the
>former than the latter.)
Assume 1d6 normal damage, and SPD 2. That's 2d6 of STUN per 12 second
turn. Defenses will be 1 point; you'll do an average of 6 points of
STUN every 12 seconds, or 1 point per 2 seconds, if we want to be
anal. So it'll take about 20 seconds.
Killing someone will take quite a bit longer, because you're only
averaging 1 point of BODY per attack, and the defenses will soak that.
So you need to get the lucky shots in, which happens on a 1/6th
chance. 1 point of body per 6 attacks translates to 1 point every 36
seconds; call it 2 points in a minute, so two and a half minutes before
you beat someone to death.
I'm not sure why you think you don't do STUN unless you do BODY, unless
you're thinking of killing attacks.
>As soon as you apply different rules to NPCs than you do to PCs, you are no
>longer even attempting to be "realistic."
Not so. NPCs are often generated by different rules. The most common
rule for generating NPCs is "write down the stats you need."
albu...@yahoo.com
smcmaho...@eiv.com (Shawn McMahon) wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Oct 1998 02:47:28 -0400, "Stephen B. Mann"
> <sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu> wrote:
>
> >universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
> >make me want to buy it?
>
> Let me preface this by saying that I'm just giving you stuff that you
> may or may not like. I am *NOT* evangelizing for CORPS here. Many of
> the things I list will be exactly the reasons some people will *HATE*
> CORPS.
>
> CORPS uses a location-impairment system for damage resolution. This
> feels a lot more realistic for some people than a hit-point system.
Explain, please. What on earth is a location-impairment system? I assume
you mean it allows some areas to be incapacitated while others are not? How
is the location of wounds determined? In such a system the availability of
aimed blows is pretty important. In my experience most 'wound' systems -
which is what I'd call 'location impairment' - are much the same as a well
designed hit point system, just more grainy.
> CORPS codifies rules for "no die roll needed if your skill is higher
> than the difficulty of the task". This simplifies and speeds play.
Good common sense rule for any system.
> CORPS uses a target-number-based skill system, instead of a modifier
> to skill.
I think this approach is vital to any good RPG system. It's one of the main
things which converted me to Ysgarth when I discovered it on the net about a
year ago.
> CORPS uses a linear progression for skills instead of a bell curve.
Is it a pure linear progression or an accelerating curve? I don't think
a straight linear progression is any more realistic than a bell curve to
represent most types of learning. Ysgarth offers a nice solution to this
in providing a rough curve in skill resolution rather than in how skills
are learned.
> CORPS uses a linear progression for task difficulties, which makes it
> more intuitively obvious how difficult a task is, instead of modifiers
> that affect different characters differently, based on where they are
> on the bell curve.
Modifier systems must die. Systems which add dice as modifiers must
die by torture. Comparative systems are the only way to go.
> CORPS has a fairly generic "superpowers" system that covers supers,
> psi, and cybernetics in a similar manner to GURPS Supers, but in just
> a couple of pages.
Essential in a generic system.
> CORPS does not use random damage rolls for firearms.
A cool idea, but it would seem to eliminate the possibility of a flesh
wound, and for player enjoyment and to simulate a lot of genres not having
characters die every time they're shot has a certain appeal.
> CORPS can use 3G3 gun designs with only very minor conversions.
>
> CORPS uses a single 10-sided die for resolution. And, due to the
> target-number based system, it's WYRIWYG; What You Roll Is What You
> Get.
Another good idea, also found in Ysgarth.
> Again, some people will hate one or more of these points. Others will
> love them.
>
> If you like the Timelords system (I.E. Timelords, Warp World,
> Spacetime), but feel it's way too complicated, you might like CORPS.
>
> If you like GURPS but hate the way it uses hit points instead of a
> location-impairment system, you might like CORPS.
>
> If you like the speed and ease-of-use of FUDGE, but prefer a more
> sound mathematical basis for decisions in order to get your mind
> around them, you might like CORPS.
Speed and ease of Fudge? Hunh?
> If you think Ysgarth needs more stats, you'll hate CORPS. :-)
How many stats does CORPS have? The lack of a decent selection of stats
is one of my main gripes with GURPS.
> If you think bell curves are more realistic than linear progressions,
> you won't like CORPS.
But then you'd also be insane. They're about equally unrealistic. Each
only represents one aspect of a complex spectrum of learning patterns.
> If you think rounding probabilities to the nearest 10% is too grainy,
> you won't like CORPS, but you're pretty much in the soup with GURPS
> and Hero too.
That's pretty grainy. Not much justification for abstracting things that
much either.
Al
Brian Newman
>
>"Brian Newman" <bne...@aracnet.com> wrote:
>
>>You would have to get a total of 20 BODY damage to instantly kill someone.
>>A shot to the head does 2x BODY damage; the most you can hope for from a .45
>>revolver is 14 BODY.
>>In any case, the person will be long unconscious, if only from the head hit,
>>losing points of mental characteristics, and bleeding for at least 1 BODY
>>per round (12 seconds). This person would be lying there functionally dead
>>for anywhere from 10-66 seconds (depending on how badly they roll while
>>bleeding) and then would "officially" die. I don't know that that's much of
>>a functional difference unless you are waiting to do something to their
>>spirit as it leaves their body or something.
>
>Or of you're a trained paramedic and are trying to *save* them. A trivial
>task if they're at -4 Body but still alive. And impossible task if they're
>*dead*. It is *impossible* to kill someone instantly with a .45, without
>changing the rules.
Yes, it is impossible to kill someone instantly with a .45.
However, I don't know that a person with Paramedic skill could save them if you
use the full bleeding rules, and they could only stop the bleeding if using the
normal bleeding rules (1 BODY every post-segment-12). They still would not be
dead but would be seriously brain-damaged (permanently lost INT and EGO points).
>>Technically, this is correct.
>>
>And it's correct in ways that matter, too. A superhero who knows that the
>gun the bad guy is holding to the hostages head *cannot* *possibly* kill
>them, and that a good paramedic roll will save them, will tend to be role
>played poorly. If realism is your goal. (But then, if realism is your
>goal, you shouldn't be playing Hero in the first place.)
I agree with all of this. I wouldn't play a non-cinematic, non-dramatic game
using the Hero system in any genre -- superhero, fantasy, espionage, '20's
gangster, horror, wild west, medieval Japan, cyberpunk, or space (I think those
are all the published rulesets).
>>This is a common misconception or exaggeration of a Murphy's Rule which
>>didn't read the entire rules in the first place.
>
>And was based on a previous edition, I believe.
The Strength ratings and Throwing rules have not changed as far as I can tell
since I have played the system, from 1st edition. IIRC, there were suggested
stats for "Small Child" in Champions II along with other sorts of normals, and
they were basically the same as they are now. There was no "puppy" example,
though.
>>Is this based on anything in the game system? The Mechanics skill, which
>>doesn't mention time taken or modifiers for using your feet, but does
>>mention that you almost always need tools, which might be hard to manipulate
>>with your feet? Something under Vehicles? I don't remember it, but that
>>system is for designing vehicles, not dismantling them with your feet.
>>Could you please give a reference or at least a hint for this one? I have
>>no idea where it could be.
>>
>It's based on the combat rules. But that, too is from a previous edition,
>and they seem to have upped the DEF of normal cars.
So you mean "dismantling a car with feet" as a euphemism for "kicking a car
until it falls apart"? :) Let's see... an average person has 10 STR which does
2d6 normal damage. Over the course of 5 minutes, a normal person with 2 SPD
would get 50 attacks. A normal attack does 0-4 BODY, average 2. If the car had
2 DEF, the same as a person, it would take no damage from an average attack.
The person would have to roll one 6 and one 2-5 to do 3 BODY and two 6's to do 4
BODY. I've never been good at computing odds... I'll estimate that they'll do 4
BODY on 1/36 of attacks (let's say on 2 attacks out of 50) and 3 BODY on 1/6 of
attacks (another 8 attacks). In 5 minutes, that would be a total of 12 BODY
that the car took -- most likely not enough to cripple it and certainly not to
dismantle it, unless we're talking motorcycle.
I don't have my books here to look up the DEF and BODY of a standard car...
--------------------
Shade and sweet water,
Brian -- bne...@aracnet.com -- http://www.aracnet.com/~bnewman
"Like Kurosawa I make mad films / 'Kay, I don't make films /
But if I did, they'd have a samurai" -- Barenaked Ladies
Stephen B. Mann
> What types of supplements and expansions?
I'm looking for something that's got enough detail that I don't
have to spend too much time making it up myself. For instance, in a
fantasy supplement, I'd want to see at least one magic system, an
assortment of weapon stats, monster stats, character types and stats,
and building stats.
> There aren't really any setting supplements, unless you count
> 'Dreamtime', which is an aboriginal Australian supplement. I usually
> use novels and other sources for setting info if I don't feel like
> making it up myself. It's certainly easy enough to grab a GURPS
> worldbook and ignore the mechanics.
I make up my own game settings. I just need the mechanical details
of powers (magic, psi, super, cyber), weapons, and transportation done
for me so I can extrapolate my own from there.
I own lots of Gurps and Hero supplements, but I just swipe the
mechanical details for myself and use my own settings and societies.
--
Stephen B. Mann sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu
SUNY Learning Network http://sln.suny.edu/sln
Triad3204
In article <3621A600...@cnsvax.albany.edu>, "Stephen B. Mann"
<sm...@cnsvax.albany.edu> writes:
>Sounds interesting. But then again, I'm satisfied with the IMO
>universal systems of Gurps and Hero. So, what's CORPS got that would
>make me want to buy it?
CORPS beats GURPS by having useful metasystems and greater flexibility within a
more elegant rules package.
CORPS beats HERO by having a more versatile and easy-to-use Powers system which
was designed for more general, multi-purpose use and a *much* more effective
and elegant rules package.
Justin Bacon
tr...@prairie.lakes.com
Doug Berry
Night...@nightdark.com (Nightshade) said:
But what is important in CORPS is the impairment, and wehter it
is an eventually/instantly fatal wound, and if you remain
conscious. Depending on the die, the same .45 cal to the chest
could leave the hero wincing, but alive, dead on the spot, or
unconcious and slowly (or quickly) bleeding to death.
--
+-------------------------------------------+
| Douglas E. Berry dbe...@hooked.net |
| http://www.hooked.net/~dberry/ |
|-------------------------------------------|
| "Hear the voices in my head, swear to God |
| it sounds like they're snoring." |
| -Harvey Danger, "Flagpole Sitta" |
+-------------------------------------------+
Jens Hage
And it's smaller, and easier to modify than either (d20 for d10, or d100)
to give a less granulated result. Plus it's easier to adjucate on the fly
(automatic successes are good things). And it has impossibly well written
combat rules, with one standard resolution, with easily pluggable rules
for more specific results.
Shawn McMahon
Austin) wrote:
>someone unconscious. (Hint: The latter is longer than the former, because,
>on average, you do no Stun unless you do Body, and you have more of the
>former than the latter.)
What? Each die will do an average of 3.5 points of stun, and 1 point
of body.
The attacks aren't killing, so non-resistant defense applies. (You
specifically said "batter someone to [death, unconsciousness] with
your fists".)
I think you're backwards, Terry. Maybe you're holding the rulebook
upside down.
Shawn McMahon
Austin) wrote:
>*dead*. It is *impossible* to kill someone instantly with a .45, without
>changing the rules.
Or using rules that are in the book, but you personally don't happen
to like them.
Or are you just going to keep glossing over that one?
Shawn McMahon
(Nightshade) wrote:
>One of the features I dislike about it. While damage to a given area
>does tend to land within a certain range given the same weapon,
>Warpworld and it's kin recognized there _is_ non insignificant
>varience in effect, which CORPS doesn't.
Unfortunately, the TimeLords system assumes that a bullet will average
half of it's maximum effectiveness when it hits. I'm not sure that's
realistic, either, and it sure looks like it was done merely because
it was a simple, no-calculator-needed way to fit it to dice.
Shawn McMahon
>Explain, please. What on earth is a location-impairment system? I assume
When you get hit in the chest, the damage done to you takes the form
of minuses on anything you do that would conceivably use the chest.
(I.E., anything physical.)
If you get hit in the arm, the damage takes the form of minuses on
anything you do with that arm.
Ordinarily, damage doesn't come off any sort of global "hit point"
statistic, with the exception of whole-body damage like explosions.
>you mean it allows some areas to be incapacitated while others are not? How
>is the location of wounds determined? In such a system the availability of
Random roll, or aim where you want and take a minus.
>aimed blows is pretty important. In my experience most 'wound' systems -
>which is what I'd call 'location impairment' - are much the same as a well
>designed hit point system, just more grainy.
I currently break systems down into three general types:
Location-impairment (CORPS, TimeLords)
Hit-point (GURPS, AD&D, Hero)
Threshold (FUDGE, Storyteller)
The problem with hit-point systems (and threshold systems, unless you
kludge on some rules about scratches not taking you above a certain
level) is that they suffer from the "foot kill" problem.
Simply put, if you're within one point of death, and you get hit in
the foot for one point of damage, you die.
I don't find that realistic. There are people reading this right now
who are getting screaming mad that I feel this way. :-)
>> CORPS uses a linear progression for skills instead of a bell curve.
>
>Is it a pure linear progression or an accelerating curve? I don't think
>a straight linear progression is any more realistic than a bell curve to
>represent most types of learning.
Straight. You spend more points, you have more skill.
Points don't represent difficulty of learning, so your objection
doesn't compute.
>A cool idea, but it would seem to eliminate the possibility of a flesh
>wound, and for player enjoyment and to simulate a lot of genres not having
>characters die every time they're shot has a certain appeal.
Nope; CORPS puts the randomness somewhere else. First, a hit can be a
graze, in which case it's a flesh wound. If not, the bullet does X
damage, but X damage can either be a straight impairment, an
eventually-fatal impairment (same level, but it's bleeding) or an
immediately-fatal impairment. (Did the same amount of damage, but hit
the heart instead of the lung.)
>> If you like the Timelords system (I.E. Timelords, Warp World,
>> Spacetime), but feel it's way too complicated, you might like CORPS.
BTW, from my few attempts to wade through Ysgarth, I'd say it fits
this statement too. If you think Ysgarth has just the right number of
stats, you might not like CORPS. If you think Ysgarth is a confused
mess that is improving at a glacial pace, you might like CORPS.
Or, hell, you might like systems that are diametrically opposed to
CORPS, then read CORPS and just fall in love with it.
Or you might like FUDGE but think it's not quite "rulesy" enough, and
then read CORPS and change your mind. I'm just giving guidance here,
not making pronouncements. :-)
>> If you like the speed and ease-of-use of FUDGE, but prefer a more
>> sound mathematical basis for decisions in order to get your mind
>> around them, you might like CORPS.
>
>Speed and ease of Fudge? Hunh?
Sure. Fudge is speedy and easy-to-use. One die mechanic handles
everything, modifiers are almost a non-issue (since a +1 is a huge
difference, it takes a lot to result in a modifier. +2 is the kind of
modifier you get for a stationary target a point-blank range) and it's
quickly obvious how well you did.
>How many stats does CORPS have? The lack of a decent selection of stats
>is one of my main gripes with GURPS.
6: Strength, Agility, Awareness, Will, Health, and Power. The last
one is for psychic stuff only.
Use of an advantage or limitation can make up for the lack of seperate
Agility and Dexterity stats. Other similar distinctions could be made
if necessary.
>> If you think rounding probabilities to the nearest 10% is too grainy,
>> you won't like CORPS, but you're pretty much in the soup with GURPS
>> and Hero too.
>
>That's pretty grainy. Not much justification for abstracting things that
>much either.
Sure there is; it's easy and fast to deal with a single d10. Cheaper
than d%, too; you purchase half as many dice. :-)
It's not for everybody, though. Some people probably think d% is too
grainy. :-)
I doubt that anybody who seriously thinks Ysgarth is a strong system
is likely to prefer CORPS, but stranger things have happened.
Shawn McMahon
<bag...@austin360.com> wrote:
>absolutely necessary. One is 'Guns! Guns! Guns!' (and it's companion '3
>Guns! ^3'...I think), which deals with how to construct weapons of all
Guns! Guns! Guns! is often called 3G3. In print, where you have more
control, it's called 3G^3.
The supplement is More Guns!
Michael T. Richter
>Straight. You spend more points, you have more skill.
>Points don't represent difficulty of learning, so your objection
>doesn't compute.
In CORPS the points may or may not represent difficulty of learning. Skills
can have difficulty factors attached to them that raise (or lower) their
costs. The sample skill trees have several examples of this.
>>That's pretty grainy. Not much justification for abstracting things that
>>much either.
>Sure there is; it's easy and fast to deal with a single d10. Cheaper
>than d%, too; you purchase half as many dice. :-)
Further, as Greg once pointed out, how many game designers have researched,
say, the results of gunfire on a human body to the level where they know to
within a percentage point what the odds are of a specific thing occuring?
My own guess would be none.
--
Michael T. Richter <m...@ottawa.com> http://www.igs.net/~mtr/
PGP Key: http://www.igs.net/~mtr/pgp-key.html
PGP Fingerprint: 40D1 33E0 F70B 6BB5 8353 4669 B4CC DD09 04ED 4FE8
Andy Wills
> Guns! Guns! Guns! is often called 3G3. In print, where you have more
> control, it's called 3G^3.
One of those things I've always wondered...why is it 3G^3? I could
understand the use of the first # as in 3(Guns), or the superscript for
the same purpose, but not both. I'm not going to lose any sleep over it,
but I'm curious nonetheless.
-Andy
Nightshade
>dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) wrote:
>
>>In article <6vvs6b$6i2$1...@hiram.io.com>, Sakura <je...@dillinger.io.com> wrote:
>>>In article <6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>,
>>>Bryant Durrell <dur...@innocence.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat.
>>>
>>>Don't they have a 10 in all Primary Stats, that being human average?
>>
>>Yup. This is a change you can make which causes the game to become far
>>more realistic, is all. Terry was saying it couldn't be done.
>
>So you argue that the average person cannot, possibly, ever, without
>pushing, pick up more than 100 pounds? Hah. Very realistic. Now compute
>how long it would take the average person to beat someone to death with
>their fists. And compare that to the average time it would take to beat
>someone unconscious. (Hint: The latter is longer than the former, because,
>on average, you do no Stun unless you do Body, and you have more of the
>former than the latter.)
I'm puzzled at where you're getting this one from, Terry. If people
all have a 5 STR, they will presumeablye have a 1 PD, and if
everything else is on the same scale, 10 STUN. On the average,
they'll be leaking 2.5 STUN through per hit, which means you'll end up
unconscious in about four blows, and may take a body pip out of it.
There may well be problems with setting everything at five, but this
isn't one of them.
Bertil Jonell
>
I think that tradeoff was necessary to get the 'Impairment equals
Damage' at the same time as only d10's are used. IMHO it isn't a big
problem: the graininess of the damage and the random 'eventually/instantly
fatal' rolls makes up for it.
Thomas N. Bagwell
<362f77e6...@news.dsuper.net>...
>
>>> CORPS beats HERO by having a more versatile and easy-to-use Powers
system which
>>> was designed for more general, multi-purpose use and a *much* more
effective
>>> and elegant rules package.
>
>a power system, but it wasn't that big a section.
2nd edition goes into far more detail on Paranormal Powers. It still
has a core nugget that is similar to 1st edition, but it is much
expanded.
There is also a follow-up section that details how to use it for
cyberware.
Tom B.
Jean-Michel GOT
> If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
> hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
> realitic and lethal are optional, too, so I don't see much difference
> in that respect.
In HERO, with hit location, if someone hit you in a vital point you're quite dead.
But the point is "If someone hit you", in HERO it's hard to hit someone with an uzi at
2 meters distance if he dodge. In HERO difficulty to hit with range weapon his based on
DCV of target plus/minus manoeuver. So in HERO, Bad Joe Average will have a small chance
to hit Mister Hero.
In CORPS difficulty to hit with range weapon his based on RANGE. So in CORPS, Bad
Joe Average will have a big cleaner bill, as after firing at Mister Hero at this range,
there will be a lot of piece of Mister Hero in the vicinity!
These are difference in style of campaign. If you replay Star Wars with HERO it's
okay, if you do it with CORPS the Millenium Falcon will have been vaporized by the
Imperial Stardestroyer quitting Mos Esley. If you replay Usual Suspect with CORPS, it's
okay, if you do it with HERO all the squad of "hero bad boys" would have survive the final
fight and Kaiser Sauzais would have to find something to kill them.
Justin Fang
Thomas N. Bagwell <bag...@austin360.com> wrote:
[CORPS fatality rules]
>This is resolved with a single die roll. If you roll the d10 and
>determine that the wound is eventually fatal, that roll also indicates
>the bleeding rate. For instance, a person is shot for 6 pts of damage.
>A d10 roll is made to see if it is eventually fatal, which it will be on
>a roll of 6 or less. If a 5 is rolled, then the wound is eventually
>fatal, and the character will lose 1 health point in 5 minutes, a 2nd
>health point in 10 more minutes, a 3rd health point in 20 more minutes,
>until the character's health reaches 0. Each lost health point is a
>further +1 impairment to all task difficulties.
This doesn't quite make sense to me, because the more damage you take, the
the larger the possible range of bleeding rates. If you only take 1 point,
then you bleed either not at all or at the maximum possible rate. But, as
in the exmple you gave, get hit for 6 points and you might bleed at a much
slower rate. I would have thought the bleeding rate would be 11 minus the
eventually fatal roll.
--
Justin Fang (jus...@ugcs.caltech.edu)
This space intentionally left blank.
Marc Puma Lombart
>> CORPS beats HERO by having a more versatile and easy-to-use Powers system which
>> was designed for more general, multi-purpose use and a *much* more effective
>> and elegant rules package.
Is this something from the 2nd Edition? The first one did have
a power system, but it wasn't that big a section.
Marc "Puma" Lombart
Montreal, Canada
http://www.dsuper.net/~katt
Terry Austin
>In article <363f18e1...@news.artnet.net>,
>Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>>dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) wrote:
>>>In article <6vvs6b$6i2$1...@hiram.io.com>, Sakura <je...@dillinger.io.com> wrote:
>>>>In article <6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>,
>>>>Bryant Durrell <dur...@innocence.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat.
>>>>
>>>>Don't they have a 10 in all Primary Stats, that being human average?
>>>
>>>Yup. This is a change you can make which causes the game to become far
>>>more realistic, is all. Terry was saying it couldn't be done.
>>
>>So you argue that the average person cannot, possibly, ever, without
>>pushing, pick up more than 100 pounds? Hah. Very realistic.
>
>Actually, yeah. It's not like pushing is that big a deal, you know.
>Fairly common. It's just extra effort which burns END faster.
Only among supers. For heroic campaigns, it says "However, casual use of
Pushing should be discouraged by applying a minus to the character's EGO
roll."
Some of us use the rules as published, instead of trying to fix something
that's not broken because we don't understand it.
>
>>Now compute
>>how long it would take the average person to beat someone to death with
>>their fists. And compare that to the average time it would take to beat
>>someone unconscious. (Hint: The latter is longer than the former, because,
>>on average, you do no Stun unless you do Body, and you have more of the
>>former than the latter.)
>
>Assume 1d6 normal damage, and SPD 2. That's 2d6 of STUN per 12 second
>turn. Defenses will be 1 point; you'll do an average of 6 points of
>STUN every 12 seconds, or 1 point per 2 seconds, if we want to be
>anal. So it'll take about 20 seconds.
No, not SPD 2. SPD 1. 1 + (DEX/10), dropping all fractions. SPD *1*. One
attack per turn, average of 3.5 STUN, minus 1 for PD, is 2.5 STUN per *hit*.
The chance to hit is only 62.5% (presuming two average people, whatever
their DEX, because they will have equal OCV and DCV). 62.5% of 2.5 is 2.56
or so. Now, at the end of the turn, we have the automatic post-12 Recovery.
Of 2. In your world, in which the average person has stats of 5, it is
extremely unlikely that one average person could every beat another average
person unconscious without doing lethal damage to them. One a hit, there is
a 1 in 6 chance of doing 2 BODY, which does 1 STUN that cannot be recovered
until the BODY is healed. Therefore, with a 62.5% chance of a hit, and a
16.667% chance of doing actually BODY, we will take an average of about 10
Phases (which is 10 *turns* with a SPD 1) to do *one* BODY. With 5 BODY, it
would take 50 full turns, or about 8 minutes. At that point, the victim will
be dying, but probably not unconscious. In another 5 turns, or 1 full
minute, he would fall over dead, and unconscious, at the same time from the
-1 BODY per post-12.
It is *possible* for a STR 5 person to render your average wimp unconscious,
but not easily. The quickest it could be done, by hitting on every attack,
and rolling a 6 for damage on every attack, is (6 - 2 PD) = 4 STUN per turn,
three hits. That makes it 36 seconds, by my count. No possible chance of a
one-punch KO, of course. And the chances of that 36 second victory is about
1 in 885, or 0.11%.
With stats being 10, BTW, the average damage per hit is 7 STUN, minus 2 PD,
or 5. SPD really is 2 now, so you get, on average, 1.25 hits per turn.
1.25 times 5 is 6.25, minus the free post-12 Recover of 4, is 2.25 STUN per
turn. At this rate, it would take just under 9 turns to render someone
unconscious, or about 1.8 minutes (107 seconds). Not bad from a reality
standpoint, but now we have to deal with a 2d6 normal attack vs. a 4 PD,
which means that the average person *cannot* kill an average person with
their bare hands, no matter what, without Pushing. While a murderous intent
is certainly a good argument that Pushing is justified, the average person
could kill someone, given enough time, with their bare hands without
exerting themselves that much.
As I said, you can make Hero more deadly, but not more *realistically*
deadly.
>
>Killing someone will take quite a bit longer, because you're only
>averaging 1 point of BODY per attack, and the defenses will soak that.
>So you need to get the lucky shots in, which happens on a 1/6th
>chance. 1 point of body per 6 attacks translates to 1 point every 36
>seconds; call it 2 points in a minute, so two and a half minutes before
>you beat someone to death.
>
See above. More like 8 minutes, if you actually take into account *all* the
combat rules.
>I'm not sure why you think you don't do STUN unless you do BODY, unless
>you're thinking of killing attacks.
On average, you recover it faster than you do it, by about half a point.
You did know about the very first paragraph (third sentence) in the Recovery
section (page 167 in the hardcover), didn't you? Or is that yet another
rule you've "fixed" in your quest for reality?
>
>>As soon as you apply different rules to NPCs than you do to PCs, you are no
>>longer even attempting to be "realistic."
>
>Not so. NPCs are often generated by different rules.
Not when your goal is realism.
Terry Austin
>On Wed, 14 Oct 1998 03:26:09 GMT, tau...@hyperbooks.com (Terry
>Austin) wrote:
>
>>someone unconscious. (Hint: The latter is longer than the former, because,
>>on average, you do no Stun unless you do Body, and you have more of the
>>former than the latter.)
>
>What? Each die will do an average of 3.5 points of stun, and 1 point
>of body.
>
>The attacks aren't killing, so non-resistant defense applies. (You
>specifically said "batter someone to [death, unconsciousness] with
>your fists".)
>
>I think you're backwards, Terry. Maybe you're holding the rulebook
>upside down.
See my response to Bryant, which goes through the math if you invoke *all*
the combat rules, like rolling to hit and post-12 Recovery. Takes, on
average, 8 minutes to kill your average opponent, and he is conscious the
entire time.
Terry Austin
>tau...@hyperbooks.com (Terry Austin) wrote:
>
>>dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) wrote:
>>
>>>In article <6vvs6b$6i2$1...@hiram.io.com>, Sakura <je...@dillinger.io.com> wrote:
>>>>In article <6vukg3$t8v$1...@usenet45.supernews.com>,
>>>>Bryant Durrell <dur...@innocence.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat.
>>>>
>>>>Don't they have a 10 in all Primary Stats, that being human average?
>>>
>>>Yup. This is a change you can make which causes the game to become far
>>>more realistic, is all. Terry was saying it couldn't be done.
>>
>>So you argue that the average person cannot, possibly, ever, without
>>pushing, pick up more than 100 pounds? Hah. Very realistic. Now compute
>>how long it would take the average person to beat someone to death with
>>their fists. And compare that to the average time it would take to beat
>>someone unconscious. (Hint: The latter is longer than the former, because,
>>on average, you do no Stun unless you do Body, and you have more of the
>>former than the latter.)
>
>I'm puzzled at where you're getting this one from, Terry. If people
>all have a 5 STR, they will presumeablye have a 1 PD, and if
>everything else is on the same scale, 10 STUN. On the average,
>they'll be leaking 2.5 STUN through per hit, which means you'll end up
>unconscious in about four blows, and may take a body pip out of it.
>There may well be problems with setting everything at five, but this
>isn't one of them.
>
If you ignore most of the combat rules. If they have DEX 5, they are SPD 1,
and therefore get a post-12 Recover of 2 for every attack. And attacks only
hit 62.5% of the time. In other words, on average, you recover faster than
the damage is being done. In about 8 minutes, you can beat someone to
*death*, with you 1 in 6 chance of doing BODY, but they will be (on average)
conscious the entire time. See my reply to Bryant for the full mathematical
details.
No wonder you people think Hero is realistic. You don't actually use the
Hero rules.
Terry Austin
>In article <363e1670...@news.artnet.net>,
>Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>>dur...@innocence.com (Bryant Durrell) wrote:
>>>In article <3639bab8...@news.artnet.net>,
>>>Terry Austin <tau...@hyperbooks.com> wrote:
>>>>"Klaus Ę. Mogensen" <klau...@get2net.dk> wrote:
>>>>>Jean-Michel GOT wrote:
>>>>>> By the way, the only advantage I can find in HERO vs CORPS is the
>>>>>> simulation of heroic movies or books. HERO combat system is tailored
>>>>>> as not to be realistically lethal, but CORPS is realistically deadly.
>>>>>> It is a question of style of campaign.
>>>>>
>>>>>If you use some of the Optional Effects of Damage rules in HERO, like
>>>>>hit location, bleeding, and impairment, it becomes quite realistically
>>>>>lethal.
>>>>
>>>>Not really. They give a Colt .45 1d6 of damage. No matter what you do, you
>>>>*cannot* instantly kill someone, even if you shoot them in the head with the
>>>>gun pressed against their temple, without using GM fiat. Then there's the
>>>>fact that a newborn infant can throw a football more than the entire length
>>>>of a football field, and a perfectly average person can completely
>>>>disassemble an average automobile with his bare feet in under 5 minutes. It
>>>>can be made more deadly, but it cannot be made more *realistically* deadly.
>>>
>>>Sometimes, Terry, I despair at your lack of imagination.
>>>
>>>Give normals a base of 5 in each stat.
>>
>>Now you have changed the system.
>
>Sure. I've made the system more deadly. You said it couldn't be done
>realistically, so I took a stab at doing so.
You failed. You've created a world in which it takes 8 minutes for the
average person to beat an average person to death, and, typically, does not
render them unconscious at all until they are dead.
>
>>Which was my point. Now the average
>>person can lift half as much, do half as much damage, etc. The game is
>>designed around the average male having an average of 10 in stats. If you
>>change that, you change a *hell* of a lot of other stuff, too.
>
>Since you completely flubbed the baby issue, you'll forgive me if I say
>I don't trust you on this claim. You're going to have to prove to me
>that it breaks a lot of stuff before I believe it.
So, you are unaware that STR affects PD and STUN? That CON affects ED, STUN
and END? That DEX affects combat values? That INT affects perception
rolls? That most skill rolls are affected by stats? Small wonder you don't
know how cinematic Hero is, if you don't actually know the rules.