damage rolls

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cczernia
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damage rolls

Post by cczernia »

The other day I was talking with my group and said one of the things I find clunky about Savage Worlds is the damage roll. To me it feels unnecessary and they could have easily removed it, especially for attacking mooks (even D&D4 does this).

Then I realized that most of my favorite rpg system do not have damage rolls: Unisystem Lite, Silhouette, Fate, new World of Darkness.

So, what do you guys think? Damage rolls add anything? When are they good, when are they bad?
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Post by jimmy corrigan »

damage rolls are always good. always.

no, seriously, it depends on the game that you're playing. sometimes they hinder the flow of the game, sometimes they are necessary.
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Post by devlin1 »


[quote="jimmy corrigan"]damage rolls are always good. always.[/quote]
+1.



No, [i]seriously[/i], I generally like damage rolls in old-schoolish or gritty games -- the former because it's evocative of old-school game design, and the latter because I usually want more crunch in gritty games.

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cczernia
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Post by cczernia »


[quote="devlin1"]+1.



No, [i]seriously[/i], I generally like damage rolls in old-schoolish or gritty games -- the former because it's evocative of old-school game design, and the latter because I usually want more crunch in gritty games.[/quote]


Old School and I can see but gritty? Why would you need damage rolls in a gritty game. Take FATE for example. You showed me how to make it gritty (by reducing or removing stress). Same can be said for other games that don't require damage rolls like ORE.



Also, I found Leftovers to be gritty and it doesn't have a damage roll :wink:

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Post by devlin1 »


[quote="cczernia"]Old School and I can see but gritty? Why would you need damage rolls in a gritty game. Take FATE for example. You showed me how to make it gritty (by reducing or removing stress). Same can be said for other games that don't require damage rolls like ORE.



Also, I found Leftovers to be gritty and it doesn't have a damage roll :wink:[/quote]


I [i]did[/i] say "generally." It just seems more natural to me for crunch and "realism" to go hand in hand, and that usually means separating accuracy from damage.

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Dragonmaster Zoc
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Post by Dragonmaster Zoc »

My familiarity with Savage Worlds is passing at best, but from what I recall it tends toward a more dramatic (or even cinematic) flavor. In this case, damage rolls help achieve that flavor by letting your attacks possibly succeed when they should not.

I've been thinking about this sort of thing a lot lately, while designing my system, and there four ways to resolve combat that I know of:
  1. An attack roll against a static value, with damage determined by the margin of success. This has the benefit that it's fast, but it's not very dramatic: if you almost miss, then you cause minimal damage which is almost as good as missing. In an even match, this will make combat drag on for a long time, as both side repeatedly scratches the other. In an unbalanced fight, the stronger side will win quickly.
  2. An attack roll against a static value, with a separate damage roll. This has the benefit that you can possibly overcome adversity with enough luck: even if your opponent severely outmatches you, you have a (small) chance of hitting and a (small) chance of doing significant damage. It's also pretty fast, over all, because all attacks deal more than minimal damage. This is more likely to turn into a war of attrition, as our heroes are worn down slowly over the course of many encounters.
  3. An attack roll and a defense roll, with damage determined by the margin of success. This has the benefit that the players feel like they have more control over their fate, because no matter what's coming at you, you always get a chance to defend yourself. It also slows things down a lot because you have two rolls per turn and you have a lot of them because it takes a lot of hits to down an opponent (assuming an equally matched fight).
  4. An attack roll and a defense roll, with damage determined by a damage roll. This has the benefit that it feels fair, as above, but gets combat over with in a relatively quick manner. It does involve a back and forth between two parties alternating three dice rolls, so it feels like it takes longer.
I think a lot of it depends on the player. Most people I know, which includes nobody from these forums, like rolling dice. If I'm designing a game for people I know, then I'm more likely to include more dice rolling, because it's more fun for them.

If you just want to get things over with quickly, then you can have a single attack roll against a static target value with a static damage associated with it. I've never seen a game system use that method before, but it would theoretically get things over with most quickly (especially against mooks, who would otherwise take up a disproportionate amount of time to resolve).
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Post by Uber_snotling »

Systems with damage rolls often have two problems that annoy me.
1. Ablative damage is boring. I'm looking at you HP.
2. Damage rolls and accounting adds significantly to length of time spent resolving combat/encounters and usually don't add significantly to the role-playing bits.

What I like most in combat is the description of what happens. In my favorite damage system, WFRP, I like the critical hit tables that say things like, "Your mace smashes through the elbow, causing your opponent's arm to fall limp. Anything held in that arm is dropped and all further attacks are at -20% to hit." Unfortunately, it usually takes too many rolls to make those interesting descriptions happen.
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Post by BlanchPrez »

Good topic.

I will admit up front that the only game system I've ever played that didn't require a damage roll was Silhouette, and I love how it's wrapped up into the attack roll.

I also think that in systems that do use damage rolls, if you're also using mooks, get rid of it, al la 4E.

And, I also want to say that, even though I am a HUGE fan of D&D (still the game I go back to after playing other things), escalating hit points are something that's bothered me throughout the games life.

All of that said, now, I would have to say I side on the part of damage rolls. First, I think that they are just fun. It's not just a matter of saying, "hey, you hit and your sword does 4 damage, because it's a sword, and all swords do 4 damage." It's being able to say, "I hit, and do... KICK ASS! 20 DAMAGE! Yeah, baby!"

Also, it's the one I'm the most used to, so there's that bias too.

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Post by Skyman »

I thought NWoD has damage rolls with escalating descriptive damage features?

I think damage rolls are old and are best suited for computer RPG's that can quickly account for it. I also think damage rolls are a product of strategy and minature gaming. I think it is a popular form of playing. I like it mostly in those contexts

I agree with Mike it can make things gritty if done right but there are other ways to make things gritty as well. The one thing that bugs with me about damage rolls is the ubiquitous counter agent called the healing potion. For some reason players have plenty of them and the poor orc NPC's...well they just get battle axes

I digress

So with this all said and done. Descriptive damage or insults can be arbitrary. I say insults only because it really comes down to that because quantifiable aspects is usually missing.
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Post by Dragonmaster Zoc »

I must admit that I'm not familiar with any systems that completely lack hit points. Even Shadowrun has ten hit points with an opposed defense roll to determine damage.

What really bothers me isn't the hit point mechanic per se, but only when it's treated as a completely abstract mechanic to measure the precise point of Critical Existence Failure (like D&D). Of course, using subsystem damage where each limb has its own hit points and different amounts of damage cause different effects (GURPS) is overly cumbersome and annoying to implement. I like the idea of these fun effects coming along with critical hits, and the (D&D) game I'm in now uses a critical hit deck to determine random effects without needing to look at a chart.

In-combat healing also bothers me, because the idea of closing significant wounds in real time as you are being hacked at with a large sword crosses the line from cool to silly. It's not impossible to alter D&D to fix that, though.

Honestly, I don't even know how a system without hit points would even work. Without hit points, you go from fine to dead instantly. I suppose if the system was really not designed for combat, then you could resolve it with a single die roll, but at that point I might argue that it becomes pure role-playing and the game aspect of it is gone.
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