Slowly adjusting to fatherhood, finding small pockets of time to write.
Anywho, question for the community: Is “Affliction” a ‘sci-fi’ enough term to denote “status effects”? Would you guys use another, more sci-fi sounding word to describe that? (Ailment? Condition? Debility?)
I’m writing up the proper Med-Bay chapter (and trying to find all my various playtest notes after a very hectic and beatifully stressdul week or so) and I feel the term might be too sword and sorcery.
For reference, cross-posted from my current document:
Harm suffered by characters is divided into two categories, injuries and [afflictions], with five levels of increasing severity, minor, major, severe, critical and fatal. A character can only have one injury and one affliction of each severity; further instances “roll up”, becoming more severe.
Injuries are immediate physical trauma suffered by the character, usually from a physical source. Burns, bruises, cuts, broken bones, missing limbs, gaping bullet holes, etc. Injuries can be resisted by Bracing for Impact.
[Afflictions] have a pronounced negative impact on the character’s ability to act. Bleeding, deafness, blindness, exhaustion, vomiting, agony, etc. They can be caused as part of an injury (especially after a failed Brace for Impact) or caused by more subtle hazards like extreme heat, cold, radiation, toxic air, bad food, etc.
Congratulations 🙂
Yes! Happy baby arrival day!
I need to mull this over a bit before I answer.
Thanks Etienne Lefebvre & Mischa Krilov . I mentioned him in my KS Update, but I’ve yet to post about him on G+. Maybe I should? I dunno, I’m new to parenting in a social-media world 😛
Seems like Condition is in the lead, with Debility a close second. That said, I feel ‘Condition’ is to neutral, while Debility has the “it does what it says on the box”; it debilitates, which works well enough to sell the pseudo-mechanics (“characters describe actions taking the debility into account, GMs punish actions that stress the debility”)
“Condition” does feel a little too neutral. “Debility”, though, has a slightly specialized feel to it that just… It’s kinda slightly awkward, I don’t know how better to put it. “Affliction” reads too fantasy-esque.
I kind of like “status effect” it just sounds kinda clinical and technical
Agree that “Condition” is ambigously good or bad. “Debility” has a negative connotation.