About the combat system (again)

About the combat system (again)

About the combat system (again)

How do you deal with damage regarding to the fiction?

For example, in one of my previous adventure (the second session actually), my characters were facing a huge Roc bird. So during one of the assaults, one of them ended up being pounded to the ground by the monster beatting up his shield. In terms of pure mechanical damage, I think he got only like 1 health point less (so he was still in positive at the time), so hence my question : do you think that in this case particularily, we can assume that even if the damages weren’t enough he could receive the Unstable condition nonethelss to respect the fiction? The Roc was really massive and I described how he could rip apart sheeps and cows like butter so hitting very hard somebody even with a shield at his arm would be enough to save his life for sure but maybe not enough to let him get away with just a fleshwound? I was thinking of giving him the condition but only temporarily as his arm will get numb for having blocked such powerful blows, meaning it will be gone either after the fight or as soon as natural healing will begin.

I ask this because quite recently I came accross an article for DW entitled injuries are not just hit points gone (or something like that) describing the kind of situation as above. So I know COJ is not DW but was wondering if any of you had to deal with the same kind of situation?

7 thoughts on “About the combat system (again)”

  1. So it depends more on the fiction and how poorly the player may have rolled. It doesn’t depend on the damage roll of the Roc. Look at its Moves and the Tags on its attacks. Does it have Forceful? That sounds Forceful to me. Messy might be that it breaks the shield arm and now the shield dangles uselessly at the character’s side, the bones poking through the skin and all.

  2. I understand your point, but this is not DW.

    (as you also pointed out)

    While I am not a big fan of hit points myself (and you can see it in the game – there is damage and armor, but hit points are actually modifiers for moves, thus a different outcome can be expected from the same numbers), I do believe that there must be a numerical representation that tells you and the player how bad is this thing that just happened.

    Role playing is a conversation: there’s space for disagreement, confusion, misunderstanding.

    As a GM, I can tell you you’re down while the Roc pounds your shield. In your mental space, you’re some fu***ng bastard who will just cut the neck of the bird with a single swing of the sword. In my mental image, as GM, you’re in awful situation.

    My description can take it only so far; yes, after a while we might attune and get on the same level. This is why numbers help (don’t solve, but help).

    At least in my opinion.

    Now, there is a lot to say about harm (consider also this – maybe we can discuss it in another post: when you suffer harm, you roll + Health ; when you start getting 7-9s and especially 6- things get messy… here is where I hit “hard” as the GM with the fiction)…

    But let’s try to keep it short and open to a discussion:

    – I personally would not inflict Unstable until the player gets to Health -1, but…

    – the Roc sounds scary; did they roll some Face Danger?

    – the Roc sounds like a huge monster? did they roll Face Death instead of Face Danger?

    – what was (if you recall) the result of the Suffer Harm move for the character?

    Situations like “scary descriptions meet 1 single (lame) damage point” are very rare when other moves get involved and not just Engage in Battle.

    You will notice that you should get plenty of material for your harm/fight staging and descriptions from moves like Face Danger/Death, Inflict/Suffer harm…

    (oh man, I’m busy but this so deserves like several dedicated discussions) Everybody please go wild with your comments! 

  3. Yes, they did had to Face Danger lots of time and this PC in particular got a 10+ to his Suffer Harm move. So nothing really. I know this isn’t very easy to sort out and I don’t want to contradict the spirit of the game. So I don’t really know yet what to do about it, but i’ll consider your suggestions of course. If I come up with an idea soon, I’ll let you know 😉

  4. Greg, for what I’ve read of the adventure, I think it went pretty well, so I wouldn’t worry too much over the details of a single harm roll. On the other hand, consider this: if the Face Danger went well and so did the Suffer Harm, then your answer is in the player’s good rolls.

    The Roc didn’t hit that hard – so your character might fall to the ground facing the giant bird but with not much other consequences.

    If you try Face Death, you’ll see that the move stands up to its name: things can get pretty deadly, fast. A move like Face Death will give you an opportunity for more harm (numeric and in fiction), in most cases.

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