Wound Level Combat Playtest
From my previous post about designing a kind of Wound Level mechanic for OSR games, in particular Dungeons & Delvers 2nd Edition, here's a very basic combat playtest between a fighter and a goblin (and then multiple goblins).
Our combatants:
FIGHTER
- Defense 14 DR 3 AC 19 (DR 0)
- Saves STR +3, CON +3
- Spear +1 to hit; 1d6+3 (AP 1)
GOBLIN
- Defense 13 DR 3 AC 18 (DR 0)
- Saves DEX +1
- Spear +2 to hit; 1d6-1 (AP 1)
Here's what some of the terms mean:
- Defense Meet-or-beat this to hit the creature. Defense reflects a character's combat skill, and increases as you level up. It can also be modified by shields.
- DR When the creature suffers damage it is reduced by this amount unless the attack ignores armor or has Armor Penetration (AP). The spears have AP 1, so ignore 1 point of DR.
- AC This is Armor Class. If you roll this or higher, the target's DR is reduced to whatever it says in parenthesis. This reflects the attacker striking a weak part in the armor, or a spot where it does not protect.
The reason why the goblin is more accurate is that when I rolled up the fighter, he had no Dexterity bonus at all (we're changing it so that only Dexterity affects attacks) and so only benefits from his inherent +1 bonus to all weapon attacks. The goblin on the other hand has Dexterity +1 by default, and gets another +1 due to size.
Fighter rolls to hit, gets a 19 and rolls 5. He beat the goblin’s AC so inflicts a full 5 damage. The goblin makes his DC 15 CON save and gets a 4. This is a failure by 11, so the goblin suffers 3 Wounds, meaning that he is Critically Wounded.
The goblin would normally attempt to flee, but let’s say he is cornered or something and so makes a desperate attack. He rolls a 19, which is increased to 21 due to his Attack Bonus, but is then reduced by 4 due to his injury to a 17.
His Damage Roll is a meager 2, reduced to 1 from Strength, which is absorbed by the fighter’s armor.
The fighter goes in for the kill, but rolls an 8. Even though the goblin is Critically Injured the fighter would still need to roll a 9 to hit, so his attack misses.
The goblin strikes back, rolling a total of 9: the fighter deftly evades the attack.
The fighter finally lands a blow with a 13, just barely under a 14 which would have avoided the goblin’s armor. He inflicts a total of 6 damage, and while the goblin rolls an 18, it is reduced to 14 due to his Injury penalty, failing his CON save by a few points.
The goblin is slain.
It should be noted that, were we using hit points the fight would have gone much the same, with the goblin being put into a Dying state after the first attack (in Dungeons & Delvers, you are still conscious while Dying, though you are penalized and take automatic damage every round until you fall unconscious).
Let’s have the fighter square off against a trio of goblins. These goblins won’t be using shields, which increases the damage of their spear attacks to a flat 1d6 (wielding a weapon in two hands adds +1 damage).
The fighter rolls a 13, striking a goblin for 8 damage. This is reduced to 6, so the goblin has to attempt a DC 16 CON save. It rolls an 11, and since this fails by 5 points the goblin suffers 2 Wounds. It now has an Injury penalty of -3.
The goblins retaliate.
The first one rolls a 21, enough to bypass the fighter’s armor. It inflicts 1 damage, however, which means the fighter has to attempt a meager CON save of 11. He rolls a total of 16, so no worries.
The Injured goblin strikes next. He gets an additional +1 to hit due to them Ganging Up on the fighter, with a total Attack Roll of 15. He rolls 2 damage and his attack is completely absorbed by the fighter’s armor.
The third goblin rolls a modified 20 (he got a +2 Ganging Up bonus) and strikes the fighter for 4 damage. This wouldn’t normally be too tough for the fighter to resist, but he only gets an 8 on his CON save, meaning he suffers 2 Wounds and is now saddled with an Injury penalty of -2.
The fighter gets an 8 on his Attack Roll, which would already be a miss even if he wasn’t saddled with an Injury penalty.
The Injured goblin attacks next. I figure this is the best strategy since he probably won’t do so hot, but surprises me with an 18 on his Attack Roll. This is reduced to 17, which is still more than enough to hit.
He only rolls 3 damage, meaning only 1 point goes through. The fighter manages to persevere with a 16 on his CON save.
The next goblin rolls an 11, just shy of the fighter’s modified Defense of 12.
The last goblin does even worse with a meager total of 8.
The fighter attacks the Injured goblin, rolling a 15 to hit and inflicting 7 damage. The goblin only gets an 11 on his CON save: he suffers 2 Wounds and is slain.
One goblin rolls a natural 1, and there will be critical failure rules but we won’t be using them for now. The last goblin also misses with a 7.
The fighter rolls a natural 1, and I begin to question the dice I am using.
The first goblin rolls a natural 4, so I now exchange dice.
The second goblin rolls a natural 6. Better, but not good enough.
The fighter rolls an 11, just enough to land a blow for a pitiable 4 damage. Three points get through, but the goblin shrugs it off with a 13 on his CON save.
I should note that this would have nearly been enough to knock the goblin into Dying, which would have further turned the tides in the fighter’s favor. I should also note that this is just one guy squaring off against three goblins.
Anyway.
Only one goblin lands a hit for a whopping-by-goblin standards 3 damage, but the fighter resists with a total of 16 on his CON save.
Fighter gets a modified 18 to hit with only 3 damage going through, but the goblin nat 1’s his CON save so suffers 4 Wounds and is instantly slain (a natural 1 deals +1 Wound).
This is where I would definitely make the last goblin flee, or at least make a Morale save, but let’s see if he can avenge his friends. He gets a 6, so probably not.
The fighter gets a 15 and deals 4 damage, which the goblin resists with a 16 CON save.
In response the goblins whiffs with another 6.
Finally a natural 20. Not sure if we’ll use the same critical hit tables, so I’ll just have the fighter inflict double damage. He gets a total of 14, meaning the goblin has to get a 24. He instead rolls a natural 1 and is utterly obliterated.
End result is that the fighter suffered 2 Wounds and I now just realized that we were going to give the class two Slightly Injured levels, which would have meant that he was only -1 to all of his stats instead of 2. Ah, well.
The fight technically took longer due to goblins resisting attacks here and there. I think all in all it only added another round or two, however.
The fighter would have also been more severely injured than normal (having lost something like 9 or so of his 12 hit points due to having a high CON), but he was able to resist a few attacks. But then he also would have been able to recover some Vitality Points here and there throughout the day, and on top of that wouldn’t have a -1 to his attacks and Defense.
Of course, this is only an issue if you don’t want these sorts of penalties at all. I know many players like grittier and/or swingier games.
It didn’t feel much more complicated than normal. With Wound and Vitality Points, you roll to hit, inflict damage, reduce DR (if any), and then apply it to Wound and/or Vitality Points as needed. With Wound Levels you roll to hit, roll damage, reduce DR (if any), make a CON save, and then from that determine how many Wounds are suffered.
Injury penalties would add another layer of math, however, as you’d need to subtract it from everything you’re doing and I could see players and GMs forgetting to do that now and then. It could also get more complicated if you have a cleric capable of healing.
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