Great White Games/Pinnacle Entertainment Group

[Clint]

Just because I took someone's blog post as a personal challenge.

Player-Facing means the players make the combat rolls in the game where the GM just sets the target and goes (mostly) dice-free.

In SW, this would mean that players attack as normal, but they no longer have a Parry or Toughness value. Instead, NPCs have an Attack (Melee/Range) and Damage ratings against which PCs roll Defense and Resistance rolls. Modifiers to Parry and Toughness are now applied as bonuses or penalties to the appropriate rolls.

When an NPC attacks a player, the player rolls their Defense against the appropriate Attack Value; Fighting vs. Melee and Agility vs. Range.

Critical Failure - Roll Vigor at -4 vs. Damage
Failure - Roll Vigor vs. Damage
Success - Roll Vigor at +4 vs. Damage
Raise - Avoid the attack entirely

When rolling Resistance (Vigor vs. Damage) the effects are...

Raise - No effect
Success - Shaken
Failure - 1 wound
Every 4 points less = +1 wound
Critical Failure = Incapacitation

Figuring Attack and Damage values...

Attack (Melee) = 2 + Fighting/2 (+2 for Wild Cards)
Attack (Range) = 2 + Shooting or Throwing/2 (+2 for Wild Cards)

Damage = Total dice of attack/2
[Ex. 3d6 = (3x6)/2 and thus Damage: 9]

Modifiers: Flat modifiers apply to Attack and Damage normally. For instance, a group of 3 Extras with an Attack (Melee) of 6 with Gang Up would have +2 for an Attack of 8. Or a Double Tap would increase Attack (Ranged) and Damage for that attack by +1.

Other Changes: A benny can still be spent to automatically remove a Shaken, but there are no more Soak rolls since the Vigor roll vs. Damage already fills that effect and a benny could be spent to reroll there.

The Full Defense manuever is also unneeded since that effect is also standard.

In the standard, Heroic game, Resistance rolls are unique because wound penalties do not apply to them (decreasing the death spiral effect), but in a Gritty game, the GM might have them applied (the GM may also rule that Hard to Kill allows a character to ignore wound penalties for Resistance rolls).

GM bennies now work as Bizarro-Bennies; the GM can spend them to remove a Shaken as normal or to force a player to reroll a Trait roll and take the worse result. A player may spend a benny of their own to counter a Bizarro-Benny spent by the GM to force them to reroll (Common Bond allows spending bennies for others as listed).


So to give an example of an NPC from the core rulebook, an Ogre might have the combat stats...

Ogre
Attack (Melee): 6
Damage (Club): 13
Parry: 6
Toughness: 11 (1)

For opposed rolls, the GM uses the same formula for Attack with the appropriate Trait to determine the TN. For instance, if an Extra has an Agility of d6 and a character wants to interrupt them, they have to roll against a 5. If it was a Wild Card, it would be an 7.
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Clint Black
Savage Worlds Core Rules Brand Manager

www.peginc.com

[Ron Blessing]

If I were played by George C. Scott, I might say, "Clint, you magnificent bastard!"

I may need to test this out soon.
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Ron Blessing
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[skylion]

I'm setting about to bring Rocketship Empires 1936 to SW, and this looks like a great way to do some seriously crazy pulp style combat. Gonna see if the players will groove on it.
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[J Gregory]

Am I reading this wrong, or does this take away the possibility for enemies to get one-hit-kills via acing damage rolls? Does it take the possible benefits of acing away from the attacker and give them to the defender (acing defense rolls)?

Interesting idea - I just want to be clear.
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the cake is a lie

[Enno]

Nice idea. But looks to me as it slows the process of combat dramatically down, because all rolls are resistance rolls now, and none is against flat values as before.

Nice idea to think about, but purely academical.
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There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who know binary and those who don't.

[Clint]

[Enno]

Which has to be rolled out before. It has to be rolled each round, and each attack? Not against Parry or TN 4 as in the core rules.

But maybe i didn't understood your mechanics correctly...
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There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who know binary and those who don't.

[Clint]

[The Angle]

As something to play, I don't think I'd enjoy it as either a player or a GM. As an exercise in game design, however, I say "well done."

Steve
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"When choosing between two evils, I always pick the one I haven't tried before." -- Mae West

[skylion]

Wait....I don't have to roll dice?

When did rolling dice become something anyone would ever want to get rid off?

Not rolling dice?

My head is currently exploding. [/i]
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[Clint]

[Chezzo]

But, what happens when a player attacks an NPC? Is it just like it is now?

If it isn't, the GM has to roll the same Defense and Resistance rolls.

If it is, the GM still has to roll to soak and roll on the incapacitation table - which granted, only happen if an NPC gets wounded.

Unless there is something I am totally missing.

[Clint]

[curiousParticle]

Thank you very much Clint.

I think this is a great idea. I was trying to put something together myself, but did not have enough experience with the system. It is strange that people are being so resistant to it. My goal as a GM is off load as much work as possible to the players, which this helps. Also this makes it much more fun for the players, who rather than having to sit there and wait while the GM rolls their fate, get the rolls placed back in there lap.

Many systems, like GURPS have defense rolls already, but I always felt that there was no need to have both the GM and players roll as GURPS does. Aren't the dice just there to simulate luck? Though both the attacker and the defender are testing their luck in an attack, it always felt to me that you could just simulate that as one roll, as savage worlds does it. And as you have shown, you can give all of those rolls to the character, thus increase the players enjoyment and their sense of agency.

I think this is a brilliant idea and I wonder if anyone has actually used it and what their thoughts are on it. I for one will be using it and will try to post my thoughts after using it for several sessions.

Thanks Clint.

[Snate56]

We're resistant to it precisly because we are familiar with the system.

Great idea, but I like rolling dice.



SteveN
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"We've got a blind date with destiny... and it looks like she's ordered the lobster." <The Shoveller>

[Zadmar]

I really like this idea - I probably wouldn't use it for Wild Cards, but it'd be interesting to try it for Extras. The number of rolls may be the same, but (as GM) I find one of the things that bogs down large combats is that I'm frequently switching between dice as I roll for different groups of opponents.

With this approach I could write out some cards for each NPC with their TNs on it, and just hand them out as players get attacked - allowing each player to simultaneously resolve (and describe) attacks made against them for the round, using their own fighting dice.

Shooting is normally against a TN of 4, so I assume players would always roll a d6 to avoid being hit by gunfire?

As an aside, this would also be superb for people running GMless games, as players wouldn't need to "roll for the bad guys" - everyone would just be rolling for themselves.

[Snate56]

Yeah, I saw the GMless possibility too. But another thing I was thinking is the players are "stuck" with the roll, for better or worse. Now I know most of us (GMs) roll openly anyway, but it does preclude any fudging the GM might want to insert. (Perhaps to save the party's lives? )


SteveN
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"We've got a blind date with destiny... and it looks like she's ordered the lobster." <The Shoveller>

[curiousParticle]

I think that most of my goal is exactly the idea that I like rolling dice. But as a GM, I get to roll many more times than your average player. Often I am rolling as often as each player combined, (for combat), then plus all of the other rolls behind the screen. But my players like rolling dice too. I like this idea because it balances the dice rolling a bit.

But, as pointed out,