The controversial world of SUBDUAL DAMAGE

[Sicktabou]

Hello all...

I just want to get the subdual rules clarified a little...

1) Subdual is no different then lethal for STANDARD characters. So no different damage track and no different effects on character (chance to get fatigue and all)

Only thing is that when you drop a standard NPC with subdual, he is unconscious...not dead.


2) When attacking an NPC with some subdual defiance/immunity, do that immunity apply only if the NPC is SPECIAL? Or does it also apply to STANDARD character?

For example, what happen to a character using a  maul on a standard skeleton (undead...immune to subdual) ? No damage whatsoever?


3) Using SUB, is it possible to knock a SPECIAL unconscious with a single blow? If I read carefuly the rules, after each source of damage you roll your Fortitude. On a miss the special NPC gains a fatigue level. After the 5th fatigue, the Special NPC is unconscious.

So even if you hit the target with a HUGE amount of sub (25+ damage, or even 50+), all you can hope to do is a single level of fatigue?


4) What happens when your subdual attack is supplementd by some sneak attack?


5) Hammer Mastery grants 2x damage when attacking objects. But subdual damage does not affect objects. Is this an exception? Or does it simply mean that by converting the hammer's damage from subdual to lethal to attack an object, the character essentially do normal damage (but still suffer de -4 to hit for damage conversion). A little lame? Especially for a master degree feat?



As usual, thanks for the help!

[Mister Andersen]

Just give skeletons Achilles Heel (Subdual)

[meadicus]

Hello all...

I just want to get the subdual rules clarified a little...

Evening, let's see

1) Subdual is no different then lethal for STANDARD characters. So no different damage track and no different effects on character (chance to get fatigue and all)

Only thing is that when you drop a standard NPC with subdual, he is unconscious...not dead.

Correct.

2) When attacking an NPC with some subdual defiance/immunity, do that immunity apply only if the NPC is SPECIAL? Or does it also apply to STANDARD character?

For example, what happen to a character using a  maul on a standard skeleton (undead...immune to subdual) ? No damage whatsoever?

This is as I understand it. Subual weapons are useless against undead.

3) Using SUB, is it possible to knock a SPECIAL unconscious with a single blow? If I read carefuly the rules, after each source of damage you roll your Fortitude. On a miss the special NPC gains a fatigue level. After the 5th fatigue, the Special NPC is unconscious.

So even if you hit the target with a HUGE amount of sub (25+ damage, or even 50+), all you can hope to do is a single level of fatigue?

On a crit you can stun them, which opens them up for a coup-de-grace

4) What happens when your subdual attack is supplementd by some sneak attack?

The bonus damage from sneak attack is always the same type of damage as the attack it is adding to.

Hope that helps, and that I'm right.

[Psion]

Just give skeletons Achilles Heel (Subdual)

Yep.

[Monkeyking]

Subdual doing no damage to Skeletons makes no sense.

I still hold that most blunt weapons doing subdual damage doesnt make a whole lot of sense. People/things can be killed with blunt force trauma, it happens a lot.

Really, if you hold even remotely close to fantasy tropes, all blunt weapons should inflict normal/lethal/killy (whatever you want to call it) damage to skeletal creatures. Especially if they ger DR to edged and immunity to bows...

Which, yeah is essentially achilles heel - subdual

[paddyfool]

I still hold that most blunt weapons doing subdual damage doesnt make a whole lot of sense. People/things can be killed with blunt force trauma, it happens a lot.

Agreed.  Saps and shields should definitely be subdual, sais, tonfas, bullwhips etc. maybe, but clubs, hammers and flails really fit better as lethal, imho.

[Nova]

The bonus damage from sneak attack is always the same type of damage as the attack it is adding to.

One little addition though: Its still "sneak damage" for purposes of what's immune/resistant/vulnerable to sneak damage.

What sneak DOES go through, is added to the attack's damage as that type.

So 10 fire and 10 sneak, vs a target with 12 sneak resist takes 10 fire damage (not 8, not 20). One with 5 resist to sneak would take 15 fire damage. One with vulnerability to sneak would take 30 fire damage, and so on. Its fire once you've taken care of Resists/immunities concerning sneak, like for purposes of "is he on fire now". Or so goes my understanding.


On question 5) I think you have to convert to lethal, but deal double instead of half. Still take the - to hit though. At least that's how I'd judge it for my game.

[Blankbeard]

Hello all...

I just want to get the subdual rules clarified a little...

1) Subdual is no different then lethal for STANDARD characters. So no different damage track and no different effects on character (chance to get fatigue and all)

Only thing is that when you drop a standard NPC with subdual, he is unconscious...not dead.


2) When attacking an NPC with some subdual defiance/immunity, do that immunity apply only if the NPC is SPECIAL? Or does it also apply to STANDARD character?

For example, what happen to a character using a  maul on a standard skeleton (undead...immune to subdual) ? No damage whatsoever?

RAW, yes, unless you take the -4 and convert to lethal.  As a house rule, you might consider making hammers able to convert to lethal with only the -4.

3) Using SUB, is it possible to knock a SPECIAL unconscious with a single blow? If I read carefuly the rules, after each source of damage you roll your Fortitude. On a miss the special NPC gains a fatigue level. After the 5th fatigue, the Special NPC is unconscious.

So even if you hit the target with a HUGE amount of sub (25+ damage, or even 50+), all you can hope to do is a single level of fatigue?

In the supplement Fragile Minds, there was the stress damage equivalent of the Table of Ouch, the Table of Sproing.  Hopefully, we'll see a Table of Ooof too.  The by the book situation you want is a Terminal Situation where you can spend an action die to knock out a special character.  Otherwise, special characters are supposed to be as resistant as PC's and they normally don't get knocked out by one hit.

I would suggest that Massive Damage should apply, save or go unconscious but that's a house rule too.

4) What happens when your subdual attack is supplementd by some sneak attack?


5) Hammer Mastery grants 2x damage when attacking objects. But subdual damage does not affect objects. Is this an exception? Or does it simply mean that by converting the hammer's damage from subdual to lethal to attack an object, the character essentially do normal damage (but still suffer de -4 to hit for damage conversion). A little lame? Especially for a master degree feat?



As usual, thanks for the help!

My interpretation is that Hammer Mastery overrides standard subdual damage and lets you affect objects and scenery with the hammer, no conversion required.  Constructs, of course, are not objects so it doesn't help there.

How about this for a quality based on excrutiating?
traumatic: An opponent struck by this weapon also suffers half as much subdual damage after DR and resistances are applied.

and convert at least the larger hammers to lethal with this quality.

[Deral]

3) Using SUB, is it possible to knock a SPECIAL unconscious with a single blow? If I read carefuly the rules, after each source of damage you roll your Fortitude. On a miss the special NPC gains a fatigue level. After the 5th fatigue, the Special NPC is unconscious.

So even if you hit the target with a HUGE amount of sub (25+ damage, or even 50+), all you can hope to do is a single level of fatigue?

In the supplement Fragile Minds, there was the stress damage equivalent of the Table of Ouch, the Table of Sproing.  Hopefully, we'll see a Table of Ooof too.  The by the book situation you want is a Terminal Situation where you can spend an action die to knock out a special character.  Otherwise, special characters are supposed to be as resistant as PC's and they normally don't get knocked out by one hit.

I would suggest that Massive Damage should apply, save or go unconscious but that's a house rule too.

Also, you should check out the errata'd Pummel, put together and updated for exactly this purpose so far as I can tell.

[Crafty_Alex]

3) Using SUB, is it possible to knock a SPECIAL unconscious with a single blow? If I read carefuly the rules, after each source of damage you roll your Fortitude. On a miss the special NPC gains a fatigue level. After the 5th fatigue, the Special NPC is unconscious.

So even if you hit the target with a HUGE amount of sub (25+ damage, or even 50+), all you can hope to do is a single level of fatigue?

In the supplement Fragile Minds, there was the stress damage equivalent of the Table of Ouch, the Table of Sproing.  Hopefully, we'll see a Table of Ooof too.  The by the book situation you want is a Terminal Situation where you can spend an action die to knock out a special character.  Otherwise, special characters are supposed to be as resistant as PC's and they normally don't get knocked out by one hit.

The reason we don't have instant knockouts on specials is twofold.

1) A PC is ALSO a special character - do you want your characters getting one shotted? After all, what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

2) Subdual actually never loses effectiveness - getting MORE effective later in the game. When a character has, say, 200 vitality, subdual still tracks pretty much the same...it just takes a little longer to wear him down (cause the character will generally have higher Fort saves later in his career). So even worse, do you want HIGH LEVEL PCs getting one shotted?

3) We have a new situation post errata that allows for vastly quicker knockouts, using the Pummel action:

Pummel has a special application outside combat. The subdual damage from the first — and only the first — Pummel action against each character made out of combat in each scene is applied normally, except that the target suffers 1 grade of fatigued per 5 by which he fails this save (see page 211).

That means you can sneak up behind a special and batter the crap out of him (remember - Pummel does triple unarmed damage) and with some luck, he'll go down. So there's that.

Massive Damage and Table of Ouch already apply to subdual (yes, clubs can also break bones), and you can per the RAW use the Terminal Situation rule if you wish. But Pummel's revision makes it easier. Pat and I talked long and hard about how far we should go, and this was pretty much our limit - the extreme end is 2.0's Subdual system, where one bad save could spell the end of a character incredibly quickly...and we don't think special characters should be chumped like that. Even if you don't knock someone out in one hit, fatigued causes a "death spiral" where even a single grade significantly affects the target's chances of survival, and fatigued also takes a long time to burn off. Since the rules apply to everyone equally, this is what we think is fair.

EDIT: Fixed quote tags

[Deral]

This is another one of those times when I've always just assumed something worked some way, but rereading makes me question my stance- when you pummel, is sneak attack damage tripled or is it added in after the tripling?

[Bill Whitmore]

This is another one of those times when I've always just assumed something worked some way, but rereading makes me question my stance- when you pummel, is sneak attack damage tripled or is it added in after the tripling?

Sneak attack dice, or any other added dice, are added after the tripling.

From page Fantasy Craft Second Printing, pg 206, under THE DAMAGE ROLL:  Occasionally, bonuses or multipliers may apply to a character’s damage. When 1 or more bonuses and multipliers apply to the same damage total, flat bonuses are applied before multipliers while variable bonuses — i.e. all rolled bonuses — are applied after.

[Deral]

This is another one of those times when I've always just assumed something worked some way, but rereading makes me question my stance- when you pummel, is sneak attack damage tripled or is it added in after the tripling?

Sneak attack dice, or any other added dice, are added after the tripling.

From page Fantasy Craft Second Printing, pg 206, under THE DAMAGE ROLL:  Occasionally, bonuses or multipliers may apply to a character’s damage. When 1 or more bonuses and multipliers apply to the same damage total, flat bonuses are applied before multipliers while variable bonuses — i.e. all rolled bonuses — are applied after.

That's what I thought originally, yet for whatever reason I couldn't find the text to back up why I thought that way- thanks.

[Wizard]

My interpretation is that Hammer Mastery overrides standard subdual damage and lets you affect objects and scenery with the hammer, no conversion required.  Constructs, of course, are not objects so it doesn't help there.

Take a look at Club Basics and it allows the conversion of subdual to lethal with no penalty. Now compare a piece of evenly balanced wood against a chunk of metal at the end of a long handle. If a club can dish out lethal than a hammer is way more capable. In my games when using a hammer that has default subdual damage it can be changed to lethal at no penalty.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

I have to say it does seem better served if the game instead of assigning some weapons automatic subdual damage had instead a quality for non-penalized conversion.