Hazards (IB)

A compilation of common consequences and hazards.

Harm

This consequence represents long-lasting debility — or death.

Level	Description	Example	Penalty
6+	Disintegrated	Cut to pieces	Instant death
5	Dismembered	Lost leg	Need help within 1 minute
4	Fatal	Macerated leg	Need help within 1 hour
3	Severe	Shattered leg	Need help within 24 hours
2	Moderate	Wounded leg	−1d
1	Lesser	Drained, Battered	Reduced Effect

Further Harm Examples

Disintegrated (Level 6): Flattened, Cut Into Pieces, Brain Dead.
Dismembered (Level 5): Lost Limb, Crushed Torso, Coma.
Fatal (Level 4): Electrocuted, Drowned, Mauled limb, Catatonic.
Severe (Level 3): Impaled, Broken Leg, Punctured Chest, Badly Burned, Terrified.
Moderate (Level 2): Exhausted, Deep Cut to Arm, Concussion, Panicked, Seduced.
Lesser (Level 1): Battered, Drained, Distracted, Scared, Confused.

Harm such as Drained or Exhausted is a good fallback consequence when nothing else is immediately threatening — for example, after spending all night Studying old books in search of a foe’s weakness.

Tracking Harm

When you suffer Harm, record the specific injury on your character sheet at the level of Harm you suffer. See the harm tracker and examples below.

Your character suffers the penalty listed for a row if any Harm recorded in that row applies to the current situation. For example, if you have Tired as Lesser Harm, you suffer reduced Effect when trying to run.

When you are affected by Severe Harm (Level 3) or worse, your character is incapacitated and cannot act unless you receive help from another character or Push yourself to act. You still get the normal benefits of Pushing; desperate action has its rewards.

If you need to mark Harm but the appropriate row is already full, the Harm moves up to the next row:

If you suffer Moderate Harm but the Level 2 row is full, it becomes Severe Harm.
If you suffer Harm that must be recorded in the bottom row and there is no space, your character immediately dies.

Harm Track

Level	Harm Boxes		Penalty
5			Need help within 1 minute
4			Need help within 1 hour
3			Need help within 24 hours
2			−1d
1			Reduced Effect

Level 6 harm is not on the character sheet as it is instantly fatal.

Example

This example character has three Harm: Drained and Battered (both Level 1) plus Shattered Right Leg and Head Trauma (both Level 3). If they suffer another Level 1 Harm, it moves up to Level 2. If they suffer another Level 3 Harm, it moves up to Level 4: Fatal. If they suffer Level 1 Harm three times, it will fill both Moderate Harm boxes and a level 4 box, Fatal.

Level	Harm Boxes		Penalty
4			Need help within 1 hour
3	Shattered leg	Head trauma	Need help within 24 hours
2			−1d
1	Drained	Battered	Reduced Effect

First Aid

Harm of level 3 or more requires help to survive. Medbots can handle this automatically, otherwise it requires basic medical kits and training.

Recovering Harm

At the end of an operation, all Harm is reduced by one level of severity. Further recovery is done using the Heal downtime activity. There are also special methods, notably the Philosopher's Medicine ability and the Praxic's Surgeon ability.

Degrav

Degrav is the slow physical degradation caused by prolonged exposure to reduced gravity. It does not occur during missions, but during downtime when a character lacks sustained access to exercise under Terran gravity conditions. Degrav represents muscle loss, bone density reduction, cardiovascular weakening, and impaired balance.

Degrav is resolved at the start of each period (month) of downtime.

Degrav Rolls

When a character resides in reduced gravity, make a Degrav roll based on the environment.

Microgravity Make a Micro roll. 1–5: Take Level 1 Micro Degrav Harm. 6: No Harm.

Lunar Gravity Make a Lunar roll. 1–3: Take Level 1 Lunar Degrav Harm. 4–6: No Harm.

If dissatisfied with the result, you may spend a Downtime Action to reroll.

Degrav Harm

Degrav Harm uses normal Harm boxes and counts as Harm for all purposes. Each instance of Degrav Harm is named after the gravity level that caused it (e.g. Micro, Lunar).

Degrav Harm only imposes penalties when acting in gravity heavier than the environment that caused it: Lunar Harm applies penalties only in Terran gravity. Micro Harm applies penalties in Lunar and Terran gravity.

Even when not imposing penalties, Degrav Harm still occupies Harm slots, increasing vulnerability to other Harm.

Healing Degrav

Degrav Harm can only be healed in an environment with one level higher gravity than the Harm’s origin: Micro Degrav can heal in Lunar or Terran gravity. Lunar Degrav can heal only in Terran gravity.

Permanent Degrav

A character may choose to accept permanent Degrav, becoming adapted to a lower gravity.

When you do so, remove all Degrav Harm of that gravity level and lighter. However: When acting in higher gravity, you suffer Reduced Effect on all Actions. If adapted to Microgravity, you are incapacitated in Terran gravity; you must Push to take any action.

Permanent Degrav can be recovered in a hospital with a 12 tick clock. Recovering from permanent Degrav is staged; characters must adapt upward one gravity band at a time. Adaptation to Lunar gravity uses Lunar rolls in Terran gravity and removes all gravity adaptation. Adaptation to Micro gravity uses Micro rolls in Lunar gravity and changes the adaptation to Lunar. During terapy you still suffer the disadvantage of adaptation but are vulnerable to degrav damage.

Degrav Table

Gravity	Degrav Roll	Harm	Applies In	Incapacitates In	Can Heal	Can Restore Permanent
Terran	—	—	—	—	Any	Lunar
Lunar	Lunar 4–6	Lunar	Micro	—	Micro	Micro
Micro	Micro 6	Micro	Terran, Lunar	Terran	—	—

Radiation

Radiation represents cumulative, invisible harm caused by exposure to charged particles, neutrons, gamma rays, and secondary showers. Unlike Harm, it often manifests late and escalates over time. Radiation is mission-defining and may itself be sufficient opposition in a low-tier mission.

Exposure

Radiation exposure occurs when characters operate:

Near the Sun, solar flares, or Solar Alchemy remnants.
In space around gas giants; hazardous zones grow with the planet’s size.
Around degraded reactor shielding, isotope work, or breached containment.
Under sustained beam, flare, or particle storm conditions.
From certain weapons of mass destruction.

Exposure is rated by Intensity (Low, Moderate, Severe) and Duration (Momentary, Prolonged, Chronic). It is usually predictable, though radiation from the Sun gives very little advance warning in Mercury’s orbital zone.

Radiation Intensity Benchmarks

1 tick — Moderate Weak solar storms, degraded reactor shielding, isotope work

2 ticks — Dangerous Strong solar storms, inner Saturn radiation belts, D–D fusion coolant breach

3 ticks — Severe Jovian radiation belts, close major solar flare exposure, D–T fusion coolant breach

5 ticks — Extreme Inner Jovian belts, major solar flare at Mercury perihelion, reactor core breach

8 ticks — Catastrophic Solar Alchemy catastrophe, weaponized radiation (outside primary blast zone)

13 ticks — Apocalyptic Dedalus-scale failures, unsurvivable plot-scale radiation events

Unprotected characters continue to mark radiation ticks as long as the radiation source remains active.

Personal protective gear can reduce radiation by 1 tick; shutters and shielding may reduce ticks by 1 or more. Water is an especially effective barrier to radiation, but any solid, dense mass provides some protection. Radiation shielding has steep diminishing returns: each additional point of tick reduction requires roughly an order of magnitude (ten times) more mass than the last. Thin shielding helps briefly; deep shielding is effective but quickly becomes impractical. Aegis systems operate on the same scale. Personal Aegis shields reduce radiation by 1 tick, while vehicle-mounted systems can reduce up to 3 ticks, roughly equivalent to a meter of water shielding.

Radiation scenes usually involve characters moving from cover to cover. Starting behind a water tank or other solid barrier, characters must leave cover to act — whether fighting, rescuing victims, or salvaging an objective. In such situations, radiation ticks are an additional consequence of each action, sometimes the only consequence. Likewise, vehicles can hide behind asteroids or terrain but must expose themselves in order to act.

When the Radiation Track fills, start a new track with any overflow and keep count of the number of filled clocks (a second 8-tick clock works well). If the third or later clock fills, also apply immediate Level 1 Harm each time a clock is completed; this stacks normally with existing Harm. Typical effects include fatigue, nausea, headaches, bleeding, burns, and confusion.

The more insidious effects are long-term. After the Operation is completed, the target suffers Harm at a level equal to the number of Radiation Clocks filled. This Harm may be resisted using Prowess, reducing its level by 2. High-level radiation damage includes effects such as bone marrow failure, cancer, neurological deterioration, immune system collapse, and genetic damage—often lasting or permanent rather than immediately lethal.

Electronics Degradation

When a character or vehicle has accumulated three or more full Radiation Clocks, all equipment and vehicles is treated as Unreliable while in the irradiated environment.

Resistance

Radiation ticks are Consequences; each may be resisted, reducing the ticks suffered by 2. This is separate from resisting any other Consequences.

Long-term radiation Harm may also be resisted using Prowess, reducing the level of Harm by 2.

Oxygen Depletion

Oxygen depletion represents the loss of breathable air due to poor ventilation, life-support failure, fire, smoke, toxic gases, or enclosure.

Oxygen hazards are resolved using a shared Air Clock and individual Asphyxiation Harm.

Air Clock

Each enclosed space has a shared Air Clock representing worsening air quality. The size of the clock depends on the volume of available air and is shared between everyone present.

Environmental Suit — 1 tick

Very Cramped (economy) — 2 ticks per person present

Cramped (cockpit) — 3 ticks per person

Small (workstation) — 6 ticks per person

Comfortable (cabin) — 8 ticks per person

Roomy (communal space) — 12 ticks per person

Air volume depends on what the area is designed for. A cockpit designed for four people has 12 ticks of air, even if only two people are present.

Ticking the Clock

Exertion consumes air. Each Action roll adds an additional Consequence: 1 tick on the Air Clock.

In addition, every 15 minutes of exposure, each character in the area must roll Micro, Lunar, or Terran (as appropriate to the environment), with the Consequence of 1 tick on the Air Clock.

Filling the Clock

When the Air Clock is filled, everyone suffers Level 1 Asphyxiation Harm (resistible with Prowess), and the clock resets.

The first filled Air Clock represents degraded but manageable air. Only subsequent clocks represent actively dangerous conditions.

Once the first Air Clock has been filled, the situation grows more dire: failing (1–3) any roll inflicts Level 1 Asphyxiation Harm as an additional Consequence.

Asphyxiation Harm

Asphyxiation Harm fills Harm boxes like any other Harm but is special in that it fades quickly with access to oxygen.

With a few minutes of fresh air, all Asphyxiation Harm is reduced by one level. Level 1 Asphyxiation Harm fades completely. Any Asphyxiation Harm that remains is converted into permanent injury appropriate to hypoxia, such as Cognitive, Respiratory, Cardiovascular, or Neurological Harm.

Converted Harm is treated as normal Harm and must be healed normally.

Notes

A sleeping character does not need to make the periodic Micro, Lunar, or Terran rolls and instead consumes air at a steady rate, marking 1 tick on the Air Clock every 30 minutes. Sleeping in these conditions usually requires nursing or medication.

Environments in space are routinely fitted with independent CO₂ scrubbers that continue to function when life support fails. As a result, oxygen depletion is usually the primary atmospheric hazard. If CO₂ scrubbers are lacking or disabled, halve the size of the Air Clock.

Fire

Fire represents uncontrolled combustion within a ship or habitat. In enclosed environments, fire is primarily a systems hazard: it consumes oxygen, produces smoke and toxins, and forces automated and manual safety responses that often create secondary dangers.

Fire does not have its own clock. Instead, its effects are expressed through consequences that interact with Oxygen Depletion and other hazards.

Fire Severity and Position

Firefighting uses Position as normal:

Controlled — Small, contained fire.
Risky — Active fire threatening systems or spreading.
Desperate — Conflagration, multiple ignition points, or structural involvement.

Automated Suppression

When a fire is detected, the ship’s automated systems respond immediately, usually while the fire is in a Controlled position.

The initial attempt to suppress a fire is resolved with a Tier roll for the ship or installation:

6 — Fire is cleanly reduced by one category.
4–5 — Fire is reduced by one category with a consequence.
1–3 — A consequence occurs and the fire escalates, worsening its Position. If already Desperate, a new fire at Risky position ignites nearby.

Automated Suppression makes an additional attempt to control the fire every 15 minutes. This interval also represents the natural spread and intensification of the fire if it is not contained.

A character able to direct automated suppression systems may add their Helm or Interface to the system’s roll. Taking control requires access to ship systems and may itself be a difficult or dangerous task.

Manual Firefighting

If the fire persists, characters may intervene directly.

Manual firefighting is a Mark or Rig roll and follows normal Position and Effect rules:

Limited Effect — Rescue someone or something threatened by the fire, or protect a specific installation.
Standard Effect — Reduce a Controlled or Risky fire by one category.
Great Effect — Reduce any fire by one category.

Effect normally starts at Limited when using hand-carried equipment. Heavier gear allows Standard effect; Great effect requires a full damage-control apparatus. Trading Position for effect may involve venting compartments, using explosives, or taking severe personal risk.

Unlike Automated Suppression, failed manual firefighting does not inherently worsen the fire’s future Position unless the fiction demands it.

Consequences

Common consequences of fire, in escalating order of severity, include:

Strong drafts feeding the fire.
Compartment isolation and fire doors sealing.
Local life-support shutdown.
Suppressant release (foam, inert gas, CO₂, etc.).
Oxygen depletion.
Reduced visibility and toxic atmosphere.
System failures requiring later repair.
Explosion.
Local structural collapse.
Active life-support spreads the fire.

Firefighters rarely take direct damage unless they take exceptional risks.

A fire rapidly worsens air quality. Firefighting consequences commonly create or worsen an Oxygen Depletion hazard by:

Shutting down or contaminating life-support systems.
Shrinking the Air Clock through compartment sealing.
Filling an Air Clock, which may also reduce fire intensity as oxygen is exhausted.