Damage (Action)

Heroic Action Role-Play

Damage in Action is cinematic; heroes can take vast amounts of damage while others collapse from a single punch. The size of the weapon matters much less than the hand that wields it.

Damage

An attack has an Outcome and a damage value. Add the outcome to the damage value, this is the final damage inflicted. Compare this to the target's soak attribute, most commonly Toughness, but different Damage Types use different soak attributes, and some powers use special rules.

Soak Attribute: If final damage is equal to or greater than the soak attribute, the target takes a Hit.

Critical Damage Threshold: If final damage is equal to or greater than the sum of Body, Mind, and Reflexes the target also suffers a Damage Setback.

In special cases the soak attribute might be greater than the targets critical damage threshold, but this should be very rare. In these cases, setbacks should not generally involve hits or wounds but indirect effects such as losing your balance.

Hits

Damage is measured in hits. Each attack that does any damage inflicts one hit. The number of hits you can take before serious injury is determined by your Role. Only when you have taken this much damage do you actually suffer any actual injury.

Role	Hits	Fortune
Hero/Villain	Body*	Mind*
Henchman	3	3
Victim/Minion	1	0

• A Hero/Villain always has at least 3 Hits and 3 Fortune points.

Hits disappear once the scene is over. You brush yourself off, wipe your brow, and examine yourself for damage, finding that what looked like serious injury was only superficial bruises. Sometimes, a scene will be a series of fights in sequence, if a rule is needed for how long a scene is it should generally not be more than 15 minutes. More permanent damage is taken as Wounds; more on those below.

In most campaigns the player characters are heroes, with hits equal to their full Body, but if a grittier game is required they can be extras or even victims.

Damage Setbacks

Some attacks are severe enough to cause additional effects. If the attack roll was a critical success or the attack inflicted enough damage there is a damage setback in addition to the Hit. A damage setback works much like a normal Setback, but the creature taking the setback has more of a say in what it is; it is more dramatically appropriate that the player describes the effects of injuries than that the game master does so, tough the GM must approve all suggested damage setbacks.

Wounds

A character who falls to zero hits is generally out of the action and starts taking wounds. 'The attack that knocks you out inflicts one wound for every five points of damage beyond your soak attribute. If you take less than five excess damage, there is no wound. Wounds are similar to hits but have additional effects.

• Wounds are combined with hits to see if you can stay in the action; in effect, each wound is also a Hit.
• Wounds last; you need proper rest to recover from wounds, generally at the end of an adventure.
• You suffer Impairment equal to the number of wounds you have taken until you receive medical attention. Anyone can bind wounds in a minute or so; doing it in the heat of the action requires First Aid.
• Depending on how many wounds you have taken, you suffer various degrees of injury. These specific injuries only apply at the end of a fight; during the fight only impairments apply.

When a character loses their last hit, check the Injury Table to see how bad it is. Depending on the number of wounds taken, this might be a simple knock-out or more serious injury.

Many finishing moves prevent wounds, inflicting some other effect instead.

Wounds	Injury
0	Knockout; You are out of action for 10 minutes, unable to do more than quietly lie still or slowly crawl about and cry pitifully. This only happens if you are out of hits; a character that is wounded but still has hits remaining is not knocked out.
1	Knockout + Bleeding; you need medical attention. Every minute make a Body roll difficulty 10; on a failure, you take an additional wound from bleeding. Once you make this roll you have stabilized. Another character can use first aid and substitute their Know skill for your body attribute, this is a full-time task once begun and until the patient stabilizes. Bleeding can cause death and impairment, but not other injuries.
2	Knockout + Dis-armed; an arm is mauled and useless. You cannot use both hands at once or Knockout + Hobbled; You cannot move when you take a basic action. If you take the Full Move action, you move at normal speed instead of double speed.
3	Knockout + Crippled; This is a permanent injury. Even if you survive, you will be crippled in some way; a good reason to use prosthesis, cybernetics, or that rare-to-find healing magic or special surgeon. Perhaps you have a lingering injury that will cause death in a year unless treated. Permanent effects of maiming can be used as an adventure hook or to motivate new schticks and flaws, which give points normally. Use this as a hook for adventures and character development, not as a way to destroy a character. Alternatively, you end up in a Coma and are out of the action for an extended period (like a Curse, but you will eventually recover fully.
4 or more	Dead. There is a point of no return in every heroic career, and this is it.

Healing

Except for Crippled, all damage is temporary. Hits disappear at the end of the fight or action scene. Wounds only give impairments in the fight when you receive them or until you get medical attention. Other injury effects require recuperation, which takes at least a few days and generally happens between adventures. The GM might make a short montage in a hospital or the character might just lie low for a while depending on the needs of the story. As noted under crippled, the permanent effects are to be used more as plot devices than character punishments.