Toughness

[Thirsty Viking]

I found this an amazing post,  I'm glad someone actually brought up the amount of SA's  needed to to achieve a TO of 10.

On a Different note, I NEVER saw TO 10  as a problem.  Pro wrestling aside..   lets look at boxers... no not mike tyson,  back a bit further...  did anyone ever see the hagler/hearns fight?  The damage those two did to each other was incredible...  the fact that they made into the third round is a huge statement about toughness.

When I was at West Point we had the privledge of getting a lecture from a Medal of Honor Winner.  In Vietnam  this man had been shot 4 times in the torso while fighting a retreat against many enemy.  He was captured after he ran out of ammo, because they followed the blood trail of the sergent he was dragging into the bushes to hide.  After 9 months in a prison camp he became IIRC  the Only officer to escape during the war.  He was shot again while escaping,  but made it 10 miles through the swamp where he found friendly units.  I don't know what this mans  toughness and will power were,  but they were far in excess of what most people would consider reasonable maximums.  

Reading the citations for the CMoH can give whole new upper range for your concepts on these abilities.

If your still worried about high TO  then average the Damage reduction between TO and AG.  In a dedicated fighter type,  it can still be high.  but you then Double(at least) the incrdible amount of SA's  required to reduce the dage by 10.  Personally i don't think the system needs to be tweaked here.  Noone complained that a ST 10 guy barehanded does MORE damage than  the average st 4 guy swinging a pole axe. Unless the vicitm is in Full platemail with full helm, in which case he hits as hard as a maul.

[Durgil]

Disregard

[Jaif]

In the game system, a person with a high toughness doesn't take damage.  In the game system, a person with a high willpower takes damage, but ignores the effects. Your officer sounds like the latter to me; he took plenty of damage, but went on despite their effects.

In regards to boxing, everbody seems to ignore the large amount of armor -padding- people wear on their fists.  Take that armor off, and they kill each other very fast.  Even with that armor, they still get hurt.  Boxers aren't 'tough 10' in the sense of the game; they are 'will 10' in that they do take large amounts of damage, but fight on anyway.

I stand by my statements - in game system terms, people can train their strength far higher than their toughness.

-Jeff

P.S. I keep stressing 'in the game system' because words in english have far broader meaning.  The game uses the word 'toughness' in a very narrow sense.  Take away the game, and of course I describe boxers and that officer as 'tough'.

[Northcott]

In regards to boxing, everbody seems to ignore the large amount of armor -padding- people wear on their fists. Take that armor off, and they kill each other very fast.

Boxing was around long, long before there were padded gloves to wear, neighbour.  John L. Sullivan and Gentleman Jim Corbet were famous for their boxing antics both barehanded and by "Marquis of Queensbury" rules... the latter being responsible for the development of gloves.

Boxing techniques developed from the backhand stance of the 1800's to the modern stance because of Spanish exposure to the Fillipino martial arts, which uses knives, swords, and rattan canes as primary weapons, with the hands being secondary.   Rattan wands are capable of striking human flesh far, far harder than a simple hand, yet people repeatedly fought, and survived, battles using such weapons.  Sometimes surviving dozens upon dozens of solid, hard-hitting blows. (Survivors of Filipino death matches tended to age in an extraordinarily poor manner, however)

The last bare-knuckle boxing match in England was fought in 1860, and came to a 42 round draw.   That's right... 42 rounds of two very strong, very tough guys pounding on each other's heads.  Apparently they looked like hamburger after.

Or you can read about the last bare-knuckle match in the US here: http://www.brainevent.com/be/WackyWeek/twwih/20020701/show_article_then_toc  

Then there's cases like Manfred Hoberl, international strongman competitor, surviving a car crash on the autobon.  Flex Wheeler, a pro bodybuilder, did the same in the USA.  In both cases the cars were utterly and completely demolished... folded up on themselves like tissue paper.  In both cases the doctors attributed survival to the unearthly muscle density of the men involved.  Both were badly hurt, taking months to recover, but a normal man would've been spatula-paste.

I've always figured that this kind of thing should be linked to strength in a game, factoring in overall muscle mass and body density... serving as protection when wearing armour as natural padding beneath, but doing little to stop the bite of a sword -- though a thicker, denser limb would, theoretically, be harder to cut off than a thin, less dense one.  I rather like the idea of toughness representing size (should they have to spend more money on oversized clothes/armour and buy far, far more food than a normal person with reduced toughness? I think so!)

BTW, the comment was made that the human skeleton doesn't get thicker once fully matured -- that's not entirely correct.  Weightlifting has been known to both increase skeletal density in mature individuals and to restore it in individuals who have lost density due to age.  The skeleton replentishes itself every 7 years or so.  It's not a quick process, but it's proven that repeated exertions of strength do thicken your bone structure over time.

If you want to get into realism (as subjective as that can be), given the relatively small scale of strength and toughness, where one point is a substantial difference, it wouldn't be unreasonable to make a character pay for an advancement in one of those stats over a period of a game year... or more.

[Mike Holmes]

Good points Ed.

Its interesting to note that many are coming to the conclusion that the boxing gloves that ar worn today are more lethal than bare fists. Seems odd, don't it? But the cuts and damage caused by bare fists (and to the fists) apparently led to fights usually ending quite a bit earlier. The boxing gloves serve to allow the fighters to deliver many more blows to the head. Which means that the brain is squished around a lot more. This combined with the need for fighters to dehydrate themselves to get into weight classes has been attributed as the sole cause of most of the boxing deaths this century.

That said, obvoiusly, this brain punishment isn't slowing anyone down. Thus, it is TO, and not WP that's keeping them going as long as they do. Whereas formerly, bareknuckled, it was probably more WP trying to ignore pain effects to keep going.

Mass does relate strongly to the ability to absorb damage IRL. See Gulliver for a very indepth treatment.

Yes, a point of ST might represent a 25% increase in strength. That could take several years.

Mike

[Sneaky Git]

I've always figured that this kind of thing should be linked to strength in a game, factoring in overall muscle mass and body density... serving as protection when wearing armour as natural padding beneath, but doing little to stop the bite of a sword -- though a thicker, denser limb would, theoretically, be harder to cut off than a thin, less dense one.  I rather like the idea of toughness representing size

I agree.  The ability to withstand (or shrug off) trauma is definately a function of body mass.

[Jaif]

That said, obvoiusly, this brain punishment isn't slowing anyone down. Thus, it is TO, and not WP that's keeping them going as long as they do.

I don't follow this.  In game terms, whether or not you take a wound is toughness.  However, the effects of many wounds can be ignored by willpower.  Boxing exactly mirrors this: people take wounds (ever see a boxer the day after? it's ugly), but they shrug off the effects while they are fighting.

-Jeff

[Apprentice of Steel]

take i think it was an SAS guy had his leg/s ? blown off not in a way that lelft open femoral arteries for bleedout, now by staying calm and focused he managed to keep it together till help arrived,
(WP over TO in that case, he was harmed)


but then some people have taken less injurus wounds but died from the sheer Shock and trauma despite it being less serious in a medical view.
(now here TO over WP but they die due to a mental effect of shock not coded in system)

The thing is although one case works in a system way (the sas guy would have damn high health to make all the BL rolls pass) the people going out to shock from less serious wounds dosnt work because in the real world  a person cannot be described as 10 seperate quantifiable numbers.

Strength and toughness and health meld and intermingle so much improving one usually means improving a collection

toughness and health and endurance can also blurr between each other etc

Agility and strength/toughness can be in opposition (people with huge muscles dont always move faster, Arnie in the old super bodybuilder days would be somewhat slower than a small lithe sprinter)

Also Agility and Endurance can be mutually exlcusive.

or any of these can not apply,

the mental side, well,

WE dont know why the brain works or the details of how we know it works and can describe processes but
 
know what is going on and what set of values and names can be atributed no chance.



Though on the Officer with the medal of honour, (from a TRoS view)

Average good toughness to not take as much damage
Great Willpower to keep going regardless
Great Health and Endurance to keep physcially functioning despite blood loss pain etc,

also on another system vs life note, ive been in situations where Adrenaline has been a key factor,

while engaged in strenous, tense, emotional situations(LARP mass battles) ive gone on doing exertion thats pretty tough for my unfit body and done it for extended periods of time ,

Course later, when i come down off the pumping adrenaline ive been tired and slow (fora while)

THen the day after the event (or hours after) ive been near paralysed due to the drain and pain ive caused myself,

People have been known in adrenaline pumpng situations to take a lethal blow, not notice and keep going, then afterwards when theyve clmed, fall over dead

its not coded for but it happens


But then hey the combat system is COOL and MUCH MORE REALISTIC im willing to take it as is as it works better than the DnD fighter, who goes on uncarring for many a fell blow from many a mighty foe then reaches 0hp falls over unconcious, from fully fit and fine to seconds from death in a heartbeat. and my personal favourite stupidity the fihter who simply cant be killed in a single blow no matter how good a blow.

Accept TRoS as it is, i have rarely seen such a good system AND setting, nor a game set up to reward ROLEPLAYING a PERSON not a CLASS

[Holt]

uh, can we say, uh, dead horse here?.....

....Instead of whining about TO is too high and alternately "there aren't enough points for attributes" limit TO to 4 or 5 and use the leftover points elsewhere.

Amen to that.

No rules system is perfect.

TRoS, when used sensibly, is the best melee combat system I've played. A lot of people have said they like the game because of it's realistic damage (i.e. You 'can' kill someone with a knife, as opposed to just knocking off a few hit points), I'm one of them.

The problem comes when you try to make it 'too' realistic. If toughness is stunted in it's capacity to reduce damage, then a lot more players are going to lose characters that otherwise might have lived. This is never fun, it's even worse in a game like TRoS where characters are (or should be) created with some thought and effort (as opposed to just picking a class and skills, etc.).

The big picture is:

Although Toughness has it's quirks, it keeps the game playable. Which to me, IMHO, is more important than whether it perfectly models real life.

Lets face it, we don't play TRoS to experience real life, we step out of our front doors for that. :)

Holt,

Who is a big fan of the 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' school of thought

[Mokkurkalfe]

A friend of mine got hit by a car driving 70 km/h. He got a bruise on the knee. *Thats* Toughness, as opposed to get completely mashed and then ignore it, which is Willpower.

[Jaif]

If toughness is stunted in it's capacity to reduce damage, then a lot more players are going to lose characters that otherwise might have lived.

Huh?  How many players have died in your campaign?  I've had 0.  It's very hard for a player to die unless they do stupid things.  With the Luck spiritual attribute, it's almost impossible.

My fear isn't players falling down dead due to toughness 5, it's the system losing integrity when a player realizes he's invincible with toughness 10.

A friend of mine got hit by a car driving 70 km/h. He got a bruise on the knee. *Thats* Toughness, as opposed to get completely mashed and then ignore it, which is Willpower.

I was in an accident, driving an old Dodge Dart going about 40mph on a major road, when a driver on the opposite side of the median had an epileptic seizure, gunned his car to around 60, and slammed into the front side of my car, scraping down it's entire length.  My car was totalled, he went on to hit a few others.

I had a bruise on my left calf. Am I tough? Nope.  Am I lucky? You betcha!

-Jeff

[Shadeling]

I have had my players almost die on a few occasions. The one with the highest Toughness being the one with the greatest wounds... Not every character puts points in Luck either. So Toughness in gameplay, doesn't make players unkillable.

[Holt]

Huh?  How many players have died in your campaign?  I've had 0.  It's very hard for a player to die unless they do stupid things.  With the Luck spiritual attribute, it's almost impossible.
My fear isn't players falling down dead due to toughness 5, it's the system losing integrity when a player realizes he's invincible with toughness 10.

Hmmm, I've had zero player characters die in my campaign (and thankfully, no players either :) ) but then maybe that's because there's only been one fight so far and the player character sat off to one side and used a bow.

As Shadeling said, not everyone puts points into Luck, and SA's are also nebulous things...they go up, they go down...once they're gone, they won't help anymore. I like to use SA's to enhance the game, not turn player characters into unstoppable killing machines.

As for characters with a toughness of 10, the simple answer is don't let them have a toughness that high. Besides, even with a toughness of 10, that character is not invincible, just have him chase someone across a few rooftops at night...then, when he falls, he should get a real shock. Falling damage doesn't take toughness into account.

Also, if that same character ends up fighting more than one opponent, then he's going to be splitting his dice pool, or using some of it for terrain rolls. That leaves his opponents with plenty of chance to get in a really good hit...if they succeed with a large number of dice, then his toughness is going to go a long way towards reducing the damage but I doubt that it would be enough. Once he takes a few wounds, he's meat.

It would be even worse if his opponents were fanatics, they would be likely to throw themselves at him without thought for their own safety. That could result in a number of attacks with 10-14 dice behind them, not a situation I'd want to find myself in...even with TO 10.    :)

Holt,

A firm believer that there's no such thing as an 'invincible' character.

[Jaif]

Ok, a few things;

1) I never said every character had luck.  I said it's tough to die, and that adding luck made it virtually impossible.  I said all this in response to the person who said that low toughnesses would bring about more deaths.

2) Holt, I'm one of the people who initially suggested limiting toughness for humans to 7.

3) As for the difference between invincible and virtually invincible; yes, I'm quite aware that there exists numbers greater than 10, and thus a character with a 10 in toughness is not invincible.  As a GM (and player), I hate the process of ever-escalating dangers to keep ahead of players with ever-escalating abilities.  It ends up feeling wrong to me, and I believe to players too.

-Jeff

[Thirsty Viking]

If you have problems with a toughness 10 charachter...  he's spent a minimum of 41 points on advancing toughness.

Give him opponents that have spent the same number of SA's on advancement.
8 + 9 + 10 + 11 profiecency 11 and 3 more SA's -  
If the Charachter started at 7 instead of 8,  proficency 12 and 7 more SA's

Or Give him a swordsman enemy with an 10 Points in STR who has heard that the charachter is unstoppable   ...   sorta like the Western Gunslinger who hears someone is the fastest gun...  then seeks him out to prove otherwise.

Not to mention the effects of VENGENCE SA's  on children/Borthers of past victims if the player is slaying wantonly...    there is also the posse scenario if the charachter becomes public enemy.