Just now, Daniel Akbas said:

I think it would certainly be acceptable to offer it. Your defeated foe is suffering an agonizing death. Offering to take their head and expediate their death could be seen as acting on the Bushido tenet of compassion.
I think not letting your opponent die on their own terms would be bad form. You've already won, after all. That's just ficton-speculation from me though, so I would take it with a grain of salt ^^

yeah narratively it really is cool.

basically the character suffering the dying condition is expected NOT to try to remove the dying condition from himself.

not sure thats how it would play out with most "villains" though.

14 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

Why is that questionable? You can remove Dying, but that doesn't prevent it from having happened. At the end of the round the Dying condition was still inflicted.

It is questionable because it is a little ridiculous from a narrative standpoint - both recovering from Dying in an instant in the middle of a duel and declaring victory over a largely unhurt opponent in a duel to death .

2 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

It is questionable because it is a little ridiculous from a narrative standpoint - both recovering from Dying in an instant in the middle of a duel and declaring victory over a largely unhurt opponent in a duel to death .

Do recall that you did successfully injure them severely enough that the wound would kill them.

Just because they're not going to die, does not mean they can hop up, dance a jig, and do some cartwheels.

They're just not actively spurting blood out of their jugular any longer. The condition isn't a "wee card" that they toss aside and suddenly having the hole through your lung magically heal.

If you get hit by a car and are dying, but the paramedics and ER docs save your life, congrats, you've had the "Dying" condition removed from you.

You are not "largely unhurt" however.

2 minutes ago, Hida Jitenno said:

Do recall that you did successfully injure them severely enough that the wound would kill them.

Just because they're not going to die, does not mean they can hop up, dance a jig, and do some cartwheels.

They're just not actively spurting blood out of their jugular any longer. The condition isn't a "wee card" that they toss aside and suddenly having the hole through your lung magically heal.

If you get hit by a car and are dying, but the paramedics and ER docs save your life, congrats, you've had the "Dying" condition removed from you.

You are not "largely unhurt" however.

does the critical effect is only "inflict the dying condition" ? nothing else ? no wounded, no bleeding etc ?

2 minutes ago, Avatar111 said:

does the critical effect is only "inflict the dying condition" ? nothing else ? no wounded, no bleeding etc ?

Any critical strike that afflicts the target with the Dying condition (meaning any crit with a severity above 13) also gives the target the Severely Wounded condition and the Bleeding condition.

Just now, Daniel Akbas said:

Any critical strike that afflicts the target with the Dying condition (meaning any crit with a severity above 13) also gives the target the Severely Wounded condition and the Bleeding condition.

then its moot.

the dude is crippled, probably getting fatigue trying to remove his conditions etc.

its not like hes "largely unhurt".

2 minutes ago, Avatar111 said:

does the critical effect is only "inflict the dying condition" ? nothing else ? no wounded, no bleeding etc ?

It inflicts Severely Wounded and Bleeding too. But then the crit catches you in Void 2, it maybe causes a big scar on your head, you are, like, "Hol up I'm gonna bandage myself!" then arm your Fire 5 and you are good to go, almost unhurt.

It is like a truck hits you, one of your kidneys split open, and you stagger to your feet with a "Nah I'm cool, the other one is still working!" or something. I actually have a hard time imagining this .

2 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

It inflicts Severely Wounded and Bleeding too. But then the crit catches you in Void 2, it maybe causes a big scar on your head, you are, like, "Hol up I'm gonna bandage myself!" then arm your Fire 5 and you are good to go, almost unhurt.

It is like a truck hits you, one of your kidneys split open, and you stagger to your feet with a "Nah I'm cool, the other one is still working!" or something. I actually have a hard time imagining this .

well, its a game.

i think that bleeding + severely wounded + dying, is kind of enough to put somebody down for a while... sure he can "resist" all that (and this is an example of where my houserule that you shouldn't be able to spend opportunities in resist checks start to make sense). but, at that point... a GM should narrate that the dude dies, and a player suffering this should be ashamed and tainted by this stigma forever if he even manage to survive this (i hope for him hes got a decent Air ring to remove that dying condition and enough strife so bleeding doesn't just gut him out while trying to remove all those).

Removing the Dying condition on yourself should be extremely difficult, and is not the kind of thing you can do while continuing the fight, I don't care what the rules say. You're not just performing a TN 4 medicine check, you're sitting down, tearing off a long strip of cloth, and trying to clamp down your own severed femoral artery. Or you're asking around for a credit card and some adhesive tape for your sucking chest wound (good luck with that, by the way).

As for continuing the fight, I have no problem with keeping it as a duel, mostly because that hits some important samurai tropes: fighting on despite being doomed, or both warriors dying on each others' blades.

If there are judges, they may step in depending on the rules, traditions and situation (although in a duel to the death, they'll probably stay out of it until one collapses). I also think it's fine to finish the round, as that easily represents a rapid exchange of blows. Kinda hard to step in after the first attack when the counter-attack is a split second later.

I actually fully support the use of Opportunity in Crit Resist rolls. I think one use could be to downplay the severity.

"Tis but a flesh wound!"

"You stupid git, your arm's off!"

"No it isn't."

(another use would be to grab the weapon that just impaled you, so your enemy either has to let go or struggle to get it back while you attack with your free hand, but I'm saving that little trick for when my PCs fight a Deathseeker)

11 minutes ago, The Grand Falloon said:

I actually fully support the use of Opportunity in Crit Resist rolls. I think one use could be to downplay the severity.

"Tis but a flesh wound!"

"You stupid git, your arm's off!"

"No it isn't."

(another use would be to grab the weapon that just impaled you, so your enemy either has to let go or struggle to get it back while you attack with your free hand, but I'm saving that little trick for when my PCs fight a Deathseeker)

using opportunities in crit resist rolls often makes the resist almost BETTER than the critical strike itself if you have a high fitness roll.

while it can be thematic etc, mechanically it is busted. you should not gain an advantage (like giving strife to the opponent, or reducing your next TN by 1, or getting a kept opportunity on your next roll..) because you resisted a critical strike.

also, hopefully the player who strike didn't also activate some kind of techniques that requires his opponent to make a resist check on top of a critical strike.

because now they have 2 resist checks to make in the same turn, and both can spend opportunities.

it feels like because you had a great attack roll (activated a technique + did a critical strike) you are getting punished for it.

i am definitely not letting that happen. but sure, RAW you can.

3 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

i dont have the book with me... but did they really wrote that a duel to the death ends after somebody gets the "dying condition" ?

why ffg... why.

Because it allows for a cool death scene, rather than forcing a player to chop up their opponent to make sure they're really dead in order to win a duel.

2 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

Because it allows for a cool death scene, rather than forcing a player to chop up their opponent to make sure they're really dead in order to win a duel.

yeah, im fine with it now since you get the severely wounded + bleeding condition on top anyway. you commented on an old post there!

Just now, Avatar111 said:

yeah, im fine with it now since you get the severely wounded + bleeding condition on top anyway. you commented on an old post there!

Three hours old. Three. I can't be here 24x7, you know. 😛 I even checked the other posts to see if someone else had made a similar comment already!

2 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

It is questionable because it is a little ridiculous from a narrative standpoint - both recovering from Dying in an instant in the middle of a duel and declaring victory over a largely unhurt opponent in a duel to death .

Exactly how are you recovering from dying "in an instant"?

12 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

Exactly how are you recovering from dying "in an instant"?

All you have to do is to perform a support action, pass a TN 4 Medicine (Air) Check and you are good to go. You don't become Incapacitated or Unconscious, it is not a Downtime Activity (unlike healing an Injured Ring), it is like a revive ability straight out of a video game: you push the button and you are instantly back to action. In fact, if you can keep enough dice you can even add a bonus kept <OPP> to your next Martial Skill Check! Or even better, you can act subtly to attract minimal attention in your efforts !

15 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

All you have to do is to perform a support action, pass a TN 4 Medicine (Air) Check and you are good to go. You don't become Incapacitated or Unconscious, it is not a Downtime Activity (unlike healing an Injured Ring), it is like a revive ability straight out of a video game: you push the button and you are instantly back to action. In fact, if you can keep enough dice you can even add a bonus kept <OPP> to your next Martial Skill Check! Or even better, you can act subtly to attract minimal attention in your efforts !

Because any action that isn't explicitly hours takes 6 seconds!

7 minutes ago, Hida Jitenno said:

Because any action that isn't explicitly hours takes 6 seconds!

its one turn. unless you houserule it.

11 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

All you have to do is to perform a support action, pass a TN 4 Medicine (Air) Check and you are good to go. You don't become Incapacitated or Unconscious, it is not a Downtime Activity (unlike healing an Injured Ring), it is like a revive ability straight out of a video game: you push the button and you are instantly back to action. In fact, if you can keep enough dice you can even add a bonus kept <OPP> to your next Martial Skill Check! Or even better, you can act subtly to attract minimal attention in your efforts !

Couple of things:

1) You can't make support actions during a duel. You'd be using the "unique action" mechanic, which frees up the GM to modify the check.

2) You're still severely wounded and bleeding. "Good to go" isn't quite right.

3) Because you're bleeding, that medicine check is extremely likely to cause significant physical damage.

4) It's a medicine check. You're not popping a pill for insta-recovery.

How I handle it in my game: Bushido answers all. If you do not have the honor to admit when you have been bested and will do anything to win, then do not run the fight as a duel in the first place, whether private or public. It is just a skirmish to begin with. Duels are ritualized forms of competition that have their rules grounded very firmly in the tenets of tradition and Bushido. Ergo: you are honor-bound to admit when you have been defeated. If you're not willing to do that, then it was never a duel in the first place. You may as well just pull a foreign handgun out of your kimono on your turn and shoot everyone around you who saw you shame yourself. Even if you're a dirty, dirty Scorpion they will shun you for being so obvious. You should have just used poison when no one was looking like a good girl... oh and you should have been better! Never forget that! Right Mom?!

*note that I am referring purely to the setting's view of Bushido, and not the real-world in any way.

I like this thread! My players are dirty enough to try this so let's try another way of screwing with them looking at this logically. I'm under the impression must duelists don't start duels with bandages in their hands. Most probably don't even carry a medicine kit, but let's say this strange Asahina duelist carries one on his obi. So that's a ready action to get it out. Even in water stance they can't get it out and use it during the same action (with it being a Medicine ( AIR ) check and all). Also have you ever tried to bandage your dying self with only one hand. It ain't easy. I mean, I've never done it either, but in all the movies it looks hard af. So if I was mean I'd say you can't do it while holding your katana (definitely NOT with a yari), and CERTAINLY not in a threatening way. But I'm nice, so sure give it a try, but with a +1 TN.

At some point good ole Hitomi is going to see Yakamo wrapping his stump, muttering "hang on just a sec" and shout "Oh **** no!" and start playing whack-a-mole with his head.

Long story short, nuke the Crabs that carry bandages from orbit.

11 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

1) You can't make support actions during a duel. You'd be using the "unique action" mechanic, which frees up the GM to modify the check.

You don't revive yourself as part of a support action. It is a support action all by itself, like, say how an Iaijutsu Cut is an attack action.

12 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

2) You're still severely wounded and bleeding. "Good to go" isn't quite right.

3) Because you're bleeding, that medicine check is extremely likely to cause significant physical damage.

The secondary effects are kinda negligible. In my experience, Bleeding is not a big deal-breaker unless you suck it up on the dice. The Injured Ring condition is very Ring-dependent. And of course the Dying critical damages cause zero actual physical/fatigue damage, so one can just soak all the Fatigue from Bleeding, it is not like Dying put them on the edge or anything.

17 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

4) It's a medicine check. You're not popping a pill for insta-recovery.

Yes, I have a very hard time imagining how this one works. It happens very quickly. It can be done very subtly. It uses the Analyze/Refine Approach, so it is not bandaging yourself (that would be Restore). The Medicine (Air) healing action is surgery but that one obviously doesn't fly. The Approach in question is actually not defined, and since Medicine is a Scholar Skill, the Approach you must use is technically Analyze . So I conclude that the character drops Dying by carefully looking through the scar and discovering that it is in fact not lethal or something like that.

4 minutes ago, AtoMaki said:

1) You don't revive yourself as part of a support action. It is a support action all by itself, like, say how an Iaijutsu Cut is an attack action.

2) The secondary effects are kinda negligible. In my experience, Bleeding is not a big deal-breaker unless you suck it up on the dice. The Injured Ring condition is very Ring-dependent. And of course the Dying critical damages cause zero actual physical/fatigue damage, so one can just soak all the Fatigue from Bleeding, it is not like Dying put them on the edge or anything.

3) Yes, I have a very hard time imagining how this one works. It happens very quickly. It can be done very subtly. It uses the Analyze/Refine Approach, so it is not bandaging yourself (that would be Restore). The Medicine (Air) healing action is surgery but that one obviously doesn't fly. The Approach in question is actually not defined, and since Medicine is a Scholar Skill, the Approach you must use is technically Analyze . So I conclude that the character drops Dying by carefully looking through the scar and discovering that it is in fact not lethal or something like that.

1) sorry, I meant healing action or whatever - the point is that you're in GM approval territory: the action you propose is not among the ones listed as available during a duel.

2) assuming a TN 4 check you want to succeed at, you'll probably be picking up quite a bit of strife results in order not to fail. Picking up strife in a duel is pretty bad to begin with. Then there's the damage part, however that turns out. Then, assuming you're still ok when all that is dealt with, you're still severely wounded and bleeding. That means that with any check you want to make the next turn, you're again taking damage (and if you want to remove that condition, it's an Earth check - not unlikely to be the severely wounded ring) - that fatigue is going to build up fast. Point is, it's a bit of a stretch to think you're largely unhurt.

3) the first thing I wanted to point out here is that it's a medicine check. TN 4 medicine (Air) checks are not exactly trivial for most duelists, and that's assuming the GM didn't see fit to modify the roll (or increase the TN). Which brings me to the second thing: whatever it is you're doing - for instance applying a tourniquet, or stuffing your hand in a wound to stop the worst of the bleeding, or literally holding in your guts so they don't spill from the cut across your belly - likely hinders you if you try to take further action. A GM might well think it appropriate to modify your dice on future checks.

6 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

2) assuming a TN 4 check you want to succeed at, you'll probably be picking up quite a bit of strife results in order not to fail. Picking up strife in a duel is pretty bad to begin with.

You are scoring 2 Strife at average with a 6k4 roll and picking 4 at maximum unless you go super-explody with your results (but you can either drop the exploding dice with Strife or keep <OPP> to kill Strife). I don't think that's a big deal in the given situation.

12 minutes ago, nameless ronin said:

3) the first thing I wanted to point out here is that it's a medicine check. TN 4 medicine (Air) checks are not exactly trivial for most duelists, and that's assuming the GM didn't see fit to modify the roll (or increase the TN).

Yes, this can be problematic for a starting character, but if you are playing with a sword at Rank 2+ and you can't hit a TN 4 Medicine check reliably then you are dead meat anyway. Had the chance to see the unfortunate consequences of ignoring Medicine personally, so I have no illusions here .

And my point is that Dying on an otherwise "healthy" character might not be anything serious like being gutted. It cannot be serious because the character can remove it on a moment's notice and function with nigh-perfect clarity thereafter. Getting gutted would be more like a Disadvantage damage like losing your fingers. And before you ask, no, I have no idea how to actually imagine "Dying" other than a theatrical outburst over a fairly minor but very painful wound .

9 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

It is like a truck hits you, one of your kidneys split open, and you stagger to your feet with a "Nah I'm cool, the other one is still working!" or something. I actually have a hard time imagining this .

4 hours ago, AtoMaki said:

And before you ask, no, I have no idea how to actually imagine "Dying" other than a theatrical outburst over a fairly minor but very painful wound .

I'd imagine it similar to how Path To Inner Peace worked (see below), but less invoking and beseeching the kami, more grit, determination, punching chi points to stop bleeding, etc. (think Donnie Yen in Dragon/Wuxia or any of the bajillion other examples of ignoring your own wounds. Also how this is often reversed mid-fight as a distraction.)

"Instead of stimulating the flesh to knit and repair itself, the spell merely sent a flood of rejuvenating chi through the target’s body, allowing him to ignore the pain and trauma of his injuries. Thus, while the spell healed Wounds in a mechanical sense (the Wounds were erased from the character sheet and thus the character no longer was under Wound Penalties to his actions), it did not actually physically repair the injuries themselves. (The L5R supplement Way of Shadow offered a vivid depiction of this effect – a gruesomely injured shugenja casts the spell on himself and is then able to move and fight normally, even though his left arm is still a shredded bloody ruin hanging uselessly at his side.)"

On 11/16/2018 at 3:48 PM, Daniel Akbas said:

2 PCs are dueling. Iaijutsu du  el to the death. The duel is settled when one person is dead or dying.

So, there's your problem; you're considering two very different win conditions as the same. Is the win condition dead or is it dying (i.e. fatally wounded)? If "dying," then the first fatal blow would win, regardless of who actually expires first. But if the win condition is "dead," then IMO you can be lying on the ground bleeding out, and if your opponent is foolish enough to come close to you and you kill him dead (think Liam Neeson's final battle in Rob Roy or Oberyn vs. The Mountain in S4 of Game of Thrones), you win.

Given that neither in RL nor in a game like this do people have perfect information about what constitutes 'fatal blow that can't be recovered from,' I'd generally suggest that you stick with "dead" as a victory condition. It's a bit easier to determine. Also, going with "dead" as the victory condition allows for awesome final-effort comebacks to count.