A few games ago an Inquisitor I was maneuvering as master used a necromancy spell to drain characteristic from a poor player (yeah...he wasn't the nicest or more "light aligned" inquisitor around, if you were wondering...actually a warlock necromancer with Deads' Blood).

Now, his characteristic would have dropped to 0, BUT we had no idea on how to work out such circumstance, so, for that game only, we chose to let characteristic drain reach a minimum of 1.

I'd like to ask the community if anyone knows if somewhere in the books there's any information about what happens if a characteristic is reduced to 0. If there isn't how about we write here ideas on how to work out such circumstance?

Waiting for feedback!

Can't think of anything in the books but lets see.

Str - Dead, no ability to move any muscles, including the heart.

Dex - No muscle cordination. Move random muscle group instead of one intended.

Agi - same as Dex.

Int - Dead, brain could not function at all, total Brain dead.

Per - Complete sensory deprivation, possibly to the extent of affecting Ki and mystical senses.

Pow - Catatonic/Coma.

WP - mindless puppet for everyone.

This is just what comes to mind for me and I will house rule in my games.

The psychic power: Psychic Death does state that if INT or WP decreases to 0 you become brain dead. Suggests using Mind Control on them after they "die".

Otherwise I do not know of it being in the book.

I agree with Sidisessinu, except I think STR 0 would not be instant death, merely Total Paralasys and falling to the ground. If you assume they live, if only just, in all cases then there is a chance of them getting better. This works for both main villains you didn't expect drain to be so effective on as well as PC's.

I was thinking about something a little softer.

Str0 - Complete inability to wield anything in hands due to weight. -200 to all Strength dependent Ability checks, -200Wear Armor, -200Damage.

Dex0 - Complete lack of coordination. -200 to all Dex dependent Ability checks, including Attack and Block, -120 to Dodge.

Agi0 - Move at the same rate as a slug. -200 to all Agi dependent Ability checks, including Dodge, -120Attack/Block.

Con0 - Life points drop to only those granted by Class. Character dies at 0 Life Points. -200 to PhR, VR, and DR.

Int0 - Character goes completely insane (let's say to the level of acting completely by instinct...like a mad worm). -200 to all Int dependent Ability checks. Usage of Attack/Block/Dodge becomes completely random...a character might make a block at full value followed by another using only 10 points of Block. Of course mental states such as rage, fear or terror may intervene at any moment completely at random.

Pow0 - Character becomes unable to use magic. -200 to MR and all Pow dependent Ability checks.

Wil0 - Character becomes unable to use psychic powers. -200 to PsR and all Wil dependent Ability checks.

Per0 - Perception is shut-down. Character gains -200 to all Per dependent Ability checks, -120 to Attack, Block, or Dodge.

A stat set to 0 does not roll a die when making a characteristic check.

Whenever a stat drops to 0, it becomes impossible to access or accumulate any Ki point from the same stat.

Whenever a stat different from Intelligence drops to 0, the character has to pass Willpower check against a difficulty of Inhuman or suffer from a Terror (Panic) state for a number of turns equal to failure level, because Panic is NORMAL when you suddenly stop to sense EVERYTHING around you or you suddenly become sluggish or weak as a 2 days old baby.

This does not make a Characteristic Loss or Drain totally OMNIPOTENT, but still a very dangerous asset, which would be more "balanced" to my likings.

I can not agree with your way Elric, for a few reasons reasons. Stat Drain is always dangerous and often overpowered. My main problem with how you handle this are mental stats decreasing to 0. Psychic Death has an effect stated in its description for WP or INT decreasing to 0. If you employ the above you either weaken Psychic Death drastically (as that it is supposed to be a form of death, an attack that can be used to defeat enemies, not just weaken them) or strengthen it drastically (as it becomes the only stat drain technique that effectively kills people).

Losing mental stats should be more penalizing to Fighter Archetypes than this. A Fighter, Taoist, Technician, etc. that has 0 POW, and espcially WP, is basically uneffected, mechanically, with this. 0 POW means no magic and 0 WP means no psychic powers, big deal, didn't have those anyway. Taking a -200 to POW and WP skills? Meh, I don't use those in battle. -200PsR, problem if a psychic is around, so could be situationally problematic, but normally not that bad. No penalty to attack, defense, initiative, Ki techniques other than POW [which could hurt] or WP [what uses this anyway, besides Supernatural Ki Shield?] ones, and Arse Magnus/impossible weapons/Ki abilities use generic Ki, so it still doesn't matter.

INT and WP have the example from Psychic Death as to go off of, I see no reason not to have POW work the same way, so having it work as Sidisessinu said, "Pow - Catatonic/Coma.", makes sense from the examples in the book, and does not just penalize Wizards (in the case of POW) or psychics (in the case of WP).

Also, although this is not very important to the argument INT 0 should in no way cause Insanity no matter how you do this. INT 0 would be someone stupid, not insane. Insane=/=stupid, and vise versa. A good in game example of this is all the insane wizards that show up in RPGs, they are very smart, but their mind breaks because of the forces they work with. This insanity does not make them any stupider, and stupid people are not insane just because they are stupid.

I take your point. Then let's make INT0, WIL0 and POW0 cause Unconsciousness as for Psychic Death, until recovery is somehow achieved.

By the way, Withstand Pain and Composure are both based on Willpower and I consider them very important secondary abilities in combat situations.

As for loss of Power not being devastating for fighters I can't see a problem with that, considering loss of Strength is mostly unconsequential to Mages or pure Psychics.

Elric of Melniboné said:

As it shouldn't be. Just as having INT, WP, or POW decreased should not effect a fighter (unless they use Tai Chi or something). Until it reaches less than 3, then all of a sudden it becomes a problem. The Fighter starts thinking like a wild animal, and the wizard can't lift their clothing. By 0 mental stats the fighters brain cannot tell him what to do, and by 0 physical the Mage can't perform the complicated guestures or words required to accumulate Zeon, or move at all for that matter. Of course 0 CON and PER are special as that they have the same effect on everyone, almost no LP or complete blindness/deafness respectively.
The Psychic is a cheater, as that they can use their abilities without moving their bodies at all.

The same goes for mages with gestureless casting and unspoken casting, actually.

Nevertheless, if we consider Str0, Agi0, and Dex0 like Total Paralysis, the character should collapse to the ground and become unable to turn his/her own eyes, hence suffering some penalty ranging from partial to total blindness while projecting his/her powers.

Anyway, I guess that Str0/Agi0/Dex0 could all be treated like Total Paralysis.

Although I understand why Intelligence0 or Willpower0 would cause a comatose state, I can't see a reason why Power0 should cause that.

Perception0 could actually cause the same penalties as Total Paralysis, since complete lack of senses is far worse than being "only" Blind, and implies you can actually only move at random as if you had Dexterity0.

Constitution0...this one is hard. The character should remain perhaps with half class life points and die once HP0 is reached or once a critical is suffered.

Power0 does not convince me...same rules as Intelligence and Willpower seems an "easy" solution, but makes not much sense to me. For now, I'm probably going with that, anyway.

I can agree with you that having POW 0 cause coma may not be a good choice, but I do not have any better ideas.