I ran a session on Fri. with a brawling contest. My problem was that brawn = damage to Stress, but soak rarley alows anything to get through. So most boxers/fighters are able to resist anything they can dish out themselves. Am I missing something?
Brawling.
Well, extra successes equals extra damage on a 1 to 1 rate. Its not explicitly stated in the rules if this is per succcess after the first, or if any weapon or fist always will deal 1 more damage than the listed value/brawn as long as it hits. Which means - if its per success and not per success after the first - that as long as a boxer hits he will always deal 1 more damage than he can soak. If its the other way - per success above and beyond the first success - its a bit harder to fisticuff someone, as you point out. The main thing though is extra successes equals extra damage.
As Jegergryte said, each extra success adds to the damage dealt (pg132, Step 3: "…each remaining [success] result adds +1 damage…").
Also, if you're an accomplished brawler, you most likely have the Hired Gun/Marauder spec. Feral strength adds directly to damage, and frenzied attack makes it more likely you'll get extra successes.
TL; DR: Brawn isn't the only thing to look at when talking about brawling.
-EF
Gamerunner said:
I ran a session on Fri. with a brawling contest. My problem was that brawn = damage to Stress, but soak rarley alows anything to get through. So most boxers/fighters are able to resist anything they can dish out themselves. Am I missing something?
Not really. It's for that reason you've got things like brass knuckles and the Feral Strength talent to boost up one's unarmed damage.
Which if you think about it, reflects how a lot of boxing fights go in real life. It's not over in a couple of swings, but rather a series of exchanges, with really potent punches (either lots of successes or enough Advantages to trigger a critical hit) being far and few between.
On the topic of Brawling, how have you been handling Pinning and the like? I had a player trained in Brawl try to pin a beast and latter hold a stormtrooper as a human shield. I simply had him roll Both times at 3 Purple dice rather than the usual 2 and allowed him to force the beast to lose his maneuver and the stormtrooper to provide cover for the next attack. It was very impromptu.
Any thoughts on how to handle the more cinematic aspects of Brawl when actual damage dealing is not the intent?
beeblebrox said:
On the topic of Brawling, how have you been handling Pinning and the like? I had a player trained in Brawl try to pin a beast and latter hold a stormtrooper as a human shield. I simply had him roll Both times at 3 Purple dice rather than the usual 2 and allowed him to force the beast to lose his maneuver and the stormtrooper to provide cover for the next attack. It was very impromptu.
Any thoughts on how to handle the more cinematic aspects of Brawl when actual damage dealing is not the intent?
Since grappling in this game is very, very abstract, I'd say your judgment call on how to cover it is probably as good as any.
The other notion might be to require a Triumph rather than just up'ing the difficulty, but that runs into the issue of cutting the PCs off from doing "cool stuff" like you described, something that was a rather constant complaint with Saga Edition, as you needed specific feats in order to actually grapple someone.
When writing stats for the garrote for the catalogue I'm putting together I suggested a way of handling - an opposed brawl check, of course a competitive check could also work I assume. Pinning could perhaps be an adaption of ensnare?
The one shining exception to the Brawl= very low damage is the Doctor. A skilled doctor (3 or more ranks in Medicine) with at least an average Brawn rating can really put the hurt on people. Which is funny…because I have this player who is a total power gamer, and I told him about this new game; and immediately, before our first session or even picking up the book, he was like, "I really wanna play a Wookiee surgeon. Is that an okay character concept?"
Yeah.
I am looking forward to seeing what the Devs come up with in regards to boosting the unarmed fighter. Might be cool to have a Martial Artist analogue to the Pressure Point talent somewhere down the line.
awayputurwpn said:
The one shining exception to the Brawl= very low damage is the Doctor. A skilled doctor (3 or more ranks in Medicine) with at least an average Brawn rating can really put the hurt on people. Which is funny…because I have this player who is a total power gamer, and I told him about this new game; and immediately, before our first session or even picking up the book, he was like, "I really wanna play a Wookiee surgeon. Is that an okay character concept?"
Yeah.
I am looking forward to seeing what the Devs come up with in regards to boosting the unarmed fighter. Might be cool to have a Martial Artist analogue to the Pressure Point talent somewhere down the line.
I think Martial Artist is something we should expect to see as a "Universal Spec" in future supplements.
-WJL
awayputurwpn said:
I am looking forward to seeing what the Devs come up with in regards to boosting the unarmed fighter. Might be cool to have a Martial Artist analogue to the Pressure Point talent somewhere down the line.
I wouldn't be surprised to see a Martial Artist spec in a future supplement, either attached to a proper Soldier career (such as what might be found in the Rebel corebook), or as an extension of the Hired Gun.
Really inclined to think that the whole "Universal Specialization" thing used for the Force-Sensitive Exile is going to be purely the domain of the Force-Sensitive specializations, since barring any sort of Force-Sensitive career, there's not really anything to attach those specs to.
The only experience My group has had with brawling and damage so far was the result of a droid. This droid used a stun grenade as an impromptu set of "brass knuckles". Since stun damage doesnt affect droids and grenades are set to detonate "on impact" this was found to be an exceptional way to knock out an opponent.
Honeslty though brawling has been used mostly for impromptu thngs such as throwing sand people off of cliffs, and seeing if you can punch through a window. Blasters seem to be the method of choice with brawling picking up the slack on cinematic effects. Even the wookie stays back and shoots.
Gamerunner said:
I ran a session on Fri. with a brawling contest. My problem was that brawn = damage to Stress, but soak rarley alows anything to get through. So most boxers/fighters are able to resist anything they can dish out themselves. Am I missing something?
This is a really good observation! But it actually mirrors brawling pretty well… Watch a boxing match with two equally matched fighters. Watch it go on for 8 rounds before a knockout. How many hundreds of punches are thrown that land? Hell… how many dozens connect in a single round? Watch a punch connect, but simply get "shrugged off" by the other boxer… (hit his guard arm or whatever). This is exactly the example of the the base Brawl damage (from Brawn) equaling out to the defender's Soak (based off Brawn). And if they have the same brawn, this is how it will continuously go.
But as has been said - it comes down to multiple successes on a hit. So a boxer might only suffer 1 or 2 strain damage on a really good hit - but that's boxing! It's a game of attrition and wearing down your foe after many many hits.
Keep in mind that all this assumes that the boxers are of the same skill level and physical capability. A more skillful brawler will naturally be generating more successes (due to a larger dice pool), which can even overcome a much Brawn-ier opponent, if the discrepancy is large enough. It also means that Mike Tyson (5 ranks in Brawl, and at least a 4, probably a 5 in Brawn) will DESTROY an average person with a 2 in Brawn, easily doing Strain damage equal to their threshold in a few hits, with enough successes. This is also where those defensive talents come into play so heavily (and why any pugilist is sure to have them), as well as judicious use of the Guarded Stance.
All of this is also assuming that Truimphs or advantage activated crits don't come into play.
MAN, I love this dice mechanic. I think it replicates a Brawl extremely well!
GM Chris said:
Gamerunner said:
I ran a session on Fri. with a brawling contest. My problem was that brawn = damage to Stress, but soak rarley alows anything to get through. So most boxers/fighters are able to resist anything they can dish out themselves. Am I missing something?
This is a really good observation! But it actually mirrors brawling pretty well… Watch a boxing match with two equally matched fighters. Watch it go on for 8 rounds before a knockout. How many hundreds of punches are thrown that land? Hell… how many dozens connect in a single round? Watch a punch connect, but simply get "shrugged off" by the other boxer… (hit his guard arm or whatever). This is exactly the example of the the base Brawl damage (from Brawn) equaling out to the defender's Soak (based off Brawn). And if they have the same brawn, this is how it will continuously go.
But as has been said - it comes down to multiple successes on a hit. So a boxer might only suffer 1 or 2 strain damage on a really good hit - but that's boxing! It's a game of attrition and wearing down your foe after many many hits.
Keep in mind that all this assumes that the boxers are of the same skill level and physical capability. A more skillful brawler will naturally be generating more successes (due to a larger dice pool), which can even overcome a much Brawn-ier opponent, if the discrepancy is large enough. It also means that Mike Tyson (5 ranks in Brawl, and at least a 4, probably a 5 in Brawn) will DESTROY an average person with a 2 in Brawn, easily doing Strain damage equal to their threshold in a few hits, with enough successes. This is also where those defensive talents come into play so heavily (and why any pugilist is sure to have them), as well as judicious use of the Guarded Stance.
All of this is also assuming that Truimphs or advantage activated crits don't come into play.
MAN, I love this dice mechanic. I think it replicates a Brawl extremely well!
3WhiteFox3 said:
See, I don't really care that it emulates a brawl, I'd rather have combat be fun and resolve itself quickly. Currently, while the two brawlers are going at it, the guy with the Blaster Rifle shoots the opponent stone dead. Realistic? Yeah, probably. Rewarding/Fun? Probably not for the player who spent a lot of effort into making a brawling based character. The opponent's skill doesn't mean as much in ranged combat, why does it have to make melee combat so tedious?
I hear you.
But it's going to be rare that a Brawl-focused character ends up going bare-knuckled against another brawl-focused character on the same level as him. This is also where talents are really going to change things. It's not just "skill check on skill check", y'know? In addition, creative uses of Advantage and Threat make things decidedly different each time.
3WhiteFox3 said:
The opponent's skill doesn't mean as much in ranged combat, why does it have to make melee combat so tedious?
How does an opponent's Brawling skill make melee combat tedious? His Brawn might, in terms of soak. But after they did away with any mention of combat being resolved via opposed rolls, I don't see how the skill comes into it at all. Maybe I missed something further up in the discussion.
-WJL
GM Chris said:
3WhiteFox3 said:
See, I don't really care that it emulates a brawl, I'd rather have combat be fun and resolve itself quickly. Currently, while the two brawlers are going at it, the guy with the Blaster Rifle shoots the opponent stone dead. Realistic? Yeah, probably. Rewarding/Fun? Probably not for the player who spent a lot of effort into making a brawling based character. The opponent's skill doesn't mean as much in ranged combat, why does it have to make melee combat so tedious?
But it's going to be rare that a Brawl-focused character ends up going bare-knuckled against another brawl-focused character on the same level as him. This is also where talents are really going to change things. It's not just "skill check on skill check", y'know? In addition, creative uses of Advantage and Threat make things decidedly different each time.
GM Chris nailed it on the head.
In just about every RPG, someone that has to resort to making bare-knuckle attacks that hasn't specialized in doing so is going to be pretty sub-par when it comes to combat. I got a taste of that first-hand just this past Saturday when my Hired Gun PC got deprived of his blaster carbine (primary means of attack, both in terms of skill ranks and talent selections) while squaring off against a Defel Assassin. I could have dived for my blaster, but I opted to fall back on my combat gloves/brass knuckles and apply a bit of the ol' "sweet science" to my foe, getting a pretty lucky roll that rang his bell pretty badly, but it didn't knock the Defel out or on his hindquarters, though I did leave him a bit punch-drunk thanks to the Disorient quality. For those that care, said character is pretty much a new character with only 15XP from a prior adventure under his belt (all of which was spent buffing up his ranged combat prowess), so beyond a Brawn of 3, a rank in Brawl, and a set of brass knuckles, he's really not primed for hand-to-hand fighting, though he's a lot better than most folks would be.
I know Cyril took the Togorian stats I created for the Unofficial Alien Menagerie and made a freaking devastating hand-to-hand fighter, using the Marauder specialization. But this character is primed for melee combat, having chosen his skill ranks and talents accordingly. I don't think the character has seen play, but the EotE version of Rezzik would probably have little trouble in ripping enemies apart with his bare claws.
In Saga Edition, it generally took dedication and a lot of feats to make a hand-to-hand fighter be pretty cool, though as GM Chris has often joked, I kinda broke SWSE with my work on the Martial Arts section of Galaxy at War. Then again, Cyril was able to make Rezzik a pure monster using only material from the Core Rulebook, KOTOR, a dash of Legacy, and a pinch of Threats (Teras Kasi talent tree), so maybe the brokenness was already there to begin with
I would like there to be a base damage to brawl/melee attacks that adds onto the brawn of a character. It would make unarmed attacks a lot more effective.
It doesn't have to be big, I'm thinking the character's shilohuete (sp?). So a Jawa gets no bonus, while a human gains +1, and a clawed creature (trandoshan) would have +2. A bantha, even a weak one by brawn standards would deal much more damage than a comparable ewok, so forth and so on.
In a game where hitting can be a challange, a little extra damage to compensate for heavy clothes would be handy IMO.
Majesticmoose said:
I would like there to be a base damage to brawl/melee attacks that adds onto the brawn of a character. It would make unarmed attacks a lot more effective.
It doesn't have to be big, I'm thinking the character's shilohuete (sp?). So a Jawa gets no bonus, while a human gains +1, and a clawed creature (trandoshan) would have +2. A bantha, even a weak one by brawn standards would deal much more damage than a comparable ewok, so forth and so on.
In a game where hitting can be a challange, a little extra damage to compensate for heavy clothes would be handy IMO.
I disagree
a average brawn gives 2 damage for a punch, a light blaster does 5. I think there should be a distinctive gap between a lethal weapon and a nonlethal one. My character has built brass knucles, a dot in brawl and a brawn of 4. The last brawl I got into with an average of 2 extra sucesses did 7 damage a swing. Minus the average soak i was still able to put down the thugs i was fighting in 2 swings each (which i did by fighting with both fists (increase difficulty by 1 for the opportunity to swing more.) Thats more effective than a average brawn with a vibro ax.
Lets tone this down to an average fight. This is a scinematic experience. Yes a 2 brawn against a 2 soak would take all day because you would have to net 2 sucesses to do damage (one to hit, the other for extra damage). However people with 2 brawn and no skill in brawling generally dont duke it out very long, usually someone goes for a gun. The poeple you see duking it out in movies have a higer brawn and may even have some training in brawl. because the difficulty does not scale as fast as the ability, even a 4 brawn, no skill agains a 4 soak would still end the fight quicker because of a larger net of sucesses.
What you do see a lot in movies is people tripping, disorienting and throwing other people. This is something that doesnt always do damage. Remeber even if your opponent soaks all of the damage, you did still hit them and can spend your advantages to do things such as trip, stun and disorient.
Remeber Han Solo didn't punch people, he shot them. Chewbacca, on the other hand….