[DL] DLd20 - Killing Harrowed Characters (Long)

[thumperhead <thumprhead@yahoo.ca>]

Howdy, all.  I’m new to the list, and have come to
Deadlands from the wilderness of the d20 systems.
(See, Shane, your marketing strategy works!)

No Man’s Land Material follows:

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I’ve gone over the DLd20 rules, and something rather
important occurred to me: there’s (apparently) no way
to kill a Harrowed character in DLd20, beyond being
destroyed by a Blessed character in a Turning attempt.
 In the classic Deadlands rules, wounds to the head
will kill a Harrowed character, but this is not the
case with DLd20.

DLd20, pg.96:

"Harrowed are also undead, and are thus immune to
criticals and stuns caused by physical pain (they can
still be stunned by mental attacks as usual)."

"Harrowed heroes automatically stabilize themselves on
the first round after going below 0 hit points.  In
fact, a Harrowed can be reduced below -10 wound (sic)
points without fear of death."

No means of permanently killing a Harrowed character
is ever mentioned in the DLd20 rules.

IMO, it’s way too unbalancing to have a character that
can never be killed, so I figured out two slight
variations to put the fear of the everafter back into
the Harrowed.

1) Change the two above sentences to read:

"Harrowed are also undead, and are thus immune to
criticals and stuns caused by physical pain (they can
still be stunned by mental attacks as usual), except
when a critical hit would reduce the character to -10
hit points or below.  In this situation, the Harrowed
receives critical damage and has suffered a fatal
wound to the head, putting him or her down for good."

"Harrowed heroes automatically stabilize themselves on
the first round after going below 0 hit points on
damage sustained from non-critical hits.  In fact, in
all cases of non-critical hits, a Harrowed can be
reduced below -10 hit points without fear of death. 
However, a critical hit on a Harrowed who is already
below -10 hit points from non-critical hits will kill
him."

The DMG backs me up on this:

DMG, pg.64, column 2, under "Critical Hits":

"When a critical hit is achieved, a vital spot on the
creature was hit.  This is an opportunity for you to
give the players some vivid description to keep the
excitement level high: ''The mace blow hits the orc
squarely on the side of the head.  He lets out a
groan, and his knees buckle from the impact.''"

OR

2) Use the variant rule for Instant Kills (DMG, pg.64
- on an attack roll of "natural 20", roll again.  If
another natural 20 is rolled, this is a threat of an
Instant Kill.  Roll again, and if the attack would hit
(not just critically), the target is dead.) to put
down a Harrowed character.

Both options require attack and "confirmation" rolls,
but the Instant Kill is a lot harder (statistically)
to achieve.  The Instant Kill can happen at any point
(not just when the Harrowed would be below -10 hit
points), which makes combat almost as deadly for
Harrowed as for living folks.  It also makes duels
with Harrowed a _lot_ less one-sided. :-) 

I ruled out the option of using called shots to get in
a hit to the head, as the d20 system doesn’t support
them. (See the DND-L mailing list archives on WotC’s
website

http://209.67.104.4/archives/dnd-l.html

for the various lengthy discussions of this topic. 
Use the search string "called shots" and search dates
beginning in July 2000.)

NOTE: This is all theoretical right now.  I’ll
playtest both the rules change and the instant kill
variant rule this weekend and let you know how well
(or not) they work. 8P

Comments, questions?

Bruce White

"Now, there’s only two things in life,
But I forget what they are..."
-- Buffalo River Home, John Hiatt

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