[HOE] Re: Casualty Rate

["Reuben McCallum" <bloopy40@hotmail.com>]

>Date: Fri, 4 Aug 2000 09:48:50 -0400
>From: bobfletch@erols.com
>Subject: Re: [HOE] Campaign Lethality  WAS: Strain-based Martial Artists
>
>     We run two Pinnacle campaigns for my group, a Deadlands campaign my
>friend runs and my own Hell on Earth campaign.  Both of them are played 
>with
>a "high hurt/low casualty" state of mind.  I make it as difficult as I can
>for my posse, and I beat the living Hell out of them in the process, but I
>haven't killed any of them yet.  It's not that I'm fudging dice rolls or
>anything, but I think my group gives out more chips in general and I don't
>go out of my way to kill characters.  No instant death stuff or anything.
>I've only been running HOE for a couple months, but my friend has been
>running Deadlands for two years and has only killed one character (the guy
>was an idiot anyway, and we didn't invite him back), though he keeps
>threatening to chop off one of the arms of my two-fisted hexslinger ;-).
>Every group likes different styles of campaigns, but I know my group
>wouldn't enjoy having two-thirds of them wiped out in the first phase of 
>the
>first round.
I have a similar philosophy for the games I run. I had a character in my 
deadlands regular game who was running like a combat munchkin (even though 
his stats weren't up to the job). You know, two fisted two-gun kid. 
Initially, when he started running this character, he role-played very well, 
but eventually he devolved into crowing about his combat skills and doing 
precious little else. Well, I knew that if I killed off the character, he'd 
just make another munchkin, so instead, I rigged a fight so he lost a hand. 
I didn't rig the damage or hit rolls or anything, but instead of hitting him 
in the guts I hit him in the arm. So the only fudging I did was to save him 
from dying, really.
Then, eventually, they got to the city of gloom, and sought out the services 
Leonitus P. Gash. He demanded that they dig up a scrapper that had been 
killed in the arena and deliver it to him. Of course, this scrapper turned 
out to be harrowed, and his manitou was pretty much in charge most of the 
time, so if it went on a rampage. They eventually tracked him down, and he 
was lying there, scared and confused. Then the manitou took over, and a huge 
fight ensued. Eventually, the mad scientist used an elixer specifically 
designed for knocking out undead, and he fell unconscious. When they 
returned him to Leonitus P. Gash, as he was locked in the back of the truck, 
they heard the non-manitou possessed scrapper pleading for help. Anyway, he 
got his mechanical hand, but to do it, he had to become a craven, mercenary, 
grave-digger, who condemned a poor soul to be experimented on by a mad 
scientist, denying him rest even beyond the grave. And now, whenever I might 
feel he's being a pig, the hand can just lock up. Much better than killing 
him.
Reuben "You can only die twice" McCallum
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