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| gang_hit_points [2016/10/27 14:15] – dave | gang_hit_points [2018/03/04 13:23] (current) – external edit 127.0.0.1 |
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| Here's idea to give PC'S a sense of progress. | =====GANG HIT POINTS AND GANG MORALE===== |
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| Each time a game event affects a gang, it takes damage points | **Damage to Gangs** |
| Maybe 1 point per gangster imprisoned or killed, 1d6 per captain/crew chief/special character captured or killed, 2d6 for the boss getting captured or killed. | |
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| Maybe the gang can heal 2d6 if the PC'S fail to prevent them pulling off a big score. | The current state of each gang (and like organization) in the city will be tracked by its hit points or damage level. Every time a gang member is killed, crippled or imprisoned or run out of town, the gang suffers 1 point of damage. Every time this happens the leader of a crew, the gang suffers 5 points of damage. Every time this happens to one of the gang's top leadership (boss, underboss etc., ) the gang suffers 10 points of damage. |
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| When a gang reaches 100 damage it has to roll on a Morale effects table, possibly even disbanding. It rolls again at each 50 points of damage. | **Gang Recovery** |
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| // Sounds good, but I'm cool with this being squishy. Also, I'm not convinced that all gangs are created equal. IMHO, the FREE MEN aren't as good as the Wound Ravens at extortion, but if a heist has to happen the FREE MEN are better at doing that. There is an M.O. to a lot of these groups that we should be aware of. Here's an idea. Let's call the hit points like a "Percentage". Rather than rolling randomly, let's just decide how many "kingpins" or even how many adventures it takes to bring one of these down a peg, or down for good. // | Gangs can heal damage too. Every time they capture a PC or other member of the Restoration Committee, a gang is healed 5 points (even if the prisoner is later freed or escapes). Every time a gang succeeds in a caper when the PC's attempt to stop them, it is healed 10 points. Every time a gang kills a PC or a member of Universal Rescue, or an NPC under the PC's protection, it is healed 5 points. Any session where a particular gang with damage is left alone by the players will allow it to heal 1d6 points. |
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| //<del>NEW IDEA: instead of hit points, why don't we rate a gang's power by how many districts they have? It is true that not all districts are created equally. However, we should be able to allow PCs to clear a single district in one or two game sessions. That should be the bar in my opinion. Want to take out a gang? Clear that district.</del> // | **Effects of Cumulative Damage** VERSION 1 |
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| **I think that 1-2 game sessions is optimistic for wiping a gang out of a district. I think the way to bust a gang is to get people to think that they're losers, so it's overall gang attrition, not localized turf war that breaks the gang. But, we can set a fixed condition for each gang (e.g., Wound Ravens: become disordered if Father, Son and Holy Ghost eliminated at once, disband if 5 crew chiefs eliminated while disordered).** | __Demoralized:__ If a gang reaches 100 to 150 points of damage, it is demoralized and each member suffers -1 on all Spirit checks and any skills depending on Spirit. |
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| | __Desperate:__ If a gang reaches 151-200 points of damage, it is desperate and each member suffers -2 on all Spirit checks and skills depending on Spirit, and must make a Spirit check if called on to fight the PC's without a top leader present or immediately flee. |
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| **What I want to avoid is doing gang demographics, that's a rabbit hole that leads only to madness.** | __Broken:__ if a gang reaches 201+ points of damage, it is considered broken in spirit. Members, except for the top leaders, will immediately flee if confronted by the PC's. Each gang should have a secret condition established for it by one of the GM's that if the gang reaches broken status, and that condition is met, the gang dissolves. (Example, perhaps the All-Americans will dissolve if both top leaders are killed, or the Wound Ravens will dissolve if condemned by Archbishop Romano). |
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| | **Effects of Damage** VERSION 2 |
| | Each time a gang ends a session with a cumulative damage total of 50 or more, it must make a morale check on the following table. Each multiple of 50 damage points imposes a -1 to the roll. |
| | The morale status lasts until the end of the next session. |
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| **The reason I was pushing hit points is that I was thinking that most of the adventures will take the form of a gang or super criminal springing a plot on the city and the heroes responding. They will incidentally do damage to gangs in response. Hit points for gangs gives us a way to track that and then maybe suggest some pro-active moves on the players' part.** | 2d10 Result. Gang Status. |
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| | 3 or less. Broken. -3 spirit, extras flee PCs gang dissolves if special condition met, permanent -2 penalty on further rolls on this table. |
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| **I've come to accept that as much as I am enamored of the idea of player-driven sand-box action, in reality, the players sit on their thumbs waiting for something to react to. They don't make long-range plans, they don't set role-play goals for themselves, they don't think much about the game between sessions. So, this campaign, when I run an adventure, it's going to start with something big to react to and run its course from there. Maybe, just maybe, if they see that the Wound Ravens have taken 75 hit points of damage, they'll for once say--hey, next time let's actually go get those guys and finish them off, if not, it's a small investment on our part.** | 4-6 Desperate. -2 spirit, extras must make spirit check or flee |
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| //Heh! See, I kind of like the idea of "gang demographics"! I totally agree that "the way to bust a gang is to get people to think that they're losers", and that we should come up with fixed conditions to break each gang. Okay, I'm on board with "hit points" as long as the gang can "heal" if their gang breaking conditions aren't met. // | 7-9 Demoralized. -1 spirit |
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| //Regarding "player-driven sand-box action", maybe we need to build something into our character creation system to generate that motivation. I'm watching Netflix's "Luke Cage" series right now, and it appears to me like for as much as Luke reacts to Cottonmouth's gang, he does plenty of sand box ass kicking because he's taking revenge or trying to protect someone. Maybe we offer bonus character generation points, or create new disadvantages that require PCs to hold a grudge against a certain gang or crime? Maybe once they "buy off" their disadvantage by achieving a goal, they may get an extra advance by choosing from a deck of new "disadvantages" which are basically just goals? // | 10-14 Standard |
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| //What about killing? Regular folks aren't going to be cool with vigilantes just mowing down people -- even if they are gangsters. Those gangsters have mothers and perhaps siblings and children who may be quality human beings even if the gangsters are just lousy scum-sucking dirtbags. Should there be a "heat" mechanic that encourages bad guys be "brought to justice" rather than just murdered in their sleep?// | 15-17 Energized. +1 spirit |
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| I've been grappling with killings too. In the adventure I'm working on now, I've put in various spots where the PC's get a Bennie if the extract information without killing anyone, but it needs some more set-up to work properly. I was just going to encourage people to kill only when justified (bad guys are going to shoot), but it does need to be a bit more consequential. | 18-19 Vengeful. +2 spirit, always make lethal attacks vs PC |
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| | 20+ Zealous. +3 spirit, appear on every 2 of clubs PC card, always lethal |
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| **You know, if you are really interested in gang demographics, and want to set up the gang conditions and so forth, I don't want to rain on your parade over this. I was looking for something quick and dirty, because I didn't want to get fiddly on this issue. If you want to fiddle, don't let me stop you, I just don't want to do it myself. | |
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| | **The Damage Board** |
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| | On the wall of 233 Leaderton, a scoreboard will be hung that records the current damage level for each gang for all to see. This score card should also be posted on the LOH blog. |
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| | Each gang (and cult, and the police) in the city is assumed to stay at an equilibrium unless something happens during an adventure session. It is player action, or NPC action that could be helped or stopped by the PC's that will affect the morale of the gang. |
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| | **The Essential Question** |
| | If we don't use this system or something similar, how do we keep track of progress (or do we not). I really like the idea of a scoreboard. Gang population: today Chicago has less than 3 million people and 150,000 gang members. Today NY mafia families are down to less than 1000, with probably up to 5 to 10 times that in associates. Do you want to work up numbers per gang? I don't. |
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| | //This is sticky. Maybe we just have five or seven "states"? You've already identified three (Demoralized, Desperate, Broken). Could we add three that are on the "plus" side? Maybe "Energized", "Vengeful", or "Popular"? Then maybe we just roll to see if the hit they took slides them up or down the scale? I certainly don't want to bean-count bad guys. That is just no fun. // |
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| | **So perhaps every time they cross, say 30 or 50 points of damage, they make a morale roll that determines a state, but with a negative penalty to the roll based on the current damage total** |
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| | //I like that a lot better! I might even roll twice if the first roll is a critical failure or the damage crosses 80-100.// |
