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Old 07-18-2019, 01:46 AM   #1
johndallman
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Join Date: Oct 2010
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Default [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Motion Sickness

Motion Sickness [-10] is a mundane physical disadvantage. You cannot travel comfortably in any kind of vehicle, because their motion induces nausea. This disadvantage appeared in Compendium I for GURPS 3e.

This disadvantage represents a severe case of the real-world condition. You need to make a HT roll every time you start a journey in any sort of vehicle, and every subsequent day, for long journeys. If you succeed, you’re queasy and at -2 to DX, IQ and skill rolls. If you fail, you vomit (or some equivalent for your race) and are at -5 to DX, IQ and skill rolls. You can never learn any kind of vehicle-operation skill.

Not many real people seem to have a full case of this disadvantage, but a quite a few suffer from seasickness, airsickness and so on. There seems to be scope for applying limitations to model this. Drugs that might be mitigators (‑60%), at least for some forms, appear at TL6. Buying it off for one kind of vehicle could plausibly be a ‑20% limitation: after a couple of days being seasick, you could spend 2 points on this, for “Not seasickness”, and buying it for five types of vehicle would buy it off altogether. There are people who are fine “once they get their sea-legs” and then need time to re-adjust to land, which might be a -10% limitation.

There are rules for getting seasick without this disadvantage on p. 436 in Basic, and Discworld applies them to travel by camel. High-Tech and Horror point out that Motion Sickness can be a side-effect of psychiatric medications; Madness Dossier has drugs that do nothing else. SEALs in Vietnam makes it a prohibited disadvantage, and Steampunk 3 has Resistant to Motion Sickness, for the truly dedicated military officer.

I’ve never seen this disadvantage used in a game. I’ve been seasick at the -2 to DX/IQ level in real life, and had an inner-ear infection that gave me motion sickness while lying very still; it seems like something to reserve for very rough travel. Has Motion Sickness been important in your games?
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Old 07-18-2019, 04:19 AM   #2
coronatiger
 
Join Date: Apr 2018
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Motion Sickness

Does riding a horse count as driving a vehicle?
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Old 07-18-2019, 05:02 AM   #3
vicky_molokh
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Motion Sickness

Quote:
Originally Posted by coronatiger View Post
Does riding a horse count as driving a vehicle?
The criterion is not just a vehicle, but a vehicle faster than buggies. So depends on speed.
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