Overpenetration

mummy_lord · 10-09-2020, 02:11 PM

Hello, dumb question for sure but I cannot find the answer.

What is the Overpenetration Threshold for hit locations?

HP/2 for limbs and HP/3 for extremities just like Crippling Injury threshold? Or just HP?

Joe has 10 HP, DR 0.
H&K USP .40 S&W (2d+2 pi+) pistol attack.
Roll 10 basic damage to the Arm, so 15 points of Injury.
Joe suffers 6 points of injury and the Arm is shattered.
Should the bullet continue to travel past Joe's arm or not?

10 basic damage > HP/2 (5) answer is yes, with 5 points of damage pi+ to deliver.
10 basic damage = HP (10) answer is no.

And what about other hit locations with no Crippling injury threshold?
Would 14 points of damage pi+ overpenetrate Joe's Skull?
If threshold is HP, answer is no (14 - DR2 - 10HP - DR 2 = 0).

Last night a player badly missed a roll to hit a bad guy in an hostage situation. Hostage has been hit... A bullet in the Cheek for 8 points of damage (poor girl with 8 HP). I didn't know if the bullet could exit from the back of Jane's head and hit the bad guy in the neck.

Thank you.

Luca

Anthony · 10-09-2020, 02:59 PM

I would assume it's the same as the threshold for 'damage beyond this amount is lost', which is the same as the crippling threshold (realistically, it should probably be stopped if it hits bone, otherwise pass through, but that's beyond the resolution of GURPS damage).

In the case of a hit to the cheek, there's a fair amount of bone in there, so I'd probably use HP, though the neck might be hp/2.

Plane · 10-09-2020, 06:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anthony

I would assume it's the same as the threshold for 'damage beyond this amount is lost', which is the same as the crippling threshold

I like this, which is why I like the max impaling damage in Low-Tech to match the cover DR.

Although weirdly I don't think there actually is a decreased maximum even when you produce less cover DR like unliving/homogenous targets do. They should probably in addition to taking lower multipliers also have a smaller cap.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anthony

(realistically, it should probably be stopped if it hits bone, otherwise pass through, but that's beyond the resolution of GURPS damage).

It's not below-res if you hit the skull or the spine...

I've always thought it'd be cool to treat HP as muscle and assign skeletal DR for everyplace underneath that HP.

Simplest might be to emulate skeletons and just make it DR 2 everywhere.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anthony

In the case of a hit to the cheek, there's a fair amount of bone in there, so I'd probably use HP, though the neck might be hp/2.

Face might be places besides the cheek, do you mean like the jaw?

Ears from the front and noses from the side should give very little cover DR, while hitting ears from side or nose from front, after passing through them, should probably just hit the face.

Anthony · 10-09-2020, 06:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Plane

Face might be places besides the cheek, do you mean like the jaw?

The OP specified 'cheek'. There are very few paths through the head from front to back that don't pass through a fair amount of bone, though.

MrFix · 10-09-2020, 11:57 PM

MA136, under extreme dismemberment, provides DR values of limbs. They're HP/2 for Limb and HP/3 for Extremity.

Since cheek is not a specific hit location, but part of face, and face cannot be crippled like limb and extremity, use full HP as it's DR value. A 10 HP person's face provides 10 DR to whoever is behind them.

Alternatively, Nose is part of Face hit location and can be crippled, it has HP/4 crippling treshold. Following above logic, it provides HP/4 worth of DR to whoever is behind it. I suppose you could rule that cheek hit equals to nose hit. Although it's worth remembering that "Face" hit location includes the entirety of person's facial skull, including teeth, jaws, chin etc, and has lots of important pieces that warrant face to provide full HP-worth of DR.

Paydalanw · 10-09-2020, 11:58 PM

First thing — PI+, Pi++ and Imp does x1 to Limbs.
And if we assume "Extreme Dismemberment" [MA136] is close relative of "Overpenetration", then for overpenetration it can work same way:

Quote:

Apply an effective DR equal to the new target’s DR, plus the DR of the severed body part, plus HP/2 if that was a limb or HP/3 if it was an extremity (round up).

"
So if you shoot HP10 guy in Arm (HP6;DR0) for 10 Basic Damage you can hope that at least 4 Basic Damage will overpenetrate. But, IIRC, Torso/Neck/Head always use full HP.

mummy_lord · 10-10-2020, 08:49 AM

Thanks everyone fo the answers!

Extreme dismemberment seems the correct way to go =)

About the Neck... Without tampering too much with this Hit Location, i think HP/2 threshold wouldn't be a bad choice for Overpenetration ONLY.

L

Plane · 10-10-2020, 06:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrFix

MA136, under extreme dismemberment, provides DR values of limbs. They're HP/2 for Limb and HP/3 for Extremity.

That part seemed weird to me, since you actually had to do enough damage to sever the limb for this to apply, meaning you actually inflicted double that amount.

So for example applying the 1.5 multiplier... to an HP 10 foe

4 damage = 6HP: arm is crippled
8 damage = 12HP: just manage to sever the arm, not enough force to carry over to attack next one

9 damage = 13HP: by exceeding the severing requirement, you may target the next arm at -5 damage (1/2 HP) to the original damage roll... 9-5=4 basic damage x 1.5 = 6 HP to other arm: enough to cripple it!

There is no middle ground there for suffering a moderate range of 1-3 damage (1-4 HP) damage to the next limb. In this situation ALL overpenetrating limb cuts are guaranteed to have enough leftover force to cripple the next.

binn05 · 05-23-2021, 07:09 PM

Sorry for necroing, but I thought was best to keep going on a topic instead of creating a new one.

How would you deal if eye threshold?
I agree with using HP/3 and /2 for hands/feet and arms/legs, but HP/10 for eyes seems strange since there is still the brain after.

But brains are not as dense as muscle and bones to justify full HP.
Any thoughts on that?

Plane · 05-24-2021, 10:28 AM

Supers 127 under Mental Crippling and Killing has fractions of HP for body parts that weren't assigned before which seem convenient to borrow if we're to speculate at the cover DR given by non-torso hit locations...

HP/10 for groin
HP/3 for face or neck
HP/2 for vitals or skull

It does still seem a bit high for a brain (wish GURPS would call it Brain instead of Skull, since you can still have a Skull if you have No Brain and you can still have a Brain with No Skull) or even for vitals for that matter.

HP/2 (same as a limb!) is probably writers edging on the side of "we want to make it hard to cripple important stuff despite how squishy they are"

I'd actually imagine them to be even more vulnerable than neck/face like perhaps HP/4.

Also groin being exactly as easy to cripple as an eyeball... in my experience it's a tad tougher, like maybe HP/5 ?

We could write off this weirdness as being unique to Mental Crippling (psychologically your groin is more vulnerable than it is physically... while psychologically your brain is less vulnerable than it is physically) I guess?

10-09-2020, 02:11 PM	#1
mummy_lord Join Date: Feb 2019	Overpenetration Hello, dumb question for sure but I cannot find the answer. What is the Overpenetration Threshold for hit locations? HP/2 for limbs and HP/3 for extremities just like Crippling Injury threshold? Or just HP? Joe has 10 HP, DR 0. H&K USP .40 S&W (2d+2 pi+) pistol attack. Roll 10 basic damage to the Arm, so 15 points of Injury. Joe suffers 6 points of injury and the Arm is shattered. Should the bullet continue to travel past Joe's arm or not? 10 basic damage > HP/2 (5) answer is yes, with 5 points of damage pi+ to deliver. 10 basic damage = HP (10) answer is no. And what about other hit locations with no Crippling injury threshold? Would 14 points of damage pi+ overpenetrate Joe's Skull? If threshold is HP, answer is no (14 - DR2 - 10HP - DR 2 = 0). Last night a player badly missed a roll to hit a bad guy in an hostage situation. Hostage has been hit... A bullet in the Cheek for 8 points of damage (poor girl with 8 HP). I didn't know if the bullet could exit from the back of Jane's head and hit the bad guy in the neck. Thank you. Luca

10-09-2020, 02:59 PM	#2
Anthony Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Berkeley, CA	Re: Overpenetration I would assume it's the same as the threshold for 'damage beyond this amount is lost', which is the same as the crippling threshold (realistically, it should probably be stopped if it hits bone, otherwise pass through, but that's beyond the resolution of GURPS damage). In the case of a hit to the cheek, there's a fair amount of bone in there, so I'd probably use HP, though the neck might be hp/2. __________________ My GURPS site and Blog.

10-09-2020, 11:57 PM	#5
MrFix Join Date: Aug 2019	Re: Overpenetration MA136, under extreme dismemberment, provides DR values of limbs. They're HP/2 for Limb and HP/3 for Extremity. Since cheek is not a specific hit location, but part of face, and face cannot be crippled like limb and extremity, use full HP as it's DR value. A 10 HP person's face provides 10 DR to whoever is behind them. Alternatively, Nose is part of Face hit location and can be crippled, it has HP/4 crippling treshold. Following above logic, it provides HP/4 worth of DR to whoever is behind it. I suppose you could rule that cheek hit equals to nose hit. Although it's worth remembering that "Face" hit location includes the entirety of person's facial skull, including teeth, jaws, chin etc, and has lots of important pieces that warrant face to provide full HP-worth of DR. __________________ Your level of GURPS proficiency: Pedestrian: 3e vs 4e Proficient: Early 4e vs Late 4e Master: Kromm vs PK GURPS: Shooting things for fun and profit Last edited by MrFix; 10-10-2020 at 12:00 AM.

10-10-2020, 08:49 AM	#7
mummy_lord Join Date: Feb 2019	Re: Overpenetration Thanks everyone fo the answers! Extreme dismemberment seems the correct way to go =) About the Neck... Without tampering too much with this Hit Location, i think HP/2 threshold wouldn't be a bad choice for Overpenetration ONLY. L

05-23-2021, 07:09 PM	#9
binn05 Join Date: Apr 2014 Location: Bahia, Brazil	Re: Overpenetration Sorry for necroing, but I thought was best to keep going on a topic instead of creating a new one. How would you deal if eye threshold? I agree with using HP/3 and /2 for hands/feet and arms/legs, but HP/10 for eyes seems strange since there is still the brain after. But brains are not as dense as muscle and bones to justify full HP. Any thoughts on that? __________________ My Blog - https://nohrpg.wordpress.com/ Mostly GURPS.

05-24-2021, 10:28 AM	#10
Plane Join Date: Aug 2018	Re: Overpenetration Supers 127 under Mental Crippling and Killing has fractions of HP for body parts that weren't assigned before which seem convenient to borrow if we're to speculate at the cover DR given by non-torso hit locations... HP/10 for groin HP/3 for face or neck HP/2 for vitals or skull It does still seem a bit high for a brain (wish GURPS would call it Brain instead of Skull, since you can still have a Skull if you have No Brain and you can still have a Brain with No Skull) or even for vitals for that matter. HP/2 (same as a limb!) is probably writers edging on the side of "we want to make it hard to cripple important stuff despite how squishy they are" I'd actually imagine them to be even more vulnerable than neck/face like perhaps HP/4. Also groin being exactly as easy to cripple as an eyeball... in my experience it's a tad tougher, like maybe HP/5 ? We could write off this weirdness as being unique to Mental Crippling (psychologically your groin is more vulnerable than it is physically... while psychologically your brain is less vulnerable than it is physically) I guess?