Low-Tech characters HT score

[Walrus]

I have polar opinions about average HT score of realistic Low-Tech (TL 3-) characters.

Obviously with lack of sanitation and proper food, constant struggling and labor people could tend to have lower HT score.

However, maybe those who managed to mature had naturally higher HT and those who had lower HT just died in childhood?

Or was that just the matter of luck and big numbers?

So, what is realistic average HT level among TL 3 adults? If it possible, please, give it for categories:
- peasants, serfs;
- semi-regular militia;
- free land-owners, lower nobility;
- professional soldiers, mercenaries, medium nobility;
- average clergy members;
- lower free people: crafters, poor squires;
- higher free people: smiths, merchants;

High nobility and higher clergy members are out of this because they have better nutrition and healthcare.

Thanks in advance!

[trooper6]

The book says an average score is 10. I just go with that and try not to overthink it.

[Maz]

I think it's fair to let malnutrition give a -1 HT penalty.

Mostly though, I think the conditions have more to do with forcing a lot more HT checks. Low sanitation might result in weekly HT checks for an infection.
Little to no understanding of viruses also means you are much more often required to roll against it.

[Anders]

But yeah, people died a lot. Remember, people had five, six, up to ten, twelve kids. Yet the population hardly grew. In a world where you can do from a wound getting infected, or getting pneumonia or cholera... people die.

[Tomsdad]

Originally Posted by Maz

...
Mostly though, I think the conditions have more to do with forcing a lot more HT checks. Low sanitation might result in weekly HT checks for an infection.
Little to no understanding of viruses also means you are much more often required to roll against it.

Yep I think this is key.

If you keep HT @ 10 on average but force more HT checks you will get the overall effect of lower HT anyway.


The thing is while they might not have known germ theory etc, sanitation was not exactly an unknown thing. They knew cause and effect even if they didn't understand the processes involved at times.

Sanitation was also variable depending on where you were. Medieval towns and cities not great (lack of infrastructure and knowledge to deal with the strain), out in the country? less of an issue.

Similarly with epidemics etc.

[Anders]

Remember that up until (IIRC) the 19th century, cities depended on people coming in from the country to keep their populations intact. The environment in cities was so bad that, left on their own, they couldn't replenish their own population. That tells you something about how much epidemics were concentrated to urban centers.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by trooper6

The book says an average score is 10. I just go with that and try not to overthink it.

In addition, anyone with a score higher or lower than 10 has to adjust their CP accordingly. Nobles don't get a free +1 HT because they put 10 points into Status. That might be the fluff justification for buying up your HT score -- but fluff justifications don't directly grant you stats because you have a good story for them.

That average of 10 is also not for all of humanity for all time, some sort of global determination of reality. It's relative to your setting. More extreme settings might not even use humans as the baseline for 10s.

Higher tech medical care already grants bonuses for being higher tech. (And "tech" includes knowledge like proper nutrition, as well as availability of the goods.) It'd be double-dipping to also add to base HT for those same reasons.

Just leave the average at ten. If you want some nobles to all be fit, well-cared-for, shining examples of humanity, feel free to give those NPCs 11s, or require such PCs to buy up their HT to match their character concept. Or if you want some miserable, downtrodden, disease-ridden serfs, again feel free to give them 9s or 8s, or require the PCs to take the HT-related Advantages and Disadvantages suitable for those concepts.

[Stormcrow]

Doesn't matter. Average level only matters for character-point cost, and character-point cost only matters to PCs. Go ahead and have NPCs with lower average HT scores if you feel it's appropriate; PCs will still default to 10. For playability, it just doesn't matter.

If you absolutely must know, consider taking a group of TL1 characters and a group of TL8 characters through a banestorm. All are the same young age, the same sex, they're all accountants, and none have the Running skill; in all other respects they are chosen completely at random. They find themselves all running a marathon. Are the TL8 characters more likely to win the marathon than the TL1 characters?

[Dustin]

I'd say it's pretty much a wash. The people who get better nutrition and sanitation are also performing less cardiovascular exercise. Considering where you are on the bell curve, going from HT 10 to 11 is a massive advantage to assign to an entire socioeconomic class. I agree that the upper classes are probably just making fewer HT checks as part of their lives.

[Purple Haze]

GURPS defines "ST:10 DX:10 IQ:10 HT:10" as "an 18 year old male fit for military service" in whatever time or place you set you campaign.

It is hard to imagine a social class with a lifestyle that would justify a blanket +1 to HT.

There are going to be a lot of marginalized people to whom you could assign a -1, but do they realistically have a lower HT or are the consequences of a failed HT simply more severe for them.