GURPS and directly crippling effects/spells?

[Liantefaron]

Hello dear hivemind,

I came across the problem of a RoleMaster->GURPS conversion (idiotic idea, I know), but I want to know if anyone has advice on this:

The RM Warlock has a spell which primary function is not to deal damage, but to break bones (that is, to cripple the opponent). I know that you'd need to inflict HT/2 points of damage to a limb to cripple it, but there seems to be no other way in GURPS to cripple someone than to inflict hit points. Or is there?

I thought about a possible Affliction à la 'Incapacitation/Paralysis' Enhancement, but that seems to be out of the question, too, since the text (B35) says "baneful, nondamaging effect" - and the Crippling would be a permanently damaging effect. It might work with a 'Disadvantage:Lame' or 'Disadvantage:One Arm' Enhancement, but, again, the effect wouldn't be permanent.

The next thought was to word a spell or advantage so that it automatically doesn enough damage to cripple its target at a fixed HP-to-FP cost (say, 2-to-1). So, when you're casting at a typical HP10 human, the spell would (if not resisted with HT), do exactly 5 hits to a leg or arm (specified by the caster) and cripple it, but it would drain 3FP (3FP*2hits=6 hit points) no matter what. This would make the spell quite dangerous against opponents with (unexpectedly?) high HP, though, and runs counter to the 'buy dice of damage with FP' GURPS standard.

Any thoughts on this?

Edit: There's Deathtouch as an example of a resistable-direct-damage-spell, but it's designed to attack the total HP of the target at touch only; I need something ranged that does resistable damage to a particular hit location instead, with the primary goal of crippling, not killing.

[Ulzgoroth]

I'm not sure how you'd go about building it with advantages. But as a spell, it sounds like it might be similar to Wither Limb.

[Liantefaron]

Good start, overlooked that one, and it is worded such that one just needs to replace "withered" by "broken".
...Now it's only a question of game balance and fixing a new, adequate FT pricing for making the thing ranged.

[davidtmoore]

As a power, I might buy an Innate Attack, limited to only be usable on a limb, to do no excess beyond more than HT/2, and to do no damage at all if it does HT/2 or less.

[starslayer]

there may be a simpler way to handle this; I'm not 100% familiar with rolemaser, so correct me if I'm wrong, but it is not granular enough to represent a broken limb the way that gurps does and instead resorts to a -x to all abilities (or -y%)

In which case you can use an affliction with reduce DX/IQ and a duration enhancement for 'healed like a crippling injury'

[LemmingLord]

You can add increased duration on afflictions can't you? Just add enough so it is permanent.

[DouglasCole]

One of my favorite "incapacitation" spells was Tickle. If successful, for a full minute, 60 GURPS turns, the victim is on the floor, giggling, unable to do anything.

It's not damaging, injurious, crippling, or directly lethal. And yet it more than does the trick...

[PK]

For a spell, sure. Just decide the effects and set the FP cost high enough to balance it out.

For a power, sure. Affliction (Disadvantage, One Armor) would temporarily cripple an arm just fine, for example. Just adjust duration to taste.