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Old 07-04-2019, 03:31 PM   #1
johndallman
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Default [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Missing Digit, One Arm and One Hand

Missing Digit [-2 or -5], One Arm [-20] and One Hand [-15] are all mundane physical disadvantages, for creatures that normally have arms, hands and digits, or something equivalent. There’s no direct way that I can find to model someone who’s lost both hands, or both arms: No Fine Manipulators is reserved for races without manipulators, or without limbs. Missing Digit appeared in Compendium I for 3e, while One Arm and One Hand both date from 1e, and have always been used to represent effects of injury.

Missing Digit simply gives DX penalties for use of that hand, -5 for the thumb or -1 for a finger. One Arm and One Hand have many of their rules in common, and assume you lost your off-hand arm or hand. You cannot perform any task that requires two hands, such as using a two-handed weapon, and tasks that can be done with one hand, but are usually done using both, like Climbing or Wrestling, are at -4. Impromptu reality checks are recommended when it’s not clear if a task requires both hands. Advanced prosthetics that cancel out these disadvantages give you a Mitigator (-60%) limitation on them. If you are of a race that has only one arm naturally, such as an elephant, you have One Arm, rather than No Fine Manipulators, and can use modifiers from the Extra Arms advantage.

One Hand lets you do more: you can make unarmed parries with the handless arm, or strap a shield to it. You can wield two weapons if one of them is attached to your stump, such as a hook; that’s also worth +1 to Intimidation skill. Simple prosthetics, such as a grabber or hook, give -2 to -4 to DX compared to having a hand.

In some game settings, simple and dangerous-looking replacements reduce appearance by a level. Societies where simply having lost a digit, hand or arm reduces appearance are probably rare; people are usually sympathetic to victims of accidents.

These disadvantages are, naturally, rare on published character templates, apart from pirates. Prosthetics are in Low-Tech, High-Tech and Ultra-Tech. Missing Digit shows up on Action’s Demolition Man, and in AtE Freakishness. DF14: Power-Ups has some ‘orrible Necromancer abilities based on One Arm, though more sensible Denizens: Swashbucklers would use Artificer technology, magic, or just buy the disadvantage down to a Distinctive Feature. Missing Digits are fairly common in Fantasy’s Roma Arcana, and Horror has a way to remove Corruption along with body parts. Martial Arts has more on combat effects, and Technical Grappling adds detail. Power-Ups 5: Impulse Buys includes a way to avoid loosing body parts in combat, at a fairly high price in character points, although if Psi-Tech is in use, you could try acquiring PK powers in their place. Steampunk has clockwork prostheses, and Supers equally-plausible powered armour which can serve as prosthetics.

How often have you seen players take these disadvantages at character creation? I suspect it is rare, but they’re worth having in the system to cover injuries.
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Old 07-04-2019, 03:35 PM   #2
Dalillama
 
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Missing Digit, One Arm and One Hand

I just recently made a character with a missing finger. He's a brawler of the old Southern school, which includes eye-gouging and digit-biting as standard manoeuvres, and you can't win them all.
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Old 07-04-2019, 03:38 PM   #3
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Missing Digit, One Arm and One Hand

Quote:
Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
Missing Digit [-2 or -5], One Arm [-20] and One Hand [-15] are all mundane physical disadvantages, for creatures that normally have arms, hands and digits, or something equivalent. There’s no direct way that I can find to model someone who’s lost both hands, or both arms: No Fine Manipulators is reserved for races without manipulators, or without limbs. Missing Digit appeared in Compendium I for 3e, while One Arm and One Hand both date from 1e, and have always been used to represent effects of injury.
By damn, you're right. The system could use a disadvantage that is to NFM what Lame is to No Legs. Though it does seem to me that an accident that removes two legs, but leaves the person alive, might be more likely than one that removes two arms without destroying the torso in between.
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Old 07-04-2019, 04:54 PM   #4
Þorkell
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Missing Digit, One Arm and One Hand

I think I've made two characters with the mentioned disads. One in an Old West game who had a missing finger, can't recall a single thing about the game or character.

The other one was a British soldier in Victorian times, can't recall the year. The game was a short one, a filler while taking a pause from a larger campaign with other characters. Anyway, he had a missing arm. Don't recall a lot of things coming up but he had trouble reloading his revolver, and climbing a rope was right out.
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Old 07-04-2019, 07:49 PM   #5
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Missing Digit, One Arm and One Hand

One of the PCs in my SF game started with a finger missing, though it never really came up in play outside of part of their backstory as to why they were Ambidextrous. Said character had the finger regrown a while back, and as of last session is missing a hand (heroically grabbed a grenade to hurl back at the thrower, grenade had an anti-tamper sensor).
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Old 07-05-2019, 12:08 AM   #6
Ultraviolet
 
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Missing Digit, One Arm and One Hand

My ongoing Cliffhanger campaign had a player just switch characters, from a Portuguese stage magician to a French-Canadian Great War veteran navy diver.

He suffer from One Hand, with a mechanical grabber in place of his left hand. He's just been playing in two sessions, it's a zombie scenario about being stuck in a small Tennesee town, racing a rival group to the dock to grab a boat out of there.

Anyhoo, his missing hand did not come into play in much of the first session, not anything I as GM had to enforce. The player is very conscious of when he needs to perform two handed tasks, and is actively describing how he carries the team's new mascot - McClucksky the chicken - in the crook of his arm.

Once things got really hairy, as their car's radiator was perforated by a shot from the rivals, and they were chased by zombies into the hotel lobby into a zombie ambush - he switched from the mechanical grabber to a mounted punching dagger. And they worked quote well, as an undroppable knife...

...until session two, when in the continued battle he rolled Crit Fail. He unfortunately didn't roll "Drop weapon" - which he was immune to - but instead "Weapon breaks". So I ruled that the stabby-hand became temporarily stuck in a door frame, while he was wrestling with a zombie. Later on he pulled it loose, but only the hand, the blade was stil lodged in the frame. Eventually the battle eased off and he pried the blade loose, but needs some quiet time to reattach it.

I think we had more than a reasonable amount of fun and nuissance with the hand, for now.
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