Re: Zero Damage Result
 

Over the years, I have had a number of characters that consistently miss or do little or no damage. Rolling high when they need low and low when they need high.


I have also found that the group gets a lot of enjoyment out of that character's predicaments. I have been tremendously frustrated by these characters and have retired them as quickly as possible, but the rest of the group seems to have just taken it in stride.

Re: Zero Damage Result
 

Exactly the Spirit of the game I'm talking about.

Enjoy the game even if your character is now grout filling, it's HOW he got there that will be remembered.

Grout....my next character's name. Her parents never did have high expectations of her anyway.

Re: Zero Damage Result
 

No disrespect intended, honorable ecz, but to me, this statement ranks among the least believable I have ever heard with respect to RPGs. I've been playing RPGs for a long, long time. I've never been around a more vocal group of complainers and subjective judges of "fairness" than RPG players. It's a player complaint about this issue that drove me to start this thread, so "never?" I guess your mileage may vary. Mine certainly does!

I'm new to Melee. Before the Kickstarter showed up I think I might have heard TFT (or Wizard or Melee) mentioned once or twice, and I've been playing RPGs and Wargames since about 1979. TFT has long been a unicorn system to me: never actually seen in the wild. I don't have any "experienced" players to guide me on this journey aside from you all. I only know one guy who actually played Melee and Wizard from way-way back, and it was so long ago he didn't remember anything at all. Also, he was a kid then.

Aside from the Squad Leader mention -- and it's been at least 30 years since I've played that game, so I'm taking that poster's word for it -- I don't recall any RPG (war games are different!) where a successful hit could result in no damage without some kind of rule-exception in the form of a power/talent/spell/condition/whatever. But that said, a Zero Damage result rule is very war game-y, and Melee is much closer to a war game than an RPG. If any of that is true, then I can see why this rule exists. What gives me pause is that I would think there would be at least one example in the text of this occurring. It seems pretty significant to me, and all three rulebooks fail to bring this up as an example across numerous examples of combat.

I have another game tomorrow. It's the continuation of the one that prompted this topic. I'm going to present all this information to them, including the statement from ecz that no one has ever complained about this in 32 years! That'll show 'em. ;-) But seriously, there may be a very good reason that Zero Damage on a successful hit is an expected result and I'm starting to think that it might make the game less deadly. The argument about "lighter" weapons having other advantages is a good one, too.

I need more reflection on this. I'll let you know what the feedback from my group is.

Re: Zero Damage Result
 

Yes, it's even harder to believe when the forum for this very game has a House Rules sub-forum!!!

And even fewer where a "critical" hit does zero damage.

Re: Zero Damage Result
 

See Steve Jackson's other RPG, GURPS, for another RPG where you can hit for zero damage, and where the median results on the Critical Hit and Critical Head Hit tables are "no special effect".

As someone who started with TFT and then GURPS, and who has tried but others but has always preferred Steve's RPG's, one of the main features for me has always been that (yes, like wargames, and unlike typical RPGs) the rules and stats are actually making an effort to behave like the situation. A weak attack (e.g. improvised weapons, a torch, a light weapon) may well hit but do no significant damage on the scale of TFT ST because that mostly makes sense and is a good representation of the situation. (e.g. if a Rapier or Horse Bow does 1d6, a dagger or Short Bow should do less than that. And there needs to be a way to represent attacks that might hurt you some but may not (1d-3, 1d-4, 1d-5).


Well TFT does have only three short (two merely one-on-one) examples of combat, and since only the lightest in the game have any chance of doing zero damage, it's not liable to come up (IIRC, only the Magic Fist attack in the Wizard example could have rolled zero damage).

"Any hit always does at least 1 damage" would be gamey in a way that TFT's rules logic generally is not. If players really want to, of course they can house rule otherwise.


Yes, it does make it less deadly, especially in situations where there are a large number of light attacks, such as a barrage of sling shots or rocks... or unarmed attacks by ordinary not very strong people.

Re: Zero Damage Result
 

when I say "nobody complained since 1987" I mean that everyone quietly accepted the rules as written and applied by the GM (me) AT MY TABLE*. Zero problems, zero requests to house rule differently the zero damage thing. Probably someone could have a different opinion about the rule that makes possible a zero damage even after a critical hit, but *OUR GROUP never discussed it around a table.

This has to do with the knowledge of other systems ( I mentioned SL/ASL) where the dice results open a wide range of effects and aren't automatically themselves the effect. Hence the mere equation low roll= high damage simply does not apply all the times and we are (were) aware of this.

Please do not take too literally what one non-English native speaker says ;-)

reason for editing: *could be you misread my phrase thinking I was talking in general and not referring to my group of players?

Re: Zero Damage Result
 

A wineskin of Absorbsion!

Small wineskin, large wineskin, bullhide armored wineskin.