Shipwreck survival

[Nereidalbel]

Originally Posted by Vynticator

Three levels. Two of the three PCs are also Very Fit. I'm thinking number three might well slip into unconsciousness near the end of the swim, nice and dramatic, adding extra urgency to the scrounging for resources and shelter to make a fire once they're out.

Thanks for the maths and the refs to Supers rules on water cooling. I do own Supers but haven't fully digested it yet. Very handy to help gauge what will be a dramatic challenge for very powerful PCs, and what would instead be a rather anticlimactic party wipe by drowning!

Aside from high HT and TT, what else makes them "super?" If anybody is so fancy as to have the Ignition perk, they're in good shape as soon as they find some dead wood.

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by Vynticator

Three levels.

Is that:

a) 3X14 = 42. 42/2 =21. Temperature range 14F (35-21) to 111 (90+21)

or

b) 3X14 = 42. Temperature range -7F (35-42) to 90 (90+0)

Either way 40-48'F is nicely within their comfort zone, so they should be able to warm up, and regain all their fatigue once they hit land.

Originally Posted by Vynticator

Two of the three PCs are also Very Fit.

That will make a massive difference! They're rolling against 16, meaning they should fail 1 time in 54. And Very Fit means they should be rolling every 2 minutes for both swimming and cold, meaning they should lose 1FP every 54 minutes. After 2 hours they should be down 2, maybe 3 FP, which will take 10-15 minutes to regain when they hit dry land.

Overnight, assuming being naked [-5 to HT roll] with HT14+Very Fit, 14FP, a) (above), 30+ mile an hour winds and an effective temperature of -40F [-1 to HT roll], over 12 hours they should lose 18 FP, costing them 4 HP, which in the long run will obviously be fatal, but one night won't kill them, even without clothing or shelter.

What are their HT based survival scores?

[DangerousThing]

How are these guys seeing land while swimming?

I ask this not knowing anything about the real distances, but I've found while swimming at the beach it's easy for me to get lost if I don't take a few seconds every so often to get my bearings.

[dcarson]

With 3 of them I'd drop the -5 for naked to -4 if they huddle together. Maybe -3 if they can find a windbreak of some sort.

[Vynticator]

Originally Posted by NineDaysDead

How many levels of Temperature Tolerance do they have?

Originally Posted by Nereidalbel

Aside from high HT and TT, what else makes them "super?" If anybody is so fancy as to have the Ignition perk, they're in good shape as soon as they find some dead wood.

Aside from high points totals, they have a genetic package including regeneration (HP only, not FP), resistance to normal disease and poisons and unaging. Temp tolerance is 2/3 cold 1/3 heat.

No super powers or cinematic skills, perks or techniques. It's a bit like a slightly-toned-down Captain America, Tony Stark and Hawkeye finding themselves dumped in the Baltic.

[Vynticator]

Originally Posted by DangerousThing

How are these guys seeing land while swimming?

I ask this not knowing anything about the real distances, but I've found while swimming at the beach it's easy for me to get lost if I don't take a few seconds every so often to get my bearings.

That's part of the fun of the swim. The tail end of a storm will be raging when their boat is destroyed, they will be miles off shore (exact distance will vary depending on in-game choices). Most likely they won't be able to see shore at time of entry into the sea, so they will have to guesstimate the route to shore. They will be in a horseshoe bay (near Modern Halmstad, if you want to check google earth!) so it will be ok so long as they go roughly in the right direction. One of them knows the coastline well and they may have a sunstone (if they grab a belt with emergency and light gear pouches before being ditched into the sea) to check direction once the clouds thin a little.

I understand on a clear day you can see the coast 7 miles away from sea level, I am told by the inter web. So if they head broadly the right way and the storm clears after half an hour or so, they may see shore soon after that.

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by Vynticator

Aside from high points totals, they have a genetic package including regeneration (HP only, not FP),

How much regeneration do they have?

[Vynticator]

Originally Posted by NineDaysDead

How much regeneration do they have?

1/hr; the whole genetic package helps in a metagame way by preventing too much downtime between incidents, which the player group tend not to be very keen on - we like some elements 'crunchy' and others somewhat more 'hand wavy'. Things like long term injury and infection we are not making a very important part of play in this campaign. It's also important in terms of the backstory and in terms of the characters' identities, how they relate to the world, their 'fellow' humans, etc. But none of that relates directly to this thread.

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by Vynticator

1/hr; the whole genetic package helps in a metagame way by preventing too much downtime between incidents,

Sounds like GURPS Boat of a Million Years!

Ok so we have:
2 guys with HT 14, Very Fit, Regular Regeneration, and a comfort zone of 7F to 104F.
For simplicities sake I will assume 12 hours of day within their comfort zone and 12 hours of night below their comfort zone.

Assuming we have 30+ mile an hour winds they roll every 20 minutes (10 minutes X 2 for Very Fit), that's 36 rolls over 12 hours. Having HT 14 +2 for very fit and being naked means their based roll is 11. Temperature Tolerance means they roll at a -1 penalty for every 10F below -28F:
-28 = -0
-38 = -1
-48 = -2
-58 = -3
-68 = -4
etc...

Assuming the temperature is -67F they will be rolling at -3, giving 8. meaning they will fail 74.1% of the time. After about 20 rolls they should be roughly at 0FP, meaning any more FP lost will cost HP as well. The remaining 16 rolls should cost them roughly another 12 FP and 12 HP. those 16 rolls take place over 5.333 hours. After the first hour they regain 1 HP, meaning they regain 4hp in total by the time day comes, at which point they regain the fatigue in just over 2 hours and the HP in just over 8 hours, allowing them to repeat the cycle again the next night!


If you use the Frostbite rules from High-Tech then things get nasty!

Originally Posted by Frostbite; High-Tech page 63

Frostbite is acute somatic damage to exposed flesh caused by freezing. It’s distinct from FP and HP losses to hypothermia (see Cold, p. B430), which represent metabolic damage. The two effects can and often do occur simultaneously! At the GM’s option, those exposed to freezing conditions lose 1 HP on any exposed hit location per FP lost to cold. This can cripple extremities or even limbs, and is cumulative with injury due to hypothermia.

Since they're naked that means losing 12+ HP for every FP lost! They need shelter or they will die for 1 night!

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by NineDaysDead

Assuming we have 30+ mile an hour winds they roll every 20 minutes (10 minutes X 2 for Very Fit), that's 36 rolls over 12 hours. Having HT 14 +2 for very fit and being naked means their based roll is 11. Temperature Tolerance means they roll at a -1 penalty for every 10F below -28F:

Where do you come up with either 30 MPH winds and that extreme cold?