Minor Tweeks to Grappling Rules

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by phayman53

Cool! I'm glad I could contribute to your quest for better grappling rules of various levels of complexity. I like your suggestions, though I don't think I'll implement them all with my newbees. But I especially like your expansion of pass limb and the ability to grapple again for more penalties.

One question: since grappling the torso gives -4 to DX for actions involving the torso, but -2 to DX for actions involving the arms and legs only (and head, I guess), which actions with the arms do not involve the torso. Most weapons strikes, even one handed, require the core, so should those suffer the whole -4 to DX? What about parries and blocks? I think it would be safe to only penalize grapple attempts by -2 since grabbing is not the same as striking hard. Thanks!

For simplicity, I'd simply carry the overall penalty as -4 to DX, -2 to Parry/Block, and -1 to Dodge. While of course it's hard to escape the "it all comes from the core!" basic truth, from a game perspective, it's easier to just say "penalties cover everything, specific locations on limbs disallow actions with that limb."

I like the idea of penalizing grappling less, if for no other reason than to encourage folks to grapple back to break free, which is the most common response (along with grabbing the other guy).