Cramped combat - low ceilings, narrow halls?

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by another_nonsense

Perhaps penalties should only apply to swung weapons?

I've always thought a bigger deal should be made about confined spaces in caves and dungeons. I think it would really add to tension especially if there were chanced of cave-ins and tight flooded spaces (swimming penalties and fright checks when you start running out of air and still can't see the other end..).

Tense. And would really knock the PC's confidence down a peg or two.

Nah, it's well known that all dungeons are barrel vaulted, closed floored and stone walled with 10' ceilings unless otherwise noted and corridors 5' or 10' wide so that they fit nicely on graph paper.

[Crakkerjakk]

Originally Posted by The Colonel

Nah, it's well known that all dungeons are barrel vaulted, closed floored and stone walled with 10' ceilings unless otherwise noted and corridors 5' or 10' wide so that they fit nicely on graph paper.

Descent (a otherwise unremarkable horror movie) really cemented to me how bad underground combat can be in a a natural structure.

[Edges]

Originally Posted by Lupo

I think you might have over-penalized a bit here.
If the human Space is 1 yard (3 feet), I would not use the word "squeeze" to describe someone walking between two vans parked at 2 feet from each other. (perhaps it's just that English is not my native language, though).
I would halve Move for running, but I would still allow ordinary Step and... maneuvers in a corridor 2 feet wide.
Running in a narrow space is very difficult, walking not so much (to pass through a 2 feet wide passage, a woman or a minute man won't even need to turn sideways his/her shoulders so much)

Also, the narrowest "wrigglable" area should probably be something narrower than 1/2 yard, if passing through is meant to be as slow as crawling.
They say that, if you can squeeze your head through a narrow place, your whole body can pass through...

Seems like it would depend a lot on the person. I'm 6'2" with broad shoulders but I may be what GURPS would call Skinny. I could probably maneuver through 2' wide passages at full Move. I think the only penalty I'd face would be "cannot sprint." But I know people that couldn't even fit in a 2' hallway at any Move.

Being in a 2' passage would require me to have my shoulders angled. It may rotate "front-flank-back" hexes relative to my direction of travel. If I was ambushed at a "T" from the direction I was turned away from, it would be hard to defend (or attack for that matter).

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by Crakkerjakk

Descent (a otherwise unremarkable horror movie) really cemented to me how bad underground combat can be in a a natural structure.

[/pisstake] Indeed. Most FRPGs don't do the horrors of fighting in the dark with not enough space to swing a weapon very well ... all too often everyone seems to have infrared night vision or the dungeon is conveniently lit. Players get upset really quickly if the dungeon is dark and the guy holding the light attracts every round of ammunition in the place.
Descent was okay for a low budget indy, and a lot better than a lot of the high budget Hollywood slasher crap that gets called horror these days, but I take your point. Of course, compared to the other two caving movies that came out that year it was a masterpiece. If it wasn't an 18 I'd be tempted to show it to my scouts before they go caving.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Lupo

They say that, if you can squeeze your head through a narrow place, your whole body can pass through...

...are they crazy? Do they think they could fit their body through the neck-hole of a helmet?

Shoulders and pelvis can both give fit problems with narrow spaces.

[quarkstomper]

That's true of ferrets. I don't know about most humans, though...

[Edges]

I saw a show once about a guy who was sucked through a pipe that wasn't much bigger than his head. If I remember right, he survived but was permanently (and seriously) deformed.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by quarkstomper

That's true of ferrets. I don't know about most humans, though...

Cats and ferrets are exceptional for being able to do that. It's because of having "floating" shoulderblades, ie not attached to the spine at hard-points.

Humans are pretty explicitly in the class of animals that can't normally do this - chinese acrobats and escape artists are sort of freakishly exceptional. And we get back to Flexible and Double-Jointed, which mitigate penalties for close quarters and awkward angles - either of which would be appropriate for the kind of human/animal that squeezes through spaces the size of its head.

[MagiMaster]

I wonder if Lupo didn't mean squeezing between two walls, instead of through a pipe.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Edges

Seems like it would depend a lot on the person. I'm 6'2" with broad shoulders but I may be what GURPS would call Skinny. I could probably maneuver through 2' wide passages at full Move.

Just as a sanity check, Move 5, full Move for Joe Average, is a 6 minute mile; 10 miles an hour. What you're saying is that you think you can move through a 2 foot wide space at this speed reliably?