Q: Using the body area damage system is a
fireball divided evenly among all the areas of the body?
A: In most cases, yes. The only exception would be an example where
the character being attacked was stand up to his waist in the water or situated
in such a way as to only expose a portion of the body. As GM I usually will
divide the fireball damage total by the number of body areas exposed. I also
think it makes sense to say that the damage goes straight to the characters
body if they are wearing metal armor. If the armor is metal it will be super
heated by the fireball doing damage and leather armor would provide protection
but be destroyed in the process.
Q: If a PC is backstabbed with a poison
dagger, does the damage from the poison only go into the area hit, or does it
travel through the rest of the PC's system? How does ingested poison work?
A: Some poisons actually do physical damage causing paralysis or
other nasty effects. In the case of a poison dagger I would assign damage to
the character for the dagger blow, if it penetrates the armor the character
should make a saving throw vs. poison. From here the damage is going to be
determined by the type of poison. If the character fails the first saving throw
I will assign damage to that body area for poison by rolling a damage die and
then each round, as the poison begins to move through the body, I will require
the PC to make a saving throw for each body area. This process would continue
until the character can get help or the poison runs its course. We handle
ingested poisons a bit differently. The character makes a saving throw and if
the check fails the characters constitution or strength will begin to drop.
Again, the effect on the PC are determined largely by the type of poison you
are using.
Q: If an assassin is using a poison dagger
that does 1d4 against a character wearing plate mail armor that has a score of
5, how can the assassin ever have a chance to succeed?
A: In order for the assassin to penetrate or puncture the fighters
armor he would need to do at least 5 points of damage to through the armor and
at least one more point of damage to administer the dose of poison. This extra
damage can be achieved by magic or strength bonuses. However, if the assassin
does not have any of these options there is also a chance that they could
administer the poison by making attacking a specific area of the armor. This
situation brings into effect the "called shot" rules discussed in the
attacking section of the house rules. If your
assassin is going to aim for a weak spot in the fighters armor I would suggest
a modifier that is a bit more severe such as -4 or -5. It can be tough to hit
this way but also very rewarding when you do.
Q: If characters are rolling against each
other's skill levels to determine hits what do you do if a character has
surprise? Is the hit automatic?
A: No, nothing in life is automatic. The defending character would
get a roll of 1d20 plus defense modifier. The attacker would receive 1d20 plus
strength, magic and a +3 ToHit modifier for surprise. As we see it, there is
always a split second of awareness before the attack due to peripheral vision,
the twang of a bow string or the reactions of others, especially for a seasoned
adventurer.
Q: How do you resolve range weapon attacks
using the dynamic ToHit system?
A: Unless the character is walking around with and arrow ready to go
we build time into the system for the character to load, draw and fire.
Characters with any bow that have one attack per round always attack in the
last phase of each round. Phase 1 is loading, phase 2 is drawing and aiming and
phase 3 is fire. If the character is higher level or specialized in bow
allowing multiple bow attacks per round they attack every other phase. So in
round one the character would fire in phase 2, in round 2 the character would
attack twice in phases 1 and 3. In the case of light and medium crossbows we
have them always fire in phase 3 and heavy crossbow fires every other round
because of the longer load time.
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