You can’t have a game inspired by Fist of the North Star
without including rules for:
1) Destroying things
2) Punching a tank to death
Also, environmental destruction needs to be a tactical dimension of battles, not just window dressing. How else are you going to defeat Super Shredder?
Hence, a refinement of the “building collapses in stages”
mechanics. They’re at the end under “Fallout”, check ‘em!
…
Environmental
Interaction/Hazards
Hazards
Hazards are dangerous things in the environment. A fire is a
hazard, as is acid, or freezing water.
They damage characters that interact with them. The amount
of damage they deal is determined by their Rating.
Rating is in Ranks of damage; a Rating of 1 deal 10 damage to an unprotected
character, a rating of 3 deal 30!
Characters can
withstand this damage with an Endurance action. Subtract the total of their
Endurance from the Hazard’s rating: if 0 or below, they weather the hazard to
no ill effect. Any positive number is dealt as damage.
Hazards are attached to the environment, either as Features or as an Attachment to a feature. A lake of lava is its own Feature, while a
burning sky scraper is a building feature with the bonfire Hazard as an
Attachment.
Hazards describe what kind of effect they have in the
tactical infinity with their Description.
This tells you what the hazard is; a fire, a freezing blast of wind, acid rain,
etc.
The Description might imply Secondary Effects, such as the choking smoke produced by a large
fire or the pushing force of a strong wind. Hazards generally specify Secondary
Effects, although GMs should rule according to the circumstances. A fire in a
well-ventilated area wouldn’t choke anybody, for instance.
Hazards might not last forever; for short-lived hazards like
fires, their Duration determines how long they endure. Once the Duration
lapses, they fizzle out.
Example:
Bonfire
Attachment
Rating: 3
Description: A large
fire; produces smoke and ash and devours air for fuel, creating a smothering
effect in enclosed areas. Spreads to nearby flammable objects that it damages.
Duration: One Action
Scene
Disasters
Disasters are things like earthquakes, typhoons, explosions,
landslides… Temporary but dangerous events that change the landscape and
endanger characters on a large scale.
They effect entire Areas at once. Their Scale tells you how many Areas are affected.
Disasters don’t attach to or occupy an environment so much
as they invade it; they lack the
Attachment/Feature distinction.
Disasters might travel; storms and tidal waves have a habit
of wreaking a path of destruction, for instance. A disaster’s Path describes the direction and speed
of its movement. They move the listed number of areas per a given interval
(such as 1 area/ action scene: they move to a neighboring area ever action
scene)
Speed is measured in increments of the Disaster’s Scale:
larger disasters don’t necessarily move faster, they simple cover a larger area
as they move.
Some Disasters, such as tornados, move. Others spread, which grows them into
neighboring areas. Fires are a notorious example of Disasters which spread,
rather than move.
For Disasters, their Rating doubles as a measure of how
destructive they are to the local scenery as well as characters caught in their
path. Consult the Environmental Destruction chart to determine the damages
caused.
Disasters are temporary; they have a Duration, exactly like
Hazards. Those lacking Duration are instantaneous; they occur once, then
expire. Explosions are a noteworthy example of this; a nuclear detonation
doesn’t last very long but is hideously destructive on a massive scale.
Disasters, as Hazards, have a Description which describes
Secondary Effects and their reality in the tactical infinity. As with Hazards,
GMs are encouraged to rule the individual effects of Disasters based on the circumstances
of the game.
Example:
Conflagration
Scale: 1 Area
Rating: 3
Path: 1 neighboring
Area/Action Scene
Duration: 5 Action
Scenes/ I real-Time Scene
Description: A raging
firestorm that engulfs everything in its path. Creates huge volumes of ash and
smoke, obscuring vision in effected areas and choking characters caught in its
path. Also roars loudly, making it difficult to hear. Spreads only to nearby
areas which have flammable material to feed it.
Environment
Destruction Chart
This chart is repeated from the Power entry under skills
(p.XX)
Rank 0 Break Glass:
Crack windows and other highly destructible terrain features. Damage the most
breakable things.
Rank 1-2 Break Wood: Totally shatter windows or put cracks
into thick, solid oak with your fists. Break the most breakable things and
damage hardier things.
Rank 3-4 Break
Concrete: Punch through sturdy wooden walls with ease or put cracks into
concrete with a punch. Break sturdy things and damage incredibly sturdy things.
Rank 5-6 Break Metal:
Knock down concrete pillars in a single blow or dent steel with you punch.
Destroy incredibly sturdy things or damage fortified things.
Rank 7-8 Break
Magical Metal: Break through a steel bulkhead or warp adamant with the
force of your blows. Destroy fortified things or damage nigh-indestructible
things.
The amount of
material reshaped/broken is up to the size of a person. For every category
by which the action exceeds the minimum number, roughly double this amount. For
example, a Rank 1-2 action could destroy an entire wall made of glass, while
3-4 could shatter the side of a glass building!
If a structure such as a building has its load-bearing
points destroyed, it will collapse, causing a Hazard, Fallout (below) or a
Disaster (p.XX)
Fallout
When big things break, they cause fallout. Examples include
a mountain exploding into an avalanche, a building imploding under structural
duress, and a submarine collapsing in the ocean’s crushing depths
The effects of fallout happen in Stages. Each stage, the environment changes as described. Stages
escalate the destruction until the fallout concludes, leaving the environment
in ruins.
Each Stage lasts for
1 round unless otherwise specified.
For example, a building beginning to collapse would use the
following fallout:
Stage 1: The
superstructure begins to warp and sway. All movement actions on or within the
building are increased in difficulty by 1 Rank. Any glass shatters, causing a Glass Shower Hazard.
Glass Shower
Attachment (walls, windows)
Rating: 2
Description: The glass fixtures
explode in a blast of razor-sharp shards.
Duration: One Round.
Sharp glass shards linger on the floor after explosion.
Stage 2: The
building collapses downwards, crushing anyone within under several tons of
concrete. This is a one-time Crushing
Hazard, Rating 5.
Stage 3: A
massive cloud of dust and pulverized concrete billows outward from the
collapsing structure. This manifests as a Dust
Cloud Disaster.
Dust Cloud
Scale: 1 Area
Rating: 1
Path: Each neighboring
Battlefield, once
Duration: 1 Action scene
Description: A cloud of
choking, blinding fallout spreads in all directions. Characters within are
blinded. The damage from the Rating manifests as lung damage from inhaled dust
and debris. The dust spreads to each neighboring Battlefield at the start of
the second round, then lingers there until it disperses at the end of the
scene.
After this, the building has completely imploded; only piles
of broken concrete and twisted metal remain.
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