Injuries

An injury is an accumulation of a kind of damage. Typically, any limb can suffer an injury effect which accumulates with consecutive hits. Unless otherwise stated, the rule of thumb goes something like this:

A successful hit with an attack (Ex. A normal sword, doing slashing damage) - performed with an oriented stat that is higher than the target's VIT - targeting the right arm will incur the Minor Bleed injury on the right arm. If another subsequent attack hits the right arm, then the damage will escalate to a Moderate Bleed injury

For every 2 VIT points a character has, they can survive a single Major physical injury without dying, rounded up. For example, a character with 5 VIT will die after suffering 3 Major injuries. Psychological injuries are never lethal, nor do they add to this counter.

When sneaking, attacks that successfully hit will ignore the enemy VIT stat and deliver a guaranteed Major injury.

There are a total of eight different physical injuries, each of which can escalate per subsequent hits to three different stages (minor, moderate, major)

1. Bleed; The target suffer from bleeding wounds that slowly drain health. When the target bleeds out, they die. If bleeding is stopped, the counter will stop, but will not be reset until out of combat. 

- Minor bleed; superficial cuts. Bleed out takes 3 rounds per target VIT point.

- Moderate bleed; deep cuts. Bleed out takes 2 rounds per target VIT point.

- Major bleed; arterial cuts. Bleed out takes 1 round per target VIT point.


2. Poison: The target suffers from a poisoned wound which rapidly spreads, lowering the total vitality until exercised. Does NOT apply per limb. Unlike other injuries, the poison injury can not be resisted by a higher VIT.

- Minor poison; A small dosage is present. -1 VIT every 3 rounds.

- Moderate poison; A considerable dosage is present. -1 VIT every 2 rounds.

- Major poison; A high dosage is present. -1 VIT every round.


3. Break: The target suffers a blunt injury that affects their physical strength. Depending on the limb targeted, this does different damage. Arm = STR. Leg = DEX. Torso = VIT. Mouth or neck = EMO. Nose, ears or eyes = PER. Cranium = INT.

- Minor break; Bruises and hairline fractures.-1 of related stat.

- Moderate break; Internal fractures. -2 of related stat

- Major break; Externalized fractures and pulverization. -3 of related stat.


4. Critical; The target suffers from damage that whittles down their resolve and leaves their health rapidly decimated. It worsens injuries already present, or creates new ones.

- Minor critical; A flesh wound. Other injuries on that specific limb are exaggerated by a degree.

- Moderate critical; A clean through-shot. Other injuries (except critical) on that specific limb are exaggerated to major status.

- Major critical; A stuck penetrative wound. Other injuries (except critical) on that specific limb are exaggerated to major status. -1 AP.


5. Burn; The target suffers a fiery injury that burns away at them. Can be quickly solved, but rapidly dissolves their health.

- Minor burn; A first-degree burn. Death takes 2 rounds per target VIT point.

- Moderate burn; A second-degree burn. Death takes 1 round per target VIT point.

- Major burn; A third-degree burn. Death takes 1 round per 2 target VIT points


6. Frost; The target suffers from deathly coldness that stifles their limbs. Severely incapacitates stats, but also slowly recovers. Depending on the limb targeted, this does different damage. Arm = STR. Leg = DEX. Torso = VIT. Head = SAU.

- Minor frost; Frost-burn. -2 of related stat for 3 rounds.

- Moderate frost; Frozen extremities. -3 of related stat for 4 rounds

- Major frost; Frozen limb. -4 of related stat for 5 rounds.


7. Shock; The target suffers from debilitating shocks that stifle the whole body. Does no actual damage, but forces the target to be stunned. Damage is exacerbated by a degree if applied mid-air.

- Minor shock; Tremors. -5 DEX for 1 round (non-lethal)

- Moderate shock; Convulsions. Stunned for 1 round.

- Major shock; Seizure. Stunned for 1 round, -5 DEX for 3 rounds (non-lethal)


8. Dismemberment / decimation; The target suffers from the complete loss of a limb (or the use thereof), resulting in serious penalties or death. This occurs when a limb suffers 2 different major injuries. Only injuries that target specific limbs can cause this. The damage to their stats is calculated by their base number, not by the diminished stat after other injuries or effects.

- Arm; Divides targets STR depending on the number of arms they have. Ex. a four armed target will lose 1/4th of their STR.

- Leg; Divides targets DEX depending on the number of legs they have. Ex. a two legged target will lose half their DEX.

- Torso; Halves targets VIT.

- Head; Halves targets INT, PER, EMO or SAU.

Surival only - Infection: When a wound goes untreated for too long or isn't properly sterilized, it will turn infected. This effect can lower the stat related to the limb infected, further weakening your character. Once an infection sets in, drastic measures will be required to heal them. Arm = STR. Leg = DEX. Torso = VIT. Head = SAU.

- Minor infection; festering wound: -1 to stat

- Moderate infection; gangrenous wound: -2 to stat, minor poisoning. Poisoning effect can only be healed with anti-biotics.

- Major infection; necrotic wound: -3 to stat, moderate poisoning. Poisoning effect can only be healed through amputation.


There are also the psychological injuries. These occur when the target EMO hits 0.

1. Frenzy; The target will attack others at random. When a player character is frenzied, they will be forced to perform actions every turn until they recover. They can still decide what these actions are, but the targets of these actions are determined by a dice roll.

2. Fear; The target will flee from combat, and use whatever methods of stealth or movement they can to achieve this. Player characters are no longer able to perform offensive, defensive or support actions until their EMO recovers.

3. Hysteria; The target enters a state of psychosis, perceiving things that are not there. Player characters will find hostile void creatures - which no one else can see - spawning around them until their EMO recovers.



Offense

There are several stats that play into offensive actions. Typically these are STR, DEX or PER for physical attacks and INT, EMO and SAU for magic attacks. Unless otherwise stated, a successful hit from an attack can only apply their injury once per action, starting at a minor degree.

Physical attacks typically have three possible manifestations:

- Slashing, which builds up the Bleed or Poison injury.

- Blunt, which builds up the Break injury

- Piercing, which builds up the Critical or poison injury


Magic attacks have a wide array of manifestations, but can be concentrated down to their eight elements:

- Darkness, which builds up the Critical injury

- Light, which builds up the Burn or Poison injury

- Void, which builds up the Break or critical injury

- Pure mana, which builds up the Bleed, Break or Critical injury (depending on the spell)

- Fire, which builds up the Burn injury

- Water, which builds up the Break (Water) Frost (ice), Burn (holy) or Bleed injury (unholy)

- Earth, which builds up the Break or Bleed injury

- Wind, which builds up the Bleed (normal), Shock (holy) or Poison (unholy) injury


Having a higher oriented status - or 'attack score' - allows more actions per round. All weapons, skills and spells have a 'scaled status' which determiens the attack score. When using different weapons/spells simultaneously in a single round, then the weapon/spell/skill with the lowest attack score will decide the maximum actions per round. Attack score is calculated as: Attack Score / 5 = actions per round. More simply said, for every 5 attack score points you have (rounded up), you have 1 action.

Any action can only target one specific limb, unless a skill or spell states otherwise / has an area of effect. A successful sneak attack incurs major damage when successful.

Defense

The VIT, EMO and AP statuses are typically involved in defensive abilities.

Vitality measures out the amount of time necessary for an injury to become lethal, as is seen in the injury description for many kinds of injuries. Additionally, it also lowers the chances of whether or not an injury is incurred. If the vitality is higher than the offensive status of the attackers orientation, then chances will decrease depending on the difference. The chances are determined by a dice roll. The poison status effect can circumvent this VIT-check and is thus very useful for softening up tough, high VIT enemies.

For example. character A has 7 VIT. Character B has 5 STR. Character B uses a STR oriented weapon to attack character A. If they hit successfully, then a 3 sided dice is thrown. If the dice lands on 1, a minor break injury occurs. If the dice lands on 2 or 3, no injury occurs.
For another example. Character A has 5 VIT. Character B has 7 STR. Character B uses a STR oriented weapon to attack character A, If they hit successfully, then a minor Break injury is always incurred.
Additionally, if an attack does not have a higher AP than the defender, the attack ALWAYS fails.

EMO forms a measure to which a defender can keep their mind cool during injuries. If the defender suffers multiple injuries, they may find their EMO randomly degenerate. When EMO reaches 0, one of the three psychological injuries will occur as determined by a dice roll.

Additionally, attacks can be blocked, deflected or dodged.

In the case of blocking, the stat requirement of the shield used is added to the total VIT. However, when blocking, no subsequent actions can be taken during that same round. Ex. if a character has a STR oriented shield and their stats have 5 STR and 5 VIT, their blocking action will yield a score of 10.
In the case of deflection, the stat requirement of the melee weapon must exceed the attacking stat, and takes a single action. This can only be performed against physical attacks and consumes additional actions for every iterative attack. Ex. if the deflector has a DEX oriented sword and 5 DEX, and the attacker has a DEX oriented sword with 4 DEX, their attacks can be deflected. But if the attacker has an automatic weapon with DEX orientation, thus firing 6 shots in a single action, the deflector will only be able to deflect 1 of the 6 bullets.
In the case of dodging, the DEX stat must exceed the attacking stat. Additional actions can be spent dodging to increase the total dodge score, with each action adding the DEX onto itself. Ex. If a character has 5 DEX and spends 2 actions in a round dodging, their dodge will calculate as 10 DEX.