WthC - Damage

In Welcome to the City I didn't want to go with hit points or something like it. I wanted to push it away from there a bit. So I went back and looked at something I had done before with the FreeForm generic system I did many long years ago and I'll probably pull that out and use it.

Basically you have five ranks of damage. With the fifth and final rank being death or near death depending on how you want to play it. There was a death spiral involved as you get a negative to your roll with each rank, however I'm thinking of easing that up a bit and only introduce the spiral on the fourth rank.

Rank One is the lowest level of damage. If you receive another Rank One damage from a hit it will take you to Rank Two. However this is where things get different than most systems. Any hit that does a lower Rank than what you have doesn't add to the total, they are not cumulative.  Example: If you are getting beat down in a fist fight and are at Rank Two and three guys hit you, each doing Rank One damage then you don't record anymore damage. Roleplay it out a bit, get descriptive but it doesn't add up in numbers.

When you take a Rank of damage that is equal to what you already have then it goes up one. If you take a Rank of damage that is greater than what you already have then it goes up that highest Rank. Example: You have taken Rank Two of damage and a then one of the thugs shoots you for Rank Four damage then you go to Rank Four immediately.

The number of Ranks is still up in the air at the moment as well is the death spiral and when it kicks in. I am thinking of using a reverse death spiral in there somehow as well. Maybe spiraling up until a certain Rank and then you start dropping fast.

It's all still in the works and a bit wonky.