Question: If a player wants to set a goal of “Bash Baszo Baz’s head in, dashing his brains across the table”, is it up to the GM to decide if Baszo can be killed in one hit or if he needs a clock?
Question: If a player wants to set a goal of “Bash Baszo Baz’s head in, dashing his brains across the table”, is it…
Question: If a player wants to set a goal of “Bash Baszo Baz’s head in, dashing his brains across the table”, is it…
Yepp
Okay, I thought so. Followup questions:
The size of that clock, should the GM choose to make it – under the GM’s discretion as well?
Also, say the risk of “killing Bazso” is that Baszo shoots the player in the chest. The size of the clock of “shot in the chest” as a lasting condition would also be at the GM’s discretion?
Yepp, same goes for the position for the roll of shooting Baz.
Okay gotcha – just wanting to make sure I wasn’t missing any “obstacle guidelines.”
There’s some guidance for what various sized clocks amount to in either case. Also, there’s a paragraph somewhere about setting and following precedents in severity of effects. If the players want an effect as drastic as killing someone immediately, that is sensible to be answered with equally as lethal and sudden dangers. 🙂
If they only aim to intimidate Baszo instead, well then the danger may be more in kind: perhaps shot to the ego, a broken nose, or a tarnished reputation. Tit-for-tat in severity I suppose.
Ultimately it comes down to tone, precedent, and consistency. If the GM and players have established that this is a highly lethal game where anyone can die nasty, then yeah, the actual killing of Baszo Baz is probably just a 4-tick clock (creating the opportunity to off him, on the other hand…). If it’s a more cinematic game where boss fights and epic duels are the order of the day (and Baszo is worthy of being considered such a foe), make him a 12-tick clock and have him throw seriously nasty dangers at the PCs.
Our ‘default’ nastiness, was that if it was a controlled situation and you rolled a success on the action roll then usually there was no need for a clock. The other parameters ramped this baseline up.
As for lasting effects, the rules suggest 6 or 8 segments for most.