[Meta thread] Iron's PokeRole Adventure: The Skull Ruins

[Dragonstrike]

You know, for a guy with 4 Insight, Ventus misses a lot of obvious stuff every so often.  Just thinking out loud here, though.  Don't mind me.

Ventus' insight represent more of his innate empathetic powers and his experience with how tragic life can be, rather than actual insightfulness. Since he's been able to read emotions and determine their root cause (to an extent) from birth, and has been through enough scheisse to always's be on edge around stranger/fairies/mystical stuff, Ventus is very much reliant on his abilities to operate with others.
 
Ironically, young Nathan is more insightful in the traditional sense than Ventus, just because he's far more rational and level headed in abnormal situation/crisises, while Ven just hunkers down and gets ready for the onslaught.

As for Ventus' murderous thought pattern...who says he started? Or never stopped? Remember, when it comes to threats to his friends or family, the researcher is far from saintly.

Nathan might SEEM more insightful, but don't forget he has the help of a Psychic type pokemon in that area as well if he needs to read people (remember, his Insight is 2, which is average).  Nathan keeps a cool head in the heat of the moment as well, but it breaks him down little by little if things aren't resolved well.  The reason for THAT is because he has an idea of how he should be reacting because he's read a ton on how others have responded to such situations, and made judgments of his own on what the appropriate course of action was.  But having never dealt with those situations himself before, he isn't prepared for when the reality check hits him.

If he gets REALLY bad though, it's going to be terrible.  Remember that bit where I missed the potion use, and Zippy wasn't holding back?  Now, Nathan knew there wasn't anything he could do to stop Zippy there (Princess had just fainted, after all.  Zippy would have resisted being recalled if he'd tried that), but he wasn't going to order the bee to do anything different anyways.  Now, he wasn't going to leave Pinsir with that Lethal damage if it took any and its trainer started being a little more...receptive, but Nathan has every capability to be as ruthless as Ventus (or the Pinsir trainer) if he so chooses.

The group is more likely to see that side of him when we encounter Almanac, by the way.  And here's the best part: Gallade has immediate access to two lethal attacks upon evolving, and can learn a third with exp.  Rapidash also gets a lethal attack upon evolving, and some more with exp.  If he intends to physically wound someone in the future, it's going to hurt.

[Lord Windos]

Well put, Dragonstrike! Ventus assumes that Nathan would not be capable of killing when its necessary, but if he starts going ham with Lethal attack in those situation, that will cause some mood whiplash for the researcher. He used to doing the cruel dirty work, not for someone else to!

[Dragonstrike]

Well put, Dragonstrike! Ventus assumes that Nathan would not be capable of killing when its necessary, but if he starts going ham with Lethal attack in those situation, that will cause some mood whiplash for the researcher. He used to doing the cruel dirty work, not for someone else to!

Lethal attacks also put a LOT of pressure on the opponent.  Either they heal off the main damage dealt, or they can heal off the Lethal damage.  You can't heal both at the same time without a healing machine.  On top of that, Lethal damage healing tends to be really slow compared to just healing HP.  And even just one point of Lethal damage is life threatening since the wounds get worse every hour if not treated properly.  Nathan was okay with the pinsir taking Lethal damage potentially because this trainer had just threatened HIS life, as well as his pokemons', and that trainer needed a lesson taught to him (and an example that Nathan isn't all that bad still as long as he can let go of his anger)

However, there's one thing concerning them I haven't managed to glean from the book yet: do Lethal attacks do both normal and Lethal damage at the same time, or is it just one or the other?  @Iron?

[PhantomUnderYourDesk]

Hmm... Lately, I spotted that Whimsicott of all costs gets Hurricane as Lethal Attack. But I'm unsure whether I want to teach this to the fluffball... Moonblast has more priority to me, somehow.

But the thought of an innocently looking wad of cotton seriously injuring anyone who dares to harm her dear caretaker is surely tempting.

[Iron]

I was under the impression that the only differences are these:

-Lethal damage can go below 0hp (and all damage below 0 is lethal)
-Lethal deals more damage every hour
-Taking your HP in lethal damage kills you


So what I'm imagining is this:

-You have 6 hp
-You take 3 damage from a lethal move.
-You are at 3/6 hp, and you'll have to keep track that it's 3 lethal damage.
-It would take a potion to heal 2 lethal damage
-You'll continue to lose HP even if the battle ends
-Collecting 3 more lethal damage would kill you, while collecting 3 more normal damage would simply faint you.

Does that answer your question?

[Lord Windos]

Hmm... Lately, I spotted that Whimsicott of all costs gets Hurricane as Lethal Attack. But I'm unsure whether I want to teach this to the fluffball... Moonblast has more priority to me, somehow.

But the thought of an innocently looking wad of cotton seriously injuring anyone who dares to harm her dear caretaker is surely tempting.

Let the temptation overtake you, my love. Mwahahahaha! Moonblast, however, is a great Fairy STAB move, though. Hmm....

[Dragonstrike]

I was under the impression that the only differences are these:

-Lethal damage can go below 0hp (and all damage below 0 is lethal)
-Lethal deals more damage every hour
-Taking your HP in lethal damage kills you


So what I'm imagining is this:

-You have 6 hp
-You take 3 damage from a lethal move.
-You are at 3/6 hp, and you'll have to keep track that it's 3 lethal damage.
-It would take a potion to heal 2 lethal damage
-You'll continue to lose HP even if the battle ends
-Collecting 3 more lethal damage would kill you, while collecting 3 more normal damage would simply faint you.

Does that answer your question?

Alright, makes sense I guess.  Thank you

[PhantomUnderYourDesk]

Hmm... Lately, I spotted that Whimsicott of all costs gets Hurricane as Lethal Attack. But I'm unsure whether I want to teach this to the fluffball... Moonblast has more priority to me, somehow.

But the thought of an innocently looking wad of cotton seriously injuring anyone who dares to harm her dear caretaker is surely tempting.

Let the temptation overtake you, my love. Mwahahahaha! Moonblast, however, is a great Fairy STAB move, though. Hmm....

First of all comes Tailwind for 28XP because I'd GREATLY appreciate +2 Dexterity for my battlefield and will start saving XP for that from now, then the temptation of Hurricane may arise~

[Dragonstrike]

Hmm... Lately, I spotted that Whimsicott of all costs gets Hurricane as Lethal Attack. But I'm unsure whether I want to teach this to the fluffball... Moonblast has more priority to me, somehow.

But the thought of an innocently looking wad of cotton seriously injuring anyone who dares to harm her dear caretaker is surely tempting.

Even if you don't wish to use it as a Lethal attack (you can just use the Hold Back command to make the damage non-lethal), it's still VERY strong.  The confusion chance and raw power of it are rather ridiculous by themselves.  Plus, it's a flying move, which is some nice coverage for those bugs that would give Whimsicott trouble otherwise.

Just need to be able to compensate for the -3 accuracy penalty it has, either with really large accuracy pools, rainy weather, or similar

[Dies Irae]

I was under the impression that the only differences are these:

-Lethal damage can go below 0hp (and all damage below 0 is lethal)
-Lethal deals more damage every hour
-Taking your HP in lethal damage kills you


So what I'm imagining is this:

-You have 6 hp
-You take 3 damage from a lethal move.
-You are at 3/6 hp, and you'll have to keep track that it's 3 lethal damage.
-It would take a potion to heal 2 lethal damage
-You'll continue to lose HP even if the battle ends
-Collecting 3 more lethal damage would kill you, while collecting 3 more normal damage would simply faint you.

Does that answer your question?

Since it's a kludge of the World of Darkness system which distinguished between Bashing, Lethal and Aggravated Damage... (Less the aggravated damage, since we're not discussing supernatural damage sources... yet).

Damage was distinguished on the character track by X and / markings. Bashing (Normal) damage would mark a / across a wound slot. Lethal damage would add a line across the slot turning it into an X, then any Bashing damage would be pushed rightward along the damage track (towards the end of the wound track) replacing anything that turned into lethal.

IE. A character with a wound track 7 slots long with three points of preexisting bashing damage (/ / /) taking a knife to the gut (3 lethal) would have a damage track that looks like this X X X / / / for a total of 6 wounds (3 lethal, 3 bashing)

If you filled your final wound slot along the wound track with bashing damage, the damage would put you out like a light. Any surplus would then wrap around the track and start converting the first available bashing damage into lethal damage. (/ + \ = X)

IE. Back to Mr Stab Victim, if he then took another stab for three, he'd outright die as adding three lethal would lead to X X X X X X / with two rollover bashing damage which would convert the last slot on his track to a lethal damage and kill him.

If your final wound slot was lethal... well... I hope you had a paramedic on site, or you were off to the morgue.

Given the writers cribbed so heavily from the WoD system that there are occasionally moments where I found stuff poorly explained (but perfectly understandable in context), Iron has the right of it.

(Anyway, as a point of trivia, Aggravated Damage was marked by an *, being basically / + \ + |, displaced both lethal and bludgeoning damage and generally did not heal normally... needless to say, it also killed you if it was your final wound.)