RQII House Rules::Projects

Underlings

Underlings in the RQII rules are still more complicated than they need to be so I've drawn up the following way of characterising them in RQII.

An underling has Hit Points equal to its (CON+SIZ)/5. Rounded up as usual. (i.e. the same value as the head).
An underling is removed from combat ("KO'd") when either its Hit Points are reduced to zero; it receives a critical hit; or it receives any Combat Manoeuvre (whether attacking or defending).
Characteristics are not needed
An underling's attributes are Movement, Strike Rank, Combat Actions, Damage Modifier & Magic Points. They are based on the normal average values for its species. Superior underlings will have better values.
An underling's Armour Penalty is equal to 1.5 times its Armour Points (rounded up as usual)..
Underlings usually only attack once per round and save other CAs for defence including any bonus CAs from shields etc. In the rare case of underlings with 4 or more total CAs it will attack twice.
Underlings with missile weapons fire once per round unless they have weapons with a reload rate of 2 or more in which case they fire once every other round.
Underlings can usually move their Movement Rating or take some sort of minor action in addition to attacking. An underling can move at up to 5 times its normal MOV if it gives up all other actions.
An underling has the following common skills listed: Athletics, Brawn, Evade, Influence, Perception, Persistence, Resilience & Stealth. A single Combat Style percentage will be given that covers unarmed and all weapons usually used. Magic and Advanced skills are listed as needed. Athletics is used as the default skill for any physical non-combat activity, Influence for all social skills, Perception also covers Insight and skills such as tracking; Stealth can cover sleight and any similar skills.

An typical underling stat block looks like this

Militia member, human

Initiative SR (12) 7, Combat Actions 2, Damage Modifier 0, Move 8m, Magic Points 9

Armour Points 3, Hit Points 5

Athletics 40%, Brawn 35%, Evade 30%, Influence 30%, Perception 40%, Persistence 30%, Resilience 40%, Stealth 30%

Combat Style: Militia regular 55% (Spear, Sword, Shield, unarmed) 55%

Weapons: Short Spear (1D8+1 M/L), Heater Shield (1D4 L/S)

Common Magic 55%: Bladesharp 2.

Underling Survival

Of course, underlings may also be on your side. After an encounter you may want to know how many of your underlings survived. To do this, take a note of how many underlings were KO'd and roll 1d6.. If the fight went particularly badly for your side you may add 1-3 to the roll. The number rolled tells you how many tenths of the underlings received at least a serious wound. The rest of the underlings have received nothing worse than a minor wound or have been able to heal themselves. If 11 underlings were removed from combat and 4 was rolled on d6 then 4/10ths of those 11 (5) have received at least a serious wound. Once you have calculated that, roll a number of d6s equal to the number of underlings with serious wounds. Each d6 that rolls a one indicates an underling who has died or received a major wound. (Again, if the battle went badly you could make this a 1,2 or 3). If it is important to note which underlings have died and who might still be saved, then roll a d6 for each affected underling. Odd results indicate a dead underling, evens indicate an underling with a major wound who could survive with emergency healing or surgery.

These are the figures after the underlings themselves have applied healing magic and first aid. PCs can help surviving underlings who have suffered a serious or major wound recover through application of their healing magic or use of the advanced healing skill.

Minor NPCs

Use the following for NPCs who may be more important than underlings and have roles. Use the Underling stat block and rules with the following exceptions.

Receiving a CM or critical does not automatically KO a minor NPC.
Whenever a minor NPC is reduced to 0 or fewer Hit Points it has received a serious wound. It must make a Resilience test to stay conscious.
Whenever a minor NPC is reduced to less than the absolute value of its Hit Points then it has potentially received a major wound. It must make a Resilience roll to test whether it is unconscious or dying.
If a minor NPC receives more than twice its Hit Points at once then it has received a major wound and must make a Resilience test to see whether it is dying or dead.
A minor NPC may have variable armour protection in which case it will be listed in the order body|head|limbs. E.g Armour (3|3|1)/6

Example Stat Block

Militia Sergeant

Initiative SR (12) 6, Combat Actions 2, Damage Modifier +1D2, Move 8m, Magic Points 9

Armour Points 4, Hit Points 6

Athletics 50%, Brawn 40%, Evade 30%, Influence 50%, Perception 40%, Persistence 30%, Resilience 60%, Stealth 30%

Combat Style: Militia Sergeant (Spear, Sword, Shield, Crossbow, Unarmed) 70%

Weapons: Short Spear (1D8+1 M/L), Longsword (1D8 M/L) Heater Shield (1D4 L/S), Medium Crossbow (1D8)

Common Magic 65%: Bladesharp 2, Protect 2

Spot Rules

Armour: minor characters may have a generic AP value representing a complete suit of armour or natural armour points or they may have locational armour. A character with locational armour uses their chest armour as their standard rating.

The Choose Location CM can still be performed. It may be useful against characters with locational armour or unusual attacks such as a sting. For the purposes of determining the effects of damage, all locations can be assumed to have the same HPs. E.g. a scorpion man may have 7 HPs. A PC attacks it and uses choose location to aim for the sting. The character does 5 damage, enough to inconvenience the monster but not enough to disable the sting. The player intends to keep attacking the sting so the GM keeps note. The intent is not to track locations unless it becomes important to do so.

Quick Creation

A simple points buy system for human NPCs. Note first that the number of CAs a character has depends on its SR. A character with SR 1-6 has 1 CA, SR 7-12 has 2 CAs and so on. The colour coding shows the number of CAs.

Cost	-4	-3	-2	-1	0	+1	+2	+3	+4
SR	3-4	5-6	7-8	9-10	11-12	13-14	15-16	17-18	19-20
Damage	-D8	-D6	-D4	-D2	---	+D2	+D4	+D6	+D8
Hit Points	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9

Hit Points and Damage Modifier must be within 2 columns of each other, so a NPC with 5 Hit Points must have a damage modifier in the range of -1D2 to +1D3.

Grey italic figures represent impossible values for a normal human.

Normal NPCs have 0 points to spend therefore if they have a positive Damage Modifier it is because they lost points elsewhere.

For non-humans: the easiest thing to do is to look at their average values and adjust accordingly. E.g. A creature with an average damage modifier of +1D4 will have 7 Hit Points on average.