60 Minutes of Thoughts: How to Doom Everyone, rules for lives hanging by four less-than-stout ropes
Hi!
This is a TTRPG rules idea, a modification of Desks and Dorks' idea for a bridge set-piece encounter built around an incrementing 'momentum' tracked on a d6. I asked their permission to iterate on the idea, and was granted it, so here goes! Notably, their idea uses the D6 only as a counter - they don't roll it. I suggest you do! I also broaden the scope of the system to cover any situation where A) the PCs are in a contest with an intelligent antagonistic force and B) the PCs and the antagonist are both vulnerable to some non-intelligent force which is made more likely by actions they take such that C) they all die or, at minimum, risk death if they don't manage their actions resulting in D) a degree of co-operation between the antagonistic forces being if not necessary then at least very useful to avoid mutual harm.
Idea is as follows, illustrated first using the original example of a bridge to contrast the differences between this approach and the original.
Bridge fight! Bridge fight!
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| This looks safe. The Bridge by Damascus, ClintCearly on DeviantArt |
Setup
The PCs and antagonists are on a rickety bridge above a deep ravine (deeper than it is wide, and deep enough that falling carries at least significant risk of death), held up by 4 ropes tied to posts. There is a 'momentum' tracker, which starts at 1. When further momentum is incurred, increase the die by the appropriate number of steps.
Gaining and losing momentum
PCs and NPCs can both incur and reduce momentum in the same ways.
Anything which involves significant rapid motion or imbalance - moving at more than half speed, swinging a sword, gesticulating to cast a spell (to take some classic fantasy examples) incurs 1 momentum.
More extreme movement - running at full-tilt, waving an end-heavy weapon like an axe around, deliberately wobbling the bridge with a magical blast of wind to try to knock foes off - incurs 2 momentum.
Just staying still, or perhaps using some telekinetic power to arrest the bridge's movement a bit, reduces momentum by 1, to a minimum of 1.
Snap checks
At the end of each full round of combat on the bridge (after each creature has had a chance to act if not using rounds), and whenever a creature incurs 2 momentum at once, roll a D6. If the number you get is less than the momentum, one of the ropes holding the bridge up snaps.
If you roll exactly the momentum, a plank fails underneath somebody at random and they must make some kind of save or fall through to the ravine, to their DOOM (or taking appropriate damage). If they fail by a small amount, they might instead just trip. Either way, mark the space they were in (a square in a grid game, a roughly 5 ft. length otherwise); that's now difficult terrain due to the difficulty of getting over the gap. If a second plank drops away within that space at any point, it's now a wholly open gap and needs to be jumped or otherwise bypassed. Landing from a jump incurs one momentum if the character is exceptionally well-balanced, two (necessitating another snap check) if not.
A character by the end of the bridge could attack and destroy the bridge or posts to break them without a snap check. A character further on or off the bridge could destroy them with an ill/well-placed fireball or something. If they aren't destroyed but are damaged, that rope is automatically the next one to snap when a snap check is failed.
OPTIONAL: it doesn't make a lot of sense with the bridge, but in riskier scenarios a number of ropes = the difference between the roll and the momentum might snap instead.
Ropes breaking
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| Desks and Dorks was inspired by the Indiana Jones rope bridge scene, apparently. I had this old Eric Cornett art from Dragon magazine #188 in my head as I wrote, which you can tell because at no point do I present an option for the bridge splitting down the middle. |
When a rope snaps, randomize which one (d4 if no ropes have yet broken, then d3, then d2).
When one rope fails, the end of the bridge it's at, up to the midway point, hangs off to one side. Characters on that end who weren't specifically hanging on immediately need to save or fall. Characters must now climb to move along this half of the bridge. OPTIONAL: if save difficulties vary in your game, it's harder the closer you are to the end where the rope failed until you're within reach of the wall, where it gets easier again. This represents a more dramatic falling-away further from the central point.
If two ropes fail at opposite ends of the bridge, the entire bridge is now hanging sideways as above, and may be traversed only by climbing.
If two ropes fail at the same end of the bridge, the bridge swings down flat against one wall. Characters who weren't hanging on need to save to grab on or fall. Characters hanging on 'fall' the distance to the wall as the bridge slams against it. Just measure the distance straight - don't bother with arcs unless you're really into that. The Momentum is now set to the number of creatures still hanging on (after any now-unconscious creatures let go) and remains at this number, changing if the number of creatures does. It no longer changes in response to actions, but a Snap Check is still needed if a creature takes an action that would have incurred 2 Momentum. If your system accomodates this, the 'ladder' formed by the bridge is notably easier to climb up or down than the wall of the ravine is, except where maps are concerned.
If all of the ropes fail, the bridge falls and any characters on it fall with it.
(Note: you don't need to redraw your sketch map to switch from a horizontal to a vertical bridge. Just erase the land at one end, and you are playing along a vertical plane. I read a good post about vertical battlemaps recently but I can't find it now :( Anyway if you're using physical terrain I cannot help you, but you're much cooler than me so hopefully that makes up for it.)
Generalizing this
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| Azog and Thorin make poor life choices in The Battle of Five Armies. I love this movie, but even if you're in the majority you have to admit it has some wonderfully dynamic set-pieces! The characters fight around half a mountain to get to this frozen lake. |
Obviously, this doesn't just work with a bridge! You just need:
- A threat in a conflict scene (a ravine; a laboratory filled with bubbling chemicals; a thin sheet of ice over frostbite-cold water)
- Something/s characters can do to make the threat 1 step riskier (swinging a sword; running; missing with a bludgeoning weapon and striking the ice)
- Something/s characters can do to make the threat 2 steps riskier and risk immediately triggering a consequence (swinging a greataxe; shooting a ranged weapon; using fire magic)
- Something/s characters can do, at some opportunity cost or risk, to make the threat 1 step less risky (deliberately balancing the bridge; shielding the lab apparatus with your own body; using ice magic on the sheet)
- (Optional:) Something/s characters can do to deliberately trigger a consequence (attacking the ropes/posts; overturning a table of chemicals; deliberately attacking the ice)
- A minor consequence affecting a single person/area, possibly even directly exposing them to the threat, but not progressing the overall danger (a plank breaks; an empty glass is knocked over and shatters creating an area of broken glass; a weak spot in the ice fails and somebody drops through into the water)
- An initial consequence with partial, possibly positional, effects (half the bridge is hanging sideways; some chemicals spill and the air fills with hazardous fumes; the ice cracks and shifts sending people sliding about wildly)
- A second, worse, consequence which might happen after the first (the bridge is hanging sideways; the chemicals catch fire and it begins to spread to the lab as a whole; the ice sheet cracks along a few fault lines, some bits tilting dangerously towards the water whilst others float level)
- A third, disastrous, consequence which might happen straight after the first or after the second (the bridge swings down lengthways; the chemicals explode; the ice sheet cracks entirely into little drifting islets)
- A final consequence which ends all hope for any characters still in the situation (the bridge wholly drops into the ravine; the lab building collapses; the mini-icebergs settle and clump together, trapping characters beneath)
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