Encumbrance Rules

[CRMcNeill]

Ideally, I’d like a system that basically ignores Encumbrance for characters until and unless a character tries to carry something heavier than normal. Tracking carrying capacity in the same manner as D&D opens the door to nit-picking over fractions of a kilogram w/r/t normal amounts of personal equipment. I’d prefer to have it just kick in past a certain point, as defined by the GM, with some examples as guidelines.
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Naaman]

So, you want a "cut off" that determines what is heavy and what is not?

Or do you want the character's lifting skill to actually be relevant in determining when a roll is triggered?

Here is a suggestion:

The lifting skill itself comes with a chart that tells how hard it is to lift certain weights.

You could average out the dice totals to determine what would trigger a roll. For example, lifting 100kg is "moderate." A character who's average roll is two levels higher than the chart indicates need not roll.

A character with 5D in lifting will average a moderate roll, which means he as approximately a 50% chance of failing the roll (he would have to roll to carry the EWHB up hill). At 7D, the character's average roll succeeds at the very difficult level, two levels higher than needed to lift 100kg, and so does not need to roll.

Another option would be to assign the trigger to a certain percentage of a character's mass (GM discretion as to whether a character's mass is mostly fat or muscle as indicated by the strength and/or lifting attribute). A character need not roll up to, say, 10% of his mass. Beyond that, rolls are triggered with the difficulty based on the percentage of mass.

I suppose the chart in the book could be used to determine the difficulty (rather than the difficulty being based on the percentage of mass).

[CRMcNeill]

In broad terms, I want a system where the Lifting roll is only triggered when carrying an object rated as Heavy, with the Lifting roll either reducing or eliminating said penalty. I do NOT want a system that nit-picks a character to death by making them roll Lifting every time they pick up a com-link.

Basically...

1) Ignore Encumbrance so long as the character is only carrying a normal, reasonable amount of personal equipment.

2) “Heavy” Objects will come with a Move Penalty and an attendant Difficulty score.

3) Characters can then roll Lifting against said Difficulty to reduce or eliminate the Move Penalty.

Personal equipment can add up to the equivalent of a Heavy item by loading the character up with 20-30 kilos of gear, weapons, ammo, armor, etc, and there will be Bonuses/Difficulty Modifiers applied for weight bearing on a character’s core (like a backpack or battle harness) as opposed to the arms.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Mamatried]

How about encumbrence point systems.
give weapons, items and the like an encumbrence point.
the character can carry his encumbrence points, once above it, his speed is going down or something like this,

lets say a average human with 2D have 12 encumbrence points,
human max is 24 (4D Max) encumbrence points carried.

a stormtrooper armor maybe have 6 encumbrence points, when worn this is 1/2

a rifle is 3, carbine 2, pistol 1
then use those item sizes to determine.
a back pack or a utility belt or other carrying aids can then rise you encumbrence points.

a standard character would carry 5-6 a weapon, medpacks, powerpacks, smaller items, a carrying aid like a utility belt, and maybe he wears some form of armor.

How to detrimne the item's encumbrence i have no idea about, but I think maybe a system like this could work

[CRMcNeill]

[Naaman]

[CRMcNeill]

50kg is a decent starting point, but I’d like to leave the option open for bulky objects that weigh less than that to count as Heavy, as well.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Bren]

It sounds like you want an attribute for all objects indicating whether it

A. Counts as heavy.
B. Does not count as heavy.

And what counts is a heavy object is the same for a Wookiee and a Chadra-Fan.

Is that right?

[CRMcNeill]

No.

I want a system where Encumbrance can be ignored unless it becomes necessary to include it. If a GM felt that a "Normal" object would be considered "Heavy" for a Chadra-fan, then there would be guidelines for the GM to come up with something on the spot.

For most PCs, however, the difference between Normal and Heavy will be relatively the same, as modified by their Strength / Lifting roll.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Bren]

Well that was an unexpected answer. If what constitutes a heavy weight is character dependent, you either need no rules at all, just GM, on the fly judgment or you need a modicum of rules that cover how encumbering different items are and what effect the lifting skill has on what can be carried.

If its the former, you are done. If the latter than just tracking encumbrance as does the D6 system or one of the many systems that abstract weight and awkwardness into some other measure (encumberance points, things, etc.) will be no more difficult and you will, essentially, be reinventing the wheel.

I confess I am more rather than less confused about what you are really looking for than I was after your opening post. It might help to better understand what you are looking for if you could provide some examples of the type of character equipment loads that concern you? We could then look at how those might be the same or different for characters with lifting skills of say, 2D, 4D, and 6D. (2D - 6D would seem to cover the likely skill range for nearly all NPCs and starting PCs.)

[CRMcNeill]

The OP is just a free form monologue about my thoughts up to that point and the general premise I’m going for. I didn’t come in with a specific rule already thought out, and original premises can change over time with input.

I don’t want a rule that adds another complexity to the basic game experience; as far as I’m concerned, normal character movement rules already factor in encumbrance for normal amounts of equipment. What I’m looking for is a system that only deals with abnormal amounts of equipment / encumbrance, such as carrying a heavy or large piece of equipment, or get hit by a weapon like a WH40K graviton gun that effectively increases encumbrance.

For the purposes of this rule, I think the Optional Rule in Rules of Engagement is a good summary of what constitutes normal equipment limits.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[MrNexx]

One of my cheap and easy forms of encumbrance tracking is the "significant items" rule... you can carry a number of significant items based on your Strength (or Lifting).
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[Argentsaber]

I'm not certain how it would work in "crunchier" games, but I've had decent success applying the "hands" rule from d6 Ghostbusters. It's very intuitive, but some veteran D&D types hate it. If there is interest, I can provide examples.. just let me know.
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[Whill]

[ThrorII]