Toxn

Muhhrage III:
 

Concept image from 2009:
 

On a related note*, archaeological evidence shows that the vast majority of casualties in any given battle occur after one side breaks and runs. Which is one of the reason why the Romans owned the battlefield so hard - having a professional, well-drilled army meant that your guys held together much better than the other side. A good deal of the time, this would result in you winning by default as the enemy would get tired/scared and break.
 
* Which I'm sure is not new information to the folks here.

Shootin Stah:
 

Renamed  .
 
Guys, should we do a design-a-fighter competition in KSP? Because I have a Mig-21 clone that's itching to get owned by someone's F-4-esque...

One of my little historical myth buster dissertations over in the Paradox Forums...
 
Movies tend to depict cavalry as charging in massed formations. It looks cool especially if you add some orchestral music to it:
 

 
And it is especially sad when you gatling gun all the men and horses in slow motion:
 

 
To an extent, the reason for this is because most paintings of cavalry depict them in such poses, such as this painting from the Battle of Beersheeba in 1917:
 
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/Palestine_Gallery_at_the_Australian_War_Memorial_(MG_9693).jpg
 
There's a little problem with this painting though. It was drawn during the age of photography, and as it turns out we have some actual photos of the battle:
 
http://www.rfd.org.au/site/beersheba.asp
 
And immediately we can go into mythbuster mode and make some key observations:
 
There are four photographs of the Australian Light Horse in the site, three of which depict the cavalry on the march and the fourth depicts them during the charge. The fourth is particularly significant - it might be the sole photograph of an actual cavalry charge ever taken. 
 
What's striking here is that the Beersheeba painting in fact bears most resemblance to the three photographs of the cavalry on the march - meaning they were in column, riding nearly knee to knee
 
Meanwhile, the "charge" photograph is very different - you can in fact see that rather than charging as a massed force, the cavalry had spread itself into three distinct waves - each of which is so sparsely manned that you can still make out individual riders on the most distant third wave. The spacing between each wave is also quite generous - several horse-lengths at least - at complete odds with the painting wherein the cavalry are basically charging as one huge column.
 
Why is the charge formation so different from the painting? Why is real war so different from Tom Cruise getting machinegunned? (No matter how amusing that may be).
 
And the answer, it turns out, is relatively simple: Cavalry charged in sparse waves for the same reason that automobile drivers maintain a minimum safe distance from the car ahead of them: In the event that the car ahead of you suddenly stopped, you want to have enough distance to either evade the car or brake yourself to a stop.
 
Cavalry were no different. If a cavalryman in the first wave got killed, then the troopers in the second wave want plenty of space to be able to avoid his corpse and that of his horse - not for sentimental reasons, but because failing to do so would likely cause your own horse to slip and lead you crashing into the ground.
 
The problem, as we know now from the history of cavalry paintings, is that most of these paintings were not drawn based on battlefield accounts. Instead, most of these paintings were drawn by artists witnessing parade-ground maneuvers (the famed painting "Scotland Forever" was drawn by someone who was not present at Waterloo, as an example) - hence the cavalry could safely gallop in massed columns due to the fact that it was unlikely anyone in the front was going to suddenly stop and cause the rest to pile up.
 
Additionally, painters tended to paint cavalry from the side view - as it seems to be a more impressive vantage point that maximizes the effect of a few horses. The painting at Bersheerba and the photographs on the march in fact seemed to have come from this school of thought.
 
Funnily, much as we want to make fun of The Last Samurai, they actually get this bit right when you look at 0:11 of this video:
 

 
Although the cavalry are charging towards the left (away from the guns and the guy we're supposed to hate), the line is actually only very sparse and contains only "our" brave white man, Ken Watanabe, and a few other extras. This gives each man plenty of space to pretend dying dramatically in slow motion without resulting in any unfortunate tramplings that could cause real injury.
 
That said, we then find out why the cavalry charged to the left and away from their intended target by 0:30 - That way we can now switch to side-view shots of the cavalry dying in slow motion, which again allows the filmmaker to maximize the impact of a handful of riders. There are perhaps just 10 guys in the scene at 0:30 - yet it seems a lot more since so much action is happening in the entire screen.
 
So there you have it, a fun little snarky piece on why people should never, ever believe pieces of Napoleonic "art" depicting cavalry drawn by artists commissioned by governments for the glorification of their armies - artists who by and large never witnessed combat. That last sentence in fact should have already been proof enough why paintings are such bad sources of historical truth, but one can never underestimate how stubbornly some people cling to what "military history" tells them.

The core problem with the whole endeavour is that, as I explained earlier (somewhat badly, apparently) cloning is a big issue all by itself. We're talking a sub-1% success rate here. And, as I also mentioned, interspecies surrogacy is also incredibly hit-and-miss.
 
The end result is that, if you use the approach I outlined, you're going to go through a lot failed elephant pregnancies (each taking close to two years to come to term) before you get your first viable baby mammoth.

I know there is a plan to bring back the passenger pigeon using an approach like the one I outlined, but I honestly don't know enough about eggs to give a good answer to this question. My gut instinct is that, so long as there is a way to get a viable egg (cell) into an environment where it can develop, the same general rules will apply.
 
Here is an article on nuclear transfer, which is one of the techniques this whole thing would hinge on. In a recurring theme; it's interesting to note how the guy who cracked the problem had endless issues with obtaining funding. Truly, good science and fundable science are two completely separate beasts.
 
 
Come on guys, I even put up an ask-a-geneticist post 
 
Are there any specific things I can help with in terms of understanding?

Part of the issue with cloning mammoths is that your surrogates are going to be elephants, and elephants tend to have ridiculously long pregnancies (edging up to two years). Meaning that you'll be spending an enormous amount of money and will only get the payoff decades down the line (if at all*).
 
Anyway, here is the program I worked out for the project. Note that this assumes a stepwise germline-transformation approach (rather than a one-shot attempt at full genome synthesis) piggybacking off of a standard cloning study:
Phase 1a: elephant cloning program. Expected timeline: 5-10 years. Phase 1b: elephant/mammoth genome comparison and transgenic strategy study. Expected timeline: 2-5 years. Runs in parallel with 1a. Phase 1c: elephant/mammoth hybrid cell line transformation and culture. Expected timeline: 2-5 years. Runs after 1b. Phase 2: round 1 elephant/mammoth hybrid nuclear transfer/IVF experiment. Expected timeline: 2-5 years. Hybrids would include partially and fully-transformed cell lines. Interphase: follow-up rounds of nuclear transfer and IVF, growth and maturation of F1 generation (if any). Expected timeline: 9-14 years. Phase 3 (optional): follow-up hybrid nuclear transfer and IVF on F1 generation. Expected timeline: 2-5 years. hybrids would all be from fully-transformed cell lines. Phase 4: beginning of conventional breeding program. Total time: 16 - 35 years.
 
The budget would be in the billions of dollars, and would include things like a large molecular genetics lab, clean lab for cell line propagation and transfer, stable and paddock facilities for elephants, elephant-capable theatre facilities and a number of park areas for the parent population and hybrids.
 
A one-shot approach would, of course, be cheaper and quicker. But it would also have a much lower chance of success. On the other end of the spectrum; an incremental breeding/transformation program would be very likely to succeed on some level (and might also be cheaper), but would take something like 50-100 years to complete.
 
* One of the biggest issues with interspecies surrogates is that we just don't have a clear handle on what might cause rejection. As an example, there are two closely-related rat species that have been tested for surrogacy using lab rats. One works fine, the other doesn't work at all and there is nothing much that points to why. Worse, we still don't have a strong handle on why cloning fails either. So most of the interspecies surrogacy experiments end with the foetus being rejected or the animal dying a short while after birth.

This is a public service announcement to anyone living in the United States and currently in possession of a rifle, musket, crossbow, bow or spear: kill and eat as many deer as you can.
 
Thank you for your cooperation.

Very different from what I'm playing with but it looks interesting. Have you done the math to see how swingy that might be? If the damage resolution rules are harsh, it might go towards the old school territory of character death being a normal part of the game. Flexibility in that regard is probably a very good thing to have because that's a huge influence on the feel of a game and a very personal taste thing.
 
It looks like you're doing similar to me and getting the base mechanic down and then bolting magic on, is that right?
 
I want to get a chance to playtest mine, but the hp pool equivalent is best handled with a table and I haven't gotten around to making those yet. Just as well, will keep it clear to discuss your system a bit.

Good start. I'm gonna make a lot of effort to give my feedback on this. I think it would be really cool to have an SH-designed game.
 
 
 
I believe pretty strongly in merits and skills as being narrative items rather than mechanical items. Rolls should just be generated at the GM's discretion; if there are any "stats" at all, they are just for the GM's crib sheet.

One thing that immediately jumps out at me is that the GM is overworked in a system that is heavily narrative-based. The less mechanical work that's delegated to the players, the more work there is for the GM. I've seen GM's get burnt out running D&D games, so we should be thinking about accommodating workload-reducing features. Way I figure it, reducing workload can be accomplished in 3 ways: 1. Having multiple GMs with their own hierarchy. Biggest downside to this is that you have a hard enough time rounding up just one GM, rounding up two or three sounds difficult. 2. Workload-reducing tools, such as Roll20.net. 3. Relying less on mechanics.

Yeah, I don't see any reason to use hit points. There isn't anything preventing a sharp GM from saying "you've been shot in the arm, I rolled to determine the bullet's effect, it yawed early and fragmented, breaking your arm, you have X amount of time before you pass out from shock", etc. 

I think skill trees should be a GM crib sheet. In real-life, skills are inter-dependent on one another, and so a tree can help the GM determine how hard or easy it is for a character to learn a skill. The two things that must be avoided, however, are "backwards" skill learning (e.g., I leveled up and got 5 points and used them to learn how to shoot a rifle - skills should be practiced before they are mastered, but it should be kept in mind that this also increases GM workload) and character designing (I'm taking the feat "ham radio operator" because it's a prerequisite for "intelligence operative" - the extent to which this actually happens in real life - e.g., going to law school - is very limited). 

Cards have a lot of upsides. They also yet again increase GM workload.

I think we're learning that the ideal RPG is one run by an omnipotent, omniscient GM.
 
 
 
Relevant: Lindybeige rails on about D&D's initiative system.
 
 
What does a "turn" mean?

Really, I see no reason to use anything but D10s.
 
It should be obvious by now but I rather liked White Wolf's (New) World of Darkness system. In it, you roll dice to attain a given number of successes. A success is always rolling above a certain value (7/10? IIRC). Tasks may take a certain number of successes to achieve (macguyvering a flamethrower out of spare parts may take six successes; someone very good at macguyvering things may find they are able to roll more dice per instance than someone who isn't, but at the end of the day it's still possible for a skilled attempter to take the same or more time to complete a task than a lucky novice.). I really like this task system, as it helps break the game out of the framework of "turns". If a roll represents 2 hours of work, and you need three rolls to complete the task, then it took you six hours.
 
 
 
First two sound like NWoD.

I don't think there should be turns. Read Erfworld to know why I don't think there should be turns.

The whole "range" classification will become hilarious when applied to firearms.
 
 
 
The basic concept is sound, I think, but it sort of assumes that a character is a series of square blocks always facing the opponent, with an equal chance to hit each part of the body. I think it would be worth investigating a more realistic system than that, but the workload level of what you have is good.

I may take some time to investigate what can be done for melee and marksman combat systems to improve their fidelity.
 
 
Sounds like a good start.
 
 
Sounds like there's enough room there to with which to work.

Okay, here is what I have so far.
 
Some preliminary thoughts:
It's hella hard to keep a system simple. Damage models are really hard to make simple and realistic. I very quickly ended up putting more time into the information for GM's section than anything else. Might have to be a separate post. I really have a thing for card-based systems. General mechanics
Attributes: short description attached to characters/items/objects. Applied as stated, with room for negotiation but without mechanical execution. May be agreed to have mechanical effects (eg: skills)
No hitpoints: characters are taken out of the fight by injury, with death being resolved after the fight unless something spectacular occurs.
No skill trees: skills are increased by adding/removing/modifying attributes on a character.
Card-based items: items are represented by cards, with standard forms being used for some items (weapons, armour etc.). The cards contain a set of relevant item variables: name, type of item, range (if applicable), armour value/coverage (if applicable), special rules and an attribute description. Items can have more than one attribute.
GM-driven play: the GM is responsible for rolls, with players giving actions/directions. Further, the GM is allowed to alter rules (with notice) to any extent he wants.
 
General Combat mechanics
1 action per turn: move or attack or cast or perform misc. action.
Combined roll (3xD6): hit roll, placement roll, damage roll. Floating dice can be used to simplify skill/counter rolls. It is advisable to have some way of easily separating dice or sorting them to allow for smooth play.
1 counter roll: opponent gets to choose 1 dice before roll to reroll if the score is unfavourable. This represents generic blocking/dodging/luck.
Skills can be represented to changing the score on a dice, changing the score-to-exceed for a roll or forcing a reroll.
 
Range and movement
Weapons and spells (if any) can have effects at range. Range is represented by four states: melee (<10m), short range (10 – 50m), medium range (50 – 100m) and long range (>100m).
Hitting involves exceeding a score, the score being dependent on the situation. GMs are allowed to tinker with to-exceed scores as the situation dictates, but must give contextual clues to players (example: "it's a rainy night and the target is moving, so it will be extremely difficult to hit" = a standard to-hit roll now has a +2 modifier to the to-exceed score.)
Hitting at range against an opponent is difficult, so the base to-exceed score for actions at range increases: melee = 2, short range = 3, medium range = 4 and long range = 5. Hitting a stationary or large object is easier, of course.
Base movement per turn is jogging speed (roughly 2m/s), so closing from range can take some time. Turns are represent roughly 10 seconds of time (although this varies for story and mechanical reasons), so a character can move 10-20m per turn.
Weapons are used in order or range, with weapons in range getting priority. This means that at short range, the short ranged weapon will go first, followed by the long ranged weapon and medium ranged weapon.
Weapons can exceed their stated range by one increment (you threw your sword), but suffer a reroll penalty to hit along with whatever the GM feels is situationally appropriate (sword now unavailable for rest of scene).
 
Placement and damage
After a successful hit roll, the placement of the shot will be determined by the placement roll. Placement is as follows:​1: legs 2: lower torso 3: upper torso 4: arms 5: head 6: player chooses ​The effect of successful hit placement determines the effect of damage, which is contextual and based on the area hit, the effect of armour and the type of weapon used (a significant wound to the legs, for instance, would result in the character not being able to move or only being able to crawl. A slashing weapon hitting the same point might even remove the leg entirely). Damage is determined by the damage roll, with the effects being as follows:​1: no damage. 2-5: a wound is inflicted.  6: a severe wound is inflicted. Characters are taken out of the fight based on wounds. A normal person, upon receiving a severe wound, generally becomes unable to continue with anything beyond finding cover or retreating. A particularly hardy or strong-willed person, on the other hand, might get multiple injuries and still carry on fighting. The number of wounds a character can withstand is determined by their attributes. Severe wounds are such that a character will be instantly out of the fight or severely impaired, with correspondingly more difficult healing and recovery.  
Narrative, scene, resolution and healing
Events in a game can happen in one of two ways: narrative (where things are broadly resolved by the GM and players discussing things) and scene (a specific event, where mechanics are in play). GMs can include rolls as needed to represent difficulty, but are advised to only use these where an unexpected, mechanistic resolution to an issue is needed. Players may, during narrative or a scene, argue an attribute. Arguing an attribute involves making a case to the GM that the description of the attribute held by a player (in the form of a character attribute or item attribute) will allow the character to perform a certain action. This might involve ignoring or instantly passing a roll ('light touch' being used to bypass a roll to successfully pickpocket another character), or it might involve a constant effect ('veteran' adding another wound to a character). The GM has final authority on the outcome of the argument, but is advised to be reasonable and refrain from simply imposing his/her own interpretation. After a scene, it is often the case that one or more characters are out of the fight due to wounds. For the player characters, there must now be a period of healing to restore wounds. Here a skill roll, with a to-exceed score based on the number of wounds received (severe wounds count as two) can be taken every few days, with a roll of 1 adding a wound. Six wounds would thus result in the character dying at the end of the scene. Attributes would, as with all actions, be taken into account where healing is concerned. However, the GM does have some leeway to fudge things if needs be. If the game is expected to be realistic and/or difficult, then a more realistic approach to injuries can be taken. If a game is expected to be easier or more fantastic, then injuries resulting in death can be treated as more rare events.  
Armour, penetration and weapon types
Armour allows characters to negate the effects of a successful attack beyond the counter-roll, and is item-based. Armour items have a coverage statistic (with the numbers corresponding to the parts of the body covered), as well as an attribute description describing the level of protection conferred. Penetration is generally dependent on the type of weapon being used, with slashing weapons generally having low penetration. Again, context is important when determining penetration of armour. A discussion of weapon types, armour and damage in the real world is included in the Appendices.

Okay, here is what I have so far.
 
Some preliminary thoughts:
It's hella hard to keep a system simple. Damage models are really hard to make simple and realistic. I very quickly ended up putting more time into the information for GM's section than anything else. Might have to be a separate post. I really have a thing for card-based systems. General mechanics
Attributes: short description attached to characters/items/objects. Applied as stated, with room for negotiation but without mechanical execution. May be agreed to have mechanical effects (eg: skills)
No hitpoints: characters are taken out of the fight by injury, with death being resolved after the fight unless something spectacular occurs.
No skill trees: skills are increased by adding/removing/modifying attributes on a character.
Card-based items: items are represented by cards, with standard forms being used for some items (weapons, armour etc.). The cards contain a set of relevant item variables: name, type of item, range (if applicable), armour value/coverage (if applicable), special rules and an attribute description. Items can have more than one attribute.
GM-driven play: the GM is responsible for rolls, with players giving actions/directions. Further, the GM is allowed to alter rules (with notice) to any extent he wants.
 
General Combat mechanics
1 action per turn: move or attack or cast or perform misc. action.
Combined roll (3xD6): hit roll, placement roll, damage roll. Floating dice can be used to simplify skill/counter rolls. It is advisable to have some way of easily separating dice or sorting them to allow for smooth play.
1 counter roll: opponent gets to choose 1 dice before roll to reroll if the score is unfavourable. This represents generic blocking/dodging/luck.
Skills can be represented to changing the score on a dice, changing the score-to-exceed for a roll or forcing a reroll.
 
Range and movement
Weapons and spells (if any) can have effects at range. Range is represented by four states: melee (<10m), short range (10 – 50m), medium range (50 – 100m) and long range (>100m).
Hitting involves exceeding a score, the score being dependent on the situation. GMs are allowed to tinker with to-exceed scores as the situation dictates, but must give contextual clues to players (example: "it's a rainy night and the target is moving, so it will be extremely difficult to hit" = a standard to-hit roll now has a +2 modifier to the to-exceed score.)
Hitting at range against an opponent is difficult, so the base to-exceed score for actions at range increases: melee = 2, short range = 3, medium range = 4 and long range = 5. Hitting a stationary or large object is easier, of course.
Base movement per turn is jogging speed (roughly 2m/s), so closing from range can take some time. Turns are represent roughly 10 seconds of time (although this varies for story and mechanical reasons), so a character can move 10-20m per turn.
Weapons are used in order or range, with weapons in range getting priority. This means that at short range, the short ranged weapon will go first, followed by the long ranged weapon and medium ranged weapon.
Weapons can exceed their stated range by one increment (you threw your sword), but suffer a reroll penalty to hit along with whatever the GM feels is situationally appropriate (sword now unavailable for rest of scene).
 
Placement and damage
After a successful hit roll, the placement of the shot will be determined by the placement roll. Placement is as follows:​1: legs 2: lower torso 3: upper torso 4: arms 5: head 6: player chooses ​The effect of successful hit placement determines the effect of damage, which is contextual and based on the area hit, the effect of armour and the type of weapon used (a significant wound to the legs, for instance, would result in the character not being able to move or only being able to crawl. A slashing weapon hitting the same point might even remove the leg entirely). Damage is determined by the damage roll, with the effects being as follows:​1: no damage. 2-5: a wound is inflicted.  6: a severe wound is inflicted. Characters are taken out of the fight based on wounds. A normal person, upon receiving a severe wound, generally becomes unable to continue with anything beyond finding cover or retreating. A particularly hardy or strong-willed person, on the other hand, might get multiple injuries and still carry on fighting. The number of wounds a character can withstand is determined by their attributes. Severe wounds are such that a character will be instantly out of the fight or severely impaired, with correspondingly more difficult healing and recovery.  
Narrative, scene, resolution and healing
Events in a game can happen in one of two ways: narrative (where things are broadly resolved by the GM and players discussing things) and scene (a specific event, where mechanics are in play). GMs can include rolls as needed to represent difficulty, but are advised to only use these where an unexpected, mechanistic resolution to an issue is needed. Players may, during narrative or a scene, argue an attribute. Arguing an attribute involves making a case to the GM that the description of the attribute held by a player (in the form of a character attribute or item attribute) will allow the character to perform a certain action. This might involve ignoring or instantly passing a roll ('light touch' being used to bypass a roll to successfully pickpocket another character), or it might involve a constant effect ('veteran' adding another wound to a character). The GM has final authority on the outcome of the argument, but is advised to be reasonable and refrain from simply imposing his/her own interpretation. After a scene, it is often the case that one or more characters are out of the fight due to wounds. For the player characters, there must now be a period of healing to restore wounds. Here a skill roll, with a to-exceed score based on the number of wounds received (severe wounds count as two) can be taken every few days, with a roll of 1 adding a wound. Six wounds would thus result in the character dying at the end of the scene. Attributes would, as with all actions, be taken into account where healing is concerned. However, the GM does have some leeway to fudge things if needs be. If the game is expected to be realistic and/or difficult, then a more realistic approach to injuries can be taken. If a game is expected to be easier or more fantastic, then injuries resulting in death can be treated as more rare events.  
Armour, penetration and weapon types
Armour allows characters to negate the effects of a successful attack beyond the counter-roll, and is item-based. Armour items have a coverage statistic (with the numbers corresponding to the parts of the body covered), as well as an attribute description describing the level of protection conferred. Penetration is generally dependent on the type of weapon being used, with slashing weapons generally having low penetration. Again, context is important when determining penetration of armour. A discussion of weapon types, armour and damage in the real world is included in the Appendices.

Okay, here is what I have so far.
 
Some preliminary thoughts:
It's hella hard to keep a system simple. Damage models are really hard to make simple and realistic. I very quickly ended up putting more time into the information for GM's section than anything else. Might have to be a separate post. I really have a thing for card-based systems. General mechanics
Attributes: short description attached to characters/items/objects. Applied as stated, with room for negotiation but without mechanical execution. May be agreed to have mechanical effects (eg: skills)
No hitpoints: characters are taken out of the fight by injury, with death being resolved after the fight unless something spectacular occurs.
No skill trees: skills are increased by adding/removing/modifying attributes on a character.
Card-based items: items are represented by cards, with standard forms being used for some items (weapons, armour etc.). The cards contain a set of relevant item variables: name, type of item, range (if applicable), armour value/coverage (if applicable), special rules and an attribute description. Items can have more than one attribute.
GM-driven play: the GM is responsible for rolls, with players giving actions/directions. Further, the GM is allowed to alter rules (with notice) to any extent he wants.
 
General Combat mechanics
1 action per turn: move or attack or cast or perform misc. action.
Combined roll (3xD6): hit roll, placement roll, damage roll. Floating dice can be used to simplify skill/counter rolls. It is advisable to have some way of easily separating dice or sorting them to allow for smooth play.
1 counter roll: opponent gets to choose 1 dice before roll to reroll if the score is unfavourable. This represents generic blocking/dodging/luck.
Skills can be represented to changing the score on a dice, changing the score-to-exceed for a roll or forcing a reroll.
 
Range and movement
Weapons and spells (if any) can have effects at range. Range is represented by four states: melee (<10m), short range (10 – 50m), medium range (50 – 100m) and long range (>100m).
Hitting involves exceeding a score, the score being dependent on the situation. GMs are allowed to tinker with to-exceed scores as the situation dictates, but must give contextual clues to players (example: "it's a rainy night and the target is moving, so it will be extremely difficult to hit" = a standard to-hit roll now has a +2 modifier to the to-exceed score.)
Hitting at range against an opponent is difficult, so the base to-exceed score for actions at range increases: melee = 2, short range = 3, medium range = 4 and long range = 5. Hitting a stationary or large object is easier, of course.
Base movement per turn is jogging speed (roughly 2m/s), so closing from range can take some time. Turns are represent roughly 10 seconds of time (although this varies for story and mechanical reasons), so a character can move 10-20m per turn.
Weapons are used in order or range, with weapons in range getting priority. This means that at short range, the short ranged weapon will go first, followed by the long ranged weapon and medium ranged weapon.
Weapons can exceed their stated range by one increment (you threw your sword), but suffer a reroll penalty to hit along with whatever the GM feels is situationally appropriate (sword now unavailable for rest of scene).
 
Placement and damage
After a successful hit roll, the placement of the shot will be determined by the placement roll. Placement is as follows:​1: legs 2: lower torso 3: upper torso 4: arms 5: head 6: player chooses ​The effect of successful hit placement determines the effect of damage, which is contextual and based on the area hit, the effect of armour and the type of weapon used (a significant wound to the legs, for instance, would result in the character not being able to move or only being able to crawl. A slashing weapon hitting the same point might even remove the leg entirely). Damage is determined by the damage roll, with the effects being as follows:​1: no damage. 2-5: a wound is inflicted.  6: a severe wound is inflicted. Characters are taken out of the fight based on wounds. A normal person, upon receiving a severe wound, generally becomes unable to continue with anything beyond finding cover or retreating. A particularly hardy or strong-willed person, on the other hand, might get multiple injuries and still carry on fighting. The number of wounds a character can withstand is determined by their attributes. Severe wounds are such that a character will be instantly out of the fight or severely impaired, with correspondingly more difficult healing and recovery.  
Narrative, scene, resolution and healing
Events in a game can happen in one of two ways: narrative (where things are broadly resolved by the GM and players discussing things) and scene (a specific event, where mechanics are in play). GMs can include rolls as needed to represent difficulty, but are advised to only use these where an unexpected, mechanistic resolution to an issue is needed. Players may, during narrative or a scene, argue an attribute. Arguing an attribute involves making a case to the GM that the description of the attribute held by a player (in the form of a character attribute or item attribute) will allow the character to perform a certain action. This might involve ignoring or instantly passing a roll ('light touch' being used to bypass a roll to successfully pickpocket another character), or it might involve a constant effect ('veteran' adding another wound to a character). The GM has final authority on the outcome of the argument, but is advised to be reasonable and refrain from simply imposing his/her own interpretation. After a scene, it is often the case that one or more characters are out of the fight due to wounds. For the player characters, there must now be a period of healing to restore wounds. Here a skill roll, with a to-exceed score based on the number of wounds received (severe wounds count as two) can be taken every few days, with a roll of 1 adding a wound. Six wounds would thus result in the character dying at the end of the scene. Attributes would, as with all actions, be taken into account where healing is concerned. However, the GM does have some leeway to fudge things if needs be. If the game is expected to be realistic and/or difficult, then a more realistic approach to injuries can be taken. If a game is expected to be easier or more fantastic, then injuries resulting in death can be treated as more rare events.  
Armour, penetration and weapon types
Armour allows characters to negate the effects of a successful attack beyond the counter-roll, and is item-based. Armour items have a coverage statistic (with the numbers corresponding to the parts of the body covered), as well as an attribute description describing the level of protection conferred. Penetration is generally dependent on the type of weapon being used, with slashing weapons generally having low penetration. Again, context is important when determining penetration of armour. A discussion of weapon types, armour and damage in the real world is included in the Appendices.

Excellent radar reflection is a prime masculine trait.

Maybe not far enough East?
 

People very rarely go out and shoot people just for being the other gender, hell even Elliot Rodger wanted to kill men too because his poor little feelings couldn't handle the thought that nobody wanted him but instead wanted actually socialized humans, and he was mad at them too. The only one I can really think of who did something straight up like that is Marc Lepine.
 
Incidentally: the worst of tumblr: really not a huge deal. If they want to have their own weird angrily touchy-feely circlejerk, they don't usually delve into straight up agitprop against men like, say, mgtows do.
 
 
 
I have met far too many people who have let their blood flow out of their brain when the subject comes up so to speak to truly believe either gender is significantly picky. Too many guys in bars whose standards sound like a NASA countdown.
 
Weirdly I can't think of any time I've gotten hit on by a dude. Then again unlike some people here despite growing up in an incredibly gay neighborhood I don't go to gay hangouts.
 
 
 
Literally and cheerfully, given the opportunity.

This makes me wonder about how many women actually go out and kill men for being male. Are we talking full-on gendercide here or... no, pretty much nobody.
 
Dude, it is hilarious when you get worked up over things like this. I'm sort of tempted to prod you over it a bit.

Also had the experience of getting hit on really heavily... by a friend who came out of the closet in a big way after high school.
 
It's really uncomfortable knowing the playbook and getting treated to the moves

This makes me wonder about how many women actually go out and kill men for being male. Are we talking full-on gendercide here or... no, pretty much nobody.
 
Dude, it is hilarious when you get worked up over things like this. I'm sort of tempted to prod you over it a bit.

Hilariously, humans are one of the few examples of sexual selection on both genders: men have oversize penises and more physical dymorphism (debated) while women get overlarge boobs and hip/buttock fat.
There are functional aspects to this (eg: fat deposits indicating reserves needed for reproduction) but like a lot of sexual selection it runs on its own logic.
We like boobs because we like boobs, basically.

I think you're missing the point.
 
We like boobies, but the market is saturated with free boobies. Which is why SI is losing ground on what is already their most profitable product. Which is why announcer guy wonders when they'll just call it a day already.
 
Also, is SJW going to become a thing now? Will I be forced to listen to humourless gits on both sides bang on about this till I want to kill everyone who so much as mentions it? Must we all be so terribly pedantic and dull?

http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-5-worst-kinds-album-every-music-fan-has-bought/

SA! SA! SA!
 
 
 
Obligatory