CT Only: Do you use morale?
- Thread starter aramis
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Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
Morale is for other non player characters.
Until you meet a dragon.
Until you meet a dragon.
Badenov
SOC-12
In many wargames, particularly in one-off scenarios, players march imaginary soldiers around a virtual battlefield don't care if they die. Morale is a mechanic to add a bit of versimilitude, but it often falls short in many gamers' eyes by not considering specifics of a situation and thus giving strange results. Most RL battles have 2 factors armchair generals often don't consider: the fact that there's actual people under command who don't want to die, and the fact that you need an effective force at the end or your victory will be undone by your inability to defend it.
Consider these situations:
A mother bear (or most other animals), protecting her cubs, ought to never fail a morale check.
Fanatical or highly motivated troops exist. Some of them on drugs, who don't even understand when they've been injured.
Highly trained and motivated troops who know what they can accomplish or feel their goals are critical to success and that success is worth the sacrifice.
People defending their homes and family.
People fighting a great evil or public menace.
A leader who has brought their troops through considerable adversity, who is working hard to do so again.
On the other hand, there are:
Poorly paid or unpaid troops forced into a fight against their will.
Barely trained or inadequately equipped troops. In WW1, some troops were sent to the front lines without weapons and told to take rifles from fallen allies.
People who feel their side of the war is unjustified.
On top of this, some game systems make it easier than others to safely disengage from a fight with an expectation of survival. And some gamers are quite bloodthirsty and will attempt to finish off retreating enemies. If enemies are not given the chance to retreat, of course they'll fight to the death - that's how it's going to go anyhow.
When I GM, I generally consider all morale situations unique, and ask myself what will the specific people do in each situation. Are they berserkers? Are they lost and at the wrong place at the wrong time? Generally this sort of analysis will make the decision clear.
Consider these situations:
A mother bear (or most other animals), protecting her cubs, ought to never fail a morale check.
Fanatical or highly motivated troops exist. Some of them on drugs, who don't even understand when they've been injured.
Highly trained and motivated troops who know what they can accomplish or feel their goals are critical to success and that success is worth the sacrifice.
People defending their homes and family.
People fighting a great evil or public menace.
A leader who has brought their troops through considerable adversity, who is working hard to do so again.
On the other hand, there are:
Poorly paid or unpaid troops forced into a fight against their will.
Barely trained or inadequately equipped troops. In WW1, some troops were sent to the front lines without weapons and told to take rifles from fallen allies.
People who feel their side of the war is unjustified.
On top of this, some game systems make it easier than others to safely disengage from a fight with an expectation of survival. And some gamers are quite bloodthirsty and will attempt to finish off retreating enemies. If enemies are not given the chance to retreat, of course they'll fight to the death - that's how it's going to go anyhow.
When I GM, I generally consider all morale situations unique, and ask myself what will the specific people do in each situation. Are they berserkers? Are they lost and at the wrong place at the wrong time? Generally this sort of analysis will make the decision clear.
I remember whe I began in the RPGs, back in the 80's, and a friend introduced us to Traveller, we discussed about the use of morale for PCs.
I said the PCs morale was the player's, if they really assumed the role, and he disagreed. Then, one day playing D&D, me being the DM, they faced a dragoon, and, as he said latter, he, not his character, failed morale and withdraw.
I said the PCs morale was the player's, if they really assumed the role, and he disagreed. Then, one day playing D&D, me being the DM, they faced a dragoon, and, as he said latter, he, not his character, failed morale and withdraw.
[Inconsistently - please comment]
I don't have much combat in my games ... nothing wrong with it, "Gunfight at the OK Coral" just doesn't come up much. So most situations seem "morale obvious" (no roll needed).
Animal Encounters have specific guidelines for Attacking vs Fleeing, so I use that to decide how an animal reacts.
More than a typical "morale" roll, I like the "REACTION" table and use it for lots of things that it was never intended [it provides inspiration for whether things are moving in one direction or the other when they could go either way.]
On the other hand ... if I had a scenario that was intended to convey a "horror" atmosphere, I would have no problem employing a "morale roll" as the situation might require.
I don't have much combat in my games ... nothing wrong with it, "Gunfight at the OK Coral" just doesn't come up much. So most situations seem "morale obvious" (no roll needed).
Animal Encounters have specific guidelines for Attacking vs Fleeing, so I use that to decide how an animal reacts.
More than a typical "morale" roll, I like the "REACTION" table and use it for lots of things that it was never intended [it provides inspiration for whether things are moving in one direction or the other when they could go either way.]
On the other hand ... if I had a scenario that was intended to convey a "horror" atmosphere, I would have no problem employing a "morale roll" as the situation might require.
Badenov
SOC-12
Well, we had players in our game who treated an RPG like a character-scale wargame, so that blurs the line a bit. But it makes sense generally.I have always felt morale rules in wargames made aa lot of sense, but in RPGs, I prefer to allow the players to be as dumb or smart, risk adverse or risk crazy as they wish. So I leave the morale rules to my wargame play.
Page #37 appears to be speaking of PC morale:
However, Pages #45-46 appear more generally to apply to any group with page #45 grouped with the other "encounter" data and page #46 a general description of Combat.
MORALE
Roll for morale every combat round, once 25% of a party has become unconscious or been killed. Throw 7+ for the group to stand (not flee); DMs allowed:
If military or mercenary unit. .+1
If any leader skill present ... .+1
If the leader has tactical skill . .+1
If casualties (unconscious or dead) exceed 50% ............... -2
If leader unconscious or dead. . -2 (for 2 combat rounds only; then a new leader takes control.)
Black Vulmea
SOC-12
Always for non-player characters, inconsistently for player characters.
Reaction and morale is my favorite 'social system' but I'm also fine with player characters generally turning every fight into a last stand if that's how they want to end themselves. For solitaire play, I definitely use the morale rule for my own adventurers.
Reaction and morale is my favorite 'social system' but I'm also fine with player characters generally turning every fight into a last stand if that's how they want to end themselves. For solitaire play, I definitely use the morale rule for my own adventurers.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
A good way to handle morale for PCs is to use something like "stress" from Alien and other such mechanics from various games, the coolness under fire from T2k4e is interesting.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
I recall coolness under fire from the original 2300 so I expect it was there in the original T2K.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
It's for something that is outside the control of the player character.
Like insanity, or confronting something awesome and/or terrifying.
Or mind control.
Like insanity, or confronting something awesome and/or terrifying.
Or mind control.
Neither do I, and players know (at least in Traveller) that combat uses to be quite deadly, so they better fight at their own risk.
Likewise, I always applied (in any RPG game I refereed) that if law and order are kept (so this may exclude some games as T2K) is because the forces defending them are powerful enough. So they better take care on illegal actions...
Original T2K had coolness under fire rules, and you had more or less actions per combat turn depening on it.
That's a cool way to handle it!
The Reaction table is a big part of my refereeing process as well.
The only reason to use morale rolls for PCs is when there's a blatant "your 20-year career-Marine character knows he'd better back out of this, even if you as a freshman-comp-sci student player don't understand why" case.
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