Grappling and melee

[TiggerCCW UK]

I know that there are a lot of faults with the melee system in T2K, but I was wondering if anyone had a better system for grappling. This has come into my head with my merc game coming up, and in light of a bit of a barney we had in work last night.

Long story short, while working last night I became involved in removing a couple of guys from work (one of them had punched a female customer and knocked her out). We were taking the guys up to hold them for the cops when one of them (had to be the biggest, didn't it) got loose and things got a bit lively for a few minutes. One of my doormen got his nose broken and there was a fair old scuffle. It took 4 of us to restrain the guy and bring him to the ground where we were able to hold him for the police. He's been charged with assault and abh.

To be honest, the Twilight melee system wasn't going through my head at the time, but thinking about it since I was wondering how that would have played out in game terms. In my last campaign I did have a player who melee'd for preference, and the grapple rules seemed to make it pretty easy to overpower and hold someone. As we proved last night, if someone doesn't want to be restrained, it can be hard to control them.

[Caradhras]

Fair point.

I guess you have to think about the 'playability' aspect too though. If it became so difficult to pin/hold someone, no-one would bother trying.

I reckon it is not too difficult to overpower/restain someone 1 v 1 when you have a str/size advantage in normal circs. In a scenario where the opponent is big and 'handy', combined with 'adrenalin rushed' and possibly drink/drugs...then maybe the GM needs to throw in a few additional modifiers to the rules

[Legbreaker]

I suppose one way to look at it is in terms of skill levels.
Do any of the participants in your RL scuffle have much in the way of actual training? If so, how would they rate on a scale of 1-10 with 1 being effectively untrained and ten the worlds greatest martial artist?

[Targan]

My players love to get into hand to hand, grappling and melee weapons combat in my campaign. The original T2K systems handle such combat poorly. I recommend making your own system for that kind of combat or convert to an existing system you like.

[TiggerCCW UK]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

I suppose one way to look at it is in terms of skill levels.
Do any of the participants in your RL scuffle have much in the way of actual training? If so, how would they rate on a scale of 1-10 with 1 being effectively untrained and ten the worlds greatest martial artist?

I'm unsure about whether the unknown male had any training, but I don't think so. On our end none of us have any formal martial arts training, but the others involved had at least 3 years experience on the door and I'm pushing 18 years bar and door. It should be pointed out that we were somewhat limited in options of what we could actually do - we were getting the police involved so we wanted to hand him over intact and uninjured. Of course his own personal rules of engagement were slightly different. Had it just been a case of chinning him to remove a threat it would have been a lot quicker.

Another relevant factor is that he was a fair bit bigger than us - but then its never the easy ones that kick off.

[Legbreaker]

I know it's simplifying A LOT but could it be said the drunk had a Str and Con of say 8 while everyone else were say average 5?
Being drunk might also contribute, artificially raising his Con another few points while simultaneously reducing Int (common sense) to a negative figure...

Of course the rules are certainly bent towards PCs winning, but as you say you were also trying to restrain rather than kill/injure. Having to "pull punches" so to speak is certainly going to have a BIG impact, especially when the drunk is probably doing everything in their power to escape.

Now, from the way I see it, and trying not to complicate things too much, Strikes, Blocks and Diving Blows can probably stand as they are - it's Grappling that appears to be too easy. How can that be adjusted in such a way that Grappling is still a viable option for characters?

[Targan]

The way Harnmaster handles grappling you first match the level of success or failure of each participant's appropriate skill roll (Unarmed Combat or a martial art skill) on a two axis grid, one axis for the attacker and one for the defender. The levels of success/failure in Harnmaster are Critical Success, Marginal Success, Marginal Failure, Critical Failure. You cross reference on the grid and it tells you what the next step will be. If the attacker has successfully grappled he can attempt to exploit the hold which requires a further Unarmed or MA check and a test of strength against strength (each side rolls 2d6 and adds their strength to it and highest total wins). There are various things you can do with an exploited hold like squeezing, choking, restraining, attempting to dislocated or break limbs, imobilise etc.

[TiggerCCW UK]

Originally Posted by Caradhras

Fair point.

I guess you have to think about the 'playability' aspect too though. If it became so difficult to pin/hold someone, no-one would bother trying.

I reckon it is not too difficult to overpower/restain someone 1 v 1 when you have a str/size advantage in normal circs. In a scenario where the opponent is big and 'handy', combined with 'adrenalin rushed' and possibly drink/drugs...then maybe the GM needs to throw in a few additional modifiers to the rules

I agree that playability needs to be maintained, rather than just going for total realism, but the game just seems to go too far down the easy route. I'm coming up on 18 years in the bar door trade and its rare that a restraint ever goes as easy as the game would make it look. For the record the guy last night was pretty drunk, but we don't think there was any drug use involved.

When you say that you think it should be easy to restrain someone 1 on 1 do you mean in game terms or in real life? I agree that the game should be slightly biased towards the players and give them a chance, I think the melee rules have gone too far.