For a game that's intended to be "gritty" the spectre of death seems to be awfully far away.

As it stands the common way to die is to be reduced to zero wounds, and then fail a TN 15 Vi or Re roll (you may spend a fate point to automatically make this roll).

A less common way to die is through spells like "strength of fallen foes", which is the only way I've ever killed anyone (sorry Brian) and the only way that I've ever seen any one "die". (barring written fiat)

I think the intention of the system originally was to make healing wounds something that does not happen nearly as often, as the first common wound healing spells start at tier 3 (Mend Wounds) is interruptible and pushes the targets clock.

I realize that this is a complex system issue, but with a new book coming out it could be fixed in fairly short order.

Suggestion 1, allow enemies to do slightly more stamina damage. The goal here is to allow enemies do more damage to bypass fortitude just a bit more often ( you could tie this reducing their attack bonus, ala Heedless attack from 3.x arcanis and come closer to solving the issue of enemies hit too often)

the corollary to that suggestion is increase the ability for Heroes to heal stamina AND wounds
at Every Tier add a Corpus spell to heal wounds , tier one could have a casting time measured in minutes but it should exist, tier two could be "mend wounds" as its written tier three could be a speed 5 strain 10 melee only once per day thing and tier 4 should be a short range possibly even fast cast spell, and Belisarda and Beltine should probably get specific adaptions on some of those or possibly some of their own spells

but what about healing stamina? people have different ideas about this, I think that healers are behind the curve and getting left behind as monsters increase in potency in tiers, Spells that do healing Plus a short buff ( like +2 ar for 6 ticks ) OR talents that add static bonuses like passive charisma to all healing spells

I'm not sure I accept your premise. First, I'd like to unpack the above statement so my assumptions are more clearly laid out. There are 2 distinct though related "games" when we talk about the living campaign - the rules as written, and the campaign itself.

With regard to the rules as written (RAW), the ability to heal wounds by spell does not present itself outside of Psionics until Tier 2 as a push reaction (Stabilize) and not in a sustained manner until Tier 3 (Mend Wounds). Characters run the risk of stat point loss or additional wounds and corresponding penalties through the standard healing rules. With base rules, Wounds are rare as crits are rare. When they do rear their heads the level of danger depends upon how close skilled healers are, or how many ranks the individual PC has in Heal. As with many other factors, grittiness is in the hands of the GM.

The Codex of Heroes specifically introduced additional gritty options such as the massive damage rule, negative stamina tracking, critical hit effect and permanent injury. All are covered in the "Gritty" Rules section in Appendix 1. That said, the introduction of those rules should be taken at face value. Specifically:

"Arcanis is designed to be forgiving to the Heroes and abstract in its treatment of damage. It is very difficult to suffer long-term injury because the PCI design team thinks it is not a great deal of fun for a great hero to be maimed and/or crippled." CoH p.186.

Based on the above, wounds are challenging, but another obstacle the heroes are expected to overcome. The GM is able to tune the level of grittiness to fit the players and the desired level in a home campaign.

The second "game" is the Living Campaign itself. Rather than use the base rules they have implemented some of the gritty rules, specifically the massive damage rule and typically the permanent injury rule as well. Given the constraints of the format (living game), tuning becomes far more difficult for a variety of reasons.

1. Player expectations and desired level of challenge and grittiness varies. While in a home campaign you can set the bar at an agreed to level, it becomes more challenging if you're not aware of exactly what characters can do or players are capable of.

2. The level of grittiness should be selected to *increase* the level of enjoyment of the players at the table. In the end, the goal of every table - GM and players alike, should be to tell a wonderful tale that's interesting and exciting. GMs that steer too far from that ideal especially going grittier than the players want to deal with are likely to draw consequences. This could be everything from having a lousy time, to never wanting to have that GM again to completely quitting the campaign and sharing their negative experiences. While player actions have consequences, so do GMs.

3. A constantly changing set of characters with any given mod can have a 1.1 or 1.5 diplomat sitting down with a 2.10 combat monster. While it's certainly possible for experienced GMs to juggle those kinds of discrepancies it's not always easy.

4. Longer term effects are harder to deal with given the format. It's not expected that each table manages their extended care healing risking additional wounds and stat point losses before wrapping the session. That's simply hand-waved as part of the living format. Make it through the final combat without dying and your hero returns hale and hearty to face the next mighty adventure in whatever mod gets played next. And there's nothing wrong with that.

5. Encounters must be built for average parties at each tier and can't be tailored. Depending on the stat blocks of the characters the same encounter may be hard and challenging or incredibly lethal especially if massive damage rules are in effect as they are for the campaign.

All that said, if there's a desire by the players to increase the challenge / lethality there are a number of different options available. You've mentioned a couple. Other options are to use the negative stamina tracking and critical hit effect optional gritty rules.

Whatever options are considered, they should be agreed to by the table playing under them. Again, the goal is for the level of grittiness whatever it is to enhance the enjoyment of all, not make it something to suffer through.

One other note of caution I would add. Part of the reason to have limited healing in the original system was that healing inevitably leads to longer combat encounters. It also increases the need to have a healer at the table rather than more flexible party configurations. I'm not sure I want to get into a greater arms race given that many mods already run to time or over.

With a sweep of his hat,

Paul

Maybe it is just me, but why? Why make it more lethal? There is presently no means (really) of a player to build a new character at -1 Level to where they are now, which means they have to either take a flaw, or be knocked back down to Tier 1.5 with a new character (+ whatever XP they get from Replay certs).

I understand that people have made comments that there isn't enough threat of death to make it interesting, but personally I have not seen any of this since the Massive Damage Rules came into effect. Basically, now that Heroes not only take Wounds, but take them on a regular basis, their sense of mortality has been brought to the fore once again and it seems to me that most people are content with this. There are recorded cases of Heroes 'dying' (most brought back with a Flaw), which means that there is established consequences for this. Why do we need to artificially change the system more to kill more Heroes? That doesn't seem fun for the players, and to be honest any GM/Chronicler or Campaign who willingly wishes to diminish the fun of their players doesn't deserve to have any players.

To your proposals: 1) damage is calculated in a very specific way using the Bestiary Vol. 1 enemy construction rules. Short of outright lying on the numbers, you can only give the enemies so many Martial Techniques, Adaptations, and Powerful Attacks before you've added too many ticks onto the creature's attack to not be viable in combat. 2) The way I've always read how the Stamina/Wound system works for Arcanis is that the Wounds SHOULD be something Heroes should be scared of at Tier's 1 and 2. If you give them the ability to Heal Wounds (aside from very limited use spells like Refresh the Body and Stabilize) at lower Tiers, it completely negates the 'threat' of those Wounds. At Tier 3, while you can heal Wounds easier, you are also more at risk of them with abilities such as The Puissant Warrior and The Perfect Cut. 3) I will agree that the dedicated "Healer Cleric" is something that starts loosing ground to threats at higher Tiers due to tick-management, but overall I have only seen problems with this on tables of 4 or less. If you have one or two people who can dish out a lot of damage or tank, the dedicated Healer can usually keep their people up long enough to finish the combat.

The "avoid death by taking a flaw" rule needs to be written down and put into play more commonly than the spoken understanding of BI folks then (or is it in the codex under fate i dont recall)

Codex of Heroes, page 186

It's the "Permanent Injury" Optional Gritty rule, p 186 of the CoH or a variation of it.

"When a Hero would die as a result of failed Healing Action rolls, the Hero can "succeed" instead. The Hero obtains a physical Flaw instead of dying. Suitable examples include: Physical Weakness, Feeble Attribute or One Eye."

With a sweep of his hat,

Paul

The point im trying to address is that in the most lethal of situations (battle interactives) there are exceedingly few deaths, and that indicates to me that there is very little risk on the part of the players.

one of the biggest challenges in writing for this system or creating things to challenge players, is making it a challenge, if a party can just walk past a trap and then heal up from it with no lasting effect and no threat of death, one could consider it a waste of effort, thats why a hallway full of traps (by its self) is something you havent really seen in mods because its not challenging.

I'm saying that as a judge in the events that are supposed to be on the lethal side, I am disappointed, not from my tables , but from the general state of the room. last year I dont think anyone died, and really where is the challenge in that?

I agree with what others have said. I don't think the lethality needs to be increased. Being killed is no fun (gaining numerous physical flaws is also no fun). I always assumed the reason why we didn't see a hallway full of traps is because it's no fun to deal with (even in D&D, it just drags on and has no lasting effect).

The whole point is not to kill characters or really even to challenge them. The point is for the players (and GMs) to have fun and to feel like they were challenged (often but not always the same thing as challenging them). I don't think anyone died at the Origins BI but every single person I talked to felt like their table had been challenged. The 3.1 table seemed like they were at serious risk of dieing - last count I heard was 18 wounds and that was not at the end. The all-Elorii table had over half the group down in 2 (I think) scenes. The BEAST table had the advantage of (iirc) 4 people with AR7+, 1 with AR3, and 1 with AR3 or 0 - we had few people drop but took a total of something like 5-6 wounds (and no way to heal them) and definitely felt challenged.

Hello,

Since design was mentioned, let me give some insights - I instructed Peter, Eric, James and the others NOT to use a standard Hit Point system BECAUSE I didn't want the system to be overly lethal as well as giving players the option to capture or be captured rather than a zero sum alternative.

So no, IMO just because we wanted the game to be gritty does not mean that it should be lethal. Gritty, or Grimdark as I've heard it called, is a sense of mood and story, not lethality.

As for it being difficult to challenge players without resorting to the need to outright smack them over the head with a death-match, I believe that's one of the reasons Arcanis provides above average adventures.

With the addition of the Massive Damage Rules I think we've struck a good balance. Obviously, Chroniclers can do as they wish for their home games, but for the OP, I think we're just about right.

Why does challenge only have to be rated by PC deaths? Could you not frame scenes around things like "stop the Ss'ressen from getting past you", with the challenge coming from stopping them before they march past you? Hell, this one is basically the Anti-BI, because usually the Heroes have to get past a succession of creatures to get to the gate/wall/objective.

Or how about timed encounters, like having to get save someone before they get dropped in acid? Or the room is collapsing and you have x ticks to get out? Or down a certain number of enemies before the ticks run out and they teleport elsewhere to thin their numbers?

Or how about environmental encounters, where you have to make Balance checks on a heaving ship in shark infested waters? Or how about fighting in a desert where you are all Exhausted?

Or how about encounters in which you have to choose for or against fighting, with the enemy not being clear and it becomes a moral dilemma?