d20 Adamant Entertainment Hot Pursuit.pdf

by Corey Reid

Layout and Graphic Design: Gareth-Michael Skarka

Artwork courtesy of Jupitermedia Corporation

Introduction

Davis leaps for the reins, grabbing them as he vaults into the

bench seat high atop the carriage. Four black stallions rear

nervously and then drive forward as he slaps the reins, yelling at

the team.

A Few Basics

Youʼre going to need to familiarize yourself with these rules

before you run a chase. In a nutshell, hereʼs what happens in a

chase:

“Come on!”

Lacie sprints from the castle gate, arrows hurtling past her, and

leaps for the half-open door of the carriage box. Wheels rattle

on cobblestone as the carriage careens down the high road, tall

ﬁelds of barley to either side.

First, everybody rolls initiative. Participants take their actions

according to the initiative, just like combat.

On each characterʼs turn, that character choose a maneuver

to attempt. The maneuver is resolved and its effects applied.

Some maneuvers allow chase participants to close in on each

other, some try to avoid (or cause) collisions, and some allow

desperadoes to leap from one moving vehicle to another.

Lacie leans out of the carriage window, wind whipping at her

hair, and sees two hobgoblins mounted on powerful warhorses

coming thundering out of the gate behind them, axes ready.

“Uh-oh.”

If the maneuver caused the conditions of the chase to change,

those changes affect everyone in the chase. For example, if you

manage a tight turn off the highway onto a narrow alley ﬁlled

with fruit stands, suddenly everyone in the chase needs to slow

right down to negotiate the more difﬁcult terrain (assuming they

can follow you at all)...and then itʼs the next characterʼs turn. And

so on.

The Chase Sequence has become a highlight of the action/

adventure movie. From the efforts of Indiana Jones to stop the

Nazis getting away, to Mad Maxʼs desperate struggle against

Lord Humungous and his army on the empty highways of

Australia, these are moments any GM wants to reproduce in their

games.

Thatʼs it. As you can see, chases arenʼt that much different from

combats in d20, but the little differences can make all the, uh,

difference. Hereʼs a quick review of whatʼs going to be new to

you:

Chases are thrilling because theyʼre risky and dramatic. Will the

heroes escape with the vial of anti-venom or will their pickup

truck swerve too far and end up wrapped around a telephone

pole? Death is never far away for both the good guys and bad

guys in a chase. A great deal can hinge on quick decisions, clever

tactics and the blind luck of the dice.

No Maps

Chases donʼt need maps or battlegrids or ﬁgures, though youʼre

welcome to use those if you like. Hot Pursuit abstracts the actual

details of terrain so that you donʼt need to have detailed maps of

the chase area. If you have them, you can use them, but you donʼt

need them. The “Chase Conditions” chapter gives you all the

details you need to generate terrain on the ﬂy.

Hot Pursuit: The Deﬁnitive D20 Guide to Chases is designed

to provide a way for d20 GMs to include thrilling, easy-to-run

chases in their games. This system should work easily with most

d20-based games. It is based on the Modern System Reference

Document and can be easily adapted for fantasy, sci-ﬁ or

modern settings. It will allow GMs to run chases on horseback,

in automobiles or even airplanes or spaceships (with a little

tinkering).

No Full Actions

Like combat, chases are divided into rounds, but in a chase,

participants can only take one action per round. Think of a chase

as being more or less just like a combat, except that everyone

involved is using a move action each round just to stay in the

chase. This means there are no full attacks in a chase, nor are

there any run actions (which seems weird, but stay with it. It

makes sense, we promise).

You donʼt need anything other than whatʼs in this book. Your

players donʼt need anything at all. Everything you need to run

excitement-packed chases is right here.

Full Speed All The Time

The big assumption this system makes has to do with speed. Hot

Pursuit assumes that all chase participants are always going as

fast as they can -- at all times. Got that? Itʼs important, so keep it

in your mind as you read on. The “Speed” chapter explains it all.

We promise.

Choosing Maneuvers

Lacie: Itʼs my turn now, right?

Each round, every participant will choose a maneuver on their

turn. These maneuvers are classiﬁed into three groups: Chase,

Passenger and Obstacle . Not all participants can choose from

every list. Many maneuvers require Reaction Rolls from other

chase participants, so people will often be making rolls even

when it isnʼt their turn. The “Maneuvers” chapter has all the

information, but you probably ﬁgured that out on your own,

didnʼt you?

GM: Yep. Youʼre a passenger on the carriage, so you can choose

any Passenger maneuver.

Lacie: Iʼve got my crossbow so Iʼm going to try and shoot this

hobgoblin.

GM: Youʼre choosing the Ranged Attack maneuver. Heʼs at

Point-Blank range, so you take no range penalty on your attack

roll. However, the current Speed Category is Cautious, so thatʼs a

-1 on your roll.

Davis and Lacie Run For It: A Sample Chase

Hereʼs an example of a Chase using the Hot Pursuit system.

Davis and Lacie are trying to escape a secret fortress using a

carriage, pursued by two hobgoblins. This shows some of the

basics of Hot Pursuit and gives you an idea of how this system

works in practice.

Lacie: Okay. I roll a 15! My attack bonus is plus 7, so thatʼs a 22,

minus 1 for the Speed Category is 21.

GM: Pretty good. The hobgoblinʼs Armor Class would normally

be 14, but at this speed he gets a dodge bonus of 2, so thatʼs an

16. Too bad for him. You lean out the window and snap off a

quick shot through the dust. Nice shooting.

GM: Okay, guys, your carriage is hurtling along a cobblestone

road through a rice paddy. Both hobgoblins are currently at Short

range. The ﬁrst hobgoblin has the highest Initiative, so he gets to

go ﬁrst. No obstacles for him this round, so heʼs going to attempt

the Close/Lengthen maneuver to reduce the range to Point-Blank.

Lacie: Right on. My damage is... 8.

GM: He curses as the bolt grazes his shoulder, but stays close.

The horseʼs hooves are right alongside your carriageʼs rattling

wheels. And the other rider is closing in, too. Your turn, Davis.

Davis: Uh-oh. Their horses are faster than this carriage, arenʼt

they?

GM: They sure are. Close/Lengthen is an opposed maneuver,

so you and the hobgoblin need to make opposed Ride checks.

Remember, the hobgoblin has a Speed Factor of 1 against your

carriage, so you take a -1 penalty on your check.

Weʼll come back to Davis and Lacie in a little bit, as their effort

to escape continues. But ﬁrst letʼs look at how the information

about a chase is recorded during the chase itself.

Davis: Okay, I get a... 12, plus my 6 for Ride, minus 1 for the

Speed Factor penalty and another for the Speed Category... total

of 16.

Forget about the battlegrid. Forget about maps (for the most part).

Chases are run using a table (which weʼll call, imaginatively

enough, the Chase Table) that keeps track of chase conditions,

key vehicle statistics, and the relationships between all the chase

participants.

GM: Not bad, but the bad guy gets a 14, plus 5 for his Ride skill,

and he gets the Speed Factor as a bonus on his roll, so thatʼs plus

an additional 1. Total of 20. So he closes in on your carriage, and

is now at Point-Blank range.

A Chase Table for Davis and Lacieʼs escape looks like Table 1-1:

Example Chase Table 1.

Davis: Uh-oh.

Table 1-1: Example Chase Table 1

Terrain: Open

Surface: Clear

Speed Category: All-Out

CHASE PARTICIPANTS

Carriage Rider One Rider Two

Speed 40 48 48

Maneuver Modiﬁer -4 0 0

vs Carriage

Range Point-Blank Short

Speed Factor 1 1

This table records all the pertinent details of the chase. We can

see that the riders are faster and more maneuverable than the

carriage (higher Speed and Maneuver Modiﬁers). We can see that

Rider One is at Point-Blank range from the carriage, while Rider

Two is at Short range. Weʼll be updating the Range from round to

round as participants close or lengthen the distance between each

other. As weʼll see in future rounds, other details on this table can

change, too.

How Chases Work

Usually chases involve one partyʼs efforts to escape from

another, either by outrunning them, disappearing from sight or

causing their pursuers to crash. Each chase participant chooses

a maneuver on their turn in their efforts to either increase or

decrease the distance between each other, or otherwise turn

the situation to their advantage. It is the resolution of these

maneuvers that determines the progress of a chase.

One of the key points about the way the table is set up is that the

rows directly beneath the chase participant titles (“Speed” and

“Maneuver Modiﬁer”) will almost never change during a chase.

The rows beneath “vs Carriage” will change from round to round,

and the set of entries at the top (“Terrain”, “Surface” and “Speed

Category”) will change every time the chase conditions change

(which could be often or never, depending on the nature of the

chase).

The Chase Sequence

Chases run in a sequence not very different from the standard

combat sequence. Characters take their actions in order of

Initiative, and each character can choose one maneuver per

round. Youʼll note there are no full actions allowed.

We know, we can hear you saying, “What do you mean the

Speed never changes? How do I speed up or slow down?” Relax.

Remember we said that chase participants always go as fast as

they can? The Speed row lists the maximum possible speed for

each participant. How fast they are actually going at any given

round in the chase depends on the current Speed Category for the

chase. Thereʼs more details on all this in the Speed chapter. Take

our word for it.

Think of it this way: the characters are using some portion of

their attention (even if theyʼre just passengers) staying up on the

chase. Theyʼre keeping their balance, or paying attention to the

road, or something, which keeps them from focusing their entire

attention on their actions this round. So no full actions in a chase.

Again, think of taking part in a chase as using up a move action

every round.

Initiative is handled exactly as for combat, using six-second

rounds. Each character involved in the chase can choose one

maneuver to perform on their turn. Even passengers can choose

maneuvers from the Passenger maneuver list -- they can attack

another vehicle, attack another passenger, attempt to change

vehicles or take control of the vehicle they are currently in.

Drivers control the behaviour of the vehicle they are driving

and can choose any maneuver (including Passenger maneuvers)

whose conditions they meet.

Youʼll want to keep the Chase Table where all the participants

can see it.

You may also want to track other vehicle information like AC/

Defence, hit points, and so on, in this table. There is a sample

Chase Table you can photocopy for your own use at the end of

this book that covers a little more detail than this one.

Each Characterʼs Turn

When a passengerʼs turn comes up, the passenger can choose

a Passenger maneuver which is then resolved. When a driverʼs

turn comes up, things are a little different. Because drivers are

responsible for the vehicle, on their turn a couple of checks are

made in regards to the vehicleʼs status.

On any driverʼs turn the following additional steps are followed

(in this order):

1. Determine Obstacles -- Depending on the type of Terrain

the driverʼs vehicle is currently crossing, there is a chance of

an Obstacle appearing. The chance per Terrain type is listed in

the Chase Conditions chapter. If an Obstacle appears, the driver

can either choose an Obstacle maneuver to avoid it or just plow

through and accept the crash damage and possible loss of control.

See the Obstacles and Collisions chapter for more information.

2. Resolve Maneuver -- The driver gets to choose a maneuver

for their action. The maneuvers available are listed in the

Maneuvers chapter further on. The maneuver selected may

affect other drivers, passengers, or the range between the current

driverʼs vehicle and other vehicles. Maneuvers can also change

Plik z chomika:

Inne pliki z tego folderu:

Inne foldery tego chomika: