Can you handle the pain?

[Superfluous Crow]

Since we already have a weekly setting philosophy question, i thought I'd post a system philosophy question instead:
How should a game handle pain?

We all know the feeling of stubbing a toe and getting paper cuts and worse, but how does pain interfere with our actions? How much control do we (or our character) have over himself and the pain? How long does the pain last in a game?

Considering different pain thresholds it seems sensible that this should be a point system of some sort. There are different levels of pain. A simple penalty could be one way to go, but how much does that help the player visualize the pain? A willpower check against a DC based on how much pain passed through the threshold, to avoid taking penalties by sucking up the pain might be more complicated, yet perhaps more interesting as well.
Should damage even interfere with a character? Or should we abstract from it like DnD and have two levels of harm: Alive and dead.

Let your thoughts run free.

[Nomadic]

Just a short thought here but I think it depends on how complex you want to get because depending on the harm system involved it could add alot of extra things to think about in combat.

[Superfluous Crow]

True, but there is probably some golden path in between completely abstract and overly complicated; we just have to look good enough. Just like with setting design, we should strive for excellence in the field of system design as well :)
For example, you could imagine a system where actual damage is only rarely calculated and the time you'd spend figuring out HP and such was instead spent on pain rules.
I know tRoS operates with some kind of pain mechanic; if i remember correctly each wound deals one round of shock and then a number of rounds of pain which then penalize you in some way.

[Lmns Crn]

Here is another situation where I think Spirit of the Century handles things really well: elegantly, adaptably, and with a minimum of fuss and rules-clutter.

The gist of it is that as characters get the stuffing kicked out of them, they start to accumulate consequences of increasing severity. Once you've got three consequences, the next hit that would otherwise cause a consequence results instead in you being "taken out" of the conflict. ("Taken out" results get described by the character taking you out of the fight. In a physical conflict, this can be death, getting knocked unconscious, getting pinned to a tree by arrows through your sleeves and pants legs, whatever-- but it always leaves you unable to continue the fight.)

In the meantime, though, the consequences you accumulate act as a handy indicator of pain and injuries. When you take a consequence, it's a little descriptive phrase that you choose, like "Exhaustion" or "Cuts and Bruises" or "Twisted Ankle"-- the second and third consequences are described as more severe injuries.

You've probably heard me gush about the aspects system of SotC, because it is awesome and I'm totally impressed by it. When you have consequences, they act exactly like temporary aspects. So other combatants can leverage your Broken Ribs, or the fact that you're Bleedin' All Over the Place, against you-- just like any other aspect.

So, the more consequences you accrue, the more handicapped you're going to be for the rest of the fight (and longer, since a lot of consequences can linger for quite a while).

So the system works pretty nicely for representing pain, injury, and the way they interfere with characters' efforts. I'm pretty satisfied with the balance it strikes between flexibility, abstraction, and not getting in the way.

[Superfluous Crow]

I like the idea of the enemies being able to use your specific injuries against you :)
And it sounds like SotC really puts some thought into its mechanics, just like one should, so they are at their most interesting. I really have to read it at some point, but I haven't managed to find time for anything beyond cursory glances up until now unfortunately.

[Lmns Crn]

I like the idea of the enemies being able to use your specific injuries against you :)
And it sounds like SotC really puts some thought into its mechanics, just like one should, so they are at their most interesting. I really have to read it at some point, but I haven't managed to find time for anything beyond cursory glances up until now unfortunately.

Yeah, the only real issue is that I'm not at all sure that those kinds of ideas can be easily lifted from SotC and dropped into another system of mechanics. Work on the Jade FATE wiki is coming along well, and in addition to being a setting conversion, I'm doing a lot of work to simplify explanations and collect related information that scattered all over the book. As much as I love the FATE System, information in the SotC book can often be really difficult to find.

If anyone's interested, I can type up a slightly more detailed explanation of SotC conflicts, stress, consequences, and all that stuff. I don't want to derail the thread topic at hand, though.