Re: drowning

[Greg Mowczko <mooch@ns1.cioe.com>]

Ahh... drowning. Or more to the point lack of air. We have the occasional
time where their is just nothing to breath. 

> > From: Steve Ames <steve>
> >
> > How long does it _really_ take to drown and what rolls/adjudications go
> > with it?
> >
> > I've seen a large range of rulings on this ranging from "you die" and
> > "5d6-vs-HEA or die" to upping the d6 every round until you miss and
> > die. I think on a mostly water world, drowning should really be defined.
> >
> > 1) Under what circumstances do drowning rules even come into play:
> >
> > 	- trapped underwater and you don't breathe water
> > 	- can't swim, fail the default and have no flotation devices

As in you start to sink since you have 30 pounds of gear on.


> From: Wright Frazier <khelek>
>
> > 2) How long does it take to:
> > 
> > 	a) pass out:  minutes
> > 	b) die: minutes
>
> In RL several minutes on both if I remember my life guard classes at all.
> I'm sure Joe will beable to quanitify more, but so long as a person
> doesn't panic(adventurers never panic it seems) they can hold their
> breath for a significant amount of time and still function.  In times
> of desperation it'll be longer because ya got no choice.  Also once
> unconcious you have about 4-5 minutes till you are braindead/unrevivable
> via CPR.  Granted AQ has no CPR mechanism, so you just bang on their chest,
> or do an impromptu heimlich(sp?), push their legs up to pump the
> water out, ect...  So make it like 2-3 minutes to revive them or brain
> death occures.

Some people have been known to go 20 minutes dead before coming back. I believe
the record for a person who fell in and then got pulled out is 30 minutes.
How would you like to try and break this :)

>
> Hmmm...since steve included a cute chart ;)
>
> 	Round	|	Check		|	Time
> _________________________________________________________
> 	7	|	3d6Hea		|	0-28sec
>  	8-15	|	4d6Hea		|	1m
> 	16-30	|	5d6Hea		|	2m
> 	31-45	|	6d6Hea		|	3m	
> 	46-60+	|	7d6Hea		|	4m+
>
> Blow the check and out you go, may be from panic? but probably not from
> lack of air.  Note I'm giving rounds 1-6 as freebies, a person in
> fair shape(not a sedintary lifestyle) will have _NO_ trouble holding
> their breath from 30sec.   

There is a difference between: I'm going to dive into this water vs.
I've fallen in. If you have a chance to inhale I think you should get
something like you HEA in rounds of breath ( I can always hold my own
breath for a minute and usually longer, just now I held out 1 min 40 sec )

> If the person has not had a chance to get a breath of air before
> going under, then half the round timings.

Maybe just the initial round bits after that you are running on the air left
in you. Lots of anearobic activity at this point.

> Once the person is unconcious, then the GM secretly rolls a 2d20 and adds
> 5.  This is how long before the person dies(for whatever reason), and gives
> a time from 30 sec to 3 minutes.  Note the longer a person has been out
> the harder they are to revive.  How to simulate the difficulty of
> reviving someone isn't coming to mind however.  Bleh.
>
> Wright

Yep this part is hard to figure out how to handle. More comments after Steve's.

> > 3) What are the appropriate checks if the above times aren't absolutes
> >    (and from a roleplaying standpoint they shouldn't... people like
> >    rolling dice).
> > 
> > I'd suggest the following:
> > 
> > 	rounds	action
> > 	-------|-----------------------------------
> > 	1 - 2  | Attempt to get air
> > 	3 - 4  | 3d6 -vs- HEA to remain conscious
> > 	5 - 6  | 4d6 -vs- HEA to remain conscious
> > 	7 - 8  | 5d6 -vs- HEA to remain conscious
> > 	etc...
> > 
> > Once unconscious the adventurer will die in 2d4 rounds (to be rolled
> > secretly by the GM).
> > 
> > Now I'm just spewing rules so that people can pick them apart and we
> > can get moving on this... But that last die roll (the secret GM roll)
> > I view as a good one. It gives players a good chance to blow luck amulets
> > and they won't know if their efforts to save their friend are going to
> > succeed until they get him to the surface and revive him. Good stuff
> > there, high tension and all that rot.
> > 
> > A really healthy person will fail at the 7d6 (impossible) check at
> > round 11 (44 seconds into their adventure) and pass out. 2d4 rounds
> > later (average 20 seconds) they'll be dead. So I guess I'm saying about
> > a minute. *shrug* Having never drowned, trained as a lifeguard or EMT
> > or any other qualification, I'm calling it as I see it.
> > 
> > 						-Steve

OK putting Steve and Wright together here with my own comments about it.
I would tend to Wrights timings more than Steve's ( and I'm the one who
will consistantly rule to screw you :) but I guess that only applies to
how you can use a spell ). Ok now here is my scenario charted out.
Pick me apart as you see fit.

This chart could also be used for any "there is no air here" scenario.

	Prepped				Not prepped
round 1	Enter the water			""
round 2 Fail swimming check/default/stuck below the water ( WIL check
	to not loose what air you have
round 3 Try to fix problem		""
	(continue till HEAlth rounds )	(continue HEAlth/4 rounds)
Air out, unconcious checks kick in for every round after
out +1	2d6 HEA				""
out +6	4d6 HEA				""
out +11 5d6 HEA				""
out +16	6d6 HEA				""
out +21	7d6 HEA				""
out +26	8d6 HEA				""
...

So basically 1 minute (64 sec) past your air being all gone you will probably fall
unconcious ( 6d6 vs. HEA ). At which point you are subject to retrieval by others
before you die. I have no clue on how long you have after falling unconcious
you have until Death but having the GM determine it behind the scenes. When the
person falls unconcious he should roll DI (secret roll to GM eyes only) and if
favorable the GM ( in our campaign Dan ) has the results happen any time up to
the time limit he rolled for death ( ie. you float somehow to the top, your
party finds you with enough time to get you out, your God picks your limp form
up and carries you to safety...). If unsuccessful the player knows this but can
hope that the party not knowing better will still try to get him. The only
problem is if the player does not DI he will rest his hopes that the others
will reach him in time ( a time he is told ). But it does keep the would be
saviors in character to the limits of their resolve to save him not knowing
plus you get to watch them try to get to him ( even more entertaining to the
GM and player if he has expired to see how far they will go thinking he could 
be saveable ) Handling the death part is tricky though to keep poeple in
character without giving away the actual time of death.

							Greg