Monkey House Games

I not only am running a WWII campaign I also served on board the USS New Jersey BB62. On my way to work but happy to throw my two cents in later today. Take care friends.

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Okay here we go. My thoughts are along the lines of an old military an-acronym KISS.

The beauty in mind on V&V is its ability to simulate comic conventions in a simplified form. In that line of thought I would use the stats for bombs as a measure for the damage naval guns or artillery will do in your campaign. The Jersey had 3 guns for each 16" turret and 2 for each 5" turret. For a total of 9 of the 16 in guns and (if I remember right) 10 per broadside of the 5 inch guns. As an example. The 16 inch guns on a battleship would use a large bomb stat. Most Cruiser I would use medium bomb stats and Destroyers get the small bomb stat. The kicks is I would apply those stats for each barrel in a particular turret or field piece, using a to hit roll for each barrel individually then for misses rolling a random direction and distance for deviation. It's simple deadly enough to be a threat to most any hero but not so much they do not remain the stars of the show.

Hope that helps in some way.

How do you defeat this 4-color 'enablement'? Do you guys have a 'piercing damage' sort of rule? Where 0 HP means lots of pain and near death?

That's the problem with trying to have "gritty realism" in an inherently unrealistic genre. If you want a grittier campaign I suggest the following optional rule:

If a character's hit points drop to zero from a "modern weapon" style of attack (pistol, rifle, grenade, bomb, cannon, etc.) the character must make a d100 Endurance save or die instantly. If the roll is made the character is not instantly killed, but he will lose 1 hp per minute due to blood loss, and once his Power is at 0 he is dead. Another character may make a Medic save to stabilize the character to prevent further blood (i.e., Power) loss.