4ed does pulp fantasy well–which is good, because that is what the game is about.  What happens if you want to play a pulp fantasy game where players constantly fear for their resources and mortality of their characters?  The first answer would be, “pick another game system.”  (And there are many fine systems to choose in that regard; All Flesh Must Be Eaten plus the Dungeons and Zombies supplement is the first that springs to mind.)  But what if you like the offerings of 4ed?

If we ask Google to define survival horror for us (like this) we get three hits:

• “Survival horror is a video game genre inspired by fictional horror films in which the player’s primary objective is to survive and/or escape a …”
• “A video game genre that emphasizes scarcity of resources (few heath or ammunition refills) in a dangerous horror film-like setting. …”
• “Sub-genre of the Action-Adventure genre in which the presentation, themes and story of the game are horror styled. …”

The first point requires no modification at all.  4ed is a game.  It contains elements of horror fiction.  The primary objective of “survive and/or escape” can easily be the main subject of many adventures.  I think that the definition was truncated right at the phrase “survive and/or escape a …” is interesting.  Really, whatever you decide “…” is will define what style of game you will play.  Just crack open the monster manual and you have plenty of “…” options to fill in.

The second point gets at the meat of what makes up survival horror mechanics.  The “health or ammunition refills” of 4ed are healing surges, magic items, and daily powers.  Of these, daily powers are already fairly limited.  Magic items have a throttling mechanism which also sufficiently limit their use.  Healing surges are a bit more tricky.  At first they appear to be a limited resource but they are in fact variable, defined by a character’s hit points.  The more HP a character has, the less frequently they need to use healing surges.

The last point just serves to drive the message home:  Survival horror is both action and horror.  The 4ed rules system brings the action.  The GM and players have to bring the horror.

And now on to the mechanics:

The most drastic change I would suggest is to limit hit points.  The fewer HP you have, the more surges you will spend, and the more you will begin to worry about death.  The most direct way to implement this would be to give characters their 1st level HP total and then reduce the number of HP they gain each level.  I would suggest starting as low as 1 additional point per level and then at 11th and 21st levels gain additional HP equal to the regular level amount for the given class.  The point here is to keep HP low and tight.  Those same monsters the party faces during the first adventure should still be able to worry them at higher levels.

In regards to keeping characters vulnerable to low-level enemies, I also suggest dropping the 1/2 level bonus to everything.  Your attacks, defense, skills and such will not advance with levels.  Characters will still have a viable chance to get hit by low-level enemies, and will also be denied the security of guaranteed hits.  Likewise, skills will not reach the extreme bonuses of a regular game.

With nearly no HP and no 1/2 level bonus, where does this leave characters?  They can squeeze some extra HP and extra bonuses out of feats.  They still receive attribute points that can improve their bonuses.  Most importantly, they still receive powers at the appropriate levels.  They will have more and better options in combat, thus enabling them to handle greater numbers of enemies.

One should not neglect the other tribulations of survival.  Food, shelter, and exhaustion are elements to consider.  Adventures can be based around finding more food or securing a safe place to sleep for the next couple nights.  4ed has some starvation rules that could be used, but I might suggest going to another game for a more compelling mechanic.  Imagine the terror of a party of adventurers who had to forgo a night of rest and find their powers and surges unrefreshed!

How does this effect GM preparations?  For one, higher level monsters will have to either be forgone or extremely modified.  It could be possible to alter stat blocks by using the DMG table for suggested damage and values.  It might be a better idea to build a new stat block from the ground up, using the original monster as inspiration.  Encounter composition becomes a little problematic because the rules have been changed so much that the wonderful 4ed math begins to break down.  Obviously, a group of level 5 adventurers will not be able to handle the same XP total as the DMG suggests.  Indeed, without play-testing, I would estimate that a group of level 5 adventurers would likely only be able to handle a little bit more than a standard 1st level encounter.  This is the point, after all.  This leaves me with the unfortunate conclusion that you will have to monitor the characters’ performance as they level and base encounter composition off of your observations.  Then again, this is survival horror, so maybe you should just throw encounter balance out the window!

It is left to the GM to come up with compelling adventures to make a campaign.  I can imagine enthralling games where the party has to defend a town against zombie hordes, worry not just about themselves but the towns people.  How about a game where vampires or werewolves stalk the night, turning more people with each bite, and the party must play detective during the day and defender during the night.  A less traditional survival horror might involve an area under constant goblin invasion, the party having to deal with constant raids as well as finding where their next meal is coming from.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 30th, 2009 at 10:24 am and is filed under D&D 4e, Rules Ideas. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.