Vitality System

The Ulfrung campaign setting operates on a vitality system rather than the traditional hit point system of D&D and Pathfinder. In a vitality system you have two pools of hit points - vitality and wounds.

## Vitality Points

Vitality points are a measure of a character’s ability to turn a direct hit into a graze or a glancing blow with no serious consequences. Like hit points in the standard d20 rules, vitality points go up with level, giving high-level characters more ability to shrug off attacks. Most types of damage reduce vitality points.

Characters gain vitality points as they gain levels. Just as with hit points in the standard d20 rules, at each level a character rolls a vitality die and adds his Constitution modifier, adding the total to his vitality point total. (And, just as with hit points, a character always gains at least 1 vitality point per level, regardless of his roll or Constitution modifier.) A 1st-level character gets the maximum vitality die result rather than rolling their hit die.

## Wound Points

Wound points measure how much true physical damage a character can withstand. Damage reduces wound points only after all vitality points are gone, or when a character is struck by a critical hit. A character has a number of wound points equal to her current Constitution score.

## Critical Hits

A critical hit deals the same amount of damage as a normal hit, but that damage is deducted from wound points rather than from vitality points. Critical hits do not deal extra damage; for that reason, no weapon in this system has a damage multiplier for its critical hits.

## Injury And Death

Vitality and wound points together measure how hard a character is to hurt and kill. The damage from each successful attack and each fight accumulates, dropping a character’s vitality point or wound point total until he runs out of points.

#### 0 Vitality Points

At 0 vitality points, a character can no longer avoid taking real physical damage. Any additional damage he receives reduces his wound points.

#### Taking Lethal Wound Damage

Taking lethal wound damage is bad. Every time you take a wound the GM will roll to see which body part is affected and determine what bodily damage you've taken, which will be more severe depending on the severity of the blow . This can and will include semi-permanent and permanent effects like broken bones or severed limbs. Critical hits are always assumed to hit the head.

#### Taking Nonlethal Damage

Nonlethal damage does standard damage to vitality, but the damage to wounds is nonlethal and tracked separately from lethal wound damage. When the total lethal and nonlethal wound damage exceeds the character's wound points they become disabled.

#### 0 Wound Points

Wound points cannot drop below 0; any damage that would cause a character’s wound point total to drop below 0 simply causes the character to have 0 wound points.

At 0 wound points, a character is disabled and must attempt a DC 15 Fortitude save. If he succeeds on the save, he is merely disabled. If he fails, he falls unconscious and begins dying.

#### Disabled

A disabled character is conscious, but can only take a single move or standard action each turn (but not both, nor can she take full-round actions). She moves at half speed. Taking move actions doesn’t risk further injury, but performing any standard action (or any other action the GM deems strenuous) worsen the character’s condition to dying (if lethal damage equals or exceeds wound points) or unconscious. Each round that a character is disabled they must make a DC 15 Fortitude save. If they fail and their lethal wound damage equals or exceeds their wound points they begin dying, otherwise they fall unconscious.

#### Dying

A dying character is unconscious and near death. Each round on his turn, a dying character must make a Fortitude save (DC 10, +1 per turn after the first) to become stable.

If the character fails the save, he dies.

If the character succeeds on the save by less than 5, he does not die but does not improve. He is still dying and must continue to make Fortitude saves every round.