Old-School Reduction: Morale

I was going to write about character advancement, but decided that I need to give the subject some more thought first. Meanwhile, I came across a Dice Goblin post from a few months back that got my brain juices flowing in a different direction.

First, a brief review of the sort of game I'm trying to run.

• A character's essential details fit on a single 3×5" card, with greatest emphasis on gear. (Check.)
• A character's combat stats are concise and unambiguous. (Check.)
• Combat and violent situations are adjudicated using a somewhat simplified procedure. (Check.)
• By default, all other situations are adjudicated by asking a "closed" question and rolling 1d6 (or 2d6, taking highest/lowest) for a Yes/No/And/But answer.

I'm reasonably happy with how the AC, HD, AT, TH, and SV stats work together to acheive the second and third points. Attacking something? Roll 1d20, add the target's AC, and if you meet or exceed your TH then inflict AT "hit points" of damage. Just been attacked? Roll and sum hit dice, add a modifier, and beat the total number of "hit points" you've accumulated so far to stay in the fight. Target of a special action of some kind? Roll 1d20 and try to meet or exceed your SV to avoid the worst of it.

However, as things stand, the morale rating (ML) means very little to player characters.

He who fights and runs away…

The morale procedure for most NPCs—whether monsters or mercenaries—is simple. Roll 2d6 for a given side when the situation demands a morale check. Each member of that side with ML less than the result must surrender or else flee. This conveys an important aspect of combat sadly lacking in many RPG systems: most living things want to go on living and will seize any opportunity to do so.

A morale check usually occurs when a given side suffers its first casualty and again when half its members are incapacitated. I can think of other scenarios that might call for a morale check, plus some corner cases such as when the "side" consists of a single member (for which remaining health could be the trigger). Whatever the case, OSE and B/X also stipulate that a creature will fight to the death if it successfully checks morale twice during an encounter.

Given that basically everything else in combat works the same for PCs as it does for NPCs, it's always bothered me that the rules for morale don't apply to PCs.

You do not know pain, you do not know fear.

The B/X rules say that "a [player] character always reacts in the way the player wishes" (B27). Thus, a PC never makes morale checks for any reason. I understand rationale for this (i.e., the need to maintain player agency) but think about the in-game implications. Whilst under the players' control, characters may suffer life-changing injuries, watch their comrades die in unspeakable ways, and come face-to-face with mind-bending horrors from beyond the Void without so much as batting an eyelid—unless the players decide that they react somehow.

The situation for retainers is slightly different but perhaps even more confounding. Although not under the direct control of a player, the section on Retainer Morale in OSE says that they never make morale checks in combat. Again, think about what that means: retainers will fight to the death for the sake of a few gold pieces per day plus a half-share of any treasure recovered (which could be nothing).

Exactly how desperate are these people?

The quality of loyalty is not strained

Retainers have a loyalty rating based on the Charisma ability score of player character that hired them—literally the ML value of the PC in my interpretation. A loyalty check occurs each time the retainer is "exposed to a particularly perilous situation" to see if they run away (although not in the midst of combat, apparently) and when the adventure is over to determine if they'll ever consider working for the PC again. The ref can tweak the roll slightly based on how the PC treated the retainer, but otherwise it is functionally the same as a morale check. B/X even uses the term "morale" interchangeably with "loyalty" in the section on retainers (B21).

What exactly constitutes a "particularly perilous situation" is open to interpretation, but it would have to be something truly terrifying when you consider the situations normally encountered on your average dungeon crawl. It's as if accepting the PC's offer somehow suppresses the retainer's natural fear response.

The Reader's resolve is tested!

Okay, so what? Can't we just rely on the players to do a little roleplaying where needed? Perhaps, but I crave a mechanic of some kind to restore symmetry to this part of the rules.

Inspiration eventually came in the form of a post by Dice Goblin, which posited the following idea.

When facing intense, scary or stressful situations, the DM might call for a Stress Save… On a failure, you take 1, 1d4, 1d6, 1d8 or 1d10 psychic damage, depending on the situation. This type of damage cannot drop you below 1 HP…

This gives the players an immediate incentive to care about the mental—as well as physical—wellbeing of their characters. It should be very easy to slot in to OSE or B/X as written, but I actually think it'll work better with "inverted" hit dice (a la DURF) in tandem with morale checks.

Procedure

Here's my take on a symmetric morale procedure.

1. If the situation demands a morale check (as determined by the ref, in combat or otherwise) roll 2d6 for each side affected.
• Where the check involves player characters and their retainers, each controlling player rolls 2d6 separately.
• The ref may add modifiers up to ±2, depending on the circumstances
  
2. Each member of a given side with ML less than the result must surrender or else attempt to flee.
• In the case of NPCs, use the ML value of the leader, if present.
• In the case of retainers, use the ML value of the hiring PC.
• A player may choose to take 1-3 "hit points" (as determined by the ref) for each affected member instead. However, this does not trigger a hit die roll in step 5 of the combat procedure (i.e., do not "tap" the character card or lay the miniature on its side).
3. Mark each member that passed the morale check (i.e., those with ML greater than or equal to the result of the roll) with a checkmark
• 2 checkmarks mean that no further morale checks will be required of that member.
• Erase all checkmarks at the end of the encounter.
  

If a player chooses to stay and fight after a failed morale check, the "hit points" sustained do not take the affected characters out-of-action immediately, but they do make them more vulnerable to future attacks. Repeatedly using this option can lead to characters that are extremely fragile and that require extended periods of time to recover fully at the standard 1d3 hit points per day of complete rest.

I can imagine several ways to build on this basic mechanic, but I think I'll leave it there for now.