Throwing damage

[XON2000]

It's probably staring me in the face, but I can't find an explicit ruling (in 3e) for how much damage is done by thrown objects. I'm guessing it would be a Strength-based attack, but it seems like the size of the object should factor in. Am I missing it, or is it missing?

[FuzzyBoots]

It's probably staring me in the face, but I can't find an explicit ruling (in 3e) for how much damage is done by thrown objects. I'm guessing it would be a Strength-based attack, but it seems like the size of the object should factor in. Am I missing it, or is it missing?

It's missing. Personally, I'd go for either strength or the mass of the object, as well as letting objects that are particularly massive hit an area rather than a point, have a bonus for their to-hit to indicate that you don't have to pinpoint attack, or both.

[Hoodsey]

Damage for thrown objects is strength based damage. To hit is Dexterity

There are some limitations, such as taking the Throwing Mastery feat to make smaller objects actually do damage (Gambit and playing cards, Bullseye and random harmless objects, etc.) but normal objects I haven't seen a ruling to where mass really applies. If it's large objects lots of people use Move Object to signify things like trucks and the like, but it's not to say that you can't use Strength to throw it. If you do this, then I don't this mass is factored in just for the simple fact that you're Strength is representative of the size object you're hurling.

[Murkglow]

From the Ranged Weapons section:

Thrown weapons are Strength-based, adding the wielder’s Strength rank to their Damage rank.

As a rock has no damage rank, it's just your strength damage.

As for worrying about mass/size and giving "bonuses" relating to that, remember that adding too much "freebie" bonuses (like Reach, Area, or alot of extra damage ect...) in the name of "realism" isn't a good thing either. It leads to characters always picking up objects instead of simply punching and can make characters who actually bought those extras you're giving away feel ripped off.

[Hoodsey]

I agree with Murk.

Keep in mind that the Gamemaster's Guide added in Mass Combat rules. This is a great option for large attacks such as cars and stuff (since you're attacking them as a unit instead of an area).

[XON2000]

From the Ranged Weapons section:
As for worrying about mass/size and giving "bonuses" relating to that, remember that adding too much "freebie" bonuses (like Reach, Area, or alot of extra damage ect...) in the name of "realism" isn't a good thing either. It leads to characters always picking up objects instead of simply punching and can make characters who actually bought those extras you're giving away feel ripped off.

That's a valid point, but I'm also concerned about mimicking exciting comic book action. If a villain throws a bus at a hero, I want it to feel like a big deal. If a thrown bus has the same effect as a thrown rock, then there's not much point in throwing buses.

Maybe the answer is not to provide bonuses for big things, but to restrict the damage of small things. After all, if a super-strong hero throws a bullet, it probably shouldn't do a lot more damage than that same bullet would have done had it been shot from a gun.

[Murkglow]

On the other hand, in comics heroes really don't pick up objects and hit with them/throw them as often as they just outright punch. If you start giving bonuses for using items found on the ground then your players will start doing that more and more often which can "ruin" the comic book feel of the game as well (of course this is all a matter of personal tastes).

You can also take the equipment sections comment on excessive strength into account:

Ordinary melee weapons are limited by their Toughness in terms of the amount of Strength they can add. If a wielder exerts Strength greater than the weapon’s Toughness (4 for wooden weapons, 7 or 8 for metal weapons), the weapon breaks when it is used.

So you could have it where a steel pole might not be on any use to Superman (beyond maybe the extra reach it grants him) because he can't use his full strength while swinging it (or if he does the excess strength is wasted as the object bends/warps/snaps).

[pawsplay]

It's probably staring me in the face, but I can't find an explicit ruling (in 3e) for how much damage is done by thrown objects. I'm guessing it would be a Strength-based attack, but it seems like the size of the object should factor in. Am I missing it, or is it missing?

It's missing. The rules on thrown weapons would imply it's at least equal to your Strength.

[FuzzyBoots]

Any particular ruling is going to run afoul of some corner case where things don't make sense, but there's a part of me that really wants it to be a little different as to whether you're throwing a baseball, a granite boulder, a Styrofoam boulder, or a bus at an opponent. 2E had some rules (you got an area attack with large enough objects and damage was the lower of strength bonus or toughness with the caveat that a high enough strength bonus let you go up to two higher than the toughness of the object) that I think that 3E could have picked up and run with.

As regards players constantly using improvised weapons, I echo that using the strength bonus versus toughness does generally do a decent job of telling you whether a given weapon will even add anything. Otherwise, you get to in-character reasons (if nothing else, the city's going to get a bit irate if the heroes are constantly uprooting stop signs to use as clubs not to mention the lawyer who tries to sue after someone uses his Ferrari as a club) and general common sense.

[XON2000]

Yeah, but villains probably don't have any compunctions about property damage...

[FuzzyBoots]

Yeah, but villains probably don't have any compunctions about property damage...

^_^ And villains are controlled by the GM and therefore there's pretty direct control of making use of these expanded properties... the problem seems to solve itself.

[Unbeliever]

...
As regards players constantly using improvised weapons, I echo that using the strength bonus versus toughness does generally do a decent job of telling you whether a given weapon will even add anything. Otherwise, you get to in-character reasons (if nothing else, the city's going to get a bit irate if the heroes are constantly uprooting stop signs to use as clubs not to mention the lawyer who tries to sue after someone uses his Ferrari as a club) and general common sense.

The action economy should be enough to discipline things: it should take an action to uproot a telephone pole or whatever and then it should break after a hit or two. Given that everyone should be hitting PL caps as it is, you'll only want to use them for a niche benefit, like extra reach.

[Venthrac]

I'm inclined to start with the mass of the object, and then maybe add a +1 bonus to it if the thrower's STR rank is higher than that mass.

So, throwing a car, which I'll guesstimate at mass rank 6, would do rank 7 damage if hurled by a character with a STR of 6 or higher. I might not grant this bonus if the character wanted to roll the car through an area, thus making it an area attack.

But if that same character picked up a pebble or a crayon or a stapler and hurled it, the most damage I would let it do is rank 1. This is assuming no throwing mastery.

This way, throwing things is a viable option, but not so much better than punching someone that it becomes a must. Besides which, heroes probably would not want to grab some poor innocent civilians car and throw it, right? That's bad karma.