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[Kay12]

Kidnapping people is a big part of many LCS strategies. It's difficult to reveal CCS safehouses without kidnapping on site or on date (I think successful dating would also do the trick though). However, most CCS characters and other armed conservatives can't be kidnapped until they're very low in health, making datenapping mandatory. And datenapping always has a chance of going awry...

I suggest that the on-site kidnap option, instead of giving the "All the targets are too dangerous" message, would have the Liberals attack the target until he's ready for kidnapping, at which point the attacks cease and the intended kidnapper snatches the target. This would require confirmation ("Pounce at 'em?") and could result in accidental death (but would be less likely, as the enemy would not be subjected to a whole round of attacks) or, even worse, the enemy remaining in fighting condition.

Whaddya say?

[Jonathan S. Fox]

Perhaps a unique form of attack, in which the liberals literally tackle the target and try to disarm the person. Takes into account agility, strength, and hand to hand for both sides. You get a brief blow-by-blow of the action, then either the Liberals successfully restrain and disarm the Conservative, getting the weapon into your inventory and taking the Conservative hostage, or the Conservative throws the squad off. Nobody in your squad can use their standard attack this round, but all the Conservatives on the tile (including the targeted one, if not successfully taken hostage), can attack in response.

Fancy Face tackles Police Officer!
Police Officer yells for help!
Fancy Face and Police Officer struggle for the 9mm Pistol.
The 9mm Pistol goes off, narrowly missing Fancy Face's head!
Fancy Face wrests control of the 9mm Pistol.
Police Officer is taken hostage.

[Atomicnom]

Good plan, but some thought should be given to how it will be extended to larger squads. A full complement of six untrained and weak liberals shouldn't be able to take down an agile, strong Death Squad officer - there's a good chance they'd trip over each other and someone would get shot (even though their relevant stats would probably add up to something higher than the Conservative's). That said, if squad size can somehow give diminishing returns, this is one more way LCS can become open-ended.

Kidnapping-related question! Does a (sadistic) interrogator's strength influence either the damage caused to a hostage or wisdom loss?

[jasonred79]

Actually, I'd like an option set aside purely for Martial Arts and Clubs: the KnockOut attempt! (or in D&D terms, subdual damage)

That way, the "overkill" factor wouldn't matter:

Ninja 1 kicks Agent in the head 3 times!
Ninja 2 kicks Agent in the body, KNOCKING HIM OUT!
Ninja 3 kicks Agent in the head... but he's already unconscious!
etc.

Finally, a reason to train up the LCS in blunt trauma dealing!

[Jacob/Lee]

Yeah, I want some kind of unique, non-lethal attack to take somebody hostage. Killing 10 police officers trying to capture 1 gets really, really annoying.

[Innominate]

Good plan, but some thought should be given to how it will be extended to larger squads. A full complement of six untrained and weak liberals shouldn't be able to take down an agile, strong Death Squad officer - there's a good chance they'd trip over each other and someone would get shot (even though their relevant stats would probably add up to something higher than the Conservative's).

You'd still want them to have a chance. After all, professionals can screw up, and there's always beginner's luck. I would suggest that the best method would be to inflate the scores of more competent targets and squads; so a target with 20 strength and agility might have a score of 80 (instead of 40), while a squad of 6 guys with strength and agility 5 would only get 60 (5*2*6).

That said, if squad size can somehow give diminishing returns, this is one more way LCS can become open-ended.

This could also be done fairly easily. Work out each squad member's score, then sort them in descending order. Total squad score is then some diminishing sum (e.g. s₁ + s₂/4 + s₃/9 + s₄/16 + ...). This order could then be used to determine who takes what action (e.g. number 1 grapples, and 2, 3, and 4 hold down limbs, while numbers 5 and 6 just try to stop other conservatives from interfering).

Kidnapping-related question! Does a (sadistic) interrogator's strength influence either the damage caused to a hostage or wisdom loss?

Yes. The amount of force done sums the normal skill rolling method for all interrogators, where the important statistic is juice-adjusted strength. This means that multiple low-strength interrogators could have wildly fluctuating force rolls (basically takes the top 3 rolls of N 6-sided dice, where N is <skill>/3); 3-6 per person one day, 15-18 per person the next day. It will tend to average out, but it's still fairly dangerous. Generally, strong interrogators are a safer bet, as their individual rolls will almost always be around 15-18, so they do more predictable interrogations.

A successful beating is when a roll of the subject's health versus force fails (so it will pretty much always happen if you have two strong interrogators). They roll against their religion skill to save. If they fail their religion save a check is made to see if it's a strong beating (force > 3*(WIS + HRT + HTH)), in which case it does 1 less wisdom damage than a normal beating and has a 50% chance to not reduce juice, as well as reducing heart by 1 (in other words, a bad thing). Normal beatings reduce wisdom by 1 + floor(force/10) and juice by force. A dangerous beating reduces health by 1 (or kills if at 1 already), where dangerous means a roll of the subject's health versus floor(force/3) fails - this will almost always happen with enough strong interrogators.

Note that the attribute reductions modify base attributes, not juice-affected ones. So a high-juice subject will probably die from a dangerous beating at around 4 displayed health.

[Kay12]

Larger squads should have the obvious drawback of the other Conservatives interfering easier. Currently, kidnapping may result in alarm (or even alienation, I think) if Conservatives see it. We could also add some bonus if using Police Uniforms with fair disguise skill - they're just arresting the guy, right? Even better - Conservatives may actually come peacefully.

[Aqizzar]

As is, my only problem with how Kidnapping works is that some targets are simply impossible to grab by the ordinary mechanics, on one method or another.  When a squad of 1000 Juice liberals with .44s and the skill to use them break into the CEO's den, he shouldn't count as "too dangerous" to kidnap when any one of my liberals would kill him in one round.  Since the CEO is also highly resistant to seduction, that makes them harder to grab than they really have an excuse for.  On the opposite end of the scale, there's Soldiers, who seem to be all but impossible to date-nap, although they have ever excuse to be hard to grab in the field.

I think more than anything, it would just be helpful if the kidnapping mechanics both on-site and on dates would take into account multiple people.  I recognize that dates aren't set up that way, but you get the idea.  Of course, I don't know if kidnapping is already effected by multiple people, but if it is, it's not enough.

[Kay12]

I don't think the CEO is seduction-resistant, at least very much so. In my last game I picked him up with a designated datenapper, who had, I think, about 10 points of seduction. Not bad, but not exceptional either.

[Jonathan S. Fox]

The CEO does have a much higher target number if you want to seduce him than most Conservatives, along with special rejection text. Still possible, though, obviously. A tackle mechanic would be a good counter to make him a bit less imba.

[Funk]

only 4-5 shoud be able to attack at one time, the rest stand guard.
the every liberal shoud try to make a graple if thay can.

one graple is need to keep the target from runing away.
a graple stop the grapled limb from being used, i.e. lowers stats like a wound.
 graplers can only punch attack and cant doge.

if the graplers hand to hand role is higher than the target then thay can dislocate the limb (treat as missing?)and can attack next turn.

for every graple the attacked get to try to break free.

[Kay12]

I've been reading too much Lucky Luke as a child, but highly skilled Liberals could disarm their enemies by shooting their guns off their hands.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I've been reading too much Lucky Luke as a child, but highly skilled Liberals could disarm their enemies by shooting their guns off their hands.

LCS does love Hollywoodian Physics.

[Kay12]

And I suppose that while shooting the gun would've been too hard to be viable in time-critical combat situations, aiming at the arm or hand would've been a lot easier and would disarm the enemy, or at least give time to land the next shot as well.

EDIT: By the way, has anyone had hostages escape immediately after kidnapping (you get the "has escaped" scree right after the raid)? I had this happen, although the circumstances were rather unusual...

[klingon13524]

Yes! This would take so much frustration out of trying to get a sleeper in places like the police station! Would the squad try to be stealthy when disarming him/her?