A Black Void Mechanics Deep Dive (Physical)
Disclaimer
This is not a replacement for the Black Void Rulebooks, which you should probably buy and read through. This is a guide that tries to take a look at the crunch in a sea of fluff. Here we're taking a look at the mechanics of Black Void, how they really work, and maybe how to bend and break them a little bit.
Physical Attacks
Your ability to strike a target with a physical attack is determined firstly by your Agility modifier and then by your corresponding Combat Skill. For example, a strike with a dagger, 4 Dexterity, and rank 2 Bladed Weapons should provide a total of +3 to the attack. Add this value to your d12 roll to determine your total attack value.
If your attack roll total is greater than or equal to the Defence Value of the opponent you're striking, the attack is successful. Now it’s time to deal damage.
Your ability to deal damage from a successful strike is determined firstly by your Strength modifier and then the damage for the source of the strike. For example, a strike with a dagger and 5 Strength would deal 1d4+2 damage.
The damage taken from a successful standard strike is modified from the result described above by Damage Reduction, which is calculated as a total of all sources unless otherwise stated. Attributes which provide Damage Reduction, a helmet, and body armor all stack together for the purposes of damage reduction, and that value is subtracted from the total damage taken from a physical strike (unless otherwise noted).
Critical Hits
Exceptional Hits are achieved with a natural 12 (unmodified on the die) attack roll. For the effects see the Exceptional Hits table on page 136 in the Core Rulebook PDF. To determine the result, roll 1d12 for severity and then roll 1d6 to see the actual effect. These effects will almost always feel devastating for the recipient, even on a low 1d12 result, but Void forbid the result climbs up to the double-digits, because that spells certain disaster for the victim.
Exceptional Success is defined by a natural roll of 12 (unmodified on the die) on an action roll with difficulty 11 or less. If the difficulty is 12 or higher, you must reroll and get another natural 12, the odds of which are 1/144, to achieve the Exceptional Success.
Critical Failure
If you roll a natural 1 (an unmodified result of 1 on the die) as an attacker in combat, it's treated as a Combat Mishap. For the resulting consequence go to the Mishap table (page 138 in the Core Rulebook PDF) and roll 1d12 to determine the effect. These effects can range from basically no downside to dealing a self-inflicted blow, depending on the fickle finger of fate.
What This All Means
Defence Value and Damage Reduction are not necessarily a package deal. You can be extremely difficult to hit (high Defence Value) and extremely vulnerable to damage (low Damage Reduction), and vice versa.
Stacking sources of Damage Reduction can make it extremely difficult for enemies to actually inflict physical damage on your character, outside of Exceptional Hits and Acid/Poison-based attacks. However, even the highest Damage Reduction will fail to protect a vulnerable mind, so you should remain aware of the dangers of the Void regardless of the armor you’re wearing.
Obviously, not being struck in the first place makes you take less damage than having high Damage Reduction, so having a good Defence value is ideal if you can muster it, but it’s also much harder to stack up, as it’s largely governed by the Defence skill and your Agility trait, both of which can be particularly costly to upgrade. It’s important also to keep in mind that with Black Void being a d12 system, every last point of Defence Value counts much more than it would in a d20 system like Dungeons and Dragons. The average result of a d12 roll is 6.5 and the average result for a d20 roll is 10.5. What that means in practice, is that a +1 bonus in a d12 system is almost 40% more effective than a +1 bonus in a d20 system, so don’t sleep on your Defense Value going up by even a measly one point.
Critical successes and failures are much more significant in Black Void than in other TTRPGs, and what's more is that they're far more common. A natural 1 or 12 has 1/12 odds versus the usual 1/20 odds, meaning that each action you take is more likely than you might think to drastically shift the state of combat. Encounters that seem unwinnable become unlosable, and vice versa. I’m not saying you should go gambling on every combat, but I AM saying that it’s not impossible for things to swing.
Boons/Fortune effects or using Experience Points for rerolls are extremely powerful due to the inherent power of Exceptional Hits: you have a 1/12 chance by default to crit a normal hit, but if you have the ability to reroll you not only gain the ability to undo a critical failure but also nearly double your chances of getting a crit.