Future Highways (15k)

Editorial (2k)

Featured Articles (2k)

Under the Hood (2k)

On Foot (2k)

On the Road (2k)

Paint Jobs (2k)

Highwayman Role-playing (2k)

Freebies (2k)

Contacts (2k)

Archives (2k)

Letters (2k)

Letters (2k)

home (4k)


Featured Articles (8k)

cleaning up the Roadkill (5k)

No matter how hard he tries to wreck the environment or destroy the life around him, man has not yet succeeded in wiping out or eating all the animal life that inhabits the world. Indeed, in some places in the world, an animals life is worth more than a humans as it can provide food and labour whilst alive, and a host of raw materials when killed. But animals are becoming increasingly scarce in the modern world, and when driving the open roads, it is rare to see one. Rumours persist of "mew-taters" in the deep desert and reported by the communities that live there. It is not sure what constitutes a "mew-tater", but certainly rumours of animals 'not quite right' are on the increase, as are animals that were once thought to be extinct. However, mutations are a lot more common than most people realise.


Animal Statistics:
Every animal has a few statistics, much like a pedestrian. These are detailed below along with how they relate to the world and rules of the road found in Dark Future.

MV:
This is the animals movement on land. It is listed in centimetres.
Animals with a counter size of 4 cm or less in length move exactly like pedestrians and follow all normal Streetfighter rules for them.
Animals with a counter size of greater than 4 cm move like off road cars. They may make a single turn of up to 90° per 8 cm of movement that they have, suffering no control rolls.

Regardless of how an animal moves, it always moves in the Pedestrian Phase. Fast animals move more quickly than a human and thus should have a second pedestrian movement phase. This could either be a second movement action or ideally use the alternative turn sequence. For simplicity, animals do not have an acceleration or decceleration and can speed up and brake to their maximum speed in one turn.

Some animals can move when off the ground as well as on it, and any movements rates will be listed in the notes section.

Flying Creatures:
Flying movement is listed in mph, as is any acceleration or deceleration rates that the animal has. Unless listed, a flying animal moves and acts like a jetcopter, but doesn't make any control rolls. It can make any manoeuvre, but none that would require the animal to make a control roll of any kind. No rolls are needed for landing or take-off and the animal doesn't suffer from panic braking. If the animal should get stunned or KO'd while flying, then it falls at the rate of one altitude level per turn stunned or KO'd, falling during the first phase of every turn. If it hits ground level, then it takes damage in the same manner as a road damage test (Dark Future page 68). Use the speed factor of the creature before it was stunned or KO'd, then add +1 to the modifier if the animal was at low altitude, 2 at medium altitude and 3 at high altitude.
A flying animal may make one turn per space of movement that is possesses.

AV:
The armour value of the animal. This is treated as normal armour and animals are not sound-proof or fire-proof unless stated.

CON:
The CON points of the animal. When a creature takes damage, always use the alternate damage system to work out wound effects. Some animals are big and go beyond the normal pedestrian critical table.

CC:
The close combat skill of the animal, this is added to any and all close combat attacks the animal may make. This represents their teeth, claws or other natural weapons as well as the creatures size and speed in close combat.

Close Combat Attacks:
An animal mainly fights in close combat. It is the rare creature that has a ranged weapon. All close combat attacks are listed here, along with the DAM that the attack does. All attacks will be from the front of the animal only and follow the 90° arc that pedeatrians have. Note that some animals may have more than one attack. If this is the case then all attacks can be used by the animal in one turn, indeed, in one phase, unless stated.

While some animals may be carrying poison and disease, that kind of damage is beyond the scope of this article.

Counter:
Some animals are big and have to be represented by a counter with a particular size, and this will be listed here if applicable. Unless a counter size is listed, creatures use the normal pedestrian size counter of 2 cm length x 2 cm width. An animal will rarely fill the entire counter, but this should be representative of its contact area.

All counters should have the animals front clearly shown as that is the direction the animal will be facing and thus move and attack in. For most creatures, the front of the animal will be along on the lengths of the counter.

Other:
Unless stated, animals function as normal humans. They have only one action and they have no augmented features as standard. Animals can have skills or other abilities, but these will be listed in the animals descripton.

The following is a small selection of animals found in North America, although many of these are rare or adapting to the dryer conditions. All speeds are the animals maximum.

AnimalMVAVCONCC Counter SizeAttacks
Alligator Mississippiensis12112+18 cm x 4 cm1x bite (+2 DAM)
Bear, Grizzly1207+14 cm x 4 cm1x claw (+1 DAM)
Bison16010+06 cm x 4 cm1x butt (+0 DAM)
Cat, Domestic1601+10.5 cm x 0.5 cm1x scratch (-2 DAM)
Cat, Wild2403+12 cm x 2 cm1x bite (+0 DAM)
Dog, medium1202+02 cm x 2 cm1x bite (-1 DAM)
Dog, large1203+02 cm x 2 cm1x bite (+0 DAM)
    Trained Attack dogs are specially trained and have an additional +1 CC and +1 DAM.
Horse, riding1606+06 cm x 4 cm1x kick (-1 DAM)
Horse, draft1208+06 cm x 4 cm1x kick (-1 DAM)
Rat801+00.25 cm x 0.25 cm1x bite (-2 DAM)
Wolf1202+12 cm x 2 cm1x bite (-1 DAM)

Index (2k)