I had some time today, so I was just flipping through some of my old RPG books and I landed on Castle Falkenstein’s alternate Feat Resolution and Damage system. I’ve always been intrigued by the attempt to streamline the damage system in Castle Falkenstein, so I thought I’d take a crack at converting it into functional ICRPG.
NOTE: This has just been a brain exercise. I haven’t tested this in a real game, but I do enjoy making charts 
How it works
The main take away from this is that their are two parts to this damage system. The first of the Location Chart and the second is the Ranking of Types of Harm.
The Location Chart’s rows indicate the type of Harm that is being inflicted, while the Columns represent what general area of being dealt damage, along with how difficult it is to hit (based on either EASY, TN, or HARD).
Within the chart you have different levels of damage dealt. Instead of numbers, you just have a basic status (you could even consider it a TAG).
- Scratched: It hurt, but no real damage was dealt to target.
- Wounded: Damage is dealt, but target able to soldier on. Abilities are slightly reduced.
- Incapacitated: The target is felled, unable to rise, but isn’t dead or dying. Possibly unconscious.
- Mortally Wounded: The target is felled, entering the DYING state.
- Killed Instantly: The target is blown apart, torn to ribbons, dies within seconds.
The Ranking of Types of Harm chart lists out six ranks, going from A through F, which weapons and harm can be assigned to. Bigger weapons have a higher rank and therefore more likely to deal critical damage.The Chart just lists examples of types of harm that fall in that range.
Application
The general application of these charts is to, 1) rank types of harm into a general scale which can then be associated with the level of damage they can feasibly deal. 2) Provide a visual indication of what would have to be done in order to deal a certain type of damage.
Example: If I’m wielding a pair of knitting needles, I can see that I need to specifically aim for critical locations or easy body shots if I ever hope to deal significant damage. Now, if I have a cannon at the ready I can see that all I really need to do is aim for the general body and I’ll probably kill my target.
Conclusion
I, by no means, believe that this is a golden system of dealing damage. At certain tables, I could see this being really useful to blow through combat by simply applying TAGS of damage and having a clear path of what weapons I’d need and where I’d need to aim to get a certain result.
My favorite part is ranking the weapons to different damage capabilities. If I know I’m wielding a weapon tagged RANK-F, I know that I’m going to be dealing some excessive damage and I that sounds cool to me.
Additionally, The Location Chart could be tweaked on a sliding scale to make things deadlier or not. That would depend on personal taste. I can see that CASTLE FALKENSTEIN wasn’t aiming for a truly deadly game and wanted something a little more civilized.