Strain and Strain Threshold

While wounds and Critical Injuries represent potentially life-threatening damage, a number of other stressors and effects can also impair a character. Collectively, this is referred to as strain.

  Any effect that impairs the character, but does not inflict physical harm or wounds, is considered strain. Spending hours wandering through blistering deserts, suffering a minor shock from an electric console, being battered around the inside of a moving shipping crate— all of these could represent types of strain. Weapons with a Stun or Stun Damage quality or other effects that impair or hinder a character also inflict strain.

  Additionally, effects that cause stress, fear, anxiety, or emotional turmoil also generate strain. Losing one’s cool in combat during a bombardment, being berated by a superior officer, waking up to realize one has been imprisoned by slavers, or having one’s ship boarded by an armed search team while smuggling goods are all incidents that could result in strain on a character. Strain can accumulate slowly as environmental effects or be gained in chunks when a PC is rattled by an effect that doesn’t cause damage but still impairs them.

  Characters can also voluntarily suffer strain to trigger certain effects. The most common use is to voluntarily suffer 2 strain to gain one additional maneuver during a character’s turn. Some talents may require the character to suffer 1 or more strain to activate.

  Exceeding Strain Threshold

  When a character has suffered strain greater than their strain threshold, they become incapacitated until their strain is reduced so that it no longer exceeds their strain threshold. They are likely unconscious, or they may just be so dazed and staggered that they’re completely unaware of their surroundings and unable to interact with them. When non-player characters and creatures suffer strain, they generally apply the strain directly to their wound threshold (unless they are nemeses and track strain separately).