Why do people with high BOD heal more quickly than others? It makes sense, given the definition of Body: It represents that character's cardiovascular fitness and endurance, immune system, how well she heals, her tolerance for drugs and alcohol, and to some extent, her muscle and bone structure. (SR4 p61) If we take this description at face value, it makes no sense for trolls to have a higher body.

But they do, and the huge mound of flesh requires much more damage to injure. That makes sense, given that we use BOD for damage resistance. But why do they heal so fast? Big bodies and high metabolisms?

Can anyone offer a reason why this is not actually messed up?

How about house rules?

Well, I mean, the game isn't realistic in all ways. Let me try an example:


Take like, a reeeeaaaaly big fat guy. Like, the ones who win the Guiness Book for fattest guy. He's like, ginourmous. He's so damn big that whacking him with a board may not hurt him so much except for a nice welt. (Let's assume just an average Joe swinging the board. Of course Ninja Bob with twinked out everything could probably hurt a tank.) But let's say for the sake of the argument that, that guy, and a skinny guy, are both whacked with said board. The really, really big fat guy might just take less damage from it. The skinny guy might have a rib broken.

But I really doubt that big, half-ton fat guy is healthy-where the skinny guy-not emanciated or anything, but just slim-might be in better health. So, does the huge, fat dude have a high body or low Body? What about the kinda skinny guy? Maybe the skinny guy doesn't get sick so often but he just doesn't take hits so well.

If I had to take a stab at things, Qualities would come into play here. A troll could have an 8 Body, but Weak Immune System, Low Pain Tolerance and Sensitive System on top of it. A Body 3 normal guy could have Toughness, Natural Immunity, and High Pain Tolerance.

EDIT: I haven't seen one, but I wonder if there could be a quality for people who healed slower(a negative one.)

bod is a catch all; toughness, endurance, constitution.
It really is not relevant to your size so much as it is your health and ability to keep it.

Is it too much to suspend disbelief to say that trolls have NATURALLY better cardivascular systems AND they are huge? Really, that seems to take care of it.

Think about it, take a muscle guy (like 80's Schwartaneger), and a skinny guy (like 80's Skreech from saved by the bell, can't remember the actor's name). Arnold has a better body score because he is A) Bigger (has more muscle mass) and B) More fit (works out everyday.) Thus, Trolls are naturally predisposed to have a bigger frame AND a better cardiovascular/immune system.

I would say that the Bod attribute doesn't make a distinction between somatotype. In this case I don't think a comparison between the worlds fattest man and a ectomorphic somatotype is fair. Usually that'[s just a matter of description.

Ironically I think Skreech likely stands a full foot taller then Arnold who is a short guy even if he likely has more body mass, and thous would have a higher bod. Maybe there's a call for having qualities like Obese, tall, short etc. Most likely the higher Troll bod not only reflects size but over all toughness and endurance.

my house rule for a character's weight is (bod+str)*30

this means the average jo' weighs 180lbs (81.64 kilo) ; which is what the average jo weighs.

(bod+str)*13.6 for metric calculations.