2.58.1 Encumbrance in the water and life-saving

When a character is in the water, the normal rules for encumbrance are modified. To calculate the modifier to a character's CO and how tiring activity is in the water:

• use the character's Swimming (including Swimming strength/Supporting weight specialisms) instead of his/her Athletics (including Lifting specialism) to calculate his/her encumbrance limit (i.e. in the water, a character's encumbrance limit is equal to 12 plus the result of a dice roll against ST + Swimming (including Swimming strength/Supporting weight specialism);
• halve the encumbrance weight limits in the water (i.e. encumbrance limit x 0.125 kg for +2 bonus to CO dice rolls, encumbrance limit x 0.25 kg for +1 1/2 bonus to CO dice rolls, etc.). Hence, a character who attempts to carry more than his/her encumbrance limit x 2 kg will only be able to tread water, and a character who attempts to carry more than his/her encumbrance limit x 4 kg will automatically sink.

For example, Roger is an expert swimmer with a Swimming skill of 5 and 3 points of specialism in Swimming strength (which is a broad specialism so the 3 points give a +1 1/2 bonus in total). His ST is +1/2. His encumbrance limit in the water is 12 plus the result of a dice roll against his basic value of 7. For this example, we'll assume Roger has an encumbrance limit of 18 on this day. Roger is virtually unencumbered (1 kg of weight carried). This is less than 0.125 x 18 = 2.25 kg, so Roger has +2 bonus to his CO.

Life-saving

A character can support others' weight in the water, by life-saving manoeuvres. Doing so, keeps the other person afloat, but encumbers the supporting character. To reflect this, when a character is lifesaving, the person being supported counts as an additional piece of equipment for encumbrance purposes.

Because bodies are largely buoyant, the weight of the person's body counts only one-fifth weight for encumbrance purposes. The weight of any equipment that the character is carrying counts its normal encumbrance value.

For example, Roger is an expert swimmer with a Swimming skill of 5 and 3 points of specialism in Swimming strength (which is a broad specialism so the 3 points give a +1 1/2 bonus in total). His ST is +1/2. His encumbrance limit in the water is 12 plus the result of a dice roll against his basic value of 7. For this example, we'll assume Roger has an encumbrance limit of 18 on this day. Roger is virtually unencumbered (1 kg of weight carried), but his friend, Charles, who weighs 88 kg, is carrying 17 kg of equipment and is sinking. Roger attempts to life save Charles. Roger's encumbrance becomes 1 kg + 17.6 kg + 17 kg = 35.6 kg. Since this is less than 2 x Roger's encumbrance limit in the water, Roger can keep Charles afloat, but suffers a penalty of -5 1/2 to all his dice rolls based on CO while doing so.