what would the order of most-dangerous to least-dangerous body parts to be injured be [closed]

Question

I am trying to make a realistic shooter game. Every body part has a certain blood loss modifier. It's basically a modifier that lets me set how much more dangerous injuries to certain body parts are. So, I can make hands loose blood slower than the thighs, or the chest, when injured with the same amount of damage (like if both are shot by a 9mm bullet). Im not quite sure what these values should be though. There isn't really a real-life answer (as far as I'm aware) on this because in real life there are many different factors that affect how quickly someone loses blood. Therefore, I think I just need to understand the most dangerous places to be shot in and set these blood loss values accordingly.

With that being said, what would the order of most-dangerous to least-dangerous body parts to be injured be? I would assume the order would start with:

• head (because brain)

• upper torso (because, heart, lungs)

but from there I'm not sure and can't really find much. I know gunshots to the thigh are extremely dangerous because of the femoral artery, but is it more dangerous to be shot there than the lower torso? What about the arm? Will you lose blood faster if you're shot in the foot or in the hand? The body parts that lose blood in the game are:

Head, upper torso, mid torso, lower torso, hips, upper leg, lower leg, foot, upper arm, lower arm (forearm), hands.

I mostly just need to know how dangerous an injury on each body part is from most dangerous to least dangerous, based on the structures in each body part.

Answer 1

Pardon me for not directly answering the question, but I think it might be unanswerable as written. Or at least, any direct answer wouldn't be very useful.

You seem to only consider blood-loss, assuming it to be constant for any given body-part, and you only consider danger to life. To make a more realistic game, maybe you should start by considering the range of different consequenses of being shot.

A fatal wound to the stomach might only be fatal because of internal bleeding, so the combatant might seem fine and keep fighting. Conversely, a non-fatal injury to the foot might render the combatant unable to walk, meaning they are effectively out of the game (and potentially in grave danger of being killed if they cannot defend themselves).

Further complexity might be added by considering that injuries to the arms and hands might make it difficult or impossible to operate certain weapons. Reloading might take longer, or aiming might be more challanging. Injuries to the torso might not be fatal, but might compromise stamina if running is required.

In summary, I think modelling blood-loss from particular limbs might be the wrong starting-point for obtaining realism and complexity in the injury-model of a game.

Note: I'm not a soldier or medical professional, so I don't know if some of the above examples are completly wrong, but hopefully it gives an impression of the potential complexity of battlefield injuries.

Answer 2

Here you go. From https://i.redd.it/hzquakm37f961.jpg

I think this might be original research! If so, pretty cool. It looks like rib, kidneys, small bowel and bladder were included but did not get percentages assigned. I will say rib >95% survival, small bowel has 75% survival same as large bowel, bladder is 85% like stomach. Kidneys bleed so I will say 50% for one and <35% for both.

Genitals did not warrant special treatment here. You can consider how to treat them for your game. Which I imagine involves a turn-based duel at 50 paces using target pistols and so genitals would be involved fairly often if I were playing.

Answer 3

Background

I study Historic European Martial Arts, and these old masters knew something about where to hit the body to remove individuals from combat quickly. The human body has not changed much in the intervening time, so I plan to outline the places they say to hit.

Additionally, I want to emphasize the goal of combat is not to kill the enemy. It's to accomplish your mission or other goal. Violence is merely means to an end! This is why this hierarchy may differ from others: this is about removing people from combat via violence, which does not always result in death.

Armored vs Unarmored?

The weapons and armor used in any combat situation are very important. Consider a knight hit with an arrow. If the arrow hits the breastplate, the knight will be fine. If that arrow hits a gap in the armor, like into the armpit, the knight could have a major injury. A similar situation occurs with bullets, shrapnel, and modern armor.

For the sake of this answer, I will assume no armor. In reality, anyone expecting combat should wear a helmet at a minimum! So the real answer is "the gaps in armor nearest the following body parts."

The List

In order of "most bad" to "least bad," with some justifications, the rank is more-or-less like so:

1. Head: the most vulnerable and important part of the body. Even small forces here can remove a combatant.
2. Neck: supplies blood to the head. Interrupt this, and it's just as bad as ahead injury!
3. Upper/Mid torso: heart and lungs are here, which you need to fight. Interrupt these, you you have very little time to do anything other than die.
4. Inside legs: there are huge arteries here. Hemorrhage here is a quick way to kill someone, but also hard to hit. Legs move quickly!
5. Inside arms: once again, arteries come through these. Not as much blood goes through these as the legs, but this can still be deadly. Very hard to hit, because people are using their arms in combat!
6. Hands: because you cannot wield a weapon without using your hands! These get armored pretty quickly for this very reason.
7. Lower Torso/Hips: likely to be deadly in the long run. Some people survive this just fine, and some accounts have people last a long time before succumbing to a belly injury. Sometimes they even kill their attacker before they go down!
8. Outside arms: once again, this may remove an individual's ability to wield a weapon.
9. Outside legs/feet: not only are these hard to hit, but they also only reduce mobility. It may take them out of a fight, immobilize them, or just put them on the ground.

Answer 4

It doesn't really matter.

Suppose a pipe bringing water from the source to your house. Does it matter to you that the pipe bursts 10 metres from the source or 10 kilometres further? No, the result is you don't have water in your house, period.

It doesn't matter that a particular vein is hit in a particular body part. What matters is whether the vein was hit, not where it was hit.

Some body parts will be more full of major blood vessels than others, sure, but at some point it's a matter of random luck whether a bullet to the leg hits the femoral or not. Soldiers don't aim for the femoral in a battle.

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If I had to simulate that, I'd just roll some dice. Give each bodypart a difficulty class (or DC), with a DC based on pretty much how many points you'd get from hitting the target the shooting range.

The head would be a one-hit KO, because it's a game and that's what players expect. Then upper torso maybe DC15, lower torso DC10, limbs DC5.

When the player is hit, roll a die, if you hit the DC or above, the player resists the bleed effect. Otherwise it means a major blood vessel has been shot. And as I argued above, it doesn't matter the precise location. So you just lose X volume of blood per tick.

You can get fancier with it. Wearing body armor could raise the DC of your torso. You could add a multiplier based on the roll, e.g. rolling a 4 on a DC10 means you take double damage. How complex and granular you get it up to you, up to the granularity of your simulation of the human body. And that decision should definitely come after some playtesting.

As for overall player damage or status effect, those are independent systems. Whether you bleed or not doesn't change that you can't run with a shattered knee. And it doesn't change that a gut shot is likely going to kill you.