Getting Filthy Dirty

Despite the fact that my mind instantly dives into the gutter, I'm not actually talking about anything suggestive or lewd - no, what I'm about to discuss is effectively another resource subsystem to track in OSR games. But, since I didn't think up the idea entirely on my own, I don't want to claim that the idea for tracking cleanliness was my sole idea. The methods for tracking it are, but the inspiration lay in the /osrg/ thread some months ago.

Filth

Adventurers are not in the cleanest of professions. These are people, who, against all reason or sense, delve into crumbling ruins filled with monsters, disease, molds, and traps on the slim hope that they might retrieve an ancient treasure that will keep them and theirs in the good life for an unknown span of future time. And when that money runs out, they'll do it all over again, risking injury, sickness, and death.

There are extensive rules for tracking heat and cold in the Wilderness Survival Guide for 1e AD&D, and while not everyone's cup of tea, it certainly will aid any DM looking to replicate the man vs. nature style storytelling of greats like Jack London. The 1e AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide also contains various bits of useful rules - of particular interest for our discussion is the disease rules.

The Rules

Player characters gain Filth Points any time they engage in an action that can be considered excessively dirty. A few suggested scenarios are outlined below:

1. Combat with close-range melee weapons (swords, axes, maces, daggers, hammers, etc.).
2. Searching a dead body, particularly ones that can no longer be considered "fresh", or bodies that have been savagely wounded.
3. Handle moldy, dirty, or rotting material (such as sacks in a dungeon).
4. Trudge through a swamp, bog, sewer, etc.
5. Mutilate a dead body.
6. Consume the flesh of a dead body (cannibalism).
7. Engage in sexual intercourse with a dead body (necrophilia).

Filth Points accumulate. Each act described above would warrant at least a single Filth Point, to a soft maximum of 5. Each time a PC engages in an act that would grant a Filth Point, they gain between 1 and 3 Filth Points depending on the environs or the severity of the act. Each Filth Point is a penalty to NPC reaction rolls due to the player character's excessively dirty appearance and vile smell.

Each Filth Point adjusts the base chance of disease by 1% (and even a single Filth Point should prompt the weekly check for disease). Filth Points beyond 5 should be recorded, but they do not further penalize reaction rolls, though they continue to modify the base disease chance. A particularly Filthy person (3+ Filth Points) should also prompt disease checks from their party members, as they are likely to render their clothing, bedding, and anything they touch unsanitary.

Removing Filth requires access to satisfactory bathing conditions (clean water, soap, and an object to scrub with). Each point of Filth requires 10 minutes (1 turn) to remove, and a standard sized bath tub of water can only handle two points of Filth before becoming so dirty that the water is rendered useless for further bathing and must be changed. Excess Filth beyond the "soft" maximum of 5 is not counted for this purpose. Moreover, removing even a single point of Filth should negate all excess Filth.

The main intent of the Filth rules is to provide a small subsystem that can be easily kept track of, and fits in with the existing AD&D 1e DMG disease rules. If too complicated, consider making 5 a hard maximum, and having each point of Filth modify the base disease chance by 2% instead of 1%.