Quote:
Originally Posted by Anthony
Define what you mean by 'most foes'? Looking at what's intended to be a pretty tough fight, against an ice wyrm (which doesn't have a brain or vitals anyway) he can get a deceptive (-3) rapid strike at 14- (20, +5 for SM, -6 for deceptive, -3 for rapid, -2 for bad footing); if the wyrm uses a retreat real hit probability is still upwards of 50%. It will take three hits to blow off the wyrm's ice armor (ablative DR 42), another three to get it below 0 HT, at which point it's an average of 4 turns before it falls unconscious. That's a pretty long time in GURPS, but it's also a boss fight that is almost certainly not intended to be soloed.
|
Try something more like a Draug (who has very respectable defenses after you pile on medium shield DB and 15 HT), or a Pudding (who just really doesn't care about your puny 3d+6 damage), a Golem-Armor Swordsman (who the knight will struggle to noticeably injure on a hit) or even an earth elemental (solid DR, good HP) none of which are even "boss fights" but can go toe to toe with a knight for a good long time. They all make HT checks more often than they don't.
Each one of those HT checks doesn't care about the one that came before, so also keep in mind that an average of 4 turns can easily turn out to be 8 or 10. In my experience, a monster who doesn't quit due to GM fiat or Fragile:Unnatural goes down to failed HT checks 1 time in 5, more often, the players end up softening it up and going for decisive brain blow long before body blows add up to a kill by failed HT.