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Old 05-08-2017, 08:00 AM   #25
Varyon
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Default Re: High Amounts of non penetrating damage. Bullets VS Plate Carriers

Quote:
Originally Posted by DeathDaisy View Post
In Low-tech, there's a box on p. 102 named Blunt Trauma and Edged Weapons which might be relevant for this discussion too. It says that it's incredibly hard for a blade to cut through armor, so optionally, treat cutting damage as crushing unless the damage exceeds twice the DR of the armor.

The same could maybe be done with high-tech armor and high velocity projectiles to solve the problem Anthony and Ulzgoroth were talking about; if the attack doesn't exceed the DR by much, the damage is BABT and converted to crushing. This seems a pretty RAW way to do it, considering the LT-box.
GURPS armor and firearm stats are interrelated and based on real-world performance - RHA steel (the standard for penetration/protection tests) has DR 70 per inch, and firearm damage is based on what they can penetrate. A 5d pi rifle is one that's rated to penetrate 1/4 inches of RHA steel, and 1/4 inches of RHA steel gives DR 17.5 (average damage for 5d). Using Blunt Trauma and Edged Weapons would throw this off. Granted, there may be cause to give all armor split DR, and I did so as part of my Combat Skills Overhaul (the relevant post is #4, under the Blunt Trauma section), but that's more complicated than most are going to want at the table. Also, IIRC, that 70% DR figure was basically just pulled out of the air - I have no idea what the actual proportion should be.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tomsdad View Post
For instance given how over penetration normally caps Pi damage by HP, having it convert to Cr could lead to more damage being inflicted instantly in some cases!
That isn't entirely unrealistic, although extremely unlikely. Because the armor completely stops the bullet, that means the armor+body must absorb all of the bullet's momentum, instead of just the portion represented with blowthrough. However, you basically need some fantasy material that gives way more DR against piercing than crushing (even Kevlar only has a 4x difference, which isn't enough to see the effect). Say you have DR 60/5 (60 vs pi, 5 vs cr). A piercing attack is capped at 10 HP injury, so with the 1/3 divisor (suggested in the linked thread, and also my previous post in this one) you reach that with a 45 damage piercing attack against the above armor (45 pi becomes 15 cr, which becomes 10 injury when DR is subtracted). Anything between 48 (11 HP injury) and 60 (15 HP injury) thus does a bit more injury.
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