FAILED parry means contact too? (Zombies)

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Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Um...I don't roll for a parry when the attack failed. GURPS combat is slow enough.

Me neither, just elaborating on the outcomes of a failed primary attack and a failed parry.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Um...I don't roll for a parry when the attack failed. GURPS combat is slow enough.

I know it's RAW to wait for the hit roll, but not having someone declare defences ahead of time and roll them regardless of the outcome deprives you of the hilarious possibility of someone crit-failing their dodge and falling down (or crit-failing their parry and smacking themself in the face) despite the attack turning out to be a whiff.

On the other hand, if you fail your perception roll to see the attack coming (P#3/57p27) then you shouldn't be able to defend unless someone else is able to quickly warn you.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Plane

MA122 only says hands, so I don't think we can do that for arms. I do like the idea though.

I see no reason not to extend it to arms (or feet/legs, for that matter). It follows logically, and isn't called out as a non-option. Note also that targets without fine manipulators lack hands, but can still punch, meaning their limbs are functionally weapons, so it follows they should be able to get out of the way - and why should having your hand removed suddenly make you better at getting your arm out of the way?

Originally Posted by Plane

I was thinking like if I did AOA:double to punch+kick a zombie with a fire aura that I'd take burning damage twice.

I think Aura is only able to affect each target once per second - after all, grappling somebody (such that they are in constant contact with your Aura) does no more Aura damage than slapping them in the face. Regardless, even if it's more a case of causing damage with each contact, I wouldn't treat a failed Parry as two contacts, as it was still just a single action. The only exception would be an edge case where someone tries an unarmed sacrificial Parry and fails, where I might be inclined to have both the would-be savior and original target get Aura'd.

Originally Posted by Plane

You think maybe it should be limited to situations resembling P144's "user can deliberately
attack others by flicking his blood around" for Acidic Blood?

I'm thinking it might not be a bad idea to just have it be for contact agents, or maybe even just for zombies. However, giving it further thought, it occurs to me that part of the concept behind it is "a failed Parry should never be better than a successful one." For both a headbutt from a touch-infectious zombie that doesn't get through the folded stop sign you are wearing on your chest and a lightsaber that fails to get through your Beskar steel breastplate, if a failed Parry means no contact, you were better off failing (on a success, you either have to roll to avoid infection from zombie slaughter or suffer severe damage to your hand from the lightsaber). That in mind, it may be best to treat a failed Parry in either case as involving as much contact (for determining the effect of Contact Agent and Destructive Parry) as a successful one.

In cases where having contact occur on a failed Parry would actually be to the defender's benefit (say, defender is blocking with a burning brand against the zombie, or something made of cortosis against a lightsaber), I'd have no such contact occur. If it would be to both the defender's benefit and detriment (unarmored hand that is magically surrounded by flame against a zombie, or a cortosis bracelet that will still have the character harmed by the lightsaber before it shuts down), I'd let the attacker decide.

Originally Posted by Plane

MA122:

Martial artists usually use the term “parry” to describe a defense that redirects or deflects an attack without absorbing much of its energy.

Intercepting an attack and safely dissipating its energy is called a “block.”

In GURPS, these terms have different meanings.

“Parry” refers to either kind of defense made with a weapon or a limb.

“Block” describes either type of defense executed with a shield.

[...]
Depends on what's meant by 'tank' I guess. You can absorb much (but safely dissipate) rather than deflect/redirect.

1 HP of injury is a fairly significant impact. A martial arts "block" works by one of a few methods. The first, for low-impact situations (where the hit wouldn't have caused injury in the first place), it doesn't do much other than avoid your opponent getting a point in a match or avoid Shock effects that GURPS doesn't cover (getting hit in the Face in GURPS does nothing unless it was sufficient to cause 1 HP of Injury, but can still be painful enough to cause short-term problems IRL). The second, more common, is to intercept an attack while it's still low-impact (a short distance into a strike, it usually has very little kinetic energy and won't damage much; there's a reason Bruce Lee had to specifically train for his "One Inch Punch"). A third, relevant to the zombie bite, is to intercept a low-impact attack that would have caused injury, by intercepting it at a location on the "striker" that doesn't cause injury (essentially having your arm tank a weak headbutt to keep the target's jaws from reaching your flesh). Finally, you may be able to block a medium-to-high impact hit by letting your arm act like a spring to absorb the impact, but that really works best if you've already got something else (like a shield or armguard) to spread out the impact. The first option is a failed GURPS Parry, but the target fails to roll enough damage to accomplish anything. The second and third (early/alternate intercept) I'd really count as redirecting the impact (you're markedly changing how it hits, forcing it to either hit too early or away from a striking surface). The fourth I'm not convinced is really an option when completely unarmed and unarmored, but is arguably a sort of redirection of the energy.

Originally Posted by Plane

I would say 'hand' specifically, unless it got broadened to arm/limb/leg/extremity/foot elsewhere. I don't think it's possible to use a 'Leg Parry' to pseudo-dodge an attack targetting your foot based on this, for example.

I'd be inclined to treat Martial Arts' mention of "weapon or hand" as not being exhaustive, and would therefore allow one to use it to get a hand, foot, arm, leg, wing, tail, tentacle, Striker, etc out of the way. Heck, letting you use it to get your head out of the way probably wouldn't be a horrible option. Just keep in mind you're still limited to what you can legally Parry (so using a Brawling Parry to duck a gunshot is a no-go).

Originally Posted by Plane

some day...

I've played around with similar options in the past, but never got anything I was entirely happy with.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I see no reason not to extend it to arms

Hands are small things at the ends of arms, so you could jerk them out of the way quicker.

I figured it was in the sense that "a parry normally lets me relocate my hand by up to ~4 feet by swinging my hand around, so logically I should be able to get it out of the way of stuff easily"

I could see that applying to at least PART of the arm too, like the forearm, since it can move around and is actually a striking surface for an attack. Since you can't use wrist movement to help get the forearm out of the way, I'd think at least a -1 to do it feels right.

Perhaps elbows too, but with Elbow Strike we do begin to see penalties (like reduced reach on AOA Long) so the reduced reach should maybe be some kind of penalty to do a "no-contact parry" to remove your elbow from the line of fire. At least a -2, I would think.

Upper arm should be even less mobile than the elbow, so if it could do a no-contact parry it should be at least a -3?

The 'shoulder' being part of the arm according to Low-Tech (yet 'hip' not part of leg...) doesn't seem like it should be an option, it's basically the torso IMO. When you start moving your torso it's a dodge.

Originally Posted by Varyon

(or feet/legs, for that matter).

MA123 allows the leg (this is what a weapon user can choose to target on a failure, so I assume this is what makes contact... same with MA124 knocking shins) to defend the groin. I imagine that PROBABLY involves lifting the foot off the ground, so at least the feet being able to do no-contact parries makes sense to me.

When I think of the reactive ROM that parries normally enjoy (example: a SM+1 guy with reach 1 could go from punching someone in his front hex with his right hand to using the same right hand to Sacrificial Parry for an ally in his rear hex) it does seem similar to weapon reach

...though weirdly there's no -2 penalty to base skill for kicking, which I would expect to give -1 to parry relative to arm/hand parrying (if you use the -2 for low-line parries it's still better)

I could look at the lack of penalty as part of technique design though: +1 for limited to lower body, +1 for losing retreat.

Anyway, for legs, I figure a similar progression: -1 for no-contact shins, -2 for no-contact knee, -3 for no-contact thigh... seem right?

Originally Posted by Varyon

It follows logically, and isn't called out as a non-option. Note also that targets without fine manipulators lack hands, but can still punch,

I'm suddenly realizing i could be making a mistake thinking 'One Hand' works like NFM for just one arm, because while B147 does mention doing unarmed parries with the handless arm, I don't see a mention of punching.

MA116 finally added "a handless arm can’t punch or grab". It does allow Elbow Strike, and there's mention when you elbow strike to front it's considered a punch... but since there's no 'Hand' hit location for One Hand chars, I assume the unwritten rule is you would apply contact damage to the arm.

Not addressed is 'Hammer Fist'... One Hand guys don't have a "fist" but "forearm smashes" sounds right.

Originally Posted by Varyon

their limbs are functionally weapons, so it follows they should be able to get out of the way

B271 classifies "Blunt Teeth" as a weapon too...
Brawling parries allowed to pseudo-dodge melee attacks aimed at jaw?

Originally Posted by Varyon

why should having your hand removed suddenly make you better at getting your arm out of the way?

I'm not sure what you mean (that isn't the case in the rules) but actually this would make sense because the arm would be lighter. A hand has to weight at least 1 lb right? Plus less air resistance.

If we were allowing no-contact parries to be done when the arm is targetted, then I'd be fine giving a +1 to those (but not parries in general) for a guy with the One Hand limitation if all he had was a naked stump. No +1 if he had a shield or hook strapped there though.

If no-contact parries were an option instead of dodges when an arm is targetted then we should also consider how to deal with people trying this when their hands are holding stuff.

It might not make a difference if all their hand is holding is a 0.25 pound dagger, but their arm should move a lot slower if they're carrying a 5lb shield...

RAW, it doesn't seem like unarmed parries are an option at all unless you choose to DROP your weapon, but if we were trying to fudge some rules for this, perhaps we could find some way to derive an arm-parry (contact or no) penalty from how the weapon's weight compares to Basic Lift?

It shouldn't apply to hands though, if you can use full weapon skill to yank a weapon out of the way then you should still be able to use full unarmed parry skill to yank a hand out of the way when it's clutching a weapon, a hand can always move faster than a hand+weapon.

The only difference I can think would be if you don't meet the ST requirements of a weapon. If a sword needs ST 12 and you have ST 10, the -2 to weapon skill would be a -1 to parry with a weapon, so it would seem okay to also have that be a -1 to parry with your arm as well.

Originally Posted by Varyon

I think Aura is only able to affect each target once per second - after all, grappling somebody (such that they are in constant contact with your Aura) does no more Aura damage than slapping them in the face.

Yeah we got a Krommquote on that recently: http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...57&postcount=5

The suggestion being to buy 'Rapid Fire' for an Aura which can damage a particular foe more than once per turn.

I wonder how that works with weapon though, since they can be built as characters themselves... or Independent Body Parts which makes them separate entities.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Regardless, even if it's more a case of causing damage with each contact, I wouldn't treat a failed Parry as two contacts, as it was still just a single action.

What about someone using AOA:Double where he does 2 distinct parries?

I know you only do the 2nd if the 1st fails, but failing doesn't mean there's no contact (ie the 'push past' with heavy weapons, at least, where you passed the roll but lacked the ST to stop the weapon) so it could happen if someone's low-ST arm failed to stop, their high-ST arm could stop it.

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'm thinking it might not be a bad idea to just have it be for contact agents, or maybe even just for zombies.

Ideally we have stats breakdowns for special rules. Which is why I like to treat "no -4 to bite the hand which failed to grapple your head" (TG1.2p7 - neck is part of head now) as a new general rule and not just a zombie rule, since there's no special zombie perk to reflect this advantage. If it's part of some 0pt feature for zombies then there should be some linked drawback (like quirk) to it.

Something like "compulsion: MUST use next attack to try to bite that hand" for example, would probably be enough.

Originally Posted by Varyon

However, giving it further thought, it occurs to me that part of the concept behind it is "a failed Parry should never be better than a successful one."

For both a headbutt from a touch-infectious zombie that doesn't get through the folded stop sign you are wearing on your chest and a lightsaber that fails to get through your Beskar steel breastplate, if a failed Parry means no contact, you were better off failing (on a success, you either have to roll to avoid infection from zombie slaughter or suffer severe damage to your hand from the lightsaber).

That in mind, it may be best to treat a failed Parry in either case as involving as much contact (for determining the effect of Contact Agent and Destructive Parry) as a successful one.

I guess the problem is that 'better' is subjective to WHO has the Destructive Parry (P103 "damages weapons it parries or that parry it") or similar (aura, spines).

If the attacker has it, then contact on failed parries is bad for the defender.
If the defender has it, then contact on failed parries is good for the defender.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Varyon

In cases where having contact occur on a failed Parry would actually be to the defender's benefit (say, defender is blocking with a burning brand against the zombie, or something made of cortosis against a lightsaber), I'd have no such contact occur. If it would be to both the defender's benefit and detriment (unarmored hand that is magically surrounded by flame against a zombie, or a cortosis bracelet that will still have the character harmed by the lightsaber before it shuts down), I'd let the attacker decide.

It seems a bit too magical though... I wish I could think of some way to dice this out.

Like for example, just have there be a risk of accidental collision when a parry fails, and then give both parties a chance to roll a dodge to avoid that accidental collision?

B389 ("Hitting the Wrong Target" and B392 ("Striking into a Close Combat") both use a 9-or-less roll for hitting non-intended targets, so that seems the right thing.

In both cases there's a "or the number you would have had to roll to hit him on purpose" caveat, but that's weird (for example: why should a blind guy or a clumsy guy be less likely to accidentally hit someone other than his target? they're not applying their sight/agility in that direction) so I'd just apply Size Modifier penalties to the 9 instead, like you would with Bombardment (B111) limitation on Area Attack. If 9 seems too much of an advantage this way, could always lower it, like to 8 which is the lowest level of Bombardment, or even something like a 3.

Originally Posted by Varyon

1 HP of injury is a fairly significant impact. A martial arts "block" works by one of a few methods. The first, for low-impact situations (where the hit wouldn't have caused injury in the first place), it doesn't do much other than avoid your opponent getting a point in a match or avoid Shock effects that GURPS doesn't cover (getting hit in the Face in GURPS does nothing unless it was sufficient to cause 1 HP of Injury, but can still be painful enough to cause short-term problems IRL).

0-damage can be made rarer by using fractional damage for all, 0.1 damage causing -0.1 DX would be enough to induce a penalty and make people want to avoid it.

Originally Posted by Varyon

The second, more common, is to intercept an attack while it's still low-impact (a short distance into a strike, it usually has very little kinetic energy and won't damage much; there's a reason Bruce Lee had to specifically train for his "One Inch Punch").

If only that helped... A Matter of Inches in MA would benefit from a 7th "Extremely Short" category for this and elbows.

Originally Posted by Varyon

A third, relevant to the zombie bite, is to intercept a low-impact attack that would have caused injury, by intercepting it at a location on the "striker" that doesn't cause injury (essentially having your arm tank a weak headbutt to keep the target's jaws from reaching your flesh).

That or you're doing a light 'shove' on the face to try and redirect the head, possibly succeeding or failing depending on the zombie head's momentum.

A perk like DR 1 (Active Defence -40% Limited: Melee Attacks -20% Flexible -20%) sounds sort of like what this might be. I didn't take "Tough Skin" because reducing the damage to 0 effectively means you're preventing contact with your HP.

It wouldn't make sense to have this be reducable by Corrosive Attack or for Armor Divisor to work against it, so that might be 2 levels of Cosmic: Defensive (+50%) making it cost 6 points though.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Finally, you may be able to block a medium-to-high impact hit by letting your arm act like a spring to absorb the impact, but that really works best if you've already got something else (like a shield or armguard) to spread out the impact. The first option is a failed GURPS Parry, but the target fails to roll enough damage to accomplish anything. The second and third (early/alternate intercept) I'd really count as redirecting the impact (you're markedly changing how it hits, forcing it to either hit too early or away from a striking surface). The fourth I'm not convinced is really an option when completely unarmed and unarmored, but is arguably a sort of redirection of the energy.

In terms of the difference to the previously defined trait, I'd definitely swap "Tough Skin" in for "Flexible", and also add "Limited: Crushing Attacks -20%" to it, since you're taking hits directly, not slowing them by intercepting another body part. That extra -40% would save 2 points and reduce it from 6 to 4.

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'd be inclined to treat Martial Arts' mention of "weapon or hand" as not being exhaustive, and would therefore allow one to use it to get a hand, foot, arm, leg, wing, tail, tentacle, Striker, etc out of the way. Heck, letting you use it to get your head out of the way probably wouldn't be a horrible option.

It sort of resembles the "Not the Face!" bonus at http://www.gamesdiner.com/rules-nugget-gurps-duck/

If using that (and especially if using "Flinch!" for a 2nd +1), then the option to use a no-contact parry instead of a dodge isn't as upsetting to the balance of power.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Just keep in mind you're still limited to what you can legally Parry (so using a Brawling Parry to duck a gunshot is a no-go).

The "Dodge This!" pyramid article has rules for blocking/parrying gunshots. As it's DX-based the penalty is twice as worse as it is for dodges, it would probably be okay to allow no-contact parries using these worse penalties. Your skill would have to be super-high for this to be a better roll than for dodging. The largest benefit would be that you could do AOA: Double to combine a no-contact parry with a dodge as a backup.

Dodging still has the benefit of getting a Dodge and Drop bonus resembling retreats (normal retreat bonuses don't apply to dodging ranged weapons, so they shouldn't apply to parrying ranged weapons, contact or not)

"Tactical Dodging, Redux" on pg 30 (pyramid3/57) has the benefit (if you dodged before the attack was rolled) of applying the posture penalty for lying down to that shot, so it might miss without you even having to roll, but if you do need to, you don't suffer the posture penalty to active defences.

TDR is an epic improvement over the usual "declare a specific attacker" for Tactical Shooting 17 (to reflect that concept we could use the +1 "one foe" for technical grappling, obviously only usable against attackers you're aware of)

The only part I don't like about it is "you only roll if the attack would have hit you if you hadn’t been dodging" because rolling could determine if you crit-fail a dodge.

That doesn't seem significant (you're diving to the ground anyway... a crit fail on a dodge doesn't use the tables, you just fall down) but I think it could represent the difference between a controlled fall (low risk of injury on a Dodge and Drop) and an uncontrolled one (high risk of injury).

RAW, I don't think you would roll fall damage on a Dodge and Drop, so having you roll it only on a crit-failed dodge would create a distinction between the circumstances.

If using a grittier "roll for fall damage when you dive to the ground under any circumstances" house rule, then I would represent the difference as you get (unless you took an AOA) an active defence (block or parry the ground...but instead of the weight of the earth, treat it like Slam from yourself, so weight equal to your ST) to mitigate that damage if it's an intended fall, and no active defence (surprise attack) if it's a crit-failed dodge, or you tripped, etc.

In terms of "Roll With Blow" or "Breakfall" (they're not active defences, so I'm not sure whether or not you'd get them against surprise attacks or if you took AOA) if you got them in both cases, I'd apply a -4 in surprise situations, like the ST-4 roll in Technical Grappling.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Plane

Hands are small things at the ends of arms, so you could jerk them out of the way quicker.

Penalties for an "Avoidance Parry" with the Arm could make sense. Personally, I'd be inclined to have there be no penalty for the forearm or elbow (although I could be convinced to apply a -1 for elbow), -1 for the upper arm, and -2 for the shoulder. Note at the point where you're using an Avoidance Parry instead of a Dodge for the shoulder, you probably need the unarmed skill at DX+4 for your Avoidance Parry to be equal to your Dodge. Honestly, allowing an Avoidance Parry for the Torso at -3 or maybe -4 probably wouldn't terribly break anything (although I'd require you to designate the limb that takes the Parry iteration penalty; fluffwise, you twisting out of the way of the attack put that limb at a disadvantage to intercept later attacks; optionally you could instead have a Torso Avoidance Parry give an iteration penalty to all limbs).

Using the above penalties for normal Parries would likely also be acceptable - a character wearing football pads might opt to Parry a zombie bite to his Neck at -2 so that he's specifically using his shoulder to Parry, that way he doesn't risk contact on a successful Parry.

Originally Posted by Plane

MA123 allows the leg (this is what a weapon user can choose to target on a failure, so I assume this is what makes contact... same with MA124 knocking shins) to defend the groin. I imagine that PROBABLY involves lifting the foot off the ground, so at least the feet being able to do no-contact parries makes sense to me.

A leg parry typically involves lifting the leg and using the shin or knee to either push an attack out of the way or - more frequently IME - to arrest the enemy's leg before it gets into a position to kick (as a result, I have no issues allowing a Leg Parry to work against most kicks, but for one that targets above the belt you should still have the -2 to skill - -1 to Parry - and probably be restricted to using it in Close Combat). So, yeah, using Leg Parry for an Avoidance Parry I feel would be perfectly acceptable. No penalty for foot/shin/knee, maybe -1 for lower thigh and -2 for upper thigh (note "thigh" is actually two sublocations for leg, corresponding to both upper arm and shoulder on the arm).

For the Head, I'd probably do no penalty for Skull/Eyes, -1 for Face (maybe -2 for the Jaw sublocation), and treat Neck as part of the Torso (unless the character has some trait that indicates a particularly flexible neck, in which case -2 might be acceptable). For non-standard limbs, like tails and wings, divide it into sublocations. Sublocations 1-4 (those furthest from the attachment point) are at no penalty, sublocation 5 is at -1, and sublocation 6 (the one that attaches to the character's body) is at -2.

Originally Posted by Plane

I'm not sure what you mean (that isn't the case in the rules) but actually this would make sense because the arm would be lighter. A hand has to weight at least 1 lb right? Plus less air resistance.

I'd call that markedly below system resolution. Indeed, I probably wouldn't have weight have any impact on any Parry unless you were a) Parrying with a weapon you lacked MinST for or b) Parrying with a fencing skill while above No Encumbrance. Realistically, heavy armor on the arms would make them a bit harder to get out of the way (or indeed in the way for a more proper Parry), but some sacrifices of realism often need to be made to keep things playable.

Additionally, I'd be perfectly fine allowing an Avoidance Parry with a hand/arm that is wielding a weapon, even if said weapon doesn't normally allow for unarmed Parries (note some weapons, like the various flavors of katar, do allow for such). I would not allow weapon skill to be used for an Avoidance Parry when the hand or arm was the target, however (getting your arm out of the way more effectively if you happen to be wielding a Broadsword-weapon than if unarmed makes no sense, even if your Broadsword skill is far higher than your Brawling).

Originally Posted by Plane

The suggestion being to buy 'Rapid Fire' for an Aura which can damage a particular foe more than once per turn.

That works. I'd still count an attack with a failed Parry as a single contact, not as two contacts. Indeed, even with AoD: Double (as you mention later), or even if you somehow get more defenses than that (due to houserules or the like; I could certainly see someone with Altered Time Rate getting more than two defenses against a single attack) I'd count everything - all the attempted Parries and the final hit after they fail - as a single contact.

Originally Posted by Plane

I wonder how that works with weapon though, since they can be built as characters themselves... or Independent Body Parts which makes them separate entities.

? If they have an Aura with RoF, they can damage each enemy up to RoF times, provided they contact the enemy that many times (such as being used in a Rapid Strike, Parrying at attack, etc). I'm more concerned with how the RoF build interacts with grappling; my inclination is to have half the RoF apply upon a successful grapple, and the other half apply if the target fails to break free on his turn. When your next turn comes around, you do one "free" Aura hit if you break the grapple (such as with a throw, or simply letting go), half RoF if you maintain it (and the other half if the foe fails to break free). I'm concerned that might be a bit unbalanced, however, given how difficult it is to hit multiple times with normal Rapid Fire rules. Probably something for another discussion...

Originally Posted by Plane

It seems a bit too magical though...

GURPS is a system for paper and pencil RPG's, not some sort of reality simulator. Some sacrifices on the altar of Gamism are to be expected. You certainly can work out a more realistic system, but that's going to add complexity (and dice rolls), and is likely to also result in questions why you are going so in depth here, yet leaving the Rapid Fire rules as-is - opening another can of worms as you try to fix that mess. And then another one, and another, until you've got an unworkable, overly-complex system.

Originally Posted by Plane

0-damage can be made rarer by using fractional damage for all, 0.1 damage causing -0.1 DX would be enough to induce a penalty and make people want to avoid it.

You'll need to restructure how GURPS damage is calculated; a roll of 2 on 1d-2 is a result of 0 while a roll of 3 on the same is a result of 1, there's no rounding down involved.

Originally Posted by Plane

That or you're doing a light 'shove' on the face to try and redirect the head, possibly succeeding or failing depending on the zombie head's momentum.

I was discussing what a "martial artist block" (that is, an unarmed defense that people IRL would call a block) would actually be; what you're describing (pushing the attacking "weapon" out of the way) would fall under a "martial artist parry" (that is, an unarmed defense that people IRL would call a parry).

Originally Posted by Plane

A perk like DR 1 (Active Defence -40% Limited: Melee Attacks -20% Flexible -20%) sounds sort of like what this might be. I didn't take "Tough Skin" because reducing the damage to 0 effectively means you're preventing contact with your HP.

... what? No special rules or traits are needed here; the result is what GURPS calls an unarmed Parry.

Originally Posted by Plane

The "Dodge This!" pyramid article has rules for blocking/parrying gunshots.

Yes, if you opt to use those alternate rules then avoiding gunshots with Avoidance Parries would be acceptable. Having ETS may have similar effects. If you're good enough to slap a bullet out of the air with your hand, you're certainly good enough to get your hand out of the way of the bullet instead.

Originally Posted by Plane

The only part I don't like about it is "you only roll if the attack would have hit you if you hadn’t been dodging" because rolling could determine if you crit-fail a dodge.

Cutting down on rolling can be useful. That said, having both parties always roll can indeed be worthwhile. If both have a Critical Success, I'd probably resolve it as a "just barely avoided" situation (normal attack, MoS 0 on defense; if using graze rules, feel free to see if the graze has special effects, such as ignoring DR or doing triple damage). If the attacker has a normal Failure and the defender has a Critical Failure, I'd let the attacker choose between it becoming a normal hit and the target rolling on the appropriate Critical Miss Table (if the attacker has a normal Success and the defender has a Critical Failure, I'd let the attacker choose between rolling on the appropriate Critical Hit Table and his target rolling on the appropriate Critical Miss Table).

Originally Posted by Plane

... a crit fail on a dodge doesn't use the tables, you just fall down

Personally, I'm inclined to have a Critical Failure on a Dodge use the Unarmed Critical Miss Table, rather than just defaulting to falling down. Note the callout for how to treat "falls down" results for characters who can't fall down (due to already being prone, such as from a Dodge and Drop).

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Varyon

at the point where you're using an Avoidance Parry instead of a Dodge for the shoulder, you probably need the unarmed skill at DX+4 for your Avoidance Parry to be equal to your Dodge.

Depends on how much higher than your HT your DX might be...

Plus B17 Extra-Heavy Encumbrance can give -4 to dodge while your parry remains unpenalized (unless fencing/karate/judo)

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'd call that markedly below system resolution.

I feel bad not giving One Hand guys some kinda benefit. I guess getting a miss if that hand is rolled as a Random Hit Location might be enough?

Originally Posted by Varyon

I probably wouldn't have weight have any impact on any Parry unless you were a) Parrying with a weapon you lacked MinST for or b) Parrying with a fencing skill while above No Encumbrance.

Where it begins to get weird though, is let's say I have enough ST (5) to wield my 0.25 pound dagger (B272) without penalty (-1 to DX if you're ST4) but I'm wearing a 3.75 pound (Instant Armor pg 10 halved) vambrace (forearm armor) made of wood.

Even though the dagger is more distal (leverage multiplies it's weight more than something worn on the forarm) it's not so distant that it should have a greater strain on shoulder movement than the Wooden Vambrace which weighs 15x as much.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Realistically, heavy armor on the arms would make them a bit harder to get out of the way (or indeed in the way for a more proper Parry), but some sacrifices of realism often need to be made to keep things playable.

I mean... if we had some kind of table/rules, you could calculate that kind of stuff ahead of time and then just note "at my usual ST, the penalty to parry when I'm wearing this is X")

It gets harder if your ST is constantly shifting (like say, penalty from being grappled, penalty from fatigue, getting hit with -ST afflictions) but then so does your Encumbrance Penalties (as a result of shifting Basic Lift) so I just kinda accept that such crunch comes with the territory. This is why we have excel sheets.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Additionally, I'd be perfectly fine allowing an Avoidance Parry with a hand/arm that is wielding a weapon, even if said weapon doesn't normally allow for unarmed Parries (note some weapons, like the various flavors of katar, do allow for such).

A lot of them can do unarmed parries using the brawling skill if in a reversed grip.

Originally Posted by Varyon

I would not allow weapon skill to be used for an Avoidance Parry when the hand or arm was the target, however (getting your arm out of the way more effectively if you happen to be wielding a Broadsword-weapon than if unarmed makes no sense, even if your Broadsword skill is far higher than your Brawling).

Maybe some combination? Like you're not just moving your weapon into the path of the attak, you could be moving your hand behind the cover of the weapon.

That should be easier than say... just doing a Sacrificial Parry for some friend, who still gets his own normal parry even if you fail.

Originally Posted by Varyon

? If they have an Aura with RoF, they can damage each enemy up to RoF times, provided they contact the enemy that many times (such as being used in a Rapid Strike, Parrying at attack, etc).

Ignoring the ROF enhancement (once per foe per turn) I just mean whether or not you'd count a weapon as a distinct foe from it's wielder (as it can be built as a character) or "separate entity" Independent Body Parts when severed.

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'm more concerned with how the RoF build interacts with grappling;

Closest match is "Requires Grapple" or "Weak Without Grapple" from GURPS Powers: The Weird for Innate Attacks.

Originally Posted by Varyon

GURPS is a system for paper and pencil RPG's, not some sort of reality simulator. Some sacrifices on the altar of Gamism are to be expected. You certainly can work out a more realistic system, but that's going to add complexity (and dice rolls), and is likely to also result in questions why you are going so in depth here, yet leaving the Rapid Fire rules as-is

I prefer Zombies to Guns? This is more like I don't know enough about guns to even see where ROF rules might need tweaking.

Originally Posted by Varyon

You'll need to restructure how GURPS damage is calculated; a roll of 2 on 1d-2 is a result of 0 while a roll of 3 on the same is a result of 1, there's no rounding down involved.

B379 mentions you round fractions down, (ie 3/2=1.5=1) but there is a minimum damage of 1 for penetrating damage, so 1/2=0.5=1 and 1/3=0.5=1

That's probably written with the 0.5 for Small Piercing and 1.5 for cutting/largePiercing in mind, but I imagine it also applies to stuff like Injury Tolerance.

Roll With Blow (MA88) is the only example I know of where you would universally round up, but that's not a wound multiplier, because it applies BEFORE calculating basic damage to subtract DR from. IE if you are wearing DR 5, a Roll With Blow vs 10 damage will protect you entirely while having Injury Tolerance (1/2) just means you take 2 (or maybe 3?) damage (10-5=5... then divide that be half... and probably round down?).

Originally Posted by Varyon

I was discussing what a "martial artist block" (that is, an unarmed defense that people IRL would call a block) would actually be; what you're describing (pushing the attacking "weapon" out of the way) would fall under a "martial artist parry" (that is, an unarmed defense that people IRL would call a parry).

I guess I just figure since 'Aggressive Parry' represents the "I'm parrying for damage", the non-aggressive is a softer "I'm parrying for distance" like a shove.

Originally Posted by Varyon

... what? No special rules or traits are needed here; the result is what GURPS calls an unarmed Parry.

I know I just mean in terms of concept. Like how that trait would not actually stop a non-melee weapon because you couldn't stop a limb propelling it.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Having ETS may have similar effects. If you're good enough to slap a bullet out of the air with your hand, you're certainly good enough to get your hand out of the way of the bullet instead.

Good point, forgot about that one. Cole said you could treat ETS as perception auto-success or +10. Latter appeals more to me.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Cutting down on rolling can be useful.

If that's the ultimate goal then people can play GURPS Ultra-Lite and ditch rolling for active defences altogether (just subtract half combat skill from attacker's skill)

Originally Posted by Varyon

That said, having both parties always roll can indeed be worthwhile.

More possibility of outcomes is more interesting :)

Originally Posted by Varyon

If both have a Critical Success, I'd probably resolve it as a "just barely avoided" situation

I like that idea, have never liked the idea of no possibility at all to dodge crit strikes.

Now if the attacker crit-fails and the defender crit-succeeds, the attacker should roll TWICE on the crit fail table :)

Originally Posted by Varyon

If the attacker has a normal Failure and the defender has a Critical Failure,
I'd let the attacker choose between it becoming a normal hit and the target rolling on the appropriate Critical Miss Table
(if the attacker has a normal Success and the defender has a Critical Failure, I'd let the attacker choose between rolling on the appropriate Critical Hit Table and his target rolling on the appropriate Critical Miss Table).

I don't think that choice is necessary, it seems weird that an attacker could somehow prevent a clumsy dodger from falling down in exchange for hitting them.

If an attacker wants to make a defence less likely to crit-fail and an attack less likely to miss, he should choose Telegraphic Attack.

Originally Posted by Varyon

I'm inclined to have a Critical Failure on a Dodge use the Unarmed Critical Miss Table, rather than just defaulting to falling down. Note the callout for how to treat "falls down" results for characters who can't fall down (due to already being prone, such as from a Dodge and Drop).

That sounds okay to me...

Just so long as we exorcise that auto-knockout weirdness on the unarmed table and replace it with the "hit yourself with your weapon" result on the normal crit fail table.

Never made sense you could more easily knock yourself out with a bare-handed punch while wearing a full metal helm than you could wielding a mace with a bare head.

B556 should maybe give options besides 50% arm 50% leg... like why can't I accidentally hit myself in the groind/foot/neck/face with a bo-staff? The only target that should be off limit is the actual hand(s) wielding the weapon.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Plane

I feel bad not giving One Hand guys some kinda benefit. I guess getting a miss if that hand is rolled as a Random Hit Location might be enough?

It's a Disadvantage; it doesn't need to include some sort of benefit.

Originally Posted by Plane

Where it begins to get weird though, is let's say I have enough ST (5) to wield my 0.25 pound dagger (B272) without penalty (-1 to DX if you're ST4) but I'm wearing a 3.75 pound (Instant Armor pg 10 halved) vambrace (forearm armor) made of wood.

Someone wearing a vambrace that weighs 75% of BL is a bit outside of the intended use case. That said, yes, armor on the arm should have some impact on how readily you can use said arm (for punching, wielding weapons, Parrying, etc), but you'd basically have to take the weight at each Arm sublocation (shoulder, upper arm, elbow, forearm - possibly all 3 sublocations there) as well as Hand. You'd then apply multipliers to each location's weight and add that to the weight of any weapon wielded in that arm to determine effective weapon weight, and decide how you want that to influence Parry and the like. You'd need to do this for each Arm and Hand. You should also probably do it for each Leg and Foot, where it would also influence Dodge. You'll need to have notes for how your character behaves when unarmored, partially armored (in case you only have time to throw on your vambraces and greaves, leaving off the rerebraces and cuisses), and fully armored, for each arm and for each set of armor your character owns (hopefully just one, but possibly more than that). If you wear different armor on each arm, you'll need to keep that in mind as well. It's all doable (provided you can figure out what are the appropriate multipliers; I never could when I played around with the idea), certainly, but may be a bit more complexity than your typical player is going to be willing to deal with.

Originally Posted by Plane

Maybe some combination? Like you're not just moving your weapon into the path of the attak, you could be moving your hand behind the cover of the weapon.

That's just a Parry using the weapon skill, not an Avoidance Parry. I mean, I guess you could do it in such a way the attacker gets a choice on if they hit your weapon or back off, but it's still just a Parry.

Originally Posted by Plane

Ignoring the ROF enhancement (once per foe per turn) I just mean whether or not you'd count a weapon as a distinct foe from it's wielder (as it can be built as a character) or "separate entity" Independent Body Parts when severed.

I'd treat the weapon and the user separately, regardless of if the weapon is just a piece of gear or a character in its own right; having an Aura be possible to avoid damage from by tapping with a stick first doesn't work from a game balance or sense standpoint. Independent Body Parts should each be treated as separate characters for purposes of Aura, just as they are for Area Effect.

Originally Posted by Plane

I prefer Zombies to Guns? This is more like I don't know enough about guns to even see where ROF rules might need tweaking.

The reason to have such an in-depth system is to add realism, but there are a lot of places where realism already suffers a lot more. Granted, if this is where you want to have a distinction, that's fine, just keep in mind that insistence on "realism" tends to cause disconnects elsewhere (because the strict realism in one rule stands in stark contrast to the more lax rules elsewhere).

Originally Posted by Plane

B379 mentions you round fractions down...

Cases where rounding comes into play are moderately rare. Personally, I prefer to avoid rounding, but "normal human punching other normal human in the face" (the type of situation I was discussing) is one where rounding doesn't really play a role.

Originally Posted by Plane

I guess I just figure since 'Aggressive Parry' represents the "I'm parrying for damage", the non-aggressive is a softer "I'm parrying for distance" like a shove.

A normal Parry typically does indeed involve a light (or sometimes rather hard) shove to help deflect/redirect the attack, yes. If you want to actually shove somebody with a Parry (causing knockback), that's an Aggressive Parry where you apply the shoving rules (no wounding, double knockback) to the damage rolled.

Originally Posted by Plane

If that's the ultimate goal then people can play GURPS Ultra-Lite and ditch rolling for active defences altogether (just subtract half combat skill from attacker's skill)

There's ground between "never roll Active Defense" and "only roll Active Defense when it's likely to matter."

Originally Posted by Plane

Now if the attacker crit-fails and the defender crit-succeeds, the attacker should roll TWICE on the crit fail table :)

That's an option, I'd be tempted to have the defender choose which of the two results applied, but applying both (hiting something hard, injuring yourself, and also losing your balance and falling, for example) could also work.

Originally Posted by Plane

I don't think that choice is necessary, it seems weird that an attacker could somehow prevent a clumsy dodger from falling down in exchange for hitting them.

This is one of those Gamist choices, and keep in mind criticals are very much Gamist convention. It makes sense that you could have the result be that what was a miss becomes a hit (target dodges into the attack), or you could have the miss stay a miss but the target's attempt to avoid the attack puts him in a worse situation (like face-planting while trying to dodge). You could just have an arbitrary roll decide (adding yet another roll), or you can let the player for the attacking character decide. The latter is likely to result in more participation and fun, so that's what I opted for.

Originally Posted by Plane

If an attacker wants to make a defence less likely to crit-fail and an attack less likely to miss, he should choose Telegraphic Attack.

Outside of a very poor defense score (6 or lower) or a narrow range of really good defense scores (14 or 15), Telegraphic Attack makes the target no less likely to suffer a Critical Failure.

Originally Posted by Plane

Just so long as we exorcise that auto-knockout weirdness on the unarmed table and replace it with the "hit yourself with your weapon" result on the normal crit fail table.

Never made sense you could more easily knock yourself out with a bare-handed punch while wearing a full metal helm than you could wielding a mace with a bare head.

Eh, I'm fine with it, all kinds of weird crap can happen when people are fighting. Someone accidentally - but safely - knocking oneself out would hardly be the strangest. This would be from a faceplant or similar (smacking oneself in the face with a mace is going to just cause straight damage), so having it be on an Unarmed Critical Miss makes sense.

Originally Posted by Plane

B556 should maybe give options besides 50% arm 50% leg... like why can't I accidentally hit myself in the groind/foot/neck/face with a bo-staff? The only target that should be off limit is the actual hand(s) wielding the weapon.

Arms and Legs are the parts of the body that are most often struck in combat (both accidentally by oneself and on purpose by the foe), but I could certainly see cause to simply use random hit locations to determine where you accidentally hit yourself. Not doing so is probably largely so that you don't need to roll on yet another table.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Varyon

Someone wearing a vambrace that weighs 75% of BL is a bit outside of the intended use case.

Of course, but had to pick the most dramatic contrast I could to demonstrate the idea.

Originally Posted by Varyon

That said, yes, armor on the arm should have some impact on how readily you can use said arm (for punching, wielding weapons, Parrying, etc), but you'd basically have to take the weight at each Arm sublocation (shoulder, upper arm, elbow, forearm - possibly all 3 sublocations there) as well as Hand. You'd then apply multipliers to each location's weight and add that to the weight of any weapon wielded in that arm to determine effective weapon weight, and decide how you want that to influence Parry and the like. You'd need to do this for each Arm and Hand. You should also probably do it for each Leg and Foot, where it would also influence Dodge. You'll need to have notes for how your character behaves when unarmored, partially armored (in case you only have time to throw on your vambraces and greaves, leaving off the rerebraces and cuisses), and fully armored, for each arm and for each set of armor your character owns (hopefully just one, but possibly more than that). If you wear different armor on each arm, you'll need to keep that in mind as well. It's all doable (provided you can figure out what are the appropriate multipliers; I never could when I played around with the idea), certainly, but may be a bit more complexity than your typical player is going to be willing to deal with.

I'd never want to do that mess by hand but I guess I figure if we had the idea set up, feeding parameters into a spreadsheet could adjust it on the fly.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Cases where rounding comes into play are moderately rare. Personally, I prefer to avoid rounding, but "normal human punching other normal human in the face" (the type of situation I was discussing) is one where rounding doesn't really play a role.

Depends on rarity of cutting damage I guess? RWB's an option for face punches so I have to remember to round that up. No idea why it even says 'minimum 1', that's a guarantee with the need to round up.

Originally Posted by Varyon

A normal Parry typically does indeed involve a light (or sometimes rather hard) shove to help deflect/redirect the attack, yes. If you want to actually shove somebody with a Parry (causing knockback), that's an Aggressive Parry where you apply the shoving rules (no wounding, double knockback) to the damage rolled.

The only time I've seen shoving rules for things other than the assumed torso is Push Kick to a leg/head for a -2/-3 to avoid fall down. Actually says no other locations are valid.

Since it should be hypothetically possible to shove an arm, we have to assume that it doesn't cause knockback to the entire guy, so representing that could be parries and perhaps beats.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Outside of a very poor defense score (6 or lower) or a narrow range of really good defense scores (14 or 15), Telegraphic Attack makes the target no less likely to suffer a Critical Failure.

True, the 17/18 for all is only joined by 16 at 6 due to the MoF 10 weirdness, brutal. Not sure how 14/15 mitigates, I know getting 16 defence expands 3/4 crits to include 5 but that wouldn't reduce the 17/18 crit fail odds.

6 could be feasible if they're suffering posture penaltes... but it might be neat if it applied in more situations.

Like what if with ANY failure... you add the MoF to a 3d6 and roll a crit if the result is above a certain number? Whereas with any success, you add the MoS to a 3d6 and roll a crit if the result is above the same number?

It's more rolling but it allows that possibility for a wider variety of rolls.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Eh, I'm fine with it, all kinds of weird crap can happen when people are fighting. Someone accidentally - but safely - knocking oneself out would hardly be the strangest. This would be from a faceplant or similar (smacking oneself in the face with a mace is going to just cause straight damage), so having it be on an Unarmed Critical Miss makes sense.

Some tough guys couldn't knock themselves out if they fell face-first off a 10-story building or punch with as much force. GURPS doesn't really have much in the realm of safe knockouts so it's kinda clownish.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Arms and Legs are the parts of the body that are most often struck in combat (both accidentally by oneself and on purpose by the foe), but I could certainly see cause to simply use random hit locations to determine where you accidentally hit yourself. Not doing so is probably largely so that you don't need to roll on yet another table.

All I know is, when shoveling snow I have totally accidentally groined myself a with the shovel handle, so it's within the realm of possibility. Happened today.

Maybe to make arms/legs more likely you roll random, reroll if it's a non-limb, but if you roll an non-limb the 2nd time you take it?

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Plane

I'd never want to do that mess by hand but I guess I figure if we had the idea set up, feeding parameters into a spreadsheet could adjust it on the fly.

Well, now you're into the same problem I had - working it out. Weight on the shoulders should count "less" than weight on the upper arms, which should count less than weight on the elbows, which should count less than weight on the forearms, which should count less than weight on the hands. What multipliers to use, I'm not certain, and I'm also not certain if weight in the hands (that is, the weight of the weapon itself) should count more than weight on the hands (in the form of gloves or similar).

Originally Posted by Plane

Depends on rarity of cutting damage I guess?

Again, I was talking about a regular guy punching another regular guy in the face. Cutting doesn't come into that. As for the minimum 1, that means that, when the target is unarmored, even rolling 0 damage or lower (say, rolling a 1 or 2 on 1d-2 cut) still results in 1 HP of Injury.

Originally Posted by Plane

Since it should be hypothetically possible to shove an arm, we have to assume that it doesn't cause knockback to the entire guy, so representing that could be parries and perhaps beats.

Letting you trade the damage from an Aggressive Parry to get an immediate Beat attempt would match the way Beats tend to work a good deal better, and would also make them actually be used, so this would probably be a Good Idea.

Originally Posted by Plane

True, the 17/18 for all is only joined by 16 at 6 due to the MoF 10 weirdness, brutal. Not sure how 14/15 mitigates, I know getting 16 defence expands 3/4 crits to include 5 but that wouldn't reduce the 17/18 crit fail odds.

If you have skill 16+, a 17 is a normal Failure, not a Critical Failure. Thus, if the foe has Parry 14 or 15 (such that they crit fail on a roll of 17 or 18), boosting that to 16 or 17 with a Telegraphic Attack makes them less likely to suffer a Critical Failure (as they now only crit fail on a roll of 18, with is 1/4th as likely as before).

Originally Posted by Plane

Like what if with ANY failure... you add the MoF to a 3d6 and roll a crit if the result is above a certain number? Whereas with any success, you add the MoS to a 3d6 and roll a crit if the result is above the same number?

Having a separate "crit roll" is something I like the idea of, but haven't come upon an implementation I'm particularly fond of. My own idea would be more to have the character's 3d6 roll represent their performance absent any outside interference, then essentially have the universe make a reaction roll (modified by some sort of "luck" trait) to modify that. A narrow Success when the universe is against you becomes a Failure, while even a Critical Failure could potentially become a Success (but probably not a Critical Success) if the universe is heavily in your favor. Something for another thread, perhaps.

Originally Posted by Plane

Maybe to make arms/legs more likely you roll random, reroll if it's a non-limb, but if you roll an non-limb the 2nd time you take it?

That would probably be acceptable, yes.