06-14-2016, 04:30 AM | #41 |
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
I think the base damage of balanced weapons needs to be lower compared to unbalanced ones.
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06-14-2016, 04:38 AM | #42 |
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Brighton
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
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06-14-2016, 07:25 AM | #43 |
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Central Europe
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
The way that the definition of ST, the relationship between ST and sw/th damage, the definition of 1 HP of injury, the definition of 1 point of penetration, etc. are all interrelated make this a hard problem. Not to mention that armour works much better in real life than in stories! If your game is in a setting where mighty heroes cut down armoured enemies one after another with a single blow each, a realistic portrayal of the effectiveness of weapons against low-tech armour may not be desirable.
I have not seen anything which could be called scientific about the performance of different swung weapons against armour, although most people would agree that axes and maces and hammers tend to perform better than swords and daggers. All I said was that one choice about what modern body armour to represent in HT, and how to do it, was not the choice I would have made. I did not say that anything in HT was wrong or the result of chauvinism in favour of one kind of evidence.
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06-14-2016, 07:32 AM | #44 | |
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
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Taking drastic measures on the ST damage table is not uncommon when trying to address this stuff though.
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06-14-2016, 11:18 AM | #45 |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
Really, the issue with damage is that an unbalanced strike should have a damage bonus: in order to deliver a 'balanced' strike you need to significantly limit your strike. Separately from this, a weapon with a compact striking head will deliver energy more effectively to hard targets, but should probably have a penalty to hit.
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06-15-2016, 05:01 AM | #46 | ||
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Brighton
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
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Are you thinking in terms of a smaller striking surface needing to be more precisely targeted int order to hit? |
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06-15-2016, 12:46 PM | #47 | |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
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A hammer or an axe is a lot stiffer than a club or a sword, but both are quite a bit stiffer than flesh or soft armor so it doesn't really matter. However, against hard armor it makes quite a bit of difference. Pretty much. Misjudge distance by 6" with a sword and you probably still hit, not so much with an axe. |
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06-16-2016, 01:16 AM | #48 | |
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Brighton
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
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I'm not sure a sword or club is that much* less stiff than an axe or mace (at least assuming your hitting edge on with the sword, but it would certainly be a factor for thrusts with swords). If nothing else the stiffness/flex of an axe vs. club is going to depend largely on the haft. Also I'm not sure stiffness (at least within the ranges of what were discussing here) when hitting hardness is actually a particularly defining feature in this. Although again thrusting attacks are a different matter. When it comes to rigid armour I think hardness vs. hardness (and concentration of force at point of impact etc) is a more important comparison point than comparative stiffness of different weapon, especially when that range of stiffness is pretty limited. Also lack of stiffness isn't necessarily a disadvantage. Stuff like flails etc exploit flexibility (although that is of course an extreme example and significantly different from the weapon you mention, but long staffs etc can benefit from 'whipping') Thinking about it if say you thinking of an axe's blade flexing upon hitting rigid armour as opposed to a mace head (although that would be counter to the comparison you made), I think I'd just count that as all part of the DR of the armour. 'Soft' armour will have advantage in the other direction by resisting damage by giving under pressure. That said I think axe blade vs. rigid hard armour is more about deflection due angle of impact, but yes I can see axe blades can flex as well to avoid potential damage to the blade *obviously there's a range over all but I'm not sure that's just down to specific individual examples of weapon, difference don't correlate between whole groups of weapons compared to one another. I.e I'm sure there's a range of flexibility within all axes, and all hafted weapons, but I'm not sure there as specific difference in stiffness when comparing say clubs and maces. True to an extent although a lot of swords are designed to get best results from hitting with specific bits of their blade. But I take your point Last edited by Tomsdad; 06-16-2016 at 04:10 AM. |
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06-16-2016, 10:59 AM | #49 | |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
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06-16-2016, 12:18 PM | #50 | |
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications
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Tags |
combat, low tech, low tech armor |
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