blocking heavy attack (slam??) in DF

[Devil_Dante]

hello
i am reading a lot of different threads, but i can't find a good answer.
With the rules for parrying heavy weapon (BL/2 for slams, BL/20 for natural attacks from Pyramid article), during my DF campaing,happens very often that the big bad monster slams or punches the tanky knight. The punch can be blocked without too many efforts, but what about a slam?

For example: a war horse with ST 25 has a slam weight of 62.5. Cannot be parried. But should be legal to let him block the horse? I suppose not (even if the knight has 14 of ST). At least, his shield should be damaged or some damage should be "penetrate the shield block". The rules about damaging shields are too clunky in my opinion. So i was looking for a way to add the overpenetration (DR+HP/4). In this way, blocking an attack that weights more than 3 times the shield's weight could harm him. But i am not sure if it could work.

Thoughts?

[Hide]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

hello
i am reading a lot of different threads, but i can't find a good answer.
With the rules for parrying heavy weapon (BL/2 for slams, BL/20 for natural attacks from Pyramid article), during my DF campaing,happens very often that the big bad monster slams or punches the tanky knight. The punch can be blocked without too many efforts, but what about a slam?

For example: a war horse with ST 25 has a slam weight of 62.5. Cannot be parried. But should be legal to let him block the horse? I suppose not (even if the knight has 14 of ST). At least, his shield should be damaged or some damage should be "penetrate the shield block". The rules about damaging shields are too clunky in my opinion. So i was looking for a way to add the overpenetration (DR+HP/4). In this way, blocking an attack that weights more than 3 times the shield's weight could harm him. But i am not sure if it could work. Thoughts?

Well, in the first place you can parry a heavy weapon. But the odds are that your weapon could break if it is not good enough (but I get the point about the horse, it is too heavy for the weapon).

Blocking with the shield... If I remember properly, the rule for breaking a shield in GURPS is more or less "optional" because it calls for "complicated bookkeeping". B/484 has "damage to shields" and it lists "your" formula "DR+(HP/4)".

AFAIK, collision damage is not calculated via "weight" but via "ST" and subject to "size modifier". Blocking with the shield employs other strategies different than parrying, but you could extend this rule (for parries) to shields: "you cannot parry anything larger than your BL (unarmed/one-handed parry) or twice BL (2 handed weapons)" (B/376). Then your Knight might pick the dodge instead of a parry or a block.

But I don't think the shield's B/484 rule is clunky. You could simply declare "shields do not break" to avoid bookkeeping, and run over penetration.

Then, you just need to calculate the shield's "passive DR" in advance, that's all. If the block is successful but the attack was very strong and collision damage surpasses that calculation... it is the same as failing the block.

Also you need to estimate knockback.

- Hide

[Anthony]

I would normally allow blocking the injury of a slam, but its effect on the knockback is to just get your shield's bonus to the slam roll. However, RAW I think you just block it.

[Devil_Dante]

Originally Posted by Hide

Then, you just need to calculate the shield's "passive DR" in advance, that's all. If the block is successful but the attack was very strong and collision damage surpasses that calculation... it is the same as failing the block.
Also you need to estimate knockback.- Hide

This was my idea. The problem is that passive DR could result to be 7-12 (i am using the Low Tech shield for DR and Hp). Is it right to assume that every attack that deals more than that damage could harm the knight (of course he has armor too)?

I like this approach, but a low passive DR could result in a lot of injuries even after a successfull block.

[Nereidalbel]

Dungeon Fantasy runs more on Rule of Cool than realism, and assumes shields only break if some jerk hits them with too much acid.

That said, blocking a Slam attack should inflict knockback on anything less than a critical success. Assume the Knight slides backwards, and has the usual DX roll to not fall over in the process. Anything large enough to use Trampling rules just knocks the Knight out of the way instead on a successful Block (choose left or right randomly).

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

This was my idea. The problem is that passive DR could result to be 7-12 (i am using the Low Tech shield for DR and Hp). Is it right to assume that every attack that deals more than that damage could harm the knight (of course he has armor too)?

Damage to shields rules only apply if the MoS is the shield's DB value or less. The same would be true for injuring the Knight through shields with weapons of reasonable size.

[Devil_Dante]

I thought to use overpenetration for strong attack even after a successful block. I imagine the high momentum blocked will injured you anyway.

Is it too punishing?

[Hide]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

I thought to use overpenetration for strong attack even after a successful block. I imagine the high momentum blocked will injured you anyway.

Is it too punishing?

If your guy wants to execute such feat, I assume your setting takes on cinematic dungeon fantasy, right?

I don’t think using over-penetration (“open”) with knockback would be punishing at all:

Supposing you have a shield with 6 DR / 30 HP (medium shield from basic book, 287) the shield has an open resistance of 13; but you have 12, that’s OK.

The horse from the basic book has 20 HP and Basic Move of 5. Since you mentioned this horse has 25 HP, I will consider your horse has 25 HP and Basic Move of 5. So, with those stats the power of such horse is 3 DICE of damage.

Hence, you got a shield that suffers open after a 12,
And a horse that deals 3 dice of damage.

I estimate your horse will deal open damage 25% of the time on that shield. In other words, with 3 dice, you normally deal damage over 12 HP 25% of the time (more or less).

Sounds OK, what do you think?
Your guy’s got to take some stakes with his bravado.
And if you want him to avoid knockback, he could learn “immovable stance”.

Finally, how many times is this guy going to stop horses with a shield?
I don’t think that’s the point of your game. Right?

- Hide

[Devil_Dante]

my world (home brew setting) is high fantasy (a lot of powerfull and ancient creatures, ancient monsters and such).

Often they will fight big creatures (SM 2 or 3), and of course they will use their body weight to slam PCs to the ground. The horse was just an example. Just image an ancient ST 25 monster (SM1) with wings and enhanced air move (28) that tackle you for 6d-7d damage. I can see any chance to block successfully that slam (harmless rather). It s like having a collission with a small car.

I'm using low tech shield's stats and my knight player has dr 7 on whole body more or less. This means he can soak 18-20 damage (5d6 has low chance to damage him) so it should be fine after all.

But as a player, do you consider this "home rule" bad? I mean, blocking a 1000 pounds creature should harm you probably, on top of a KB.

[Hide]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

my world (home brew setting) is high fantasy (a lot of powerfull and ancient creatures, ancient monsters and such).

Often they will fight big creatures (SM 2 or 3), and of course they will use their body weight to slam PCs to the ground. The horse was just an example. Just image an ancient ST 25 monster (SM1) with wings and enhanced air move (28) that tackle you for 6d-7d damage. I can see any chance to block successfully that slam (harmless rather). It s like having a collission with a small car.

I'm using low tech shield's stats and my knight player has dr 7 on whole body more or less. This means he can soak 18-20 damage (5d6 has low chance to damage him) so it should be fine after all.

But as a player, do you consider this "home rule" bad? I mean, blocking a 1000 pounds creature should harm you probably, on top of a KB.

Personally, I would give him a better shield (a shield fit for the tasks that will fall on his back... or shield), that's the point of your house-rule, right? Basically it will make his shield much better than it is.

On the other hand, you could run a series of tests to see if your rule works properly. For example, rolling 100 times to see whether your idea is good or not.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

But as a player, do you consider this "home rule" bad?

From a realism perspective it's fine. From a play balance perspective, it makes fighting giant monsters harder; that may be good or bad.