07-15-2016, 09:00 PM | #111 | ||
Join Date: Oct 2004
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Re: Swords and plate
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Give me some more! Done. More I say! Done. More...in the original language!...with illustrations! etc...with period artifacts! |
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07-15-2016, 09:02 PM | #112 |
Join Date: Oct 2004
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Re: Swords and plate
Fair enough.
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07-16-2016, 12:28 AM | #113 | |
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
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Re: Swords and plate
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Tibia injuries: 98 Skull injuries: 97 Forearm injuries: 69 Upper arm injuries: 21 Torso injuries: 0 Thigh injuries: 0 Either torso armour was invulnerable to these weapons or nobody ever aimed at the torso.
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Compact Castles gives the gamer an instant portfolio of genuine, real-world castle floorplans to use in any historical, low-tech, or fantasy game setting. Last edited by DanHoward; 07-16-2016 at 12:51 AM. |
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07-16-2016, 12:37 AM | #114 |
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
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Re: Swords and plate
If we are going to examine sources for weapons penetrating armour then we need to limit ourselves to fight manuals and eye witness accounts. Not assumptions made by historians such as Oakeshott and Oman.
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Compact Castles gives the gamer an instant portfolio of genuine, real-world castle floorplans to use in any historical, low-tech, or fantasy game setting. Last edited by DanHoward; 07-16-2016 at 12:45 AM. |
07-16-2016, 02:25 AM | #115 | |
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Brighton
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Re: Swords and plate
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This is what I do, simply because the precedent is already set in GURPS for specific combinations of armour type and injury type already (e.g mail vs. Cr), and it gives more realistic and differentiated results. Now I haven't found it that problematic, but that is purely a matter of personal preference / tolerance for complexity. That is certainly true, also for some game types it's just not worth worrying about anyway! |
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07-16-2016, 02:42 AM | #116 | |
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Brighton
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Re: Swords and plate
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Historical interpretation is always going to fraught with potential issues, especially when it come to inferring facts on what is pretty esoteric and tangential stuff like how to model armour in an role-playing game. That obviously doesn't make it useless but it does mean we have to take that into account. If nothing else I'm sure that for every historical cite of blades chopping though plate, they are plenty of cites of armour withstanding such blows (in fact you've provided plenty of such) Also as I said earlier if we didn't have experimental data* to look at too then we'd be forced to rely solely on historical interpretation, but we do have some data. I'm always going to weigh that quite heavily so long as I can see the experimental assumptions and set up (possibly my own background bias at work there of course). *or even just knowing the mechanics of blade cutting through various materials Last edited by Tomsdad; 07-16-2016 at 04:20 AM. |
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07-16-2016, 03:40 AM | #117 |
Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: New Zealand.
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Re: Swords and plate
Another thought, while GURPS has armour piercing as an option for impaling weapons (Low tech companion 2, pg 12) their may be a case to be made that some cutting weapons have an armour piercing effect even if it does not fully justify a (2) armour divisor.
I recall reading that a curved blade (convex) works best when no armour is present, Halberds include straight blades and even concave cutting edges. When cutting sheet steel a slasher (slingblade(?) concave cutting surface with a protrusion/beak at the top of the blade) works quite well as it seems to have some armour piercing properties.
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Waiting for inspiration to strike...... And spending too much time thinking about farming for RPGs Contributor to Citadel at Nordvörn |
07-16-2016, 04:21 AM | #118 |
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
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Re: Swords and plate
Curved blades are no more effective against flesh than straight blades. The main benefit of a curved blade seems to be that it is easier to manipulate from horseback.
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Compact Castles gives the gamer an instant portfolio of genuine, real-world castle floorplans to use in any historical, low-tech, or fantasy game setting. |
07-16-2016, 04:45 AM | #119 | |
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Brighton
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Re: Swords and plate
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(Generally speaking they involve a lot of force over a relatively long period to make their cuts, i.e not very similar to hand held weapons blows in combat). A vaguely similar thing is bolt cutters. Now that's a hand held device that use human muscle input to cut through metal, but try applying that in combat. It does what it does via specific mechanical advantage (and material properties) so it can cut through pretty thick and tough material. But again if you actually look at how a modern bolt cutter actually does this, you see how fast swung historical blades in combat rely on different mechanics to inflict their damage. Another more powerful example is things like "jaws of life". Big steel works use (or certainly used to) great big steam or electric driven cutting blades to cut metal of quite considerable thickness*. Put it another way, I've personally used heavy duty scissors or snips to cut through pretty light metal. So I'm well aware that in the right circumstances yes in abstract blades can cut metal. But it how it's done that matters most. Sitting there and slowing putting force into a scissored blades onto carefully placed metal and working my way through it, is a different thing from swinging such blades at the same piece of metal in combat. There's another point to make here a lot of systems for cutting through metal involve cutting from the edge in, this makes a difference compared to trying to initially push a blade into a sheet. The edge being more susceptible to certain forces. EDIT: actually Douglas Cole covers some of this in post 87 I realise *there's a story that's used to illustrate how the different manufacturing ethos for tank construction in WW2 partially led to different output rates. So Germany would do 'X' , but the US would do 'Y', but the USSR would do 'Z', blah blah blah. But the relevant point here was one of the things the USSR did was cut the turret hole out of the hull plate by using industrial snips (obviously on a big scale). It wasn't pretty, but it was quick, snip, snip snip, like making a rushed costume for you kids "blanket, arm holes, head hole, belt, off you go" kind of thing! Last edited by Tomsdad; 07-17-2016 at 02:21 AM. |
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07-16-2016, 04:57 AM | #120 | |
Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: New Zealand.
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Re: Swords and plate
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*also used a spade. Demolition experience plus used the same technique when cutting large amounts of corrugated iron while building flood gates. On a side note it is possible to get a reasonably tidy finish if you start the cut with a slasher/axe/spade and then tear the metal with a guide pressed tightly in place Edit Slasher though the ones I have used have a smaller "beak" about 1/4 the size. Edit 2 An Irish single edged slasher to be exact
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Waiting for inspiration to strike...... And spending too much time thinking about farming for RPGs Contributor to Citadel at Nordvörn Last edited by (E); 07-16-2016 at 05:14 AM. |
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