Reinforced Concrete, Punching and ST

[Culture20]

Don't forget to give the character enough DR or Injury Tolerance to prevent the striking arm and hand from turning into a red pulp upon striking the concrete wall with that much force.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Culture20

Don't forget to give the character enough DR or Injury Tolerance to prevent the striking arm and hand from turning into a red pulp upon striking the concrete wall with that much force.

That's not genre consistent for any setting I know of that allows humanoids super strength.

[chandley]

In GURPS Supers, all you need to not take damage to your hand is DR 3, so that you qualify for the Striking Surface perk. You probably WANT more DR and IT:DR, but that is all you need to not damage your own fist.

That and ST 20 [100], +14 ST (Super Effort +300%) [400], is all you actually need to qualify for "put your fist through 1 ft of concrete" as a character concept.

[Culture20]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

That's not genre consistent for any setting I know of that allows humanoids super strength.

There are several superhuman strength characters who injure their hands when striking hard surfaces. Spiderman is the most popular ("Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #1"; Peter punches a brick wall with spider strength and injures his hands). Most super heroes who are super strong are also usually uncannily armored like Colossus, have super levels of IT:DamageReduction like Superman, or have incredible levels of hit points and fast regeneration like the Hulk. Being super strong doesn't mean your body can withstand its own strength under all conditions.

[Culture20]

Originally Posted by chandley

In GURPS Supers, all you need to not take damage to your hand is DR 3, so that you qualify for the Striking Surface perk. You probably WANT more DR and IT:DR, but that is all you need to not damage your own fist.

This incorrect per RAW. Striking Surface does not make your hands immune to your own punch damage. It instead makes your punches more damaging.
You do more damage as if you had brass knuckles or steel toed boots, but you don't suddenly get infinite DR for the punch.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Culture20

This incorrect per RAW. Striking Surface does not make your hands immune to your own punch damage. It instead makes your punches more damaging.
You do more damage as if you had brass knuckles or steel toed boots, but you don't suddenly get infinite DR for the punch.

DR3(non-Flexible of force field) is a prereq for buying Striking Surface.

I'd take Striker(Limb/Arm) over Striking surface myself. You get mor.f.

Also, I don't believe Forced Entry and a Melee Skill stack. they're either/or.

[Culture20]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

DR3(non-Flexible of force field) is a prereq for buying Striking Surface.

But DR3 is not infinite, or at least enough to protect against reinforced concrete. Imagine it another way: a creature with DR3 shell or scales falls onto the concrete sidewalk. DR3 doesn't protect completely.

Start with Campaigns p379 "Hurting Yourself" "Any time you strike unarmed (with bare hands, feet, fangs, etc.) and hit a target with DR 3+, you may hurt yourself! For every 5 points ..." yadda yadda yadda.
Going off the first post's assessment at needing a damage of 155, the character will need a minimum of DR of 31 prevent hand damage in the best case scenario. To completely remove any possibility of hand damage (by striking too hard), the character's DR will need to equal the DR of the concrete ("up to a maximum equal to the DR of the target you hit").

To fit a cinematic martial arts genre, you could make the DR with accessibility of "only when striking inanimate objects"

[simply Nathan]

Originally Posted by Culture20

Start with Campaigns p379 "Hurting Yourself" "Any time you strike unarmed (with bare hands, feet, fangs, etc.) and hit a target with DR 3+, you may hurt yourself! For every 5 points ..." yadda yadda yadda.

And for the purposes of the "striking unarmed" part, a strike with brass knuckles doesn't count as "unarmed". And Striking Surface counts the same as brass knuckles. It's a small damage bonus and the larger benefit of not counting as completely unarmed for the purposes of Hurting Yourself (your unarmored hand is still in trouble if someone parries your punch).

[lwcamp]

Originally Posted by Sunrunners_Fire

My answer:
A cubic foot of reinforced concrete generically weighs 150 lbs, has 42~43 HP and provides 120~144 Cover DR (being 12 inches thick). The character is essentially invoking overpenetration vs the concrete and so needs a basic damage that exceeds (HP / 4) + Cover DR. Thereby, the character needs 155~ basic damage / 45~ damage dice / ST 440~.

Cover DR is the amount of damage you need to do to penetrate the barrier and smack someone on the other side. So to punch through, he merely needs to exceed the cover DR (120 to 144 in this case).

Luke

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by lwcamp

Cover DR is the amount of damage you need to do to penetrate the barrier and smack someone on the other side.

Though the cover DR rules have the minor flaw of being total nonsense; it's harder to punch through a 1/2" x 2' x 2' sheet of plywood than a 1" x 1' x 1' sheet, because the first sheet weighs more and thus has higher HP.

For another data point, According to http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...-06-11/ch8.htm it takes 20 kg of TNT to breach an 8" reinforced concrete wall, and thus it would take about 40 kg for a 1' wall. That's sufficient for a damage of 112d, which will do max damage for a contact explosion or 672.