FAILED parry means contact too? (Zombies)

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Doesn't make sense in the quoted text - there's no guarantee that the zombie targeted an exposed body part.

Contact doesn't mean skin-to-skin contact. I take it to be not a statement of rules, but simple player advise: if you're counting on using unarmed parties to protect yourself, be sure to protect your hands.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Plane

"Sprawling Parry" (pg 40 Technical Grappling) is another "no hands parry" which I forgot, seems to function like a dodge where there's no contact.

Absolutely not. A sprawl is an attempt to "parry" a grapple by dropping on TOP of a foe shooting for the legs. Not only is there contact, the contact is deliberate and intended. TG is very clear:

Dodge
see pp. B374-375
A successful dodge means the attack failed to connect at all.
Dodging is the only way to create a “clean” miss without contact, important if you want to avoid effects transmitted by
touch, such as some spells, electrical attacks, or cooties.

emphasis added by me.

When "Sprawling Parry" says "you avoid the attack" it means "you don't get grappled."

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Contact doesn't mean skin-to-skin contact. I take it to be not a statement of rules, but simple player advise: if you're counting on using unarmed parties to protect yourself, be sure to protect your hands.

In context, contact clearly means skin-to-skin contact. Otherwise, it wouldn't need to specify an 'uncovered' body part.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by swampthing

Sounds to me (as the OP suggests) that it's treating the zombie's infectious agent like a weapon attack, where a failed unarmed parry does allow the attacker to hit the arm.

If so, they used uncharacteristically-poor language to do so. The most natural reading of the section seems to be along the lines of "Any attempted unarmed Parry with an exposed limb counts as 'contact' for the purpose of Contact Agents." The result on a success is obvious (you push the zombie away, getting the contact agent on you in the process), but the explicit mention of it occurring as well on a failure - and not just on a failure when the zombie opts to strike the parrying limb instead of its original target - indicates the assumption that the character's arm still comes into contact, but is unable to deflect the attack.

Originally Posted by Plane

"Sprawling Parry" (pg 40 Technical Grappling) is another "no hands parry" which I forgot, seems to function like a dodge where there's no contact.

In cases where a "Parry" is unlikely to involve any contact, I'd be perfectly fine disregarding the rule. For example, when someone attacks one of your arms specifically, a Parry can actually represent simply getting the arm out of the way, in which case I wouldn't have a success involve any contact.

Originally Posted by Plane

Which one would be pretty important if you had variable DR. The impression I've got is you can parry using a hand or an arm, so I guess GM should ask people to always specify limb or extremity.

Unarmed Parries typically involve the Hand or Forearm, although Elbow, Upper Arm, or even Shoulder can be the parrying surface. If only one of hand and forearm is protected, I'd have a successful Parry involve the protected one, an unsuccessful Parry involve the unprotected one. If both are protected, but the rest of the arm isn't, on an unsuccessful Parry I'd probably roll 1d (using the table from LT) to determine where on the arm was exposed.

Originally Posted by Plane

The situation we're looking at seems to be "I touched the zombie's virus-ridden cheek as I failed to stop the zombie chomping my neck" (double exposure) so it's not really an either-or situation...

Eh, it's not a double exposure, you should really only use the exposure that is worse. The "contact on a failed Parry" doesn't matter if the zombie is attacking an exposed location already, but if it's attacking a protected location, shoving your ungloved hand in the way means you were exposed, even though the bite was just to the armor on your neck.

Originally Posted by Plane

That seems important not just for viral transmission, but also if you're doing something like trying to stop a flaming zombie from biting you and your hands get burned even on a failure to parry properly PLUS your neck gets burned too.

Again, I really wouldn't treat this as "Every single touch effect ever should follow this rule." At most, I'd make it something specific to Contact Agents (extending to Blood Agents if you have open wounds on your parrying hand), and honestly treating it as something zombie-specific may be a good idea (much of the rules in GURPS Zombies is focused toward the zombie genre, where things may function a bit differently than in other settings).

Originally Posted by Plane

I don't think we're looking at a weapon being redirected here. When you parry a bite, I get the sense you're actually touching the face (not necessarily the mouth) since doing a weapon parry against a bite gives you a free attack on the face (mentioned right before the Z109 warning)

Unarmed Parries are always about redirection (with the exception of when the Parrying limb is the one being targeted, in which case they're just about getting out of the way); simply having your arm tank an attack means it gets damaged. Weapon Parries can get away with "tanking" to some extent, because they are more resilient than flesh (otherwise, weapons would break when they hit their targets). Personally, I'm inclined to treat all Parries as involving redirection (and reducing the damage an unarmed attacker takes when you parry their attack, unless you specifically use Aggressive Parry).

[Tomsdad]

I think it's better to look at this question from the angle of the zombie.infection not the parry.

(Generally speaking what is or isn't a parry in broad system wide terms is subject to to interpretation and often falls somewhere on a sliding scale of things that don't normally matter too much but might be important here).


For me it's going to come down to just how contagious they are and how protected your parrying surface is. And I'd wrap them all up into a penalty to parry if you trying to limit your exposure to infection.

e.g. a possible scenario is drool is the primary transmission agent, which means you have to parry a bite without getting skin/membrane contact with drool/spittle. So to avoid it you basically need to parry the head or body of the zombie without getting any of that on you. Depending on what your arm was wearing I might well allow that to be a parry at -1.

Another possible scenario might be above but also sweat or some other secretion being a vector and present in enough quantities that you have to avoid the zombie's bare skin as well. I might say that is a parry at -3


the other side is as mentioned how protected your skin and membranes are, and with skin to skin what the zombie is wearing! (is there not rules for equipment modifiers to exposure in GURPS:Zombies?)

Hovwr my parry penalty is basically an extra rule on top of contact agents though, and might warrant a repricing of that.


Ultimately Block might be a safer option, especially if you in a TL with see-through shields!

[Plane]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

Dodge
see pp. B374-375

A successful dodge means the attack failed to connect at all.
Dodging is the only way to create a “clean” miss without contact, important if you want to avoid effects transmitted by touch, such as some spells, electrical attacks, or cooties.

emphasis added by me.

I had missed that before, "the attack" in this context is "a grapple" so this probably wouldn't over-ride standard striking rules...

B401 already had an option for non-contact parries under "Defending Your Weapon":

A parry represents turning your weapon so that the foe’s blow misses or slides off harmlessly.

Treating miss/slide as equivalent probably focuses too much on kinetic combat, since there is no "slides off harmlessly" if someone is trying to use a Force Sword to melt your bo staff.

I'm guessing that's probably a defender's option, depending on what their priority is.

If you create a miss instead of a slide, that should probably prevent doing stuff like Beat or Riposte which requires a parry (presumably a contact-created parry) to initiate.

MA122 expanded this beyond weapons to also attacks on hands:

Not every parry involves contact.
A parry against an attack on your weapon or your hand represents yanking the target out of harm’s way

Though BOTH now require some skill:

When using a combat skill at its DX default or parrying unarmed at DX/2 + 3, your parry is a frantic, brute-force attempt to slap aside the attack, and always involves some contact.

I assume that means anyone with a point in a weapon skill could do it, not sure about Dabbler.

TG22 refers to MA122 but not this portion of it, was that omission meant to say it (and B401's note about weapons) aren't legal anymore?

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

A sprawl is an attempt to "parry" a grapple by dropping on TOP of a foe shooting for the legs.
Not only is there contact, the contact is deliberate and intended.

I knew that was the case if you combined it with Grabbing Parry as the 2nd column of TG 40 mentions.

Where knowing points of contact is essential (specific body armor, etc) do you know where contact would occur?

"Shoot the legs out of reach" I would assume means no contact on the legs. From what I've seen of sprawls it looks like it usually involves the defender leaning his chest on the attacker's upper back, often with 1 or 2 arms where if they're not used to grapple (seems almost rear-hexish) used to aid balance or getting upright again afterwards.

The crit fail "lying down, with your foe on top of you" I assume means they're balancing atop you by holding a leg, since the leg is the original target in a Sprawling Parry and there was a failed defence against the grapple?

Originally Posted by Varyon

when someone attacks one of your arms specifically, a Parry can actually represent simply getting the arm out of the way, in which case I wouldn't have a success involve any contact.

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

Originally Posted by Varyon

Eh, it's not a double exposure, you should really only use the exposure that is worse.

The "contact on a failed Parry" doesn't matter if the zombie is attacking an exposed location already

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.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Again, I really wouldn't treat this as "Every single touch effect ever should follow this rule." At most, I'd make it something specific to Contact Agents (extending to Blood Agents if you have open wounds on your parrying hand), and honestly treating it as something zombie-specific may be a good idea (much of the rules in GURPS Zombies is focused toward the zombie genre, where things may function a bit differently than in other settings).

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?

Originally Posted by Varyon

Unarmed Parries are always about redirection

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.

Originally Posted by Varyon

(with the exception of when the Parrying limb is the one being targeted, in which case they're just about getting out of the way);

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.

Originally Posted by Varyon

simply having your arm tank an attack means it gets damaged.

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

Originally Posted by Varyon

Weapon Parries can get away with "tanking" to some extent, because they are more resilient than flesh (otherwise, weapons would break when they hit their targets).

Personally, I'm inclined to treat all Parries as involving redirection (and reducing the damage an unarmed attacker takes when you parry their attack, unless you specifically use Aggressive Parry).

some day...

[Hide]

The way I handle it, is: A failed parry means you are hit if the hit was successful. But if the hit is unsuccessful, then you aren't hit; thus if your parry failed as well, you have not made contact (both of you hit the air).

Regarding zombie infection, I would clearly establish how it works for your setting. Mere contact feels like too much for me; I think the infection should stem from a successful hit (e.g. a bite).

You could provide a zombie with a secondary uncontrollable attack. For example, drool; if your zombie's bite fails, then there's also this drool coming out from its mouth... players must notice it and then dodge it to avoid potential infection.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Hide

The way I handle it, is: A failed parry means you are hit if the hit was successful. But if the hit is unsuccessful, then you aren't hit; thus if your parry failed as well, you have not made contact (both of you hit the air).

Failed hits sometimes hit secondary targets (for example axe kick) so maybe failed parries act similar, or maybe it parries the same target after it's pointless to do so. IE you smack the side of a sword after it's already impaled you.

Originally Posted by Hide

Regarding zombie infection, I would clearly establish how it works for your setting. Mere contact feels like too much for me; I think the infection should stem from a successful hit (e.g. a bite).

You could provide a zombie with a secondary uncontrollable attack. For example, drool; if your zombie's bite fails, then there's also this drool coming out from its mouth... players must notice it and then dodge it to avoid potential infection.

Z125 has some neat rules, there's a 'tally' system, first of which:
"Strike, grapple, or parry a zombie in unarmed combat."

I would instinctively think that means successful rolls, but maybe even attempts result in "Splatter"? IE your fist misses the zombie's face but your forearm harmlessly (to the zombie, not to you) rubs along his cheek?

You get a chance to dodge splatter to avoid the HT roll penalty apparently though, unlike auto-successes on the slightest contact.

[Hide]

Originally Posted by Plane

(...) IE you smack the side of a sword after it's already impaled you. (...)

Yeah, but I am talking about a failed parry when the attack failed as well. There's no contact here.

Still... one way you could get hurt under said situation is when the original attack has a secondary effect. And IMO, for this secondary effect to take place, you also get a chance to defend.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Hide

Yeah, but I am talking about a failed parry when the attack failed as well.

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