Improving the Tonfa

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Varyon

A tonfa is a baton with a funny grip, just as a pata is a thrusting broadsword with a funny grip. It should use the same skill as a baton (Shortsword), possibly with an Exotic Weapon penalty (the go-to for "like this skill, but handled a bit differently," like the Three-Part Staff).

Any Techniques that are unique to using a tonfa should, naturally, require that you be using a tonfa. Requiring you to also have the Tonfa Proficiency Perk to use such Techniques may also be appropriate.

As it stands, I should note there's only one Technique (well, two versions of the same Technique) in this thread that is usable only with the tonfa, and that's the tricky little spin strike. Everything else should be usable with other weapons.

This should be fine at GURPS levels of granularity, and realistically I'd be shocked if someone who was a master of the tonfa had any issues at all handling a baton. If you really want a tonfa master to be at a disadvantage when armed with a Shortsword-class weapon other than a tonfa, Technique Mastery of the tonfa-specific Technique(s) should be sufficient.

The only problem I see, then, is that when you improve tonkwa with experience, you also improve baton and all the likes with experience. If it was totally true, kobudo would not teach jo and tonkwa, for instance. It would only teach one, a few manipulations for the other and the work would be done...

Having said that, as ou say, it may be beyond GURPS granularity.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Only the spinning strike is unique. The generic grip is not. Katars and Patas have a grip set at the same angle and that doesn't knock them out of Knife/Shortsword/Broadsword as appropriate to length..

I've always found GURPS weapon skill list a bit weird. I would have found more logical to base the different skills on different manners of handling things and to say that length of the weapon just give a little unfamiliarity experience... But GURPS doesn't works like that. Weapons who sound very close are different skills (Shortsword, Broadsword...) while weapons who may be used very differently are on the same skill...

Having said that, that is a very different topic. So I content myself to follow the rules and, when my players wonder, to answer them: sorry, that are GURPS rules.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Gollum

Having said that, as ou say, it may be beyond GURPS granularity.

Indeed. In GURPS, a character with Broadsword at DX could learn to use a pata, spend years training exclusively with a large falchion to get skill to DX+6, then pick up a pata and use it at DX+6 with no issues. Realistically, and particularly with serious Familiarities, you need to keep up practice with other types of weapons, even within the same category, to be able to use all of them with equal reliability.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Gollum

The only problem I see, then, is that when you improve tonkwa with experience, you also improve baton and all the likes with experience. If it was totally true, kobudo would not teach jo and tonkwa, for instance. It would only teach one, a few manipulations for the other and the work would be done...

Having said that, as ou say, it may be beyond GURPS granularity.

That's no reason not to teach both. If they ran off the same skill, you'd be training the same skill the whole time, and would be able to pick up Familiarity with both, plus any Techniques or Perks that are more applicable to one or the other weapon.

Originally Posted by Gollum

Which is largely sufficient to explain why kobudo masters absolutely want to warn their pupils. Thanks for the calculations and data.

Basically, there's nothing you can hit someone in the Skull with that isn't going to be either useless or dangerous. (GURPS-wise, if you manage to do exactly 1 penetrating damage, you are very unlikely to kill or permanently injure anyone except a hemophiliac. But if you're hitting for 1d6 plus or minus a constant, that means that at least 5/6ths of possible results will be either non-penetrating and thus useless, or 2 or more points of penetrating damage and thus potentially very serious.)

[Sindri]

Note that in a more powerful skill engine, if you wanted to, you could turn "requires Exotic Weapon Training to use at full skill" to very closely linked skills. This would have an advantage in elegantly letting someone say that they are used to an unusual grip and not the more typical grip. Though that wouldn't make sense with Tonfa which is trained in both grips.

Originally Posted by Gollum

A tonfa is as different from a shortsword or a kama than a shortsword is different from an axe...

Well I can't agree with that. I think a shortsword and an axe are much more different than a shortsword and a shortsword type weapon with an altered grip.

Originally Posted by Gollum

Which means that you cut in half your possibilities... It deserve at least a penalty, in my humble opinion.

Does it deserve a -1 penalty? Because a -1 penalty is very large, especially for parry where it's really a -2 penalty. Are other parrying disadvantages at the same detail level dealt with? If they aren't this would unbalance the mechanical difficulty and disincentivize doing this compared to equally difficult actions.

Originally Posted by Gollum

There is no mention of any penalty in the Tonfa skill description. It's full karate or brawling skill.

Why would there? It doesn't have anything to do with Tonfa. It's a general rule.

Originally Posted by Gollum

Yes... A perk could do the job as well. But the problem of a perk is that it doesn't open to techniques. What makes a martial art interesting (in reality as well as in GURPS, for those who use these rules) is the techniques it allows to use and to develop with experience.

A perk, even if it represents 200 hours of training with a master (which is quite important to be realistic), is a matter of either you have it or you don't. And once you have it, you cannot anymore improve it.

Techniques are rarely weapon dependent. Tonfa probably doesn't have more than the spinning attack, although I can't say for sure. Plus I think that style perks hold their weight in terms of interest against techniques.

Originally Posted by Gollum

I've always found GURPS weapon skill list a bit weird. I would have found more logical to base the different skills on different manners of handling things and to say that length of the weapon just give a little unfamiliarity experience... But GURPS doesn't works like that. Weapons who sound very close are different skills (Shortsword, Broadsword...) while weapons who may be used very differently are on the same skill...

Having said that, that is a very different topic. So I content myself to follow the rules and, when my players wonder, to answer them: sorry, that are GURPS rules.

Weapon length can be very important to the handling of weapons, but keep in mind that the Shortsword/Broadsword division is far from unchallenged. Varyon, for example, turns it into just Sword.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Varyon

Indeed. In GURPS, a character with Broadsword at DX could learn to use a pata, spend years training exclusively with a large falchion to get skill to DX+6, then pick up a pata and use it at DX+6 with no issues. Realistically, and particularly with serious Familiarities, you need to keep up practice with other types of weapons, even within the same category, to be able to use all of them with equal reliability.

Exactly. But to be more precise, learning a specific weapon also teaches and improves several things that are very important for all other weapons: vigilance, reflexes, balance, feet move, ankle move, aiming at a very precise target, maintaining your guard even when you hit, making your body follow your weapon, "reading" the foe's body, decision spirit, etc.

A perfectly realistic roleplaying game would have a generic melee combat skill which would be low, on which all other combat skills would be based, and that all other combat skills would improve slowly. But this coming and going experience is very hard to simulate easily in terms of calculation because the player would have to take into account both the number of specific weapon skills and their depth...

So, GURPS, with its default system is a quite good compromise.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

That's no reason not to teach both. If they ran off the same skill, you'd be training the same skill the whole time, and would be able to pick up Familiarity with both, plus any Techniques or Perks that are more applicable to one or the other weapon.

Very good argument!

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Basically, there's nothing you can hit someone in the Skull with that isn't going to be either useless or dangerous. (GURPS-wise, if you manage to do exactly 1 penetrating damage, you are very unlikely to kill or permanently injure anyone except a hemophiliac. But if you're hitting for 1d6 plus or minus a constant, that means that at least 5/6ths of possible results will be either non-penetrating and thus useless, or 2 or more points of penetrating damage and thus potentially very serious.)

You are right. a punch can be deadly. And, in the new, there are sometimes people who killed someone else unintentionally just by punching them in the face... Having said that, taking a tekko (783 g/1.72 pounds of hard metal a piece for mine) is not a very good idea if you don't really want to kill. Especially when you are used to punch with it.

[Tomsdad]

Originally Posted by Gollum

OK... Let's me remake the calculation. Ordinary punch, thr-1. Karate training, +1. Tekkos (or brass knuckles), +1. That's a flat thr+1. For a quite strong guy (ST 11-12), possibly with one level of striking ST, damage: 1d or 1d+1 cr... That's even less that was I first thought.

Hang on, just on ST10 its 1d-2 +2 (for DX+2 Karate), +1 (for brass kuckles/tekkos) so 1d+1 before you get into ST11-12 or levels of striking ST*.

(and actually I was basing 1d+2 off tonkwa with an extra +1 to thrusting attacks from reversed grip)

EDIT: actually I'm wrong because I'm guessing the tekkos count as knuckle dusters adding +1 to punch (I'm basing off basic thr not basic punch, sorry still thinking in terms of tonfas/tokwas!)

As Ulzgoroth has pointed out 1d+1 will mess you up on a skull hit. Remember in terms of finishing a fight in one hit, a major wound to the skull is -10 on knockout. That's a 66% chance on the dice roll there. There's no first aid for bleeding in the skull and you'll be making bleeding rolls ever 30 seconds.

Its the no first aid that kills you here. If you roll a 4 the target's taken a 12pt injury so will test at -2 every 30 second if he started with 10 hps and HT10 he rolling against 8's which is only a 26% success so there's only a 1.76% chance of stringing three together in row. So ignoring crits in either direction. he'll bleed for 1 hp 3 times out of 4 tests which in this case is 3hp per 2 minutes so he'd taking death tests after 6 mins, 12 mins, 19 mins, 25 mins and finally dying at 32 mins.


Your really hoping for a crit success on bleeding roll and since its 2.4% chance per roll with 64 rolls to get it odd are pretty good ..... if you keep making you death saves.

*which I's struggle to allow in this area as that training is partly what I envisage the karate bonus being (but it's also why anything based on karate skill gets a big boost it's like +3 or 4 St for thrust attacks).

Originally Posted by Gollum

Not really, because even for GURPS, it is as dangerous as a bullet... They didn't say which kind of bullet...

OK. I'm kidding.

Heh, now I'm picturing your master pouring over High tech, muttering,

"no not like 7.62 rifle, hmm not like 9mm, hmm .45 maybe, now do wounding multipliers stack for locations, ahh he we go .22 long"

Originally Posted by Gollum

Kobudo teachers are good to compare what they know (as everybody). That is, for them, kobudo weapons.

Their exaggeration is not just stupid. It is a teaching way to make their pupils really understand that fighting with tekkos can kill and that it's a very bad idea to do it (unless you really have to kill to save your life).

No I know, but what's fine for making warning be taken seriously, is less good for making hard and fast numbers comparisons in RPG.

Either way as shown a tonfa hit to the head doesn't need to be the equivalent of a 9mm (or what ever) to kill.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Sindri

Note that in a more powerful skill engine, if you wanted to, you could turn "requires Exotic Weapon Training to use at full skill" to very closely linked skills. This would have an advantage in elegantly letting someone say that they are used to an unusual grip and not the more typical grip. Though that wouldn't make sense with Tonfa which is trained in both grips.

Yes. GURPS is a very flexible game.

Originally Posted by Sindri

Well I can't agree with that. I think a shortsword and an axe are much more different than a shortsword and a shortsword type weapon with an altered grip.

That may be true for shortswords, indeed. But a tonkwa is really different from a baton, a mace or a blackjack. The endless tightening/releasing of the grip that you have to do is very specific. So, in a handling point of view, it is very different. But I do agree on the fact that GURPS weapon skill defaults are not based on the manner of handling the weapon (which I regret: it would be most easy to understand... At least for me).

Originally Posted by Sindri

Does it deserve a -1 penalty? Because a -1 penalty is very large, especially for parry where it's really a -2 penalty. Are other parrying disadvantages at the same detail level dealt with? If they aren't this would unbalance the mechanical difficulty and disincentivize doing this compared to equally difficult actions.

Oh yes, it deserve a -1. If someone tells you: you can now use only half of your parry techniques, you do have a penalty. And if he add something in your hand, something that you have to maintain very firmly to avoid its natural spinning move on that, it will be worse. Not to mention the risk to hurt yourself when your hands go very fast near your own body...

So, in my humble opinion, a -1 is the minimum. -1 to parry do correspond to -2 to attack (because parry is based on half the attacking skill). -2 to attack is just the difference between a shortsword and a broadsword. When you see how close is the handling of these two weapons in reality and how different are the parries with a tonkwa and without a tonkwa, the conclusion is inevitable. A penalty is required.

Originally Posted by Sindri

Why would there? It doesn't have anything to do with Tonfa. It's a general rule.

There would if once would like to have a bit more realism. And the tonfa is already an exception. It is the only weapon that can be use without any specific training. A warrior trained with broadsword cannot use a shortsword without penalty. But a karateka (bare handed training) can use a tonfa without the least problem... Very strange, isn't it.

Originally Posted by Sindri

Techniques are rarely weapon dependent. Tonfa probably doesn't have more than the spinning attack, although I can't say for sure. Plus I think that style perks hold their weight in terms of interest against techniques.

The tonkwa, as any weapons, as a lot of specific techniques. Some are close from the sai techniques; but the handling is different (which is why specific training is required in reality). Some others are very different. Especially the linked attacks. Three very fast attacks (ribs-ribs-head or knee-knee-head); for instance. This is possible with the specific grip of the tonkwa but becomes impossible (at the same speed) with any other weapon, except the nunchaku, maybe (I never trained with nunchaku yet).

Originally Posted by Sindri

Weapon length can be very important to the handling of weapons, but keep in mind that the Shortsword/Broadsword division is far from unchallenged. Varyon, for example, turns it into just Sword.

Yes. Sword sound more logical. But the fact is that there are a difference between shortsword and longsword in rules as written. And that the karate skill allows to use a tonkwa at no penalty in rules as written. In my humble opinion, this is an inconsistency.

Which is not serious! Martial Arts is really a very good book, full of very well thought rules and data about all what I can speak about. Here again, may karate style, the bo and the sai are very well described and handled in terms of rules. New rules about harsh realism, specific wounds and hit location, committed attacks and defenses are amazing.

I just find that the tonkwa has been forgotten. It deserve a little correction.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Tomsdad

No I know, but what's fine for making warning be taken seriously, is less good for making hard and fast numbers comparisons in RPG.

Either way as shown a tonfa hit to the head doesn't need to be the equivalent of a 9mm (or what ever) to kill.

Which is why I immediately said it was exaggerated. Having said that, I do agree with all the rest of your post. And thanks for the correction about the calculation. I'm so used to think than despite of my third dan, I'm only DX+0 in matter of true combat that I completely forgot that the karate bonus for damage could be +2. My GURPS campaigns are Cthulhu campaigns, so, we almost never use karate or tonkwa skill... Er... Not almost never. Just never.