Low-Tech Armor - Proposal for some modifications

[DanHoward]

Originally Posted by Tomsdad

Out of interest what's the issue with axes and edge protection?

I think the base damage of balanced weapons needs to be lower compared to unbalanced ones.

[Tomsdad]

Originally Posted by DanHoward

I think the base damage of balanced weapons needs to be lower compared to unbalanced ones.

Ah OK cool,

[Polydamas]

The way that the definition of ST, the relationship between ST and sw/th damage, the definition of 1 HP of injury, the definition of 1 point of penetration, etc. are all interrelated make this a hard problem. Not to mention that armour works much better in real life than in stories! If your game is in a setting where mighty heroes cut down armoured enemies one after another with a single blow each, a realistic portrayal of the effectiveness of weapons against low-tech armour may not be desirable.

I have not seen anything which could be called scientific about the performance of different swung weapons against armour, although most people would agree that axes and maces and hammers tend to perform better than swords and daggers.

Originally Posted by safisher

I don't think the general comments about the difficulty of matching everyone's expectations are out of line. It's certainly nothing compared to your comments directed at me in this thread.

All I said was that one choice about what modern body armour to represent in HT, and how to do it, was not the choice I would have made. I did not say that anything in HT was wrong or the result of chauvinism in favour of one kind of evidence.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Polydamas

The way that the definition of ST, the relationship between ST and sw/th damage, the definition of 1 HP of injury, the definition of 1 point of penetration, etc. are all interrelated make this a hard problem.

Penetration and injury have a nice wobbly wounding factor and penetration modifier in between. You'll have trouble if you want them to not have a linear relationship, but you can make the proportionality whatever without going much out of your way.

Taking drastic measures on the ST damage table is not uncommon when trying to address this stuff though.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by DanHoward

I think the base damage of balanced weapons needs to be lower compared to unbalanced ones.

Really, the issue with damage is that an unbalanced strike should have a damage bonus: in order to deliver a 'balanced' strike you need to significantly limit your strike. Separately from this, a weapon with a compact striking head will deliver energy more effectively to hard targets, but should probably have a penalty to hit.

[Tomsdad]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Really, the issue with damage is that an unbalanced strike should have a damage bonus: in order to deliver a 'balanced' strike you need to significantly limit your strike.

Yep this is shown with defensive attacks removing the 0U on an unbalanced weapon for a -2 reduction in damage. But I think it's also good that the difference between the two (an inherently unbalanced weapon limited in order to strike in a balanced way compared to balanced weapon) are not equal

Originally Posted by Anthony

Separately from this, a weapon with a compact striking head will deliver energy more effectively to hard targets, but should probably have a penalty to hit.

Out of interest why do you specify hard target there (and not targets in general), and what's your thinking behind penalties to hit?

Are you thinking in terms of a smaller striking surface needing to be more precisely targeted int order to hit?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Tomsdad

Out of interest why do you specify hard target there (and not targets in general), and what's your thinking behind penalties to hit?

In general, what matters is how stiff your weapon is compared to the stiffness of the target, and whether the force required to make the weapon yield is greater than what is required to make the armor yield.

A hammer or an axe is a lot stiffer than a club or a sword, but both are quite a bit stiffer than flesh or soft armor so it doesn't really matter. However, against hard armor it makes quite a bit of difference.

Originally Posted by Tomsdad

Are you thinking in terms of a smaller striking surface needing to be more precisely targeted int order to hit?

Pretty much. Misjudge distance by 6" with a sword and you probably still hit, not so much with an axe.

[Tomsdad]

Originally Posted by Anthony

In general, what matters is how stiff your weapon is compared to the stiffness of the target, and whether the force required to make the weapon yield is greater than what is required to make the armor yield.

A hammer or an axe is a lot stiffer than a club or a sword, but both are quite a bit stiffer than flesh or soft armor so it doesn't really matter. However, against hard armor it makes quite a bit of difference.

I'm not sure a sword or club is that much* less stiff than an axe or mace (at least assuming your hitting edge on with the sword, but it would certainly be a factor for thrusts with swords). If nothing else the stiffness/flex of an axe vs. club is going to depend largely on the haft.

Also I'm not sure stiffness (at least within the ranges of what were discussing here) when hitting hardness is actually a particularly defining feature in this. Although again thrusting attacks are a different matter.

When it comes to rigid armour I think hardness vs. hardness (and concentration of force at point of impact etc) is a more important comparison point than comparative stiffness of different weapon, especially when that range of stiffness is pretty limited.

Also lack of stiffness isn't necessarily a disadvantage. Stuff like flails etc exploit flexibility (although that is of course an extreme example and significantly different from the weapon you mention, but long staffs etc can benefit from 'whipping')

Thinking about it if say you thinking of an axe's blade flexing upon hitting rigid armour as opposed to a mace head (although that would be counter to the comparison you made), I think I'd just count that as all part of the DR of the armour. 'Soft' armour will have advantage in the other direction by resisting damage by giving under pressure. That said I think axe blade vs. rigid hard armour is more about deflection due angle of impact, but yes I can see axe blades can flex as well to avoid potential damage to the blade




*obviously there's a range over all but I'm not sure that's just down to specific individual examples of weapon, difference don't correlate between whole groups of weapons compared to one another. I.e I'm sure there's a range of flexibility within all axes, and all hafted weapons, but I'm not sure there as specific difference in stiffness when comparing say clubs and maces.

Originally Posted by Anthony

Pretty much. Misjudge distance by 6" with a sword and you probably still hit, not so much with an axe.

True to an extent although a lot of swords are designed to get best results from hitting with specific bits of their blade. But I take your point

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Tomsdad

I'm not sure a sword or club is that much* less stiff than an axe or mace (at least assuming your hitting edge on with the sword, but it would certainly be a factor for thrusts with swords). If nothing else the stiffness/flex of an axe vs. club is going to depend largely on the haft.

The stiffness of the haft isn't really that important; what matters is the part of the weapon that holds most of the energy and momentum of the strike. When a weapon hits a target, the weapon deforms until the force required to deform the weapon exceeds the strength of the target or weapon, or all of the energy of the strike is absorbed. For an axe or a hammer, the amount of force required to deform the weapon rises extremely quickly; for a sword or rod, it rises less quickly.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Anthony

The stiffness of the haft isn't really that important; what matters is the part of the weapon that holds most of the energy and momentum of the strike. When a weapon hits a target, the weapon deforms until the force required to deform the weapon exceeds the strength of the target or weapon, or all of the energy of the strike is absorbed. For an axe or a hammer, the amount of force required to deform the weapon rises extremely quickly; for a sword or rod, it rises less quickly.

Well, really both weapon and target deform during the impact, but I guess you're referring to non-elastic deformation.