The Mighty Cestus

[Mcoorlim]

I have a few questions about the cestus (and its cousins, the myrmex and gauntlet and bladed hand - basically the entire "use unarmed skills with THIS family).

1. Can you parry armed attacks without fear of hurting your hands?

2. When attacking with a strike, will an armed parry count as a strike against the hand in question?

3. What about grappling? If I go to grapple while wearing my cestus, if my target parries with his battleaxe am I going to be missing some fingers?

Basically, while wearing a cestus, myrmex, or gauntlet, am I 'armed'?

[Sam Baughn]

I'm fairly sure they all count as unarmed attacks for the purpose of hurting yourself and armed parries.

[Darekun]

Well, what does counting as armed mean?

If you parry with a dagger, the only way your hand could get hit is if you fail the parry, or they get through your dagger. The second is accounted for by weapon breakage rules.

With a cestus/gauntlet/etc, OTOH, a parry naturally involves your armored hand getting hit, and applying the weapon breakage rules doesn't seem appropriate. So I'd say those still count as unarmed.

As a house rule, I'd say you can forgo the usual penalty for parrying a weapon unarmed, in exchange for a parry counting as a hit against the arm you parried with if it succeeds but wouldn't've with the penalty. Thus if your DR is up to the task, you're as good as armed. I don't think I've seen that come up, though.

[Kale]

Originally Posted by Darekun

As a house rule, I'd say you can forgo the usual penalty for parrying a weapon unarmed, in exchange for a parry counting as a hit against the arm you parried with if it succeeds but wouldn't've with the penalty. Thus if your DR is up to the task, you're as good as armed. I don't think I've seen that come up, though.

This sounds reasonable to me. The Cestus in particular gives a fair bit of armor, so I think you would be able to parry much more effectively than bare hands. In my opinion that also justifies reducing the 'bare hand' penalty to parry overall. I'd still stick with the 'parrying arm damaged' rule for only marginal success though.

[The Wrathchild]

Originally Posted by Kurlumbenus

I have a few questions about the cestus (and its cousins, the myrmex and gauntlet and bladed hand - basically the entire "use unarmed skills with THIS family).

1. Can you parry armed attacks without fear of hurting your hands?

2. When attacking with a strike, will an armed parry count as a strike against the hand in question?

3. What about grappling? If I go to grapple while wearing my cestus, if my target parries with his battleaxe am I going to be missing some fingers?

Basically, while wearing a cestus, myrmex, or gauntlet, am I 'armed'?

1: No - but they do provide some DR

2: Yes.

3: Yes.

(4); No.

[vicky_molokh]

I'm not sure that Nekode fits into the same category as the Cestus/Myrmex/knuckles. After all, the Nekode/Bladehand can swing . . .

[Joseph R]

Originally Posted by Molokh

I'm not sure that Nekode fits into the same category as the Cestus/Myrmex/knuckles. After all, the Nekode/Bladehand can swing . . .

That's an interesting point, because no other attack type that uses an "unarmed" striking skill does anything other than thrust-based damage (AFAIK). Indeed, all the various "natural-weapon" Claw advantages are thrust-based as well - even when you might consider those to include similar raking/cutting attacks to a blade-hand.

Thrust-only unarmed attacks seemed to me to be a deliberate change from 3e, where some 'techniques' in the last edition of Martial Arts allowed swing-based damage.

This raises a related question in my mind: if my Boxer wants to parry your Blade-hand attacks, do the swing-based attacks mean that I defend at -3? I would guess not myself, for the reason that such attacks are still being made using an "unarmed" skill. I suspect the "official" answer to my question will also answer yours, and vice-versa - if a blade-hand is or isn't an "armed" weapon in one context should also hold true for other contexts as well, as far as GURPS definitions go, I feel.

The blade-hand debate notwithstanding, my conclusions to the OP questions seem to mirror The Wrathchild's answers:

Originally Posted by Kurlumbenus

1. Can you parry armed attacks without fear of hurting your hands?

2. When attacking with a strike, will an armed parry count as a strike against the hand in question?

3. What about grappling? If I go to grapple while wearing my cestus, if my target parries with his battleaxe am I going to be missing some fingers?

Basically, while wearing a cestus, myrmex, or gauntlet, am I 'armed'?

1. No (unless you never fail), but the hand covering will often provide DR.

2. Yes (sort of). Normally armed parries hit the limb not the extremity, which may mean the hand-covering does not provide any DR in this case.

3. Yes (it's a risk). Of course, certain types of hand covering might make grapples harder to attempt, as they would inflict some form of Bad Grip on the wearer.

(4). No. You are using an "unarmed" skill to attack with. The covering might better protect your hand/arm, but you are still using the limb to attack and defend with. Whereas a "weapon" user has a blade, hilt, and/or haft to give them extra distance and protection, without having to put their arm into as much direct danger.

[Mcoorlim]

Kromm has stated in the past, on the subject of if a bladed hand or tonfas took the brawling penalty to parry weapons or risked injury if they failed:

The -3 to parry weapons is a property of the skill, so it still applies.

The chance of injury is a property of being bare-handed, so it doesn't.

So bladed hands and tonfas (used with brawl or karate, not swung with Tonfa) count as "armed" for parry purposes, but not cestus, myrmex, etc?

[Joseph R]

Kurlumbenus, could you link to where Kromm has said that, please? You see, I am not sure from the wording of your post whether what you have just said (and the quote, as well) is in relation to my last post or not.

The mention of -3 in my post was in relation to unarmed parries against a blade-hand. Your statement seems to be talking about unarmed parries while using one, which is why I think there may be confusion.