Stone-Weapon Armor-Divisors and Blunt Trauma

[Trachmyr]

Originally Posted by Kraydak

Giving sharp (non-bullet) stone weapons an armor divisor of 0.5 doesn't really work as it often makes adding an edge to a stone weapon a downgrade. I would suggest instead listing a DR against which the point breaks, and treating the weapon as crushing against that DR level and up, possibly only after the hit. For more resolution you could list both a break DR, against which it keeps the cut/imp for the first hit, and a shatter DR against which even the first hit is reduced to cr. Stone bullets might get treated as hollow-points against heavy enough armor to make them shatter, but still lose the base 0.5 armor divisor.

Since a 0.5 armor divisor doubles the targets armor, it is ofcourse a problem for stone weapons. The Penetration Factor Houserule is an extension of the Blunt Trauma rules for cutting weapons (presented in Low-tech), and I think it does a good job of making stone points realisticly effective vs. armor.

Using a single DR theshold for when a weapon gets it's cut/imp bonus and when it breaks is problematic. Some stones (like flint and obsidian) hold an edge fairly well, but also shatter fairly easily. Other stones (like basalt and especialy jade, which is often regarded as stronger than iron) don't take or hold an edge very well, but are much more resistant to shattering.