Realistic Human DR

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by mburr0003

Then why if it's suboptimal, in real fights, do people frequently stop and "do nothing" for 2-3 seconds. You would think trained fighters wouldn't stop, in a real fight, and assess the situation... oh wait.

The actual problem is GURPS combat is hyper-efficient. The cause of this is "combat omniscience", which every PC has... unless the GM does things to remove it, which, and trust me I've done this, garners you all the grumbles from the Players.

They don't like giving up their omniscience. Even if the NPCs are under the same constraints, it's nothing but "Nope, don't like it" and "let's just go back to the unrealistic way of doing things".

Does that ever happen asynchronously? Or are you talking about lulls where both fighters simultaneously stop actively fighting?

Because it's very hard to justify the latter with 'do nothing is tactically powerful'. It's easier to justify them other ways, though I don't have a model for why they'd start and stop at any given moment.

(One way to partially justify them tactically under GURPS rules, but potentially a weird gamey one, is that retreat is powerful. If one fighter starts giving ground, retreating and using their step to retreat further, the other can't force the engagement to continue without fighting at a significant handicap - either using more aggressive maneuvers to keep up or using their retreat as a less-effective forward slip.

Consequently, either fighter wanting to start a lull in melee can strongly pressure their opponent to grant it.

This is, of course, opposite to the popular 'momentum' model.)


Aside, what about the 'situation' are you supposed to be 'assessing'? In a duel, there's very little to assess and if you wanted to do so, your opponent would seem motivated to not let you. In a complex melee battle there's loads to assess, but nothing but sheer chance to create the opening where nobody's currently attacking you. (In a prolonged gunfight, of course, being in total or near-total cover gives you limited visibility but a good possibility of taking a time out.)

Originally Posted by mburr0003

My experience as well. Even in duels, even in sparing matches. Especially in street fights.

The only place I don't really see it is in boxing when one fighter is either desperate, or has completely taken the measure of their opponent and is just hammering them, or MMA where relentless pounding or submission grappling rules the day.

See, to me the exception sounds like a considerable endorsement of what I said. If it was a strong play why would MMA fighters avoid it?

Street fights, on the other hand, are a really big place you would expect lulls, because in a forceful intimidation match (which is the base state of animal fights where neither party is planning to eat the other) you have to give the other party a chance to fold!