High tech armor vs Ultra-tech armor

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by weby

Indeed.

But the extra problem is that in terms of armor protection a pair of standard armor panels of 25cm*30cm size is in Gurps terms a vitals and 2/6 of chest protection.

But the real effect is much larger in front and back where there is only a very small probability of hitting chest hit locations from directly front or rear while bypassing the plate. And most of the shots that do that will be "grazing" shots on the sides where realisitcally they should do less damage. But on the other hand immediately as you start to angle away from the straight front or back the protection gets lower and there is no protection from straight at sides.

Most soft vests actually give close to full protection of chest hit location. The the armo hole and such exists, but that is true of any era chest only armor and Gurps does not model hits through the arm to the chest.

Ugh, you're making me want to revive the disaster that was my attempt at an Armor Overhaul. That involved a "shot placement" roll where the lower the roll on 1d, the closer to "center" your shot hit, and thus the more damage it did before blowing through (also, a roll of 1 had a special effect - on the Chest this would be a hit to the Vitals, on the Skull at hit to the Eye, on a limb a hit to the Bone - which would make crippling much more likely - etc). So that 2/6 protection would wind up capping the blowthrough on a shot from the front, thus providing a degree of protection even when the shot doesn't hit the plate.

As for the arm hole, Low Tech actually has rules for targeting that, although you have to do it purposefully. You could probably rule that, on a hit from the side to the Shoulder*, if the shot does enough damage to blow through the arm (presumably the crippling threshold), there's a 1/6 chance that it will go through the armpit hole, striking the Vitals.

*Technically, this could be a hit to the upper part of the upper arm, but I feel it would be too likely if there's a chance to hit it with a hit to the shoulder as well as with a hit to the upper arm. I think most pauldrons cover the very top of the upper arm anyway, even if they are only statted as protecting the shoulders.

Originally Posted by weby

It is in line with "we are getting to UT TL 9" assumptions.

TL 9 Ceramic Nanocomposite is 0.1

The TL 8 Improved Ceramic is 0.15

Of course, I think that, realistically, APHC doesn't actually manage double penetration; a divisor of around (1.5) may be more realistic, but GURPS is loathe to divide by 1.5 (or 7). That would put the WM at around 0.125, halfway between TL 8 and TL 9. Or maybe APHC is something more like (1.8), which would be a WM closer to 0.12.