Shield DR

[cupbearer]

Hi

If you implement the shield damage rule, is it only impaling and piercing that can damage the person behind the shield?

Its confusing because over penetration differs from cover DR , not sure how that works

[Flowergarden]

Hi,
Overpenetration is for normal targets, shields are homogeneous, so have x4 HP for the same weight. Supposedly it's why it's different. It's just because shields are more ok with being penetrated.
There is nothing about only this types of damage can penetrate shields. I would say that crushing or cutting attack can break an arm behind it. Cutting can even cut through, put edge protection on it, I suppose. Seems kinda realistic and not against the rules.

[Varyon]

The Damage to Shields rules reference the Overpenetration rules for resolving such cases, so considering those only apply with pi/imp/beam attacks, it would makes sense for the same to be true of shields. If you want a cutting or crushing attack to break through to harm the wielder, that probably requires that they destroy the shield outright - causing sufficient Injury to drop the shield to -1xHP or lower and having the shield fail the resulting Death Check. As for how much gets through, I'd say use the damage remaining when the shield fails its Death Check. So, let's say you've got an undamaged Light Shield (DR 5, HP 20) and your foe hits it for a whopping 85 cut. That leaves 80 damage to get through, which gets boosted to 120 HP Injury - enough to get the shield to -5xHP, so it's a done deal that the shield's a goner. But how much damage it absorbs before it fails is a pretty big deal, since you're looking at between 0 and 53 cut getting through to hit you. If it fails the first Death Check, which would be for when it's at -1xHP, there's 80 HP Injury left over; that's equivalent to 53 cut. Failing the second (-2xHP) means 60 HP, or 40 cut. Failing the third means 40 HP, or 26 cut. Failing the fourth means 20 HP, or 13 cut. And succeeding at all of them means 0 HP is left over - your shield is destroyed, but you are unharmed.

(Note if you want to not have to potentially roll 4 times in a case like this, just roll once at -4. Success means it passes all 4 checks. Failure by 1 means it passes the first three checks but fails on the fourth. Failure by 2 means it fails on the third. Failure by 3 or 4 means it fails on the second. Failure by 5+ means it fails on the very first check. This is because every doubling of the number of rolls that need to be passed is roughly equivalent to a -2 to the check - so +0 for 1 roll, -2 for two, -4 for four, and you can interpolate this to -3 for three.)

[Anthony]

The overpenetration rules are somewhat poorly written.

Originally Posted by B408

When you inflict piercing, impaling, or tight-beam burning damage with a ranged attack, there is a chance that damage might pass through your target and harm something on the far side; e.g., an innocent bystander. Similarly, a powerful attack might go right through cover

It is not clear from context whether this means "Similarly, a powerful [piercing, impaling, or tight-beam ranged] attack might go right through cover" or whether in fact all attacks can pass through cover and this is just a similar rule. My suspicion is that the intent is the first, but either one would be a valid interpretation.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Anthony

The overpenetration rules are somewhat poorly written.

It is not clear from context whether this means "Similarly, a powerful [piercing, impaling, or tight-beam ranged] attack might go right through cover" or whether in fact all attacks can pass through cover and this is just a similar rule. My suspicion is that the intent is the first, but either one would be a valid interpretation.

I interpret it as having the pi/imp/beam applying to the whole thing, and then it notes this can apply both in cases where you're shooting one target and there's something else behind it that could get hit in the case of an overpenetration and in cases where you're trying to shoot through cover at a target on the other side. Considering the meat of the rules deal with calculating Cover DR and assessing its effects, and the fact this Cover DR can be from actual cover or just a person or whatever, it seems weird to have the case where the target is what gets overpenetrated use one set of rules (being restricted to pi/imp/beam) and using a different set of rules (no restrictions) in the case where the target is behind something that needs to be overpenetrated for them to get hit.

[Flowergarden]

Originally Posted by Anthony

The overpenetration rules are somewhat poorly written.

It is not clear from context whether this means "Similarly, a powerful [piercing, impaling, or tight-beam ranged] attack might go right through cover" or whether in fact all attacks can pass through cover and this is just a similar rule. My suspicion is that the intent is the first, but either one would be a valid interpretation.

Yes, I agree here.
My thoughts we that strapped shield isn't that much different from armor. And huge ogre clubs supposedly can break an arm without breaking a shield or 85 damage (never tested, do somebody have an ogre?).

Thinking a little bit more... You can put an extra amount of padding between shield and an arm... Or metal strip on top of the shield on the other side of the arm... Something like 20% of equivalent body armor weight.
Your normal arm armor protects normally anyway

At the same time, some shields have DR 5-6, which made me thinking that RAW is ignoring cover DR. At least for bucklers.
So supposedly forget all I said

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Anthony

The overpenetration rules are somewhat poorly written.

It is not clear from context whether this means "Similarly, a powerful [piercing, impaling, or tight-beam ranged] attack might go right through cover" or whether in fact all attacks can pass through cover and this is just a similar rule. My suspicion is that the intent is the first, but either one would be a valid interpretation.

They are in the section on ranged combat, and presumably are written the way they are to prohibit overpenetration with sling bullets, thrown maces, and the like.

I think that the shield damage result referring to them does not mean that shield damage and overpenetration is supposed to be so limited, as the box on shield damage makes no mention of damage type at all.

Personally, I think it's way too hard to overpenetrate, or even damage, shields. They have more DR and far more HP than their composition and mass warrants. DR1 for wood/leather, DR2/3 for a metal facing, DR4 for an all-metal shield suits their weights (and thus thickness) better, with HP to match their weight (cube root x 8) would make them actually sometimes break.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Rupert

Personally, I think it's way too hard to overpenetrate, or even damage, shields.

Basing cover DR on hit points is one of those approximations that doesn't really make sense, as it means a shield that is larger (but no thicker) provides more protection due to being heavier. A reasonably plausible rule of thumb is to say that 1 lb/sf of miscellaneous materials is about DR 1 worth of cover, and armor materials use their DR instead. That would put the total cover DR of shields at 2-3, 4 at the upper end.

Note that, because there's a large space between the shield and the person behind it, the actual protection of a shield against low tech projectiles is significantly greater than this, other than possibly injury to the shield arm -- if an arrow is poking 6" through a shield, the shield user is still probably fine, whereas 6" of penetration through armor is bad.

[Flowergarden]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Basing cover DR on hit points is one of those approximations that doesn't really make sense, as it means a shield that is larger (but no thicker) provides more protection due to being heavier. A reasonably plausible rule of thumb is to say that 1 lb/sf of miscellaneous materials is about DR 1 worth of cover, and armor materials use their DR instead. That would put the total cover DR of shields at 2-3, 4 at the upper end.

Note that, because there's a large space between the shield and the person behind it, the actual protection of a shield against low tech projectiles is significantly greater than this, other than possibly injury to the shield arm -- if an arrow is poking 6" through a shield, the shield user is still probably fine, whereas 6" of penetration through armor is bad.

So... Low/high/ultra tech shield design article?) Would be interesting.

Hm, maybe cover DR is uniform because shields are thicker where your arm is, so you need the same amount of damage to pierce on shield arms and to fully blow through shield in other places?

[cupbearer]

Originally Posted by Varyon

The Damage to Shields rules reference the Overpenetration rules for resolving such cases, so considering those only apply with pi/imp/beam attacks, it would makes sense for the same to be true of shields. If you want a cutting or crushing attack to break through to harm the wielder, that probably requires that they destroy the shield outright - causing sufficient Injury to drop the shield to -1xHP or lower and having the shield fail the resulting Death Check. As for how much gets through, I'd say use the damage remaining when the shield fails its Death Check. So, let's say you've got an undamaged Light Shield (DR 5, HP 20) and your foe hits it for a whopping 85 cut. That leaves 80 damage to get through, which gets boosted to 120 HP Injury - enough to get the shield to -5xHP, so it's a done deal that the shield's a goner. But how much damage it absorbs before it fails is a pretty big deal, since you're looking at between 0 and 53 cut getting through to hit you. If it fails the first Death Check, which would be for when it's at -1xHP, there's 80 HP Injury left over; that's equivalent to 53 cut. Failing the second (-2xHP) means 60 HP, or 40 cut. Failing the third means 40 HP, or 26 cut. Failing the fourth means 20 HP, or 13 cut. And succeeding at all of them means 0 HP is left over - your shield is destroyed, but you are unharmed.

(Note if you want to not have to potentially roll 4 times in a case like this, just roll once at -4. Success means it passes all 4 checks. Failure by 1 means it passes the first three checks but fails on the fourth. Failure by 2 means it fails on the third. Failure by 3 or 4 means it fails on the second. Failure by 5+ means it fails on the very first check. This is because every doubling of the number of rolls that need to be passed is roughly equivalent to a -2 to the check - so +0 for 1 roll, -2 for two, -4 for four, and you can interpolate this to -3 for three.)

that is how i read it, too. i guess what i am asking is, what is the difference between cover dr and over penetration.

if damage exceed cover DR what happens? it says powerful attacks can blow through it, then in a different paragraph now says you can be hurt by overpenetration, so is penetration different than cover DR?