Armed Parries against unarmed attacks.

[sir_pudding]

From here.

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

Hmm... I think the big problem with the damage-on-parry rules as they exist is not that the defender gets to roll full skill*, but that the attacker doesn't get any defense against the counter hit.

My problem is much of what GURPS calls a "parry" with most weapons isn't realistically going to result in any damage at all, much less full damage. Even if the attacking limb (or maw, or whatever) does end up making full force contact with the parrying surface of the weapon (which isn't even necessarily the case) most of the time it's not going to be significantly different then if they had just attacked any hard surface. Realistic armed parries (especially since GURPS includes non-contact defenses as "parries") aren't generally offensive, at least in any style that I've personally studied.

It also doesn't make any sense that "double-dagger" Min-ST weapons can do full damage on a parry and somehow remain ready. How is it that I can make a full force swing with my big-honking-mace and bring it to ready instantly on a parry but not on an attack. This doesn't make a lot of sense.

I think the rule should be something more like:

• Hurting Yourself (B. 379) applies when an unarmed attack is successfully parried or blocked by any weapon or shield with DR+HP>3 (in other words basically anything); unless the parry was made by exactly one or zero (in which case it's a non-contact parry). EDIT: Actually, I'm not even sure this is right. Most unarmed strikes against a parrying surface aren't going to be full force anyway. Maybe Hurting Yourself should apply if you only made your attack by some margin, or if the parry critically succeeds or something.
• The Agressive Parry technique (Martial Arts p. whatever) applies to armed parries just as it does to unarmed parries. If a weapon would normally become unready on either an attack or parry it does so in this case as well. You may do reduced damage (as per Defensive Attack (Martial Arts p. something-or-other)) to keep your weapon ready if it would have been unreadied as an attack.

[Peter V. Dell'Orto]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

[*]The Agressive Parry technique (Martial Arts p. whatever) applies to armed parries just as it does to unarmed parries. If a weapon would normally become unready on either an attack or parry it does so in this case as well. You may do reduced damage (as per Defensive Attack (Martial Arts p. something-or-other)) to keep your weapon ready if it would have been unreadied as an attack.[/LIST]

One thing I tried in my previous DF was this:

- Roll parry normally. If you succeed by 2 or more, roll damage*
against the attacking limb (or face, if it's a bite). For an unarmed
Aggressive Parry, use the rules under the appropriate technique.

That basically gives everyone the benefit of the -4 for using Judo or
Karate. You use one roll and just look at the dice and announce that
you either parried and injured or just parried. Done and done.

* For my game, halved.

I figured that was in line with the current rules enough, ditched a die roll (not always a concern for forumites, but a big deal for me), and gave about the same results. Not exactly what you're proposing here, but it's another option to look at.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Toadkiller_Dog

I figured that was in line with the current rules enough, ditched a die roll (not always a concern for forumites, but a big deal for me), and gave about the same results. Not exactly what you're proposing here, but it's another option to look at.

It still has the problem that a mace parry leaves the weapon ready, but still does damage. What does this look like exactly?

With the rifle parries I've studied, even with a mounted bayonet, the body of the weapon (not the blade was used to parry). This similar to the polearm work I've done too. I can't imagine that a blade-edge parry in either case would be as effective. It's really weird that in GURPS if I parry with a polaxe or something that I'm doing even half the cutting damage of a full-bodied swing, even if I'm more likely take the strike against a langeted haft.

Similarly with swords, every style I've seriously trained parries with the flat (yes, I do know that there are edge-parry styles), so my instinct as a fighter would be to parry a punch or bite with the flat. Flat parries generally use minimal force (and thus preserve economy-of-motion). It would take special effort for me at least to do a damaging parry with a blade. At any rate such an effort is probably best represented by a Wait (Stop-Hit) or a Riposte in the first place.

The only thing I've personally done with weapons that trained defensively to damage attacking limbs is with knives, in which case a defense against a punch isn't mechanically much difference from that against a knife and in both cases it should be doing damage against the limb.

Now I'm not really much of Martial Artist, at best I'm a poorly motivated dabbler, so I could be totally off base, but my personal experience with both training and contact sparring is that generically most weapon "parries" aren't going to do any significant damage to an unarmed attacker without a follow-up attack.

[Gnomasz]

We used a margin of succes of 3 on a parry to roll damage, similarly to Toadkiller. Even if it doesn't fix the problem (though reduces frequency of Hurting Yourself) or isn't realistic, it reduces number of rolls, speeding up barehanded combat a little bit.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Maybe Hurting Yourself should apply if you only made your attack by some margin, or if the parry critically succeeds or something.

I'm against any rule where rolling well is bad for you. The other guy rolling well is fine of course! It's just ridiculous that being very good at something and performing particularly well that day should somehow cause a stack overflow and result in negative amounts of success :P

My opinion crystalized... spoilered for OT

Spoiler:  

in a D&D 3e game, when jumping distance was based on skill roll. My strong character with athletic training and a magical ring of +30 to Jumping (as big a bonus as that sounds) rolled about twice what was necessary to leap aboard the escaping airship. The GM had a snit and said I had to leap to maximum height, miss the ship, and then take falling damage because I rolled well.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I'm against any rule where rolling well is bad for you.

If you don't succeed at all, your opponent doesn't get to try to parry in the first place. This is already an area in which success is riskier than failure.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

If you don't succeed at all, your opponent doesn't get to try to parry in the first place. This is already an area in which success is riskier than failure.

Acknowledged, but it seems a better executed attack, for an unarmed attacker, is one with less risk of self injury. And the BEST executed attack is one with no injury.

So saying "if you have a GREAT attack, you break your hand" seems kind of... counter intuitive. To say the least.

I would suggest it's far more appropriate to say "if you don't make your roll by (magic number) you risk Hurting Yourself".

Otherwise, I think what you want is "If you roll damage over (x)" - damage is the force of the attack, not skill. Of course, you don't normally roll damage when attacking and succesfully defended against ;) but my group roll to hit and damage at once (different coloured dice) so I guess it would work for us.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I would suggest it's far more appropriate to say "if you don't make your roll by (magic number) you risk Hurting Yourself".

That is what I said, isn't it? If you only make your roll by some margin (0? 3? dunno) you risk Hurting Yourself.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

That is what I said, isn't it? If you only make your roll by some margin (0? 3? dunno) you risk Hurting Yourself.

Oops, thought you were saying the opposite (success by 5 or more = horrible suffering).

[Peter V. Dell'Orto]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

It still has the problem that a mace parry leaves the weapon ready, but still does damage. What does this look like exactly?

I avoided dealing with that, because it's a multi-turn complication. "I parried on my turn and hurt you, so next turn I can't attack, but I can parry. If I parried a weapon, I could choose to parry or attack on my next turn." Bleh. Who wants to deal with that? Not me, that's for sure.

Half damage, as a run it, means it was interposing the weapon in a forceful and hurtful way. Why hurtful? Because unarmed striking surfaces are vulnerable and easily hurt, but it's not a full power attack.