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Old 05-06-2021, 09:06 AM   #181
Rupert
 
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
...polearms are a bit unwieldy (Parry 0U, sometimes become Unready after each attack) but have better Reach and far better damage...
Note that until MA (and later LT) polearms also didn't do good damage at reach 1, and some had no reach 1 attack.

The introduction of the shorter (but still high damage) duelling polearms changed the calculus quite a bit, especially when combined with the various techniques and perks from MA that increase their flexibility.
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Old 05-06-2021, 09:34 AM   #182
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

I may be restating something thats already been said.

But this whole thing revolves around the Title "Knight" and what "should be associated with it", is a subjective question not a historical one. Subjective to the World it applies to, unless the attempt is to recreate a specific person from historical records (in which case Char Points dont factor in, except at the end when you tabulate the point value to get there).

Sean Connery was a Knight. Bono is a Knight along with Elton John, Clint Eastwood is a Knight. How are you resolving this with your issue of martial prowess? And these are people that ACTUALLY are KNIGHTED, not a subjective discussion.

A Knight is a title, conferred by "an Authority" of some variety. That's pretty much it in terms of how it applies globally and generically. (Im pretty sure I was made a Knight of Peanut Butter by the Jif company back in the early 80s)

Even historically there were Knights with and without land, Knights with and without martial prowess, Knights who were educated and some who were dumb as stumps. Its just a TITLE. Like being a "Doctor"... well of what? can you do surgery? No Im a Doctor of Law... But your a Doctor!?!?

This is basically what this whole debacle is about. The GM sets a value for the Title Knight with some kind of Lens that contains what ever the GM says are specific advantages, disadvantages, and skills required to have the title in his world.

The rest of the chatter is just people getting prissy because THEIR vision of "Knight" differs, but not a single one of you is exclusively correct, and you are all probably completely correct in your own game.

The answer for the Original poster is "Knight has a value equal to what you set it in your game. If that's just a a Title, if that's a list of martial skills, if that's a list of Status, advantages, disads, and skills, or some other combination of factors is up to the GM and determined by its value in the setting"

If the player wants to use his points to have that Title then he takes that Lens. If its not worth it to him then dont take it. The value of the Lens should be relative to its value in the Game.
......If you aren't using status and royal courts and peasants and horses/spaceships and swords then its pretty much just a title, and shouldn't cost much (so if your just about dungeon crawling its really really pointless to care or maybe a 1pt "reputation Quirk" for flavor, Congrats Bono, that and $1.20 will get ya a cup of coffee) .
.....If on the other hand your playing a game that involves political intrigues and situations where a Knights Title will open doors and make it possible to bypass barriers or purchase controlled items, skip difficulties in the adventure(s) possibly even allow you to exercise Legal powers then it may well be worth it and have a value that has nothing to do with Martial prowess and your Mercenary is nothing more than a generic Bodyguard that needs to keep his mouth shut in the presence of his betters.

It all comes down to the Game, the setting, the GM... not historical accuracy circa 1502 London (unless that happens to be the setting the GM has chosen)
Yes in Reality a Landed Knight is probably a higher point char than a Merc regardless of overall martial skills, HOWEVER this isnt reality and the point of the CP value is to give all players an even chance to contribute to the game, not to every situation.
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Old 05-06-2021, 02:33 PM   #183
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

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This appears to be true to some people because they are fixated on bashing through armor rather than attacking where it does not cover.. In histiory the second choice was universaly favored and if anything Gurps makes it more difficult than it really was.

Generally Gurps makes attacking most specific hit locations harder than reality because they tend to be fight winners. so purely gamist reasons. <shrug>
I think people are 'fixated' on bashing through armor in part because GURPS rules make doing so very feasible. It doesn't "appear to be" true that armor is easy to penetrate, it is true under RAW.
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Old 05-06-2021, 08:10 PM   #184
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

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Also, if the point is to reduce the number of skills, and allow characters to more readily use a wide range of weapons, charging an extra 4 or 8 points (for the skilled users) to get back to where they'd otherwise be seems unfair. It also means skill 11-12 (normal professional level) is very expensive for normal people, and your basic armed guard/soldier wasn't a particularly exceptional individual.
I think the main goal is to get the end result the same; If "Sword" is a Hard skill, then Broadsword would be an optional specialty that would result in an Average skill which costs the same as it already does.

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Raising from default fails to be useful for reasons that have nothing to do with weapons - it's simply not a good use of points, normally. Raising one skill one point from default costs as much as raising the skill it defaults from, and raising the defaulted skill as a side effect. At best, it's worth paying the bare minimum to make the defaulted skill count as a learned skill.
Yeah, I took a houserule PK has and made it true for all skills; Buying skills up from defaults now costs 1/level instead of 4/level. Because of this, techniques are effectively perks (and the very, very few places that's an issue I either try to fix or point out the technique is too good or badly built).
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Old 05-07-2021, 07:20 AM   #185
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

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Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth View Post
I think people are 'fixated' on bashing through armor in part because GURPS rules make doing so very feasible. It doesn't "appear to be" true that armor is easy to penetrate, it is true under RAW.
Indeed. The optional armor rules from LT do help somewhat here, where cutting damage gets reduced to crushing in most cases of "penetration" (representing energy transferred through the armor, rather than actually breaking through it), but it's still probably too easy to chop through armor (and armor probably doesn't protect as well as it should, but using Conditional Injury would probably help there). One idea I've had, which I intend to make use of if I ever end up running a game, is what I call Simple Armor, explained here (in a UT context, but it's the same for LT), where most hit locations have a portion that isn't armored; said armor is much less expensive than its coverage would dictate, to encourage it to be used over full-coverage armor. Combined with (house)rules that make armor more effective against hand weapons, it could serve to often essentially penalize attack rolls (as characters need to attack where the armor isn't) rather than penalize damage rolls.

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Originally Posted by kirbwarrior View Post
I think the main goal is to get the end result the same; If "Sword" is a Hard skill, then Broadsword would be an optional specialty that would result in an Average skill which costs the same as it already does.
I originally just intended to consolidate, but then opted to change the required specializations into optional ones, with an increase in difficulty to match.
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Old 05-07-2021, 11:16 AM   #186
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Default Re: Are knightly characters inefficient?

This has been batted back and forth a lot, but I think I can answer OP's question completely in one sentence:

The activities and goals of traditional fantasy adventurers are not realistic, so realistic characters will not be efficient fantasy adventurers.

Corollary: This is one one of the reasons traditional fantasy adventurers tend to react explosively when you expose them realistic societies - they are literally not built to fit in.
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Old 05-07-2021, 01:30 PM   #187
Varyon
 
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Default Re: Are knightly characters inefficient?

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This has been batted back and forth a lot, but I think I can answer OP's question completely in one sentence:

The activities and goals of traditional fantasy adventurers are not realistic, so realistic characters will not be efficient fantasy adventurers.

Corollary: This is one one of the reasons traditional fantasy adventurers tend to react explosively when you expose them realistic societies - they are literally not built to fit in.
Getting back to the original topic (I invite those who wish to continue the discussion about weapon skills to the other thread), I'd say these are largely correct. You can build an adventurer who functions decently well in society without giving up adventuring skills, but that's because a) it doesn't take a lot of point investment to function in society and b) you can typically make use of most of the necessary traits and skills in adventuring scenarios. However, it's very easy for a GM to make a game where b) really isn't the case - social challenges can be completely covered by a single Face character (so a Knight with some Face traits has wasted his points, as the Rogue is better than he is and you only need one), intellectual challenges can be completely handled by a single Brainy character (so a Knight with some Brainy traits - like knowledge skills - has wasted his points, as the Wizard is better than he is and you only need one), stealth challenges can be completely handled by a single Stealthy character (so a Knight with some Stealthy traits - perhaps gained from hunting, warfare, police work, etc - has wasted his points, as the Ranger is better than he is and you only need one), etc. So in those campaigns, it's basically you can give up some combat skill (which all adventurers typically need, as it's rarely an option to sit out a fight) to be The Guy for social challenges, intellectual challenges, stealth challenges, etc (possibly more than one), you can give up a bit less combat skill to be useless in those challenges (because somebody else has already got them covered), or you can give up no combat skill to be just as useless in those challenges, but much more effective in combat.

This is generally a case of bad GM'ing (but an easy one to fall into - I'd probably be guilty of it) rather than bad character design. If the GM is good at keeping characters relevant, nobody is likely to feel cheated. Sure, the Knight isn't quite as good in a fight as the Brute - but he's the guy who warmed up Lord Hanton for the Rogue to convince him to invest in the party, he's got the connections that allowed the Wizard access to the Great Library to research an upcoming dungeon (and even helped with the research, figuring out which fallen Noble House was previously located there by the heraldry, which gave a better idea of what to expect), and the Ranger can always count on him to have her back when she goes hunting for game - or orcs. As I said before, however, the players can help the GM here, by suggesting ways their secondary traits/skills can be used to further the party's goals. In the above cases, perhaps the Knight's player asked the GM if he could use Status and Savoir-Faire to already know a friendly nobleman contact, asked about using the same to hook the Wizard up with better research facilities (and then asked about using his own knowledge skills to help), or made it a point to follow the Ranger on stealth missions, asking the GM to let him keep his distance so as not to risk being seen and thus ruining her stealth, but be available to help with finding tracks, noticing traps, etc.
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Old 05-07-2021, 02:34 PM   #188
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

Knights are generalists and generalists never seem to be as effective as specialists. But let me address some points.

While knights need a lot of advantages to be modeled correctly those advantages are only a sunk cost in a setting where those advantages aren't given weight. More relevantly many of those advantages would only be available to a narrow number of character types so your wizard or mercenary may not be able to have to authority or social mobility of the knight, perhaps not even the wealth.

Knights are known for being well-rounded in their pursuits, so if they're made correctly, yeah, there's going to be a lot of skills. That said not every knight is a falconer and in a game where a knight is a useful character falconry would potentially be a useful skill. Also your Wizard likely knows Literature, cooking, politics, History and a number other skills that are survival skills inside the tower. Your peasant Mercenary knows how to farm or how to raise sheep, probably how to pack a mule, and he's probably a noteworthy fisherman or weaver. Characters have skills.

Being a master of none is rough in a lot of cases, so is being a specialist. Your peasant mercenary doesn't know how not to be an embarrassment in court he's going to have to wait outside when you speak with the Duke. Your Wizard doesn't know the first thing about camping, she's going to stand there looking useless while people set up camp. The knight probably has skills in both venues and more. He won't be the best in most situations but rarely will he be shut out of helping the party.
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Old 05-07-2021, 04:21 PM   #189
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

It all depends on the campaign. I've played in campaigns where a military officer was far less effective because of all the points they had to waste on combat and field leadership skills.
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Old 05-09-2021, 07:02 AM   #190
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Default Re: Are knightly characters ineffective?

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It all depends on the campaign. I've played in campaigns where a military officer was far less effective because of all the points they had to waste on combat and field leadership skills.
In my experience that is due to not fully understanding Task Difficulty Modifiers and the non uses of talents such as Born War-Leader or some homebrew variant (Well trained War-Leader)
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