How do you fight high armor with a low ST character?

[bluekitsune13]

I play with miniatures, so I've been rolling up a few characters and playing around in the system. I have some Warhammer figures, and I'm trying to figure out how to represent them in the system.

What I run into is you'll have these heavily armored knights that are also very skilled. This means they will have a high DEX to account for negative modifiers for wearing armor, but I also want them to have descent STR to be able to do good damage. Obviously these warriors will be fewer in number than other weaker characters. Then you have your rift-raff units like goblins who have low STR. If a Goblin can only even do 1d of damage, but he's attacking a warrior wearing plate that blocks 5 or 6 hits, how can he even do damage?

In another thread I was asking about hand to hand combat. It would make sense if in that situation that 2 or 3 goblins could try jumping onto that armored warrior and just taking him to the ground. Still, their daggers wouldn't be able to pierce his armor either.

Unless I'm missing something, if you just walk though some Goblins in plate mail you are invincible. Unless they get lucky with a crit or something, if they only roll 1d for damage, they can't touch you. I was thinking of maybe house ruling something where you can trade in a DEX bonus for a plus to damage. This would represent a sneak attack, or literally just piling on a downed enemy and stabbing for the joints in the armor.

I thought that any time you would gain a DEX bonus for an attack, you can forgo that bonus to gain that bonus as extra damage. So if you attacked a downed fighter, you would normally hit at +4DEX. If you wanted to use your regular DEX, you could add 4 to your damage roll. This means that you have a more reliable way of dealing damage to armored fighters.

I haven't tested it out, but it would be thematic for goblins and ratmen, and other small horde creatures.

[Shostak]

Going by the RAW, you could use pinning in HTH, aiming for the head, using nets, ...

[Kirk]

It seems TFT is new to you, if I understand your post.

It's basically true that a higher point character can beat lower point ones! ;)

If a character can afford to have heavy armor and a decent DX and ST, a small orc or such probably should lose.

Of course, definitely use tactics such as knocking them down to allow standing characters with average weapons to whack them while they are recovering their weapon and standing back up, if not in HTH with another orc.

There are also aimed shots, go for eyes, etc. with knives, stars, etc.

One can use MAGIC sometimes, or be really creative and use fire (my fave), spiders, insects, slime, or traps to take 'em down, since the armor protects differently in some of these cases.

And if the DX penalty isn't too bad, crossbows can be loaded with mechanical or personable help and fired, 3 dice damage usually will penetrate most armor setups. Petards, perhaps? Spiked drinks and spiked pits?

Attractive orcs of the appropriate gender can be disarming, as well...

[larsdangly]

The odds of double and triple damage hits are non-negligible (about 3 %, total), and even a 1d attack has a good chance of getting you in that case. Anyway, armor should be effective against light weapons. a person in full mail or greater armor is actually really hard to hurt.

[The Wyzard]

Well, this is why you use combined-arms tactics. A guy who has those good stats and that good armor is equal to several lesser fighters. One of those lesser fighters should be using a two-handed weapon or the like, and the other two are ready to hold him down. But an orc with a high ST, middling DX, low IQ, big heavy weapon, and no armor? That guy is your executioner. You lock the knight down with slightly more conservatively statted orcs, and then the executioner closes in for the attack while he's prone, or from the rear, or what have you.

If your knight has ST 16, DX 16, good equipment, and Warrior/Veteran, then damn son, he's *supposed* to be an absolute beast.

[flankspeed]

Replying to the original post by bluekitsune13:

I don't know how Steve may be changing the rules regarding charging with a pole weapon, but they can do double damage on a charge attack. This still may not penetrate, of course, but it is a dangerous attack for those who can wield at least ST=11 spears doing 1d+1 damage according to Advanced Melee.

[Skarg]

Yes, armor is very effective against weak opponents.

However, not wearing armor is also very effective against people wearing armor. Someone at MA 6 from armor often can't catch someone with MA 10. Numerous goblins using bows could pepper the armored foes with arrows. Eventually they're liable to hit for double or triple damage.

You can also stay just out of engagement range and when you win initiative, see if you can move up to range 2 for a 2-hex jab with a 1d+1 spear, then declare you are running to claim an automatic initiative win next turn, so you can get away.

It's easier to get people in HTH when you have higher MA, too. You can try to pin them (see Advanced Melee (AM)). When they're down, the goblins can hit them with heavier weapons, such as:

Spears will do 2d+2 in a charge.

Even as beginning goblins or hobgoblins they could also have some ST 13 or 14 friends who even if they were clumsy, could be reserved for hitting armored foes who have been tackled in HTH so you get a +4 to hit and can run away before being engaged.

In you have AM (hopefully a new edition with slightly nerfed peculiar weapons), you can use nets and ropes to ensnare them.

And of course, if you have wizards, you can cast spells on them.

[Steve Jackson]

Pole weapons - "double damage" has been slightly cut down, to "+1d damage." Still very much a good thing to do if you can.

So low-ST guys charging the knight with spears could be worth trying.

Then, of course, the knight remembers that DEFEND is an option, and the pole-weapon people now have to roll an extra die. Now it matters: are they just cannon fodder, or are they starting-level characters with a 14 DX to complement their 10 ST? In that case, a 14 roll is exactly average on 4 dice and you might get knight-ka-bob.

[Nils_Lindeberg]

I don't have a problem with weak untalented warriors having to rely on luck or innovative terraine tactics, superior numbers or the like to take down an experienced armored knight.

What I would like to see is a general rule for bypassing armor, or at least halving armor by hitting the right or weaker spots. Not only markmanship rules. Maybe something along the lines of: Bypass X amount of armor for a -2X adjDX. That would mean that a guy with chainmail pays 3 adjDX for wearing armor, but his opponent that tries to by pass it would have to "pay" twice that. Not an appealing proposition most of the time. But it would solve the problem of being almost impervious to a low damage weapon.

And sometimes a trade off, by taking let say -4 DX and bypassing most of the chainmail and aim for the places where it is mostly padding or sensitive spots that are still armor covered. All or nothing is not super realistic. Even a dagger through the face guard would most likely do a little less damage than a clean attack against an enemy without a helmet.

Another rule could be to say that every hit do at least 1 fST. Or every hit of at least half the armor would do 1fST. So hitting a plated knight with a shield and 7 armor with a blow of at least 4 would cause 1fST. This way a knight can walk around with impunity among the peasant levy on the battle field, and then have to retreat behind his own lines for some rest, refreshments and maybe som quick fST healing (if there are rules for that). And then get back into the fray.

A third solution for talented fighters could be to extend the Fencing talent to become a more general critical hit talent. All weapons could be included, maybe even unarmed and possibly missile spells. A sort of weapon mastery. Trainers for odd weapon mastery talents might be uncommon and that would mean that sword "fencing" would be the norm in normal fantasy worlds.

Instead of a pre req of adj14DX and a target number of 7 for double damage, set the target number to adjDX/2 round down. Then A DX20 guy would have a 10 target number for double damage, and a normal tank with 9 adjDX would have 4 and not really benefit from the talent at all. And there won't be a natural stopping point or optimum at adjDX 15 since your crit chance would still increase. And if necessary also increase the tripple damage target number to a third of adjDX minimum 3 or just set it to 4. I was never a big fan of tripple damage. Way too leathal.

The important thing with any rule change is that, if it gives a new option the new option will not be chosen almost every time at the expense of other choices. And if it is something that will be in effect all the time, it shouldn't add too much complexity, if any.

The above suggestions all adhere to that. Bypassing armor is an option that wouldn't be used very often, but when it comes into play it will have a big impact and it is not clear cut when it is optimal to use it.

fST damage will not come into effect that often either, but it will be a consolation price for many 0 damage hits, and will slowly wear down super tanks and curb the problem with stacked armor somewhat.

And the Weapon Mastery talents will not be any more complex than the Fencing talent. As long as the calculation is not too complicated. And I don't think that more characters will be starting to "fence" than Before. But a few new options are there (other weapons for one), highDX will be very nice to have and low damage weapons in the right hands can be viable. And the talent text length doesn't have to increase by much. Just keep it as one talent that works with all basic weapons you already know how to use.

[David Bofinger]

Originally Posted by Nils_Lindeberg

a general rule for bypassing armor

The main solution to armour historically was smashing through it with weapons like pollaxes and lucerne hammers. The alternate solution of agile rapiers with precision to spare that could find gaps wasn't considered effective. So I think if you do introduce this tactic then it should be more difficult and/or less effective than the high ST solution of punching through with increased damage. If it is to be a defining feature of a character then it should be represented by a talent that makes it less difficult or more effective.