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Old 07-17-2018, 04:03 PM   #11
phayman53
 
Join Date: Dec 2012
Default Re: Martial Arts style for [Banestorm] Knights of St. George of the Dragon

Quote:
Originally Posted by Railstar View Post
However, monstrous threats vary quite a bit, so the fighting style will need to depend on what they are fighting. It might help if you list a few 'typical' monsters you expect them to encounter as a guideline for the appropriate fighting style for them to use.
I think the order would train in dragon slaying, but this would probably be advanced training since it doesn't come up that often. Mostly I would expect them to deal with any basilisks, hostile giants, harpies, minotaurs, nightstalkers, ogres, sphynxes, striders, and trolls that might threaten localities in Caithness. Likewise, as a religious order, they might be the ones to take on Demons, Lycanthropes, and Vampires. Of course, per their description, they are also committed to defending the church of Caithness in general, which would include more normal threats of orc and reptile men bands from the desert as well as invasions from Megalos or al-Wazif.

Many of these monsters listed above can dish out a lot of damage that makes relying on heavy armor without the defense bonus of a shield somewhat risky. Indeed, even reptile men, especially armed with a heavy weapon, can make relying on armor for protection a risky prospect. That is why I am thinking the two-handed weapon focus of Late Medieval Knightly Mounted Combat might be modified to include a shield--at least when fighting really strong monsters. Historically knights discarded shields because armor got good enough to be excellent protection on its own and two-handed weapons were needed to reliably defeat it. But for things with monstrous strength, being able to deflect a blow with a heavy and large shield might stay relevant even with plate armor.

One final note, I do like to use a house rule that makes armor much better against bladed weapons, especially swords and other balanced cutting weapons, while leaving most crushing weapons about as effective against armor as RAW. So for my game that would make swords vs. mid to high DR monsters less than ideal and even spears would have to target weak spots.

Quote:
Originally Posted by scc View Post
I'll go further and point out that dragons would either be considered non-sentient, and therefore code's of honor don't apply to them, or as they have 4 legs they are automatically considered mounted.
This is an interesting way to look at it. Personally, it seems to me that the GURPS code of chivalry focuses most on a fair fight--even sides and weapons. Since dragons are vastly more powerful than humans, I don't see any reason why a chivalrous knight would feel the need to fight on foot. Indeed, since dragons have an innate ranged breath weapon, powerful ranged weapons don't seem out of the question either.

Quote:
Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl View Post
I imagine that the majority of dragons that people will face will be hatchlings or young dragons (90% of dragons probably die as hatchlings and another 80% probably die as young dragons). Adolescent dragons have a century under their belt, meaning that they have probably developed their magical knowledge far beyond the majority of human mages, and have probably developed a number of useful magical abilities and mundane skills. Adult dragons are even worse, and I imagine that they end using very intelligent tactics against humanoid opponents.
While I agree that most dragons are probably young, I disagree that adolescent ones are necessarily that much more powerful than human mages. That would assume they have the same drive to gain skill and knowledge as quickly as humans do. But, given an indefinitely long lifespan, they may have a more relaxed view of this as long as their skills are sufficient for survival. The one canonical Banestorm dragon we have (listed on pg. 145-146) is 1,200 years old and slightly above average intelligence for a "Monstrous Dragon" as Banestorm defines them. He knows a lot of spells, 55 if I counted right, but all of them only have 1 point in them, so they are either at the 18 (Hard) or 17 (Very Hard) level. This is certainly powerful, but this is a 1,200 year old dragon--the oldest defined age category. If we make him adolescent but change nothing else, all of these spells go down to the 14 and 13 level. By comparison, the "Freelance Wizard" template has about 23 or 24 spells, but all at the 15 level.

Last edited by phayman53; 07-17-2018 at 04:06 PM.
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