[LT] Interesting study on the effects of wearing heavy armor

[giant.robot]

I stumbled across this article today and thought it would be interesting to share. The encumbrance rules look like they do pretty well with heavy armor but I'm not sure about FP usage. It seems that exerting oneself in armor would mean that a character should start paying FP in combat that lasts 5 rounds instead of the typical 10. Then again I'm not an expert in that area. Thoughts?

[Sabaron]

30 to 50 kilograms in armor weight? That right there makes the study very suspect. 50 kilogram armor is 110 pounds!

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

Originally Posted by giant.robot

I stumbled across this article today and thought it would be interesting to share. The encumbrance rules look like they do pretty well with heavy armor but I'm not sure about FP usage. It seems that exerting oneself in armor would mean that a character should start paying FP in combat that lasts 5 rounds instead of the typical 10. Then again I'm not an expert in that area. Thoughts?

A lot of different FP usage is currently below the resolution level in GURPS.

That being said, I could easily support an optional rule that carrying lower leg encumbrance impacts FP loss at 2x the normal rate.

This is why we sprint in sneakers instead of combat boots.

Of course, building encumbrance by body part would likely get too fiddly real quick for most people...

[Novembermike]

That armor seems fairly unrealistic. IIRC non-tournament armor tended to be in the 20-30 kg range, not 30-50 and plate armor for foot soldiers often lacked lower leg protection.

[zoncxs]

after 10 seconds according to the rules you lose 1 FP plus your encumbrance level + anything else the GM would rule on (heat and the like)

so with that you could be losing anywhere from 3-5 FP in that 10 seconds.

with ST 10 and armor weighing in at 110lb you looking at spending 4 FP. not including any optional rules for extra effort or the likes.


if the person has a good HT it won't phase them much, but if we are looking at a person with average (10) HT then they will be exhausted fast.

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

Originally Posted by Novembermike

That armor seems fairly unrealistic. IIRC non-tournament armor tended to be in the 20-30 kg range, not 30-50 and plate armor for foot soldiers often lacked lower leg protection.

Mind you, putting on an extra couple of pounds of sabatons/sollerets on your feet is a drag, especially on top of the couple of pounds in shoes/boots underneath.
Athletic shoes are measured in ounces, not lbs, no one can run at their full speed with a couple of pounds on their feet.


A few years ago, before Low Tech came out, we had a great thread which went into footwear discussion for a bit:
http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=42907

[Anthony]

It's fairly difficult to take a study like this and convert it into useful game data, because fatigue effects on humans are not linear in power output. Some old hpv research would suggest that going from 0.1 hp to 0.2 hp for walking would exhaust an average healthy adult in around 2h45m (vs 8h for walking normally), or about 3x as fast, whereas going from 0.2 to 0.4 reduces the exhaustion time down to 15m or so, or something like 10x as fast.

[Novembermike]

Originally Posted by Ze'Manel Cunha

Mind you, putting on an extra couple of pounds of sabatons/sollerets on your feet is a drag, especially on top of the couple of pounds in shoes/boots underneath.
Athletic shoes are measured in ounces, not lbs, no one can run at their full speed with a couple of pounds on their feet.


A few years ago, before Low Tech came out, we had a great thread which went into footwear discussion for a bit:
http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=42907

Sorry, my point was that foot soldiers don't wear heavy leg armor. It's possible that I'm wrong, but every example of infantry armor that I'm aware of, from Roman Legionaries to Landsknecht, have avoided heavy armor for the legs.

An example of what I'm talking about.
http://i52.tinypic.com/5wxgu0.jpg

EDIT: Dan Howard got to it before I did, but it's an important point. The concept of a soldier marching into battle wearing plate from head to toe isn't historically accurate. We're either talking about mounted knights wearing full plate or foot soldiers wearing partial plate, but it's not really fair to talk about someone wearing 50kg of armor walking around to fight.

[DemiBenson]

Originally Posted by Novembermike

Sorry, my point was that foot soldiers don't wear heavy leg armor. It's possible that I'm wrong, but every example of infantry armor that I'm aware of, from Roman Legionaries to Landsknecht, have avoided heavy armor for the legs.

An example of what I'm talking about.
http://i52.tinypic.com/5wxgu0.jpg

So, anyone want to have a go at writing up that armor?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Novembermike

An example of what I'm talking about.
http://i52.tinypic.com/5wxgu0.jpg

I'm not sure the coverage of that armor indicates anything other than what armor was convenient to mount on that armor stand.