Armor absorbing Damages

[orangefruitbat]

I posted some modified combat rules a couple of days back hoping for comments. I didn’t receive any, mostly I think because the post was really long and the most-interesting parts were buried. http://www.enworld.org/messageboards/showthread.php?threadid=4429

The problem was how to make armor absorb damage (like the grim and gritty rules), but not require major changes to various game stats (weapon damage vs spell damage, etc), since I want to use these new rules in a regular game. I’m also trying not to overly complicate and slow things down, though my love for rules-building sometimes gets the better of me.

The game would use a defense system much like Star Wars. However, armor bonuses would absorb damage on a 1 for 1 basis (shields would add to your defense, not armor). But now, some weapons are totally useless against armor, and everyone wants the full plate.

My idea was that weapons would have an armor piercing value equal to their critical multiplier. So an arrow (3x critical) would ignore the first 3 points of armor. The problem with this change is now, light armors are completely useless (padded and leather provide no protection whatsoever).

To solve this new problem, I figured the armor piercing value would only be used if the attack roll was an EVEN number. This way, even light armors provided protection some of the time.

Anyways, that was my idea. The rest of my earlier post deals with logical extensions (such as how to deal with natural armor, interaction with damage reduction, etc). I’d really love some feedback, suggestions or alternate ideas about how to get a viable damage reduction system in DnD. I don’t want to have to wait for DnD Modern.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi there!

I actually had similar ideas (and we are not the only ones to have such an epiphany) which I think start on about page 7 of my Worship Points System - in this Forum. (Its the one with about 14 pages)

One difference was that I ruled all piercing weapons halve the armor bonus.

So Full Platemail would only give +4 armor bonus versus an arrow, bolt, dagger or spear etc.

I also have additional rules for Outsider Natural Armour being divided into 'Natural Armour' and 'Supernatural Deflection'.

I am interested in D20 Modern myself.

 

[Malin Genie]

My suggestion would be to go for half the AR as DR. So full-plate would provide only +4 DR.

Analogous to the GURPS system, though, armour would still provide an advantage to defence rating (again, one-half the current AR: round down for defence, up for DR.)

So Studded Leather (which I would replace with Ringmail, as IMHO Studded Leather is not an effective armour type) would give +1 AC, +2 DR. Chainmail would give +2 AC, +3 DR. Full plate would give +4 AC, +4 DR. This represents the increased ability to deflect blows that armour gives, as well as absorbing part of the force of a blow that strikes directly. A warrior in full plate could still be hurt by an average sword blow, but historically a solid blow from a sword, axe or mace *would* hurt even a fighter in full plate.

Weapon Finesse would add half the DX bonus to attack rolls (round up) and half the DX bonus as Penetration (reducing armour DR; round down.)

If both 'external' and 'natural' armours are used, the DRs stack, but the AC bonus is only equal to the AC bonus of the external armour.

 

[MonkeyBoy]

...

I'm going to make 2 half-posts I think; first up are just some random bits of other system's thinking on armor that might be worth mulling over while thinking about this. Then I'll make my actual thoughts on this a seperate post.

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay had armor reduce damage; the lighter armors only provided protection against less damaging blows. It had just 3 levels of armor; leather, chain and plate (which was kind of special, i'll explainin a sec)

Chain was the basis of the system, it reduced damage by 1 point per hit, every hit. (damage was d6 + strength, strength being from about 2 to 7 ish)

Leather would give 1 point of reduction, but only if the damage was less than 5 points anway.

Plate was modeled as being another 1 point reduction to all damage, you were expected to put plates over your chain. ('twas a piecemeal armor system)

---

IIRC correctly rolemaster (spit!) uses the concept that heavier armor makes you hit MORE often, but less severely.

 

[MonkeyBoy]

...

OK, some devils advocacy, and some random thoughts:

Why not a variable amount of damage reduction?

For example, maybe leather gives d2-1 damage reduction on a hit, but field plate gives 3d4 damage reduction?

If you need to add armor penetration to weapons then it can be represented as a modifier to that roll.

For example a longsword might not have a modifier, but a heavy crosbow might be -4, or more.

That might give the little margin of extra leeway in balancing things.

IMO, it would be best to avoid changing or adding to the stats for weapons if at all possible; otherwise people ned to create these new values for any extra weapons they use.

In the same vein it would be better to avoid adding stats to armor - same reason.

If you create a table linking overall AC value from armor, and the new damage reduction value it lets everyone easily use the rule with their chosen bits and pieces.

Similarly if you can calculate any armor penetration from the weapon's existing stats that helps again.

For the same reason I'd personally advise against redefining too much of the to hit mechanic or armor calculation mechanic. At least if you do, make it a seperate house rule - then DMs can pick bits that they like, without needing to pull in the multiple other changes that fix things just to preserve the balance of the first change.

 

[orangefruitbat]

Thanks for all the comments. It’s good to see similar ideas from fellow great minds.

Upper-Krust
I’d been avoiding the Worshiper_point thread, due to its extreme length. Maybe I should give it a try.
I’m not so sure that simply doubling the penetration value of piercing weapons is a good idea. That would make a rapier more dangerous to an opponent in plate than a 2-handed axe. Using the critical multiplier provides a nice distinction between heavy-hitting weapons (axes, spears, picks, arrows), and precise weapons (swords, daggers).

Malin
I like that idea of splitting armor between deflection and protection – it provides for decent protection without making characters invulnerable. I’d have to eliminate my armor penetration values for weapons (which I’m rather partially to), otherwise even heavy armor would be virtually useless.
How accurate is the notion that someone in plate would be hurt by the average sword blow? Does armor give away like tinfoil, or does it provide significant protection that is hard to overcome? How many blows did it normally take to bring someone down? If we had a good baseline, then we could model our armor values better.

Monkeyboy.
There’s a lot of things I love about Warhammer FRP, particularly the elegant way it does hit locations and its critical hits table. In fact, I plan to use a modified version of the criticals table for characters who drop below 0 hp (rather than just go unconscious).

Unfortunately, I don’t really like their armor system. Armor is of little importance relative to Toughness (aka, the naked dwarf syndrome). Furthermore, since armor only gives you 0/1, 1, or 2 pts of coverage, it’s hard to model all the different armors in DnD.
I also don’t want to have to roll for armor protection. Rolling for armor protection provides variability in coverage (good), but adds another roll, slowing down combat (bad).

I'm now also trying to make my house rules modular. That's why I want to separate damage/armor rules from wound tables, etc. My first post didn't do a good job of that.

 

[MonkeyBoy]

>>
How accurate is the notion that someone in plate would be hurt by the average sword blow? Does armor give away like tinfoil, or does it provide significant protection that is hard to overcome? How many blows did it normally take to bring someone down? If we had a good baseline, then we could model our armor values better.
<<

Personally, I disbelieve the concept that an "average" sword blow would damage someone in Plate.

This is based on a few differenct things; having seen the stuff, hving worn (i.e. felt the weight of metal in) chain, which plates go on top of, and finally the fact that plate armor was historically frequently "proved" by testing against point blank crossbow and hand-gun shots. (the suits I've seen hve included the marks from this process - the armor has to not be pierced to pass)

Now, thats not to say that the character wouldn't be HURT, but thats different from being DAMAGED. That distinction is part of why armor provides AC in DND, and why high level fighters have so many HP...

(if you punch your leg, it hurts a bit, but unless you got carried away you shouldn't have damaged yourself!)

Now, some weapons are specifically designed to punch through armor - i'm thinking of bodkin arrows, quarrels and military picks. Some are designed to damage despite the armor - i'm thinking of clubs, maces, hammers and the like. Finally some are designed to work optimally against lightly or unarmored foes - this is where axes and swords (specifically slashing blades) feature.

Take arrows; to cause maximum damage, you'd likely use a broadhead, or even a barbed arrow; bigger hole = more bleeding = more damage. But to punch through armor you use a bodkin (closer to target arrows), but you sacrifice damage (smaller hole) to get through the armor (apply your force to a smaller area). The same notions hold true right through to FMJ vs KTW bullets, for your modern games.

Bludgeoning weapons work through armor by using the fact that the force of an impact will be transmitted through the armor to the person inside, hence they can still concuss and break bones through plate

Slashing weapons, well obviously they expect to cut; hard armor works pretty good against them. But they cause the most swiftly debilitating damage to unarmored opponents. (being able to sever extremeties, cut muscles and tendons and being able to cut arteries without needing to get such a small area to it as a piercing weapon does)
Remember that a real full-plate setup is really going to be (taking chest as an example, inside to out);

Arming Jacket - padded, protects versus bludeoning a bit.
Chainmail - protects well versus slashing weapons.
Breatplate - angles of plate deflect blows and especially piercing weapons.

(thats why plate suits have bird-like chests on them; better deflection)

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi all!

Good thread this!

Thanks for all the comments. It’s good to see similar ideas from fellow great minds.

Upper-Krust
I’d been avoiding the Worshiper_point thread, due to its extreme length.

It is something of an unwieldy beast. I may iminently restart the thread!?

Maybe I should give it a try.

Well its centred around Immortal characters/rules - the Optional Armour rules I mentioned are to be included within an Appendix at the back of the .pdf/book.

The reason I tackled the subject was because I needed logical rules to explain the natural armour of Outsiders because immortals are capable of augmenting their natural armour.

So to explain the natural armour of a succubus you have to predetermine what is natural armour and what is supernatural deflection.

In the WPS thread I have a simple mechanic for this process:

Firstly consider that all Outsiders gain a Supernatural Deflection bonus equal to their HD (in place of NA adding to AC).

Then decide skin type and size to determine natural armor:

Skin Type

Gaseous/Incandescent/Incorporeal (no armor)* +0
Liquid/Fluid (no armor)** +0
Normal Skin (no armor) +0
Leathery/Blubbery (akin to light armor) +2 (typically)
Scaly/Tough (akin to medium armor) +5 (typically)
Carapace/Plated (akin to heavy armor) +8 (typically)
Material Hardness As material
*Treat as Incorporeal and Immune to Critical Hits.
**Treat as Immune to Critical Hits.

Size

The second factor is the creatures size.
• Gaseous or Liquid biologies (see above) are unnaffected by increases in size. Only solids are affected.

Fine skin type ÷4 then -14
Diminutive skin type ÷3 then -9
Tiny skin type ÷2 then -5
Small skin type ÷1.5 then -2
Medium skin type x1 same
Large skin type x1.5 then +2
Huge skin type x2 then +5
Gargantuan skin type x3 then +9
Colossal skin type x4 then +14

So nothing of diminutive or fine size will have (literal) natural armour good enough to absorb damage from opponents using the current damage rules (even if they wear platemail for their size it wouldn't prevent 1hp damage).

Even if you assume an ant is effectively wearing platemail (for its size) for the purposes of how we rate damage and armour it won't have any bearing when the game mechanics are medium size-centric!

Also a byproduct of size is:

Colossal -14 Dex
Gargantuan -9 Dex
Huge -5 Dex
Large -2 Dex
Medium +/- 0 Dex
Small Size +2 Dex
Tiny Size +5 Dex
Diminutive Size +9 Dex
Fine Size +14 Dex

I’m not so sure that simply doubling the penetration value of piercing weapons is a good idea. That would make a rapier more dangerous to an opponent in plate than a 2-handed axe. Using the critical multiplier provides a nice distinction between heavy-hitting weapons (axes, spears, picks, arrows), and precise weapons (swords, daggers).

I concur. After consideration I am not changing the penetration value for piercing weapons.

Technically, critical threat range and multiplier should decide armor penetration.

Malin
I like that idea of splitting armor between deflection and protection - it provides for decent protection without making characters invulnerable. I’d have to eliminate my armor penetration values for weapons (which I’m rather partially to), otherwise even heavy armor would be virtually useless..

I don't think this will work.

How accurate is the notion that someone in plate would be hurt by the average sword blow? Does armor give away like tinfoil, or does it provide significant protection that is hard to overcome? How many blows did it normally take to bring someone down? If we had a good baseline, then we could model our armor values better

Exactly. chances are a dagger won't penetrate Full Platemail unless it scores a critical hit. Which is probably the way it should be.

 

[Infinite Monkey]

In the interestes of simplicity, how about this for penetration values...

Take either (20 - threat range) or (crit mult -2) and double it. THis is the weapons penetration.

So a great axe (20/x3) would have (3 - 2) * 2 = 2pts of penetration, cause you hit the armoured guy so hard.

and a rapier (18-20/x2) (I may have that wrong) would have (20 - 18) * 2 = 4 pts of penetration, cause you hit the armoured guy so accurately.

Weapons with 20/x2 crits have no penetration.

 

[Infinite Monkey]

Another thought, to make light armour more useful. Ona non-critical hit, you can penetrate no more that half of the armours penetration. So if you hit armour that gives you DR 2 with a weapon with penetration 2, you still have DR 1, because you can't get past more than half the DR. Critical hits can ignore the entire DR, so long as they have enough penetration.

Reasoning is that on usual hits, you will still expend some of the force of the blow on smashing into / poking through the armour.