Combat/To-Hit Matrix

[Storminator]

The attack tables aren't perfectly formulaic. Mostly they improve by 2 points when you move a column, but occasionally they move by one, and the pattern isn't precise. There's also the repeat 20 issue. That makes it hard to have a simple BAB vs AC conversion.

Having a look up table instead of a formula does give the game designer more control of how things scale at the ends of things. One could replicate that with a formula, but it would become pretty unusable pretty quickly.

I had remembered monsters hitting better than PCs, but looking at the chart last night it seems like they essentially use the fighter table with a few extra entries for weird hit dice like 1-1, 1+, etc.

PS

 

[jaz0nj4ckal]

I might have called what I was thinking of by the wrong name, since I only saw it once, and I thought it was the THAC0 progression. I just happened to stop off at a used-books store on the way home, and found AD&D Oriental Adventures 1st Ed. The attached image is a snippet of what I was talking about. I think I should have called it weapons bonus/penalty against armor.



What really started this idea - I am thinking about making a similar table for some other weapons, but I cannot determine how to balance new weapons. I have been thinking of just modelling weapons off particular existing number/weapons, but wanted to see how others achieved adding new weapons.

Thanks
JJ

 

[Jan van Leyden]

Be carefull with this table! It isn't exactly as it looks like.

The modifications for a weapon don't depend on Armour Class, but on Armor Type. It should model the effectiveness of different wepaons against the way armours were built and probably some consideration of speed an maneuverability. So the table isn't meant to be balanced, but to realisitcally protray the weapons.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Be carefull with this table! It isn't exactly as it looks like.

The modifications for a weapon don't depend on Armour Class, but on Armor Type. It should model the effectiveness of different wepaons against the way armours were built and probably some consideration of speed an maneuverability. So the table isn't meant to be balanced, but to realisitcally protray the weapons.

Yarp. This is the old when is AC not AC issue. A swift moving creature might have AC 5 (due to speed) but could use the chart as AC 10 because it's skin wasn't equal to chain. Even only using armor, the added confusion of shields lowering AC (but not armor type!) by one made these tables a hot mess and it is no small wonder that they were abandoned by a lot of groups.

 

[billd91]

Second edition AD&D took a couple of steps back from the 1e tables. They highlighted the fact that they were optional and they grouped the table based on weapon type, like so:

Table 36: Weapon Type Vs. Armor Modifiers (DMG, table 52 in the PH)
[table="width: 500"]
[tr]
[td]Armor Type[/td]
[td]Slash[/td]
[td]Pierce[/td]
[td]Bludgeon[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Banded mail[/td]
[td]+2[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Brigandine[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Chain mail*[/td]
[td]+2[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[td]-2[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Field Plate[/td]
[td]+3[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Full Plate[/td]
[td]+4[/td]
[td]+3[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Leather armor**[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[td]-2[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Plate mail[/td]
[td]+3[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Ring mail[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Scale mail[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Splint mail[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]+2[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Studded leather[/td]
[td]+2[/td]
[td]+1[/td]
[td]0[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]
* Includes bronze plate mail
** Includes padded armor and hides

While this is easier in many ways because you're no longer referring to AC type by its number, it fails to differentiate between light and heavy versions of the respective weapons. Bludgeoning weapons fare well on the chart here, but in 1e often do well (morning star, footman's mace) or poorly (fist, bo stick) depending on whether or not the weapon is "heavy" or not.

The other difference is the application of the adjustment. The modifiers in 1e effectively applied to the die roll to hit while the 2e ones were applied to the THAC0, not the attack roll. They were written in opposite terms.

 

[Storminator]

@jaz0nj4ckal, there's a similar table in the 1e PHB for the basic weapons. Game balance was not a factor!

This is one of those cool ideas that didn't work well in practice. Most of my D&D games were PCs vs monsters. Where's the "claw" and "bite" entries?! What kind of armor do I use for giant alligator scales? What about a lizardman wearing leather armor? gah!

Until I've recently been looking over the rules I had forgotten just how fiddly 1e was - and how many of the rules we routinely ignored. And how hard it is to tease the rules out of the text.

Frex, do to-hit bonuses get added to the die roll or subtracted off the AC (and by subtracted I mean the AC goes up, of course!)? Near as I can tell there's a line in the DMG that says you can use either method - just be consistent. Counter to what I've seen in this thread.

And if you can find a copy of Dragon 74 there's a spiffy Combat Computer that indexes your class/level vs AC and simultaneously pulls out the weapon vs armor modifier. We used that thing all the time once we found it.

PS

 

[TerraDave]

Ah, that is different.

One of the posters already touched on that, before you posted it, so a testament to the power of ENWorld.

That table, which is only in some 1E books and not in O/B/X/BCMI D&D and was clearly optional (again, see above) in 2E, was meant to capture the fact that maces where good against chain, or some weapons piercing and heavy weapons were good against plate, and so forth. It was rooted in historical research (up to a point) and that some warriors would use a range of weapons, depending on the opponent, and different weapons dominated at different times, for the same reason.

Not used much in play. In a game of monsters and magic, the situations where you really need to get your mace out vs your sword just don't come up that much. And that particular table is not that user friendly.

But I remember being intrigued by it. There was a palladium product that had a pretty good interpretation, and its the sort of thing that would work better if armor reduced damage instead of avoiding hits...but now we are talking about another game.

 

[TerraDave]

Yeah, the weapon vs AC table was intended to further differenciate the weapons. For example, a polarm like a Bec de Corbin was designed quite specifically to crack plate armour so it actually had a bonus to hit lower AC's. Some blunt weapons like maces and the like had bonus' against mid range AC's to simulate their effectiveness against flexable armour like chainmail.

This is the post...even before the clarification.

 

[Jan van Leyden]

I actually used the table at the beginning of my very first campaign, but without noticing the difference between armor class and armor type. I made a character sheet with a to-hit line for each weapon, so the bookkeeping wasn't a big problem. Well, most of the players didn't care. One looked into it and showed me that I'd exchanged bonus and penalty . So the rule was thrown in the basket laebeld Obscure and Optional.

 

[jaz0nj4ckal]

Thanks everyone!!!

I guess I am playing too much Classic Traveller these days, and it reminded me at one time seeing something similar to AD&D 1e.