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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 1679026" data-attributes="member: 3146">You're right that it's the kind of realism that gives systems a bad name. However, let's not pretend that a flanged mace, a wooden club, a quarterstaff, a flail, and a warhammer are equally effective against fullplate. One of the primary differences between a club and a mace is the mace's superior ability to penetrate armor. Nor should we pretend that an arming sword, a falchion, a battle axe, a greatsword, and a halberd are equally effective against fullplate. One of the reasons that falchions were developed was to better concentrate the force of a blow and to penetrate armor. Similarly, as I understand it, hand and a half swords developed when arming swords began to have greater difficulty penetrating armor.Dividing weapon vs. armor effectiveness into slashing, bludgeoning, and piercing may be more complex than simply giving armor equal defense against all three categories but I don't see it as being any more realistic. Added complexity without added realism or playability is a bad thing in my book. Just because the 1e weapon vs. armor type chart was not conducive to play doesn't mean that the simpler classification system is an improvement. If the selling point of tracking three armor classes rather than one is realism, I want the system to actually be more realistic than what it replaces.Fair enough. I guess I can see that. However, it seems like it would overly advantage two handed weapons unless it were coupled with adequate rules for shields. 3e is a lot better in that regard than previous editions but adding a 7.5' reach increment would be a big push back towards the previous editions where shields were really only good if they had massive magical bonusses.Actually, I think swapping out power attack (and, to a lesser extent, cleave) would go a long way towards allaying some of my concerns. Power Attack is, IMO, the biggest failing of the armor as DR systems I've seen presented since, with 3.5 power attack an Unearthed Arcana style armor as DR system trades 4 points of AC from fullplate for 4 points of DR. This works fine until the barbarian with the greataxe power attacks for three, does more damage to you than before and still has a better chance of hitting than he did before. If you replace power attack with other feats, I think the resulting system probably has a better chance of being balanced.I suppose so. It's really too bad these are being sold as a pdf. They're the kind of thing I'd want to pick up and read through in a store before making a purchasing decision rather than buying sight unseen.</blockquote>

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