[Rant] Armor as DR is bad !

[Geocorona]

Re: Re: [Rant] Armor as DR is bad !

A rapier is pretty ineffective against plate armour in real life... A pistol is great against armour.

I doubt the wide use of the rapier or foil in latter medieval times could have happened without the coevolution of firearms, which made armor obsolete. True to their name, there would have been no musketeers without muskets.

 

[Gez]

I pity da fool.

 

[Pbartender]

Here's why D&D is more realistic. With armor as DR, you will only be able to hurt people with the biggest weapons. Unless you've Conan-like strength, you're not going to ever hurt a full-plate armored guy with a dagger.

And that's where the irrealism lies. Daggers were created to pierce armors, because larger, less precise weapons couldn't be used to target the holes in the articulations. Against heavy armor, daggers were the most efficient weapons. With armor as DR, they are the least.

Coup de gras.

Those articulated weak spots were still hard to hit, with the knight moving around or on horse back. The most common dagger tactic (especially amongst the common infantry) was to pull a knight off his horse with a hooked polearm (or any other means available). Once the knight was on his back like an overturned turtle, it was trival to sit on his chest and slide a dagger through his visor slit. Of course, if you had a knight in that position, you'd normally be better off forcing him to yeild and ransoming him back to his family, but the low-born weren't always very aware of the worth of captured nobility.

Also consider that in historical real life most knights only wore arms and armor (even light armor) during combat. In daily life, only normal clothing was worn, sometimes a sword, but more likely a more useful and compact dagger as a self-defense weapon.

 

[KarinsDad]

A very popular house rule is using armor as a damage reduction factor, rather than as the damage avoidance factor it is in D&D.

Here's why D&D is more realistic

More realistic???

hehehe

You've got to be kidding.

More realistic would be:

Full Plate: Armor Bonus +0: DR: +8
Half Plate: Armor Bonus +1: DR: +7
Splint/Banded: Armor Bonus +2: DR: +6
Breastplate/Chainmail: Armor Bonus +3: DR: +5
Scale Mail/Chain Shirt: Armor Bonus +4: DR: +4
Hide/Studded Leather: Armor Bonus +5: DR: +3
Leather: Armor Bonus +6: DR: +2
Padded: Armor Bonus +7: DR: +1
No Armor: Armor Bonus +8: DR: +0

Or something to this effect.

 

[hong]

Armour as DR is bad, because one of the core tropes of D&D is a puny six-foot-tall human, waving a three-foot-long sword, killing an 80-foot-long dragon (albeit perhaps with some help). "Realistically" speaking, there's no way the sword should do more than tickle the dragon, but that would be no fun for most D&D gamers.

 

[hong]

Coup de gras.

Reducing combats to who gets the first CdG sounds like a hideous idea to me.

Also consider that in historical real life most knights only wore arms and armor (even light armor) during combat. In daily life, only normal clothing was worn, sometimes a sword, but more likely a more useful and compact dagger as a self-defense weapon.

Consider that the bulk of gaming time in D&D, for the bulk of D&D groups, is probably made up of combat.

 

[Pbartender]

Reducing combats to who gets the first CdG sounds like a hideous idea to me.

Consider that the bulk of gaming time in D&D, for the bulk of D&D groups, is probably made up of combat.

I won't argue with you about that. In fact, I'd whole heartedly agree on both counts.

But hey... I wasn't the one complaining about realism.

 

[Xeriar]

And that's where the irrealism lies. Daggers were created to pierce armors, because larger, less precise weapons couldn't be used to target the holes in the articulations. Against heavy armor, daggers were the most efficient weapons. With armor as DR, they are the least.

You only used daggers on an already down and disarmed knight in full plate, typically in the groin or armpit area - but I don't know of any account where someone seriously took on an armed, standing man in full plate with a dagger and lived.

 

[Xeriar]

I doubt the wide use of the rapier or foil in latter medieval times could have happened without the coevolution of firearms, which made armor obsolete. True to their name, there would have been no musketeers without muskets.

It wasn't a direct effect. Plate armor was great and all - even against pistols and early muskets, but chain well, wasn't.

It simply became too resource inneficient to make armor in general, and it actually passed out of favor before it became outmoded by muskets.

 

[Gez]

Coup de gras.

Hitting people with fat has never been used on the battlefield. Not even sumo resort to that technique. Try again.