[Rant] Armor as DR is bad !

[Ace]

Armor as DR is bad-- Drifty

Seeing as how the giant example is becoming prevelant, you can see how DnD is not a realistic system in any way. If you get hit by a large chunk of wood moving at high speed, a good solid hit will shatter your bones and kill. Squish, you're dead, roll new character. Since this is not the case, realism is gone.

Just because of that, I don't feel DR should apply. Wearing Plate or Leather won't matter when that giant club hits you with the force of a car travelling at speed. Whichever you're wearing, you are not going to walk away. In fact, the leather would be better as you can move out of the way easier and avoid the hit all together, or at least roll with it, in which case you only have some of your bones shattered.

The only game system I have seen that takes this into account is The Riddle of Steel which was written by an Jake Norwood

Jake was a martial artist trained in Medieval weapons

The game was realistic enough to get the AEMMA (Academy of European Martial Artists) http://www.aemma.org/ seal of approval. Not bad

I used to have copy. The combat was very cool Man to Man, brutal to no end especially without armor.

When I used the simulator Man vs Small (12 foot) Giant unless I got rather lucky with a polearm or a great sword was well SPLATT- In one blow from the ginat

The only way I could take the giant out was to build a "Jack" high dex, high skill with a big weapon and get lucky. Armor (which slows you down) was a downright hazzrd and worse than useless. You can test the system out here

http://www.theriddleofsteel.net/

Just be warned

Riddle is a brutal system where one sip can result in maiming or death.

Just like real sword play.

If you like D&D meele, bugs and all you probably won't like Riddle

 

[AnthonyJ]

Read the rest of the post. I said MODERN rifles will blow through armour. NOT muskets and such.

I read the rest of that post. My point is that your statement, while true, is completely irrelevant.

 

[Aaron2]

Now another statement: Rapiers were not developped after armour became obsolete. They were in use since 2000 years B.C. (bronze rapiers from Kurgan for example). They got more common as armour disappeared, but they were NOT new.

Bronze age thrusting swords [rapiers] were only made because no good way of attaching swords to their hilts had been invented yet. The lateral stress of a chopping action ripped them apart. The vast majority of this type of weapon found have been broken at the hilt. Once the tang was invented, this type of weapon completely disappeared. The rapier is not the descendent of these early thrusting swords.

I saw one in Athens this summer. They resemble an elongated spear point much more than a rapier.


Aaron

 

[Aaron2]

If you're wearing full plate, the chances of a hit by the giant should be roughly 95%. (You can't dodge anything, period.)

Who invented this notion that people wearing plate armor are somehow immovable? Everything I've seen indicates that just isn't true. The Royal Armory in Leeds has some great vidoes of people moving about (mock fighting) in actual period armor. Looks fast enough to me.


Aaron

 

[KarinsDad]

Who invented this notion that people wearing plate armor are somehow immovable? Everything I've seen indicates that just isn't true. The Royal Armory in Leeds has some great vidoes of people moving about (mock fighting) in actual period armor. Looks fast enough to me.

It is not that you are immobile, it is that you are less mobile.

I haven't had period armor on, but I went backpacking on numerous occasions with a 45 pound pack and quick movement in heavier armor is something you just cannot do. Sure, you may be able to dodge a single blow, but you'll have a hard time avoiding more than one. The other problem is one of stopping yourself. Once you get heavier armor in motion in a given direction, it takes time and effort to get it to stop moving in that direction and moving into a new direction. Hence, movement in armor, especially heavy armor, is predictable. You feint someone in heavy armor into attacking straight ahead and your next blow is nearly impossible to miss (it may not penetrate, but you can practically guarantee a hit unless your opponent parries or something).

 

[Enkhidu]

It is not that you are immobile, it is that you are less mobile.

I haven't had period armor on, but I went backpacking on numerous occasions with a 45 pound pack and quick movement in heavier armor is something you just cannot do. Sure, you may be able to dodge a single blow, but you'll have a hard time avoiding more than one. The other problem is one of stopping yourself. Once you get heavier armor in motion in a given direction, it takes time and effort to get it to stop moving in that direction and moving into a new direction. Hence, movement in armor, especially heavy armor, is predictable. You feint someone in heavy armor into attacking straight ahead and your next blow is nearly impossible to miss (it may not penetrate, but you can practically guarantee a hit unless your opponent parries or something).

With all due respect, this isn't exactly true. While a person in up to 60 pounds of gear certainly won't move quite as quickly as if they were unencumbered, armor (especially plate armor circa late 1300s and onward) had weight distributed in such a way that it rested on various parts of the body. For example, a chain hauberk rested on both the shoulders and the waist/hips if worn properly (with a strong and wide belt), while a late period plate harness rested on shoulders, hips, arms, and legs. This distribution of weight allowed people to have only slightly slower movements than an unarmored counterpart (assuming that both were otherwise healthy and hardy specimens).

However, you are not incorrect in assuming that wearing armor does get you hit more often. Its a simple matter of torso and joint flexibility. While an unarmored fighter could bend shoulder and torso away from a potentially harmful blow, a heavily armored fighter simply does not have the range of motion required for that movement, and as such relies on a combination of the armor and whatever skill he has in rolling with a blow.

 

[KarinsDad]

With all due respect, this isn't exactly true. While a person in up to 60 pounds of gear certainly won't move quite as quickly as if they were unencumbered, armor (especially plate armor circa late 1300s and onward) had weight distributed in such a way that it rested on various parts of the body. For example, a chain hauberk rested on both the shoulders and the waist/hips if worn properly (with a strong and wide belt), while a late period plate harness rested on shoulders, hips, arms, and legs. This distribution of weight allowed people to have only slightly slower movements than an unarmored counterpart (assuming that both were otherwise healthy and hardy specimens).

However, you are not incorrect in assuming that wearing armor does get you hit more often. Its a simple matter of torso and joint flexibility. While an unarmored fighter could bend shoulder and torso away from a potentially harmful blow, a heavily armored fighter simply does not have the range of motion required for that movement, and as such relies on a combination of the armor and whatever skill he has in rolling with a blow.

It is not ao much a matter of flexibility. The flexibility of armor, even heavy armor, was relatively good (except for a breastplate for the torso). It had to be in order to be useable.

The real issues are weight and heat. DND does not have a minimum STR for various armors, but they should (ditto for weapons). An extra 5 pounds of armor on your arm is going to slow up your sword ever so slightly, especially over time. They should also have a minimum CON for armor in DND. The moment you start fighting, you start generating a lot of body heat in what is basically a self contained oven. There is a lot of insulation and very little ventilation in armor.

Look at the NFL. Those guys are in the equivalent of light weight (i.e. padded) armor, "fighting" for 15 to 20 minutes out of 3 hours with many rests in between. They do not have nearly the weight, mobility, or heat issues of real armor (although the lack of ventilation can result in players losing 5 to 15 pounds of water during a game if they do not rehydrate) and they are still fairly fatigued each week after a game (or a practice).

Fatigued combatants, just like fatigued football players, are less coordinated, have decreased reaction times, are more prone to mental errors, etc.

On the issue of weight, I do not disagree with you that the weight itself did not prevent most types of movement of action. If it did, the armor would have been fairly useless. What it did, though, was slow that movement of action ever so slightly. In DND terms, what that should mean is that heavier armor results in a slight penalty to hit and on the chance to get hit (at least in a DR system of DND).

 

[Enkhidu]

It is not ao much a matter of flexibility. The flexibility of armor, even heavy armor, was relatively good (except for a breastplate for the torso). It had to be in order to be useable.

Uhhh, 7 years of beating on my friends with sticks (in the SCA) has crtainly told me differently. The biggest decision with what armor to wear was always a question of flexibility vs. protectiveness. Protecting a joint with even a well articulated cop made it extrememly difficult to move in ways that became easy with lighter or no armor.

The real issues are weight and heat. DND does not have a minimum STR for various armors, but they should (ditto for weapons). An extra 5 pounds of armor on your arm is going to slow up your sword ever so slightly, especially over time. They should also have a minimum CON for armor in DND. The moment you start fighting, you start generating a lot of body heat in what is basically a self contained oven. There is a lot of insulation and very little ventilation in armor.

Now that one your right about. The additional weight and the heat factor are sizable (and I think the best way to deal with this in d20 terms would be to say that combat is a fatigueing exercise, much like swimming or running).

Look at the NFL. Those guys are in the equivalent of light weight (i.e. padded) armor, "fighting" for 15 to 20 minutes out of 3 hours with many rests in between. They do not have nearly the weight, mobility, or heat issues of real armor (although the lack of ventilation can result in players losing 5 to 15 pounds of water during a game if they do not rehydrate) and they are still fairly fatigued each week after a game (or a practice).

And its worse than that - football players wear the protective equivelent of leather armor!

Fatigued combatants, just like fatigued football players, are less coordinated, have decreased reaction times, are more prone to mental errors, etc.

On the issue of weight, I do not disagree with you that the weight itself did not prevent most types of movement of action. If it did, the armor would have been fairly useless. What it did, though, was slow that movement of action ever so slightly. In DND terms, what that should mean is that heavier armor results in a slight penalty to hit and on the chance to get hit (at least in a DR system of DND).

I disagree with penalties to hit when in heavy armor: IMO the fatigue rule would better model what you're looking for.

 

[KarinsDad]

Uhhh, 7 years of beating on my friends with sticks (in the SCA) has crtainly told me differently. The biggest decision with what armor to wear was always a question of flexibility vs. protectiveness. Protecting a joint with even a well articulated cop made it extrememly difficult to move in ways that became easy with lighter or no armor.

...

I disagree with penalties to hit when in heavy armor: IMO the fatigue rule would better model what you're looking for.

So, let me see if I understand you.

You think that highly protective armor is less flexible, but this lack of flexibility should not result in a lack of ability to hit or to parry?

Are you saying that any flexibility lost due to more protective armor is irrelevant to the flexibility needed for combat?

 

[frankthedm]

People really should give BRP a chance. Armor sucks up damage and you survive by avoiding getting hit rather than being able to be hit lots of times.