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Why do guns do so much damage?
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<blockquote data-quote="DammitVictor" data-source="post: 8294927" data-attributes="member: 6750908"><p>A big part of our problem is that when we talk about weapon damage, we talk about fatigue and wearing a combatant down until the one crucial strike that turns their birthdays off-- and whether we're talking blades or bullets, armed combat just doesn't work that way. If a knife fight or a gunfight somehow lasts longer than six seconds... well, there's the shots/strikes that <em>end the fight</em> and there's the shots/strikes that <em>don't matter</em>.</p><p></p><p>Brain, heart, lungs, spleen, liver, kidneys, spine... those will end the fight immediately, maybe lethally. Major arteries in the shoulder and inner thigh, you're dead within a minute, but you're still fighting that whole time. Bladder, bowel, intestine, those will kill you in <em>three or four days</em> with only a marginal decrease in your ability to sustain a firefight. (I would imagine the pain would be more of a hindrance to melee, but...)</p><p></p><p>But the defensive wounds you get all up and down your hands and forearms from a prolonged knife fight? They're not what's slowing you down. Long, shallow cuts along the outside of your forearms will never kill you, and they'll only have a serious effect on your ability to keep defending yourself if they catch the tendons in your wrists, or if you're not wearing gloves when the blood starts flowing. It's the effort of defending yourself that wears you down, and from personal experience-- years and years of personal experience-- there isn't that much difference between stiletto fighting and flamberge fighting because they're all wrestling anyway.</p><p></p><p>If you take one bullet in a vital region, you fall down and stop fighting and probably die. If you take one bullet in a non-vital region, you keep fighting and you go to the ER afterwards and... there really isn't a whole lot of <em>in between </em>as far as gunshot wounds go. If you take <em>thirty </em>bullets in non-vital areas, and nothing touches the birthday control centers, you <em>walk to the trauma surgery yourself</em> and you're home in time to get enough free drinks to offset your hospital bill.</p><p></p><p>D&D combat most resembles a boxing match, and the reason boxing matches last as long as they do is that the rules don't allow the means to end them faster. You can't land a knockout punch on a well-trained and well-prepared opponent until you've compromised their ability to resist you, until they can't get their hands up or their chin down fast enough to stop you.</p><p></p><p>Ironically, in the <em>d20 Modern </em>rules, they took <em>the one thing</em> that the D&D combat system actually represented well... and made it use a wholly different subsystem.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Does it really change anything, though? Whatever the class values were, they'd still have to be adjusted to compensate for weapon special properties and handedness</p><p></p><p></p><p>That's why if I'm ever challenged to a duel and forced to choose weapons, I have two options in mind: if I actually want to hurt the son of a bitch, I'm pretty confident in my prowess with the Italian smallsword. And if I'd rather not have to fight the duel at all, I'm pretty confident nobody's ever going to be mad enough at me to follow through with a duel after I've chosen the <em>flammenwerfer</em>.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Problem is that AD&D, 3.PF, and 5e have all, frustratingly, done the exact opposite of this.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>And <em>shields</em>, shields are dramatically and tragically underrated. As long as your enemies are in front of you, a good stout shield is better than head-to-toe <em>maille</em> and gives you the option of trading your arming sword up for nice hammer or axe.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Worth noting that AD&D considered fighting humans by <em>spitting needles at them</em> to be a perfectly cromulent fighting style.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="DammitVictor, post: 8294927, member: 6750908"] A big part of our problem is that when we talk about weapon damage, we talk about fatigue and wearing a combatant down until the one crucial strike that turns their birthdays off-- and whether we're talking blades or bullets, armed combat just doesn't work that way. If a knife fight or a gunfight somehow lasts longer than six seconds... well, there's the shots/strikes that [I]end the fight[/I] and there's the shots/strikes that [I]don't matter[/I]. Brain, heart, lungs, spleen, liver, kidneys, spine... those will end the fight immediately, maybe lethally. Major arteries in the shoulder and inner thigh, you're dead within a minute, but you're still fighting that whole time. Bladder, bowel, intestine, those will kill you in [I]three or four days[/I] with only a marginal decrease in your ability to sustain a firefight. (I would imagine the pain would be more of a hindrance to melee, but...) But the defensive wounds you get all up and down your hands and forearms from a prolonged knife fight? They're not what's slowing you down. Long, shallow cuts along the outside of your forearms will never kill you, and they'll only have a serious effect on your ability to keep defending yourself if they catch the tendons in your wrists, or if you're not wearing gloves when the blood starts flowing. It's the effort of defending yourself that wears you down, and from personal experience-- years and years of personal experience-- there isn't that much difference between stiletto fighting and flamberge fighting because they're all wrestling anyway. If you take one bullet in a vital region, you fall down and stop fighting and probably die. If you take one bullet in a non-vital region, you keep fighting and you go to the ER afterwards and... there really isn't a whole lot of [I]in between [/I]as far as gunshot wounds go. If you take [I]thirty [/I]bullets in non-vital areas, and nothing touches the birthday control centers, you [I]walk to the trauma surgery yourself[/I] and you're home in time to get enough free drinks to offset your hospital bill. D&D combat most resembles a boxing match, and the reason boxing matches last as long as they do is that the rules don't allow the means to end them faster. You can't land a knockout punch on a well-trained and well-prepared opponent until you've compromised their ability to resist you, until they can't get their hands up or their chin down fast enough to stop you. Ironically, in the [I]d20 Modern [/I]rules, they took [I]the one thing[/I] that the D&D combat system actually represented well... and made it use a wholly different subsystem. Does it really change anything, though? Whatever the class values were, they'd still have to be adjusted to compensate for weapon special properties and handedness That's why if I'm ever challenged to a duel and forced to choose weapons, I have two options in mind: if I actually want to hurt the son of a bitch, I'm pretty confident in my prowess with the Italian smallsword. And if I'd rather not have to fight the duel at all, I'm pretty confident nobody's ever going to be mad enough at me to follow through with a duel after I've chosen the [I]flammenwerfer[/I]. Problem is that AD&D, 3.PF, and 5e have all, frustratingly, done the exact opposite of this. And [I]shields[/I], shields are dramatically and tragically underrated. As long as your enemies are in front of you, a good stout shield is better than head-to-toe [I]maille[/I] and gives you the option of trading your arming sword up for nice hammer or axe. Worth noting that AD&D considered fighting humans by [I]spitting needles at them[/I] to be a perfectly cromulent fighting style. [/QUOTE]
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