Skill Question [Net]
Steve
Does anyone out there in GURPS land know if combat skills such as Net,
Lasso, or Bolas are affected by PD (ie Does PD help your defense)?
Thanks much,
Steve
Magesteff (Steffeny)
> Does anyone out there in GURPS land know if combat skills such as Net,
> Lasso, or Bolas are affected by PD (ie Does PD help your defense)?
Yes to Basic PD before armor, and No, to PD from armor... (just my
opinion)... You can move out of the way of the weapon, but due to the
grappling/area effect nature of such attacks armor will not help you avoid
them because it is not the avoidance of damage .
--
Magesteff
- "Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."
-Albert Einstein
Xiphias Gladius
> Hi all,
> Does anyone out there in GURPS land know if combat skills such as Net,
> Lasso, or Bolas are affected by PD (ie Does PD help your defense)?
Yes, PD does.
Is this realistic? I dunno. Sorta. Probably not. But it's pretty
playable.
- Ian
--
Marriage, n: The state or condition of a community consisting of a master,
a mistress, and two slaves, making, in all, two. -- Ambrose Bierce
http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/ian
SSBB Diplomatic Corps; Boston, Massachusetts
Franz & Michael Köttl
8iuqpc$s3m$9...@hiram.io.com...
> Steve <mcca...@galynx.com> wrote:
> > Hi all,
>
> > Does anyone out there in GURPS land know if combat skills such as Net,
> > Lasso, or Bolas are affected by PD (ie Does PD help your defense)?
>
> Yes, PD does.
>
> Is this realistic? I dunno. Sorta. Probably not. But it's pretty
> playable.
Why shouldn't it be realistic?
PD represents the "flatness" of the armour - how likely lows are to glance
off.
The same flatness will cause the rope to slip off, so it helps.
Q: would oiling your surface increase PD?
--
Just some ideas.
Michael Köttl
prei...@my-deja.com
> > Yes, PD does.
> >
> > Is this realistic? I dunno. Sorta. Probably not. But it's pretty
> > playable.
>
> Why shouldn't it be realistic?
Because reality doesn't work that way? ;)
> PD represents the "flatness" of the armour - how likely lows are to
> glance off.
PD more represents the hardness of the armour (boiled leather may be as
flat as steel plate, but not as hard). I highly doubt whether armour
should give one any greater ability to defend against entanglement
weapons, much less such a large advantage.
IMHO, PD is basically a bad idea, and removing it entirely would make
for a simpler and better game - no "his lasso glances off my plate and
pops up from where it had settled around my neck", no "his 9mm bullets
are deflected by my GAP leather jacket", no "I'm naked so I can't
parry", no "we need special skills for lightly-armoured combatants", no
"we need special rules for rifles against low-tech armour", no "he tried
to tackle me but glanced off my armour", no "how nice, I've got Block-15
and it didn't cost much", no...
(There're a variety of problems that PD causes. AFAICT, dropping PD
altogether, changing shields to give Cover, and basing all parries on
4+skill/2 works much better (hits that glance off the armour are hits
that don't penetrate DR), but YMMV...)
-P
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Franz & Michael Köttl
8jtpo7$3je$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
>
> > > Yes, PD does.
> > >
> > > Is this realistic? I dunno. Sorta. Probably not. But it's pretty
> > > playable.
> >
> > Why shouldn't it be realistic?
>
> Because reality doesn't work that way? ;)
Reality also doesn't have only 16 values for possible outcomes ;-)
> > PD represents the "flatness" of the armour - how likely lows are to
> > glance off.
>
> PD more represents the hardness of the armour (boiled leather may be as
> flat as steel plate, but not as hard).
Partly. The plate has a higher PD than Leather, because the sword can't
scratch and bite into the plate like it can with leather.
But PD also represents flatness, which is IMHO the reason for plate having
higher PD than chain.
> I highly doubt whether armour
> should give one any greater ability to defend against entanglement
> weapons, much less such a large advantage.
This would depend on the method of entanglement. If there is a *reasonable*
chance for the implement of entaglement sliding off because of the
hardness/flatness/slipperyness of the armour, then the PD should factor in.
> IMHO, PD is basically a bad idea, and removing it entirely would make
> for a simpler and better game - no "his lasso glances off my plate and
> pops up from where it had settled around my neck"
Unless it was a called shot to the head, the lasso could also glance off
from the shoulder or some other flat, round part.
It it was a called shot to the head, a dodge which is only successful by PD
would imply, that the lasso glanced off the crown of the helmet.
>, no "his 9mm bullets
> are deflected by my GAP leather jacket"
Leather has PD 2, so you can't be successful on 3d with PD alone. So I would
interpret, that your dodge turned you out of the way enough, that the
bullets met the jacket at a rather flat angle. Remember that spaceships can
even be deflected by atmostphere if the angle is flat enough.
>, no "I'm naked so I can't
> parry",
Nowhere in the rules is this stated. You don't get the bonus for your
armour, as there is no chance of the enemies blade glancing off your metal
plate when you are naked.
> no "we need special skills for lightly-armoured combatants",
We don't need special skills for those. If you use the encumberance rules in
full, the heavily armed combatant will be slower and have lower skills.
> no
> "we need special rules for rifles against low-tech armour",
Do we? IIRC you can dodge only slow moving missiles like thrown objects.
Plate has PD 5, so the chances are ~5% for the bullet glancing off the plate
armour.
> no "he tried
> to tackle me but glanced off my armour"
Which is entirely possible.
Again: Plate alone offers PD 5 for a 5% chance that the opponent glances off
the flat metal. Combined with a Dodge, you can assume, that you would dodge
in such a way as to maximize the effect of your armour.
>, no "how nice, I've got Block-15
> and it didn't cost much", no...
Knights in full plate *had* few enemies on the battlefield.
The were hindered by (a) pikes wich had a longer reach (b) firearms which
mostly ignored their armour.
> (There're a variety of problems that PD causes. AFAICT, dropping PD
> altogether, changing shields to give Cover, and basing all parries on
> 4+skill/2 works much better (hits that glance off the armour are hits
> that don't penetrate DR), but YMMV...)
How would that cover work?
Or do you propose to use the regular rules for missile fire in melee (that
is -4 to hit or something like that)?
prei...@my-deja.com
> Partly. The plate has a higher PD than Leather, because the sword
> can't scratch and bite into the plate like it can with leather.
> But PD also represents flatness, which is IMHO the reason for plate
> having higher PD than chain.
I can make flat armour plates out of CDs, but that doesn't mean they'll
give any PD. I think it's almost exclusively based on non-biteness
(mail isn't really flat, but is hard for blades to bite into; hence the
good PD).
> > I highly doubt whether armour
> > should give one any greater ability to defend against entanglement
> > weapons, much less such a large advantage.
>
> This would depend on the method of entanglement. If there is a
> *reasonable* chance for the implement of entaglement sliding off
> because of the hardness/flatness/slipperyness of the armour, then the
> PD should factor in.
True; however, I don't think there is apt to be such a chance, and
almost certainly not to the extent PD would give it.
With Move 6, Medium Encumbrance, Combat Reflexes, and Light Plate, one
can Dodge 1/3 of lassos, about 90% of which will only be Dodged due to
the plate's PD; IMHO, that's unreasonable.
> It it was a called shot to the head, a dodge which is only successful
> by PD would imply, that the lasso glanced off the crown of the helmet.
Any lasso that would glance off the crown of the helmet would also
glance off the crown of the head (unless the target had huge hair or
something... ;) ).
> >, no "his 9mm bullets
> > are deflected by my GAP leather jacket"
>
> Leather has PD 2, so you can't be successful on 3d with PD alone. So I
I was thinking PD 1, actually - extra-feeble leather jacket - with Move
6 + Retreat (Drop; +3); Dodge of 9- (2/6) without PD or 10- (3/6) with
--> that feeble leather jacket let you dodge 50% more bullets; 1/6 of
all bullets which would have hit glanced off a light leather jacket.
IMHO, this is unreasonable - bullets aren't going to glance off
something like that in any except the most bizarre circumstances.
> interpret, that your dodge turned you out of the way enough, that the
> bullets met the jacket at a rather flat angle. Remember that
An extremely flat angle. An angle so flat that the skin (which is
remarkably hard to penetrate with a bullet; it offers as much resistance
as four inches of muscle, apparently) would likely have deflected it; if
not, it would have been no more than a flesh wound.
> >, no "I'm naked so I can't parry",
>
> Nowhere in the rules is this stated.
Broadsword-15 --> Parry 7 --> no effective parry.
Broadsword-15 + Light Plate --> Parry 11 --> quite effective parry.
Because of the way the rules add in PD, lightly armoured characters have
pathetic defenses and heavily armoured ones have too-high defenses. If
all defenses were 4+skill/2 and armour just gave DR, it'd work out more
smoothly.
> > no "we need special skills for lightly-armoured combatants",
>
> We don't need special skills for those. If you use the encumberance
> rules in full, the heavily armed combatant will be slower and have
> lower skills.
Lower skills? All encumbrance seems to reduce is Move (and thus Dodge),
which doesn't usually make that much difference.
As for whether special skills are needed, see the skilled swordsman
above; without armour, he's got minimal defenses. Similarly, check out
the special Parry rules for lightly armoured characters (aka "Fencing"
and "Karate") - they give a higher Parry limited by an encumbrance
requirement. There has been some suggestion these were meant to give
lightly armoured warriors a reasonable chance of defending themselves.
> > no "we need special rules for rifles against low-tech armour",
>
> Do we? IIRC you can dodge only slow moving missiles like thrown
> objects. Plate has PD 5, so the chances are ~5% for the bullet
> glancing off the plate armour.
Nope - you're described as dodging the attacker's aim (although whether
that's reasonable is often questionable...). The rules I'm referring to
are something like "reduce PD by 1 for each 3d in the attack" from
High-Tech IIRC, which are essentially meant to prevent a 125mm tank
shell from glancing off a knight's breastplate.
> > no "he tried to tackle me but glanced off my armour"
>
> Which is entirely possible.
Then why don't football players wear a light-weight plate-style armour?
That extra 4 PD would make a _huge_ difference in their ability to avoid
a tackle, yet they don't do it. Hmmm...
Probably because it's unlikely to work - a human being isn't going to
"glance off" armour - he'll be too massive and too slow. Armour isn't
going to make it harder to wrap my arms around someone (unless it's
spiked...), nor is it going to prevent my momentum from transferring
into him. PD just isn't going to apply to things like that.
> >, no "how nice, I've got Block-15 and it didn't cost much", no...
>
> Knights in full plate *had* few enemies on the battlefield.
> The were hindered by (a) pikes wich had a longer reach (b) firearms
> which mostly ignored their armour.
ie. they were hindered by things that could _penetrate_ their armour
(overcome their DR) rather than things that could penetrate their
_defenses_ (overcome their Block score).
AFAICT, the most reasonable way to represent the capacity of medieval
armour to protect the wearer from damage is to make it directly take
away from that damage (give it a good DR) rather than in an abstract and
indirect manner (causing an attack to glance off and miss, even when it
makes little sense).
This solves a lot of problems, including all the ones I've listed (DR
doesn't repel lassos, the defenses of both lightly and heavily armoured
folk will be reasonable, no special rules will be needed, bullets and
300-pound men won't "glance off" flimsy leather jackets, and so on).
> > (There're a variety of problems that PD causes. AFAICT, dropping PD
> > altogether, changing shields to give Cover, and basing all parries
> > on 4+skill/2 works much better (hits that glance off the armour are
> > hits that don't penetrate DR), but YMMV...)
>
> How would that cover work?
It's an optional rule from CII; shields give the enemy a -1 to hit for
each point of PD that they used to have.
FWIW, I'm not entirely happy with that rule either, but it helps ratchet
down both defenses and weapon skills to more reasonable levels (skill-16
professionals would have defenses of 12 and attack rolls of 12-16), so
it's an improvement IMHO.
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > Partly. The plate has a higher PD than Leather, because the sword
> > can't scratch and bite into the plate like it can with leather.
> > But PD also represents flatness, which is IMHO the reason for plate
> > having higher PD than chain.
>
> I can make flat armour plates out of CDs, but that doesn't mean they'll
> give any PD. I think it's almost exclusively based on non-biteness
> (mail isn't really flat, but is hard for blades to bite into; hence the
> good PD).
CDs are fragile and tend to break much more easily than plate or even
leather. The numbers for the armour also take into account the sturdyness of
the material used.
> > > I highly doubt whether armour
> > > should give one any greater ability to defend against entanglement
> > > weapons, much less such a large advantage.
> >
> > This would depend on the method of entanglement. If there is a
> > *reasonable* chance for the implement of entaglement sliding off
> > because of the hardness/flatness/slipperyness of the armour, then the
> > PD should factor in.
>
> True; however, I don't think there is apt to be such a chance, and
> almost certainly not to the extent PD would give it.
>
> With Move 6, Medium Encumbrance, Combat Reflexes, and Light Plate, one
> can Dodge 1/3 of lassos, about 90% of which will only be Dodged due to
> the plate's PD; IMHO, that's unreasonable.
Hmmm. I think a posible solution would be a PD-divior for some attacks.
Like we have a DR-divisor for armour-penetrating bullets, we could have a
PD-divisor for attacks which will not glance off as easily as a sword.
(BTW: I can also imagine giving Axes an DR-divisor of 1.2 and Warhammers of
1.5)
> > It it was a called shot to the head, a dodge which is only successful
> > by PD would imply, that the lasso glanced off the crown of the helmet.
>
> Any lasso that would glance off the crown of the helmet would also
> glance off the crown of the head (unless the target had huge hair or
> something... ;) ).
:-)
Maybe. But a metal-helmet is much flatter and slippery than hair. Maybe
baldheads would have a PD ;-)
> > >, no "his 9mm bullets
> > > are deflected by my GAP leather jacket"
> >
> > Leather has PD 2, so you can't be successful on 3d with PD alone. So I
>
> I was thinking PD 1, actually - extra-feeble leather jacket - with Move
> 6 + Retreat (Drop; +3); Dodge of 9- (2/6) without PD or 10- (3/6) with
> --> that feeble leather jacket let you dodge 50% more bullets; 1/6 of
> all bullets which would have hit glanced off a light leather jacket.
> IMHO, this is unreasonable - bullets aren't going to glance off
> something like that in any except the most bizarre circumstances.
This extra-feeble leather jacket is quite sturdy. PD2 DR 2 refers to leather
*armour*.
Also the difference is not that large: (9-)= 37.5%, (10-)=50.0%, which is a
difference of 12.5% and an increase of only 33.3%.
> > interpret, that your dodge turned you out of the way enough, that the
> > bullets met the jacket at a rather flat angle. Remember that
>
> An extremely flat angle. An angle so flat that the skin (which is
> remarkably hard to penetrate with a bullet; it offers as much resistance
> as four inches of muscle, apparently) would likely have deflected it; if
> not, it would have been no more than a flesh wound.
The shooter hits.
You dodge, thus moving your body out of the flight-path of the bullet.
If your dodge was successful, you avoided taking any damage in hitpoints.
You can still say, that you have some nicks and bruises (remember: the
average fist-punch does 1d-3, so most bruises are not worth HP).
If your dodge was not successful, you were hit. If the shooter rolls low on
damage, you have still some bigger wound, with associated bleeding.
Otherwise it would not be associated with HP-damage.
Skin is by definition PD 0 DR 0, Leather jackets are sturdier than that and
offer PD 1 DR 1.
"Flimsy" leather jackets would be equated with clothing and offer PD 0 DR 0,
or if having heavy lining with PD 0 DR 1 like winter clothing.
> > >, no "I'm naked so I can't parry",
> >
> > Nowhere in the rules is this stated.
>
> Broadsword-15 --> Parry 7 --> no effective parry.
>
> Broadsword-15 + Light Plate --> Parry 11 --> quite effective parry.
So what?
If you are running around in light plate, many blows which would have made
shishkebab out of an unarmoured fighter will glance off your plate. You
bought the plate to achieve this.
> Because of the way the rules add in PD, lightly armoured characters have
> pathetic defenses and heavily armoured ones have too-high defenses. If
> all defenses were 4+skill/2 and armour just gave DR, it'd work out more
> smoothly.
This could lead to the problem, that plate doesn't give adequate defense vs
swords anymore, so you up DR. Which in turn leads to upping the damage of
certain "armour-breaking" weapons, which in turn makes these weapons too
powerful against unarmoured foes.
> > > no "we need special skills for lightly-armoured combatants",
> >
> > We don't need special skills for those. If you use the encumberance
> > rules in full, the heavily armed combatant will be slower and have
> > lower skills.
>
> Lower skills? All encumbrance seems to reduce is Move (and thus Dodge),
> which doesn't usually make that much difference.
IIRC the encumberance penalty is subtracted from those physical skills,
where you have to move (like melee-combat skills), double the encumberance
penalty is subtracted from swimming and climbing.
> As for whether special skills are needed, see the skilled swordsman
> above; without armour, he's got minimal defenses. Similarly, check out
> the special Parry rules for lightly armoured characters (aka "Fencing"
> and "Karate") - they give a higher Parry limited by an encumbrance
> requirement. There has been some suggestion these were meant to give
> lightly armoured warriors a reasonable chance of defending themselves.
And there have been suggestions allowing P/H skills for any weapon, giving
2/3 parry with light encumberance.
> > > no "we need special rules for rifles against low-tech armour",
> >
> > Do we? IIRC you can dodge only slow moving missiles like thrown
> > objects. Plate has PD 5, so the chances are ~5% for the bullet
> > glancing off the plate armour.
>
> Nope - you're described as dodging the attacker's aim (although whether
> that's reasonable is often questionable...).
IMHO this is reasonable only if you are aware of the attacker and can see
him aiming.
> The rules I'm referring to
> are something like "reduce PD by 1 for each 3d in the attack" from
> High-Tech IIRC, which are essentially meant to prevent a 125mm tank
> shell from glancing off a knight's breastplate.
But which can be used to prevent *any* massive attack (like dragon claws,
falling boulders, ...) from glancing off. This rule seems useful and
universal.
> > > no "he tried to tackle me but glanced off my armour"
> >
> > Which is entirely possible.
>
> Then why don't football players wear a light-weight plate-style armour?
> That extra 4 PD would make a _huge_ difference in their ability to avoid
> a tackle, yet they don't do it. Hmmm...
Maximum weight?
Standardized equipment?
Freedom of movement?
> Probably because it's unlikely to work - a human being isn't going to
> "glance off" armour - he'll be too massive and too slow. Armour isn't
> going to make it harder to wrap my arms around someone (unless it's
> spiked...), nor is it going to prevent my momentum from transferring
> into him. PD just isn't going to apply to things like that.
So apply an PD-divisor to grappling attacks, nets, lassoes ...
> > >, no "how nice, I've got Block-15 and it didn't cost much", no...
> >
> > Knights in full plate *had* few enemies on the battlefield.
> > The were hindered by (a) pikes wich had a longer reach (b) firearms
> > which mostly ignored their armour.
>
> ie. they were hindered by things that could _penetrate_ their armour
> (overcome their DR) rather than things that could penetrate their
> _defenses_ (overcome their Block score).
To penetrate the armour you used:
- non-avoidable attacks like crossbow bolts
- self-inflicted attacks like the knight spearing himself on a block of
pikes
- attack after restreinment like stabbing him through the chinks of the
armour after tackling him.
Swung weapons could and did glance off of armour.
Thrusting attacks (or ttacks with swung impaling weapons) were more reliable
in contacting if not blocked/parried/dodged, but also could penetrate.
Idea: extend the principle of chain mail to other armours and give each
armour different PD/DR vs cr, cut, imp and fire.
> AFAICT, the most reasonable way to represent the capacity of medieval
> armour to protect the wearer from damage is to make it directly take
> away from that damage (give it a good DR) rather than in an abstract and
> indirect manner (causing an attack to glance off and miss, even when it
> makes little sense).
>
> This solves a lot of problems, including all the ones I've listed (DR
> doesn't repel lassos, the defenses of both lightly and heavily armoured
> folk will be reasonable, no special rules will be needed, bullets and
> 300-pound men won't "glance off" flimsy leather jackets, and so on).
"It ain't no GURPS anymore" :-)
But if you drop PD, why not:
replace the skill/2-parry by a contest of skills? The winner hits the loser.
Or:
Parry=skill;
Attack
CS S F CF
Parry CS no 1 1 1
S 2 no no 1
F 3 2 no 4
CF 3 3 5 6
1: defender strikes attacker for normal damage
2: attacker strikes defender for normal damage
3: attacker strikes defender critically
4: attacker fumbles
5: attacker strikes defender for normal damage, defender fumbles
6: both fumble
> > > (There're a variety of problems that PD causes. AFAICT, dropping PD
> > > altogether, changing shields to give Cover, and basing all parries
> > > on 4+skill/2 works much better (hits that glance off the armour are
> > > hits that don't penetrate DR), but YMMV...)
> >
> > How would that cover work?
>
> It's an optional rule from CII; shields give the enemy a -1 to hit for
> each point of PD that they used to have.
I see.
> FWIW, I'm not entirely happy with that rule either, but it helps ratchet
> down both defenses and weapon skills to more reasonable levels (skill-16
> professionals would have defenses of 12 and attack rolls of 12-16), so
> it's an improvement IMHO.
I know that bringing down the skills will shorten combat. But considering
that the duration of a combat round is only 1 second, it is reasonable that
most combats will have a duration of many, many rounds.
prei...@my-deja.com
> CDs are fragile and tend to break much more easily than plate or even
> leather. The numbers for the armour also take into account the
> sturdyness of the material used.
ie. the sturdiness of the material, as I was saying. AFAICT, the idea
behind PD is "how good is this armour at _turning_ blows?" and the idea
behind DR is "how good is this armour at _lessening_ blows?"
Almost without exception, these'll be pretty much based on the same
thing (as they are with the listed armour), and a marginally more
general "how good is this armour at _resisting_ blows?" would easily
take both into account in a single number. The most reasonable
candidate is DR; that it fixes a bunch of problems as well as
simplifying things and maintaining realism is a nice side-benefit.
> Hmmm. I think a posible solution would be a PD-divior for some
> attacks. Like we have a DR-divisor for armour-penetrating bullets, we
> could have a PD-divisor for attacks which will not glance off as
> easily as a sword.
To a certain extent, there's some scope for that - a mace is less likely
to glance off than a sword, but any PD divisors are likely to be very
similar to the DR divisors of the appropriate weapon, suggesting we're
measuring one thing with two numbers.
> > I was thinking PD 1, actually - extra-feeble leather jacket - with
> > ...
> > IMHO, this is unreasonable - bullets aren't going to glance off
> > something like that in any except the most bizarre circumstances.
>
> This extra-feeble leather jacket is quite sturdy. PD2 DR 2 refers to
> leather *armour*.
Which I'm *not* refering to - a PD 1 DR 1 leather jacket is only 4
pounds, and described as "light and flexible". That's probably not a
whole lot different than a leather jacket you'd buy at a department
store, but I'd be surprised if one of those would protect you from 1
bullet in 100. The PD is just unreasonable in this instance.
Of course, that's largely because it was designed with medieval combat
in mind, much like the hit-location penalties. By the target size
rules, the arm is a 24" by 5" target, meaning you use the width (5") and
it should be a -6 target; instead, it's -2. This is fairly reasonable
for a swung sword, but not for a gun.
> Also the difference is not that large: (9-)= 37.5%, (10-)=50.0%, which
> is a difference of 12.5% and an increase of only 33.3%.
True; I should have been more explicit that I was approximating.
OTOH, deflecting 1/8th of all bullets that hit is rather more than one
can expect out of a normal leather jacket AFAICT...
> > Broadsword-15 --> Parry 7 --> no effective parry.
> >
> > Broadsword-15 + Light Plate --> Parry 11 --> quite effective parry.
>
> So what?
So the rules make it virtually impossible for someone with a broadsword
to defend himself without a shield and heavy armour. AFAICT, this fails
a reality check - a skilled swordsman will likely be able to parry quite
well. It's just that any parry he fails will be extremely dangerous.
With armour, those failed parries will be less dangerous. That some of
the attacks he _failed_ to parry will _also_ fail to penetrate his
armour is aptly handled by DR.
Adding that armour means he parries nearly _four times_ as many
attacks. Against a man swinging an armour-piercing military pick or
large mace in both hands with enough force to punch right through the
armour with ease, somehow the number of parried attacks is quadrupled.
Are half of the attacks that would have hit glancing off the armour?
Probably not - not only is it a weapon designed to penetrate the armour
reliably, few or none of those attacks wouldn't have glanced off had the
sword not been there and he'd dodged instead (Dodge of 7-8); hence, the
main defensive benefit must be coming from the sword.
And yet those attacks would have squarely hit if the armour hadn't been
there; hence, the main defensive benefit must be coming from the armour.
So, it seems like the massive defensive benefit is magically appearing
due to some wondrous synergy in the sword-armour combination, since each
alone is woefully less effective.
IMHO, this sounds unreasonable; more likely, about the same fraction of
attacks are going to land solidly with and without the armour in place
and about the same fraction of landing attacks are going to solidly
connect with the armour regardless of what they evaded in order to
land. The function of the armour, then, is to prevent these landing
attacks from _penetrating_ into the wearer via DR. IMHO, this
explanation is both simpler and more plausible.
> This could lead to the problem, that plate doesn't give adequate
> defense vs swords anymore, so you up DR. Which in turn leads to upping
> the damage of certain "armour-breaking" weapons, which in turn makes
> these weapons too powerful against unarmoured foes.
Not really - Light Plate's DR 7 (with cloth) makes for an average of
only 2/3 of a point of damage from a Str 12 swordblow, meaning anyone
wearing it will be reasonably safe even when their defenses fail (and
moreso if they're a professional warrior with Toughness).
OTOH, those defenses will fail more often (Parry 11-12 vs. Parry 14),
but fewer attacks will land (skill 12-14 vs. skill 15-16), meaning about
30% hits vs. about 15-20% hits, and with far fewer criticals, so even
this part of the defense is still pretty good.
Even better, the interminably boring "attack-parry, attack-parry,
attack-parry..." dance will be significantly reduced, which will make
combats faster and more fun to play IMHO (before anyone says it, no,
Feint doesn't speed things up in most cases - I've crunched the
numbers).
OTOH, I would bump up a few of the armours, _regardless_ of what you do
with PD. Mail was used for a very long time, with good effect, but
it'll still let about 4 points of that Str 12 swordblow through, and
warriors with a fine sword and moderately high Strength (like 14) can
penetrate plate armour with a broadsword with relative ease (2d+3 vs. DR
7 -> 4-5 average damage), which AFAIK was not the case. The main
problem here is that damage goes up too quickly with Strength, but...
> IIRC the encumberance penalty is subtracted from those physical
> skills, where you have to move (like melee-combat skills), double the
> encumberance penalty is subtracted from swimming and climbing.
Certainly not combat skills, and AFAIK only a _very_ few exceptions
(Climbing, Stealth, Swimming, and maybe Acrobatics IIRC) have _any_
effect from encumbrance. IMHO, more should, but I don't think they do,
and I'm pretty sure combat skills (other than the special
low-encumbrance ones) don't suffer any penalty.
> And there have been suggestions allowing P/H skills for any weapon,
> giving 2/3 parry with light encumberance.
Which doesn't mean they're good or realistic suggestions; AFAIK they're
mainly game-balance hacks. One's bladework and footwork are not apt to
differ too vastly at 30 and 50 pounds of encumbrance AFAIK; I would
recommend the same parry ratio at any level of encumbrance, possibly
with some appropriate encumbrance-based penalty.
> But which can be used to prevent *any* massive attack (like dragon
> claws, falling boulders, ...) from glancing off. This rule seems
> useful and universal.
And entirely unnecessary if you use "glanced off = failed to penetrate
DR".
And still not enough - is Light Plate going to deflect an M16 or AK-47
AP bullet? It still provides PD 3 against them, which is enough to
cause up to half of the bullets that would have hit to be successfully
dodged.
Of course, Light Plate's DR 6 will do almost nothing to their 5d damage,
much as one might expect...
> Maximum weight?
> Standardized equipment?
> Freedom of movement?
The first is unlikely - plastic armour plates can be made quite light,
these guys are strong, and the armour is only needed where tackles are
going to occur.
The second is IMHO even less likely - if it worked, it would most likely
be used. I can only assume the millions of Americans who play or have
played football collectively have a pretty good idea of how to do it
well.
The third is, again, unlikely - we're repeatedly assured that actual TL3
steel plate armour doesn't restrict movement much, so specially-tailored
TL7 plastic plate armour certainly wouldn't.
Almost certainly, it's not used because it wouldn't help. A tackler
isn't going to just "glance off" armoured plates - it's much too large
of an attack for that to possibly be the case. The plates resist
penetration, but, since that's not what the attack is doing, they don't
have much effect.
> > going to make it harder to wrap my arms around someone (unless it's
> > spiked...), nor is it going to prevent my momentum from transferring
> > into him. PD just isn't going to apply to things like that.
>
> So apply an PD-divisor to grappling attacks, nets, lassoes ...
Orrr...get rid of all the special rules and use DR to represent
armour...
> > ie. they were hindered by things that could _penetrate_ their armour
> > (overcome their DR) rather than things that could penetrate their
> > _defenses_ (overcome their Block score).
>
> To penetrate the armour you used:
> - non-avoidable attacks like crossbow bolts
How is this non-avoidable? Or any more non-avoidable than a warhammer
blow? And why then a special rule for crossbow bolts, which don't even
trigger the special rule for lowering PD for powerful attacks?
> - self-inflicted attacks like the knight spearing himself on a block
> of pikes
> - attack after restreinment like stabbing him through the chinks of
> the armour after tackling him.
Or apparently mass weapons (like maces) were somewhat effective. One
could model this by giving them slightly higher base damage than edged
weapons of equivalent handling characteristics; the edged ones would
then be better against light armour and the blunt ones against heavy
armour, with no need for doing anything with PD...
> Swung weapons could and did glance off of armour.
> Thrusting attacks (or ttacks with swung impaling weapons) were more
> reliable in contacting if not blocked/parried/dodged, but also could
> penetrate.
>
> Idea: extend the principle of chain mail to other armours and give
> each armour different PD/DR vs cr, cut, imp and fire.
Probably too much effort IMHO - I'd just say that a stabbing attack
against plate can attack against half DR with a penalty of, say, -6
(you're stabbing at the joints, as was done). And give armour divisors
to armour-piercing weapons.
OTOH, several people out there have done this and have the armour tables
already made (I can probably dig up a link if you want).
> But if you drop PD, why not:
> replace the skill/2-parry by a contest of skills? The winner hits the
> loser.
The numerical characteristics are quite different; in particular, this
makes each point of skill quite a bit more important than with the
attack/parry method.
OTOH, I've toyed with it - the simplicity is appealing.
A contest that weights the defender's skill more lightly (like Parry =
4+skill/2 or 4+3*skill/4 or whatever) might work out better; it would
make a small skill difference less overwhelming than in the standard
contest-of-skills approach. Haven't tried it, though.
> I know that bringing down the skills will shorten combat. But
> considering that the duration of a combat round is only 1 second, it
> is reasonable that most combats will have a duration of many, many
> rounds.
No it isn't - they're a pain in the neck to play out!
(FWIW, I consider 1 second to be too short for a turn of combat
involving warriors of some skill. I would much rather have a longer
turn, like 3 seconds, abstract away a little of the detail that's
currently choking GURPS, and give the highly skilled (or highly
desperate) ways to attack several times in a turn if they feel they
must.
It is true that most fights like bar brawls are over in 2-5 seconds;
OTOH, they are also generally over in a matter of one or two _attacks_.
People in these situations tend not to defend themselves well (AOA in
GURPS terms), and the first solid hit to the head usually signals the
end of the fight; often, this is the start of the fight as well - sucker
punches are apparently rather popular. IMHO, this shouldn't generally
require more than one or two combat turns to portray - anything more is
overanalysis.
Moreover, with more skilled and cautious fighters who give nontrivial
thought to defense, it seems reasonable that most fights would take
longer (although I haven't read anything about this). Lengthy duels
might actually occur, and talking during combat would actually be
possible - rather than the two or three words per turn that is currently
realistic, one could spit out an entire sentence.
YMMV.)
Bryan J. Maloney
> So the rules make it virtually impossible for someone with a broadsword
> to defend himself without a shield and heavy armour. AFAICT, this fails
> a reality check - a skilled swordsman will likely be able to parry quite
> well. It's just that any parry he fails will be extremely dangerous.
In the age of heavy armor, swords were for counterattacking, not
parrying. Shields were for parrying.
Here's how I handle it locally.
PD has been eliminated.
I use a Parry maneuver, etc.
All "no ready needed" weapons can have this bought up to 2/3 skill for
Parry. Other weapons are limited to 5/8 skill for Parry.
Current ENC level subtracts from parry.
Shields and bucklers give a bonus to parry equal to their former "PD".
So, let's say that Mr. Broadsword 15 has bought his Parry all the way up
to 10--got to defend against street thugs when not in armor, after
all--but he's wearing a lot of armor and stuff and his ENC level is 3 or
4, which brings his parry back down to 7 or 6. He has also brought his
shield parry up to 10, dropped to 7 or 6, but his shield gives him +3 to
parry, which means that he has a parry of 10, if he takes it on the
shield. This means that, numerically, his best bet is to parry with the
shield and simultaneously Counterattack (a-la Swashbucklers) with his
sword. Ideally, he would also want to attempt to Esquive to get the best
position (and +3 to defense).
Guess what the best advice of medieval swordmasters seems to have been in
such a situation: Parry with your shield while attempting an Esquive and
simultaneously counterattacking with your sword.
But, remove the armor, and the sword defense becomes more useful. Looking
at the rules for weapon lightness and ripostes, you can see how ultimately
it becomes more efficient (on a character point basis) to abandon the
off-hand protection and put more points into your sword once we get to the
Smallsword era...
--
For those in the know, potrzebie is truly necessary.
Emily Smirle
> > Idea: extend the principle of chain mail to other armours and give
> > each armour different PD/DR vs cr, cut, imp and fire.
>
> Probably too much effort IMHO - I'd just say that a stabbing attack
> against plate can attack against half DR with a penalty of, say, -6
> (you're stabbing at the joints, as was done). And give armour
> divisors to armour-piercing weapons.
>
> OTOH, several people out there have done this and have the armour
> tables already made (I can probably dig up a link if you want).
Oh please, do so. I've long entertained the idea of tossing PD to the
wind, and as I am soon to start up a medieval game it's suddenly become
quite relevant.
Emily
--
Catapultam habeo. | Emily Smirle
Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, | <smirl...@home.com>
ad caput tuum saxum immane mitam. | ICQ #33140104
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > CDs are fragile and tend to break much more easily than plate or even
> > leather. The numbers for the armour also take into account the
> > sturdyness of the material used.
>
> ie. the sturdiness of the material, as I was saying. AFAICT, the idea
> behind PD is "how good is this armour at _turning_ blows?" and the idea
> behind DR is "how good is this armour at _lessening_ blows?"
Agreed on that part.
> Almost without exception, these'll be pretty much based on the same
> thing (as they are with the listed armour),
Not necessarily. Take modern woven composites, which ought to have a high DR
(as they can stop low powered bullets), but low PD (as they are not really
flat, and won't let the blow of a sword glance off)
> and a marginally more
> general "how good is this armour at _resisting_ blows?" would easily
> take both into account in a single number.
That would be the HT of the armour :-)
> The most reasonable
> candidate is DR; that it fixes a bunch of problems as well as
> simplifying things and maintaining realism is a nice side-benefit.
Yes. There is some possibility for this, as many RPGs have a single value
for armour which can be equated with GURPS DR. (except for the infamous AD&D
AC which seems like PD)
But in this case I would suggest different DR values for different types of
attacks, like we have for chainmail today.
> > Hmmm. I think a posible solution would be a PD-divior for some
> > attacks. Like we have a DR-divisor for armour-penetrating bullets, we
> > could have a PD-divisor for attacks which will not glance off as
> > easily as a sword.
>
> To a certain extent, there's some scope for that - a mace is less likely
> to glance off than a sword, but any PD divisors are likely to be very
> similar to the DR divisors of the appropriate weapon, suggesting we're
> measuring one thing with two numbers.
Again not necessarily: the grapple-attack, the lasso and the net ought to
have the biggest PD-divisor, but I can see no DR-divisor for these attacks.
> > > I was thinking PD 1, actually - extra-feeble leather jacket - with
> > > ...
> > > IMHO, this is unreasonable - bullets aren't going to glance off
> > > something like that in any except the most bizarre circumstances.
> >
> > This extra-feeble leather jacket is quite sturdy. PD2 DR 2 refers to
> > leather *armour*.
>
> Which I'm *not* refering to - a PD 1 DR 1 leather jacket is only 4
> pounds, and described as "light and flexible". That's probably not a
> whole lot different than a leather jacket you'd buy at a department
> store, but I'd be surprised if one of those would protect you from 1
> bullet in 100. The PD is just unreasonable in this instance.
The problem here is the grainyness of GURPS. You can't give it less then 1
PD, and it also seems reasonable, that Leather armour has a better chance of
turning blows than plain cloth.
> Of course, that's largely because it was designed with medieval combat
> in mind, much like the hit-location penalties. By the target size
> rules, the arm is a 24" by 5" target, meaning you use the width (5") and
> it should be a -6 target; instead, it's -2. This is fairly reasonable
> for a swung sword, but not for a gun.
Absolutely right.
There has been the suggestion of using different modifiers for meelee and
for missile attacks. More effort, but also more realism.
> > Also the difference is not that large: (9-)= 37.5%, (10-)=50.0%, which
> > is a difference of 12.5% and an increase of only 33.3%.
>
> True; I should have been more explicit that I was approximating.
>
> OTOH, deflecting 1/8th of all bullets that hit is rather more than one
> can expect out of a normal leather jacket AFAICT...
Wich bullets: yes. But a bullet doing more than 3d of damage would reduce
the leather jackets PD to 0 anyway ...
> > > Broadsword-15 --> Parry 7 --> no effective parry.
> > >
> > > Broadsword-15 + Light Plate --> Parry 11 --> quite effective parry.
> >
> > So what?
>
> So the rules make it virtually impossible for someone with a broadsword
> to defend himself without a shield and heavy armour. AFAICT, this fails
> a reality check - a skilled swordsman will likely be able to parry quite
> well. It's just that any parry he fails will be extremely dangerous.
In the current GURPS-model an unarmoured fighter will use fencing to wield
his sword. Again, I dare not comment on how realistic this is.
Maybe this was only a house-rule which I inhaled somewhere on the Web, and
used from then on?
> > And there have been suggestions allowing P/H skills for any weapon,
> > giving 2/3 parry with light encumberance.
>
> Which doesn't mean they're good or realistic suggestions; AFAIK they're
> mainly game-balance hacks. One's bladework and footwork are not apt to
> differ too vastly at 30 and 50 pounds of encumbrance AFAIK; I would
> recommend the same parry ratio at any level of encumbrance, possibly
> with some appropriate encumbrance-based penalty.
Indeed. There was as suggestion recently, of discarding the P/H-combat
skills with 2/3 parry, and instead introduce a maneuver "Enhanced Parry"
which starts at 1/2-skill and can be bought up to 2/3-skill. I would add in,
that you count double encumberance if using this maneuver.
> > But which can be used to prevent *any* massive attack (like dragon
> > claws, falling boulders, ...) from glancing off. This rule seems
> > useful and universal.
>
> And entirely unnecessary if you use "glanced off = failed to penetrate
> DR".
O.K.
> And still not enough - is Light Plate going to deflect an M16 or AK-47
> AP bullet? It still provides PD 3 against them, which is enough to
> cause up to half of the bullets that would have hit to be successfully
> dodged.
Is it that unreaonable, that a conic object (which a bullet is) can be
deflected by a metal plate, i it doesn't hit head on?
> Of course, Light Plate's DR 6 will do almost nothing to their 5d damage,
> much as one might expect...
Yes: If the bullet hits the metal straight on, i will most surely penetrate.
> > Maximum weight?
> > Standardized equipment?
> > Freedom of movement?
>
> The first is unlikely - plastic armour plates can be made quite light,
> these guys are strong, and the armour is only needed where tackles are
> going to occur.
But you have cloth (PD 0) over the plastic :-)
> The second is IMHO even less likely - if it worked, it would most likely
> be used. I can only assume the millions of Americans who play or have
> played football collectively have a pretty good idea of how to do it
> well.
As nobody except Americans plays this game, thay should know it best <g,d,r>
> The third is, again, unlikely - we're repeatedly assured that actual TL3
> steel plate armour doesn't restrict movement much, so specially-tailored
> TL7 plastic plate armour certainly wouldn't.
Which would depend on how the joints are made. But you are right, that
modern plastic armour should not inhibit your movement much.
> Almost certainly, it's not used because it wouldn't help. A tackler
> isn't going to just "glance off" armoured plates - it's much too large
> of an attack for that to possibly be the case. The plates resist
> penetration, but, since that's not what the attack is doing, they don't
> have much effect.
I agree that certain attacks would not be hindered much by PD.
But I take the freedom to offer my own solutions for these problem (like the
PD-divisor)
> > > going to make it harder to wrap my arms around someone (unless it's
> > > spiked...), nor is it going to prevent my momentum from transferring
> > > into him. PD just isn't going to apply to things like that.
> >
> > So apply an PD-divisor to grappling attacks, nets, lassoes ...
>
> Orrr...get rid of all the special rules and use DR to represent
> armour...
Or get rid of DR and use PD to represent armour (like in AD&D :-)
> > > ie. they were hindered by things that could _penetrate_ their armour
> > > (overcome their DR) rather than things that could penetrate their
> > > _defenses_ (overcome their Block score).
> >
> > To penetrate the armour you used:
> > - non-avoidable attacks like crossbow bolts
>
> How is this non-avoidable?
You can dodge fast missile attacks (like guns and crossbows) only, if you
can see tha shooter and actually dodge his aim. If you don't see the attack
coming, you can't dodge it.
At least this is how I ruled it: you can dodge melee-attacks, thrown weapons
and arrows, but not crossbow bolts and guns.
> Or any more non-avoidable than a warhammer
> blow? And why then a special rule for crossbow bolts, which don't even
> trigger the special rule for lowering PD for powerful attacks?
Not a special rule for crossbow bolts, just applying the ruling for not
dodging bullets.
> > - self-inflicted attacks like the knight spearing himself on a block
> > of pikes
> > - attack after restreinment like stabbing him through the chinks of
> > the armour after tackling him.
>
> Or apparently mass weapons (like maces) were somewhat effective. One
> could model this by giving them slightly higher base damage than edged
> weapons of equivalent handling characteristics; the edged ones would
> then be better against light armour and the blunt ones against heavy
> armour, with no need for doing anything with PD...
Not the blunt ones, but the spiked ones. Imp seems to be good against plate.
The warhammer with its long beak was invented to counted plate. The estoc,
an edgeless, massive stabbing-sword was introduced to counter plate. The
impressive nails and spikes on maces were introduced to counter blade.
A massive blunt attack would not penetrate the plate. Unspikes maces were
used mostly in tournaments, where the object was *not* to hurt your opponent
(only give him some blue marks)
> > Swung weapons could and did glance off of armour.
> > Thrusting attacks (or ttacks with swung impaling weapons) were more
> > reliable in contacting if not blocked/parried/dodged, but also could
> > penetrate.
> >
> > Idea: extend the principle of chain mail to other armours and give
> > each armour different PD/DR vs cr, cut, imp and fire.
>
> Probably too much effort IMHO - I'd just say that a stabbing attack
> against plate can attack against half DR with a penalty of, say, -6
> (you're stabbing at the joints, as was done). And give armour divisors
> to armour-piercing weapons.
That is one possibility.
> OTOH, several people out there have done this and have the armour tables
> already made (I can probably dig up a link if you want).
I did it, too. After stumbling across Hārn, I thought this to be a nice
model, and extended the principles of chain-mail across the whole spectrum.
Although I did it without PD, so I would appreciate the link, to see how he
did it.
> > But if you drop PD, why not:
> > replace the skill/2-parry by a contest of skills? The winner hits the
> > loser.
>
> The numerical characteristics are quite different; in particular, this
> makes each point of skill quite a bit more important than with the
> attack/parry method.
Increase the importance of skill, decrease the importance of armour. Makes
it "more heroic"
> OTOH, I've toyed with it - the simplicity is appealing.
>
> A contest that weights the defender's skill more lightly (like Parry =
> 4+skill/2 or 4+3*skill/4 or whatever) might work out better; it would
> make a small skill difference less overwhelming than in the standard
> contest-of-skills approach. Haven't tried it, though.
Did you crunch the numbers on the differences between current parry and
straight contest of skills?
> > I know that bringing down the skills will shorten combat. But
> > considering that the duration of a combat round is only 1 second, it
> > is reasonable that most combats will have a duration of many, many
> > rounds.
>
> No it isn't - they're a pain in the neck to play out!
It is a pain in the neck, yet is still reasonable.
Thinking of swachbuckling movies, and the lengthy duells between the hero
and the villain, this is something GURPS models quite well. Two good
swordsmen can fight almost indefinitely until one of them does somehting
stupid, or trips (which would be a CF in GURPS) or the other has a stroke of
luck or a genious idea (which would be a CS in GURPS)
The same skilled swordsmen would wade into spearcarriers *almost* at will.
> (FWIW, I consider 1 second to be too short for a turn of combat
> involving warriors of some skill. I would much rather have a longer
> turn, like 3 seconds, abstract away a little of the detail that's
> currently choking GURPS, and give the highly skilled (or highly
> desperate) ways to attack several times in a turn if they feel they
> must.
RuneQuest has an interesting model of this: you can split your attack, that
is if you have a basic skill of 80%, you can chose to make two attacks of
40% each, or three attacks with 26%, and so on. These attacks are 3 "Strike
Ranks" separated (there are 10 Strike ranks per melee round), so a maximum
of 3 attacks per round with one weapon.
In GURPS current rules (like Chambara) allow highly skilled warriors many
many attacks per 1-second round (if the attacks are seperated 1 Move each, a
fighter with Move 6.25 could do 6 attacks per round), which is rather much
for a 1-second round.
So what about a 5-second round, or even a 10-second round?
> It is true that most fights like bar brawls are over in 2-5 seconds;
> OTOH, they are also generally over in a matter of one or two _attacks_.
> People in these situations tend not to defend themselves well (AOA in
> GURPS terms), and the first solid hit to the head usually signals the
> end of the fight; often, this is the start of the fight as well - sucker
> punches are apparently rather popular. IMHO, this shouldn't generally
> require more than one or two combat turns to portray - anything more is
> overanalysis.
And a single punch to the head can already signal knockout. Yet the length
of a combat round doesn't alter how many counds you need to finish a combat.
Only if you also alter the number of attacks per round, will you get less
rounds for a given combat.
> Moreover, with more skilled and cautious fighters who give nontrivial
> thought to defense, it seems reasonable that most fights would take
> longer (although I haven't read anything about this). Lengthy duels
> might actually occur, and talking during combat would actually be
> possible - rather than the two or three words per turn that is currently
> realistic, one could spit out an entire sentence.
The high art of insulting during swashbuckling combat, to give the enemy the
decisive -1 on his skill :-)
Wasn't there a skill for this?
Timothy Little
><prei...@my-deja.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
>8k2q88$fh6$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
>
>> problem here is that damage goes up too quickly with Strength, but...
I think *everything* goes up too quickly with stats. Damage (hence armour
penetration) with strength, skills with DX and IQ, survivability with HT.
>Or get rid of DR and use PD to represent armour (like in AD&D :-)
:^)
>> Probably too much effort IMHO - I'd just say that a stabbing attack
>> against plate can attack against half DR with a penalty of, say, -6
>> (you're stabbing at the joints, as was done). And give armour divisors
>> to armour-piercing weapons.
I like this idea, I'll shamelessly steal it for my game :^)
>> > But if you drop PD, why not:
>> > replace the skill/2-parry by a contest of skills? The winner hits the
>> > loser.
>>
>> The numerical characteristics are quite different; in particular, this
>> makes each point of skill quite a bit more important than with the
>> attack/parry method.
>
>Increase the importance of skill, decrease the importance of armour. Makes
>it "more heroic"
I like this idea a lot. It seems natural to consider the combat process as
a contest of skills. Nearly every opposed action in GURPS is modelled by a
quick contest of skills, except weapon combat.
>> A contest that weights the defender's skill more lightly (like Parry =
>> 4+skill/2 or 4+3*skill/4 or whatever) might work out better; it would
>> make a small skill difference less overwhelming than in the standard
>> contest-of-skills approach. Haven't tried it, though.
Much like the optional 'really fast combat' rule in the sidebar of the
combat section: contest of attacker's skill vs parry?
To begin with, let's consider a fight between warriors of equal skill to
see how it progresses as skill increases.
Skill Miss Parry Hit
8 75% 2% 24%
10 50% 8% 42%
12 25% 15% 60%
14 9% 18% 73%
16 2% 16% 81%
18 2% 10% 87%
20 2% 6% 92%
At low skill, fights are dominated by clean misses, and parries are
useless. At moderate skill, parries are occasionally useful. At high
skill, parries are once again useless against opponents of similar skill.
The problem is that as skill increases, defences don't keep up. I've no
idea whether this is realistic or not, but it doesn't model how I would
want to play. I like my high-skill fighters to be able to defend
themselves fairly well, even against those of similar skill.
I'd prefer to use a straight contest of skills, with cover modifiers for
shields and the usual options for attack and defence.
The probabilities for the equal-skill contest (without shields) now look
like:
Skill Miss Parry Hit
8 75% 2% 24%
10 50% 13% 37%
12 25% 32% 43%
14 9% 46% 45%
16 2% 52% 45%
18 2% 52% 45%
20 2% 52% 45%
This means that parries are now useful at high skill against equal-skill
opponents, but not so overwhelming as in the standard rules. The
effectiveness of the parry varies with skill of the attacker. e.g. for a
defender of effective skill 14, and attackers of various effective skill
levels:
Skill Miss Parry Hit
10 50% 36% 14%
12 25% 47% 27%
14 9% 46% 45%
16 2% 34% 64%
18 2% 19% 79%
This gives the sort of feel I want in one-on-one fights.
- Tim
prei...@my-deja.com
> Not necessarily. Take modern woven composites, which ought to have a
> high DR (as they can stop low powered bullets), but low PD (as they
> are not really flat, and won't let the blow of a sword glance off)
True - I was thinking of the medieval armours - but I can skillfully
counter your example by saying "PD BAD!!" ;)
(By and large, as the hardness of the armour material increases, so do
both DR and PD, although this trend only really works within a
particular technological paradigm. And, since ultratech armour IIRC
tends to be either flexible (and hence generally about the same low PD)
or ultrahard materials (and hence generally about the same high PD),
it's only really clear with low-tech armour. Important clarification, I
guess.)
> There has been the suggestion of using different modifiers for meelee
> and for missile attacks. More effort, but also more realism.
I guess one could have the two sets of modifiers and only ever use the
one most appropriate to the particular game (melee for low-tech, missile
for high-tech); shouldn't be much extra effort. OTOH, it may still be
too much for the benefit - one's mileage may vary.
> > OTOH, deflecting 1/8th of all bullets that hit is rather more than
> > one can expect out of a normal leather jacket AFAICT...
>
> Wich bullets: yes. But a bullet doing more than 3d of damage would
> reduce the leather jackets PD to 0 anyway ...
Ahh, but that's why I used 9mm handgun rounds doing 2d+2 damage, letting
me gleefully exploit a loophole... ;)
> > and I'm pretty sure combat skills (other than the special
> > low-encumbrance ones) don't suffer any penalty.
>
> Maybe this was only a house-rule which I inhaled somewhere on the Web,
> and used from then on?
Could be. Does it work well? (An interesting alternative is the
"penalize Parries with Encumbrance" option; not sure which is better to
use. OTOH, one can only presume that heavy armour should be more of a
help than a hindrance in most cases, so there is some balancing to keep
in mind.)
> Is it that unreaonable, that a conic object (which a bullet is) can be
> deflected by a metal plate, i it doesn't hit head on?
Dunno - I haven't gunned down any Renaissance knights recently.
OTOH, some time ago there was discussion about the armour-penetrating
capabilities of hollowpoint ammunition, and IIRC Andrew Priestly seemed
of the decided opinion that even handgun hollowpoints would go through
plate armour without too much trouble. As he appears to know veritable
oodles more than I do about guns, I defer to my half-forgotten
recollection of his judgement.
> Or get rid of DR and use PD to represent armour (like in AD&D :-)
All hail the Uber-system! ;)
> > > - non-avoidable attacks like crossbow bolts
> >
> > How is this non-avoidable?
>
> You can dodge fast missile attacks (like guns and crossbows) only, if
> you can see tha shooter and actually dodge his aim. If you don't see
> the attack coming, you can't dodge it.
> At least this is how I ruled it: you can dodge melee-attacks, thrown
> weapons and arrows, but not crossbow bolts and guns.
Crossbow bolts were/are marginally faster than arrows at best (perhaps
moreso now than then), so I'm not sure this is justified. OTOH, bolts
were shorter and tended to have less fletching that one might use to
spot them, so a penalty vs. arrow dodging may be in order.
Of course, it gets easier to dodge either the farther away they were
loosed from. And perhaps I'll stop there before I launch into a(nother)
diatribe about the...questionable...nature of some aspects of GURPS's
bows and (especially) crossbows.
> Not the blunt ones, but the spiked ones. Imp seems to be good against
> plate. The warhammer with its long beak was invented to counted
> plate. The estoc, an edgeless, massive stabbing-sword was introduced
> to counter plate. The
I keep thinking I'd just make those sorts of attacks armour-piercing
(half DR, no Impaling bonus, or maybe half _rigid_ DR and reduced
Impaling bonus), although I haven't actually had a chance to try it
out. Someone crunched the numbers for that some time ago, though, and I
think it actually worked out pretty well.
> > OTOH, several people out there have done this and have the armour
> > tables already made (I can probably dig up a link if you want).
>
> I did it, too. After stumbling across Hārn, I thought this to be a
> nice model, and extended the principles of chain-mail across the whole
> spectrum.
> Although I did it without PD, so I would appreciate the link, to see
> how he did it.
Also inspired (in part) by Harn -
www.pvv.ntnu.no/~leifmk/english/gurps/harnarmor.html
Also on that site is an interesting (and complicated) wound-based damage
system that's worth checking out, if not actually using...
> > makes each point of skill quite a bit more important than with the
> > attack/parry method.
>
> Increase the importance of skill, decrease the importance of armour.
> Makes it "more heroic"
True; OTOH, a single point makes a really big difference (something like
20% more hits IIRC). And I'm not entirely keen on how fast stats push
skills up, so I'm not sure I want that. It'd be great for some game
styles, though.
> Did you crunch the numbers on the differences between current parry
> and straight contest of skills?
Yeah, at some point in the dim and distant past, and using a couple of
skill/parry levels I considered representative. Don't have the numbers
on hand, alas.
OTOH, one can kinda guess - Parry 11, for example, is about 2/3 success,
and Parry 12 is about 3/4, so two points of skill there works out to
around about 20% fewer hits, whereas a +1 skill in an otherwise equal
Quick Contest would take the odds from about 45/45/10 (~10% ties) to
more like 55/35/10, about a 20% increase in the first guy's success
rate. Numbers are way rough, but that's the general idea.
> > > is reasonable that most combats will have a duration of many, many
> > > rounds.
> >
> > No it isn't - they're a pain in the neck to play out!
(Oops - forgot the smiley.)
> It is a pain in the neck, yet is still reasonable.
> Thinking of swachbuckling movies, and the lengthy duells between the
> hero and the villain, this is something GURPS models quite well. Two
> good swordsmen can fight almost indefinitely until one of them does
> somehting stupid, or trips (which would be a CF in GURPS) or the other
> has a stroke of luck or a genious idea (which would be a CS in GURPS)
For a duel like that, I'd probably tone down the effects of CS and CF to
avoid a "who rolls well first" contest.
One possibility is an extended contest of skills, where margins of
success accumulate (with a modest bonus for CS and penalty for CF) and
victory is achieved by accruing a certain total bonus (like the other
guy's skill level, for example). The nice this about this is the
current winner, and the degree to which he's winning, is always
apparent, allowing easy description of what's going on. And there's
always the possibility for a desperate hero to turn things around with
one last-ditch Extra Effort...
(FWIW, this is a little like magical duels - Certamen - in Ars Magica;
should anyone actually be interested in duels handled like this,
there're a variety of suggestions for Certamen that could be adapted or
used for inspiration.)
> fighter with Move 6.25 could do 6 attacks per round), which is rather
> much for a 1-second round.
> So what about a 5-second round, or even a 10-second round?
Depends on what one considers reasonable for the current game, I guess.
While a highly-skilled combatant could conceivably chew through two or
three lesser foes in a second, he's unlikely to keep that rate up, and
such a situation is probably not the norm.
Generally speaking, I'd make the baseline one somewhat abstract attack
per round and change the round length to what I felt was appropriate (I
have a weakness for 3 second rounds). Taking penalties to weapon skill
(probably -4) would then allow faster attack rates - probably 3/2 for -4
(gotta use that AD&D training), 2/1 for -8, and 3/1 for -12.
> > longer (although I haven't read anything about this). Lengthy duels
> > might actually occur, and talking during combat would actually be
> > possible - rather than the two or three words per turn that is
> > currently realistic, one could spit out an entire sentence.
>
> The high art of insulting during swashbuckling combat, to give the
> enemy the decisive -1 on his skill :-)
> Wasn't there a skill for this?
I think it's an Advantage in CI, actually, "Rapier Wit" or something
like that. Although I'm sure a less-cinematic version could be used for
less-cinematic wordsmiths, although I'm not sure what the appropriate
skill would be - Poetry? Bard?
David P. Summers
prei...@my-deja.com wrote:
> IMHO, PD is basically a bad idea, and removing it entirely would make
> for a simpler and better game - no "his lasso glances off my plate and
> pops up from where it had settled around my neck", no "his 9mm bullets
> are deflected by my GAP leather jacket", no "I'm naked so I can't
> parry", no "we need special skills for lightly-armoured combatants", no
> "we need special rules for rifles against low-tech armour", no "he tried
> to tackle me but glanced off my armour", no "how nice, I've got Block-15
> and it didn't cost much", no...
>
> (There're a variety of problems that PD causes. AFAICT, dropping PD
> altogether, changing shields to give Cover, and basing all parries on
> 4+skill/2 works much better (hits that glance off the armour are hits
> that don't penetrate DR), but YMMV...)
Actually, PD work well for shields. I played with a system where I dropped
it for amour but not shields. It also keep shield realistically effective....
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > Not necessarily. Take modern woven composites, which ought to have a
> > high DR (as they can stop low powered bullets), but low PD (as they
> > are not really flat, and won't let the blow of a sword glance off)
>
> True - I was thinking of the medieval armours - but I can skillfully
> counter your example by saying "PD BAD!!" ;)
Ah! That is a good response. I bow deeply to your genius ;-)
> (By and large, as the hardness of the armour material increases, so do
> both DR and PD, although this trend only really works within a
> particular technological paradigm. And, since ultratech armour IIRC
> tends to be either flexible (and hence generally about the same low PD)
> or ultrahard materials (and hence generally about the same high PD),
> it's only really clear with low-tech armour. Important clarification, I
> guess.)
Yes! You are *mostly* right, that high DR is associated with high PD. But
generic universal rules should be usable not for *most* types of armour, but
for *all* types of armour.
> > There has been the suggestion of using different modifiers for meelee
> > and for missile attacks. More effort, but also more realism.
>
> I guess one could have the two sets of modifiers and only ever use the
> one most appropriate to the particular game (melee for low-tech, missile
> for high-tech); shouldn't be much extra effort. OTOH, it may still be
> too much for the benefit - one's mileage may vary.
If it is playable with 4 types of DR (vs imp/cut/cr/fire), than adding a
fifth DR vs high velocity attacks is not that complicated. I only need one
more column on my item-sheets (and they are already horribly crowded)
> > > OTOH, deflecting 1/8th of all bullets that hit is rather more than
> > > one can expect out of a normal leather jacket AFAICT...
> >
> > Wich bullets: yes. But a bullet doing more than 3d of damage would
> > reduce the leather jackets PD to 0 anyway ...
>
> Ahh, but that's why I used 9mm handgun rounds doing 2d+2 damage, letting
> me gleefully exploit a loophole... ;)
Now you now, why Dirty Harry uses the .44 Magnum, and not a flimsy 9mm. Far
too many villains wore leather jackets :-)
> > > and I'm pretty sure combat skills (other than the special
> > > low-encumbrance ones) don't suffer any penalty.
> >
> > Maybe this was only a house-rule which I inhaled somewhere on the Web,
> > and used from then on?
>
> Could be. Does it work well?
I don't really know. The combat encumberance (that is: with backpack on the
ground) was almost always in the no-encumberance range for the party I
mastered. They wore mostly leather armour or their burnus only. But maybe
this was due to me enforcing the hot-weather-and-metal-armour rules :-)
> (An interesting alternative is the
> "penalize Parries with Encumbrance" option; not sure which is better to
> use. OTOH, one can only presume that heavy armour should be more of a
> help than a hindrance in most cases, so there is some balancing to keep
> in mind.)
And if you reduce all skills where you move, the parry is reduced by itself.
But in any case will strong characters receive greater benefit from heavy
armour than weaklings, who can't lift the armour plates. But IMHO this is as
it should be.
> > Is it that unreaonable, that a conic object (which a bullet is) can be
> > deflected by a metal plate, i it doesn't hit head on?
>
> Dunno - I haven't gunned down any Renaissance knights recently.
:-)
I was thinking along the lines of sloped armour: the same sloping which
helps you to deflect swords would also help ou to deflect bullets. And
really fast bullets, which are not deflected that easily, have their
armour-divisor anyhow.
> OTOH, some time ago there was discussion about the armour-penetrating
> capabilities of hollowpoint ammunition, and IIRC Andrew Priestly seemed
> of the decided opinion that even handgun hollowpoints would go through
> plate armour without too much trouble. As he appears to know veritable
> oodles more than I do about guns, I defer to my half-forgotten
> recollection of his judgement.
I agree that Andrew Priestly is the most knowledgable member of this group
concerning guns.
But would you know, whether he was referring to a straight shot, or to a
shot hitting at an angle, so possibly deflected?
> > Or get rid of DR and use PD to represent armour (like in AD&D :-)
>
> All hail the Uber-system! ;)
And they have much easier combyt skills, too. Instead of shortsword,
broadsword and greatsword and a great number of other skills, you have only
one skill: THAC0!
I never saw why my character would have to learn a skill, just to punch
someone on the nose :-)
> > > > - non-avoidable attacks like crossbow bolts
> > >
> > > How is this non-avoidable?
> >
> > You can dodge fast missile attacks (like guns and crossbows) only, if
> > you can see tha shooter and actually dodge his aim. If you don't see
> > the attack coming, you can't dodge it.
> > At least this is how I ruled it: you can dodge melee-attacks, thrown
> > weapons and arrows, but not crossbow bolts and guns.
>
> Crossbow bolts were/are marginally faster than arrows at best (perhaps
> moreso now than then), so I'm not sure this is justified.
IMHO bolts are faster at the moment when they hit their target. My reasoning
why:
Bolts have less fletching, so they have a shorter flight distance than
arrows. As the amount of kinetic energy lost due to friction is proportional
to the distance traversed, arrows will have lost more of their velocity when
they hit.
Also in RL arrows were often shot at ballistic trajectories, while bolts
were almost always shot at direct trajectories.
It would be possible to say:
Arrows are dodgable from d1 yards from the shooter, while bolts are dodgable
d2 yards from the shooter.
Arrows have an average flight distance of f1 yards, while bolts have an
average flight distance of f2 yards.
IMHO f1 >> d1, while f2 < d2. (in reality this would depend on the initial
velocity and the quality of the fletching)
So to avoid too much bookkeeping, I made this ruling.
> OTOH, bolts
> were shorter and tended to have less fletching that one might use to
> spot them, so a penalty vs. arrow dodging may be in order.
>
> Of course, it gets easier to dodge either the farther away they were
> loosed from. And perhaps I'll stop there before I launch into a(nother)
> diatribe about the...questionable...nature of some aspects of GURPS's
> bows and (especially) crossbows.
>
>
> > Not the blunt ones, but the spiked ones. Imp seems to be good against
> > plate. The warhammer with its long beak was invented to counter
> > plate. The estoc, an edgeless, massive stabbing-sword was introduced
> > to counter plate. The
>
> I keep thinking I'd just make those sorts of attacks armour-piercing
> (half DR, no Impaling bonus, or maybe half _rigid_ DR and reduced
> Impaling bonus), although I haven't actually had a chance to try it
> out. Someone crunched the numbers for that some time ago, though, and I
> think it actually worked out pretty well.
This would be a possible solution. OTOH imp represents additional damage to
the vital organs, and warhammers were able to reach these vital organs. If
warhammers are denied imp, than short knives should also be denied imp.
> > > OTOH, several people out there have done this and have the armour
> > > tables already made (I can probably dig up a link if you want).
> >
> > I did it, too. After stumbling across Hārn, I thought this to be a
> > nice model, and extended the principles of chain-mail across the whole
> > spectrum.
> > Although I did it without PD, so I would appreciate the link, to see
> > how he did it.
>
> Also inspired (in part) by Harn -
> www.pvv.ntnu.no/~leifmk/english/gurps/harnarmor.html
>
> Also on that site is an interesting (and complicated) wound-based damage
> system that's worth checking out, if not actually using...
Thank You. I'll do, if I find the time :-)
> > > makes each point of skill quite a bit more important than with the
> > > attack/parry method.
> >
> > Increase the importance of skill, decrease the importance of armour.
> > Makes it "more heroic"
>
> True; OTOH, a single point makes a really big difference (something like
> 20% more hits IIRC). And I'm not entirely keen on how fast stats push
> skills up, so I'm not sure I want that. It'd be great for some game
> styles, though.
But the discussion on Stats and Skills is an entirely different topic. (and
a topic which could need some adjusting, too)
> > Did you crunch the numbers on the differences between current parry
> > and straight contest of skills?
>
> Yeah, at some point in the dim and distant past, and using a couple of
> skill/parry levels I considered representative. Don't have the numbers
> on hand, alas.
>
> OTOH, one can kinda guess - Parry 11, for example, is about 2/3 success,
> and Parry 12 is about 3/4, so two points of skill there works out to
> around about 20% fewer hits, whereas a +1 skill in an otherwise equal
> Quick Contest would take the odds from about 45/45/10 (~10% ties) to
> more like 55/35/10, about a 20% increase in the first guy's success
> rate. Numbers are way rough, but that's the general idea.
Parry 11 implies a skill of 22. I would assume that such masters fight for a
long time.
Or if the skill is more in the usual range of 14-16, than the original parry
is 7-8, and the fighter has 4-5 PD which looks like Plate Armour. And again
I would expect a lengthy fight if both opponents are armoured such.
So the contest of skills might make combat too fast, unless you lengthen the
combat-round.
> > > > is reasonable that most combats will have a duration of many, many
> > > > rounds.
> > >
> > > No it isn't - they're a pain in the neck to play out!
>
> (Oops - forgot the smiley.)
:-)
Here you are.
> > It is a pain in the neck, yet is still reasonable.
> > Thinking of swachbuckling movies, and the lengthy duells between the
> > hero and the villain, this is something GURPS models quite well. Two
> > good swordsmen can fight almost indefinitely until one of them does
> > somehting stupid, or trips (which would be a CF in GURPS) or the other
> > has a stroke of luck or a genious idea (which would be a CS in GURPS)
>
> For a duel like that, I'd probably tone down the effects of CS and CF to
> avoid a "who rolls well first" contest.
If both have high skills, it will always be "who rolls extremely
well/abysmal bad first".
If both have intermediate skills (14-16), than the parry will be in the
range of 7-8, so most successful strikes will hit (using the current model).
Therefore most RL mediveal fighters used either good armour, or a shield to
block.
The 2/3-parry for fencing was probably introduced, to give a more reasonable
model of the unarmoured fighter of the Renaissance and later. But (as stated
elsewhere) I like the idea, of making the improved parry a maneuver usable
with any balanced weapon as long as you are only lightly encumbered.
> One possibility is an extended contest of skills, where margins of
> success accumulate (with a modest bonus for CS and penalty for CF) and
> victory is achieved by accruing a certain total bonus (like the other
> guy's skill level, for example). The nice this about this is the
> current winner, and the degree to which he's winning, is always
> apparent, allowing easy description of what's going on. And there's
> always the possibility for a desperate hero to turn things around with
> one last-ditch Extra Effort...
But in the end you would have one winner (who lives) and one loser. Is the
loser now dead? Has the winner hit him once?
> (FWIW, this is a little like magical duels - Certamen - in Ars Magica;
> should anyone actually be interested in duels handled like this,
> there're a variety of suggestions for Certamen that could be adapted or
> used for inspiration.)
I don't have Ars Magica, so could you please elaborate.
> > fighter with Move 6.25 could do 6 attacks per round), which is rather
> > much for a 1-second round.
> > So what about a 5-second round, or even a 10-second round?
>
> Depends on what one considers reasonable for the current game, I guess.
> While a highly-skilled combatant could conceivably chew through two or
> three lesser foes in a second, he's unlikely to keep that rate up, and
> such a situation is probably not the norm.
Of course not. This high rate of attack is only achievable with Chambara
rules, Trained by a Master or other Cinematic advantages.
> Generally speaking, I'd make the baseline one somewhat abstract attack
> per round and change the round length to what I felt was appropriate (I
> have a weakness for 3 second rounds). Taking penalties to weapon skill
> (probably -4) would then allow faster attack rates - probably 3/2 for -4
> (gotta use that AD&D training), 2/1 for -8, and 3/1 for -12.
The same could be used for parries.
Or you simply state:
You have two basic actions per round. The normal case would be 1 attack, 1
parry. AOA means 2 attacks, AOD means 2 defenses.
total normal AOA AOD
actions attack parry attack parry attack parry
+1 2/2 1/2 1/2 2/2 0/2 0/2 2/2
+0 4/2 2/2 2/2 4/2 0/2 0/2 4/2
-2 5/2 3/2 2/2 5/2 0/2 0/2 5/2
-4 6/2 3/2 3/2 6/2 0/2 0/2 6/2
-6 7/2 4/2 3/2 7/2 0/2 0/2 7/2
-8 8/2 4/2 4/2 8/2 0/2 0/2 8/2
-10 9/2 5/2 4/2 9/2 0/2 0/2 9/2
-12 10/2 5/2 5/2 10/2 0/2 0/2 10/2
-14 11/2 6/2 5/2 10/2 1/2 1/2 10/2
-16 12/2 6/2 6/2 10/2 2/2 2/2 10/2
I used a cutoff of maximum 5 attacks per round, but I would tie this to the
actual move of the character.
This system has the advantage, that you don't have the automatic additional
attacks per round, but you have to sacrifice aim to get them. Also you could
choose different options between normal and AOA, and also between normal and
AOD. (like always using 2/2 parries and only the remainder for attacks, or
always usinf 2/2 attacks and only the remainder for parry)
> > > longer (although I haven't read anything about this). Lengthy duels
> > > might actually occur, and talking during combat would actually be
> > > possible - rather than the two or three words per turn that is
> > > currently realistic, one could spit out an entire sentence.
> >
> > The high art of insulting during swashbuckling combat, to give the
> > enemy the decisive -1 on his skill :-)
> > Wasn't there a skill for this?
>
> I think it's an Advantage in CI, actually, "Rapier Wit" or something
> like that. Although I'm sure a less-cinematic version could be used for
> less-cinematic wordsmiths, although I'm not sure what the appropriate
> skill would be - Poetry? Bard?
I remember seeing "Repartee M/H" in the unofficial GURPS:Starwars.
And reading the description of "Intimidation" in CI, it could also be
applicable.
Paul T.
"Bryan J. Maloney" <bj...@cornell.edu> wrote in message
news:bjm10-06070...@potato.cit.cornell.edu...
> > to defend himself without a shield and heavy armour. AFAICT, this fails
> > a reality check - a skilled swordsman will likely be able to parry quite
> > well. It's just that any parry he fails will be extremely dangerous.
>
Amen, brother.
Those are almost exactly the rules I use--and I developed them independently
based the same logic.
They increase realism while simultaneously increasing playability AND
simplicity
of rules.
P.
Paul T.
"Franz & Michael Köttl" <mob...@aktiv.co.at> wrote in message
news:8k4j7n$jgh$2...@rohrpostix.uta4you.at...
> <prei...@my-deja.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
> 8k2q88$fh6$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
> >
> > > CDs are fragile and tend to break much more easily than plate or even
> > > leather. The numbers for the armour also take into account the
> > > sturdyness of the material used.
> >
> > ie. the sturdiness of the material, as I was saying. AFAICT, the idea
> > behind PD is "how good is this armour at _turning_ blows?" and the idea
> > behind DR is "how good is this armour at _lessening_ blows?"
>
> Agreed on that part.
>
> > Almost without exception, these'll be pretty much based on the same
> > thing (as they are with the listed armour),
>
> Not necessarily. Take modern woven composites, which ought to have a high
DR
> (as they can stop low powered bullets), but low PD (as they are not really
> flat, and won't let the blow of a sword glance off)
This is where I had the idea of keeping a stat for armor that would take the
place
of PD. It would no longer add to defenses but it would have a similarity to
current
PD scores in that this stat would represent the "hardness" of the armor.
In game terms, this "new PD value" represents how much damage it takes to
reduce
the DR of the armor by one point (or whatever value is most convenient).
For solid metal armor it would be quite high, and so it would take a lot of
damage
to severely reduce the efficiency of the armor. A soft, cushy armor (like
taking cover
behind blocks of hay or something) would have a high DR perhaps, for its
thickness,
but a low score in this new stat, meaning that it would be very easy to
damage and
would wear away quickly.
Granted, for most personal combat you could just avoid using this for
simplicity,
but it would be a handy value to have for reference and for number-crunchers
who
enjoy detailed WW2 tank combat, for example, or it can be used to model very
odd types of ablative armor.
P.
Paul T.
>
> > Generally speaking, I'd make the baseline one somewhat abstract attack
> > per round and change the round length to what I felt was appropriate (I
> > have a weakness for 3 second rounds). Taking penalties to weapon skill
> > (probably -4) would then allow faster attack rates - probably 3/2 for -4
> > (gotta use that AD&D training), 2/1 for -8, and 3/1 for -12.
>
> The same could be used for parries.
> Or you simply state:
> You have two basic actions per round. The normal case would be 1 attack, 1
> parry. AOA means 2 attacks, AOD means 2 defenses.
I use almost this exact system in a homebrew RPG. It doesn't use 3d6, so I
can't compare the actual numbers, but the gist of the matter is that you
have
two basic actions, and 3 second rounds. You can perform one action at a
bonus,
two actions at no bonus, three at a penalty, etc.
You can also trade skill for damage. This simple framework works really well
and allows for an almost unlimited number of options in combat. I tend to
use
GURPS for highly detailed games, however, and so have chosen to stick
to their 1-second rounds, reserving the 3-second round (however wonderful)
for cinematic games.
P.
Paul T.
"David P. Summers" <sum...@alum.mit.edu> wrote in message
news:396A6AA5...@alum.mit.edu...
This is true. But you can think of it as a bonus to parry (or block, however
you want to call it) due to the size and construction of the shield--which
is
designed to maximize your chances of blocking successfully.
P.
prei...@my-deja.com
> Yes! You are *mostly* right, that high DR is associated with high PD.
> But generic universal rules should be usable not for *most* types of
> armour, but for *all* types of armour.
Better to be right for 95% than wrong for 100% (or, worse, *unfun*).
With or without PD, the behaviour of armour has to be abstracted to fit
into a game; I just don't think the abstraction inherent in how PD is
used is better than the abstraction used without PD, but is more
complicated. More complexity for zero or negative gain is generally bad
(although some may disagree about the amount of gain, there's enough
bizarre effects and problems from PD that it's, IMHO, a net loss to
include. But, hey, it's MHO).
> If it is playable with 4 types of DR (vs imp/cut/cr/fire), than adding
> a fifth DR vs high velocity attacks is not that complicated. I only
FWIW, that's the first column I'd add - I'd cheerfully fold the other
four into "normal" DR unless the game in question had a reason for doing
otherwise. IME, one can get away with having all melee weapons use the
same DR, but it works oddly when bullets and maces try using the same
DR. All five would certainly be appropriate for some games, though.
> this was due to me enforcing the hot-weather-and-metal-armour rules
Probably a good idea. OTOH, IIRC, one could manage to travel in heavy
metal armour through hot climates even with a thick quilted gambeson
over top (Richard's Crusaders did this as defence against arrows). Of
course, they didn't travel very _fast_...
> But would you know, whether he was referring to a straight shot, or to
> a shot hitting at an angle, so possibly deflected?
No idea; the question was IIRC more-or-less "doubling DR against
hollowpoints would let plate armour stop them; is that realistic?" with
a response on the order of "they'd punch through it like through cheap
sheet metal" (or so). So I have no idea at what angle deflection
becomes a moderate possibility (one could probably calculate this from
the properties of steel); my ignorant opinion is that the angle would
have to be fairly high - I don't think a bullet is apt to shatter quite
like a bodkin point.
> IMHO bolts are faster at the moment when they hit their target. My
Depends on range. What I've read suggests comparable speeds at release,
with the bolts losing speed faster and hence having a shorter effective
range.
Personally, I'd draw the line between close-range and long-range shots
rather than between bolts and arrows (especially since some lighter
crossbows shot things that looked very much like arrows); a shot at 20
yards will take around 1/3 of a second to arrive, which isn't enough
time to do much more than dodge the aim, whereas one at 100 yards will
take 2 or more seconds, meaning the projectile itself is certainly
dodgeable.
> This would be a possible solution. OTOH imp represents additional
> damage to the vital organs, and warhammers were able to reach these
> vital organs. If warhammers are denied imp, than short knives should
> also be denied imp.
My reasoning is that warhammers aren't _sharp_ - they just kind of mash
a hole in the target instead of cutting into it and hence create a
smaller entrance wound than something with sharp edges that would slice
through the flesh rather than allowing it to stretch. They impale, but
don't create the same type of wound as a sword thrust, which (along with
game balance and that they weren't the weapon of choice against light
armour) suggests that they don't do as much damage as being stabbed with
a sword.
Besides, the numbers work out so nicely...
> Or if the skill is more in the usual range of 14-16, than the original
> parry is 7-8, and the fighter has 4-5 PD which looks like Plate
> Armour. And again I would expect a lengthy fight if both opponents are
> armoured such.
Parry-11 is just Sword-14, Small Shield, and Heavy Leather under the
current system; not all that unusual.
Even Block-16 is just Shield-16, Large Shield, and Light Plate.
> The 2/3-parry for fencing was probably introduced, to give a more
> reasonable model of the unarmoured fighter of the Renaissance and
> later. But (as stated elsewhere) I like the idea, of making the
> improved parry a maneuver usable with any balanced weapon as long as
> you are only lightly encumbered.
I think penalizing Enhanced Parry with Encumbrance is a better approach;
it models the weighting down of the warrior as well as removing
arbitrary distinctions (like the "use Fencing style when unarmoured and
Sword style when mail-clad" thing); works out about the same, I suspect.
> But in the end you would have one winner (who lives) and one loser. Is
> the loser now dead? Has the winner hit him once?
Depends on what you want from the duel; you could set breakpoints (won
by X points over what was needed) that describe the status of the loser,
or just let the winner choose. It's a fairly abstract resolution
method, so any number of final-status determiners could be used.
> > (FWIW, this is a little like magical duels - Certamen - in Ars
> > Magica; should anyone actually be interested in duels handled like
> > this, there're a variety of suggestions for Certamen that could be
> > adapted or used for inspiration.)
>
> I don't have Ars Magica, so could you please elaborate.
It's a lot like extended contests of skill, really, except one can
either accumulate a bonus from round to round or use some portion of
that bonus (usually all) to try damaging the enemy.
For example, suppose the winner of a given round of the Extended Contest
can make a Quick Contest to try damaging his opponent, with every 5
points of victory meaning 2 HP of damage. Since winning a Quick Contest
by 5 is usually highly unlikely, he'll want to accumulate a sizeable
bonus from the Extended Contest to do so, and will usually use the whole
bonus so as to waste as little of it as possible (since damage comes
only in units of 5).
If Bob has been winning the battle and has accumulated a score of 12
over Jim, Bob could make a damage attempt at +12 against Jim; barring
disaster, he'll probably do 4 HP of damage. This will slow Jim down
(say, -1 or -2 to his skill in the Extended Contest), meaning Bob will
be likely to accumulate a bonus again and, hence, set Jim up for another
telling blow. The penalty from damage also induces one to attempt
damaging one's foe earlier, since an injured foe is less likely to
reduce or reverse your advantage.
One could count CS as +5 extra and CF as -5 extra; hence, had Bob not
injured Jim and then rolled a 17 to Jim's 4, he would now have a bonus
of 12 - (13 + 5 + 5) = -11 -> Jim has a bonus of 11.
That's the basic idea, although a few details differ, but it should be
enough to allow one to use Certamen ideas from the net (on the unlikely
chance one will... ;) ).
> > While a highly-skilled combatant could conceivably chew through two
> > or three lesser foes in a second, he's unlikely to keep that rate
> > up, and such a situation is probably not the norm.
>
> Of course not. This high rate of attack is only achievable with
> Chambara rules, Trained by a Master or other Cinematic advantages.
I was thinking RL, actually - I'd believe some people could fell foes
that quickly, but probably only with luck in both situation and
execution, making the typical and default case rather lower.
> You have two basic actions per round. The normal case would be 1
> attack, 1 parry. AOA means 2 attacks, AOD means 2 defenses.
Yeah, something like that, although I'm not sure one can trade between
attacks and parries so easily. I'd probably increase the penalties a
little as a realistic baseline and increase the extra-time attack, but
YMMV.
> I remember seeing "Repartee M/H" in the unofficial GURPS:Starwars.
> And reading the description of "Intimidation" in CI, it could also be
> applicable.
Yeah, Intimidation would probably work. It just doesn't sound quite
swashbuckly enough...
(I guess any game where it's actually a factor may as well have the
"Repartee" or "Repartee!" skill.)
Franz & Michael Köttl
j%2b5.9852$V34.1...@news1.sttls1.wa.home.com...
>
> > The same could be used for parries.
> > Or you simply state:
> > You have two basic actions per round. The normal case would be 1 attack,
1
> > parry. AOA means 2 attacks, AOD means 2 defenses.
>
> can't compare the actual numbers, but the gist of the matter is that you
> have
> two basic actions, and 3 second rounds. You can perform one action at a
> bonus,
> two actions at no bonus, three at a penalty, etc.
Which is very comparable to GURPS. You can have:
1 action at a bonus: AOA, +4 to hit or +2 to damage
AOD, +2 to defense
2 actions at no bonus: normal, 1 attack, 1 parry
move
AOA, 2 attacks
AOD, 2 defenses
3 actions at a penalty: AOCharge, 1 attack at -1 to hit
> You can also trade skill for damage. This simple framework works really
well
> and allows for an almost unlimited number of options in combat. I tend to
> use
> GURPS for highly detailed games, however, and so have chosen to stick
> to their 1-second rounds, reserving the 3-second round (however wonderful)
> for cinematic games.
The possible actions in your 3-second rounds are almost the same as in
GURPS. Still I agree, that the 1 second round may be to short if combat
should interact with other things like the arrival of reserves or the length
of a spell. 3-12 seconds for a combat round all seem viable alternatives,
depending on the intended graininess, and the possible number of actions per
round.
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > Yes! You are *mostly* right, that high DR is associated with high PD.
> > But generic universal rules should be usable not for *most* types of
> > armour, but for *all* types of armour.
>
> Better to be right for 95% than wrong for 100% (or, worse, *unfun*).
Yes. 95% is better than 0%. But 96% would be better than 95% :-)
> With or without PD, the behaviour of armour has to be abstracted to fit
> into a game; I just don't think the abstraction inherent in how PD is
> used is better than the abstraction used without PD, but is more
> complicated. More complexity for zero or negative gain is generally bad
> (although some may disagree about the amount of gain, there's enough
> bizarre effects and problems from PD that it's, IMHO, a net loss to
> include. But, hey, it's MHO).
I agree. Combat is already complicated enough, so any change should speed
things up, not slow them down.
> > If it is playable with 4 types of DR (vs imp/cut/cr/fire), than adding
> > a fifth DR vs high velocity attacks is not that complicated. I only
>
> FWIW, that's the first column I'd add - I'd cheerfully fold the other
> four into "normal" DR unless the game in question had a reason for doing
> otherwise. IME, one can get away with having all melee weapons use the
> same DR, but it works oddly when bullets and maces try using the same
> DR. All five would certainly be appropriate for some games, though.
The differentiation between imp and cut/cr is already in place for chainmail
and high-tech woven armours. But the principle could easily be extended to
include all armours - especially if you do away with PD.
> > this was due to me enforcing the hot-weather-and-metal-armour rules
>
> Probably a good idea. OTOH, IIRC, one could manage to travel in heavy
> metal armour through hot climates even with a thick quilted gambeson
> over top (Richard's Crusaders did this as defence against arrows). Of
> course, they didn't travel very _fast_...
And IIRC there were a good number of losses due to disease, which was
furthered by the hot, dirty gambesons.
> > But would you know, whether he was referring to a straight shot, or to
> > a shot hitting at an angle, so possibly deflected?
>
> No idea; the question was IIRC more-or-less "doubling DR against
> hollowpoints would let plate armour stop them; is that realistic?" with
> a response on the order of "they'd punch through it like through cheap
> sheet metal" (or so).
Possibly. Standard plate armour was not considered bullet-proof. The first
bullet-proof cuirasses were so heavy, they did away with arms and legs to
compensate for it.
> So I have no idea at what angle deflection
> becomes a moderate possibility (one could probably calculate this from
> the properties of steel); my ignorant opinion is that the angle would
> have to be fairly high - I don't think a bullet is apt to shatter quite
> like a bodkin point.
The bullet will certainly not shatter. But for the safety of the wearer it
is sufficent, if it is deflected and leaves only a scratch on the metal. and
considering than stones are deflected on water, and spacecraft may be
deflected on air, it is fairly possible that bullets are deflected on metal.
I know, that a 7.62mm rifle can shoot through some walls, but the same
bullets can also be deflected from water tubing, if the angle is flat
enough.
Although it would be helpful to know the necessary angle, to calculate a
possibility from that and arrive at a "realistic" PD against high-velocity
attacks.
> > IMHO bolts are faster at the moment when they hit their target. My
>
> Depends on range. What I've read suggests comparable speeds at release,
> with the bolts losing speed faster and hence having a shorter effective
> range.
I agree with the shorter range. Yet crossbows had a better ability to punch
through plate, which would suggest a higher impact velocity.
> Personally, I'd draw the line between close-range and long-range shots
> rather than between bolts and arrows (especially since some lighter
> crossbows shot things that looked very much like arrows); a shot at 20
> yards will take around 1/3 of a second to arrive, which isn't enough
> time to do much more than dodge the aim, whereas one at 100 yards will
> take 2 or more seconds, meaning the projectile itself is certainly
> dodgeable.
Agreed. Maybe I wrote it a bit too complicated, but basically I stated, that
there are different distances from the shooter, where the projectile becomes
dodgeable. I reasoned that targets of bows were often beyond this distance
due to the greater range of the bow, so I made arrows dodgeable. By the same
token the targets of crossbows were often within the non-dodgeable distance,
so I made crossbows not dodgeable.
But if you really want to note a dodgeable distance for each weapon, you are
free to do so. I just made this ruling to avoid too much bookkeeping.
> > This would be a possible solution. OTOH imp represents additional
> > damage to the vital organs, and warhammers were able to reach these
> > vital organs. If warhammers are denied imp, than short knives should
> > also be denied imp.
>
> My reasoning is that warhammers aren't _sharp_ - they just kind of mash
> a hole in the target instead of cutting into it and hence create a
> smaller entrance wound than something with sharp edges that would slice
> through the flesh rather than allowing it to stretch.
Yes, the wound will be rather conical. OTOH you will have tearing-effects,
which are similar to low-speed bullets (no supersonic shock-wave of course)
> They impale, but
> don't create the same type of wound as a sword thrust, which (along with
> game balance and that they weren't the weapon of choice against light
> armour) suggests that they don't do as much damage as being stabbed with
> a sword.
If they hit the heart (a called shot to the vitals), the will cause death,
so the x3 imp-modifier for vitals should be granted.
But an armour-divisor of 1.5 or 2 might also be called for.
> Besides, the numbers work out so nicely...
Who needs nice numbers? :-)
> > Or if the skill is more in the usual range of 14-16, than the original
> > parry is 7-8, and the fighter has 4-5 PD which looks like Plate
> > Armour. And again I would expect a lengthy fight if both opponents are
> > armoured such.
>
> Parry-11 is just Sword-14, Small Shield, and Heavy Leather under the
> current system; not all that unusual.
Do you allow shield-PD to be used, if the character parries instead of
blocking?
IMC this would be parry-9.
> Even Block-16 is just Shield-16, Large Shield, and Light Plate.
Someone with a superior skill in shield, plus a large shield plus a plate
armour is indeed well protected.
Note: Historically the shield grew smaller and smaller as the armour
improved. When plate armour ruled the field, shields were not used except
during tournaments. When wielding a bastard-sword two-handed, you have no
place for a shield.
> > The 2/3-parry for fencing was probably introduced, to give a more
> > reasonable model of the unarmoured fighter of the Renaissance and
> > later. But (as stated elsewhere) I like the idea, of making the
> > improved parry a maneuver usable with any balanced weapon as long as
> > you are only lightly encumbered.
>
> I think penalizing Enhanced Parry with Encumbrance is a better approach;
> it models the weighting down of the warrior as well as removing
> arbitrary distinctions (like the "use Fencing style when unarmoured and
> Sword style when mail-clad" thing); works out about the same, I suspect.
Agreed. And on the parry the encumberance will usually hurt more, as the
skill starts out lower.
> > > (FWIW, this is a little like magical duels - Certamen - in Ars
> > > Magica; should anyone actually be interested in duels handled like
> > > this, there're a variety of suggestions for Certamen that could be
> > > adapted or used for inspiration.)
> >
> > I don't have Ars Magica, so could you please elaborate.
>
> It's a lot like extended contests of skill, really, except one can
> either accumulate a bonus from round to round or use some portion of
> that bonus (usually all) to try damaging the enemy.
This sounds a bit like Judo, where thh amount of damage done is determined
by a contest between Judo and ST/HT/Judo
> For example, suppose the winner of a given round of the Extended Contest
> can make a Quick Contest to try damaging his opponent, with every 5
> points of victory meaning 2 HP of damage. Since winning a Quick Contest
> by 5 is usually highly unlikely, he'll want to accumulate a sizeable
> bonus from the Extended Contest to do so, and will usually use the whole
> bonus so as to waste as little of it as possible (since damage comes
> only in units of 5).
You mean damage comes in units of 2 HP, and you do damage only for each +5
difference. (but not for fractions thereof)
> If Bob has been winning the battle and has accumulated a score of 12
> over Jim, Bob could make a damage attempt at +12 against Jim; barring
> disaster, he'll probably do 4 HP of damage. This will slow Jim down
> (say, -1 or -2 to his skill in the Extended Contest), meaning Bob will
> be likely to accumulate a bonus again and, hence, set Jim up for another
> telling blow. The penalty from damage also induces one to attempt
> damaging one's foe earlier, since an injured foe is less likely to
> reduce or reverse your advantage.
>
> One could count CS as +5 extra and CF as -5 extra; hence, had Bob not
> injured Jim and then rolled a 17 to Jim's 4, he would now have a bonus
> of 12 - (13 + 5 + 5) = -11 -> Jim has a bonus of 11.
This looks like the rolls are independent of some basic skill (as 13 is
exactly the difference between 17 and 4), or are you assuming the same skill
for both (in which case the result would also be 13)
> That's the basic idea, although a few details differ, but it should be
> enough to allow one to use Certamen ideas from the net (on the unlikely
> chance one will... ;) ).
Thank You.
> > > While a highly-skilled combatant could conceivably chew through two
> > > or three lesser foes in a second, he's unlikely to keep that rate
> > > up, and such a situation is probably not the norm.
> >
> > Of course not. This high rate of attack is only achievable with
> > Chambara rules, Trained by a Master or other Cinematic advantages.
>
> I was thinking RL, actually - I'd believe some people could fell foes
> that quickly, but probably only with luck in both situation and
> execution, making the typical and default case rather lower.
Indeed. I doubt that anyone could fell 3 foes in one second, except with an
extremely lucky stroke, and the foes nicely aligned.
> > You have two basic actions per round. The normal case would be 1
> > attack, 1 parry. AOA means 2 attacks, AOD means 2 defenses.
>
> Yeah, something like that, although I'm not sure one can trade between
> attacks and parries so easily. I'd probably increase the penalties a
> little as a realistic baseline and increase the extra-time attack, but
> YMMV.
You mean, AOA should incur a penalty on the two attacks?
> > I remember seeing "Repartee M/H" in the unofficial GURPS:Starwars.
> > And reading the description of "Intimidation" in CI, it could also be
> > applicable.
>
> Yeah, Intimidation would probably work. It just doesn't sound quite
> swashbuckly enough...
The swashbuckly thing is not the name of the skill, but what is said with
the skill ...
> (I guess any game where it's actually a factor may as well have the
> "Repartee" or "Repartee!" skill.)
Or the Rapier Wit advantage ...
Or even the Punning-skill if it is a lighter movie.
prei...@my-deja.com
> And IIRC there were a good number of losses due to disease, which was
> furthered by the hot, dirty gambesons.
Yup - lice and other vermin were a problem in the best of situations, so
add in a thick covering of loosely-constructed cotton or wool that you
sweat like a pig* into all day, and it starts to sound like a
vermin-n-germ hotel...
*I read somewhere that pigs don't sweat - that's why they wallow in mud
instead - which makes one wonder about the origin of the phrase "sweat
like a pig"...
> Possibly. Standard plate armour was not considered bullet-proof. The
> first bullet-proof cuirasses were so heavy, they did away with arms
> and legs to compensate for it.
My wild guess would be the soft lead ball ammunition of those days
probably doesn't penetrate armour as well as modern rounds, although I
can't find data on relative projectile velocities right now (I did once,
and IIRC musket balls had a velocity comparable to modern handguns;
FWIW, there's some interesting information on the horrendous accuracy of
muskets at http://server.irons-assoc.com/larry//musketry.htm; about 25%
hits on an enemy battalion that at 30 yards seemed to be common).
> Although it would be helpful to know the necessary angle, to calculate
> a possibility from that and arrive at a "realistic" PD against
> high-velocity attacks.
According to
http://www.actiontarget.com/Pages/IndoorRangesFolder/IndoorRanges.htm,
10 gauge (0.135") steel will deflect standard handgun bullets impacting
at over 45 degrees, and 0.25" mild steel will deflect perpendicular
handgun bullets. 0.25" AR steel will deflect 45 degree rifle rounds,
and 0.375" AR steel will deflect perpendicular rifle rounds.
If we figure 2 square metres of surface area, full plate armour that
could deflect an angled handgun bullet would weigh something like 50 kg
with modern steel (20,000 cm^2 * 0.343 cm * ~8 g/cm^3), or maybe more
like 40 kg when one considers high-surface-area parts like fingers
aren't likely to have such protection.
This is, to a certain extent, overprotection for such angled hits,
though, so plate armour close to that heavy would probably provide
reasonably decent protection against modern handguns.
> I agree with the shorter range. Yet crossbows had a better ability to
> punch through plate, which would suggest a higher impact velocity.
Could be - not sure. Might also be due to greater projectile weight
(although I've seen varying information that places bolts from the same
weight as arrows to about twice as heavy), or greater projectile
resilience (the shorter and thicker bolts might shatter less than bodkin
points, and hence penetrate with greater likelihood).
> But if you really want to note a dodgeable distance for each weapon,
> you are free to do so. I just made this ruling to avoid too much
> bookkeeping.
I'd just say "over 30 yards is dodgeable" or something like that - IMHO,
the differences between the weapons aren't likely to be important enough
to both with in terms of dodgeability.
(FWIW, it's unlikely that one would use bows to shoot at an individual
at longer ranges than a crossbow, simply because of the extreme
difficulty of hitting anything that small, much less a target that will
have 2-5 seconds of movement after the missile is in the air.
Long-range shots were, AFAIK, almost solely against enemy units, and
individuals were targetted only within 30-50 yards.)
> Yes, the wound will be rather conical. OTOH you will have
> tearing-effects, which are similar to low-speed bullets (no supersonic
> shock-wave of course)
Apparently, there aren't much in the way of tearing effects for
low-speed bullets (flesh is stretchy; bullets like the Black Talon are
meant to deal with that tendency, with questionable success) - see
http://www.firearmstactical.com/hwfe.htm. With the much lower speed of
a warhammer, I'm not sure tearing would occur.
> If they hit the heart (a called shot to the vitals), the will cause
> death, so the x3 imp-modifier for vitals should be granted.
Just about anything to the heart will kill...
FWIW, impaling's +50% damage on vitals hits would have a good chance of
bringing a lightly armoured target to or near the knockout level of
damage, after which he would probably bleed to death. A hit that
actually penetrates the heart (called shot to the heart doing, say, HT/2
damage) would probably bleed at the same rate as artery hits (1
HP/turn).
> Do you allow shield-PD to be used, if the character parries instead of
> blocking?
Well, no, since I don't use PD, but them's the rules... ;)
> Note: Historically the shield grew smaller and smaller as the armour
> improved. When plate armour ruled the field, shields were not used
> except during tournaments. When wielding a bastard-sword two-handed,
> you have no place for a shield.
Yup - when your enemy's DR is high enough that you need a two-handed
weapon to penetrate it, a shield is of questionable value...especially
if your own DR is similarly high.
Increasing the DR of armours and the damage of two-handed weapons would
likely create this result. IME, adding another hand to something
increases the power of it more than 1d+3 to 1d+4 - you can use your body
to drive it more effectively, especially for a heavier or more unwieldy
weapon.
> This looks like the rolls are independent of some basic skill (as 13
> is exactly the difference between 17 and 4), or are you assuming the
> same skill for both (in which case the result would also be 13)
Same skill.
Paul T.
> Paul T. <danielha...@home.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
> j%2b5.9852$V34.1...@news1.sttls1.wa.home.com...
> >
> > > Or you simply state:
> > > You have two basic actions per round. The normal case would be 1
attack,
> 1
> > > parry. AOA means 2 attacks, AOD means 2 defenses.
> >
I
> > can't compare the actual numbers, but the gist of the matter is that you
> > have
> > two basic actions, and 3 second rounds. You can perform one action at a
> > bonus,
> > two actions at no bonus, three at a penalty, etc.
>
> Which is very comparable to GURPS. You can have:
> 1 action at a bonus: AOA, +4 to hit or +2 to damage
> AOD, +2 to defense
> 2 actions at no bonus: normal, 1 attack, 1 parry
> move
> AOA, 2 attacks
> AOD, 2 defenses
> 3 actions at a penalty: AOCharge, 1 attack at -1 to hit
Very true, but my system sets a very definite framework for these things--
the bonus is the same whether you're defending, attacking, or trying to
do more damage. But it was certainly inspired by GURPS.
I just wanted a very simple yet flexible system that wouldn't require people
to look ANYthing up. Or at least keep the look-up necessity down as much
as possible.
>
> > You can also trade skill for damage. This simple framework works really
> well
> > and allows for an almost unlimited number of options in combat. I tend
to
> > use
> > GURPS for highly detailed games, however, and so have chosen to stick
> > to their 1-second rounds, reserving the 3-second round (however
wonderful)
> > for cinematic games.
>
> The possible actions in your 3-second rounds are almost the same as in
> GURPS. Still I agree, that the 1 second round may be to short if combat
> should interact with other things like the arrival of reserves or the
length
> of a spell. 3-12 seconds for a combat round all seem viable alternatives,
> depending on the intended graininess, and the possible number of actions
per
> round.
That's true. My system is much more simple and "grainy", and abstracts a lot
more away, so the time is not that far off.
But I did make a mistake--I use 2-second rounds, not 3-second rounds.
P.
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > And IIRC there were a good number of losses due to disease, which was
> > furthered by the hot, dirty gambesons.
>
> Yup - lice and other vermin were a problem in the best of situations, so
> add in a thick covering of loosely-constructed cotton or wool that you
> sweat like a pig* into all day, and it starts to sound like a
> vermin-n-germ hotel...
>
> *I read somewhere that pigs don't sweat - that's why they wallow in mud
> instead - which makes one wonder about the origin of the phrase "sweat
> like a pig"...
Maybe the pigs sweat the mud?
OTOH I think I heard, that the mud is intended to get rid of bloodsuckers,
which will crumble away together with the dried mud.
> > Possibly. Standard plate armour was not considered bullet-proof. The
> > first bullet-proof cuirasses were so heavy, they did away with arms
> > and legs to compensate for it.
>
> My wild guess would be the soft lead ball ammunition of those days
> probably doesn't penetrate armour as well as modern rounds, although I
> can't find data on relative projectile velocities right now (I did once,
> and IIRC musket balls had a velocity comparable to modern handguns;
> FWIW, there's some interesting information on the horrendous accuracy of
> muskets at http://server.irons-assoc.com/larry//musketry.htm; about 25%
> hits on an enemy battalion that at 30 yards seemed to be common).
According to a M.Thierbach (1886) the chances for 17th ct. prussian recruits
to hit a wooden wall, 2.64 m high, 31 m long were:
at 100 steps ( 75 m) 36 of 60 shots (60%)
at 200 steps (150 m) 24 of 60 shots (40%)
at 300 steps (225 m) 15 of 60 shots (25%)
at 400 steps (300 m) 12 of 60 shots (20%)
Comparing these numbers to the accuracies of the weapons below, it seems
that this inaccuracy is not due to the weapons, but due to the shooters.
FYI: I found some data from a series of tests done by the armament museum of
Graz, Styria:
Explanation:
Weapon: is the weapon (R) indicates rifled
Weight: the weight of the unloaded weapon
bore : the diameter of the fields
the diameter of the bullet
shot : the weight of the bullet
the weight of the blackpowder
v0 : bullet-velocity on leaving the barrel
bullet-velocity on maximum range
Rm : theoretical maximum range
steel : the penetration depth into St37 building steel at 100 m
(the weapon did penetrate n, but not n+1)
wood : the penetration depth into dry pinewood at 100 m
height: the height of the scattering around the aiming-point at 100 m
width : the width of the scattering around the aiming-point at 100 m
half of these values van be seen as the deviation
xx indicates, that the weapon scattered so much, that some bullets
ended
in the walls of the shooting gallery.
TW : the probability of hitting a target 300x1670 mm (0.5 m2)~ human
torso
(the weapons were fixed and laser-aligned before each shot)
penetration accuracy
Weapon weight bore shot v0 Rm steel wood height width
TW
(kg) (mm) (g) (m/s) (m) (mm) (mm) (mm) (mm)
(%)
1571 wheellock (R) 13.40 19.8 38.3 482 1141 2 153 870 655
52.5
19.0 14.0 67
1580 matchlock 18.00 20.6 49.1 533 1278 4 189 535 585
51.5
20.2 20.0 71
1Q17 matchlock 2.50 15.1 17.4 449 957 1 93 785 595
60.9
14.3 6.0 60
1595 wheellock 5.48 17.8 30.1 456 1095 2 80 460 505
54.5
17.2 10.0 65
1593 wheellock 2.90 13.2 10.8 427 834 1 84 290 505
54.5
12.3 5.0 56
1Q17 wheellock (R) 3.69 18.1 32.1 392 1085 -- 103 xx xx
17.5 10.0 66
1686 flintlock 4.20 17.8 30.9 494 1107 2 114 820 535
50.2
17.5 10.7 66
1700 flintlock 4.39 17.4 27.5 474 1071 2 83 1180 1080
32.7
16.8 9.3 64
1700 flintlock 4.74 18.3 32.2 451 1110 2 147 950 630
48.6
17.6 10.7 66
1700 flintlock 4.82 18.4 34.3 467 1151 n/a n/a 770 680
54.0
17.8 11.6 67
3Q18 flintlock (R) 3.88 16.4 26.7 455 1058 2 80 310 395
83.0
16.6 8.5 64
StG-58 (FN-FAL) 4.55 7.62 9.5 835 3890 12 483 102 75
100
7.85 2.9 123
StG-77 (AUG) 3.6 5.56 3.6 990 2734 9 287 51 59
100
5.70 1.7 99
1Q17 = 1st quarter of 17th ct (1600-1625)
3Q18 = 3rd quarter of 18th ct (1750-1775)
> > Although it would be helpful to know the necessary angle, to calculate
> > a possibility from that and arrive at a "realistic" PD against
> > high-velocity attacks.
>
> According to
> http://www.actiontarget.com/Pages/IndoorRangesFolder/IndoorRanges.htm,
> 10 gauge (0.135") steel will deflect standard handgun bullets impacting
> at over 45 degrees, and 0.25" mild steel will deflect perpendicular
> handgun bullets. 0.25" AR steel will deflect 45 degree rifle rounds,
> and 0.375" AR steel will deflect perpendicular rifle rounds.
>
> If we figure 2 square metres of surface area, full plate armour that
> could deflect an angled handgun bullet would weigh something like 50 kg
> with modern steel (20,000 cm^2 * 0.343 cm * ~8 g/cm^3), or maybe more
> like 40 kg when one considers high-surface-area parts like fingers
> aren't likely to have such protection.
>
> This is, to a certain extent, overprotection for such angled hits,
> though, so plate armour close to that heavy would probably provide
> reasonably decent protection against modern handguns.
I doubt, that you have to take that much armour. 0.5 m^2 seem more
reasonable, as most "bullet-proof" cuirasses were in fact only a front
plate, with a leather back. So 12.5 kg are a more reasonable weight for that
body-protection.
At the tests in Graz, they waged one shot at a cuirass from 1570:
The cuirass is 2.8 mm thick and was mounted over two layers of thin cloth
(average linen shirt) and a sand-sack representing the body.
The weapon used was a 12.3mm wheellock-pistol with 9.54g bullet-weight,
v5=444 m/s, v8=436 m/s, E8=907 J
The distance was 8.5 m
The angle was perpendicular.
The shot penetrated the cuirass, but the bullet was found between the
cuirass and the shirt. The sandsack (i.e. the "body") was not penetrated.
There were also no splinters from the bullet or the cuirass.
> > I agree with the shorter range. Yet crossbows had a better ability to
> > punch through plate, which would suggest a higher impact velocity.
>
> Could be - not sure. Might also be due to greater projectile weight
> (although I've seen varying information that places bolts from the same
> weight as arrows to about twice as heavy), or greater projectile
> resilience (the shorter and thicker bolts might shatter less than bodkin
> points, and hence penetrate with greater likelihood).
Also the different point factores in: most arrows have a bladed leafshaped
point, while most bolts have a short dartlike point, which is better for
penetrating armour.
> > But if you really want to note a dodgeable distance for each weapon,
> > you are free to do so. I just made this ruling to avoid too much
> > bookkeeping.
>
> I'd just say "over 30 yards is dodgeable" or something like that - IMHO,
> the differences between the weapons aren't likely to be important enough
> to both with in terms of dodgeability.
Agreed. But there are always tose pesky beancounters, who wan different
dodging-distances for each weapon :-)
> (FWIW, it's unlikely that one would use bows to shoot at an individual
> at longer ranges than a crossbow, simply because of the extreme
> difficulty of hitting anything that small, much less a target that will
> have 2-5 seconds of movement after the missile is in the air.
> Long-range shots were, AFAIK, almost solely against enemy units, and
> individuals were targetted only within 30-50 yards.)
I agree. Bows were used mostly to saturate the air with whole clouds of
arrows, so that the individual arrow was no longer dodgeable.
Crossbows were used mostly in prepared positions. Only in China did the
crossbow play a similar role as the bow in Europe. But for the same reason
the Chinese crossbows had lower strength, as to be drawable during battle.
> > Yes, the wound will be rather conical. OTOH you will have
> > tearing-effects, which are similar to low-speed bullets (no supersonic
> > shock-wave of course)
>
> Apparently, there aren't much in the way of tearing effects for
> low-speed bullets (flesh is stretchy; bullets like the Black Talon are
> meant to deal with that tendency, with questionable success) - see
> http://www.firearmstactical.com/hwfe.htm. With the much lower speed of
> a warhammer, I'm not sure tearing would occur.
FWIW: the woundpath is smaller and more cylindrical for faster bullets, and
more trompet-shaped for slower bullets. This is due to the fact, that the
slower bullet has more time to transfer the energy to the tissue. So the
warhammer (which is even slower) would transfer all energy to the tissue,
which might be more, despite the lower total energy.
> > If they hit the heart (a called shot to the vitals), the will cause
> > death, so the x3 imp-modifier for vitals should be granted.
>
> Just about anything to the heart will kill...
Therefore the x3 modifier for damage to the vitals ...
> FWIW, impaling's +50% damage on vitals hits would have a good chance of
> bringing a lightly armoured target to or near the knockout level of
> damage, after which he would probably bleed to death. A hit that
> actually penetrates the heart (called shot to the heart doing, say, HT/2
> damage) would probably bleed at the same rate as artery hits (1
> HP/turn).
Agreed.
> > Do you allow shield-PD to be used, if the character parries instead of
> > blocking?
>
> Well, no, since I don't use PD, but them's the rules... ;)
Aha
::baffled face::
I used Shield-PD only when blocking, but not when parrying.
Something like "PD of shields adds to block."
> > Note: Historically the shield grew smaller and smaller as the armour
> > improved. When plate armour ruled the field, shields were not used
> > except during tournaments. When wielding a bastard-sword two-handed,
> > you have no place for a shield.
>
> Yup - when your enemy's DR is high enough that you need a two-handed
> weapon to penetrate it, a shield is of questionable value...especially
> if your own DR is similarly high.
Exactly.
> Increasing the DR of armours and the damage of two-handed weapons would
> likely create this result.
And adding armour-divisors to weapons like warhammers, the spiked mace and
the estoc, which were intended to unch through armour.
> IME, adding another hand to something
> increases the power of it more than 1d+3 to 1d+4 - you can use your body
> to drive it more effectively, especially for a heavier or more unwieldy
> weapon.
I would not attribute it to the weapon, but devise something like "sw2" for
two-handed swing. Then we could say:
Shortsword cut/sw 2-H Bastardsword cut/sw2
Broadsword cut/sw+1 2-H Greatsword cut/sw2+1
1-H Bastardsword cut/sw+2
or something like that.
prei...@my-deja.com
> Comparing these numbers to the accuracies of the weapons below, it
> seems that this inaccuracy is not due to the weapons, but due to the
> shooters.
Quite possibly - early firearm units were, apparently, prone to just
pointing the gun in the proper direction rather than actually aiming
(the site I mentioned gives the results of an experiment one army
conducted showing that aiming was, in fact, rather useful).
And 15% of the shots misfired in optimal conditions (for matchlocks, I
think it was); still, it's interesting to have information that even
weapons which are relatively accurate, physically, still have horrible
battlefield performance; stark terror'll do that, I guess.
> FYI: I found some data from a series of tests done by the armament
> museum of Graz, Styria:
Interesting - thanks.
> I doubt, that you have to take that much armour. 0.5 m^2 seem more
> reasonable, as most "bullet-proof" cuirasses were in fact only a front
> plate, with a leather back. So 12.5 kg are a more reasonable weight
> for that body-protection.
For just a cuirass, yup - ~0.33 m^2 is enough to cover the front of the
torso, but it's so much cooler to have full plate... ;)
> At the tests in Graz, they waged one shot at a cuirass from 1570:
> The cuirass is 2.8 mm thick and was mounted over two layers of thin
> cloth (average linen shirt) and a sand-sack representing the body.
> The weapon used was a 12.3mm wheellock-pistol with 9.54g
> bullet-weight, v5=444 m/s, v8=436 m/s, E8=907 J
> The distance was 8.5 m
> The angle was perpendicular.
>
> The shot penetrated the cuirass, but the bullet was found between the
> cuirass and the shirt. The sandsack (i.e. the "body") was not
> penetrated. There were also no splinters from the bullet or the
> cuirass.
FWIW, 2.8mm = 0.11" = ~80% of the 10 gauge steel that place used for
angled deflection of modern handgun bullets. The wheellock pistol
bullet would be about the same weight and ~25% faster than a modern
bullet, so my wild guess would be that the cuirass would provide
protection against modern handgun bullets similar to that it provided
against this wheellock pistol (ie. pretty good).
Interesting.
> > resilience (the shorter and thicker bolts might shatter less than
> > bodkin points, and hence penetrate with greater likelihood).
>
> Also the different point factores in: most arrows have a bladed
> leafshaped point, while most bolts have a short dartlike point, which
> is better for penetrating armour.
War arrows had a bodkin point, which is the same kind of thick dart
shape. I think leaf arrows would skitter off plate pretty easily,
although I've heard they'll go through chain.
> I agree. Bows were used mostly to saturate the air with whole clouds
> of arrows, so that the individual arrow was no longer dodgeable.
> Crossbows were used mostly in prepared positions. Only in China did
> the crossbow play a similar role as the bow in Europe. But for the
> same reason the Chinese crossbows had lower strength, as to be
> drawable during battle.
Yup; I recall reading in a few places that the Chinese repeating
crossbow was so weak that its ammunition was regularly smeared with
poison to make it effective. Given the lesser efficiency of crossbows
and the speed and ease with which this one could be drawn, it couldn't
have been very powerful at all; OTOH, I wouldn't be surprised if it
could still injure someone with no armour or thick clothing.
> > > If they hit the heart (a called shot to the vitals), the will
> > > cause death, so the x3 imp-modifier for vitals should be granted.
> >
> > Just about anything to the heart will kill...
>
> Therefore the x3 modifier for damage to the vitals ...
x1.5, actually (x2 -> x3), except for bullets, which is why I treat
bullets as impaling weapons instead; they then do half damage to limbs
and x1.5 damage to vitals, just like other impaling attacks. With
current damages, this'll make them do 3d+3 damage to an unarmoured
person, the most likely result of which is instant incapacitation and
death by bleeding within 15-20 minutes - something like an 80% death
rate is to be expected without treatment. IMHO, that's quite sufficient
to represent the deadliness of bullets in the game without an additional
doubling of damage.
> I used Shield-PD only when blocking, but not when parrying.
> Something like "PD of shields adds to block."
Yeah, that might work. I guess I do something vaguely similar (I've got
a list of parry modifiers based on weapon characteristics, and the
diameter of a shield is one of them; I suppose this works out roughly to
adding the PD to the block).
> I would not attribute it to the weapon, but devise something like
> "sw2" for two-handed swing. Then we could say:
> Broadsword cut/sw+1 2-H Greatsword cut/sw2+1
Could do - I think I approximated that adding another hand adds 50%
power (and a little extra mass for angular momentum), which at moderate
Strengths works out to about +2 damage (2-h bastard sword over 1-h) to
+6 damage (2-h great axe over 1-h axe; note the great axe is twice as
heavy).
The problem is, damage goes up too quickly with Strength in the current
rules (at least twice as fast as it should, AFAICT), so there will
always be some problems. Still, as a rule of thumb one could assign +2
damage to using a weapon in two hands rather than one (if it's made for
that), and add, say, +1 damage for each 25% heavier the weapon is than a
similar one. Unbalanced weapons get another +1 damage (they deliver
more force).
So, if a broadsword is sw+1, an axe would get +1 (weight) +1
(unbalanced) = sw+3, whereas a great axe would get +2 (2 hands) +4
(+100% weight) = +6 over an axe = sw+9 damage.
OTOH, the Strength minimums are kinda low for making a weapon balanced;
I use 4 categories (unbalanced, heavy, normal, light), the only new one
of which is heavy, which allows one attack _or_ parry (at -1) every turn
("light" is like fencing weapons are now; +1 to parry, 2 parries/turn,
and unbalanced weapons are at -2 to parry).
So, anyway, I'd put the Strength mins lower (like 5 for broadswords, 8
for axes, 11 for great axes), but increase the Strength mins for each
level of control by 50% over the level before. Hence, an axe could be
used as Unbalanced with Str 8, as Heavy with Str 12, as Normal with Str
18, and as Light with Str 27. This allows unbalanced weapons to be
effectively used at moderate Strength levels without making them as fast
as balanced weapons - a Str 13 axeman could rely on his shield for
defense while not getting half the normal attack rate. He'd get more
damage, but have to spend points on another skill for defense, and would
arguably get other penalties (to hit or to be defended against, since
the axe would be slower).
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> "Franz & Michael Köttl" <mob...@aktiv.co.at> wrote in message
> news:8ko162$n5m$5...@rohrpostix.uta4you.at...
> >
> > 1 action at a bonus: AOA, +4 to hit or +2 to damage
> > AOD, +2 to defense
> > 2 actions at no bonus: normal, 1 attack, 1 parry
> > move
> > AOA, 2 attacks
> > AOD, 2 defenses
> > 3 actions at a penalty: AOCharge, 1 attack at -1 to hit
>
> Very true, but my system sets a very definite framework for these things--
> the bonus is the same whether you're defending, attacking, or trying to
> do more damage. But it was certainly inspired by GURPS.
Well, the defensive bonus is +2 instead of +4, because parry = skill/2.
But you are right, that the framework is not elaborate enough. The thing
with 3 actions is hardly framework at all - more guesswork. How move is
really related is also not definitively explained.
BTW: what about all-out-flee, which allows full movement als 1 defense at -1
?
> I just wanted a very simple yet flexible system that wouldn't require
people
> to look ANYthing up. Or at least keep the look-up necessity down as much
> as possible.
This is one of the great advantages of GURPS over RoleMaster: you calculate
everything at character-generation, and don't have to look up many tables
during actual play.
> > The possible actions in your 3-second rounds are almost the same as in
> > GURPS. Still I agree, that the 1 second round may be to short if combat
> > should interact with other things like the arrival of reserves or the
> > length
> > of a spell. 3-12 seconds for a combat round all seem viable
alternatives,
> > depending on the intended graininess, and the possible number of actions
> > per
> > round.
>
> That's true. My system is much more simple and "grainy", and abstracts a
lot
> more away, so the time is not that far off.
>
> But I did make a mistake--I use 2-second rounds, not 3-second rounds.
That is still twice as long as in GURPS, so might be more realistic. OTOH:
How much insults or commands can you exchange in 2 seconds?
BTW: There were rules in CII for pacing combat, by alternating 1d seconds of
actual combat with 1d seconds of maneuvering - which on average works out to
your 2-second round :-)
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > Comparing these numbers to the accuracies of the weapons below, it
> > seems that this inaccuracy is not due to the weapons, but due to the
> > shooters.
>
> Quite possibly - early firearm units were, apparently, prone to just
> pointing the gun in the proper direction rather than actually aiming
> (the site I mentioned gives the results of an experiment one army
> conducted showing that aiming was, in fact, rather useful).
By itself this sentence looks rather funny: Who would have thought, that
aiming could be useful ;-)
But I understand, that you mean, that the weapons were accurate enough, to
validate the effort of aiming.
> And 15% of the shots misfired in optimal conditions (for matchlocks, I
> think it was); still, it's interesting to have information that even
> weapons which are relatively accurate, physically, still have horrible
> battlefield performance; stark terror'll do that, I guess.
And insufficient training on aim. The soldiers of these days were trained
primarily for speed. Firing one volley after the other, thus saturating the
enemy with lead. This has both a psychological effect (NO, I will not run up
that hill with all the lead in the air) as well as a practical effct (If you
shoot enough bullets, even a low hit-percentage will result in enough hits)
Only latr on the idea of aiming was introduced with specialist
Jaeger-troops.
> > FYI: I found some data from a series of tests done by the armament
> > museum of Graz, Styria:
>
> Interesting - thanks.
You are welcome.
> > I doubt, that you have to take that much armour. 0.5 m^2 seem more
> > reasonable, as most "bullet-proof" cuirasses were in fact only a front
> > plate, with a leather back. So 12.5 kg are a more reasonable weight
> > for that body-protection.
>
> For just a cuirass, yup - ~0.33 m^2 is enough to cover the front of the
> torso, but it's so much cooler to have full plate... ;)
If you are strong enough ...
But with the average soldier in mind, the reduction of the plate armour to a
cuirass is reasonable.
OTOH nothing prevents our ST 18 hero from wearing a custom made (i.e.
expensive) bullet proof plate armour.
> > At the tests in Graz, they waged one shot at a cuirass from 1570:
> > The cuirass is 2.8 mm thick and was mounted over two layers of thin
> > cloth (average linen shirt) and a sand-sack representing the body.
> > The weapon used was a 12.3mm wheellock-pistol with 9.54g
> > bullet-weight, v5=444 m/s, v8=436 m/s, E8=907 J
> > The distance was 8.5 m
> > The angle was perpendicular.
> >
> > The shot penetrated the cuirass, but the bullet was found between the
> > cuirass and the shirt. The sandsack (i.e. the "body") was not
> > penetrated. There were also no splinters from the bullet or the
> > cuirass.
>
> FWIW, 2.8mm = 0.11" = ~80% of the 10 gauge steel that place used for
> angled deflection of modern handgun bullets. The wheellock pistol
> bullet would be about the same weight and ~25% faster than a modern
> bullet, so my wild guess would be that the cuirass would provide
> protection against modern handgun bullets similar to that it provided
> against this wheellock pistol (ie. pretty good).
>
> Interesting.
For comparison:
The StG77 (AUG 5.56 mm) has wt=3.6 g, v8~980 m/s, E8~1730 J
The Pi80 (Glock 9 mm) has wt=8.0 g, v8~355 m/s, E8~ 505 J
So: the assault rifle would hurt the wearer for sure (as thee linen can't
absorb the difference of energies), while the pistol would only dent the
cuirass (BTW: the ancient bullet is ~18% heavier and ~23% faster)
Things moght look different for a .44 Magnum, or other pistols of large
calibre.
> > > resilience (the shorter and thicker bolts might shatter less than
> > > bodkin points, and hence penetrate with greater likelihood).
> >
> > Also the different point factores in: most arrows have a bladed
> > leafshaped point, while most bolts have a short dartlike point, which
> > is better for penetrating armour.
>
> War arrows had a bodkin point, which is the same kind of thick dart
> shape.
O.K.
> I think leaf arrows would skitter off plate pretty easily,
> although I've heard they'll go through chain.
Many things go through chain - that was one of the reasons for inventing
plate.
But it would depend on the quality of the chain: the links could be simply
bent together, but expensive chains had riveted links, which were much
sturdier.
> > I agree. Bows were used mostly to saturate the air with whole clouds
> > of arrows, so that the individual arrow was no longer dodgeable.
> > Crossbows were used mostly in prepared positions. Only in China did
> > the crossbow play a similar role as the bow in Europe. But for the
> > same reason the Chinese crossbows had lower strength, as to be
> > drawable during battle.
>
> Yup; I recall reading in a few places that the Chinese repeating
> crossbow was so weak that its ammunition was regularly smeared with
> poison to make it effective.
I read that too, but would not make too much out of it. Consider, that the
great number of Chinese infantry had no armour to speak of. They had a linen
shirt, a shield and a polearm or sword.
Nobles on chariots or elite troops like the guard of the emperor had metal
lamellar or lacquered rhinoceros hide, and a helmet.
> Given the lesser efficiency of crossbows
> and the speed and ease with which this one could be drawn, it couldn't
> have been very powerful at all; OTOH, I wouldn't be surprised if it
> could still injure someone with no armour or thick clothing.
Exactly. And considering the makeup of Chinese armies from 1500-200 BC, this
is sufficient, as the unarmoured infantry fight against the unarmoured
infantry, while the armoured nobles used reflex-bows against armoured
nobles.
Also the weak crossbow was probably sufficient against horses, which stopped
the enemies chariots and the barbarian invaders from the north. Once this
mobility-advantage was negated, the mass of infantry with polearms could
overwhelm the enemy.
Also the crossbow has the advantage that you can aim more easily than with a
bow. Considering, that it was impractical to train the large numbers of
troops for long times, the ease of use was an additional reason for choosing
the crossbow for the infantry from the 6th ct BC onwards.
> > > > If they hit the heart (a called shot to the vitals), the will
> > > > cause death, so the x3 imp-modifier for vitals should be granted.
> > >
> > > Just about anything to the heart will kill...
> >
> > Therefore the x3 modifier for damage to the vitals ...
>
> x1.5, actually (x2 -> x3), except for bullets, which is why I treat
> bullets as impaling weapons instead; they then do half damage to limbs
> and x1.5 damage to vitals, just like other impaling attacks.
Sounds good. Also represents our heroes favourite wound: the shot in the
left shoulder ;-)
> With
> current damages, this'll make them do 3d+3 damage to an unarmoured
> person, the most likely result of which is instant incapacitation and
> death by bleeding within 15-20 minutes - something like an 80% death
> rate is to be expected without treatment. IMHO, that's quite sufficient
> to represent the deadliness of bullets in the game without an additional
> doubling of damage.
I agree. As long as an unarmoured target can be killed with a well placed
shot, yet at the same time easily survive a not-so-well placed shot, the
rules are sufficient.
> > I used Shield-PD only when blocking, but not when parrying.
> > Something like "PD of shields adds to block."
>
> Yeah, that might work.
Well, it did work for my group, but different groups have different
preferences.
> I guess I do something vaguely similar (I've got
> a list of parry modifiers based on weapon characteristics, and the
> diameter of a shield is one of them; I suppose this works out roughly to
> adding the PD to the block).
:-)
Doing it different leads to the same.
> > I would not attribute it to the weapon, but devise something like
> > "sw2" for two-handed swing. Then we could say:
> > Broadsword cut/sw+1 2-H Greatsword cut/sw2+1
>
> Could do - I think I approximated that adding another hand adds 50%
> power (and a little extra mass for angular momentum), which at moderate
> Strengths works out to about +2 damage (2-h bastard sword over 1-h) to
> +6 damage (2-h great axe over 1-h axe; note the great axe is twice as
> heavy).
>
> The problem is, damage goes up too quickly with Strength in the current
> rules (at least twice as fast as it should, AFAICT), so there will
> always be some problems.
You could split sw, into sw1 (lightly lower than now, to correct the
perceived failure), and sw2 50% greater than that.
> Still, as a rule of thumb one could assign +2
> damage to using a weapon in two hands rather than one (if it's made for
> that), and add, say, +1 damage for each 25% heavier the weapon is than a
> similar one. Unbalanced weapons get another +1 damage (they deliver
> more force).
>
> So, if a broadsword is sw+1, an axe would get +1 (weight) +1
> (unbalanced) = sw+3, whereas a great axe would get +2 (2 hands) +4
> (+100% weight) = +6 over an axe = sw+9 damage.
Sounds reasonable, and might be easier, than redefining sw.
> OTOH, the Strength minimums are kinda low for making a weapon balanced;
> I use 4 categories (unbalanced, heavy, normal, light), the only new one
> of which is heavy, which allows one attack _or_ parry (at -1) every turn
> ("light" is like fencing weapons are now; +1 to parry, 2 parries/turn,
> and unbalanced weapons are at -2 to parry).
>
> So, anyway, I'd put the Strength mins lower (like 5 for broadswords, 8
> for axes, 11 for great axes), but increase the Strength mins for each
> level of control by 50% over the level before. Hence, an axe could be
> used as Unbalanced with Str 8, as Heavy with Str 12, as Normal with Str
> 18, and as Light with Str 27. This allows unbalanced weapons to be
> effectively used at moderate Strength levels without making them as fast
> as balanced weapons - a Str 13 axeman could rely on his shield for
> defense while not getting half the normal attack rate. He'd get more
> damage, but have to spend points on another skill for defense, and would
> arguably get other penalties (to hit or to be defended against, since
> the axe would be slower).
Yes. I like it.
I think I have seen your proposal before (and I think it was aslo a post
from you).
Would you have the list with proposed ST-values available?
Thank you in advance.
Paulo Marcondes
>> pointing the gun in the proper direction rather than actually aiming
>> (the site I mentioned gives the results of an experiment one army
>> conducted showing that aiming was, in fact, rather useful).
>
>By itself this sentence looks rather funny: Who would have thought, that
>aiming could be useful ;-)
>But I understand, that you mean, that the weapons were accurate enough, to
>validate the effort of aiming.
>
>primarily for speed. Firing one volley after the other, thus saturating the
>enemy with lead. This has both a psychological effect (NO, I will not run up
>that hill with all the lead in the air) as well as a practical effct (If you
>shoot enough bullets, even a low hit-percentage will result in enough hits)
>
>Only latr on the idea of aiming was introduced with specialist
>Jaeger-troops.
This is one of the motives snipers have such a high shoot-to-kill ratio -
they
AIM!
A stat by US snipers: During Vietnam, the normal infantry soldier needed
50,000 rounds to a kill. Snipers needed only 1.3 rounds to kill a enemy.
[]s, Paulo
marc...@bigfoot.com
prei...@my-deja.com
> And insufficient training on aim. The soldiers of these days were
> trained primarily for speed. Firing one volley after the other, thus
> saturating the enemy with lead.
Yup. There were some skirmishers who picked their targets individually
(and could hit them reasonably well within 50m or so), but apparently
skirmishing troops fired significantly more slowly than close-packed
ones (harder to order and control, I guess), so they stayed mostly with
the dense units.
> > although I've heard they'll go through chain.
>
> Many things go through chain - that was one of the reasons for
> inventing plate.
> But it would depend on the quality of the chain: the links could be
> simply bent together, but expensive chains had riveted links, which
> were much sturdier.
I think strongly-cast broadheads would shear through the links rather
than force them apart. There was apparently
(http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/rialto/archery-msg.html, and I've seen it
quoted in books on the bow) a shooting test done against period mail:
"He asked the curator of a museum if he could shoot his bow at a coat of
(rivet) mail from the colection. The curator was so sure of the mail's
protective qualities that he offered to *wear* it and be shot at. Wisely
declining this offer, Saxton Pope placed the mail over a *wooden box
filled with meat*. He then fired at it using a 75 lb draw longbow. The
arrow had a homemade broadhead point (*not* a bodkin). The arrow entered
the front of the mail, went through the box, through the meat, through
the back of the box, and caused the mail to bulge out in the back. The
link that was penetrated had been neatly sliced by the broadhead.
The curator turned green."
(The archer in question recounts this in his book "Hunting With the Bow
and Arrow".)
This was undoubtedly close range, though, like 10-20m, and it's
questionable whether the angle of attack would allow this with an arcing
200m shot.
> Also the weak crossbow was probably sufficient against horses, which
I dunno about that. Horses have a lot of muscle covering most anything
vital, and I would be surprised if a crossbow that weak would do more
than startle and cause pain.
Also, the Mongols at least had some armour on their horses (to prevent
the evaporation of sweat off the chest from causing freezing during long
rides in cold climates, apparently). The Mongols also used loose silk
armour against missiles, and would most likely have draped the same over
their horses if weak crossbows had been causing them problems.
Personally, I doubt such crossbows would be effective weapons against
horses unless poisoned; they were, as you suggest, probably for use
against the unarmoured hordes of men.
> Also the crossbow has the advantage that you can aim more easily than
> with a bow.
I don't really agree. Bows are quite easy to aim IME. Further, the job
of the repeating crossbow seems to have been to launch bolts as fast as
possible (likely into a packed, unarmoured mob), so aiming would have
been both unlikely and largely unneeded.
IMHO, the mechanical troubles with a crossbow (string having to move
over the nut, whack, the bolt, and slide the bolt along the track to
release) probably more than compensate for not being able to sight along
an arrow with a bow; IME, one quickly gets used to that, and the simpler
release operation of a bow has less variables (compared to early
crossbows, anyway).
> Yes. I like it.
> I think I have seen your proposal before (and I think it was aslo a
> post from you).
> Would you have the list with proposed ST-values available?
> Thank you in advance.
Yeah, I trot it out every now and then (the same topics always come up
on this ng...). I don't have access to the list right now (long-term
computer boo-boo), but I've actually posted the list before. I can't
find it on deja.com right now (it's been pretty flaky for a while), but
I'll see if I can dig it up, one way or another.
Xiphias Gladius
> A stat by US snipers: During Vietnam, the normal infantry soldier needed
> 50,000 rounds to a kill. Snipers needed only 1.3 rounds to kill a enemy.
Yeah, but loading three-tenths of a round is a bitch.
- Ian
--
Marriage, n: The state or condition of a community consisting of a master,
a mistress, and two slaves, making, in all, two. -- Ambrose Bierce
http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/ian
SSBB Diplomatic Corps; Boston, Massachusetts
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > And insufficient training on aim. The soldiers of these days were
> > trained primarily for speed. Firing one volley after the other, thus
> > saturating the enemy with lead.
>
> (and could hit them reasonably well within 50m or so), but apparently
> skirmishing troops fired significantly more slowly than close-packed
> ones (harder to order and control, I guess), so they stayed mostly with
> the dense units.
IMHO it has something to do with the recruiting system: In those days people
were impressed into service, so they had no real incentive to participate in
heavy training. The only exception would be members of Guard-units, which
served voluntarily on a job-like basis. But their training would be more
concerned with looking snappy on parade, than with pinpoint shooting.
Also people had no possibility to train privately with a firearm, so had no
basic experience at all. Those who had (rangers, foresters, hunters) were
drafted for specialized skirmisher units.
> > > although I've heard they'll go through chain.
> >
> > Many things go through chain - that was one of the reasons for
> > inventing plate.
> > But it would depend on the quality of the chain: the links could be
> > simply bent together, but expensive chains had riveted links, which
> > were much sturdier.
>
> I think strongly-cast broadheads would shear through the links rather
> than force them apart. There was apparently
> (http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/rialto/archery-msg.html, and I've seen it
> quoted in books on the bow) a shooting test done against period mail:
>
> "He asked the curator of a museum if he could shoot his bow at a coat of
> (rivet) mail from the colection. The curator was so sure of the mail's
> protective qualities that he offered to *wear* it and be shot at. Wisely
> declining this offer, Saxton Pope placed the mail over a *wooden box
> filled with meat*. He then fired at it using a 75 lb draw longbow. The
> arrow had a homemade broadhead point (*not* a bodkin). The arrow entered
> the front of the mail, went through the box, through the meat, through
> the back of the box, and caused the mail to bulge out in the back. The
> link that was penetrated had been neatly sliced by the broadhead.
> The curator turned green."
>
> (The archer in question recounts this in his book "Hunting With the Bow
> and Arrow".)
>
> This was undoubtedly close range, though, like 10-20m, and it's
> questionable whether the angle of attack would allow this with an arcing
> 200m shot.
Interesting. But thinking of it: the links of chain came in a multitude of
varieties, and riveting was not the only mark of quality:
First of all, there were rings of wire, which could be simply bent, but also
soldered or riveted.
Second there were rings stamped from a sheet of metal - these rings were
much stronger than wire-rings, as they had more resistance to be widened.
But these rings were also heavier, and much more expensive (stamped metal
was something unusual in those days)
Open rings were often simply bent, but many of the chain-mails recovered at
Wisby had their rings cut through by swordstrokes.
So, returning to that arrow: that arrow didn't necessarily cut through the
wire-rings, but simply stretched the metal, until the arrow passed through.
Or maybe the cutting of a single wire would be sufficient to let the arrow
strike.
Bodkin-pints OTOH didn't even have that much trouble, as the arrow would
easily fit within a single link, thus no need to damage the mail at all.
Thirdly I agree, that this was surely a perpendicular shot from short
distance. Under battlefield-conditions neither the angle nor the delivered
force would be similar to the experiment. But chain is vulnerable to small
attacks, which can pass through the links. So there were a multitude of
ideas how to counter this, like the quilted gambeson or the leather
colleret, and finally plate.
> > Also the weak crossbow was probably sufficient against horses, which
>
> I dunno about that. Horses have a lot of muscle covering most anything
> vital, and I would be surprised if a crossbow that weak would do more
> than startle and cause pain.
I don't think, that the non-repeating crossbow was that weak: One of my
sources (Osprey Military, Man-at-arms Series 218) explicitely states, that
the crossbow introduced during the era of Spring and Autumn / Warring States
had less range than the bow (600 paces maximum), but greater penetration
power at short ranges. "It [the crossbow] may have contributed to the
decline of the chariot, which as a lare, slow-moving target, protected only
by leather, must have been very vulnerable."
IMHO the effect would be comparable to roman pila, which were thrown at
short range immediately before entering melee. Also the standard block of
infantry was three spearmen and two crossbowmen - so the time to ready the
crossbow was not so essential, as the archers were "in cover".
> Also, the Mongols at least had some armour on their horses (to prevent
> the evaporation of sweat off the chest from causing freezing during long
> rides in cold climates, apparently). The Mongols also used loose silk
> armour against missiles, and would most likely have draped the same over
> their horses if weak crossbows had been causing them problems.
Mongols are 1400 years later, than the Warring States (200 BC vs 1200 AD).
I also know of no armor shirts of raw silk during the time of the Warring
States.
Also the chinese armies of the time of the Mongol Conquest had an even
larger percentage of crossbowmen (50% instead of 30%), but the employment
was radically different between Chinese and Mongol armies: Chinese armies
waged statig battles, where the spearmen represented the citywall, behind
which the crossbowmen could alternate in turns shooting their crossbows.
Mongol amries OTOH were highly dynamic, enveloping the enemy and/or drawing
him from his prepared positions by feints.
Alos note, that the only defeat Ghenghis Khan ever experienced was at the
hand of a Chinese army, so the crossbows might not have been as useless, as
you like to imply.
> Personally, I doubt such crossbows would be effective weapons against
> horses unless poisoned; they were, as you suggest, probably for use
> against the unarmoured hordes of men.
Horses are largely unarmoured, too. At least unarmoured enough for the
penetration power of the chinese crossbow. Still: many hits by many bolts
will fell a horse, which would be unimpresses by a single bolt.
> > Also the crossbow has the advantage that you can aim more easily than
> > with a bow.
>
> I don't really agree. Bows are quite easy to aim IME. Further, the job
> of the repeating crossbow seems to have been to launch bolts as fast as
> possible (likely into a packed, unarmoured mob), so aiming would have
> been both unlikely and largely unneeded.
I tend to agree. The positioning of rotating ranks of crossbowmen behind
solid lines of spearmen points in the same direction. But the targets were
not only the enemy infantry, but also charging chariots.
> IMHO, the mechanical troubles with a crossbow (string having to move
> over the nut, whack, the bolt, and slide the bolt along the track to
> release) probably more than compensate for not being able to sight along
> an arrow with a bow; IME, one quickly gets used to that, and the simpler
> release operation of a bow has less variables (compared to early
> crossbows, anyway).
Probably. But aiming with a bow held drawn requires the buildup of a certain
musculature. England had the required weekend-trainings to achieve this. The
Chinese crossbowmen were in a position like European flintlock-infantry much
later: untrained troops, which shall saturate the enemy with missiles. Both
the crossbow and the flintlock can be fired without much training, simply by
pointing them in the right direction.
> > Yes. I like it.
> > I think I have seen your proposal before (and I think it was aslo a
> > post from you).
> > Would you have the list with proposed ST-values available?
> > Thank you in advance.
>
> Yeah, I trot it out every now and then (the same topics always come up
> on this ng...).
We are still talking about the same game, don't we?
> I don't have access to the list right now (long-term
> computer boo-boo), but I've actually posted the list before. I can't
> find it on deja.com right now (it's been pretty flaky for a while)
Deja always seems to have "slight problems, starting just the week before"
:-)
> , but
> I'll see if I can dig it up, one way or another.
O.K. I'll wait. No urgency is associated with this.
prei...@my-deja.com
> IMHO it has something to do with the recruiting system: In those days
> people were impressed into service, so they had no real incentive to
Was this still the case for gun-armed troops in the 17th and 18th
centuries? I thought professional or semi-professional armies had
started to become common by then.
> > The link that was penetrated had been neatly sliced by the
> > broadhead.
>
> So, returning to that arrow: that arrow didn't necessarily cut through
> the wire-rings, but simply stretched the metal, until the arrow passed
> through.
> Or maybe the cutting of a single wire would be sufficient to let the
> arrow strike.
The latter, apparently.
> Bodkin-pints OTOH didn't even have that much trouble, as the arrow
> would easily fit within a single link, thus no need to damage the mail
> at all.
How wide were typical mail links? I'd always thought they were fairly
small, but the quote suggests only a single link had to be broken to
allow a broadhead to penetrate.
As bodkins tend to widen towards the shaft, I would expect them to burst
a link even if they hit the centre of it, although I'm not sure what
would happen if they hit the edges of two links (might skitter into a
centre, skitter off, or go through). This might not be the case,
especially if the links were significantly wider than I'd thought, but
modern mail is often made with washers, suggesting (albeit not terribly
reliably) small link sizes.
> Thirdly I agree, that this was surely a perpendicular shot from short
> distance. Under battlefield-conditions neither the angle nor the
> delivered force would be similar to the experiment.
Depends on the situation - I would guess hitting a charging man on a
facing part of his torso at 20m would be reasonably similar, although
indirect shots would of course be very different.
> But chain is vulnerable to small
> attacks, which can pass through the links. So there were a multitude
> of ideas how to counter this, like the quilted gambeson or the leather
> colleret, and finally plate.
Yup. I can't help but wonder how something like thick silk over a
quilted gambeson would work (well, I think, although it might not be
great armour for other considerations or situations).
> > I dunno about that. Horses have a lot of muscle covering most
> > anything vital, and I would be surprised if a crossbow that weak
> > would do more than startle and cause pain.
>
> I don't think, that the non-repeating crossbow was that weak: One of
I was referring only to the repeating crossbow (sorry if that wasn't
clear). I would expect even relatively light non-repeating crossbows
would hit with enough force to cause serious injury to men and even
horses.
> infantry was three spearmen and two crossbowmen - so the time to ready
> the crossbow was not so essential, as the archers were "in cover".
It depends - low readying time is always nice because of the greater
volume of shots it allows (until you run out of ammunition...), and is
especially important if one is engaged in a missile exchange and the
enemy has a much lower time (crossbows vs. longbows in European field
battles). OTOH, I can certainly see how units of the above could be
very useful in a mixed melee.
> Also the chinese armies of the time of the Mongol Conquest had an even
> larger percentage of crossbowmen (50% instead of 30%), but the
Did Chinese armies ever make moderate use of bows? (Were they used by
nobles against other nobles? I seem to recall someone mentioning
something of the sort...)
> Alos note, that the only defeat Ghenghis Khan ever experienced was at
> the hand of a Chinese army,
Cool - any more details?
> so the crossbows might not have been as useless, as you like to imply.
Perhaps my comments regarding them have been a little misleading - they
tend to be slanted more towards RPG use of crossbows, where I honestly
think the long reload times would be a serious hindrance in many
situations. In the general case, crossbows certainly have their uses
(defense from secure cover is the canonical one), and are certainly
better than bows for some things (casting extremely powerful bolts
without weird muscles, for example).
In general, crossbows tended to be notably less efficient than bows,
meaning they would deliver a less powerful attack for comparable effort
if hand-drawn. I would assume from this that the tendency would be to
use either bows or more powerful crossbows, but that may not have been
the case in China. Any idea why they used so many crossbows and so few
handbows?
> Still: many hits by many bolts will fell a horse, which would be
> unimpresses by a single bolt.
My guess is that that would largely be a result of one of the bolts
getting lucky and penetrating unusually far or hitting something
unusually vital (I don't think wounds add well), or of blood loss from
sustained bleeding from multiple minor wounds.
> Probably. But aiming with a bow held drawn requires the buildup of a
> certain musculature. England had the required weekend-trainings to
> achieve this. The Chinese crossbowmen were in a position like European
> flintlock-infantry much later: untrained troops, which shall saturate
> the enemy with missiles. Both the crossbow and the flintlock can be
> fired without much training, simply by pointing them in the right
> direction.
As can a bow - point, draw, release. When you're shooting at a mass of
enemy infantry, you don't need to aim for too long. For all that, I
usually aim for a second or less when target shooting, and simply draw
and release when shooting along a ballistic path. I think you're
overstating the difficulty of using a bow.
AFAICT, using a bow is very easy, but using an extremely powerful bow is
very difficult, simply because it's so much harder to draw - these are
the ones that take the specialized musculature. IME, an average man can
with little trouble or training draw and use a bow with enough power to
be useful against unarmoured troops.
OTOH, I don't doubt that Chinese generals had good reasons for choosing
crossbows. Any idea what they were? (It might be a reflection of the
nature of the battles of the time, I guess.)
prei...@my-deja.com
> This is one of the motives snipers have such a high shoot-to-kill
> ratio - they AIM!
Yup. There's lots of other factors, though - snipers aren't apt to lay
down suppressive fire, they aren't apt to spray some bullets in the
hopes of hitting a target that's cutting down their unit, they're
probably not getting shot at and so are about as calm as on the practice
range, they can generally wait for a stationary target with good
visibility, they're probably better shots to start with, and so on.
Of course, getting to where they can take a perfect shot can be a pretty
impressive feat sometimes... (High levels of Stealth and Camoflage.)
Still, it's worth noting that sniper shots are probably not too far
below practice range efficiency, while normal shots are vastly less
likely to hit. Making the normal soldier's situation the default
assumption, and hence making firearm shots vastly less accurate than
practice shots, is probably reasonable; snipers (or target shooters, if
you want to game that out) then get large bonuses for stationary,
unaware, fully-visible targets with a long time to aim in a
(comparatively) low-stress environment.
Paul T.
> Paul T. <danielha...@home.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
> hkVb5.15185$V34.2...@news1.sttls1.wa.home.com...
> >
> > "Franz & Michael Köttl" <mob...@aktiv.co.at> wrote in message
> > news:8ko162$n5m$5...@rohrpostix.uta4you.at...
> > >
> > > Which is very comparable to GURPS. You can have:
> > > 1 action at a bonus: AOA, +4 to hit or +2 to damage
> > > AOD, +2 to defense
> > > 2 actions at no bonus: normal, 1 attack, 1 parry
> > > move
> > > AOA, 2 attacks
> > > AOD, 2 defenses
> > > 3 actions at a penalty: AOCharge, 1 attack at -1 to hit
> >
> > Very true, but my system sets a very definite framework for these
things--
> > the bonus is the same whether you're defending, attacking, or trying to
> > do more damage. But it was certainly inspired by GURPS.
>
> Well, the defensive bonus is +2 instead of +4, because parry = skill/2.
Of course. In this system, there are no rolls based on skill/2 so I don't
have to deal with that. Simply halving bonuses and penalties seems to work
well enough in GURPS, however.
> But you are right, that the framework is not elaborate enough. The thing
> with 3 actions is hardly framework at all - more guesswork. How move is
> really related is also not definitively explained.
>
> BTW: what about all-out-flee, which allows full movement als 1 defense
at -1
> ?
>
The system I am referring to is highly cinematic, so movement is usually
not considered, but in a more rigid framework it could be considered an
action.
You would have to do movement and parrying at the same time at no
penalty or at a penalty to both, depending on how far you want to move,
I suppose.
> > I just wanted a very simple yet flexible system that wouldn't require
> people
> > to look ANYthing up. Or at least keep the look-up necessity down as much
> > as possible.
>
> This is one of the great advantages of GURPS over RoleMaster: you
calculate
> everything at character-generation, and don't have to look up many tables
> during actual play.
Yeah, that is nice. I don't care if I have to do a few integrals at chargen
if
it improves the gameplay later. I figure that if other people do mind, there
will usually be a computer or a smart person around to help them.
>
> > > The possible actions in your 3-second rounds are almost the same as in
> > > GURPS. Still I agree, that the 1 second round may be to short if
combat
> > > should interact with other things like the arrival of reserves or the
> > > length
> > > of a spell. 3-12 seconds for a combat round all seem viable
> alternatives,
> > > depending on the intended graininess, and the possible number of
actions
> > > per
> > > round.
> >
> > That's true. My system is much more simple and "grainy", and abstracts a
> lot
> > more away, so the time is not that far off.
> >
> > But I did make a mistake--I use 2-second rounds, not 3-second rounds.
>
> That is still twice as long as in GURPS, so might be more realistic. OTOH:
> How much insults or commands can you exchange in 2 seconds?
Arbitrary rule: one sentence.
I suppose two commands or maybe even three could be made into one sentence:
"Larry, please move the tank, and tell Jane to shoot the alien who is about
to
jump me from behind."
:-)
>
> BTW: There were rules in CII for pacing combat, by alternating 1d seconds
of
> actual combat with 1d seconds of maneuvering - which on average works out
to
> your 2-second round :-)
Hehe. I suppose so.
I don't remember whether I mentioned that I DO like the 1-second rounds in
GURPS.
I just like something a little longer for very cinematic games.
P.
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > IMHO it has something to do with the recruiting system: In those days
> > people were impressed into service, so they had no real incentive to
>
> Was this still the case for gun-armed troops in the 17th and 18th
> centuries? I thought professional or semi-professional armies had
> started to become common by then.
Yes and no.
The Guards (by whatever name they went in each country) were indeed
professional bodies of men, and besides parading also fulfilled the duties
of police and elite crack troops.
The general troops were just that: Scores of people pressed to the duty.
Morale was low and often fortified with alcohol or whipping. If an army lost
in a battle, half or more of the survivors would desert.
This only changed when Prussia intvented the draft, and France invented the
levee en masse after the Revolution.
> > > The link that was penetrated had been neatly sliced by the
> > > broadhead.
> >
> > So, returning to that arrow: that arrow didn't necessarily cut through
> > the wire-rings, but simply stretched the metal, until the arrow passed
> > through.
> > Or maybe the cutting of a single wire would be sufficient to let the
> > arrow strike.
>
> The latter, apparently.
In this case, yes.
> > Bodkin-pints OTOH didn't even have that much trouble, as the arrow
> > would easily fit within a single link, thus no need to damage the mail
> > at all.
>
> How wide were typical mail links? I'd always thought they were fairly
> small, but the quote suggests only a single link had to be broken to
> allow a broadhead to penetrate.
a viking-mail 10th ct. norway
ring-diameter 0.85-1 cm
ring density 4 rings/cm^2
Arrows 800-1000, Norway:
head length 8 - 10 cm
head width 1.8 - 2.2 cm
shaft length 55 - 65 cm
shaft width 0.6 - 1 cm
Considering that the shaft of an arrow has a diameter of less than the
ring-diameter, only the head has to fit through the mail - something which
is reinforced by the notion of only one ring being cut.
Bodkin points don't have to harm the mail at all.
> As bodkins tend to widen towards the shaft, I would expect them to burst
> a link even if they hit the centre of it, although I'm not sure what
> would happen if they hit the edges of two links (might skitter into a
> centre, skitter off, or go through).
If they really hit the link, then the PD1 of the chain kicks in :g,d,r:
> This might not be the case,
> especially if the links were significantly wider than I'd thought, but
> modern mail is often made with washers, suggesting (albeit not terribly
> reliably) small link sizes.
The links were small, but the shafts of the arrows were of roughly the same
size - so no more than one link has to be cut to penetrate the chain mail.
> > Thirdly I agree, that this was surely a perpendicular shot from short
> > distance. Under battlefield-conditions neither the angle nor the
> > delivered force would be similar to the experiment.
>
> Depends on the situation - I would guess hitting a charging man on a
> facing part of his torso at 20m would be reasonably similar, although
> indirect shots would of course be very different.
And what I have read, most battlefield shots would have been indirect shots.
> > But chain is vulnerable to small
> > attacks, which can pass through the links. So there were a multitude
> > of ideas how to counter this, like the quilted gambeson or the leather
> > colleret, and finally plate.
>
> Yup. I can't help but wonder how something like thick silk over a
> quilted gambeson would work (well, I think, although it might not be
> great armour for other considerations or situations).
Well ...
Silk is not good in avoiding being hurt. But the fact that raw silk (as
opposed to processed silk) doesn't tear allows you to remove the arrow
without causing further harm.
The quilted gambeson would take much punishment indeed. The Horsehair
stuffing was that dense, that it was harder to penetrate than wood of the
same thickness.
The problem is, that it is hot in summer, wet in winter and extremely stiff,
so much harder to move in than fluid chain or articulated plate. That could
be a reason, why the quilted gambeson was used mostly by the mounted knight,
who doesn't rely on quick footwork.
Knights fighting on foot preferred to have chain with an added layer of
scale on the torso. This was slightly heavier, but allowed better movement.
> > > I dunno about that. Horses have a lot of muscle covering most
> > > anything vital, and I would be surprised if a crossbow that weak
> > > would do more than startle and cause pain.
> >
> > I don't think, that the non-repeating crossbow was that weak: One of
>
> I was referring only to the repeating crossbow (sorry if that wasn't
> clear). I would expect even relatively light non-repeating crossbows
> would hit with enough force to cause serious injury to men and even
> horses.
It would depend where the bolt hits. Remember that a single arrow to an eye
toppled a whole kingdom (Hastings). There are many locations where you don't
have much protection, yet much harm can be done.
Also what I have read the difference between crossbow and bow in China was,
that the Crossbow had lower range, but higher penetration power at short
distances.
In GURPS this could be modelled with a rather low 1/2D.
> > infantry was three spearmen and two crossbowmen - so the time to ready
> > the crossbow was not so essential, as the archers were "in cover".
>
> It depends - low readying time is always nice because of the greater
> volume of shots it allows (until you run out of ammunition...), and is
> especially important if one is engaged in a missile exchange and the
> enemy has a much lower time (crossbows vs. longbows in European field
> battles).
More shots per time unit is always nice. Maybe *that* was the reason for
developing the repeating crossbow ...
> OTOH, I can certainly see how units of the above could be
> very useful in a mixed melee.
There are other examples of such mixed formations. E.g. Byzantine Thegmatic
cavalry was a mixture of lancers up front and archers behind. Also Byzantine
Scoutatoi were Spearmen backed with archers.
These units were very successful during the reconquest of the Balkans under
Basileios II (~1000 AD)
> > Also the chinese armies of the time of the Mongol Conquest had an even
> > larger percentage of crossbowmen (50% instead of 30%), but the
>
> Did Chinese armies ever make moderate use of bows? (Were they used by
> nobles against other nobles? I seem to recall someone mentioning
> something of the sort...)
They made use of the bow from 1500 BC to 400 BC. From the 6th ct. BC onwards
the crossbow started to replace the bow, and was the main missile weapon
from the 4th ct. BC until the introduction of firearms.
And yes, I did mention the Nobles in their chariots using the bow.
And I also mentioned that the decline of the chariot was during the same
time as the decline of the bow and the introduction of the crossbow.
> > Alos note, that the only defeat Ghenghis Khan ever experienced was at
> > the hand of a Chinese army,
>
> Cool - any more details?
Not much detail on the battle itself, only at the background (I apologize
for mixing German and English Transliteration of Chinese and Mongol names)
In the spring of 1211 Ghenghis Khan had started his campaign with an
army of ~200,000 Mongol warriors. He struck against Chin in the province of
Shan-si, and had arrived at Peking in the autumn. The Emperor Yün-chi sent
an emissary who was a descendant of the former Liao-dynasty. Ghenghis Khan
forged an alliance with this emissary.
In the spring of 1212 revolutions started in the Chitan area, while
Ghenghis Khan started to ravage the provinces north of the Great Wall. Later
that year he struck again against Shan-si and eliminated two western armies
of Chin (but didn' manage to take the Western Residence Ta-tung-fu) before
retreating to winter quarters.
In the winter of 1212/13 a command under Dschebe-Noion liberated Chitan
and managed to take the eastern residence of Liao-Yang by trickery. The Liao
were instituted as vassal kings of the Mongols.
In the spring of 1213 the main army was divided to ravage the northern
provinces. Meanwhile the emperor Yün-chi was murdered by Hu-sha-hu (an
eunuch). Ghenghis Khan thought, that this was the action of his Liao-allies
in Peking, and hurried towards the Middle Residence of Peking, expecting the
doors to be flung far open to invite him in.
Yet Hu-sha-hu was a sympathizer of Sung, who regarded the Liao as much
as barbarians as the Chin. He crowned some unimportant prince emperor as
Hsüan-tsung, assembled an army and met Ghenghis Khan in the vicinity of
Peking. The Mongols were in the process of crossing a river, when they were
attacked, and the advance guards were almost totally obliterated. Only the
fact that general Kao-chi (who should have attacked the Mongols in the rear)
arrived late, allowed Ghenghis Khan to withdraw with his main army intact.
Kao-Chin pleaded for his life and much to Hu-sha-hu's dismay this was
granted. So he sent him against the retreating army of Ghenghis Khan, who
had already sent messengers to the other armies in the northern provinces
and to the detachments in Chitan. He defeated Kao-Chin easily. Kao-Chin
feared for his life, so he killed Hu-sha-hu, and was "rewarded" by the
Emperor by becoming the new commander in chief (Kao-Chin marched to
Hsüan-tsung, the head of Hu-sha-hu in his hand, and demanded "Judge between
him and me!")
During the summer of 1213 Ghenghis Khan reorganized his army (Mongols
plus 46 chinese "divisions" with Liao commanders) into three parts: one army
under his brother Kassar against Manchuria, one uner his sons to the south,
and he himself towards Schantung.
In the spring of 1214 the armies reunited in front of Peking, with most of
Chin being wasted by now. Peace was drafted, and Ghenghis Khan went home. In
the summer Hsüan-tsung moved to the southern residence of Kai-föng, and an
emissary of Sung (southern China) pleaded the Mongols to renew their attacks
on Chin. Yet Ghenghis Khan honored the peace.
Yet when Chin marched to concquer Chitan, Ghenghis sent forth his
generals in autumn 1214. They freed Chitan, subdued Korea and rescued the
rebellious Liao-Guard. During the winter 800 cities were taken, and in
spring 1215 Peking fell. All lands north of the Ho-schan mountains were now
a Mongol province.
> > so the crossbows might not have been as useless, as you like to imply.
>
> Perhaps my comments regarding them have been a little misleading - they
> tend to be slanted more towards RPG use of crossbows, where I honestly
> think the long reload times would be a serious hindrance in many
> situations.
yes, RPG-uses are somewhat different from real uses (like swords against
plate mail :-)
> In the general case, crossbows certainly have their uses
> (defense from secure cover is the canonical one), and are certainly
> better than bows for some things (casting extremely powerful bolts
> without weird muscles, for example).
Exactly. Standing behind spearmen can account for some secure cover.
And the bolts were shorter ranged, but more powerful than contemporary bows.
> In general, crossbows tended to be notably less efficient than bows,
> meaning they would deliver a less powerful attack for comparable effort
> if hand-drawn.
Not necessarily: a bow is drawn only with than arms and shoulders. Drawing a
crossbow gets the aid of the legs, hip and back, so with the same amount of
bodily strength, you can draw a stronger crossbow.
> I would assume from this that the tendency would be to
> use either bows or more powerful crossbows, but that may not have been
> the case in China. Any idea why they used so many crossbows and so few
> handbows?
As stated above: give the untrained peasant a bow and a crossbow, which he
can both draw: the crossbow will be stronger.
The fact that better penetration but lower range was the preferred option
points to the fact, that the missile fire in chinese battles was at rather
short range.
The problem for missile-troops is always: how to prevent that they are
ridden down by cavalry and/or chariots? The formation of integrated units of
spearmen and missile troops alleviates this problem: a wall of spears is a
great disincentive for charging. The archers can now load and shoot at
leasure. They can also be posidioned much nearer to the enemy, as the
pourpose of this unit is to engage in melee.
Bow-equipped archer units have a longer range, thus can fire from further
back, standing behind the combat units and/or behind temporary
fortifications.
Crossbow-equipped units have a shorter range, thus need to be nearer to the
enemy. Yet the invention of combined arms not only allows, but furtheres
this, so the weapon which has the better punch at close range is chosen.
> > Still: many hits by many bolts will fell a horse, which would be
> > unimpresses by a single bolt.
>
> My guess is that that would largely be a result of one of the bolts
> getting lucky and penetrating unusually far or hitting something
> unusually vital (I don't think wounds add well), or of blood loss from
> sustained bleeding from multiple minor wounds.
"Multiple minor wounds" is what I meant by "many hits by many bolts"
Also the chances for a lucky hit are greater, if you have more hits.
> > Probably. But aiming with a bow held drawn requires the buildup of a
> > certain musculature. England had the required weekend-trainings to
> > achieve this. The Chinese crossbowmen were in a position like European
> > flintlock-infantry much later: untrained troops, which shall saturate
> > the enemy with missiles. Both the crossbow and the flintlock can be
> > fired without much training, simply by pointing them in the right
> > direction.
>
> As can a bow - point, draw, release. When you're shooting at a mass of
> enemy infantry, you don't need to aim for too long. For all that, I
> usually aim for a second or less when target shooting, and simply draw
> and release when shooting along a ballistic path. I think you're
> overstating the difficulty of using a bow.
Not the difficulty of using it, but of holding it drawn. Aiming is one
necessity, where you have to hold the bow drawn. A whole unit shooting on
command is another possibility. IMHO a dense cloud of arrows followed by
another dense cloud some time later is more effective than a sustained thin
shower.
> AFAICT, using a bow is very easy, but using an extremely powerful bow is
> very difficult, simply because it's so much harder to draw - these are
> the ones that take the specialized musculature. IME, an average man can
> with little trouble or training draw and use a bow with enough power to
> be useful against unarmoured troops.
O.K.
> OTOH, I don't doubt that Chinese generals had good reasons for choosing
> crossbows. Any idea what they were? (It might be a reflection of the
> nature of the battles of the time, I guess.)
I gave some reasons above.
From the texts I have, the higher penetration power at short range was the
most important reason for choosing the crossbow against the bow. (Maybe
blowthrough?)
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> "Franz & Michael Köttl" <mob...@aktiv.co.at> wrote in message
> news:8l92ig$4u8$4...@rohrpostix.uta4you.at...
> >
>
> Of course. In this system, there are no rolls based on skill/2 so I don't
> have to deal with that. Simply halving bonuses and penalties seems to work
> well enough in GURPS, however.
Parry based on straight skill?
Or contest of skills - winner hits loser?
> > But you are right, that the framework is not elaborate enough. The thing
> > with 3 actions is hardly framework at all - more guesswork. How move is
> > really related is also not definitively explained.
> >
> > BTW: what about all-out-flee, which allows full movement als 1 defense
> > at -1 ?
>
> The system I am referring to is highly cinematic, so movement is usually
> not considered, but in a more rigid framework it could be considered an
> action.
Yes. I have thought about a redefinition of the possible actions in a
GURPS-round, but didn't devote too much time to it.
> You would have to do movement and parrying at the same time at no
> penalty or at a penalty to both, depending on how far you want to move,
> I suppose.
Or you divide move by three, and have:
1 Move + 2 actions (step and ...)
2 Moves + 1 actions
3 Moves (current move)
> > This is one of the great advantages of GURPS over RoleMaster: you
> > calculate
> > everything at character-generation, and don't have to look up many
tables
> > during actual play.
>
> Yeah, that is nice. I don't care if I have to do a few integrals
Integrals?
What would you need integrals for?
Logarithmic and exponential progressions I can see, but integrals???
> at chargen if
> it improves the gameplay later. I figure that if other people do mind,
there
> will usually be a computer or a smart person around to help them.
That's usually me :-)
> > That is still twice as long as in GURPS, so might be more realistic.
OTOH:
> > How much insults or commands can you exchange in 2 seconds?
>
> Arbitrary rule: one sentence.
>
> I suppose two commands or maybe even three could be made into one
sentence:
> "Larry, please move the tank, and tell Jane to shoot the alien who is
about
> to jump me from behind."
>
> :-)
That long sentence in 2 seconds? You are talking fast indeed ...
> > BTW: There were rules in CII for pacing combat, by alternating 1d
seconds
> > of
> > actual combat with 1d seconds of maneuvering - which on average works
out
> > to your 2-second round :-)
>
> Hehe. I suppose so.
>
> I don't remember whether I mentioned that I DO like the 1-second rounds in
> GURPS.
> I just like something a little longer for very cinematic games.
Or for very realistic games. Fights can go one for some time. The notion of
"holding on until help arrives" is senseless, if combat is over in 3
seconds, while help arrives in 2 minutes.
prei...@my-deja.com
> Morale was low and often fortified with alcohol or whipping. If an
Now that presents an odd mental picture - roust a bunch of people from
their homes, whip a bunch, liquor 'em up, and _give them all guns_.
Doesn't sound safe for anyone involved... ;)
> a viking-mail 10th ct. norway
> ring-diameter 0.85-1 cm
> ring density 4 rings/cm^2
>
> head width 1.8 - 2.2 cm
I can only assume mail stayed more-or-less like that for the next few
hundred years - those are fairly small rings (smaller than a
fingernail). Nevertheless, because of overlap caused by the thickness
of the wire and the fact that the width of the arrowhead is a little
more than double the diameter of the links, I would have expected more
than one link to be severed. I guess not.
(Thanks for all the great info, by the way.)
> > Depends on the situation - I would guess hitting a charging man on a
> > facing part of his torso at 20m would be reasonably similar,
> > although indirect shots would of course be very different.
>
> And what I have read, most battlefield shots would have been indirect
> shots.
Yup, but not the most effective ones. I recall reading that most of the
arrow kills at either Agincourt or Crecy were caused at about 20m by
direct shots. While the indirect volleys were numerically greater,
those are largely "spray and pray" - a large number of shots gives many
chances for a freak penetration, or a chance hit of an unarmoured man.
Moreover, they force the enemy to close to where he can try defending
himself (unless he sits back, sucks it up, and closes only after all of
the enemy's arrows have been used up; while a valid tactic that would
have been very useful in some circumstances, it's understandably hard to
use, especially with touchy nobles), and at this point the more
dangerous direct shots can be used to penetrate armour and (hopefully)
break the charge, starting the cycle over again.
And, to again show my bias, most arrow shots in RPGs are likely to be
direct rather than indirect - it's just too hard to hit an individual
after 4 seconds of shot flight.
> Silk is not good in avoiding being hurt. But the fact that raw silk
> (as opposed to processed silk) doesn't tear allows you to remove the
> arrow without causing further harm.
> The quilted gambeson would take much punishment indeed. The Horsehair
> stuffing was that dense, that it was harder to penetrate than wood of
> the same thickness.
Yup - the idea is that the raw silk effectively blunts the attack so the
gambeson can absorb the blunt trauma, turning something that would have
skewered you into a mere bruise.
OTOH, as you point out, these would be _nasty_ to wear in just about any
conditions. That, and the difficulty of getting raw silk to make such
armour, probably helped prevent its use.
> It would depend where the bolt hits. Remember that a single arrow to
> an eye toppled a whole kingdom (Hastings).
I've read that may have been more poetic license than an actual
description of how Harold(?) was killed. Nevertheless, yes, even
relatively weak arrows/bolts are dangerous to all but the most
plate-encased.
> Also what I have read the difference between crossbow and bow in China
> was, that the Crossbow had lower range, but higher penetration power
> at short distances.
> In GURPS this could be modelled with a rather low 1/2D.
Low 1/2D and low Max Range, but somewhat higher damage and significantly
higher loading time. For example:
Handbow: thr+2, 1/2D 5*Str, Max 25*Str, shoot every 3-5 seconds
Crossbow: thr+3, 1/2D 4*Str, Max 20*Str, shoot every 15-20 seconds
This makes the crossbow do about 25% more damage even to unarmoured
targets, but requires using special devices (Goat's Foot) to utilize the
back muscles for drawing it. If your limit is more on ammunition than
time, such as firing from secure cover, the crossbow is a good choice.
Pushing the crossbow up to thr+4 damage gives it about 50% more damage,
which may or may not be too much.
OTOH, how were Chinese crossbows drawn? I only really know about
European ones.
> provinces. Meanwhile the emperor Yün-chi was murdered by Hu-sha-hu (an
> eunuch). Ghenghis Khan thought, that this was the action of his
> Liao-allies in Peking, and hurried towards the Middle Residence of
> Peking, expecting the doors to be flung far open to invite him in.
> Yet Hu-sha-hu was a sympathizer of Sung, who regarded the Liao as
> much as barbarians as the Chin. He crowned some unimportant prince
> emperor as Hsüan-tsung, assembled an army and met Ghenghis Khan in the
> vicinity of Peking. The Mongols were in the process of crossing a
> river, when they were attacked, and the advance guards were almost
> totally obliterated. Only the fact that general Kao-chi (who should
> have attacked the Mongols in the rear) arrived late, allowed Ghenghis
> Khan to withdraw with his main army intact.
Ahh, the old "caught with his pants down" scenario. Crossing the river
presumably pinned the Mongols into place, negating the mobility they
used so effectively. Hmm - I'm surprised they fell into that (so were
they, I expect).
Again, thanks for all the info.
> > tend to be slanted more towards RPG use of crossbows, where I
> > honestly think the long reload times would be a serious hindrance in
> > many situations.
>
> yes, RPG-uses are somewhat different from real uses (like swords
> against plate mail :-)
I _was_ more thinking of _situations_ rather than _rules oddnesses_...
;)
In particular, RPGs generally seem to be small-unit stuff, so anything
optimized for large-scale battles, like indirect shooting or massed pike
formations, is apt to play a fairly minor role. While the pike was a
tremendous battlefield weapon, I wouldn't recommend it for an RPG
character - its forte lies elsewhere. Same, to a certain extent, with
the crossbow.
Each weapon has its place, but not all of those places show up often in
RPG games.
> Exactly. Standing behind spearmen can account for some secure cover.
> And the bolts were shorter ranged, but more powerful than contemporary
> bows.
I can't help but wonder what they would have done if someone got a bunch
of bowmen and started pounding them with indirect shots from 50-100m
beyond their max range and at several times their max rate of shooting.
Spearmen help create secure cover from melee, but are much less secure
from missiles, even with large shields.
> > In general, crossbows tended to be notably less efficient than bows,
> > meaning they would deliver a less powerful attack for comparable
> > effort if hand-drawn.
>
> Not necessarily: a bow is drawn only with than arms and shoulders.
> Drawing a crossbow gets the aid of the legs, hip and back, so with the
> same amount of bodily strength, you can draw a stronger crossbow.
True; however, this takes significantly longer than drawing a handbow
("lower the bow, step into the end loop, attach a belt device to the
string, use your back and legs to move the string into place, detach the
belt device, step out of the end loop, bring the bow back up" as
compared to "yank!"). Perhaps I overestimate the utility of being able
to shoot rapidly in a large-scale battle.
> The fact that better penetration but lower range was the preferred
> option points to the fact, that the missile fire in chinese battles
> was at rather short range.
Which is interesting; I wonder if that was a cultural thing, if it was
just because everybody used crossbows, if it was a geographical thing,
or if it was because battle _became_ a close-range thing quickly enough
that range didn't matter much.
With a crossbow, that may be the case - at one shot every 20 seconds,
even infantry can close from max range to melee before more than one or
two shots have been loosed.
Hmm. Did typical Chinese footmen have no armour, cloth armour, thick
cloth armour, or something more? Or were there large numbers of troops
with fairly heavy armour, like often a sizeable minority of French
troops were IIRC clad in metal armour? The handbows that untrained men
could use would likely have trouble with substantial armour.
> enemy. Yet the invention of combined arms not only allows, but
> furtheres this, so the weapon which has the better punch at close
> range is chosen.
If the penetration isn't crucial, though, the faster bow may be better.
Hmm. Perhaps the important part was to fell the more heavily-armoured
leaders, as doing so could perhaps rout the army as effectively as
killing a much larger number of peasant levies, so the crossbow's
strength was needed to penetrate their armour. While it would result in
less kills, each would have greater strategic significance. Of course,
this is fairly wild speculation...
> Not the difficulty of using it, but of holding it drawn. Aiming is one
> necessity, where you have to hold the bow drawn. A whole unit shooting
> on command is another possibility. IMHO a dense cloud of arrows
> followed by another dense cloud some time later is more effective than
> a sustained thin shower.
Likely - IIRC this is how they were used. OTOH, I suspect
cloud-shooting could be, and probably was, achieved without holding the
bow drawn for more than a second.
Moreover, it's not that hard to draw and hold a bow. I'm not overly
strong, but I could easily draw, aim, and shoot a 35-pound bow hundreds
of times consecutively without any experience or training whatsoever,
and with no ill effects. I could most likely do much the same with a
heavier bow, say 50 pounds (didn't have one to test with), and could
likely handle an even stronger bow less often. Since most archers
carried, IIRC, only a few dozen arrows, less often is likely often
enough. (FWIW, 40 pound bows are the minimum for hunting in most places
since one wants to be reasonably sure the animal will be killed fairly
quickly rather than just wounded, and most hunters seem to use bows
around the 50-60 pound range, making them most likely quite adequate for
use in battle against relatively light armour.)
> From the texts I have, the higher penetration power at short range was
> the most important reason for choosing the crossbow against the bow.
> (Maybe blowthrough?)
I guess - crossbows seem to trade range and especially rate of shooting
for power, so I can only assume that was a trade worth making for them.
Paul T.
> Paul T. <danielha...@home.com> schrieb in im Newsbeitrag:
> xj2h5.59558$V34.5...@news1.sttls1.wa.home.com...
> >
> > "Franz & Michael Köttl" <mob...@aktiv.co.at> wrote in message
> > news:8l92ig$4u8$4...@rohrpostix.uta4you.at...
> > >
> > > Well, the defensive bonus is +2 instead of +4, because parry =
skill/2.
> >
> > Of course. In this system, there are no rolls based on skill/2 so I
don't
> > have to deal with that. Simply halving bonuses and penalties seems to
work
> > well enough in GURPS, however.
>
> Parry based on straight skill?
> Or contest of skills - winner hits loser?
Contest.
>
> > > But you are right, that the framework is not elaborate enough. The
thing
> > > with 3 actions is hardly framework at all - more guesswork. How move
is
> > > really related is also not definitively explained.
> > >
> > > BTW: what about all-out-flee, which allows full movement als 1 defense
> > > at -1 ?
> >
> > The system I am referring to is highly cinematic, so movement is usually
> > not considered, but in a more rigid framework it could be considered an
> > action.
>
> Yes. I have thought about a redefinition of the possible actions in a
> GURPS-round, but didn't devote too much time to it.
>
> > You would have to do movement and parrying at the same time at no
> > penalty or at a penalty to both, depending on how far you want to move,
> > I suppose.
>
> Or you divide move by three, and have:
> 1 Move + 2 actions (step and ...)
> 2 Moves + 1 actions
> 3 Moves (current move)
That's not bad. But in this system I don't calculate movement rates--
just say "you get there" or "you can't get there".
> > > This is one of the great advantages of GURPS over RoleMaster: you
> > > calculate
> > > everything at character-generation, and don't have to look up many
> tables
> > > during actual play.
> >
> > Yeah, that is nice. I don't care if I have to do a few integrals
>
> Integrals?
> What would you need integrals for?
> Logarithmic and exponential progressions I can see, but integrals???
I wasn't serious.
>
> > at chargen if
> > it improves the gameplay later. I figure that if other people do mind,
> there
> > will usually be a computer or a smart person around to help them.
>
> That's usually me :-)
Me too. :)
>
> > > That is still twice as long as in GURPS, so might be more realistic.
> OTOH:
> > > How much insults or commands can you exchange in 2 seconds?
> >
> > Arbitrary rule: one sentence.
> >
> > I suppose two commands or maybe even three could be made into one
> sentence:
> > "Larry, please move the tank, and tell Jane to shoot the alien who is
> about
> > to jump me from behind."
> >
> > :-)
>
> That long sentence in 2 seconds? You are talking fast indeed ...
Bah! It's cinematic. You need to say something with everything you do--
you know, "this is for my mother", and so forth.
>
> > > BTW: There were rules in CII for pacing combat, by alternating 1d
> seconds
> > > of
> > > actual combat with 1d seconds of maneuvering - which on average works
> out
> > > to your 2-second round :-)
> >
> > Hehe. I suppose so.
> >
> > I don't remember whether I mentioned that I DO like the 1-second rounds
in
> > GURPS.
> > I just like something a little longer for very cinematic games.
>
> Or for very realistic games. Fights can go one for some time. The notion
of
> "holding on until help arrives" is senseless, if combat is over in 3
> seconds, while help arrives in 2 minutes.
I would just say--"ok, so you're all-out defending and backing away from
confrontation for as long as you can", and make the player roll a dodge
or something every arbitrary amount of time (whatever is necessary for
drama), or you could actually calculate a parry penalty based on how
many attacks you abstract into the action.
P.
Xiphias Gladius
>> Morale was low and often fortified with alcohol or whipping. If an
> Now that presents an odd mental picture - roust a bunch of people from
> their homes, whip a bunch, liquor 'em up, and _give them all guns_.
> Doesn't sound safe for anyone involved... ;)
Get a couple of the professionals *behind* them, and make it very clear
that if any of their guns aren't firing, and firign *at the enemy*,
they'll save the enemy the trouble of shooting at 'em.
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > Morale was low and often fortified with alcohol or whipping. If an
>
> Now that presents an odd mental picture - roust a bunch of people from
> their homes, whip a bunch, liquor 'em up, and _give them all guns_.
> Doesn't sound safe for anyone involved... ;)
Those guns can't be fired very fast, which allows the officer to react much
faster than the recruit can fire his weapon. Also the recruit has no ideas
of aiming.
The stick still seen as mark of officer in the middle ot the 20th ct was a
remainder of this era, when the officers had to use this stick to actually
enforce discipline.
> > a viking-mail 10th ct. norway
> > ring-diameter 0.85-1 cm
> > ring density 4 rings/cm^2
> >
> > head width 1.8 - 2.2 cm
>
> I can only assume mail stayed more-or-less like that for the next few
> hundred years - those are fairly small rings (smaller than a
> fingernail).
Yes. Mail stayed mostly the same, as the method of manufacture sayed mostly
the same: make a wire, wind the wire around a twig, cut along the twig -->
many many open rings.
> Nevertheless, because of overlap caused by the thickness
> of the wire and the fact that the width of the arrowhead is a little
> more than double the diameter of the links, I would have expected more
> than one link to be severed. I guess not.
The wire was not really thick, as this would have added too much weight and
reduced the maneuverability. But the padded chain mail was sufficient for
what it did, and only with the developement of the thrusting broadsword
arose the need for better protection by adding scale and/or pieces of plate.
> (Thanks for all the great info, by the way.)
You are welcome. Glad to be of help.
> > And what I have read, most battlefield shots would have been indirect
> > shots.
>
> Yup, but not the most effective ones. I recall reading that most of the
> arrow kills at either Agincourt or Crecy were caused at about 20m by
> direct shots.
Which was only possible due to a special arrangement of the order of battle:
the archers were not behind the knights, but besides them, protected by
temporary fortifications of stakes. So they could wait for the French
knights to ride their attack and shoot them at point blank.
But when you don't have the time to prepare such positions, you have to keep
the archers behind the other troops, so only indirect fire is possible.
Mixed units of archers and spearmen/lancers were not usual in Europe IIRC
> While the indirect volleys were numerically greater,
> those are largely "spray and pray" - a large number of shots gives many
> chances for a freak penetration, or a chance hit of an unarmoured man.
You also hinder the enemy at advancing towards you. Plus you have good
chances against cavalry with unarmoured horses.
> Moreover, they force the enemy to close to where he can try defending
> himself (unless he sits back, sucks it up, and closes only after all of
> the enemy's arrows have been used up; while a valid tactic that would
> have been very useful in some circumstances, it's understandably hard to
> use, especially with touchy nobles), and at this point the more
> dangerous direct shots can be used to penetrate armour and (hopefully)
> break the charge, starting the cycle over again.
Also sucking it up is viable only if you have big shields to take the
arrows. While this might have been a viable tactic for roman legions or
mediveal civic militias, it as not useful for knights, which had shields
optimized for speed in melee.
> And, to again show my bias, most arrow shots in RPGs are likely to be
> direct rather than indirect - it's just too hard to hit an individual
> after 4 seconds of shot flight.
Yes. But RPGs are also mostly one-on-one. Not large scale battles. But cou
could try to play Hastings, Agincourt or Crecy as GURPS Combat (preferrable
with the advanced combat system). Please report back in a few years ...
> > Silk is not good in avoiding being hurt. But the fact that raw silk
> > (as opposed to processed silk) doesn't tear allows you to remove the
> > arrow without causing further harm.
> > The quilted gambeson would take much punishment indeed. The Horsehair
> > stuffing was that dense, that it was harder to penetrate than wood of
> > the same thickness.
>
> Yup - the idea is that the raw silk effectively blunts the attack so the
> gambeson can absorb the blunt trauma, turning something that would have
> skewered you into a mere bruise.
From what I read, I doubt that you could consider the arrow as a blunt
attack after the silk. The silk would enclose the arrow very tightly, so it
would still be impaling.
But surely the force would be reduced and the arrow impale not that deep (as
the silk stretches only so far). The second advantage was, that the arrows
were easily to be removed afterwards.
BTW: you can test the idea of a thin layer of material not being damaged by
wrapping a knife in one layer of thin paper and cutting meat with it: the
meat will be cut as usual, but the paper is undamaged.
> OTOH, as you point out, these would be _nasty_ to wear in just about any
> conditions. That, and the difficulty of getting raw silk to make such
> armour, probably helped prevent its use.
Raw silk was usual only in eastern and central Asia. Europe saw only soft
and supple processed silk.
> > It would depend where the bolt hits. Remember that a single arrow to
> > an eye toppled a whole kingdom (Hastings).
>
> I've read that may have been more poetic license than an actual
> description of how Harold(?) was killed.
Yup, Harold.
And most descriptions speak of an arrow hitting him through the eyeslit thus
bypassing DR and going directly to the brain.
> Nevertheless, yes, even
> relatively weak arrows/bolts are dangerous to all but the most
> plate-encased.
Yes. Concentrating the force on a small point increases the ability to
pierce through things.
> > Also what I have read the difference between crossbow and bow in China
> > was, that the Crossbow had lower range, but higher penetration power
> > at short distances.
> > In GURPS this could be modelled with a rather low 1/2D.
>
> Low 1/2D and low Max Range, but somewhat higher damage and significantly
> higher loading time. For example:
>
> Handbow: thr+2, 1/2D 5*Str, Max 25*Str, shoot every 3-5 seconds
> Crossbow: thr+3, 1/2D 4*Str, Max 20*Str, shoot every 15-20 seconds
>
> This makes the crossbow do about 25% more damage even to unarmoured
> targets, but requires using special devices (Goat's Foot) to utilize the
> back muscles for drawing it. If your limit is more on ammunition than
> time, such as firing from secure cover, the crossbow is a good choice.
>
> Pushing the crossbow up to thr+4 damage gives it about 50% more damage,
> which may or may not be too much.
>
> OTOH, how were Chinese crossbows drawn? I only really know about
> European ones.
Stepping directly on the bow and drawing the string back with both hands.
The Chinese crossbows of these era differed from the European ones: The
stock and the bow were not one part, but you had the stock with the notch,
and a reflex bow was tied to it underneath. Also the stock was really only a
wooden stick without any elaborations except the trigger. The trigger itself
was not used by pushing a bar towards the stock, but a small stick was drawn
back (like modern firearms)
The trigger-mechanism itself was cast bronce, thus possibly mass produced.
> > provinces. Meanwhile the emperor Yün-chi was murdered by Hu-sha-hu (an
> > eunuch). Ghenghis Khan thought, that this was the action of his
> > Liao-allies in Peking, and hurried towards the Middle Residence of
> > Peking, expecting the doors to be flung far open to invite him in.
> > Yet Hu-sha-hu was a sympathizer of Sung, who regarded the Liao as
> > much as barbarians as the Chin. He crowned some unimportant prince
> > emperor as Hsüan-tsung, assembled an army and met Ghenghis Khan in the
> > vicinity of Peking. The Mongols were in the process of crossing a
> > river, when they were attacked, and the advance guards were almost
> > totally obliterated. Only the fact that general Kao-chi (who should
> > have attacked the Mongols in the rear) arrived late, allowed Ghenghis
> > Khan to withdraw with his main army intact.
>
> Ahh, the old "caught with his pants down" scenario. Crossing the river
> presumably pinned the Mongols into place, negating the mobility they
> used so effectively. Hmm - I'm surprised they fell into that (so were
> they, I expect).
Well, they expected:
- our Liao allies have killed the Emperor
- they now hold Peking, so
- Peking is open for us
While in reality
- a Sung sympathizer has killed the Emperor
- he has equipped a new army
- he tries to catch us before reaching Peking.
Sidenote: Afterwards the Mongold greatly improved their espionage, and by
1240 (first advance into Europe) the knew better about the secret deals and
relations between the European nobles, than the Europeans themselves did.
> Again, thanks for all the info.
You are welcome.
> > > tend to be slanted more towards RPG use of crossbows, where I
> > > honestly think the long reload times would be a serious hindrance in
> > > many situations.
> >
> > yes, RPG-uses are somewhat different from real uses (like swords
> > against plate mail :-)
>
> I _was_ more thinking of _situations_ rather than _rules oddnesses_...
> ;)
Oh, *situations* ... :-)
> In particular, RPGs generally seem to be small-unit stuff, so anything
> optimized for large-scale battles, like indirect shooting or massed pike
> formations, is apt to play a fairly minor role. While the pike was a
> tremendous battlefield weapon, I wouldn't recommend it for an RPG
> character - its forte lies elsewhere. Same, to a certain extent, with
> the crossbow.
Yes. A simgle pike can easily be circumvented. Things look different, when
hundreds of pikes are lined up and packed closely together.
> Each weapon has its place, but not all of those places show up often in
> RPG games.
No, most weapons showing up prominently in RPG are those suited for single
combat. (At least if the rules somewhat reflect reality)
> > Exactly. Standing behind spearmen can account for some secure cover.
> > And the bolts were shorter ranged, but more powerful than contemporary
> > bows.
>
> I can't help but wonder what they would have done if someone got a bunch
> of bowmen and started pounding them with indirect shots from 50-100m
> beyond their max range and at several times their max rate of shooting.
> Spearmen help create secure cover from melee, but are much less secure
> from missiles, even with large shields.
Northern China is very rough and hilly. While the hills are smooth enough
not to inhibit chariots, they are sufficiently high te remve LOS for long
range archery.
Southern China has many marshy areas, which inhibit cavalry and chariots,
but also steaming jungles, which again inhibit archery.
Wide open areas are only much further north, where the "horse-riding
bararians" dwelled - and they used bows.
> > > In general, crossbows tended to be notably less efficient than bows,
> > > meaning they would deliver a less powerful attack for comparable
> > > effort if hand-drawn.
> >
> > Not necessarily: a bow is drawn only with than arms and shoulders.
> > Drawing a crossbow gets the aid of the legs, hip and back, so with the
> > same amount of bodily strength, you can draw a stronger crossbow.
>
> True; however, this takes significantly longer than drawing a handbow
> ("lower the bow, step into the end loop, attach a belt device to the
> string, use your back and legs to move the string into place, detach the
> belt device, step out of the end loop, bring the bow back up" as
> compared to "yank!"). Perhaps I overestimate the utility of being able
> to shoot rapidly in a large-scale battle.
No belt device, no end loop for the foot --> faster drawing.
By the same token, the crossbows were weaker han their European
counterparts. But they didn't have the necessity to punch through plate
armourd knights.
> > The fact that better penetration but lower range was the preferred
> > option points to the fact, that the missile fire in chinese battles
> > was at rather short range.
>
> Which is interesting; I wonder if that was a cultural thing, if it was
> just because everybody used crossbows, if it was a geographical thing,
> or if it was because battle _became_ a close-range thing quickly enough
> that range didn't matter much.
As stated above: hilly country makes for short viewing distances. The open
plains north of that were occupied by the Mongols and other nomads before
that.
> With a crossbow, that may be the case - at one shot every 20 seconds,
> even infantry can close from max range to melee before more than one or
> two shots have been loosed.
Combined arms allows you to shoot during melee. (at least partly - but still
better chances than a separate body of archers firing into the melee from
the outside)
> Hmm. Did typical Chinese footmen have no armour, cloth armour, thick
> cloth armour, or something more?
No armour. shield and spear, shield and sword or crossbow. Very rarely a
helmet.
The nobles OTOH had helmets and either jackets from rhinoceros skin or metal
lamellar covering the chest and abdomen (sometimes also the groin).
> Or were there large numbers of troops
> with fairly heavy armour, like often a sizeable minority of French
> troops were IIRC clad in metal armour?
Only after 221 BC. The first troop with armour I can find is the Ch'in
Imperial Guard after the unification of China. They had metal lamellar
covering shoulders, chest and abdomen.
> The handbows that untrained men
> could use would likely have trouble with substantial armour.
Yes, but the armour of the common soldier can not have been the main reason.
I think it has something to do with the decline of the chariot: the crossbow
was intended as a weapon to fell horses and break the decisive charge of the
enemies chariots.
> > enemy. Yet the invention of combined arms not only allows, but
> > furtheres this, so the weapon which has the better punch at close
> > range is chosen.
>
> If the penetration isn't crucial, though, the faster bow may be better.
>
> Hmm. Perhaps the important part was to fell the more heavily-armoured
> leaders, as doing so could perhaps rout the army as effectively as
> killing a much larger number of peasant levies, so the crossbow's
> strength was needed to penetrate their armour. While it would result in
> less kills, each would have greater strategic significance. Of course,
> this is fairly wild speculation...
But it seems somewat correct. Only extend the "armoured leader" to "armoured
nobles on chariots normally riding over the peasant rabble but now
effectively stopped for the first time"
But my guess is as good as yours.
> > Not the difficulty of using it, but of holding it drawn. Aiming is one
> > necessity, where you have to hold the bow drawn. A whole unit shooting
> > on command is another possibility. IMHO a dense cloud of arrows
> > followed by another dense cloud some time later is more effective than
> > a sustained thin shower.
>
> Likely - IIRC this is how they were used. OTOH, I suspect
> cloud-shooting could be, and probably was, achieved without holding the
> bow drawn for more than a second.
Possibly. It depends on the number of stragglers, and the discipline and
coherence of the unit.
> Moreover, it's not that hard to draw and hold a bow. I'm not overly
> strong,
By what measurement? I assume, that the average meat-eating 20th ct.
American is bigger and stronger than the average rice-eating 4th ct BC
Chinese peasant.
> but I could easily draw, aim, and shoot a 35-pound bow hundreds
> of times consecutively without any experience or training whatsoever,
> and with no ill effects. I could most likely do much the same with a
> heavier bow, say 50 pounds (didn't have one to test with), and could
> likely handle an even stronger bow less often. Since most archers
> carried, IIRC, only a few dozen arrows, less often is likely often
> enough. (FWIW, 40 pound bows are the minimum for hunting in most places
> since one wants to be reasonably sure the animal will be killed fairly
> quickly rather than just wounded, and most hunters seem to use bows
> around the 50-60 pound range, making them most likely quite adequate for
> use in battle against relatively light armour.)
obGURPS: What would you consider the equivalent minimum strength?
> > From the texts I have, the higher penetration power at short range was
> > the most important reason for choosing the crossbow against the bow.
> > (Maybe blowthrough?)
>
> I guess - crossbows seem to trade range and especially rate of shooting
> for power, so I can only assume that was a trade worth making for them.
I think felling horses and armoured nobles was the incentive for this.
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> "Franz & Michael Köttl" <mob...@aktiv.co.at> wrote in message
> news:8m72of$mq5$1...@rohrpostix.uta4you.at...
> >
> > Or contest of skills - winner hits loser?
>
> Contest.
Makes sense in some environments.
But most players I met prefer a differentiated parry or defense roll.
> > Or you divide move by three, and have:
> > 1 Move + 2 actions (step and ...)
> > 2 Moves + 1 actions
> > 3 Moves (current move)
>
> That's not bad. But in this system I don't calculate movement rates--
> just say "you get there" or "you can't get there".
I see. So no combat on hex-maps. Well, makes the GMs task easier (you don't
have to prepare hex-maps). But then there are the players questions: Where
am I? Where are the enemies?
> > Integrals?
> > What would you need integrals for?
> > Logarithmic and exponential progressions I can see, but integrals???
>
> I wasn't serious.
I see. :-)
> > That long sentence in 2 seconds? You are talking fast indeed ...
>
> Bah! It's cinematic. You need to say something with everything you do--
> you know, "this is for my mother", and so forth.
How come, that all talk about my mother? Do they even know her?
:-)
> > Or for very realistic games. Fights can go one for some time. The notion
> > of "holding on until help arrives" is senseless, if combat is over in 3
> > seconds, while help arrives in 2 minutes.
>
> I would just say--"ok, so you're all-out defending and backing away from
> confrontation for as long as you can", and make the player roll a dodge
> or something every arbitrary amount of time (whatever is necessary for
> drama), or you could actually calculate a parry penalty based on how
> many attacks you abstract into the action.
I see. You enjoy a rather cinematic style of play. Not something for the
gearheads and beancounters I have to master.
Paul T.
> > >
> > > Parry based on straight skill?
> > > Or contest of skills - winner hits loser?
> >
> > Contest.
>
> Makes sense in some environments.
> But most players I met prefer a differentiated parry or defense roll.
Well, it's possible to increase or decrease your Parry by manipulating
some numbers--"Parry" can be a skill defaulting to the weapon, etc.
>
> > > Or you divide move by three, and have:
> > > 1 Move + 2 actions (step and ...)
> > > 2 Moves + 1 actions
> > > 3 Moves (current move)
> >
> > That's not bad. But in this system I don't calculate movement rates--
> > just say "you get there" or "you can't get there".
>
> I see. So no combat on hex-maps. Well, makes the GMs task easier (you
don't
> have to prepare hex-maps). But then there are the players questions: Where
> am I? Where are the enemies?
Then we draw a quick diagram or put some dice on the table. :-)
Usually it's simple enough to be explained, though.
Hmmm... I think gaming tables should have a little sandbox for
drawing quick diagrams...
What do you think?
> > > Or for very realistic games. Fights can go one for some time. The
notion
> > > of "holding on until help arrives" is senseless, if combat is over in
3
> > > seconds, while help arrives in 2 minutes.
> >
> > I would just say--"ok, so you're all-out defending and backing away from
> > confrontation for as long as you can", and make the player roll a dodge
> > or something every arbitrary amount of time (whatever is necessary for
> > drama), or you could actually calculate a parry penalty based on how
> > many attacks you abstract into the action.
>
> I see. You enjoy a rather cinematic style of play. Not something for the
> gearheads and beancounters I have to master.
Oh, I can be a gearhead myself at times--but for when I want some cinematic
gaming, I use the system we are discussing.
P.
prei...@my-deja.com
> Yes. Mail stayed mostly the same, as the method of manufacture sayed
> mostly the same: make a wire, wind the wire around a twig, cut along
> the twig --> many many open rings.
Neat.
> > Yup, but not the most effective ones. I recall reading that most of
> > the arrow kills at either Agincourt or Crecy were caused at about
> > 20m by direct shots.
>
> Which was only possible due to a special arrangement of the order of
> battle: the archers were not behind the knights, but besides them,
> protected by temporary fortifications of stakes. So they could wait
> for the French knights to ride their attack and shoot them at point
> blank.
Which was, of course, why they arranged their troops that way. I think
that was a pretty common way to use good missile troops (I don't think
crossbows do indirect shots well).
At any rate, it's most likely the way RPG characters would use their
missile weapons (unless they're shooting at an enemy the size of an
army, which is generally unwise...).
> But when you don't have the time to prepare such positions, you have
> to keep the archers behind the other troops, so only indirect fire is
> possible.
Yes and no - in large battles, even having little time to prepare is
usually quite a bit of time. In one of those two battles, IIRC the
English didn't have all that much time to prepare (I think they were
being chased), but set up anyway - it doesn't take all that long to move
the archers to the centre and the footmen to either side.
> Also sucking it up is viable only if you have big shields to take the
> arrows. While this might have been a viable tactic for roman legions
> or mediveal civic militias, it as not useful for knights, which had
> shields optimized for speed in melee.
Although they had enough armour to manage it at longer ranges. A
concerted charge is probably a better idea, though, unless (a) you're
going to break off the charge in disarray at ~10-15m a few times (like
the French did on occasion), or (b) you're fighting horsebowmen who will
just ride away.
> Yes. But RPGs are also mostly one-on-one. Not large scale battles. But
> cou could try to play Hastings, Agincourt or Crecy as GURPS Combat
> (preferrable with the advanced combat system). Please report back in a
> few years ...
What, after the first turn?... ;)
> From what I read, I doubt that you could consider the arrow as a blunt
> attack after the silk. The silk would enclose the arrow very tightly,
> so it would still be impaling.
Not blunt per se, but rather not sharp, so it wouldn't be able to cut
through the thick cloth armour underneath. The cloth would then spread
and absorb the no-longer-sharp arrow's force, converting it into a blunt
attack. Straight silk helps (the Mongols used that), but the arrow
still penetrates a ways (draggin the silk in with it).
> And most descriptions speak of an arrow hitting him through the
> eyeslit thus bypassing DR and going directly to the brain.
Really? Most descriptions I've read don't even mention DR... ;)
(Most descriptions do say that, but the alternative was suggested, IIRC,
in a medieval history class I took, for what it matters.)
> > OTOH, how were Chinese crossbows drawn? I only really know about
> > European ones.
>
> Stepping directly on the bow and drawing the string back with both
> hands.
Hmm. My guess is that would take about twice as long to reload as a
bow, but would be somewhat stronger (the force pulling it would probably
be weaker than the back but stronger than the arms, while a bow is
pretty much all arms; OTOH, crossbows tend to be less efficient because
of their shorter bow arms, although Chinese ones may have had arms less
short than handbows, like some sort of neat recurve thing).
> Northern China is very rough and hilly. While the hills are smooth
> enough not to inhibit chariots, they are sufficiently high te remve
> LOS for long range archery.
Hmm, interesting. Although presumably putting your archers on top of a
hill would allow them good LOS, but the hills may not be large enough to
make that practical for many archers - there's only so many people that
can stand on the top of a hill with enough room to fight. And there's
still sight-shadows from other hills.
> > Or were there large numbers of troops
> > with fairly heavy armour, like often a sizeable minority of French
> > troops were IIRC clad in metal armour?
>
> Only after 221 BC. The first troop with armour I can find is the Ch'in
> Imperial Guard after the unification of China. They had metal lamellar
> covering shoulders, chest and abdomen.
Was it mostly light/no armour even after then?
> > The handbows that untrained men
> > could use would likely have trouble with substantial armour.
>
> Yes, but the armour of the common soldier can not have been the main
> reason. I think it has something to do with the decline of the
> chariot: the crossbow was intended as a weapon to fell horses and
> break the decisive charge of the enemies chariots.
Hmm. Perhaps the ability to keep a crossbow loaded and to aim it
without effort made it easier for untrained troops to use in situations
like this (where a fast-moving chariot might pop over a nearby hill
without notice). Perhaps I've underestimated the amount of training one
might want to give handbowmen under battlefield conditions.
> > Moreover, it's not that hard to draw and hold a bow. I'm not overly
> > strong,
>
> By what measurement? I assume, that the average meat-eating 20th ct.
> American is bigger and stronger than the average rice-eating 4th ct BC
> Chinese peasant.
Indeed, and even those of us who aren't Americans.
I measure, of course, in relation to the information I have, which is
about modern Americans, particularly men, since that gives data pretty
close to most players' experiences, and most people IME base characters
on what they're familiar with, rather than what's historically accurate.
Besides, while modern folk are larger and better nourished, we tend to
be much more sedentary, and it's difficult to say to what extent those
cancel each other out, especially since the smaller stature of previous
generations was, AFAICT, largely due to shorter leg length, which
wouldn't affect strength as much.
For game purposes, I'm willing to say they cancel out.
> > enough. (FWIW, 40 pound bows are the minimum for hunting in most
> > places since one wants to be reasonably sure the animal will be
> > killed fairly quickly rather than just wounded, and most hunters
> > seem to use bows around the 50-60 pound range, making them most
> > likely quite adequate for use in battle against relatively light
> > armour.)
>
> obGURPS: What would you consider the equivalent minimum strength?
That depends on what you consider Strength 10 to be.
Strictly speaking, if it's the Strength of an average member of the
population (of a modern Western nation), a man in his 20's would average
Strength 13-14, while a woman in her 60's would average Strength 6-7
(relative muscle mass of men and women suggests a difference in Strength
of 2-3 points, whereas a recent Men's Health article gave average bench
presses for men in each decade of life, and they seem to drop about 10%,
or 1 point, every decade after the 20's). Setting perhaps the most
common character type, young men, to Str 10, OTOH, gives that elderly
woman a Str of about 4, and the average young woman a Str of 7-8.
Hence, to more-or-less centre things for fairly young characters
(generally the most common), I figure on young men as being Str 11,
making middle-aged men Str 9-10 and young women Str 8-9.
Hence, I would say the minimum Strength would be about 8/11.
The 8 is because it seems it's reasonably easy to draw a 40-lb bow with
practice, while the 11 is because hunters (AFAIK) apparently hold the
bow drawn for comparatively long times on occasion, waiting for the
perfect shot. For an RPG character going to use the bow in combat, I'd
say Str 8, and allow something like only +1-2 from aiming, with the full
+3 only if sufficiently stronger than the bow.
That, and the kind of bow I figure I could reasonably use, suggest about
5 pounds of draw weight per point of Strength.
Of course, the problem with this is that it puts the effective Strength
of English yeomen at 20-30+, but...
(If you figure the strongest of them had, say, an effective Strength of
20 with a 180-pound bow, that's 9 pounds per point of Strength, or an
effective Strength of 4-5 for a minimal hunting bow and about 6-7 for
what I figure I could use without training. If one assigns a -4 to
effective Strength for using a bow and then adds +1 per gained level in
the skill, that would more-or-less work out, although it would require
them to have about Dex+5 or Dex+6 in Bow skill. Hmm, that could work,
actually...)
> > I guess - crossbows seem to trade range and especially rate of
> > shooting for power, so I can only assume that was a trade worth
> > making for them.
>
> I think felling horses and armoured nobles was the incentive for this.
Works for me - if defeating lots of armour and horses at short range is
what it takes to win battles, a crossbow may be your man. Or you could
always try training several tens of thousands of peasants to use strong
enough handbows... ;)
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > > Yup, but not the most effective ones. I recall reading that most of
> > > the arrow kills at either Agincourt or Crecy were caused at about
> > > 20m by direct shots.
> >
> > Which was only possible due to a special arrangement of the order of
> > battle: the archers were not behind the knights, but besides them,
> > protected by temporary fortifications of stakes. So they could wait
> > for the French knights to ride their attack and shoot them at point
> > blank.
>
> Which was, of course, why they arranged their troops that way. I think
> that was a pretty common way to use good missile troops (I don't think
> crossbows do indirect shots well).
I also doubt the usage of crossbows for indirect shots (they are more
rifle-like in this area).
But the possibility to use temporary frtifications would depend on the
availability fo wood, and the time to prepare. Otherwise use the spearmen as
fortification.
> At any rate, it's most likely the way RPG characters would use their
> missile weapons (unless they're shooting at an enemy the size of an
> army, which is generally unwise...).
Five man against an army of fivethousand? hardly sporting :-)
> > But when you don't have the time to prepare such positions, you have
> > to keep the archers behind the other troops, so only indirect fire is
> > possible.
>
> Yes and no - in large battles, even having little time to prepare is
> usually quite a bit of time.
Yes. But this would depend on the era: The romans carried their temporary
fortifications with them, so could set up in no time at all. In the middle
ages, battles were fought where one met, and temporary fortifications were
AFAIK not usually used. In the 30-years-war, the Swedish and Russians
started to carry their own temporary fortifications with them
(swinefeathers).
> In one of those two battles, IIRC the
> English didn't have all that much time to prepare (I think they were
> being chased), but set up anyway - it doesn't take all that long to move
> the archers to the centre and the footmen to either side.
The question is, whether you have stakes in front of you, or open field. In
the first case, the knights will impale themselves when they charge, while
in the second case, they will ride your archers into the ground.
> > Also sucking it up is viable only if you have big shields to take the
> > arrows. While this might have been a viable tactic for roman legions
> > or mediveal civic militias, it as not useful for knights, which had
> > shields optimized for speed in melee.
>
> Although they had enough armour to manage it at longer ranges.
Well, if you are talking knights with plate and horse barding, then you can
almost ignore the archers.
But if your horses are unarmoured and/or you have only chainmail, then you
will have to stay outside theri range, and then charge them fast and
decisive.
> A concerted charge is probably a better idea, though, unless (a) you're
> going to break off the charge in disarray at ~10-15m a few times (like
> the French did on occasion), or (b) you're fighting horsebowmen who will
> just ride away.
Ys. The breaking off of a charge is something stupid to do. But it might be
not avoidable, if the archers command high ground behind a marshy area.
> > Yes. But RPGs are also mostly one-on-one. Not large scale battles. But
> > cou could try to play Hastings, Agincourt or Crecy as GURPS Combat
> > (preferrable with the advanced combat system). Please report back in a
> > few years ...
>
> What, after the first turn?... ;)
:-)
I thought you were playing faster than that.
> > From what I read, I doubt that you could consider the arrow as a blunt
> > attack after the silk. The silk would enclose the arrow very tightly,
> > so it would still be impaling.
>
> Not blunt per se, but rather not sharp, so it wouldn't be able to cut
> through the thick cloth armour underneath. The cloth would then spread
> and absorb the no-longer-sharp arrow's force, converting it into a blunt
> attack.
O.K. I agree.
> Straight silk helps (the Mongols used that), but the arrow
> still penetrates a ways (draggin the silk in with it).
The Mongols had the silk under the leather/scale/chain armour. So those
arrows, that penetrated the armour could easily be removed from the patient
(also the arrow uses some of its force to stretch the silk, thus has less
force for your body)
> > And most descriptions speak of an arrow hitting him through the
> > eyeslit thus bypassing DR and going directly to the brain.
>
> Really? Most descriptions I've read don't even mention DR... ;)
Most descriptions also ignore how many damage the arrow did.
> (Most descriptions do say that, but the alternative was suggested, IIRC,
> in a medieval history class I took, for what it matters.)
As I have not taken that class, I can't comment on the reliability of that
source.
> > > OTOH, how were Chinese crossbows drawn? I only really know about
> > > European ones.
> >
> > Stepping directly on the bow and drawing the string back with both
> > hands.
>
> Hmm. My guess is that would take about twice as long to reload as a
> bow, but would be somewhat stronger (the force pulling it would probably
> be weaker than the back but stronger than the arms, while a bow is
> pretty much all arms; OTOH, crossbows tend to be less efficient because
> of their shorter bow arms, although Chinese ones may have had arms less
> short than handbows, like some sort of neat recurve thing).
I finally found a number: one example of the repeting crossbow had a pull of
55 lbs. I guess that the non-repeating crossbow would have a similar or
stronger pull.
Also the bow itself seems not to be recurved, as the middle part is not
behind the arms.
> > Northern China is very rough and hilly. While the hills are smooth
> > enough not to inhibit chariots, they are sufficiently high to remove
> > LOS for long range archery.
>
> Hmm, interesting. Although presumably putting your archers on top of a
> hill would allow them good LOS, but the hills may not be large enough to
> make that practical for many archers - there's only so many people that
> can stand on the top of a hill with enough room to fight. And there's
> still sight-shadows from other hills.
IMHO the sight-shadows are more of a problem, than the size of the hilltop.
> > > Or were there large numbers of troops
> > > with fairly heavy armour, like often a sizeable minority of French
> > > troops were IIRC clad in metal armour?
> >
> > Only after 221 BC. The first troop with armour I can find is the Ch'in
> > Imperial Guard after the unification of China. They had metal lamellar
> > covering shoulders, chest and abdomen.
>
> Was it mostly light/no armour even after then?
First a correction: the nobles had armour before 221 (but I think I already
mentioned it).
The common foot soldier always had no armour at all (maybe a helmet). He was
equipped variously with polearm, polearm and shield, sword, or sword and
shield.
Armoured troops I found include:
- Shang nobles (1300 BC - 1000 BC)
bronce lamellar on torso, heavy neck-protector and helmet
axe, dagger, spear and bow
- Western Chou nobles (1000 BC - 770 BC)
torso armour and helmet of lacquered rhinoceros hide
archer on the left side of the chariot, halbardier/spearman on the right
side of the chariot
- Ch'in palace guard (221 BC - 206 BC)
bronze lamellar on torso and shoulders
sword and halberd
- Han Heavy Infantry (202 BC - 189 AD)
small armourplate from laquered metal lamellar on the front torso
helmet, shield, iron longsword
- T'ang Heavy Cavalry (618 - 907 AD)
couir bouilli on torso and upper legs, bronze helmet
sword
- T'ang Foot Guards (618 - 907 AD)
iron scale mail (torso, shoulders, upper legs), iron helmet
chain-sleees on forearms; sword
- T'ang Horse Guards (618 - 907 AD)
iron scale mail (torso, shoulders, upper legs), iron helmet
sword
Still the mass of the troops were unarmoured infantry. (plus unarmoured
horsearchers during the early T'ang)
> > > The handbows that untrained men
> > > could use would likely have trouble with substantial armour.
> >
> > Yes, but the armour of the common soldier can not have been the main
> > reason. I think it has something to do with the decline of the
> > chariot: the crossbow was intended as a weapon to fell horses and
> > break the decisive charge of the enemies chariots.
>
> Hmm. Perhaps the ability to keep a crossbow loaded and to aim it
> without effort made it easier for untrained troops to use in situations
> like this (where a fast-moving chariot might pop over a nearby hill
> without notice). Perhaps I've underestimated the amount of training one
> might want to give handbowmen under battlefield conditions.
IMHO shooting on the range would be very different from shooting under
battlefield conditions. So you would need some training, to enable your
archers to function under battlefield conditions (which the English did with
their compulsory weekend trainings). A conscript army doesn't have this kind
of training, so you choose a weapon, which doesn't require much skill.
Also: drawing, loading and aiming are one fluid movement for the trained
bowman, but these are three distinctive steps for the crossbow --> better
drill management
> > > Moreover, it's not that hard to draw and hold a bow. I'm not overly
> > > strong,
> >
> > By what measurement? I assume, that the average meat-eating 20th ct.
> > American is bigger and stronger than the average rice-eating 4th ct BC
> > Chinese peasant.
>
> Indeed, and even those of us who aren't Americans.
O.K. I said "American" because most people posting here are from America,
and the addredd "my-deja.com" doesn't imply any country.
> I measure, of course, in relation to the information I have, which is
> about modern Americans, particularly men, since that gives data pretty
> close to most players' experiences, and most people IME base characters
> on what they're familiar with, rather than what's historically accurate.
>
> Besides, while modern folk are larger and better nourished, we tend to
> be much more sedentary, and it's difficult to say to what extent those
> cancel each other out, especially since the smaller stature of previous
> generations was, AFAICT, largely due to shorter leg length, which
> wouldn't affect strength as much.
Agreed. Size and strength are not necessarily related - especially when
other factors like work in the field as opposed to work on the computer come
to mind.
> For game purposes, I'm willing to say they cancel out.
O.K. A workable hypothesis. (And also one supported by GURPS: historical
characters also have ST 10, but are smaller)
> > > enough. (FWIW, 40 pound bows are the minimum for hunting in most
> > > places since one wants to be reasonably sure the animal will be
> > > killed fairly quickly rather than just wounded, and most hunters
> > > seem to use bows around the 50-60 pound range, making them most
> > > likely quite adequate for use in battle against relatively light
> > > armour.)
> >
> > obGURPS: What would you consider the equivalent minimum strength?
>
> That depends on what you consider Strength 10 to be.
By definition the average strength of a person between 18 (reaching
maturity) and 40 (begin of aging)
The upper limit depends on TL, as higher TL tends to postphone aging.
> Strictly speaking, if it's the Strength of an average member of the
> population (of a modern Western nation), a man in his 20's would average
> Strength 13-14, while a woman in her 60's would average Strength 6-7
> (relative muscle mass of men and women suggests a difference in Strength
> of 2-3 points, whereas a recent Men's Health article gave average bench
> presses for men in each decade of life, and they seem to drop about 10%,
> or 1 point, every decade after the 20's).
If you got numbers for lifted weight, you could calculate effective ST from
that (dividing by 20 or 25lbs IIRC)
> Setting perhaps the most
> common character type, young men, to Str 10, OTOH, gives that elderly
> woman a Str of about 4, and the average young woman a Str of 7-8.
And that ST 4 for an elderly woman would fit with the aging-rules, which
reduce attributes.
> Hence, to more-or-less centre things for fairly young characters
> (generally the most common), I figure on young men as being Str 11,
> making middle-aged men Str 9-10 and young women Str 8-9.
Which sounds reasonable.
But I am still interested in those bench press figures :-)
> Hence, I would say the minimum Strength would be about 8/11.
>
> The 8 is because it seems it's reasonably easy to draw a 40-lb bow with
> practice, while the 11 is because hunters (AFAIK) apparently hold the
> bow drawn for comparatively long times on occasion, waiting for the
> perfect shot. For an RPG character going to use the bow in combat, I'd
> say Str 8, and allow something like only +1-2 from aiming, with the full
> +3 only if sufficiently stronger than the bow.
Good rule. I'll use it, if you don't mind.
> That, and the kind of bow I figure I could reasonably use, suggest about
> 5 pounds of draw weight per point of Strength.
Which would give:
G:Short bow min ST 7 35 lbs
G:Regular Bow min ST 10 50 lbs
G:Longbow min ST 11 55 lbs
OTOH:
Apache bow 30 lbs -> ST 6
Mohave bow 40 lbs -> ST 8
English short bow 50 lbs -> ST 10
Turkish bow 70 lbs -> ST 14
English long bow 80 lbs -> ST 16
> Of course, the problem with this is that it puts the effective Strength
> of English yeomen at 20-30+, but...
A bow with 100-150 lbs pull?
> (If you figure the strongest of them had, say, an effective Strength of
> 20 with a 180-pound bow, that's 9 pounds per point of Strength, or an
> effective Strength of 4-5 for a minimal hunting bow and about 6-7 for
> what I figure I could use without training. If one assigns a -4 to
> effective Strength for using a bow and then adds +1 per gained level in
> the skill, that would more-or-less work out, although it would require
> them to have about Dex+5 or Dex+6 in Bow skill. Hmm, that could work,
> actually...)
If 1 ST=5 lbs, then the 180 lbs bow has a min ST 36, which results in -26 to
skill. Urgh.
O.K. The other way round:
Assume ST 10 and DX 10.
8 hours of training each weekend for 52 weekends per year results in 416 h
per year = 2.08 CP
An yeoman of 30 years has had 20 years of training, giving him 41.6 CP in
Bow, which would amount to a basic skill of DX+5 or 15.
When using a bow with 80 lbs (min ST 16), he has -6 to skill or an effective
skill of 9.
Now: shooting at an enemy army (+10 for size) from 100 yards (-10 for range)
after aiming (+3) and using accuracy (+3), he has an effective skill of 15.
Even if showering the enemy from 200 yds, he still has a skill of 13 (or 10
if noting that 1/2D is 150 yds - but I know you don't like the loss of Acc
at 1/2D)
> > > I guess - crossbows seem to trade range and especially rate of
> > > shooting for power, so I can only assume that was a trade worth
> > > making for them.
> >
> > I think felling horses and armoured nobles was the incentive for this.
>
> Works for me - if defeating lots of armour and horses at short range is
> what it takes to win battles, a crossbow may be your man. Or you could
> always try training several tens of thousands of peasants to use strong
> enough handbows... ;)
But training was in short supply then.
Unskilled is the best word to describe the chinese armies (besides guards
and nobles)
I suppose it has something to do with the necessity of peasants working on
the rice fields, and going to war only after the harvest.
Franz & Michael Köttl
>
> > Makes sense in some environments.
> > But most players I met prefer a differentiated parry or defense roll.
>
> Well, it's possible to increase or decrease your Parry by manipulating
> some numbers--"Parry" can be a skill defaulting to the weapon, etc.
Or you use the same skill for attack and parry, modified by the weapon (some
weapons are better for attack, some are better for defense), by the maneuver
you make, and by the situation.
> > I see. So no combat on hex-maps. Well, makes the GMs task easier (you
> > don't
> > have to prepare hex-maps). But then there are the players questions:
Where
> > am I? Where are the enemies?
>
> Then we draw a quick diagram or put some dice on the table. :-)
> Usually it's simple enough to be explained, though.
I preferr verbyl descriptions, too. But sometimes exact positions can make
or break a combat. I fondly remember the incident when the enemy mage
teleported directly under my warhammer to die extremely shortly afterwards -
because the GM had forgotten, where I was.
> Hmmm... I think gaming tables should have a little sandbox for
> drawing quick diagrams...
> What do you think?
I hate to get sand into my cookies.
But:
What about a replica of the terrain/building?
A big sandbox for deploying the peasants you assembled in the last village.
There are also hexagonal concrete-stones used for paving. They come in grey,
dark brown, light brown and sometimes also greens and blues. You could build
the terrain and play it outdoors with your favourite figurines.
> > I see. You enjoy a rather cinematic style of play. Not something for the
> > gearheads and beancounters I have to master.
>
> Oh, I can be a gearhead myself at times--but for when I want some
cinematic
> gaming, I use the system we are discussing.
We use AD&D for that :-)
GURPS is for our realistic or semi-realistic campaigns.