I think the weapon differences can be fun, but difficult. I always like 3e's method of varying weapons by giving them different abilities. So, for example, the ability to wield a longsword with one or two hands, and the difference is either being able to use your off hand or getting a damage bonus. The only downside is that it might favor some weapons. Then again, there's a reason some weapons were so common in real life. A spear is easy to use, can set against cavalry, and you can support over the guy in front of you.

Another example is the billhook: you can poke, slash, and chop. It can be used to support allies, and you can use it to drag cavalrymen off their mounts. I think having abilities tied into the weapon for this make them unique, but then again it makes stuff like a shortsword look meek in comparison. At the end of the day though if players flock around a handful of weapons it makes it easier to stock magic weapons you know they'll use.

Bonuses vs. specific armors is really cool but really unwieldy. It makes sense that a mace gets +2 vs Plate, but a sword has -2. However, it really can slow down combat. I liked AD&D 1e's approach where weapons get a bonus/penalty vs. a specific AC, but that loses out on some of the realism since a high DEX thief with leather can have a 3. Why would a mace get a bonus against that? Either way, I think it's neat but I will say I think you either gotta go whole hog with realism, or nothing at all.

Either way, if I found a Billhook +1, I'd be a happy Fighter.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on April 22, 2024, 12:02:01 PMGURPS was good at this, but too complex to the point of becoming unrealistic: a 10-second fight between two people has 20 or more sword blows, most being parried.

There's nothing unrealistic in this, ten seconds are an eternity in a close combat fight. Same goes for the parries, the absolute majority of fighting styles emphasize defense for a reason; what's totally unrealistic, instead, is being hit (good hit, not a glancing blow) more than once or twice by a sword and not dying.

[sorry, posted twice. is there a way to erase a post?]

Quote from: NotFromAroundHere on April 23, 2024, 01:11:09 AM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on April 22, 2024, 12:02:01 PMGURPS was good at this, but too complex to the point of becoming unrealistic: a 10-second fight between two people has 20 or more sword blows, most being parried.

There's nothing unrealistic in this, ten seconds are an eternity in a close combat fight. Same goes for the parries, the absolute majority of fighting styles emphasize defense for a reason; what's totally unrealistic, instead, is being hit (good hit, not a glancing blow) more than once or twice by a sword and not dying.

I disagree.

No 10-second fight has 20 blows. Maybe you can find a 10-second period in a 5-minute fight with such a frantic pace, or a fight that ended in 10 seconds with a single punch, but I never seem such a frantic pace of attacking in fencing, UFC, larping, or medieval fighting simulations. If you have, send me the YouTube link

10-second combats only make sense if weapons are present and armor absent, but then they'll probably be finished before 20 blows.

Other than that, a duel (not to mention a skirmish) of say, people in swords and armor, will definitely last more than 10-seconds - in fact one might take a few seconds just to find an opening before approaching.

Same for people with no weapons and no armor. - even boxing matches do not have two punches per second, and punching is faster than swinging an axe!

GURPS kinda recognized this by publishing the "lull" supplement I mentioned but unfortunately can't find.

Without armor, I agree that taking a couple of sword blows would lead to death.

Quote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2024, 08:37:17 PMOooh... We're touching on a subject which is near and dear to my heart.

For my money, if you want a fairly realistic approach to the way ancient/medieval/early modern weapons and armor interact, the optimum way is to address three factors for weapons:

--Ability to circumvent armor: i.e., the ability to strike at gaps or weak points in armor.
--Concussive force: i.e., blunt force trauma,
--Penetrative capability: slashing and piercing.

The ability to circumvent armor by striking at weak points is critical, because it is the entire purpose of many weapons, such as the rondel dagger and most types of late medieval sword. Some historians assert that it is also the purpose of massed bow fire. As far as concussion and penetration goes, the balancing there is fairly obvious: A piercing sword like a rapier has good penetration, but almost no concussion, a cutting sword a bit more concussion and less penetration, an axe a fairly even mix of the two, and a mace pure concussion.

Armor would then optimally reflect the same three factors, with a rating for thoroughness of coverage, and concussion and penetration resistance stats. Mail for example, would have good penetration resistance, but minimal concussion resistance. Textile armor would have little of either, but perhaps better against concussion than penetration, and renaissance style full plate good levels for all.

This is the only system I can think of which represents the choices of weapon vs. armor as they were in history. E.g., if you expect opponents to be in head-to-toe mail, as you might if you were fighting 12th or 13th century knights, you really want a lance (which should have an extremely high penetration rate when couched from horseback) mace or hammer, but if those aren't an option, a battleaxe is a good second choice, which is exactly the trend in battlefield weapons during that time.

The additional wrinkle you could add in is a bonus to combat checks (attack if you're using D&D rules, but optimally both attack and defense), to represent the combination of reach and wieldiness. That further ups the realism of the decision making, since while an axe might be a more damaging weapon, a sword is much more nimble.

The point of doing all this for a game IMO, is to give your players a more interesting choice to make when choosing their loadout, and to allow you as DM to mix up the dynamic by changing the weapons and armor in play. Being forced by social circumstance to carry "civilian" weapons such as swords and knives makes much more difference when a sword and an axe no longer have the exact same utility.

Admittedly, the level of complexity this requires is possibly too much to be practical. I haven't tried to implement it in my own games, but where I can, I do aim for half-measures that move towards the same effect.

This is useful, thanks. Maybe the problem is that I'm putting maces and rondel dagger in the same "defeat armor" category, but they defeat armor for different reasons...

Another thing I don't even want to consider is swords that cut AND thrust - or worse, swords techniques such as half-swording.

Quote from: 1stLevelWizard on April 22, 2024, 09:25:38 PMBonuses vs. specific armors is really cool but really unwieldy. It makes sense that a mace gets +2 vs Plate, but a sword has -2. However, it really can slow down combat. I liked AD&D 1e's approach where weapons get a bonus/penalty vs. a specific AC, but that loses out on some of the realism since a high DEX thief with leather can have a 3. Why would a mace get a bonus against that? Either way, I think it's neat but I will say I think you either gotta go whole hog with realism, or nothing at all.

IIRC the DMG explains this: "AC 2" really means "plate", so a thief in leather and very high dex uses a different column.

...which adds to the confusion, of course, since "AC 5" has 3 or more different meanings.

Quote from: 1stLevelWizard on April 22, 2024, 09:25:38 PMI think the weapon differences can be fun, but difficult. I always like 3e's method of varying weapons by giving them different abilities. So, for example, the ability to wield a longsword with one or two hands, and the difference is either being able to use your off hand or getting a damage bonus. The only downside is that it might favor some weapons. Then again, there's a reason some weapons were so common in real life. A spear is easy to use, can set against cavalry, and you can support over the guy in front of you.

Another example is the billhook: you can poke, slash, and chop. It can be used to support allies, and you can use it to drag cavalrymen off their mounts. I think having abilities tied into the weapon for this make them unique, but then again it makes stuff like a shortsword look meek in comparison. At the end of the day though if players flock around a handful of weapons it makes it easier to stock magic weapons you know they'll use.

Bonuses vs. specific armors is really cool but really unwieldy. It makes sense that a mace gets +2 vs Plate, but a sword has -2. However, it really can slow down combat. I liked AD&D 1e's approach where weapons get a bonus/penalty vs. a specific AC, but that loses out on some of the realism since a high DEX thief with leather can have a 3. Why would a mace get a bonus against that? Either way, I think it's neat but I will say I think you either gotta go whole hog with realism, or nothing at all.

Either way, if I found a Billhook +1, I'd be a happy Fighter.

The AD&D weapon vs armor table is meant to represent base AC by armor type. Dexterity & magic bonuses are not considered for this. The thief wearing leather armor and an 18 DEX has an AC of 4 but for purposes of weapon vs armor uses AC 8.  Not that the system as a whole is worth bothering with IMHO, but that is how it works in theory.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on April 23, 2024, 09:54:06 AMIIRC the DMG explains this: "AC 2" really means "plate", so a thief in leather and very high dex uses a different column.

Quote from: Exploderwizard on April 23, 2024, 09:56:34 AMThe AD&D weapon vs armor table is meant to represent base AC by armor type. Dexterity & magic bonuses are not considered for this. The thief wearing leather armor and an 18 DEX has an AC of 4 but for purposes of weapon vs armor uses AC 8.  Not that the system as a whole is worth bothering with IMHO, but that is how it works in theory.

Ahhh okay! That actually makes a lot more sense now! I gotta do some reading later, I haven't really been using that rule. It was the same in 2nd edition: a neat idea, but I always glossed over it.

Quote from: rytrasmi on April 22, 2024, 01:18:09 PMI struggle with this too and the pinnacle of realism AFIAC is a matrix of weapon vs armor with each cell describing initiative, to-hit, and damage. AC, weapon speed, etc are just abstractions that simplify the matrix at the cost of realism. But even that matrix does not account for the defensive capabilities of weapons. So then we need a matrix of kit vs kit. 

This essentially gets you Rolemaster. Each weapon type versus a family of armor. Against an unarmored foe, longswords do slashing criticals; against metal armor, the lesser criticals alternate with crushing criticals. Rolemaster usually simplifies defense to some extent, but various editions have some shield rules tucked in here and there that add a little more rhythm.

AD&D "speed factor," incidentally, doesn't make sense. It says a dagger is faster than a two-handed sword. That's... not true. Setting aside that you have to account for reach first (which AD&D acknowledges, but doesn't give you guidance on), two-handed weapons are generally faster. A two-handed sword attack is fast. What a dagger is fast at is close in work, but you have to get close in, first.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on April 23, 2024, 09:10:50 AM

Quote from: NotFromAroundHere on April 23, 2024, 01:11:09 AM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on April 22, 2024, 12:02:01 PMGURPS was good at this, but too complex to the point of becoming unrealistic: a 10-second fight between two people has 20 or more sword blows, most being parried.

There's nothing unrealistic in this, ten seconds are an eternity in a close combat fight. Same goes for the parries, the absolute majority of fighting styles emphasize defense for a reason; what's totally unrealistic, instead, is being hit (good hit, not a glancing blow) more than once or twice by a sword and not dying.

I disagree.

No 10-second fight has 20 blows. Maybe you can find a 10-second period in a 5-minute fight with such a frantic pace, or a fight that ended in 10 seconds with a single punch, but I never seem such a frantic pace of attacking in fencing, UFC, larping, or medieval fighting simulations. If you have, send me the YouTube link

10-second combats only make sense if weapons are present and armor absent, but then they'll probably be finished before 20 blows.

Other than that, a duel (not to mention a skirmish) of say, people in swords and armor, will definitely last more than 10-seconds - in fact one might take a few seconds just to find an opening before approaching.

Same for people with no weapons and no armor. - even boxing matches do not have two punches per second, and punching is faster than swinging an axe!

GURPS kinda recognized this by publishing the "lull" supplement I mentioned but unfortunately can't find.

Without armor, I agree that taking a couple of sword blows would lead to death.

  This assumption means both parties choose to attack every turn.  Evaluate, all out defense, stepping back to disengage, etc make that stretch out quite a bit IME. Deceptive attacks and feints also cut down greatly on the number of attacks parried.   You can see lots of fights that during a flurry of activity it will approach what you describe, but they are rare as most parties involved in that frenetic pace lack the defense to avoid real damage or the durability to absorb it solely for the sake of throwing a shot. 
 
   I do wish GURPS used a 5 second round/turn as it would make a good deal more sense overall with regard to melee (the 1 second turns make a lot more sense with regard to gunfights) but using the things I mentioned also tends to slow the pace down a good deal and allows characters with a skill disadvantage to take measures to not get overwhelmed.

Quote from: NotFromAroundHere on April 22, 2024, 10:38:47 AMWith weapons you can have simple or you can have detailed: not both.
For example, an european longsword and a katana (or better, a tachi) of the same period (let's say middle 15th century) are functionally identical against unarmored opponets.... but the materials they're made of are different enough that the defensive techniques for them are wildly different.
How do you track that (important) difference in game while staying "simple", especially in a D&D like framework ?

LOL. And then you read Allan William's The Sword and the Crucible: A History of the Metallurgy of European Swords up to the 16th Century and his The Knight and the Blast Furnace: A History of the Metallurgy of Armour in the Middle Ages & the Early Modern Period, and realize that who made the armor or sword, where, and when, even in the same town and time period can drastically change individual characteristics.

I'm reading them for fun and out of interest. I may steal some of the relationships between manufacturers for a setting (either RPG or novel), since some of them are pretty interesting.

Quote from: pawsplay on April 23, 2024, 10:40:02 AMAD&D "speed factor," incidentally, doesn't make sense. It says a dagger is faster than a two-handed sword. That's... not true. Setting aside that you have to account for reach first (which AD&D acknowledges, but doesn't give you guidance on), two-handed weapons are generally faster. A two-handed sword attack is fast. What a dagger is fast at is close in work, but you have to get close in, first.

AD&D reach is really only used in charging situations, otherwise it isn't much of a factor. Speed factors are rather funny because they completely ignore strength considerations. GURPS does that fairly well. A reach weapon, such as a long spear or polearm loses a lot of effectiveness when not used in formation. Against a single weapon of that type, a swordsman can deflect and slip past, and unless the reach weapon user can retreat quickly, that swordsman will be inside the weapon's effectiveness forcing the pole weapon wielder to drop it and draw a shorter weapon.

Remember that in AD&D a combat round is not measuring a single strike attack. A round represents 'numerous attacks which are unsuccessful, feints, maneuvering, and so forth' (DMG p.61). Speed factor has therefore to be seen in the context of what a combat round is in AD&D. It is also necessary to understand that weapon speed only comes into affect if there is a tied initiative - if a fighter with a two handed sword wins initiative against a thief with a dagger, the fighter gets to hit the thief first regardless of weapon speed. It is only when the initiative is tied that the dagger wielding thief goes first due to weapon speed (and, in fact, gains two 'to hit' rolls), to simulate that that the thief has closed in and is temporarily passed the danger space of the sword.

As to reach - Gygax makes the ambiguous comment about a pikeman vs a person with a faster weapon - 'an opponent surviving the first attack from the bearer of a pike will likely be able to strike several times' (DMG p.66). He does not spell it out, but that comment gives rise to the not uncommon house rule that a weapon with a longer reach gives an automatic initiative win in the first attack. 

Whether any of it makes sense is another matter - According to Luke Gygax, Gary never played weapon speed in his game and we know he also never played the weapon v armor tables and later regretted allowing them being added to Eldritch Wizardry/1e. In addition, RPGers like to pick and choose their 'real life' examples to justify what they like - for example, knight duel HEMA guys like Dequitem on YouTube seem to bear out the AD&D one minute rounds - watching those videos a 'damage' strike seems to occur at +/- 45s - 1 minute in. On the other hand I have been in fencing bouts where what would be a fatal strike is scored within a few seconds.

Quote from: pawsplay on April 23, 2024, 10:40:02 AMAD&D "speed factor," incidentally, doesn't make sense. It says a dagger is faster than a two-handed sword. That's... not true. Setting aside that you have to account for reach first (which AD&D acknowledges, but doesn't give you guidance on), two-handed weapons are generally faster. A two-handed sword attack is fast. What a dagger is fast at is close in work, but you have to get close in, first.

Ehhh... I mean, it does make sense in AD&D 1e.  In that case, there are rules about when the two hander strikes first, and when the dagger strikes first, and when the dagger strikes multiple times.  These rules are weird and confusing, but assuredly all of your concerns there were given consideration in AD&D 1e. 

In 2e, your complaint is totally vaild.  In that game, the main use of slower weapons is against large beasts and monsters, who have bad initiative modifiers and who take extra damage from the bigger weapons.  AD&D 2e has large weapons as unrealistically terrible in man on man combat.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on April 23, 2024, 09:10:50 AMNo 10-second fight has 20 blows. Maybe you can find a 10-second period in a 5-minute fight with such a frantic pace, or a fight that ended in 10 seconds with a single punch, but I never seem such a frantic pace of attacking in fencing, UFC, larping, or medieval fighting simulations. If you have, send me the YouTube link

10-second combats only make sense if weapons are present and armor absent, but then they'll probably be finished before 20 blows.

Other than that, a duel (not to mention a skirmish) of say, people in swords and armor, will definitely last more than 10-seconds - in fact one might take a few seconds just to find an opening before approaching.

Same for people with no weapons and no armor. - even boxing matches do not have two punches per second, and punching is faster than swinging an axe!

GURPS kinda recognized this by publishing the "lull" supplement I mentioned but unfortunately can't find.

Without armor, I agree that taking a couple of sword blows would lead to death.

You do occasionally see that kind of volume in MMA, though it is quite rare. And I agree with you that it isn't really relevant as a comparison to historical melee combat. Punches can be chained more quickly than effective sword strokes, but more importantly, one generally does not "stand and bang" when edged weapons are in play.

I could see a situation where it would occur: Say two heavily armored knights, that particularly hate each other, meet on a late medieval battlefield. Both are armed with poleaxes, and because of the surrounding mass of friendly and hostile infantry, they don't want to risk closing to grapple. In that circumstance, they might decide to just see who's tougher and has better armor, but no one would go to battle expecting to stand still and duke it out with their opponent.

Ironically, the way D&D combat plays out, it gives the impression that "stand and bang" is exactly what you do. Thinking about it, D&D combat would replicate a boxing match much better than it does a sword-fight.

EDIT: I reread your comment and saw that you mentioned bursts of high activity in the context of longer fights, which is of course what's being shown above. I'd argue though that the slower feeling-out process you get in professional fighting is a product of the round structure. When the same fighters decide to throw down outside of the ring (as they occasionally do), they usually go right at each other at full blast from the get-go.

EDIT EDIT: Actually the first flurry shown in that video (in the Sanchez vs. Guida fight) starts in the first 5 seconds of the first round, so it happens there, too.