Seems to me that most games seem to equate skill at arms as a better chance to hit an opponent rather than an ability to inflict more damage due to expertise. Sure, some games give you an extra point of damage or two as you advance levels and are able to get new special abilities or feats that allow you to inflict more damage, but what about your skill being the main contributor to damage inflicted and not the weapon you are using or your strength?

Could not skill at arms allow you to hit the areas that will inflict more damage rather than relying on simply being able to hit with a meaty weapon and relying on your strength?

Don't many rules systems have called shots, or something like them?

Quote from: One Horse TownSeems to me that most games seem to equate skill at arms as a better chance to hit an opponent rather than an ability to inflict more damage due to expertise. Sure, some games give you an extra point of damage or two as you advance levels and are able to get new special abilities or feats that allow you to inflict more damage, but what about your skill being the main contributor to damage inflicted and not the weapon you are using or your strength?

Could not skill at arms allow you to hit the areas that will inflict more damage rather than relying on simply being able to hit with a meaty weapon and relying on your strength?

Well, not to plug but Iridium lets you gain plusses to damage and add dice of damage to a weapon you specialize in. This is combined with the Targeting skill increasing with levels and being able to spend experience on it all makes me think it might be close to what you are describing. So, for instance, if you have a Ranger with the Sword Use skill and specialize with the two handed sword, you start with
+0 to hit, + 0 to damage, 5d10 damage and 2 attacks.

You adventure and receive 9 exp.

You can
1. buy plusses to hit. If you wanted to gain a +2 to hit then you would need to spend 3 xp + 6 xp for a total of 9 xp.

2. Buy plusses to damage. If you wanted a +3 to damage you would need to spend 1 xp + 2 xp + 3 xp for a total of 6 xp.

3. Buy damage dice with that weapon. These cost six per additional die so 6 for the first, 12 for the second etc.

4. Buy additional attacks. Same cost as the damage dice.

Some classes get these cheaper than others. For instance, a Specialist can purchase them at 1 less with a minimum of 1.


I think this is what you were getting at. If not, hopefully it was informative.

Thanks,
Bill

I like systems wherein skill affects damage, directly.  

You know that line John Cusack has in Grosse Pointe Blank?  "They all have husbands and wives and children and houses and dogs, and, you know, they've all made themselves a part of something and they can talk about what they do. What am I gonna say? 'I killed the president of Paraguay with a fork. How've you been?' "

Like that.

Quote from: Dr Rotwang!I like systems wherein skill affects damage, directly.  

You know that line John Cusack has in Grosse Pointe Blank?  "They all have husbands and wives and children and houses and dogs, and, you know, they've all made themselves a part of something and they can talk about what they do. What am I gonna say? 'I killed the president of Paraguay with a fork. How've you been?' "

Like that.

Poodle Pumper!



Bill

Rolemaster strength has very little effect on your damage. It's Ability + Skill - DB + roll, with your total determining the damage. In order to have a major impact on your damage, you have to have supernatural strength (or be some sort of giant). but even then you'll still need to be skilled, because the spells and effects that multiply your damage done have a comparatively low bonus to your attack value.

Other than that, I can't think of a game where strength wasn't the damage determiner, and skill just determined if you hit or not. Obviously I haven't played any of the ones mentioned here.

I like Called shots for this. Skill directly effects your ability to pull those off. Not to mention it makes more sense when it isn't hand to hand or muscle powered missile weapons. I especially like it when the game has called shots to weak points in armor, better skill in a particular weapon really helps here.

And to top it all off I like a game where a called shot to the knee can be a lot more devastating than the same attack to the torso, even when the damage is the same.

Called shots ae a good way to go or any system that allows you to trade cahcne to hit for increased damage.  

Called shots are basically doing that by allowing you to target weak spots at a penalty to hit, while more abstract sytems might just let you trade a success dice to hit for a dice of damage.

I also like systems where you can trade your defense for attack, going beserk to gain a bonus to hit but suffering a detriment to being hit.

Seems to me like it'd be a pretty weak system if you only had to pump up one thing to hit hard and hit often.  I rather enjoy trade-offs and options.

Quote from: James McMurrayRolemaster strength has very little effect on your damage. It's Ability + Skill - DB + roll, with your total determining the damage. In order to have a major impact on your damage, you have to have supernatural strength (or be some sort of giant). but even then you'll still need to be skilled, because the spells and effects that multiply your damage done have a comparatively low bonus to your attack value.

Other than that, I can't think of a game where strength wasn't the damage determiner, and skill just determined if you hit or not. Obviously I haven't played any of the ones mentioned here.

I don't agree that strength in Rolemaster has very little effect on damage. Skill in Rolemaster is very important, but strength can pump your combat skill a lot.

Most pool systems do this: Every net success increases the damage too. Shadowrun, WoD and TRoS would be popular users of this principle.

In a roll-under or roll-over system, you could take the margin between the needed die result and the rolled die result and add this difference to the damage.
The German RPG TDE had an interesting way to do this: You could gamble and increase your damage by impeding a +x on your attack roll. If you were successful despite your impedance, you could add the +x to your damage roll.

Passages does this very thing for this very reason. (It also has the benefit of eliminating the necessity of other polyhedrals and cutting down on the total number of rolls.)

Combat is a skill. Attacker makes a combat roll; defender makes a combat roll. If the attack roll equals or exceeds the defense roll, the attack lands. The difference between the rolls (called "spread") is the base damage of the attack and is further modified by the weapon used and any armor worn.

As you might imagine, this results in potentially very damaging attacks, making combat somewhat more lethal generally. But it works very well for the setting, i.e., over-the-top literary adventure. Particularly with the addition of plot points that allow a player to ignore a die roll and simply describe the outcome instead; not surprisingly, these are often reserved for bad combat outcomes.

Quote from: One Horse TownSeems to me that most games seem to equate skill at arms as a better chance to hit an opponent rather than an ability to inflict more damage due to expertise. Sure, some games give you an extra point of damage or two as you advance levels and are able to get new special abilities or feats that allow you to inflict more damage, but what about your skill being the main contributor to damage inflicted and not the weapon you are using or your strength?

Because that not how it works in real-life and a fair amount of RPGs try to be simulation of real combat.

Quote from: One Horse TownCould not skill at arms allow you to hit the areas that will inflict more damage rather than relying on simply being able to hit with a meaty weapon and relying on your strength?

If you state it this way then people buy why a system awards more damage for skills. But called shots are a better mechanic for simulating this as it give the option to the player about what he wants to do.

The fact of the matter is that realistic melee combat is pretty much about how beat the hell out of your opponent. It not about skill versus skill seeking the the one shot kill.

However if your RPGs is say a three musketeers type game or any number of subgenres that has highly skilled swordmen dueling one another with fencing weapons then a system of skill increasing damage may be a elegant way of simplifying combat.

Quote from: estarBecause that not how it works in real-life and a fair amount of RPGs try to be simulation of real combat.

I don't agree with that statement fully. If all real combat involves is bashing at each other until your brute force and ignorance won out why do/did people engage in combat training at all? I think that armour is the real decider in RL medieval combat really and so hacking away was the best option, but surely skill gives you the advantage even there? Otherwise why train at all? Can the guy who happens to be wearing armour and waving a sword for the first time really match the trained warrior equiped likewise, just because he is strong? I'm not so sure. He might hold out for longer than a weaker novice, or might get lucky, i guess.

That also goes for called shots in RPGs. Take a penalty to hit, to target a specific area. What i'm saying is what if the skill of the combatant already covered called shots? His skill enables him to cause more damage because he automatically targets an unarmoured or vital area, causing more damage. No need for mechanical modifiers, his advanced skill takes that into account already in inflicting more damage than a less skilled person.

Aside from Called Shots (which actually, I don't like very much), there's the fact that many games have criticals (in BRP there are even two levels of crit), with the chance of a crit based on skill.

Also, off the top of my head, I'm pretty sure Burning Wheel, High Fantasy (old game), and Harnmaster all place at least as much emphasis on how well you hit as they do on how big your muscles are. Though in some cases that may be abstracted a bit, e.g., basing hit chance on some formula that includes strength, and then having damage derive directly from the attack roll minus defenses.