| From: | Richard Bukowski <bukowski@**.BERKELEY.EDU> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Chain and plate |
| Date: | Sun, 12 Mar 1995 18:00:54 -0800 |
the day's mail in this "bulk" fashion; I need to get the
mail from this list in digest form, which makes it very difficult
to reply to postings individually. I have also "compressed"
a number of postings by various people together, with attributions,
to save space. With that, let's get to today's discussion of period
armor in SR...
***
1. On the effectiveness of plate/chain vs. slashing/bashing weapons...
>From: Damion Milliken <adm82@***.EDU.AU>
>>Richard Bukowski writes:
>>[Chain mail 1/5 or so, platemail 2/8 or so]
>
>You think that they could be a little high? An average person wielding a
>sword will have a damage code of 5M, this way a person with chainmail will
>be looking at 2's to resist. They'll be looking at 2's even from a person
>with strength 5 (rather above average). Platemail on the other hand, with a
>rating like that makes anyone almost invulnerable to melee weapons.
>From: Paul Jonathan Adam <Paul@********.DEMON.CO.UK>
>Plate armour made you damn near invulnerable as long as you were upright.
>Typically, to kill a knight you knocked him down, sat on him and went
>through the gaps in the armour with a poignard. A full-on charge with a
>lance, or a crossbow bolt, were able to get through.
>From: Chris McKinnon <cmckinno@********.CA>
>Chain is pretty good at withstanding slashing attacks
>(such as drawing a sword across the rings), while thrusting attacks
>(arrows, spears, etc) would have less trouble affecting the wearer. Blunt
>attacks, such as clubs, maces, etc., are the most effective against
>chain (which is why the soldier wears padding).
>
>Plate is more resilient against most weapons (arrows excepted), but still
>requires padding beneath, to help distribute any impact damage. A full
>suit of plate could be virtually impenetrable to most melee weapons. Only
>joints and other weak points are particularly vulnerable.
This is pretty much the idea. Period armors are excellent defense
against slashing and (more for plate) bashing attacks; they are _far_
less useful against thrusting attacks. The more "pointy" the attack,
the more effective. Large-surface- area attacks like sword slashes or
blows with clubs just can't get through the steel. Note that a bullet
is the ultimate in a thrusting, pointy attack, therefore it is the
direct antithesis of period armor.
***
2. On the effectiveness of plate/chain vs. bows...
>From: Damion Milliken <adm82@***.EDU.AU>
>BTW, I think you'll find that bows (particularily the later ones) were
>rather effective against platemail. But I'l let Rat have his say on that
>topic - as he always does :-)
Some replies:
>From: Chris McKinnon <cmckinno@********.CA>
>Yes, longbows and turkish recurves were particularly good at penetrating
>plate armour, and would just slice through chain mail like butter.
>From: Paul Jonathan Adam <Paul@********.DEMON.CO.UK>
>Bows were effective against plate mailed knights because the broadhead arrows
>used killed the horses and immobilised the knights. They didn't do well
>against the armour itself, but then see above for how you could deal with
>them afterwards.
In fact, I once saw a very interesting research report done by someone
(I don't know whom) that did tests with plate armor vs. bows. They
set up a piece of steel plate, about the right thickness, and shot
arrows at it, both the broadhead type and the clothyard (Is this
correct? There was a broadhead and a pointy head type with specific
names that I can't recall) type, at various angles of incidence.
Their conclusions were that the broadhead arrows, whose heads were
wide (imagine that :), just sort of bounced off the armor; a good,
head-on hit could _maybe_ manage to make a few-millimeter dent in the
armor, and almost never penetrated. A dead-on hit with the other type
of arrow (I can't recall the name, but the head looked like the tip of
a pencil enlarged to about 3 inches long and 1/2 inch in diameter at
the base) could penetrate up to 1/2 inch in their tests, but still
didn't go through due to size and length of the arrowhead. The
conclusion of the study was that _neither_ type of arrow fired from a
_normal_ bow would actually do significant damage to a plate-mailed
person without almost a perfect dead-on-flat hit; they just couldn't
penetrate the plate. Bullets, on the other hand, are short enough and
"sharp" enough to punch through the plate and do real damage.
***
3. On the effectiveness of plate/chain vs. bullets...
>From: Chris McKinnon <cmckinno@********.CA>
>Versus bullets, most period armour is useless. Some manufacturers
>in the seventeenth century did produce breastplates that could withstand
>bullets (musket balls), and bore the mark of the ball that had been shot
>at it (seal of authenticity). These were extremely heavy, and awkward.
>Not something you want to be wearing. Against modern ammunition, just
>about all period plate would be ineffective as an armour.
I agree completely.
>From: Stainless Steel Rat <ratinox@***.NEU.EDU>
>Basically, medieval armor is useless against firearms as a class, at
>best maybe 1 or 2 points of ballistic protection for the heaviest armors
>with padding underneath. Against impact damage from 2 to 4, 5 for the
>heaviest stuff that's nigh-impossible to move in. Stillettos are armor
>piercing vs. medieval armor.
I agree with the ballistic assessment. The impact assessment is arguable;
I think you're not giving the armor enough credit when it comes to
impact weapons.
***
4. Conclusions on modelling plate/chain in SR...
>From: Chris McKinnon <cmckinno@********.CA>
>Thus, you can see that period armour ratings would vary, based upon what
>type of weapon it is defending against.
My point exactly.
>From: Damion Milliken <adm82@***.EDU.AU>
>it with padding). Piercing and blunt/crushing weapons have little to worry
>about when attacking a chainmailed opponent. If pading is used, one gets
>better protection against the blunt attacks, but you are still screwed by the
>piercing ones. (I'd guess paddin would rate in at 0/1 or 0/2)
>
>Platemail is OK vs cutting and blunt attacks, but fails miserably when
>countered with piercing weapons.
I would have to sit down and work out some numbers I could live with;
I haven't really thought through how effective a rating 5 vs. rating 3
or 7 in Impact is versus the various melee weapons at various people's
strengths. Certainly, ballistic ratings in the 1-2 range seem
obvious.
The SR damage code/armor rating system would really begin showing its
bias here; as the discussion has revealed, we really need to have a
breakdown into more than two classes. I'd say there are probably four
classes of damage you need to reasonably realistically model armors
and weapons from all periods:
1. Ballistic: covers very small, super-high velocity, low to medium mass
piercing attacks.
Weapon types: Bullets (duh)
2. Impact(Thrust): covers more massive, larger, slower piercing attacks.
Weapon types: Arrows, poniard, pike, spear, stiletto, etc.
3. Impact(Crush): covers large, blunt-trauma type weapons.
Weapon types: Maces, clubs, etc.
4. Impact(Slash): Large-area slashing weapons.
Weapon types: Swords, axes, etc.
Since #1 so far outweighs 2-4 in the Shadowrun universe, the latter 3
get lumped together into one Impact category.
The best armor/weapon modelling systems I have known (which, probably
not coincidentally, are all fantasy/mideval systems, and most of them
are in computer RPGs) model Thrust, Crush, and Slash damage and
protection independently for both weapons and armor. So, for example,
a sword may have medium Thrust, high Slash, and low Crush for damage
ratings, and an axe would give you _no_ Thrust, high Slash, and medium
Crush. For armor, chain mail has _really_ low Thrust, high Slash, and
low Crush defense ratings, and plate might up that to low Thrust, high
Slash, and medium to high Crush. A bullet, of course, is all
super-high Thrust; note that this is a weak point for virtually all
period armor. You can model the various
advantages/disadvantages/vagarities of most combinations of weapon and
armor quite well this way.
Rick
