rust

The alternative to the generic weapon names and descriptions, which are indeed

more confusing than useful for historical settings, would probably be something

like the Oakeshott Typology, but I doubt that gamers would like such a scientific

approach:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakeshott_typology

Sorry, trying to revive this thread because of my Celestial Empire related blog, on which I would like to publish a post dedicated to the 19th century weapons used in China. My book only features the rifled musket; I'm sure there were more. My problem is that I am a complete ignoramus in the field of firearms.

You could try to find a copy of this article written by Barton Hacker, perhaps

through your library. I think it would be a good start for any research into this

subject:

http://www.jstor.org/pss/3103204

You could also ask the users of the Military History forum of SinoDefence,

they are probably the best "panel of experts" immediately available:

http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/

I'd want to know if one has a clear advantage over the other.

From my experience, no, the advantages and disadvantages tend to balance out.

For example, in my view a serious disadvantage of a two hand sword is the com-

paratively high mass, and therefore comparatively high inertia, which usually leads

to a somewhat slow fighting style, while someone with one hand sword and shield

can attack with both in quick succession, which usually results in a faster fighting

style.

In truth, if you are trained in 1-hand weapon parry and you have a shield, it hampers you. Your training tells you to keep your weapon towards your enemy, but using the shield requires that you keep that towards your enemy.

If you are used to fight with a one hand weapon (e.g. longsword) or with a one

hand weapon and a small parry weapon (e.g. rapier and dagger), but not trained

in the use of a shield, that d****d thing also gets in the way of all the "unarmed

martial arts" elements of your style which use the "off hand", and which are far

more important in a realistic fight than most people tend to believe.

I want to be called Loretta. I want to have babies.

Your first wish is granted, Loretta.

Hm, interesting point of view ...

It seems more plausible to me, because otherwise techniques where the secon-

dary weapon is a dedicated parry weapon, like fighting with sword and shield or

fencing with rapier and dagger, would not work in any remotely realistic way, es-

pecially when there are two or more opponents.

Now try the same situation but the warrior also has a shield with skill 30%. I can't see anywhere in the rules where the shield increases the defence (i.e. increases the chance to parry) of the warrior and yet intuition tells me that this time he should be able to parry more than half of the orc's successful blows.

Any thoughts on the above?

Your warrior with a Sword skill of 50 % uses the sword to parry an attack. Now

a second parry with the sword would be at - 30 %, giving him only a 20 % chan-

ce to parry the second attack. However, he also has his shield and his Shield

skill of 30 %, so he can use the shield to parry that second attack, with a chan-

ce that is 10 % better than the one he would now have with the sword.

It seems to me that this does improve his defence.

The stats are a starting point for characters, but they are not really that important compared to skill level. Skills could work without stats.

True, but then you would either have to replace the stats with other values used

for all tasks which are not covered by skills (e.g. lifting things, etc.), or your skill

list would have to become a bit longer because of additional skills required to co-

ver such tasks. I am not sure whether this would be much of an improvement.

At least the stats could easily be reduced to one Physical stat and one Mental

stat, and all other really necessary values based upon them. The only real prob-

lem I would see is that the characters could become too much alike.

According to page 261, the Burden of the armour can be used with the optional

fatigue system, and according to page 219 the character loses two to four times

the normal loss of fatigue points per combat round of activity when he suffers

stifling heat or freezing cold. Combined this could probably be seen as a rule for

the "armour and heat problem".

I still doesn't really adress the basic issue, that anybody can master any skill. Again it isn't a complaint, just an observation about RPGs in general.

In the German Midgard RPG a character needs a minimum attribute to be allowed

to learn a skill (e.g. a Dexterity of 61+ to be able to learn Climb), and the attri-

bute also determines the maximum skill level the character can reach. It works

quite well, but it adds another layer of complexity to the character generation,

because it also influences possible background skills, professions and character

types, and I am not certain whether this is worth it.

And, you only find out what you did wrong (and how to fix it) from an oracle who may have their own agenda....

... or who later, much too late, turns out to have been Nemesis in disguise ...

The Gods are more personal and are, to a certain extent, touchier and more dangerous as a result.

It will depend on the style of the campaign, but if it is close to the "feeling" of

the Greek myths and heroic tales, this also influences the consequences of an

unwise use of a divine blessing - a character who uses it against the (not al-

ways obvious) interests of the deity who gave him the blessing has probably

earned himself a few centuries of cruel torture.

There would also be many other dangers, acts which are always punished by the

deities, like comparing someone with a deity, entering a deity's sacred place, kil-

ling one of a deity's sacred animals, and so on and on.

Speaking of superheroes ... Homeric action heroes. They'd need the CON+SIZ calculation for Hit Points. They'd get occasional special equipment from assorted divine relatives. They'd be able to wade through mooks easily but engage in regular gritty combat against other heroes. They'd get occasional power boosts from a godly sponsor, enabling them to perform outrageous feats temporarily until it wore off.

And they usually have at least one enemy among the deities who wants them

dead, uses his or her powers to make life miserable for them, and often also

succeeds in killing them. The more heroic the hero is, the higher is the probabi-

lity that one of the deities will begin to dislike what he does, and therefore be-

gin to plot his downfall. For example, Ajax - mentioned some posts earlier - an-

gered Athena, who had him shipwrecked, and when he survived this and boas-

ted that even she did not manage to kill him, Poseidon made him drown ...

Yes, just imagine a life size "Trojan" horse made of paper mache and hollow, a

person with an average strength could easily throw it. On the other hand, a ve-

ry much smaller statue of a horse made of solid gold could be much too heavy

to throw, even for a much stronger person.

wait... wha? I thought that was like 10 years ago and it never happened?

It seems seneschal never really got over it ...

If so, does this mean that you can't throw objects with a SIZ score 11 or higher than your STR?

I very much think so. For example, with an average human Strength of 10.5 and

the average SIZ of a horse of 26 this seems very plausible, as throwing horses is

a comparatively rare pastime. However, this system uses SIZ for volume as well

as mass, and therefore tends to break down whenever volume and mass of an

object are not closely related, for example when a large object is very light or a

small object is very heavy. This is why I would prefer to make a mental "reality

check" before I apply the rule and replace the rule with common sense whenever

its result seems weird.

Beyonce as Wonder Woman. Discuss.

Well, nothing wrong with her thorax, I think.

Did the linen used in the Linothorax project match the same qualities (weave, binding, structure, etc...) of the linen that would have been used in ancient Greece? Did the project demonstrate that this had been considered for the tests and the conclusion?

From the project's webpage:

Using the available literary and artistic sources, the group has reconstructed several linothoraxes using only the authentic fabrics and glues that would have been available in the ancient Mediterranean.

By the way, there was also a late distant relative of the linothorax, the

Gambeson, although in this case the layers of linen were quilted toge-

ther instead of glued together:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambeson

In fact, I don't think CoC had the slash/crush specials, did it?

At least not any version I know. The early version only had the rule for a critical

hit mentioned above, later versions also have an optional rule for special success

and fumble, but as far as I am aware of it the differences between the weapon

types (for example crushing, slashing, impaling, etc.) do not exist in Call of Cthul-

hu.

My understanding is that "linothorax" is a word of modern construction, but based on Greek root words. Hence my use of quotation marks when using the word.

Homer already used "Linothorax" (λινοθώρηξ), and so did others of

the ancient authors.

Edit.:

I looked it up in an online translation of the Iliad to see whether any other inter-

pretation would be possible, but the text is very clear:

Ajax, the fleet son of Oileus, commanded the Locrians. He was not

so great, nor nearly so great, as Ajax the son of Telamon. He was

a little man, and his breastplate was made of linen, but in use of

the spear he excelled all the Hellenes and the Achaeans.

http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/iliad.html

Other translations of the Iliad are identical, Homer definitely wrote about

a thorax / breastplate made of linen.

Greek "Linothorax" might have been made of linen (all assumption, educated guess and theory), yet no evidence has been found. Citation required.

"Lino ..." means "made of linen", and I would be very surprised if the ancient

Greek authors would have fumbled their mother tongue rolls.

I remember something in CoC about bullets being crushing weapons.

I am not aware of this. The only relevant rule I know of is that all firearms and

all melee weapons with a point can cause critical hits on 1/5 or less of the cha-

racter's skill with the weapon, leading to double damage (and a melee weapon

has to be removed from the target's body next round without additional dama-

ge).

For me the abbreviation "BGB" for BRP's core rules is bad enough, because here it

is the abbreviation for "Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch", our code of civil law. There ha-

ve already been some occasions where a text mentioned some paragraph or quo-

te from our civil law and I tried hard to remember from which part of the BRP ru-

les that could have come, or why Jason Durall had written a chapter about inhe-

ritance or beekeeping into the BGB ...

But with BRP how does one handle say a "combatives" (MAA style) Strikes, Locks, Chokes & Throws. Using simple combinations like Inside punch intrecept/choke that in blinding speed turns into a takedown with knee to the groin.?

I think the best place to find an answer would be the Dragon Lines supplement with

its focus on the martial arts, the BGB itself does not cover this very well.