Wrestling for a weapon

[Seldak]

While trying to make sense of the wrestling skill I'm not quite sure how wrestling an armed opponent is supposed to work.

As far as I understand it, there are two possible scenarios:

a) You are faster than an armed opponent and can wrestle them before they would be able to attack.

b) The opponent is either faster than you or is holding you at bay with a long weapon, so wrestling could be used instead of parry.

 

In case of a) per definition of the wrestling skill, the opponent could try to parry you and/or would still be able to counterattack you, for example by using a knife. This is only possible in the first round of the wrestling attempt (propably because after that, the wrestler has seized control of either the weapon or the hand holding it.) If the wrestling attempt is parried or broken off from, it fails otherwise the opponent is subdued and you can start using different options on them.

Some questions come to mind:

1) If the opponent chooses to parry the wrestling attempt, for example with his sword, how would you handle damage to the wrestler, if the parry succeeds?

2) With which weapon are you allowed to counterattack? Only with other hand? The same weapon that was just grabbed?

3) When is the attempt broken off from? After a successful counterattack?

4) Could the wrestler use his wrestling skill to parry the counterattack, effectively rolling twice for wrestling in the same round?

 

For clarity's sake I'll ask my questions for scenario b) in a later post. For now I'm interested in your take on this wrestling attempt.

[NickMiddleton]

OK, what follows are my readings of the rules.

1)If the opponent chooses to parry the wrestling attempt, for example with his sword, how would you handle damage to the wrestler, if the parry succeeds?

The opponent is on the defensive: they can thus attempt to parry with Brawl, Wrestle OR a hand held weapon - per the combat results table, any result where the difference in degrees of success would result in damage to "Attacking weapon" I'd say the parrying weapon can roll damage against the character attempting the Wrestle manoeuvre.

2) With which weapon are you allowed to counterattack? Only with other hand? The same weapon that was just grabbed?

Here I think the wording is unhelpful: the phrase "counter-attack" actually should be read as "parry with a weapon".  To quote the whole first paragraph:

Quote

Parry Wrestle with Wrestle or Brawl, or make it less convenient by counterattacking (with a knife, say), but only in the first round of the Wrestle. If a Wrestle attack succeeds and it is not parried or broken off from, then the attacker holds and has subdued the target.

So, if the attack makes a Wrestle attack and succeeds (see below), they have a hold of the target and the target's options are now restricted to basically breaking that hold (STR vs STR, see below).

3) When is the attempt broken off from? After a successful counterattack?

Per above, I think the only "counter-attack" is actually a parry with a weapon against the initial Wrestle attack.

• If the Wrestle in the first round succeeds, the opponents ONLY option is to attempt to "break free" on their action in that round (and subsequent rounds) by winning a STR vs STR contest (per penultimate paragraph of the the Wrestle entry in the Skills chapter).
• If the first Wrestle succeeded, and the opponent did not break free (STR vs STR) then if the Wrestle in the second round ALSO succeeds, the Wrestler has seized the weapon and the opponent is no longer "Wrestled" but has lost the weapon.
• If the Wrestle in the SECOND round fails, the attacker still has hold, but has not succeeded in taking the weapon away. The opponent can attempt to break free on their action (STR vs STR).

4) Could the wrestler use his wrestling skill to parry the counterattack, effectively rolling twice for wrestling in the same round?

First paragraph of the Wrestle skill: "If a Wrestle attack succeeds and it is not parried or broken off from, then the attacker holds and has subdued the target."

• If the opponent did NOT successfully defend against the initial Wrestle attack, the attacker "holds and has subdued the target" and no counterattack is possible, only an attempt to escape the hold via STR vs STR: so there is nothing for the Wrestler to Parry, per se, and they certainly logically can't Wrestle someone else.#
• If that first Wrestle DID fail, then (subject to existing caveats regarding parrying with Wrestle) yes, Wrestle (like any other Combat skill) can be used a second time in a round. Just as you could attack and parry with a sword in the same round, one can do the same with Wrestle and Brawl I believe.

Now, there is the question of if both attacker and opponent roll successes in that first round, does ANY Wrestle success start the whole process, or does any successful defence "block" the Wrestle sequence from beginning? My opinion is that any combination of Wrestle attack and Defensive roll (Brawl, Weapon Parry or Wrestle) results on the Attack and Defence Matrix that mentions "attacker's weapon takes damage" or "Damage MAY get through parry"  ALSO means that the Wrestle is NOT established. Any combination of results that says "roll damage normally" or "double weapon damage" means the Wrestle IS Established.

Does that make sense? And side rhetorical quesiton: why are Wrestling / grappling rules always such a problem?!? 😄 

#we will for the moment exclude weird multi-arm demons and Octopi / Squid etc... 😛 

[Seldak]

On 4/12/2021 at 11:36 AM, NickMiddleton said:

The opponent is on the defensive: they can thus attempt to parry with Brawl, Wrestle OR a hand held weapon - per the combat results table, any result where the difference in degrees of success would result in damage to "Attacking weapon" I'd say the parrying weapon can roll damage against the character attempting the Wrestle manoeuvre.

Sounds reasonable. But it raises another question in me: do you believe that parrying a weapon using wrestle (or brawl for that matter) is an equivalent defense to using a weapon? Speaking from my personal experience in different martial arts (some of them also using weapons) I would refrain from trying to parry an attack from an armed opponent unless the circumstances are actually that inconvenient for them that using a weapon would actually hinder them more than help them.

I was thinking of house ruling this. You can try to parry a weapon unarmed, but your success level has to be above the attacker's. If you then succeed, you also get to grab the attacker's weapon or weapon hand (your choice) and can use a wrestling maneuver on them right away with your next action.

Do you think this is too harsh?

I just feel that it is such a suboptimal choice that ist should be more of a gamble.

On 4/12/2021 at 11:36 AM, NickMiddleton said:

Here I think the wording is unhelpful: the phrase "counter-attack" actually should be read as "parry with a weapon". 

That is what I thought it propably wants to express as well, but I wasn't quite sure. I guess that would be an appropriate to handle wrestling armed opponents, given the potential risk discussed above.

On 4/12/2021 at 11:36 AM, NickMiddleton said:

My opinion is that any combination of Wrestle attack and Defensive roll (Brawl, Weapon Parry or Wrestle) results on the Attack and Defence Matrix that mentions "attacker's weapon takes damage" or "Damage MAY get through parry"  ALSO means that the Wrestle is NOT established. Any combination of results that says "roll damage normally" or "double weapon damage" means the Wrestle IS Established.

In other words the wrestler's success level has to be above the target's success level.

On 4/12/2021 at 11:36 AM, NickMiddleton said:

Does that make sense?

Makes a lot of sense to me. That is how I will handle it. As a side note: that somehow also enforces my Idea for house ruling the wrestle skill to parry weapons, as it basically comes down to the same.

On 4/12/2021 at 11:36 AM, NickMiddleton said:

And side rhetorical quesiton: why are Wrestling / grappling rules always such a problem?!? 😄 

I've yet to see great wrestling rules in any RPG. It propably comes down to the need of having really abstract rules (so they don't hinder you at the gaming table) for a really complex and technical task withs lots of important minutiae which are usually not of importance in different fighting styles. It is simply easier to whack someone with a stick than to grab and twist them into submission while also making sure the same is not done to you at the same time.

I would most likely make wrestling a sort of minigame with contested skill tests, where success levels could shift the "state" of the wrestle along a scale. Or use success levels to choose from a list of maneuvers with certain outcomes, depending if you want to submit your opponent or hurt them.

Just my 2c.

On 4/12/2021 at 11:36 AM, NickMiddleton said:

#we will for the moment exclude weird multi-arm demons and Octopi / Squid etc... 😛 

That is a D10 sanity loss right there, given the clarity of the rules ;o)

Edited April 14, 2021 by Seldak

[NickMiddleton]

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You can try to parry a weapon unarmed, but your success level has to be above the attacker's. If you then succeed, you also get to grab the attacker's weapon or weapon hand (your choice) and can use a wrestling maneuver on them right away with my next action.

Don't see a problem with that and as you noted, lines up with how I interpret things. In the Arete rules I wrote for Advanced Sorcery, masters of Brawl / Wrestle (skills of 101 or more) can effectively have "hit points" for their parries, so even if they DON'T get a whole degree success over their opponent, their successful unarmed defence can block some damage.

[Seldak]

Cool, I didn't even realise there were skill mastery rules in AS yet as I'm concentrating on the MW core book at the moment. Looking forward to these rules once I played a while and my group is starting to look for more character advancement options.

I guess the b) part of my question is now answered as well.

Thanks for sharing your opinion!