RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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I've recently decided to see what happens if I re-write most of Pathfinder from the ground up. Since I'm starting from scratch on almost everything, I have the opportunity to examine not only the "issues" that inspired me to attempt this in the first place, but also things that are probably okay but I now have room to change.
One such topic is the role of armor. Some systems (like Pathfinder and D&D) represent armor's effect on combat by having it simply reduce the chances of an enemy successfully landing a meaningful blow. This is somewhat backed up by a very brief look at Wikipedia, where I learned that (at least with some armors) enemies would respond to it by simply aiming for the joints or other weak spots rather than trying to punch through it. Thus, they're aiming for a smaller target: you have a higher AC.
Other systems (as well as a set of variant rules for Pathfinder in UC) have armor simply absorb some of the damage you would have taken from a blow. This seems to assume that an attacker would try to hit you in exactly the same manner as they would if you were unarmored, and the armor simply gets in the way. This idea goes contrary to what I learned above, but on the other hand, certain piercing weapons (such as especially thin swords) were developed for breaking chainmail; similarly, while plate armor was apparently nigh-impervious to slashing weapons and highly resistant to piercing weapons, apparently heavy blows still hurt and so people developed heavy hammers/polearms/maces to just beat you to death inside your plate armor. Additionally, flexible armors like chainmail, while unlikely to be cut, often simply converted slashing damage to bludgeoning, so you still got hurt.
Seems there's support for either method.
Part of me wants to go the direction of armor absorbing damage, and maybe even make combat a little more dynamic by having certain weapons (or types of weapons) reduce or bypass that DR for certain armors. Like, maybe rapiers and arrows face reduced resistance from chain, while certain heavy bludgeoning weapons are less affected by plate.
Additionally/alternatively, what if different types of armor granted different mixes of AC/DR? Like, maybe chain is mostly just DR because it just cushions/protects, while plate offers more deflection because a glancing blow can slide off of it?
And then of course that's just the "realism" side; there's also the "game" side. Which methods are more fun? Does watching damage types or having different effects for different armor add too much work to combat?
What are folks' thoughts on the role of armor in a d20 system?
If I were re-writing it from the ground up, I'd go with a combined approach, as you seem to be suggesting. In addition to providing armor class as armors current do, Chainmail would give DR X/Piercing, Platemail would give DR X/Bludgeoning, etc. (I'm not sure if any armor should have DR that is specifically overcome by slashing - maybe not, since the best & most common weapons tend to deal slashing damage anyways and that was therefore the type of damage armors were most commonly made to resist.) This would help to up the effectiveness of heavier armors which seems to have grown less popular with the increase of dexterity based builds and the increasing usage of higher point buys. (The higher point buy is my perception of the situation from other posters - not sure of absolute reality.) As for the X, it might make sense to have it be 3 + the enchantment bonus of the armor or something similar. This type of DR should probably stack with armor based DR such as from adamantium armor. Maybe it could stack with other DR types, but maybe not.
Anyways, I really like the idea, so I'll follow this thread and post my thoughts.
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If you want realism then I would suggest going with an entirely different system. If you have a sword and you are fighting a guy in full plate then you are more or less SOL. Really, you are probably SOL if you even have a hammer because that guy in full plate is also faster than you might think and he can still take a most of your hits unless you are a mighty mountain man or you are throwing some hard core haymakers. Combat manuals of the era kind of focused on tackles and throws to knock down armored opponents, at which point you would stab them through the visor with your thin knife. As such, I shall ignore realism in my discussion.
I think you have a lot of questions to ask yourself here, Jiggy.
How much do you value simplicity? The current pathfinder system kind of is as simple as thing will get while maintaining the bones of a D20 game (with its separate attack and damage rolls). Armor items almost always modify armor class. Anything you change will probably make the defense system more cumbersome, but maybe that is worth it.
How would changing the armor system make the game more or less fun and how much does this change in fun matter to you? Optimally, there would be some kind of neato-cool system that made being attacked fun somehow rather than it just passively happening. I feel like Numenara tries to do this by having everything done as a player-rolled defense (rather than having monsters attack) and fails miserably because I am not an idiot and I don't care who makes the numbers happen.
How compatible should these rules be regarding existing material? I just was telling this guy how his damage reduction system wreaks havoc with the balance of the game. This is going to be true. Current D20 products are balanced around the existing AC rules. Many holes will appear very quickly if you are going to change armor class. How much will this matter to you? Will you design new classes and feats and everything from the ground up based around your new rules?
What do you think armor should be for? I tend to think of AC as a sort of easy abstraction. It is just a stylized success/failure mechanism. Right now the system is binary more or less, but perhaps there could be different degrees of success and failure that do different amounts of damage.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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How compatible should these rules be regarding existing material? I just was telling this guy how his damage reduction system wreaks havoc with the balance of the game. This is going to be true. Current D20 products are balanced around the existing AC rules. Many holes will appear very quickly if you are going to change armor class. How much will this matter to you? Will you design new classes and feats and everything from the ground up based around your new rules?
I want to address this in particular: this is a major re-write that I'm doing. It will not be compatible with existing d20 products; not even the Pathfinder Bestiary.
It uses the six ability scores and the base d20 mechanic. You gain hit dice. I might stick with the existing skill system (i.e., put ranks into skills).
But that's about it. I'm not even using classes. Nor will there be built-in expectations of getting a +X enhancement to stat Y by level Z. Your power comes from your levels, not your gear. No treadmill, no Christmas Tree, no uncomfortable economic questions where someone can get wealthy enough that the only thing they can't afford is better adventuring gear.
So when I say there's room to change the implementation of armor, I mean it. I could do anything, because it doesn't need to match existing balance.
If you go with the idea of armor absorbing damage, then you also need to address weapon damage and penetration of armor as well. Weapon stats are based on the idea that weapons do a certain amount of damage when they hit -- only a handful of monster and character types have damage reduction, and for most of those the issue for the attacker is how to overcome (i.e., eliminate) that damage reduction.
The thread that Excaliburproxy linked to has a set of rules in which the attacker can choose whether or not to attempt to bypass a foe's armor. If he does (essentially aiming for the armor's joints), the armor contributes AC but no DR. If he does not (battering through the armor with sheer strength), the armor contributes DR but reduced AC. The system struck me as very interesting, and maybe close to what you're looking for here.
As Excaliburproxy mentioned, the system wasn't balanced properly for anything past low level play. This is a problem with every attempt I've seen at an armor-as-damage-reduction system. But it has the realism you seem to want, and presents a new combat choice that is potentially interesting and rewards a variety of build archetypes in different ways. If you're essentially creating a new d20 system and balance with traditional Pathfinder isn't a concern to you, then that may be an interesting route to investigate.
Welcome to Rolemaster, where each weapon had a chart versus the various types of armor. Death was generally caused by critical hits, causing injuries, as opposed to beating down hit points. Plate armor was easy to hit and do small amounts of HP damage, but hard to get criticals. Leather armor was harder to get the initial HP damage, but it went up quickly and criticals came faster.
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This idea goes contrary to what I learned above, but on the other hand, certain piercing weapons (such as especially thin swords) were developed for breaking chainmail; similarly, while plate armor was apparently nigh-impervious to slashing weapons and highly resistant to piercing weapons, apparently heavy blows still hurt and so people developed heavy hammers/polearms/maces to just beat you to death inside your plate armor. Additionally, flexible armors like chainmail, while unlikely to be cut, often simply converted slashing damage to bludgeoning, so you still got hurt.
The way Palladium handled this was that each armor type had several defensive values: cut, chop, thrust, and impact. In that system, they also allowed the layering of some armors (such as double chain mail over padded armor).
We adopted these rules for our D&D 2E game way back when. The information can be found in The Compendium of Weapons, Armour, and Castles.
It becomes a decision of how far you want to take 'realism' over game mechanics. I am not sure if it is worth having four base AC values along with a Touch AC, Flat-footed AC (four of those?), and CMD.
Personally, I like the idea that armor not only protects the user from blows, but also lessens the damage. The difficult thing to work around with this idea is what to do with damage on the extreme ends of the scale, such as when a dagger faces plate mail.
I went through the same train of thought, Jiggy, when I tackled the task of developing for my campaign setting. I originally meant to adapt it to Pathfinder until I realized I'd need to completely rewrite pretty much everything, so I ultimately choose to build my own system. Armor was one bullet point in the design.
You should ask yourself what role you want armor to play and how it relates to combat and the game's health system. In Pathfinder, AC and DR prolongs a fight. Characters suffer no performance penalties for sustaining injury. A monster remains dangerous as long as it still lives. However, hitpoints are valuable to a PC because they carry over after combat and determine whether a PC can carry on or abandon their quest. So, the players benefit from having combats end quickly.
With this in mind, DR and AC plays a different role for PCs and enemies. For a PC, AC reduces the chance of losing health as result of a battle whereas DR reduces the damage they take over the course of an adventure. Note that stoneskin essentially adds hitpoints to a PC and that DR without a duration or reduction limit is exceptionally rare for a PC. For a monster, AC and DR prolongs a battle, causing the PCs to take more damage and expend more resources as result of the fight. Also note that DR and AC has different consequences for a PC whereas they accomplish the same thing in different ways for a monster.
In my game, "DR" and "AC" plays a slightly different role. A PC makes opposed skill checks against attacks whereas Armor reduces the damage they take. However, the game uses a wounds system where if a character takes damage up to a threshold, they get a major wound, which can hinder a character's performance and impact their action economy. While Armor doesn't prevent hits, it reduces the chance a hit will be detrimental to a character. Characters can easily patch wounds after a battle, but long term healing costs money, which works well because my game places a large value on a character's wealth.
Numenera also uses checks and Armor like my system, but they play a different role due to the game's health economy. Instead of wounds or hitpoints, each character has a pool of points for each of the three ability scores: Might, Speed, and Intellect. Damage takes away points (character dies if all pools are depleted), but the points are also the resource for the character's abilities and for performing skill checks. Characters can replenish their pools gradually over a day or take a full rest or a day or so to almost completely replenish their pools.
Note that health plays a different role in each game and how AC/DR affects the health economy for PCs. In Pathfinder, hitpoints are largely a long term resource drained through long combats, affecting a PC's ability to finish an adventure. In my game, wounds have a short term consequence on performance and long term impact on wealth. In Numenera, pools mainly determine performance on a day by day basis.
So to start designing your AC and DR system, I recommend figuring out how you want your health system resources to work and how it affects the PCs and their risk of death. Then, determine how AC/DR interacts with that resource.
I'd like to find a way to make defending one's self a saving throw. I really enjoy the idea of an opposed roll against an incoming attack or damaging effect. I have no actual constructive input at the moment, just wishful starry eyes.
I'd like to find a way to make defending one's self a saving throw. I really enjoy the idea of an opposed roll against an incoming attack or damaging effect. I have no actual constructive input at the moment, just wishful starry eyes.
Numenera actually handles it quite in an interesting way. In every situation, the player rolls, but the GM does not. If you attack, you have to roll and beat a defense target number. If the enemy attacks, you have to roll and beat an offense target number. This was meant to speed turns, which I really like. It's not that I want fast combats, but rather I want fast combat rounds. I think everyone would have a lot more fun in a 30-40 minute combat if they got to do more than 3 or 4 rounds of actions.
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If I were re-writing it from the ground up, I'd go with a combined approach, as you seem to be suggesting.
I've played a game system with a combined approach.
Rolemaster had a very intricate system, with each weapon having its on table showing effectiveness versus each type of armor. The guy in full plate, for example, was very easy to hit; not that it would do much unless you were swinging a very large weapon.
Not sure how much this'll help... But I'm fiddling around with re-writing d20 from the ground up as well... Though I'm likely well on my way to using a different dice mechanic so S&Gs... Here's something I'm toying around with.
Armor grants DR, Defense, AND Conversion. Mainly, I just kind of combined Damage Conversion and Armor as DR from Unearthed Arcana as a basis. Working out kinks and specifics, still, but I'm focusing more on my magic since it's hit an unexpected snag. Eventually I'll look at it more seriously.
I'll use a current Full Plate for example. Grants +9 armor to your AC. In my system, I've cut that in half, so that full plate gives you only a +5 to your defense. You'll wind up with 4 DR. On the other hand, that +5 to your defense score, converts 5 points of damage into nonlethal. So if you take 10 points of damage form an attack, you nix 4 right off, 5 is converted into nonlethal, and you get 1 real damage dealt to you.
Basically just went for the fact that armor made you harder to hit, and made you take less actual damage. Considering these are fantasy heroes, I felt that being beaten in full plate would more likely wind up fatiguing and knocking you out due to innate 'fantasy toughness', as it were.
Buuut this is also the system I'm designing with cinematics in mind more than realism. As well as a Health & Vigor system. So far, in arena-styled play tests (mini 1 to 2 level dungeons, or straight up arena matches), some numbers needed to be tweaked, but I'm told it's rather fun. Made the testers feel like they were actually playing the heroic types in literature and film.
That said, you could easily start including charts with weapon types, or make it simple and give armors specific DR resistances. Full Plate could give a good deflection with a decent DR/Bludgeoning, for example.
Just some food for thought. In case it wasn't obvious, I'm advising a hybrid approach, lol.
Interested in seeing the end results.
How compatible should these rules be regarding existing material? I just was telling this guy how his damage reduction system wreaks havoc with the balance of the game. This is going to be true. Current D20 products are balanced around the existing AC rules. Many holes will appear very quickly if you are going to change armor class. How much will this matter to you? Will you design new classes and feats and everything from the ground up based around your new rules?I want to address this in particular: this is a major re-write that I'm doing. It will not be compatible with existing d20 products; not even the Pathfinder Bestiary.
It uses the six ability scores and the base d20 mechanic. You gain hit dice. I might stick with the existing skill system (i.e., put ranks into skills).
But that's about it. I'm not even using classes. Nor will there be built-in expectations of getting a +X enhancement to stat Y by level Z. Your power comes from your levels, not your gear. No treadmill, no Christmas Tree, no uncomfortable economic questions where someone can get wealthy enough that the only thing they can't afford is better adventuring gear.
So when I say there's room to change the implementation of armor, I mean it. I could do anything, because it doesn't need to match existing balance.
...if I could insert, here. Please consider redoing the skills system. As it is, skills are sort of: one person rolls, and that's it. Most of the dynamism of the game is within combat. This shortchanges some forms of adventure, and some classes...and puts the emphasis on "everyone should be able to fight and do x amount of damage, just in a different way," because right now that's the most interesting thing to do.
If diplomatic combat for example, were built in--some form of challenge mechanic skills could be used for or with... It would add a needed dimension to the game.
Were I you, pursuing this line of thought, this is what I'd do:
Shields grant bonuses to AC, including touch AC.
Armor grants DR, though you could also have it grant an AC bonus based on its type. The DR bonus would also be based on type, protecting against Bludgeoning (slams), slashing (claws) and piercing (bite).
For instance:
Chainmail, as a medium armor, grants +2 AC. It also grants DR unique to chainmail in the equivalent of something like 4/Bludgeoning, 2/Piercing, 6/Slashing. In the interest of balance you could try to keep those numbers relatively even within armor types. In other words all light armors grant +1 AC and grant a total of DR 1-6 spread across the three damage types. Medium Armor grants +2 AC and a total of DR 7-12 spread across the three damage types while Heavy Armor grants +3 AC and a total of 13-18 DR spread across the various damage types. This would seem a fine way to address both 'layers' of defense, with similar things done for creatures with natural armor as well.
Of course, all of this means you would need to tweak attack rolls and damage a bit, or be very, very careful what ranges you set the AC/DR bonuses to keep from having things go awry.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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What I'm currently looking at is this:
All armors would have what I'm currently calling a "glance" value, as well as another value called "DR" or "soak" or some such thing.
The glance value is added to your Defense score against slashing or piercing attacks. The DR/soak/whatever subtracts from the damage dealt by bludgeoning attacks. So armor is always useful to have against weapon-users, just in different ways depending on the weapon faced.
Of course, there will be countermeasures: a strong sword-user might carry a backup hammer for beating down an armor user and invest in options for trading to-hit for damage. A lower-damage Finesse-type combatant with a light blade might not be able to beat through the DR by using a backup bludgeoning weapon, but could invest in the ability to make fast flurries of attacks each turn, increasing the chances of one or more hits getting through despite the higher Defense. Or someone might even invest in being able to just cut your armor off your body (and since I'm all but removing gear dependency, sunder tactics won't be the issue they are in Pathfinder).
On the other hand, the armor wearer could invest in being really good in armor, increasing the glance/DR of whatever armor he wears. Of course, someone who does so has less to invest in their offensive capabilities.
Different strategies. Different strengths. Different results when they meet.
That's the plan, at least. :)