Official Thread for "Non-Flashy Fighter Discussion"

[ckafrica]

How come there's never a weapon group for Dane axes? (staff+battle axe)

That just sounds like slightly short polearm to me.

Frank: I guess my dilemma with the range thing is that a lot of iconic fights take place in quarters that make many weapons unrealistic. I mean I'd have a hard time fight someone in my apartment with a battle axe or two handed sword, and certainly in a man-sized tunnel or at an opponent on the other side of a normal door. Do we really want tunnel adventures to consist of knife fights?

I tend to want opponents to fight each using special talents that each one has and I care less what is actually in their hands to do this. Some guys use big swords, some use small daggers and some fight with a hammer in one hand and an axe in an other. Whether someone has a glaive or a ranseur in their hand is something I couldn't give a flying fuck about. Whatever. It's more flavour than something I care about that much mechanically. To me the key is not dismissing potential character concepts because of weapon choice. No one will fight with sickles if sickles suck. And that is sad.

[Draco_Argentum]

I actually think that there is room for keeping track of weapon length, and having weapon length provide real solid benefits and detriments. If people's positions are tracked relatively, rather than in absolute squares or hexagons, then weapon which is longer than another gives a substantive difference in relative threat distance no matter how much extra length that actually is.

I'm on board with this sort of deal. I like weapons and like looking at an RPG weapon list and trying to figure out which one to use. One caveat, I should be able to build a balanced fighting style around the weapons offered. Obviously that would involve being a grappler with a dagger or leveraging a greatsword's reach into a scything style. It'd suck to have weapons with no support from the ability set, if I can't make a character who uses the dagger's advantage up close then having daggers be good up close is a red herring.

A fair fight is one in which you have a chance of losing. Hence, in a fair fight, if you fought dirty, you'd win. However, general game design is that the 'dirty' is built into the system, so a fair fight where someone 'fights dirty' is even chances instead of tilted.

This is how it should work, assuming that the knight stereotype is intended as a valid character alongside scoundrels obviously. The issues are letting the honourable combatant choose abilities that are as varied and effective as the rogue, in opposition to realism. The abandonment of realism there seems to be a hangup for some people. The other problem is the exact opposite, having roguish themed maneuvers work even though there is a culturally ingrained conception that fighting fair is somehow better. You can't let people's notions of fair play be vindicated through biased rules or the game won't function as intended.

[Username17]

Do we really want tunnel adventures to consist of knife fights?

Yes.

If you didn't want the fight to be a knife fight, you wouldn't set it in a crowded marketplace or a cramped storm drain. Getting people to use close quarters weapons is the entire fucking point of having close quarters.

-Username17

[ckafrica]

Ok because my problem is in here

it would be bloody inconvenient to swing any non thrusting weapon so the whole theme of axe wielding dwarves gets a little silly.

That to me is a classic sword and sorcery dungeon bash and I wouldn't be swapping out my weapons when I played it.

I mean it's not that I'm inherently opposed to a gritty realism to combat. I just thought the theme was for more cinematic games where good guys didn't accidently cleave nearby civilians in 2 when swinging a 2 handed sword in a crowded market and conveniently ignored that their sword would have imbedded itself in the ceiling mid-swing

[violence in the media]

Do we really want tunnel adventures to consist of knife fights?

Yes.

If you didn't want the fight to be a knife fight, you wouldn't set it in a crowded marketplace or a cramped storm drain. Getting people to use close quarters weapons is the entire fucking point of having close quarters.

-Username17

I completely agree with this. You want people to be forced into using weapons appropriate to the situation. That's why you try and change the situation to favor yourself whenever you can.

Your opponent is a swordsman who is devastating with the blade? Try and fight him in a cramped alley or bar where your knife skills come into play. You're playing that swordsman? Aim for duels in market squares and open fields. Are you a sailor? Try and make those landlubbers fight on moving or uneven ground.

As far as the relative weapon reach thing, I can get behind that too. The problem is HP and game systems themselves (their rightful desire to not kill PCs willy-nilly). Trying to close in on a guy with a spear really tends to be an either/or proposition. He either misses you entirely somehow, or you're fucking impaled. Trying to close in on someone should probably deal damage if you fail and keep you at bay.

[Elennsar]

Elennsar: A fair fight is one in which you have a chance of losing. Hence, in a fair fight, if you fought dirty, you'd win. However, general game design is that the 'dirty' is built into the system, so a fair fight where someone 'fights dirty' is even chances instead of tilted. But it's hard to constrain players from that option...

Not if "dirty" is relatively minor instead of a massive advantage where the nondirty person is either helpless to resist or heavily penalized if they don't (or worse, both)

So you get an advantage when you fight dirty. It does not hand you victory on a silver flatter any more than any other good-use-of-the-situation does.

If the advantage of throwing sand in someone's eyes is minor and short lived and the advantage of being brave/determined enough to persist despite dire injuries is bigger, you don't need to be over the top at all - people who fight like cowards are treated as cowards by the rules as well as the social conventions.

People who fight bravely are treated as brave by the rules as well as the social conventions.

[violence in the media]

That was a great game!

[Elennsar]

So what weapon list (specifically) are we using?

If polearms are relatively rare, we can merge the skill (if not the property) with "Spears" - assuming we have seperate skills for seperate weapons.

If spearwork as distinct from polearm fighting is important to make different, it should stay more seperated.

Related to that, do we want there to be reasons to use a scimitar/saber over a straightsword (to use one of the best examples of two-weapons-in-the-same-basic-role - same with long/bastard sword and katana), because doing so is doable without making one a no brainer.

There is obviously support for "same weapon essentially".

What are the feelings of those who do favor breaking things down a bit?

I'd like to make there be a difference there - they're similar, so moves that work with one probably work with the other nearly all the time, but if your prefered attack is cutting and you're on horseback, a curved blade may offer a slight advatnage.

Similarly, a straight blade thrusts better.

No point having "combat is important" and then skip weapon details - that would be like having a social interaction based game where your choice of gemstone was entirely preference, only more so.

[Anguirus]

Frank: So each weapon has three distinctive threat zones (short - optimal - long) where they receive situational modifiers? Did 3rd ed shadowrun have something like that? Would we then have weapon groups (if we're doing weapon groups) that consisted of similarly ranged weapons or similarly wielded weapons? Would a very short sword and a very long dagger be grouped together or would the short sword be grouped with other swords and the long dagger grouped with other daggers? Also, not that I disagree with you but sometimes the reason that you are fighting close quarters is because the image is very cinematic and effects the narrative mood instead of plot.

E: Why can't I fight bravely and dirty? Why do I need to be afraid to kick you in the balls; can't I just know that its a good idea?

For specific maneuvers and abilities, how do we want to learn them, what do we want them to do and on what do we want them to be dependant? Similarly, do we want to have weapon skill or melee weapon skill as a whole? The answer to those questions, I think, will have a great impact on how complicated the weapon groups we come up with will be.

My vote is to have melee combat skill be one skill relevant to all weapons and then have abilities for specific weapons or weapon groups but my system has some conceptual problems.

[zeruslord]

Melee combat skill is not the same for all weapons. There's some knowing where to hit somebody, but defenses and counters to defenses are completely different. You can't disengage with a broadsword, and you can't put two hands on a rapier. The basic weapon positions don't even match.

[Username17]

You can't disengage with a broadsword, and you can't put two hands on a rapier. The basic weapon positions don't even match.

That's an incredibly shitty example.

-Username17

[Elennsar]

E: Why can't I fight bravely and dirty? Why do I need to be afraid to kick you in the balls; can't I just know that its a good idea?

Because warriors who are noted for their bravery and martial skill -don't- resort to dirty tricks, as a rule, even when counting people who aren't formally or informally vowed against them.

So unless you want everyone who doesn't have "damn fool" written on their sheet fighting dirty, there has be a reason that people who don't have a motivation to appear honorable avoid it as much as those who do.

Saying that the abilities tied to heroic resolve (none of which have to flashy - or even unrealistic) are not available to people who choose to fight using dirty tricks and stealth is both appropriate and somewhat balancing between the two, instead of making it so that only utter morons follow rules in combat.

Again, if you really make it so "honorable combat" is pointless, the style you are prompting not Indiana Jones shooting someone who challenges him to a sword fight, but treachery and assassination and a dearth of heroes (either in the sense of noble or brave).

For specific maneuvers and abilities, how do we want to learn them, what do we want them to do and on what do we want them to be dependant? Similarly, do we want to have weapon skill or melee weapon skill as a whole? The answer to those questions, I think, will have a great impact on how complicated the weapon groups we come up with will be.

In order, and as a rough statement:

1) Spend points upon meeting requirements.
2) Depends.
3) Your competence at the things important to the manuever - including but not limited to your (weapon) skill.
4) Weapon (group) skill, though that still leaves whether we want "narrow" or "broad".

[Caedrus]

E: Why can't I fight bravely and dirty? Why do I need to be afraid to kick you in the balls; can't I just know that its a good idea?

Because warriors who are noted for their bravery and martial skill -don't- resort to dirty tricks, as a rule, even when counting people who aren't formally or informally vowed against them.

What reality are you from?

[Elennsar]

The reality where I can point to the following examples of "nonflashy fighters" that would be worth representing PCs:

The Knights of the Round Table
Druss
Solomon Kane
Robin Hood (depends on the telling, mind) and at least a fair number of his Merry Men
The Chevalier de Bayard*
The heroes in LotR, the Silmarilion, and the Hobbit
Captain Gars*

King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden

* for being historical figures.

I could continue, no doubt.

Now, we can also point to brave individuals who would kick someone in the balls - but if we don't want to say "being honorable is for MORONS", which is not (automatically) appropriate for "nonflashy fighters" - it may fit Conan's world specifically, for instance, but that's a "may" and not the only thing we can use, nor necessarily the best thing to use.

Some of those named (Bayard, probably Gars, the Knights of the Round Table) are at least informally vowed - but nothing in Robin's code expects him to fight fair, or makes him benefit from doing so (his good reputation is based entirely or nearly entirely on something else) - but he does so anyway.

[Anguirus]

So unless you want everyone who doesn't have "damn fool" written on their sheet fighting dirty, there has be a reason that people who don't have a motivation to appear honorable avoid it as much as those who do.

Saying that the abilities tied to heroic resolve (none of which have to flashy - or even unrealistic) are not available to people who choose to fight using dirty tricks and stealth is both appropriate and somewhat balancing between the two, instead of making it so that only utter morons follow rules in combat.

Not to sidetrack this broader rules discussion, because really this is a minor point, but why can't appearing honorable be an incentive for not doing terrible things? I can't stand it when games try to regulate narrative serving behavior with heavy handed rules that essentially say "you don't have a choice in the matter, also -just in case you forgot- YOU ARE PLAYING A GAME!" These sorts of rules make it impossible to make effective decisions and still evaluate a situation from the perspective of your character. "Don't kick him the balls or throw sand in his eyes. It'll just piss him off. You should stab him instead because that is more civilized." Who thinks like that? I could see "Don't kick him in the balls or throw sand in his eyes or everyone is going to know you as that guy that kicks people in the balls." If it makes you feel better we could even represent the social penalty that this reputation carries with it with numbers instead expecting GMs to do their God damned job and simulate the features (including taboos and the consequences of their violation) of the game world. Do you also want a non-social penalty associated with violating other forms of etiquette or are 'the rules of war' some how more sacred in this campaign setting (which we haven't even begun to discuss)? Do your good guy bonuses apply if the person you're fighting is an awful human being that doesn't violate your 'rules of war' (your as in Elennsar's - not to be confused with pervasive social constructions of propriety specific to the campaign setting or your as in the PC whose resolve these rules are intended to simulate 's)? If your good guy character gets involved in combat with a pedophile rapist cannibal who murder your mother and burned your village do you get your heroic resolve or does that only come into play if he dares to try to fight you intelligently?

[virgil]

Back on to a proper topic...I figured that whole aspect of axes being poor choices in cramped quarters would be part of the situational modifiers associated with weapons which would encourage the use of training in multiple weapons.

Since reach weapons should have modifiers to engagement checks and combat in various situations, you can likely get enough variation without actually giving many 'properties'.

I'm going to try to give an idea of what I'm talking about...
Longsword: +1 reach, +1 thrusting, +1 swinging
Pike: +3 reach, +2 thrusting, +0 swinging
Greataxe: +1 reach, -1 thrusting, +2 swinging

Cramped dungeon halls like the above require use of the thrusting modifier instead of the swinging modifier if the weapon's reach is +1 or higher. You use the reach modifier as a modifier to melee engagement checks (both for attacking and resisting someone getting close enough to perform a standard attack).

Feel free to counter, as this is something that I pulled from the aether as I was typing.

P.S.

Because warriors who are noted for their bravery and martial skill -don't- resort to dirty tricks, as a rule, even when counting people who aren't formally or informally vowed against them.

It has been established before that Elennsar ALSO believes that 'brave' warriors will die like redshirts against overwhelming odds.

[Elennsar]

"Don't kick him the balls or throw sand in his eyes. It'll just piss him off. You should stab him instead because that is more civilized." Who thinks like that?

People who are actually concerned with being civilized/honorable/decent/fair?

As for social penalties/bonuses:

Quoth Robin Hood: "I cannot in cold blood, send a shaft through a foe's body with but a pace or two between us. Once a I slew a man, and ne'er again will I take life save at dire need or in the heat of combat."

Since Robin is already an outlaw, and his good reputation as said is based on his charity, not his reluctance to kill, there's no benefit to reward him with based on that aspect.

If your good guy character gets involved in combat with a pedophile rapist cannibal who murder your mother and burned your village do you get your heroic resolve or does that only come into play if he dares to try to fight you intelligently?

It is not "fighting intelligently" to fight dirty. You can fight intelligently and not fight dirty, or you can fight dirty and be a blithering idiot.

Regardless, I'd give the good guy bonuses when appropriate - regardless of your opponent's behavior - this guy http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0010467/quotes didn't fight dirty as I recall (though he may have pushed the rules to their limits) - but the right situation would prompt the "heroic resolve" nonetheless.

But in regards to the setting on the whole, if you set things up so that only a blithering moron refuses to use the blatantly superior tactics of poison and sand in the eyes, then you automatically are writting a kind of setting where you don't -want- Robin or Lancelot or Ulrich von Lichtenstein from Gelderland because you're making them not simply disadvantaged but gimped.

So yeah.

We do need to decide the setting to make useful rule decisions - because a game where fighting dirty is the order of the day and the exceptions are noted from that as a baseline is a very different game than one where sand-to-eyes is a trick that only those who are "dishonorable" use and most don't.

Similarly, we need to know whether we want a setting that somewhere or another covers the whole of the muscle powered age (like Conan's world) or one focused on some particular part of that era...making clubs viable weapons is worth actually addressing in Conan's world, but will never come up for Robin's or Lancelot's.

It has been established before that Elennsar ALSO believes that 'brave' warriors will die like redshirts against overwhelming odds.

No, I believe that overwhelming odds should actually jolly well be overwhelming. If 10-1 is supposed to be "We can't win" from our heroes, them winning should -be- an upset. If 10-1 is "There really aren't enough of you. This isn't a fair fight.", then it should -be- that.

And insisting that those who can confidently say the latter are as brave as those who face the former is ridiculous.

[Anguirus]

Back on to a proper topic...I figured that whole aspect of axes being poor choices in cramped quarters would be part of the situational modifiers associated with weapons which would encourage the use of training in multiple weapons.

Since reach weapons should have modifiers to engagement checks and combat in various situations, you can likely get enough variation without actually giving many 'properties'.

I'm going to try to give an idea of what I'm talking about...
Longsword: +1 reach, +1 thrusting, +1 swinging
Pike: +3 reach, +2 thrusting, +0 swinging
Greataxe: +1 reach, -1 thrusting, +2 swinging

Cramped dungeon halls like the above require use of the thrusting modifier instead of the swinging modifier if the weapon's reach is +1 or higher. You use the reach modifier as a modifier to melee engagement checks (both for attacking and resisting someone getting close enough to perform a standard attack).

Feel free to counter, as this is something that I pulled from the aether as I was typing.

P.S.

Because warriors who are noted for their bravery and martial skill -don't- resort to dirty tricks, as a rule, even when counting people who aren't formally or informally vowed against them.

It has been established before that Elennsar ALSO believes that 'brave' warriors will die like redshirts against overwhelming odds.

I don't know if I'm following. What are the situations that each of your three categories of attack modifiers are associated with? Not to contradict you because I don't really know what your system is yet but what I was thinking is that we would have three ranges for each weapon, represented in feet. This sort of disregards swinging weapons which may be a problem. You would have weapon profiles that looked something like this.
Dagger: Short - Optimal 2' Long 4'
Broadsword: Short 3' Optimal 5' Long 7'
Spear: Short 5' Optimal 9' Long 12'

I'm sorry if these ranges don't make sense. I haven't a clue as to what distance you want to use any of these weapons at and the number exist just to illustrate the concept.

Then you would note for each weapon what penalty, if any, it had at short and long range and what bonus, if any, it had at optimal range. Then you would have a mechanic in place for moving towards or away from your opponent (assuming that you were within their threat range of course) that was essentially an opposed attack role with any relevant modifiers.

[Username17]

I'm sorry if these ranges don't make sense. I haven't a clue as to what distance you want to use any of these weapons at and the number exist just to illustrate the concept.

Indeed, the weapon ranges should just be arbitrary numbers, because they only matter in relative terms between two opponents.

-Username17

[virgil]

My intent was that the reach modifier is for actions that involve getting in range of your opponent, maybe where the reach difference acts as a bonus for the person at the advantage; so the axe fighter has a +2 against the pikeman when he's in his face, but the pikeman instead has the +2 as long as he keeps his distance.

The swinging/thrusting modifiers are supposed to be general modifiers to the use of the weapon depending on how you're using it. As I mentioned, if you don't have alot of room with that large axe, you're force to try to stab with it (using the subpar -1 modifier rather than the preferred +2).

Hmm...might be easier to instead just give the weapon the 'swinging' descriptor and have a universal penalty if it's in cramped conditions. Though I'm curious as to when it's actually an advantage to have/use a swinging weapon over something that's either thrusting in design or dual-purpose (like a sword).

[Caedrus]

I suggested a system a long while back that added a 3rd common melee range (in addition to Reach and Not Reach), which was the one where you would engage in grapples: Moving inside a person's square. The basic idea was that you had a sort of range triangle: Reach > Melee > Close Quarters > Reach. Moving into and out of a person's square used the same AoO rules as everything else.

How this would work out would be determined by AoOs and movement. If you want to attack a spear guy with a sword, you get AoOed on your approach, and the enemy can just 5 foot step back to attack again normally. A guy with a dagger had the same disadvantage against a guy with a sword. However, if you get under spear guy's reach with a dagger, he can't backstep and counterattack, and with the right abilities you can keep him in his place, unable to properly respond to your attacks.

[ckafrica]

Well if reach is going to be incorporated, how exactly are we going to emulate it without adding an annoying level of complexity? How are we going to let people know that the reach of the weapon is unfavorable in this situation?

For example do we emulate the fool heartiness that is the real life charging a spear wall? Or how are we going to show that using a 2 handed sword in tunnels doesn't work well be a spear should be fine? What is the mechanism that keeps an opponent from closing within my weapon's reach or pushing them out to my weapon's reach?

edit
2 people posted before I did so you mmight have answered

[Caedrus]

Well if reach is going to be incorporated, how exactly are we going to emulate it without adding an annoying level of complexity?

Was it complex or confusing in 3e? I'm not sure I see your problem here.

[Draco_Argentum]

How about this?

A spear is a [thrusting] weapon, you can use [thrusting] tagged moves with it. A straight sword is a [thrusting][swinging] weapon you can use moves that are tagged [thrusting] or [swinging] with it.

This would combine with the movement and surroundings rules. You can make [swinging] attacks only if the surroundings are more open (an abstracted value) than your weapon's abstracted size. [Thrusting] attacks can be used is the surroundings are one step narrower than the weapon's size. Also a weapon with a larger size gives you an advantage over a smaller one.

That'd let you have spears be good in a tunnel, stop battleaxes being good in tunnels and gives spears an advantage over a shortsword.

Obviously the [swinging] only axe user needs to have a dagger or similar as backup. A swordsman can rely on a sword on more confined spaces by having [thrusting] moves in addition to [swinging] ones.

[Anguirus]

How about this?

A spear is a [thrusting] weapon, you can use [thrusting] tagged moves with it. A straight sword is a [thrusting][swinging] weapon you can use moves that are tagged [thrusting] or [swinging] with it.

This would combine with the movement and surroundings rules. You can make [swinging] attacks only if the surroundings are more open (an abstracted value) than your weapon's abstracted size. [Thrusting] attacks can be used is the surroundings are one step narrower than the weapon's size. Also a weapon with a larger size gives you an advantage over a smaller one.

That'd let you have spears be good in a tunnel, stop battleaxes being good in tunnels and gives spears an advantage over a shortsword.

Obviously the [swinging] only axe user needs to have a dagger or similar as backup. A swordsman can rely on a sword on more confined spaces by having [thrusting] moves in addition to [swinging] ones.

I would agree with this with the addition that [swinging] weapons are generally more bad ass than [thrusting] ones so as to make up for their lack of usability (how much more bad ass depends on how much we anticipate close quarters fighting to come up). Also, weapons that are tagged with both would need to have two separate weapon profiles (a thrusting one and a more bad ass swinging one) and I would expect that they would be marginally disadvantaged at both swinging and thrusting. Not enough to make playing a straight swordsman un-workable but enough to make it not more powerful than diversifying. This would make sense and give a game mechanic reason for there being proportionally more swordsmen than spearmen in the world. I wouldn't have people learn [swinging] or [thrusting] moves either, I would have weapon groups that were more specific than that and you would learn moves for those groups.