Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

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slimykuotoan
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Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by slimykuotoan »

I was just thinking about Conan-esque barbarian art in general. The majority of it depicts a heavily muscled individual in loincloth and helmet only.

Could there be some real world advantage fighting this way? Obviously against really heavily armoured opponents one would be quicker, but could underwear combat truly best others in the field?
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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Grandpa »

"Barbarian's" are depicted that way because when the Romans encountered them they didn't have much in the way of armor unless they got it from Romans they took it from. Same reason American Indians didn't have flintlocks but only bows when Europeans first fought them. There was no advantage to being under armed...

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Kayolan »

If the CK takes into account encumbrance of armor, then you would have an advantage in speed. Being able to outrun opponents can be a benefit, even if it's to run away, or hit and run tactics.

You'll generally be safe from Heat Metal spells.

If you're travelling in a hot climate you will be much less affected by heat exhaustion than someone wearing armor, especially metal armor.

Electrical attacks might not hurt you as much since you're not wearing metal.

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Fizz »

Kayolan wrote:
Sun Sep 20, 2020 1:22 am
Electrical attacks might not hurt you as much since you're not wearing metal.
I might argue that metal would potentially protect you from electrical attacks. Electricity follows that path of least resistance, so rather than the electrical current being forced through your flesh, it would flow through the metal and ground out. Or if you took the principle to the extreme, if you're completely surrounded by conductive metal, it would act as a Faraday Cage, making you completely immune to electrical attacks.

Of course, in a setting where magic is real, real rules of physics don't have to apply. :)

Note this is not an endorsement walking into a thunderstorm while wearing full plate mail. Don't do that! :)


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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Grandpa »

Fizz wrote:
Sun Sep 20, 2020 3:21 pm

Note this is not an endorsement walking into a thunderstorm while wearing full plate mail. Don't do that! :)
Why not? If it would keep electricity from going through your body you have nothing to worry about.

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Fizz »

Grandpa wrote:
Sun Sep 20, 2020 9:11 pm
Fizz wrote:
Sun Sep 20, 2020 3:21 pm
Note this is not an endorsement walking into a thunderstorm while wearing full plate mail. Don't do that! :)
Why not? If it would keep electricity from going through your body you have nothing to worry about.
Because i can't guarantee that a suit of plate mail acts as a perfect Faraday Cage. If it's a bit imperfect, all bets are off. :)

Plus, even assuming it did work as a perfect Faraday Cage, and the lightning passes around you, the bolt is giving up a huge amount of energy to the air (the bolt about 50,000 degrees for a split second) so you'd likely be burned. Plus the concussive shock to the system as well. You might not be electrocuted but you'd still sustain other injuries. So please don't try it. :)

Now, whether a lightning bolt spell is of similar power to a naturally occuring one, i'm not sure. Has damage from a natural lightning strike ever been established anywhere? The spell's range is much more limited, so i'd suspect it's power would be much lower than a natural strike.


Ah, mixing real-world physics with fantasy... always fun. Heh.


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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Kayolan »

Fizz wrote:
Sun Sep 20, 2020 10:17 pm
Has damage from a natural lightning strike ever been established anywhere?
Call Lightning is a natural lightning strike, a bolt that does d10 per caster level.

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Go0gleplex »

It's gotta be PLOT armor. :P
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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Grandpa »

Fizz wrote:
Sun Sep 20, 2020 10:17 pm

Because i can't guarantee that a suit of plate mail acts as a perfect Faraday Cage. If it's a bit imperfect, all bets are off. :)

Okay, understood

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Grandpa »

Fizz wrote:
Sun Sep 20, 2020 10:17 pm
Has damage from a natural lightning strike ever been established anywhere?
Assuming people avg 4.5 HP and knowing from 30 years of national weather service data that only 10% of people struck die then bolts probably do 1 maybe 2 points of damage. A positive strike maybe 2D4 if the result is an 8 add a 1D4

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Captain_K »

A bare wire is a great conductor... when you grab it you get shocked... I would NOT want to test plate mail protecting you as you're in contact with it...
In the old days didn't you NOT get your DEX to AC in heavy armors? I'm very tempted to add that back in... I have an elf in plate mail and high DEX... no STR.... seems nuts that they are as dextrous as the thief in leather.... would balance things out, once you go TANK, you get no DEX bonus to AC... still to shot and throw things, but not to DEX.
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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Fizz »

Captain_K wrote:
Sat Sep 26, 2020 3:00 am
A bare wire is a great conductor... when you grab it you get shocked... I would NOT want to test plate mail protecting you as you're in contact with it...
Indeed you are correct. You'd have to be very well insulated from the plate mail- some sort of non-conductive padding. And since lightning strikes involve very high voltages, preventing all conduction would not be easy.
In the old days didn't you NOT get your DEX to AC in heavy armors? I'm very tempted to add that back in... I have an elf in plate mail and high DEX... no STR.... seems nuts that they are as dextrous as the thief in leather.... would balance things out, once you go TANK, you get no DEX bonus to AC... still to shot and throw things, but not to DEX.
I know that 3E had that rule- a maximum AC bonus for every armor type. I don't think earlier editions did. It is a rule i still i use. but i also prefer armor as damage reduction with reduced hit points. It makes for a grittier game, but also one where combat is not flippantly considered.


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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Captain_K »

I like damage reduction for armor but I still like seeing the plate mailed knight bleed to death from a dagger strike...
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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Fizz »

Captain_K wrote:
Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:34 am
I like damage reduction for armor but I still like seeing the plate mailed knight bleed to death from a dagger strike...
That's what critical hits are for. :) And things like sneak attack could be justified as bypassing armor (getting between the gaps, etc).

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Captain_K »

Pretty much on this topic... heavy armors negate or take away AC bonus from DEX.. do I recall correctly that used to be a rule, your fighter in plate with and 18 dex does not get his dex bonus?
Helps keep armor class creep down, helps remove temptation to stick to only the physical, and it brings the dexterous thief in leather closer to the slow moving fighter in plate.
I also recall max movement rates by armor type which also makes sense.

CnC seems to leave it all to "encumbrance" which I would assume is more or less ignored by many/most/all.

A simple table or set of rules for AC limits to DEX and MOVE would do it, similar to those for multiclass and class and a half.
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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Lurker »

I used to agree with the 'heavy armor negates dex bonus'. However, some years ago I saw a show, semi scientific covering effectiveness of weapons and debunking misconceptions etc. It had 2 guys wearing Plate (not full Milanese Plate, I'd say it was possibly plate & mail from C&C or maybe field plate from old AD&D) they were able to do a full aerobic exercise session, one was able to do cartwheels in it. Then they had a race against soldiers wearing kit similar to what I wore running around the deserts of Iraq & in the Mountains of Afg, and they were as dexterous or more so than the guys in modern armor. Sooooo with that, I allow at least half dex bonus in even heavy armor, and full bonus for 'master work' fitted armor made specifically for the individual.

Fizz wrote:
Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:44 am
Captain_K wrote:
Mon Sep 28, 2020 1:34 am
I like damage reduction for armor but I still like seeing the plate mailed knight bleed to death from a dagger strike...
That's what critical hits are for. :) And things like sneak attack could be justified as bypassing armor (getting between the gaps, etc).

-Fizz
Agree on both points. I've always kicked around the idea of making armor damage reduction instead of protection. But it looks to be tooooo big a change to the fundamental setup of the rules and how attacks AC & HP work together.

However, heavy armor existed for a reason. It DOES greatly protect the wearer. The danger to a knight was not another sword hitting them, but a lance with 100s of lbs of force focused on the tip of the lance, an axe or a mace made to crack the armor like a nut, or a group of poor peasant fighters working together to over power the knight drag them down into the mud and then stick the knife in the chinks of their armor.

2 good examples of this are the movies 'Outlaw King' & King (the movie about Hennery V) on Netflix.

With that, if I ever did armor reduces damage, I'd say that a crit hit does full damage to the target and ignores the armor's damage reduction & weapons that were made specifically to fight heavy armored opponents (axe, mace, hammer etc) reduces the armor reduction by half.
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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Fizz »

Lurker wrote:
Wed Oct 07, 2020 5:42 pm
Agree on both points. I've always kicked around the idea of making armor damage reduction instead of protection. But it looks to be tooooo big a change to the fundamental setup of the rules and how attacks AC & HP work together.

With that, if I ever did armor reduces damage, I'd say that a crit hit does full damage to the target and ignores the armor's damage reduction & weapons that were made specifically to fight heavy armored opponents (axe, mace, hammer etc) reduces the armor reduction by half.
There are some conversions out there. I think the most notable was the Grim'N'Gritty rules that was for 3E. But it has a lot of detail. I've done my own simplified version for C&C. I like this modification because it really gives makes different types of combat feel different. There is a substantive shift in a nimble unarmored versus an armored tank.

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Rigon »

Here's an idea, what if there was an AC bonus that increased with level, but if a character wore armor it would suppliment that bonus. The bonus would range from +1 to +3 at first level and then increase by +1 every 2/3/4 levels 9depending on class). You could also allow classes that have more training with armor to add part of the bonus when wearing armor. I know there are games that do this (the Wheel of Time RPG had a system like this) and I've considered doing it for my games on occasion.

For ex: Rogues would get a +2 to AC at 1st level and it would increase by +1 every 3 levels. But if the rogue was wearing leather armor, their AC bonus would only be +1.

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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Fizz »

Rigon wrote:
Thu Oct 08, 2020 1:40 pm
Here's an idea, what if there was an AC bonus that increased with level, but if a character wore armor it would suppliment that bonus. The bonus would range from +1 to +3 at first level and then increase by +1 every 2/3/4 levels 9depending on class). You could also allow classes that have more training with armor to add part of the bonus when wearing armor. I know there are games that do this (the Wheel of Time RPG had a system like this) and I've considered doing it for my games on occasion.

For ex: Rogues would get a +2 to AC at 1st level and it would increase by +1 every 3 levels. But if the rogue was wearing leather armor, their AC bonus would only be +1.

R-
So are you suggesting a rule where they get either a bonus from level or a bonus from armor, but not both? If so, then i think armor would only be valuable to low level characters, as their own skill would eventually supercede the armor. Or am I misunderstanding your intent?

Grim'N'Gritty had a system of improving AC with level, but they don't call it AC. It removes AC as a term altogether, and have a new term, Base Defense Bonus. It is completely analagous to an attack bonus, and every class has their own progression (independent of attack bonus). Things like dexterity add to defense bonus, but armor does not. Instead, armor works as damage reduction.


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Re: Is there some advantage attacking in your underwear?

Post by Rigon »

Fizz wrote:
Thu Oct 08, 2020 8:44 pm
Rigon wrote:
Thu Oct 08, 2020 1:40 pm
Here's an idea, what if there was an AC bonus that increased with level, but if a character wore armor it would suppliment that bonus. The bonus would range from +1 to +3 at first level and then increase by +1 every 2/3/4 levels 9depending on class). You could also allow classes that have more training with armor to add part of the bonus when wearing armor. I know there are games that do this (the Wheel of Time RPG had a system like this) and I've considered doing it for my games on occasion.

For ex: Rogues would get a +2 to AC at 1st level and it would increase by +1 every 3 levels. But if the rogue was wearing leather armor, their AC bonus would only be +1.

R-
So are you suggesting a rule where they get either a bonus from level or a bonus from armor, but not both? If so, then i think armor would only be valuable to low level characters, as their own skill would eventually supercede the armor. Or am I misunderstanding your intent?
Yes, but things like magical rings and spells add to it. I don't think that armor would be supplimented at higher levels, though. My thinking is along this line: The fighter would have the best Defense Bonus. They'd start at +3 and increase by +1 every 2 levels (3rd, 5th, 7th, etc.), so they would end up with a DB of +13 at 19th level. Now, depending on your style of play/campaign, a 19th level fighter would probably have +5 full plate (also a +13 to AC).
Grim'N'Gritty had a system of improving AC with level, but they don't call it AC. It removes AC as a term altogether, and have a new term, Base Defense Bonus. It is completely analagous to an attack bonus, and every class has their own progression (independent of attack bonus). Things like dexterity add to defense bonus, but armor does not. Instead, armor works as damage reduction.


-Fizz
If I ever did this, I wouldn't call it Armor Class, I'd use something like Defense Bonus. But it would be similar to that, just without the armor as DR.

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