AR Hacks

[Library Ogre]

So, a couple people mentioned they don't use AR as written. What are your personal hacks for AR?

Mine has two forms... simple and complex. The complex version uses Weapons, Armor & Castles RF numbers, taking into account different attack types and using the RF as a damage resistance number. The simpler version takes the AR of the armor and reduces it by 4, and makes that the damage reduction against all weapon attacks.

In either case, the SDC of the armor is reduced by however much damage it blocked, and armor can be completely bypassed on a critical by reducing your damage multiplier by one (so if you normally do triple on a critical, you can choose to do triple OR double plus ignore armor).

[kiralon]

I use a roll to strike with all bonuses
then a roll to penetrate armour with only Armour Penetration bonuses which is your WP + to strike, plus perks, and some weapon bonuses (dwarfs can add the same amount to penetrate armour as to strike and for the same costs for example) and some magic bonuses. Now even at high level your chance of penetrating armour is a lot lower (not doubled by fleet feet for example).
Also a nat 20 on the armour pen roll means the armour takes the damage too.
and with rigid armours (mostly full plate) if you get hit by a crit you can use an action and roll to get the armour to absorb the extra half of the doubled damage instead of it passing straight through.

[drewkitty ~..~]

Unless a player describes their attack (role-playing) be the attack type that is used to penetrate a certain type of armor just use the AR rules almost as normal. Being AR number +4 to bypass the armor.

If a player says their char is going to thrust a dirk or other pointy blade into chainmail I would give them a bonus to bypass the chainmail.

Otherwise, if the player is just roll-playing ....the weapons are just bashing the armor.

There are some rules about armor and weapons in the ancient weapons compendiums.

[Lord Malachdrim]

Natural roll is compared to AR. Rolled equal or better you bypass the Armor (or in natural AR you bypass the SDC).

[Glistam]

I used to use the A.R. rules as written for Natural/Robotic AR. Since Palladium body armor covers the main body at least and all regular shots strike the main body, I ruled that body armor always took the damage first. I treated body armor A.R. as a "called shot" number to bypass the armor and damage the person's main S.D.C..

More recently we've been using Kiralon's rule he listed above instead of what I used to do, and I thought it worked pretty well.

[eliakon]

I use something similar to Kiralon.
The roll to strike is calculated as normal, and is used to determine hits, dodges, parries, etc.
But the natural roll combined with your bonus from W.P. is the only number that is counted to penetrate AR. With certain case by case exceptions for things I feel should (or should not) get a bonus or penalty.
This allows armor to still be of some use in the game even in the face of the ability to routinely get "automatic bypass" levels of bonus (by which I mean previously I had a problem where peoples rolls were so high that on a 2+ they would automatically beat AR... making the armor pointless to be there in the first place)
I am still working on getting it 'just right' but its worked for me so far. (Previously I just used the natural roll to compare to the AR. But I decided that was unfair to people who actually trained in weapons instead of relying on 'luck' or 'raw ability' or what ever. Thus I added W.P. back in so that training (and only training) could bypass armor, everything else just help you hit the target itself)

[Hotrod]

I've seen it done many ways. Perhaps my favorite way was also the most simple:

We subtracted the recipient's AR from all damage rolls. Thus, if you hit an enemy in plate armor (AR=17) and did 24 points of damage, that enemy would take 24-17 = 7 points of damage.

To offset this and keep the game moving, most damage taken went straight to hit points. Thus, the aforementioned enemy would lose 7 hit points, not SDC. Person-SDC was used only for bare-handed fighting and for weapons that don't tend to cause deep or penetrating trauma (whips, darts, caltrops, that sort of thing).

A heavily armored opponent could be injured in one of three ways:
1. Powerful attacks could simply try to smash through the armor, like in the example I used above. Players that sought to power through an opponent's armor would beef up their strength stat and often used 2-handed weapons, charge attacks on horseback, and special OCC-specific attacks.
2. A called shot could bypass the armor if the total roll to strike exceeded the AR. This was more like the rules as written, except that such attacks cost two attacks and were at -3 to strike. Players that tried for this approach would need a character with a high P.P. and a lot of attacks.
3. If the opponent was unconscious or incapacitated (tangled up in a net, paralyzed, etc), then all attacks automatically bypassed armor. This was often the most interesting way for players to take; it often involved quite a bit of creativity.

We ignored all armor S.D.C. Armor wear and tear was handled much like shield wear and tear; it would need some repair/replacement after extended heavy use, but it wasn't closely tracked.

This approach had several advantages. Armored warriors became much more formidable in combat, while hand-to-hand became much more dangerous for unarmored people. It also reduced much of the attrition-related book-keeping (armor SDC, personal SDC, hit points). When the party came across an armored opponent in full plate, it was a big deal, and even light armor could affect the party's tactics somewhat.

This approach had one major drawback: AR's weren't designed for this purpose. A quick rule of thumb we devised was to simply subtract five points from all armor AR, but ultimately, the GM house ruled new armor values for all armor types. Light armor provided a mild benefit, while moving to heavy armor made a big difference in protection. The new AR values went something like this:

Cloth: 0
Padded/Quilt: 2
Soft Leather: 4
Hard Leather: 6
Studded Leather: 7
Chain Mail: 12
Double Chain: 13
Scale: 14
Plate and Chain: 15
Splint: 16
Plate: 17

Half suits had the same AR as full suits, but called shots to bypass the armor became much easier (just one attack).