Feedback Regarding Armor/Weapon Realism

[Antaeus]

An axe will literally inflict blunt damage in addition or even in absence of its cutting damage. You can have the edge taken off an axe entirely and it still remains a devastating weapon, and hitting heavy armour will be equivalent to a flanged mace or similar.

I should know -- for years I carried around a camp-axe with me while backpacking that was never sharpened and blunt as anything. It still chopped wood.

Anything heavy with enough force will kill.

Even a rock...



...I'll get my coat.

 

[Mad Vader]

Anything heavy with enough force will kill.

Even a rock...

True, for years I carried around a heavy rock when going out and no one dared to be mean to me. After five years together, I proposed and we are still together.

 

[WarandPeace]

There's a reason David killed Goliath with one stone...

 

[Seafoodking]

I responded to another post like this complaining about stones causing damage through armour.

We're not talking small stones, but if you look at the size of the projectile in hand, these are full on rocks. If you threw one of these at an unarmoured head, you could very well one-shot that person. Wearing plate armour, this projectile would likely trash your plate -- let alone only damaging you. Any bend in the plate could prevent the suit from moving properly, and a hit in the head would cause the helmet to bend in against your skull and on top of your concussion you would be dealing with a metal plate grinding against your head. If you're wearing mail, the impact of a blunt strike like this would be dampened somewhat, but it would still damage you. A chainmail head-covering of any sort would likely do little to prevent the resulting concussion.

So, in short, yes, you should take damage in certain situations, where appropriate. This is where maces and hammers have always shined, what they were generally used for in history.

I've studied history my whole life, as well, especially relating to weapons and armour. Definitely, blunt attacks have always been used against armour, and also piercing attacks were used with skill to hit vulnerable points. The latter isn't included in the game, and I'd hate to see the realistic play of blunt impacts on armour missing as well.

I highly doubt the roaming looters possess such strength to throw a rock of that size and hit you from 30-40 meters. Their throwing range should be 8-10m max with the size of the rocks.

 

[Berzerker Jay]

I highly doubt the roaming looters possess such strength to throw a rock of that size and hit you from 30-40 meters. Their throwing range should be 8-10m max with the size of the rocks.

Why, though? I don't even train at throwing rocks, but I could likely throw a rock about as well. In classical Rome, soldiers actually did train every day at rock-throwing by hand. This was part of becoming a legionary, and actually the legionary's apparently used it as a defensive tactic in battle.

To compare to that level of training, I think we at least have to consider it equivalent to an amateur-league baseball pitcher, if not major league. The training is about the same. And if you were a looter roaming around with nothing to keep you alive but your rags, a scythe, and a handful of rocks, you'd probably practice at it, too.

 

[Philozoraptor]

In vanilla there are 3 types of damage. Cut, Pierce and blunt. All weappons taht deal Cut deal same percentage of blunt damage (I think its 30%), all pierce damage deal 50 % blunt I think. Blunt damage deals 100% blunt damage. Not sure how it works ATM, but when we started to mess with the damage calculation many patches ago it was working like this in vanilla; initial damage is first multiplicatively reduced = 100 / 100 + armor value, so 40 armor = 71% of damage instead of 100%. Now the blunt party of damage is subject only to this multiplicative reduction. Non blunt portion of damage is further subtracted by armor value * armor threshold (pierce and cut damage have different thresholds). Lets say you hit with a sword for 100 damage agains 40 armor, lets assume thet blunt factor is 0.3 and armor threshold factor is 1.0, this would mean that initial damage will be reduced to 71, 30 % of 71 (21.3 damage) is guaranteed since that part is blunt, remaining 49.7 damage have 40 subtracted from it (because armor is 40 and threshold is 100%, so 40*1.0) which means you will end up with 21.3+9.7 = 31 damage. This is how it used to work few patches ago in vanilla, no idea whether they tweaked it or not in a mean time.

In RBM we completelly reworked it to this: Damage that penetrates armor = damage caused by the weapon - (armor of body part * ExtraArmorThresholdFactor); Blunt trauma = 100 / 100 + damage absorbed by armor (based on above calculation) * ExtraBluntFactor * ArmorMultiplier
So the blunt trauma comes from the damage that actually gets "absorbed" by armor instead of punching through it. Obviously we gave each weapon type unique armor threshold factor and bluntness that should roughly fit with the experimental data avialable (admittedly this data is really good only for arrows, for other weapons its more of induction and deduction from few scientific papers and youtube videos).

 

[Philozoraptor]

Why, though? I don't even train at throwing rocks, but I could likely throw a rock about as well. In classical Rome, soldiers actually did train every day at rock-throwing by hand. This was part of becoming a legionary, and actually the legionary's apparently used it as a defensive tactic in battle.

To compare to that level of training, I think we at least have to consider it equivalent to an amateur-league baseball pitcher, if not major league. The training is about the same. And if you were a looter roaming around with nothing to keep you alive but your rags, a scythe, and a handful of rocks, you'd probably practice at it, too.

I am pretty sure Romans used slings which significantly increasy power / speed of throw - I heard its up to 4 times the speed of hand throw which means 16 times the kinetic energy (obviously for relativelly small rocks and lead projectiles but still).

 

[Philozoraptor]

Mostly true, but it's nothing to do with "blunt" and all to do with "pendulum-based", with all the mass put on the end of a stick to maximize momentum at the point of impact due to centrifugal force. An axe works exactly on this principle and is not a blunt weapon at all.

But arent military axes generally light in comparison to maces (not saying maces are super heavy but they are probably few hundred grams heavier near center of mass than military axes), so axe is esentially somewhere between sword and mace in terms of anti armor capabilities, obviously historical warhammer concentrates the impact into small area but the blunt side of polearm is rather big (so more in style of typical idea of blunt weapon with larger impact area), no?.

 

[Berzerker Jay]

I am pretty sure Romans used slings which significantly increasy power / speed of throw - I heard its up to 4 times the speed of hand throw which means 16 times the kinetic energy (obviously for relativelly small rocks and lead projectiles but still).

De Re Militari explains how they drill with both, as well as making a case for equipping all troops with slings. From my understanding the hand thrown rocks were especially a thing prior to the sling being more widely adopted, but even then they continued to drill with both methods.

 

[geala]

Stones thrown by hand were surely often used in combat, however more as an improvised weapon or weapon of the poorest. There are several ancient depictions showing it's use (like a hoplite with a stone in hand throwing at people in a sieged city, or a psiloi with stones), as well as short notices in ancient texts. That are usually stones of the size of the fist or only slightly bigger, as big brick-like stones would be awkward to handle and throw (except throwing them down in sieges or town battles, as poor Pyrrhus had to suffer from).

The average player of the US top baseball league (so "average" means very well trained) allegedly throws the fast balls with about 40 m/sec which results in an energy of 116 Joules (taking an average ball weight of 145 g). That's about the energy level of a weaker .22 lr bullet. Of course the baseball (or an equally sized stone) cannot penetrate the human skin. One study of the US Army refers as follows to non-penetrating projectiles: 40 to 120 Joules can result in "dangerous" injuries, like concussions, broken rips, blindness, while with more than 120 Joules there are "severe damages" possible, like broken skulls, wounds from ripped skin, damage to organs near the body surface.

That's on the unprotected body however. Rigid armor with padding (like a metal helmet) can greatly reduce the energy transfered to the body. As someone who experienced some bigger blunt damage to the head while it was (luckily) helmeted, I can say that helmets do a wonderful job in mitigating such energy.

 

[Mad Vader]

The average player of the US top baseball league (so "average" means very well trained) allegedly throws the fast balls with about 40 m/sec which results in an energy of 116 Joules (taking an average ball weight of 145 g). That's about the energy level of a weaker .22 lr bullet. Of course the baseball (or an equally sized stone) cannot penetrate the human skin. One study of the US Army refers as follows to non-penetrating projectiles: 40 to 120 Joules can result in "dangerous" injuries, like concussions, broken rips, blindness, while with more than 120 Joules there are "severe damages" possible, like broken skulls, wounds from ripped skin, damage to organs near the body surface.

In Cooking Chicken By Slapping science, the slaps are calculated as delivering about 24 Joules. This is not very dangerous to humans, but it does mean that throwing rocks (or baseballs) at chickens is about five times more efficient for cooking a chicken, something to consider when there are rocks available and there's not enough time for the slapping method.
However, armored chicken will have most of the projectile energy dissipated by armor, so you will need to revert to slapping them at unprotected body parts like the cloaca.

 

[Berzerker Jay]

Stones thrown by hand were surely often used in combat, however more as an improvised weapon or weapon of the poorest. There are several ancient depictions showing it's use (like a hoplite with a stone in hand throwing at people in a sieged city, or a psiloi with stones), as well as short notices in ancient texts. That are usually stones of the size of the fist or only slightly bigger, as big brick-like stones would be awkward to handle and throw (except throwing them down in sieges or town battles, as poor Pyrrhus had to suffer from).

The average player of the US top baseball league (so "average" means very well trained) allegedly throws the fast balls with about 40 m/sec which results in an energy of 116 Joules (taking an average ball weight of 145 g). That's about the energy level of a weaker .22 lr bullet. Of course the baseball (or an equally sized stone) cannot penetrate the human skin. One study of the US Army refers as follows to non-penetrating projectiles: 40 to 120 Joules can result in "dangerous" injuries, like concussions, broken rips, blindness, while with more than 120 Joules there are "severe damages" possible, like broken skulls, wounds from ripped skin, damage to organs near the body surface.

That's on the unprotected body however. Rigid armor with padding (like a metal helmet) can greatly reduce the energy transfered to the body. As someone who experienced some bigger blunt damage to the head while it was (luckily) helmeted, I can say that helmets do a wonderful job in mitigating such energy.

I'd actually thought the same prior to reading De Re Militari more closely about it. It's less a matter of improvisation as opportunity. It was an advantage they were trained to seize, to allow them to hold positions on hilltops longer, et cetera.

Also, you are about right with the fist-sized rock. The stones they were trained to select were about one pound, so that's roughly the size. But in comparing the damage to the body and what damage would be done to and through armour, I think those measurements need to be adjusted away from a baseball and to a one pound stone which likely also had a sharp edge or two -- it would be significantly more devastating than a baseball, which to some degree is padded in comparison. I think the damage mentioned is right, but the more severe forms would occur more often, I think.

 

[Berzerker Jay]

In Cooking Chicken By Slapping science, the slaps are calculated as delivering about 24 Joules. This is not very dangerous to humans, but it does mean that throwing rocks (or baseballs) at chickens is about five times more efficient for cooking a chicken, something to consider when there are rocks available and there's not enough time for the slapping method.
However, armored chicken will have most of the projectile energy dissipated by armor, so you will need to revert to slapping them at unprotected body parts like the cloaca.

A human can throw a punch of up to 400 joules, however, so I would assume this rock can be given even more force than that. From my reading, the force mentioned for throwing there is the minimum required to reach 90 mph.

 

[Akka]

But arent military axes generally light in comparison to maces (not saying maces are super heavy but they are probably few hundred grams heavier near center of mass than military axes), so axe is esentially somewhere between sword and mace in terms of anti armor capabilities

That's just what I said : what made weapons "anti-armor" was not that they were blunt (in fact, for the most part they simply weren't), but that they were designed to deliver a lot of kinetic energy through centrifugal energy. Blunt in itself does nothing against armor, momentum does.

obviously historical warhammer concentrates the impact into small area but the blunt side of polearm is rather big (so more in style of typical idea of blunt weapon with larger impact area), no?.

What blunt side are you speaking of ? Polearms nearly always are made of spikes and blades.

 

[Berzerker Jay]

That's just what I said : what made weapons "anti-armor" was not that they were blunt (in fact, for the most part they simply weren't), but that they were designed to deliver a lot of kinetic energy through centrifugal energy. Blunt in itself does nothing against armor, momentum does.

So...what you are saying...is that the blunt object has to have kinetic energy applied to it...or in other words that simply presenting a blunt weapon to an armoured foe and just holding it there in front of him alone is not enough to damage him?

I think the distinction you're trying to draw is something the rest of us just thought was safe to presume. Of course the blunt weapon must make an impact in order to factor in against armour.

 

[Nystagmus]

The reason you may want a blunt part (poleaxes come to mind) is because it has one big advantage - it doesn't care about edge/point alignment. Especially considering armor which is designed to deflect incoming blows.

 

[Berzerker Jay]

The reason you may want a blunt part (poleaxes come to mind) is because it has one big advantage - it doesn't care about edge/point alignment. Especially considering armor which is designed to deflect incoming blows.

There is that, to a degree -- some blunt weapons do in fact have edge alignment to take into consideration, such as a hammer or even a flanged mace. Most of what makes a blunt weapon has to do with balance, mass, and leverage, though. A hammer and a sword of the same weight and length will perform differently because of the differences in balance, mass, and leverage, even if they require the exact same edge-alignment to use effectively.

 

[DooomRider]

I love that throughout this entire argument one massive factor has been barely mentioned, armour is designed to divert energy either through dissipation such as we see in lamellar, padding, scale and mail or through deflection which is more common in "plated" armours. Now I'm sure that you've all seen the curved nature of the helms and shoulder armours in game this is in effect to prevent a direct energy transference if an axe, mace or sword strikes the armour it is incredibly hard for the attacker to hit at an angle that transfers energy directly to the target which would produce heavy concussive effects, "blunt" weapons usually have flanges or points to help reduce the impact area this is to one increase force and two to reduce the chance of slippage occurring which would make the strike ineffective. Against a well designed helm a thrown rock is quite likely to be deflected off of the target especially from the front as the target need only lean left or right to avoid the shot (impossible in game) meaning a lot of the calculated impact would be lost.

Realism can't be argued in a game sadly as simple tricks that someone trained in armour can use to reduce the impact of an attack or completely negate it can't be adequately introduced, simply put heavily armoured troops would be highly resistant to many forms of attack due to their armour and skill in use of said armour this can be represented by significant damage reduction especially against low danger attacks such as thrown rocks from looters. Throwing weapons are effective however launched weapons are more so, throwing rocks as armour got better became more of a siege defence tactic as the angle of attack is a lot more effective plus gravity is damn scary when dropping weight on people.

Also blunt weapons should have a chance of being lethal, a mace to an unprotected head will make a mess not knock someone out

Final note: I'm not saying immunity to thrown rocks but realistically rocks hitting an armoured individual trained to use their armour is so low in danger that we should be taking at max about 7-8 damage and that's if it strikes well at speed and the target isn't aware. Dropped rocks however should do stupid damage.

 

[Nalgasucia507]

Jesus Christ people, where do y'all get so much time to shoot the sh*t with a no brainer thing. Amor needs a buff, period. Once you are in the game 99.99999% will get pissed by the amount of damage you get from small arms. This is about gameplay, that's it.

If y'all got some extra time on your hand, ill buy some.

 

[vonbalt]

Love the rabbit hole this thread has became and all but going back on tracks, i'm not advocating for complete realism because i know it's a game and it needs to have a compromise between realism and gameplay (or be built from the ground up in one style)

I just wish medium-high tier armors would protect you a bit better in general (because right now they are too weak and not worth the investment) and blunt wouldn't be so broken, by TW own formula blunt just simply ignores 100% of your armor, being hit by a blunt weapon is like as if you are naked and this is just bad gameplay design, i would be fine if blunt ignored maybe half or even 2/3 or armor but 100%?