TA: Wizards and Armor

[Bismark]

Re: TA: Wizards and Armor

 

All the spellcasters in my campaign wear armour, and they all have an absolute minimum of 13 STR as well (the most recent spellcasters in the latest 'round' of my campaign - which are all 200pt characters - all have 20 STR ).

 

The STR thing is just an idiosyncrasy of mine - I stat up all the characters for the players - and the players have grown to appreciate the extra STUN the STR provides, plus, as mages they lack the combat skill levels and Martial Arts that my fighters have [owing to a finite number of points to buy everything with], so when things go wrong and they end up in melee,every blow has to count and they have to be able to absorb punishment. The high STR also makes wearing serious armour a real 'goer' as it were.

 

I use DCV (and DEX roll penalties where applicable) penalties for armour (typically -1 to -3 depending on the type), but allow a Manoeuvre in Armour skill (basically Penalty Skill Levels to offset the penalty), but with a limit on the number of those levels that can be bought (heavy armour like 'Plate + Chain' and reinforced mail will always have a minimum of -1 penalty to DCV, for example).

 

The Long Term END rules are also used to prevent people wearing heavy armour all the time.

 

The cost of spells and spell skills also prevents the mages from sparing points to buy down the END cost of their STR like ALL the serious fighters in my party do .

 

Of course, when dealing with 'real armour', you can dial the 'realism' level to include such things as the construction of the armour (for example, it is much easier to do cartwheels in full plate than reinforced mail - the rigidity of the armour plates is actually an advantage in this case as it will not 'flop' everywhere). [Good] Plate is also severely underrated by giving it a straight 8 DEF - it is massively superior defensively even to reinforced mail [7 DEF in the rules as written].

 

As for stacking armour and force fields - that depends on the limits the GM puts on; for example, I made the force field Wizardry spell an 'advanced' one (meaning that you need to buy a certain number of points in Wizardry spells before you can access it). Given the fact that most of the party are not primarily Wizards, the extra point investment required (on top of the required Wizardry skill) is usually a disincentive.

 

Necromancers have the easiest time as they can use Osseous Armour without having to go outside their chosen speciality (but that is OK as the only Necro in the party is a player who does not abuse the rules, and it makes the 'bad guy' Necros so much more scary).

 

Despite some of the statements above, my 200pt characters are not totally OTT with fighting or magic as they usually have stacks of non-combat skills (I am always looking at published characters and go - 'why does he/she not have THAT skill when the concept means that he/she should really have it') and points disappear pretty quicky once you start stacking up the AK, CuK and other assorted Knowledge skills. Try doing a Steppe Nomad warrior sometime and count the skills that are required - scary.

 

If players want to start off with magical armour to get around all the 'real armour' disadvantages, charge them points for it as if they were superheroes - that should make them think twice .

 

Just a few ideas to mull over...

[Markdoc]

Re: TA: Wizards and Armor

 

This becomes an arm's race fairly easily. "Well' date=' if he can have a 6/6 Force Field and wear plate mail, my character with Plate Mail wants to buy a Magic Force Field Amulet. I'll pay the points, and I get the same defenses he's got, so whats the problem?"[/quote']

 

And THAT is why I emphasise that you need to design your games with this kind of problem in mind (unless you want a very high magic/high DEF sort of game, of course).

 

One of the things that some GMs complain about is that combat in fantasy hero often ends with lots of unconscious foes, rather than dead and dying ones. My reaction is always "that's because you are a poor GM: you gave your players and their foes access to lots of armour and now are complaining that they have lots of armour. What did you expect?"

 

(I occasionally have the opposite problem of keeping rash players alive, but I guess that falls under "natural selection" )

 

I get around this problem with the following rules.

 

1. I make magic dificult to do in combat, with required limitations like concentration, skill roll, enforcing encumbrance penalties, etc. I have many, many different schools of magic, but this applies to *all* of them. That means mages can wear armour to their heart's content, but in the front line, because they spent magic on spells and skills, they will never match up to a dedicated fighter type. That makes heavy armour slightly less important, simply because HTH combat is regarded as a possibility for that character, not the main point. This also applies to other skills such as stealth and concealment, for example.

 

2. Powers and free equipment do not stack. The mage does not get to buy a 10 PD forcefield and add it to 8 DEF plate. That also makes heavier armour less attractive or flat-out redundant (of course it may mean the mage skips buying FF, but there are times when armour is not available, so then it's nice to have). Either way, the mage gets no combat advantage. Of course this applies evenly to all characters, so the light fighter gets combat luck *or* armour, but not both and the fighter does not get to buy Deadly Blow and add it to a freebie sword, but that's a useful impediment to the arms race anyway.

 

3. I enforce social and "realistic" rules for armour. It's hot, it's heavy, it chafes and no, you can't wear it when you are walking around town, without getting into trouble. That also diminishes the problem and encourages mages to be less concerned about armour.

 

In other words, I never tell anyone "You can't have armor". I just make the game so that they can choose to rely on it or not and each approach has its own advantages and disadvantages. What's nice is that this approach leads the players to naturally behave rationally. When they are expecting a big fight, warriors pile on the heaviest armour they can get. If they are raiding the thieves' guild at night, they tend to ditch heavy armour in favour of stealth and speed - *without* me saying anything.

 

cheers, Mark

[Rapier]

Re: TA: Wizards and Armor

 

One of the things that some GMs complain about is that combat in fantasy hero often ends with lots of unconscious foes, rather than dead and dying ones. My reaction is always "that's because you are a poor GM: you gave your players and their foes access to lots of armour and now are complaining that they have lots of armour. What did you expect?"

 

(I occasionally have the opposite problem of keeping rash players alive, but I guess that falls under "natural selection" )

 

That was the problem I kept running into. What? ANOTHER Deader?