What fantasy role-playing games get WRONG about medieval armor

A detailed look at how armor is depicted and implemented in medieval fantasy role-playing games.
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[@wanderingshade8383]

Wait. I know a roleplaying system that does armor exactly like this!! COGENT. THE ONE SHAD MADE.

[@shadiversity]

cogentroleplay.com/ ^_^

[@moisedieucaryoteescholecte8439]

also Fantasy Craft, an ofshoot of dnd

[@wanderingshade8383]

@@moisedieucaryoteescholecte8439 , Also Mount and Blade.

[@flatfingertuning727]

Does it take into account the fact that real armor has at least six independent aspects of quality: 1. How much it protects from blows which hit armor; 2. How hard it is to bypass; 3. How much does it encumber; .4-6.How prone is it to damage, how are its attributes affected by such damage, and how repairable is it? It may not be possible for a single slashing attack to make it through all the layers of a gamberson, but repeated slashing attacks could eventually slice it to ribbons. A single stabbing attack might not be likely to penetrate very far through mail, but repeated stabbing attacks in the same place might be able to progressively weaken it.

[@wanderingshade8383]

It's got 1-3. The rest is very nit-picky about armor. Hell yeah, it'd be very important IRL, but I think that if any system took that into account it would only bog down gameplay. "The bandit attacks your left shoulder, does a 17 pass through the DR?" "Nah, my gambeson is too thick." "But, you havent repaired it from the last encounter, where I purposefully kept attacking your left shoulder, so now there is no armor there. You take 46 damage." "But not all the attacks went through..." And so on and so forth. If any system you know of uses that, let me know.

[@ratman505]

But leather armor is so great for sneaking. I mean, bloody hell, it's literally made from hide

[@zaidhernandez4601]

Now THAT'S a pun...😁✌️🙏

[@charmedrools1]

get out

[@mr.bubbles5829]

Shut up and take my upvote

[@theluckycan5764]

LMFAO LOL AHHAHHAHAHHAHAHA

[@jacxanimation2014]

Sorry Man but There is a hide armor in 5e

[@AbelDuviant]

Everyone knows a fast midget in studded leather armor is completely invincible in battle

[@bloody4558]

Nope, that's actually a naked halfling monk, no one can beat their defense. Full Plate Mails are nothing compared to that.

[@AbelDuviant]

@@bloody4558 A naked half orc barbarian, making blades glance off his muscles using pure rage

[@cyrilgigee4630]

What the heck I started DnD for the first time a few days ago and that's literally my character. ...and I've only taken 1 hit so far, which was from boiling water I was put into while I was AFK...

[@fsmoura]

Half-orc half-elf half-midget fighter/mage. First you load him _shurikens_ and then you toss! Victory guaranteed.

[@SurmaSampo]

RIP Dio

[@johannfowl8653]

Studs are actually to be used against intelligent enemies: they see it and laugh, giving you an opportunity move.

[@theMosen]

Intelligent enemies would assume it's a brigandine, which in RPG settings it probably is considering the stats.

[@mattlewandowski73]

I thought that was how bikini mail worked :)

[@businessproyects2615]

'Studs!...must be an idiot' -'I was the distraction'

[@arthurtwa]

-I am a paladin with a Full Plate with +30 of Armor value. -The dragon uses his fire breath attack.

[@lt.branwulfram4794]

Arthur Rogue/Monk multiclass with Evasion and a +10 to both Dex and Wis, factoring in an Unarmoured Defence of AC - 30? Dragon breath is no problem. No need to tank it.

[@lt.branwulfram4794]

@@gamecavalier3230 I'm saying even without a high AC, it's no hassle for a Rogue/Monk with Evasion (no damage on successful Dex save and 1/2 damage on failure)

[@lt.branwulfram4794]

@GameNinjaD Any attack with a monk weapon or unarmed strike deals magical damage after 6th lvl. What good is my Sneak Attack if it's resisted by high CR monsters? With Kensei, that rapier can deal magical piercing. Edit: With 1 more attack, I get damage insurance since Sneak Attack is dependent on so many variables, therefore a tad unreliable if I chalk it up to just 1 attack to deal my damage & fail. Deft Strike can make up for some of the Sneak Attack damage I didn’t get on my 1st attack had I stayed with just Rogue, since their features are a bit naff after 11th lvl. 7th lvl Monk isn’t totally bupkis if I had gotten past Rogue 7th lvl for Evasion because I still get a feature to get rid of a charmed or frightened condition with my action & it’s even better with Wood Elf, since I’m getting advantage on those saves to avoid getting charmed.

[@lt.branwulfram4794]

@GameNinjaD DM can be stingy about magic weapons, so I had to think of something. Edit: Worldly possesions are easy to lose, ask ANYONE who ever lived ever. If I ever lost that +3 rapier, it’s still assuring that I can still deal magic damage with a dinky little dagger without magical properties because Ki-Empowered Strikes is something that stays with me. I always have rules when making characters, one of them is, “If the damage ain’t magic, the resistance is tragic.” Edit #2: I can’t speak for every D&D player/DM on the topic of losing items, but this is a VERY frequent occurrence in my games, so much so that if it doesn’t happen at least 4 times per session, we’d think something is wrong. It’s just how we do things. To give more context, it’s a grim dark game.

[@chalcedonycoral1943]

Flight Of Dragons intensifies. (Fligh Of Dragons is an old charming animated film - JP animation, US voicing. It has this very scene. Knight died, cooked in his own armor.)

[@rebbyra]

I think there would be an abundance of leather and hide in a fantasy world, Because: What's the first quest every adventurer needs to do in a fantasy world? -Killing rats, boars and other pests that's annoying the citizens of that current city/town/village

[@aysseralwan]

That was my thought too 😂

[@kenansabic2901]

I think they make their hide armors very thick. Something not unlike gambeson.

[@noukan42]

Imo it's because there are all kind of magical beasts. A cow leather armor is usually worse than a gambeson, but in a d&d setting they would use,for example, dire boar leather or stuff like that, wich is far better(there are magical beasts whose hide is thicker than full plate, based on the natural ac bonus.)

[@liamwalton4183]

Obviously you havent been downloading from Loverlab... My first quest in Skyrim was quite different ;)

[@DeathMetalSon]

​@@noukan42 Or dire wolf. You know what dire wolf is, right? It's like a wolf, bu it's dire

[@PhilBagels]

"Studded leather" is not armor, it's a BDSM outfit.

[@logansorenssen]

Yep. Or else it's a misinterpretation of brigandine, and that should be medium or heavy armor.

[@hawkticus_history_corner]

@@logansorenssenI'm fairly certain its them misunderstanding Brigandine or a Coat of Plate

[@dylanperkins7939]

I always thought of it as like, leather armor with metal bits. Like, steel pauldrons or something, or bits of mail included in the armor somewhere.

[@edwinsuijkerbuijk5106]

@@logansorenssen yes seems somebody looked at brigandine from the outside, and did not realize those studs are actually rivets keeping the plates inside in place.

[@samuelraymond5852]

When I first saw it in a movie I was like how is that supposed to protect you? then I found out there was a coat of plates under all along, then I found out that people actually thought the studs protected you.

[@patrician1082]

Shad: D&D armour works like it's only covering a small percentage of the body. Me: so like most fantasy armour then.

[@dougthedonkey1805]

*female fantasy armor

[@tompatterson1548]

Yep.

[@tompatterson1548]

DougtheDonkeyTV exactly! Who knew chainmail bikinis were the most accurate depiction!

[@DeHerg]

@@dougthedonkey1805 or Anime fantasy armor where it only covers the upper ribcage and sometimes shoulders but nothing more (sometimes even looks like a tiny heater shield strapped to one side of the chest). The rest is just cloth.

[@charlottewalnut3118]

@@DeHerg berserk armor covers everything

[@nuclearpopsiclestand9245]

I always thought that "studded leather" armor was brigandine armor. Why else would you need all those studs if they aren't holding plates in place? On another note, I like the idea of armor functioning as damage reduction rather than chance to hit.

[@monke6774]

I think originally it was suppose to be brigandine but then bad filmmakers saw it and were like "Well it looks leather with nails in it, so that's what its going to be in the movie."

[@babycherie5874]

Runequest... reducing damage by armour type, since 1978.

[@soulofresolve9514]

I think games like dnd do armor as chance to hit because calculating damage reduction is more effort.

[@babycherie5874]

@@soulofresolve9514 I don't think that's the reason, I think the ætiology is simply because Gygax was using miniature rules that have a chance to hit, and then a saving throw to avoid death (toughness in warhammer). Reducing damage is arguably less work: the person attacking doesn't need to know anything about the opponent, all they need to know is their own skill with a weapon. The person who is hit resolves hit points loss only subtracting armour from the damage. Neither party needs know properties of their opponent. It is less work. The attacker doesn't need to know the armour of the defender at any point. Damage reduction is done by the attacked. It is quicker from an armour point of view, although parrying slows down combat (Runequest / cthulhu / ringworld, etc).

[@JarieSuicune]

The complaint about Armor Class being a combination of the idea of Agility (ability to dodge an attack) plus Damage Resistance (more like Nullification, in this case as you typically have to meet or beat the AC to deal any damage) can be a fair one. One alternative would be to give all armors two stats, a +/- to Agility along with Damage Resistance. I would be ok with that in general, except that then you have to account for damage type resistances separately (ie: Plate Mail is overall much more resistant to Piercing Damage than Chain or Leather; Shad brings this up in his now-new video about War Scythes). Further, you could then include distinct weaknesses to said armors as well (like Metal being explicitly more vulnerable to heat than Leather). That said, it would make the game more complicated, which I think is the opposite of what Wizards is trying to do; by simplifying things, they make it more accessible to more players. You can always homebrew in more complexity (that's where Pathfinder came from, it was basically a 3.5 homebrew that became its own thing, as I understand it), but that doesn't mean it necessarily should become part of the official material. Another difficulty, however, is the difference between merely "hitting" an opponent and actually dealing damage. As it is, AC is basically just saying "This is how hard it is to do ANY damage, because I am so agile and/or well-protected". Further, we don't have targeted attacks in D&D. So how are you to say that just because, say, your plate mail should reduce all damage by 4 points, but what if it doesn't HIT that part? Are all your enemies just stupid Lv. 1 AI's and aim for chest blows? Or are they aiming for head-shots to actually kill you (using a weapon with a spike at that, Shad brings that up a few times in several videos)? Heck, if you read the descriptions of the different armors, they make it clear that they don't even always cover the same parts of the body as each other (in fact, only Full Plate Mail actually includes all the pieces: helmet, chestplate, leggings, boots, arm guards, gauntlets) which makes it rather awkward when you realize that someone with Full Plate mail has equipped magic boots and gauntlets, thus actually replacing part of that single unit of armor. To to mention identifying truthfully which armors have metal (check, one will likely surprise you, it IS vulnerable to Heat Metal!). Last note, is damage itself. Especially in 5th Edition, they basically flattened stats, to avoid the infinite growth of power that I guess was ridiculous in past editions? (I dunno, I started in 5E, that's what I've read). So damage and HP also got rather flattened. That's not bad or good, it's just a mechanic system for tracking how much "hurt" your character can take before they fall unconscious/dead. (Which, to everyone who wants D&D to be more "realistic"... HAVING TONS OF HP IS REALISTIC!? No, you get slashed by a dragon and take a wound... YOU ARE DEAD. Seriously, you want these games to be more realistic, remove the HP system altogether and implement wound levels! You can have like, 3 light wounds, 2 major, 1 severe, then dead. Or something, I dunno, I, for one, want to play as an epic hero, not a realistic dragon chewtoy.) In short, it's about simplicity and accessibility. Are there improvements to be had? Yep, just ask Shad! But it's not meant to be "the perfect system", it's one where it is meant to provide the structure for a fun time with your friends. (In fact, as much as I do enjoy the rules as they are, I'm going to see if I can find a good "realistic" armor system that I like. It would have to incorporate evasiveness, damage reduction, armor PARTS (ie: having only half-plate without arm guards would be blatantly less effective), have damage-type resistances/weaknesses (if any are applicable; Heat Metal comes to mind again... technically, cold probably shouldn't be a weakness, due to the protective under layers?), and such.)

[@dragonmaster613]

Don't tell him that 5e puts Gambeson(padded) at the same protection as Leather(11 + dex mod), but disadvantage on stealth.

[@SilvrSavior]

...push this up so that Shad goes full pommel on that info.

[@noukan42]

5 has fucking shields. Literally just shield, not even small and large shields, just one kind of shields for everything from buckler to pavise.

[@2MeterLP]

disadavantage on stealth. While you are effectively in a thick jacket. Yeah that makes no sense.

[@windhelmguard5295]

@@2MeterLP well gambeson does tend to make you look bigger and therefore easier to see.

[@dynamicworlds1]

@@windhelmguard5295 any leather thick enough to function as armor would too (and be harder to be silent in)

[@hasankazmiACCA]

Shad created himself using historically correct facts.

[@fsmoura]

historically correct facts best facts

[@khorps4756]

what happened to shad facts?

[@fsmoura]

_"what happened to shad facts?"_ *Dragons* came and took it away. We tried to defend against their attack, but our fortifications didn't have proper *machicolations* so we were toast. ( ; __ ; )

[@SilvrSavior]

@@fsmoura The king's men also came by and bought back all the pommels so they were left without their best weapon.

[@fsmoura]

@@SilvrSavior And to think that all the while we were building our castle we were smug and confident: _"This shall protect us from all possible sieges and attacks carried out Man."_ Though that peasant kept protesting: *_"But what about dragons?! But what about dragons!?"_* - Alas, we didn't heed his advice.

[@johnniewoodard648]

DM: "You see an armor shop....Umm...Shad make a saving throw." Shad: "I rolled a 7." Rest of the party: "Oh Crap, here we go!" Shad: "Leather Armor was....." Believe it or not, I would love to be in a D&D party with you. Would probably spend most of the game rolling on the floor laughing.

[@Aconspiracyofravens1]

Johnnie Woodard the 5th edition item description for chain ail is accurate (mentions the presence of a gamberson underneath and the fact that it counts as heavy)

[@urticantspoon9960]

Mattias Calvignac chainmails not heavy though, even with the gamberson

[@tompatterson1548]

@@urticantspoon9960 It matters in terms of if you add dex though.

[@ambustio9807]

@@urticantspoon9960 its not heavy but due to bad mass distribution it seem heavier than IT it really is

[@nowgoawayanddosomethinggoo8978]

Dragon: a powerful creature that can only be slain by the most powerful heroes working in perfect coordination Also Dragon: easily obtainable Dragon Leather for 10 gold pieces at Ye Olde Wallemart, like they're farmed commercially

[@eazy8579]

Ye Olde Wallemart. Fucking hell, that killed me

[@tompatterson1548]

Probably actually just made from a monitor lizard or something. Or maybe dragons shed their skins?

[@rikardosilva1754]

@@tompatterson1548 So, i'm pretty sure you're being scammed by those Ye Olde Wallemart merchants.

[@tompatterson1548]

@@rikardosilva1754 I think they shed their skins.

[@rhett5058]

But are they free range?

[@BTheHeretic]

I've always assumed studded leather just means thick leather plates riveted together. I never realized the studs are meant to be protective by themselves. I'm really surprised anyone would actually think that.

[@valentinmitterbauer4196]

I always thought "studded leather" (not native speaker) was just the english word for "leather cloth where metal plates are below so you can only see the studs".

[@kapitanbeuteltier5889]

@@valentinmitterbauer4196 isn't it exactly that? ^^'

[@Janshevik]

I didn't even know what studs are and why is called studded leather, I thought that is just more specially treated leather, so I even used on my druid, who generally don't wear leather armor

[@sleep3417]

I normally wear Stallioned leather. Studded leather is for normies.

[@MegaTenser]

@@valentinmitterbauer4196 Presumably that's what they were seeing in pictures when they put it in the game. But if they knew it was basically like a banded mail coat riveted under leather, they wouldn't have made it a light armor with barely more protection than leather.

[@AMoodyB3ar]

Oh dude, you want to hear something that will REALLY grind your gears? Pathfinder has padded armor and has separate clothing items called a gambeson and arming dublet. They provide NO armor.

[@shadiversity]

REEEEEEEE!

[@BelligerentKnight2481]

But what about dragons?

[@baddgerpaw]

When I saw that for my players I was like... Fuck that +3 Ap for each

[@duchessskye4072]

That sounds rathre accurate. Arming doublets weren't padded, and 'gambeson' in some historical sources refers to an underarmor garment which is implied is not padded either

[@Sorestlor]

We were talking about the uses of the winter jacket as a piece of Armour during our last 5e session.

[@MalonzeProductionsGaming]

BUT WHAT ABOUT DRAGONS?! They'll kill you no matter what armor you wear.

[@worthlessfajita8816]

I can imagine a knight been coked alive in their full plate armour Oh thats gruesome

[@ruthmeow4262]

Dragon POV: Crunchy on the outside chewy on the inside.

[@Kher4m]

@@ruthmeow4262 dont forget to scare them first and peel'em later.

[@june012006]

worthless fajita I was going to correct the word coked, but I suppose with the heat of dragon fire, and provided the fire burned the oxygen before it got to the victim, the dragon could coke a person in armor.

[@Kher4m]

@blackrave404 Burning oil, melted wax, boiling water was used by defenders of a castle, first to wayless than water. hell, they even used molten lead, if you take movies as a plausible source of information.

[@Guardsman08]

Just wanted to throw in a comment about the off the cuff comment on biker leather. A proper biker jacket is quite thick and study and actually quite good as basic armor. The thin stuff is basically cosplay level, same as fake mail.

[@zordran3843]

Proper biker leather was the first type of armor (+1) in d20 Modern.

[@JankyShack]

Biker leather literally is armor. lol

[@kyriss12]

Janky Shack Especially when you get into synthetic motocross gear. When ever I throw on my Kevlar weave jacket with carbon fiber impact plates I get the urge to run into the nearest bar and yell “which one of you pussies wants a go”

[@ArchmageIlmryn]

@@TomCruz54321 It won't offer meaningful protection, but it will offer more protection than a t-shirt. Much like the +1 AC (or DR 1 if using a DR system) from the most basic armor rarely is that meaningful, but still more than nothing.

[@ofironboundflame5117]

12:50 Armor was made to protect people. - Shadiversity, 2019

[@dragoneye6229]

Wrong. Armor was made so I could pretend to have a giant schlong. Just ask my old friend Henry.

[@cerocero2817]

The armor in the 3.5 manual is hideous even for fantasy standards

[@jacobnoelle8428]

How 5th armor?

[@phenjaws569]

@@jacobnoelle8428 they don't show what any of the 5e armor looks like besides plate (which looks like decent plate armor with a Corinthian helmet for some reason), although by it's description, you can come up with some mental images that don't all have to be the same like the description of half plate being applicable to Hoplite armor or Samurai armor

[@Thagomizer]

Brigandine is represented in 1st and 2nd edition D&D, by the way. It grants AC 6, which would be the equivalent of +4 in 3e.

[@pyrocent6469]

TL;DR: You can try to describe hits and misses not as hits/misses, but as blocks parries, scratches and wounds depending on the rolls. Whenever my players roll, I have them roll both a d-20 and their damage at the same time. Depending on where their roll lands in comparison to the armor class they're trying to beat and how much damage they deal, I will describe they're attack differently. For example, someone who rolled way below their opponent's armor class would miss completely, a roll that was close would be described as being blocked or parried at the last moment. On the other hand, I describe hits depending on the damage they deal. should they deal a lot of damage, then they swing true and the hit sinks deep within the beasts flesh, or if the damage dealt was low, then the enemy just manages to deflect the blade, wincing as it's sharp edge catches their shoulder. this even works for hitting armor, your gm could describe how you hit the enemy's shield with such force that it dents the steel, breaking their arm as they fall back in pain. I had the same problem as you when I played with a gm who described everything as hits or misses, and never understood why I was unable to parry the attacks. I find this way to be much more immersive for the players and adds both a cinematic and realistic element.

[@jameslesher940]

I agree. And how it's described would depend on how above or below the roll is compared to the armor class. It seems like a more enjoyable way to play. You actually know what happens.

[@LDSG_A_Team]

This is the right way to gm combat. Hands down.

[@LittleNemoGaming]

I do the same. When the characters / NPC's are at higher health I describe their "damage" as straining themselves dodging or parrying attacks... like they're winded or they pulled something. So when someone in plate gets damaged, they just used up some energy trying to not be pushed around or knocked down. When they actually get hurt, they've used up so much of their stamina (HP) that they are really easy to get really good strikes on when foes hit.

[@alistairmorley8464]

The old rolemaster system got this right by integrating to hit and damage to a single roll.

[@menarg1549]

i really like this, except the missing part, feel like a career adventurer would not be missing no matter what, would prefer parried/avoided

[@catfishcave379]

D&D 5e expansion pack: The Shad Rules of medieval reality; Volumes 1-24. (for a shortcut - watch all his videos)

[@kyokyoniizukyo7171]

Honestly, I would love if Shad made a roleplaying game based around IRL medieval world.

[@ambuknight1567]

As I read the Comment... I was hearing Blinkess form Trollhunter.. Dreamworks show on Netflix check it out cool armor hehe. In any case u may check that Volume set.

[@CJ_F0x]

Haha, I'm actually encouraging my players to watch Shad's videos. Especially the heavily armoured paladin

[@blablubb4553]

@@kyokyoniizukyo7171 Thing is... the rules would be unplayable.

[@lukzloty]

You forgot one word in the title: "Abridged"

[@didierpelupessy]

They don’t even have rules for the pommel. The most powerfull weapon in the world did not get rules...

[@damianmorningstar3150]

Pathfinder dose

[@matteoalberti2729]

Because pommels don't follow your rules, you follow theirs or you'll be ended rightly

[@Berserk_Knight]

Oh, they tried to add them in the rules. The rulebooks kept exploding spontaneously so they had to take it out.

[@didierpelupessy]

Berserk Knight explains a lot

[@RoninCatholic]

GURPS Martial Arts also has rules for the pommel.

[@consoya]

Wanting to narroow the gap on realism, I really encourage you to try RPG systems like "Warhammer Fantasy" or "Zweihander: Grim and Perilous". They have vast character depth, armour as damage reduction and a cool parry/dodge mechanic.

[@dax7574]

Oh yea I forgot the parry! Fuck that was so perfect, I miss it so much!

[@DZ-1987]

There's a game called Zweihänder. I'm getting that, i'm gonna play that until i become a master who's only equal is a dark souls speedrunner.

[@DZ-1987]

And that speedrunner only used his hands.

[@danforthlaertes]

"Robin Hood, prince of thieves - see the studs? Studs are everywhere!" That is what a lot of women watching the movie said, I am sure.

[@UnitRico]

I totally understand the desire to want to split armour into damage reduction and damage threshold values, and it's a system you see quite often in videogames, but I can see why it's an unwieldy system for tabletop RPG's. I've been reading through the pdf for the Fallout PnP RPG (which uses the exact same system of the original games, most of which is still in the newer ones) and while the combat looks a lot more realistic than, say DnD, it also seems like combat would take much, much longer because of how many different rolls, checks and calculations there are. Having said that, I've yet to actually try that system out so maybe once a group gets used to them combat goes by a lot smoother but the example combat excerpts are MUCH longer than the ones I've read in the DnD 5e rulebook.

[@Serahpin]

Armour adding DR instead of AC _is_ an optional rule you know.

[@noukan42]

Combat in D&D is very abstaract and a lot of stuff depend on how the DM describe the scene. Damage reduction is mostly used for creatures that cannot be harmed by normal mean(werewolves requiring silver weapons for example), rather than to describe the actual mitigation of damage. Armor class is used as the general defensive statistic, and is up to the DM thescribe a miss as "the fighter dodged", " the attack hit the armor but is blocked completely", "the ring of protection's forcefield deflected the club away from the fighter" and so on. D&D is a gameist system more than a simulationist, it's priority is to be fun as a game rather than create realistic rules.

[@jean-sebastienmatte2358]

I'm a GM of a fallout PnP game and yes, calculating damage becomes crunchy and time consuming. My solution is: I use Excel. I made an excel sheet that uses random generation for rolls, cells to input players and NPCs DR and DT. All I have to do is press F9 and BAM, damage calculated! This means I don't make a lot of dice rolls, which is less satisfiying but efficiency is there and the combats are more fluid. My players still roll their stuff, but I can use the excel sheet to input raw damage for quick calculation.

[@davidhansen951]

PnP? Are you talking about powers and perils?

[@RanninRavensight]

more granularity = more time. Combat may become tiresome unless you're whole group is in *love* with this idea.

[@oliviabean8264]

They fixed cloth armour in 5E, now it's basically just the equivalent of leather armor with an encumbrance penalty... really? I mean REALLY? ... ok, better stop before I'm reenacting a SNL skit.

[@Verbose_Mode]

I redid the light armors in my game: "Improvised" (a heavy coat and some rope wrappings) is +1, Leather Plate / Gambesons are +2, and Light Brigantine (basically a vest without the arms and legs) is +3 and not stealthy.

[@oliviabean8264]

Sounds like a decent system, they really do underplay how protective even just a couple layers of clothing is.

[@pentadeuce1086]

Sounds like AD&D II where Padded is functionally identical to Leather armor.

[@sexualharassmentpanda7273]

It gives disadvantage on stealth checks why?

[@Xeonort]

Because, in D&D 5E, padded armor is actually just big puffy fubu jacket that rustles when you breathe too much...it just so happens that breathing normally is too much.

[@takingbacktoxic7898]

As someone that has played D&D from nearly the beginning, there are some assumptions from the original game from the 70s to mid 80s that have been lost in the later iterations/editions of the game. 1. Each attack represented a full minute of a character attacking another. It was not an individual swing. 2. Hit points were an abstraction and actually represented a character's ability to parry/duck/avoid a full minute of attacks that would have killed a normal human being. The reason there was not a damage reduction originally in the game is there was an assumption that if you are stabbed by any weapon in an undefended manner, your character died (which is actually a rule for magical held or sleeping characters in the original ruleset from the 70s/mid 80s) 3. Originally the rules did had specific weapon vs armor type, for example a dagger would have a +3 to hit an unarmored person, but a -4 to hit modifier (in addition to the armor class) to hit someone in plate armor. 4. While in current versions of the game the armor classes go from 10 on up to represent how difficult the roll is required to hit, this is not the original envisioning of what armor class represented. Armor class was a representation of the percentage your character was exposed. The reason the worst armor class was 10 (originally 9, but that's another long story) is it meant that your character was considered 100% exposed. If you wore plate mail and used a shield, your armor class was "2" which meant that only 20% of your body was vulnerable to any form of attack. Higher level characters possessing more skill had higher chances of scoring hits just as it does from the year 1999 and beyond when AC became ascending values instead of descending ones. In later editions of the game, many of these rules and concepts were set aside for ease of play and the historic reason "why things are now how they are" (i. e. the rules jargon) is not due to any form of realism, but rather the assumption that any normal human stabbed with a sword dies in one hit, and heros can duck, parry and sidestep them. Armor just lets you fudge the margin of error more.

[@giorgitsiklauri1283]

Excuse me those studs reflect the light blinding enemies and decreasing their accuracy.

[@ignignxkt]

Compared to....the enemy in full body metal armor that reflects the sun like a laser? Lol

[@BluecopetitaTL]

@@ignignxkt The sun is a deadly laser.

[@gerrardhart6040]

@@BluecopetitaTL not anymore there's a blanket

[@amirking5452]

@@gerrardhart6040 is it made of leather?

[@kylelundgren5133]

I thought studded letter was apart of a fetish cult.

[@Verbose_Mode]

DM here, and one who likes realism! ... although not at the cost of fun, and bookkeeping and math are not fun for me. In my 5e game, I completely replaced the light armors with more sensical sets. Leather and padded (gambesons) are equal (+2), while studded leather is replaced by light brigantine (+3) and loses the standard light armor stealthyness. The lowest light armor is "improvised" (+1) for people that basically only have thick clothes and bits of rope not intended to be armor. The advantage to Light Armor is you can add your full Dexterity: in other words, it will not tire you out or interfere as you dodge or parry the stuff that you could very safely ignore in heavier armors (commoner swinging a rake at you is barely a threat in Plate, but in a Gambeson you'll need to so _something_ to defend yourself). I keep the same mechanic, though, it's streamlined and thus playable. I "justify" it as it's _not just the armor preventing you from being hit,_ it's an assistance in sustaining you in a fight, same to Hit Points. A "hit" does not mean the weapon drew blood through the armor, it means the attacks are starting to wear the defender down, and things like Full Plate is better at stopping that. That high AC _is_ the damage resistance, the swings are physically connecting... they're just not doing _garbage_ to the defender. The only "hit" that _actually_ goes through the armor is the last one. The fact that a nimble rogue with an arming sword can consistently damage a knight in full plate isn't him getting that blade through every crevasse, it's him giving the man a runaround and tiring him until he makes a fatal mistake. When the knight hits 0 HP, that's because he's panting in his tin can, getting frustrated, he overcommits to a lunge and the rogue takes him to the ground and puts a dagger through his visor. When the rouge hits 0 HP, that's because he can only dance around this guy for so long before his luck and energy just run out and that sword finally connects, and that heavy leather vest that deflected so many scrapes and fumbles before just isn't going to stop a longsword. And, realistically, the trained knight is going to have a bigger pool of stamina and the training and ability to preserve it than some street thug.

[@duff325]

Great points, Verbose! I hope you don't mind me copying your light armor system. There are one more point to be made in regards to fighting in DnD. If your character has any attribute higher then 10 (which includes all players, basically) then they are above human standards. A rogue with 16 in dexterity is 6 point above the average Joe, so it would not be that weird for him to perform flamboyant dodges or parries.

[@dreadnoughtnecrosis5695]

My brother who GMs always explained to me that your HP is stamina. The example he used was. Getting hit and taking a lot of damage doesn't mean they injured you. It means you had to strain yourself to block, parry, or deflect the attack in a way that isnt efficient or as effective. Doing so caused you to expand lots of energy or caused cramps or soreness from absorbing the impact. You didn't get injured until you went below 0. So the negatives.

[@mauriceanderson5413]

For me as a DM HP is just a summary of the physical stamina and mental will to live. Ability scores are *potential* and not the actual physical features (thats why we can have normal sized elves that have a STR score of 20) We also have reduction to damage types depending on the material and type of armor. For example traditional plate removes 6cut/4thrust/3blunt damage, and weird fantasy Fluted armor (can rub the cheese on it) resists 5/6/2, and ultrathick cloth armor with some hard scales resists 3/4/7 while providing the same AC and going into class of heavy armors. Also a big system is coming up for melee and ranged weapons and shields. All weapons will have 3 passives, that are somewhat logical, and sometimes with a taste of fantasy. Like rapier letting you attack your attacker spending reaction and move back for few feet if enemy throws 1-3 against you (and it misses), if you want it. You get them only if you get proficient with them on levels 1, 5 and 10, when lvl10 one, the strongest one, means that you have mastered the weapon and cant master another unless you spend a lot of time in training with a new one.

[@ascovill]

I like the idea of HP as your resource for preventing a killing blow, one well placed stab or knock to the head should be able to KO a character. It's hard for me to not fall back into the paradigm of HP as cumulative wounds though. If HP is basically stamina though, d&d and most games I've played don't do a good job of making that feel consistent. You should be able to expend extra HP for attack bonuses or energy intensive actions and you should be able to rest on your turn to regain HP instead of relying on your cleric to heal you. Also for the sake of realism there should be some chance to one-shot someone who has a high HP.

[@lawaern3474]

It is pleasing to see a fellow DM who doesn't view any amount of HP lost as a real wound.

[@artix548]

Shad, you should write a D&D campaign with all of your Fantasy Re-Armed suggestions and real arms and armor.

[@NieroshaiTheSable]

Or at least a setting manual

[@eliparker4114]

There’s Cogent, which Shad and his brother put together a few years ago. It was abandoned in the play testing stage, but you can download the rule book for free: Cogentroleplay.com

[@commode7x]

I'd like to play as a fairy wielding a dirk

[@Hopeofmen]

@@NieroshaiTheSable That's probably better.

[@TheMrFrankov]

M8 he should play GURPS

[@SpecialAgentCake]

A lot of auxiliary rules you mentioned, especially those of situational armor class, are all included in the game Pathfinder. Here's the thing: 5e isn't meant to be realistic. Hells, it isn't meant to be *complicated.* The edition was made to draw in new people to an, at the time, ailing series. That's what it did. Layering in more and more rules--damage reduction, contextual AC, etc etc--would mire it down as its predecessors were and are, and further drive away newcomers as the learning curve would become too steep to manage. 5e will never be any of what you mentioned, because frankly that was never the goal of it. That's why Pathfinder, Warhammer, and the like all exist for us more dedicated and more willing to slog through extra learned rulings to enjoy a more ind epth and experienced campaign. Love your videos, keep 'em coming.

[@monteparnas]

First, he was talking about 3.5Ed, not 5th. Second, compared to 3.5 Pathfinder didn't worked out any of the problems he pointed. Unearthed Arcana did a better job and it still sucked. Third, both 3.5 and Pathfinder are certainly more complex, and I personally like 3.5, but to say they "offer more in-depth and experienced campaign for more dedicated players" isn't just prejudice, it is outright laughable. Pathfinder isn't a bit more realistic than 5e. Pathfinder isn't a particularly realistic RPG by any degree. It doesn't respect any degree of realism and only add even more uneducated guesses to the rules of D&D 3.5, a game that was already full of uneducated guesses. It is pretty much the apex of 'rule of awesomeness'.

[@SpecialAgentCake]

@@monteparnas You're right, he was talking about 5e and not 3.5e. Not entirely sure how I missed that, if I'm honest. But as a follow up to your point: does it always matter? In a game where you play mystical races and pit them against fantasy creatures using genuine magic, does the actual specific realism that any one rule has truly matter? Realistically, no one is getting stabbed 40 times and still walking through town. Realistically, I can't summon a fireball and blow apart half a city block. Realistically, the game shouldn't conflate hundreds of years of the vague "medieval/renaissance" period as if it all happened at once. My original point to his was to sometimes just let anachronisms or simplifications go in favor of just enjoying the game experience. I'm well aware he does that; he has stated more than once that he's more than capable of it, he just likes making these kinds of videos (just as much as we enjoy watching them). It'll always be impossible to make a system perfectly accurate to reality (not until we can all start virtually fighting on the holodeck, anyway) so it's best to just enjoy the fun of a system-in both its peaks and faults.

[@monteparnas]

@@SpecialAgentCake I agree that doesn't matter if it is realistic. But my point about it was because you stated 5th ed simplicity in comparison to Pathfinder in such a way that it struck me as strongly pretentious. It is a different game, but that's all, and I say that as a DM of 3.5, that is just as complex as Pathfinder (since, well, PF is basically 3.5 with some tweaks rules-wise).

[@ReanuKeeves7716]

haha 69th like

[@stephenschamber6004]

I used to be a duelist like you. Then I took a card game to the motorcycle.

[@FuelDropforthewin]

CARD GAMES ON MOTORCYCLES!

[@joda7697]

Is that a Yu-Gi-Oh 5d reference? If so, please see yourself out. If not, I would like to hear the story behind your comment.

[@stephenschamber6004]

@@joda7697 No, it's a reference to Yugioh Abridged making fun of 5d. And Skyrim, a little bit.

[@decanusmorte]

Roll to hit, roll to wound. Warhammer has been doing it for years.

[@DZ-1987]

I was about to say "What's the difference between hitting and wounding" But then it clicked. You can hit, but that doesn't mean it'd hurt. DZ, well done ya bloody idiot. All this time in training, and you forgot the difference. What do i mean? well my doctrine here is "Strike hard, parry fast, and don't stop swinging" Strong endless swings should be enough to land a hit, right? i mean, as far as I've noticed, as long as i strike really hard and fast, it'd crush through the blocks. I don't know, no one wants to spar me so i'm left with assumptions and a Pell.

[@Tucher97]

The thing is yea I may throw a stick at you, but if the stick is small and with little force it wont do much, if I throw broken twigs at you and come in contact, do they hurt? no not really

[@hideshisface1886]

Not sure how it works in RPG systems, but 40k tabletop does it in kind of a strange way, but it still makes sense in retrospect. You roll to hit - nothing fancy here. You roll to wound - that measures strength of the attack against toughness of target. Basically - it checks if you have chance to actually damage the target if you penetrate the armour. Only after that, you roll the armour save. The reason you roll to wound first simply saves the throws. If the hit would not wound anyway, it does not matter if it penetrated the armour or not. Now... As for D&D - higher armour value, on a technical level simply affects the "to hit" modifier. Basically - higher armour = harder to hit BUT it is because every successful hit = some sort of damage (well, there are exceptions, but I digress). Now, that sounds stupid when you look at it from purely technical standpoint, but this is where Dungeon Master comes in. A successful "save" while in plate may mean anything: from dodge, parry to a simple fact that the hit harmlessly glanced off. The game rules do not specify that, because it does not matter - result is the same - no damage taken - how exactly was it avoided is left to players and DM.

[@dementedlemming9746]

As I see it in dnd even when you deal damage you are not physically hurting someone you are damaging their fighting ability. Only the last few hit points you are actually physically hurting someone. At least that is how I see it also help make it make more sense.

[@willinnewhaven3285]

@@dementedlemming9746 That was Gygax's explanation and it does fit the D&D system. I thought it hung together and worked ok for many but I also thought it was bullshit in 1983 and I think it's bullshit now. I stopped running D&D mostly over that, although I still played it in other people's campaigns.

[@gyrosphinx]

I think the reason for using AC opposed to DR is because the AC roll is a faster way to resolve than solving to hit, then applying DR. It also makes the monsters with actual DR stand out more. Some times I think it is better to value playability over realism.

[@nosajimiki5885]

Personally, this is why I prefer systems that use shifts of success because you only need to make one role to account for all of it. If you roll high enough to hit, you do damage equal to your weapon's base damage minus the opponent's armor plus how much better than the minimum to-hit score you rolled. Fewer rolls, makes combat go at least as fast, even with the added math.

[@tompatterson1548]

Yeah, the chance to hit factors in damage reduction.

[@janmikaldouglas2767]

Try Steve Jackson's GURPS, Shad. That system has the damage reduction that you're talking about, no classes, no levels....might be your dream game

[@TheZapan99]

Studded leather armor in D&D comes from historical "false brigandine" that was indeed a simple leather armor with decorative studs, used as a bluff that made it look like you had the protection of a full metal brigandine. It seems noble men also started to wear studded doublets that ressembled brigandines. There is a scene in the french historical novel "The Accursed Kings" (set in the 14th century, and written in 1955-77) where two young knights are accused of wearing false brigandines during the hundred years' war "for unlike their peers they did not seem to sweat, nor tire of riding, under the sun of august."

[@lattekahvi1298]

And then they got utterly screwed by few english peasants with longbows

[@TheZapan99]

@@lattekahvi1298 If you mean resisted for 118 years to raids, pillaging and the first weapon of mass destruction, to prevail in the end, then yes.

[@beganfish]

@@TheZapan99 No one won the 100 years war, people are still arguing for both sides to this day.

[@TheZapan99]

@@beganfish By all means, the UK would today include continental territories if it was an english victory.

[@beganfish]

​@@TheZapan99 By that same logic would france own areas in the british isles if they had won?

[@williamweissner6379]

Don't worry Shad the character I recently made for a d and d game has historical plate over a chain mail shirt AND a gambeson underneath

[@pancake7117]

You are immortal

[@ilikeyourname4807]

I'm making a character wearing linothorax

[@nevik2950]

Full chainmail under plate with gambason underneath... hope he has a good strength stat. Also that sounds hot as hell. Overly protective though.

[@williamweissner6379]

well it is a 20 so I think he could handle it and as for over heating I don't that will bother him either since he is slightly undead but thanks for your comment@@nevik2950

[@HunterHerne]

Even if that would work historically, I think the Rules don't allow stacking, to avoid broken builds. You can wear it, but you only get the benefit of the largest value. Also, though it doesn't say it specifically, the descriptions for chain and full plate contain a description for padded armour, or it's equivalent ("...thick layer of padding..." in full plate, "...a layer of quilted fabric... to cushion blows." in both chain armours), so it's pretty safe to say that gambeson is already included in their armour values.

[@dupeesfashionconsultant4204]

You need to do some collabs with lindybeige that would be the most op historical KZbin ever

[@TheDeinonychus]

Personally, me and my friends always thought that 'studded leather' was only studded because it was the method used to hold layers of hardened leather together, while keeping it still somewhat flexible. Basically a leather version of brigandine where the studs are there to hold it together rather than for protection. As for half-plate, we just assumed that meant a plate breastplate and maybe shin guards, but mail or leather over the rest of the body, while full-plate was just that, fully plate.

[@ender4101]

I as well have a problem with D&D's AC system, as a simple "chance of hitting" rule. In the Iron Kingdoms RPG, the Defense/Armor values work perfectly for me, where Defense is the chance of getting hit, and Armor is the damage reduction when you do get hit. Also, the heavier your armor piece, the highter is your Armor value (obviously), but you suffer a Defense penalty. It's so well thought out in my opinion.

[@Serahpin]

Armour adding DR instead of AC _is_ an optional rule you know. And the Dex reduction remains, which would lower your AC on heavier armours, exactly like what you just described.

[@ender4101]

Serahpin Oh... I guess I should read the core books more often. But, thanks for letting me know.

[@kamorikioko]

I was going to suggest Iron kingdoms too lol I think shad would like it

[@oaksparoakspar3144]

Actually, it isn't a "chance of hitting" but a "chance of getting hit where you take damage." That is why there is the distinction of a character's Touch AC (how hard it is to hit them) and their actual AC (hitting with damage). So, things like Dexterity, Dodging, and Size modifiers apply to your Touch AC. Your Natural Armor Class (shells, hide, or other things monsters and animals might have), Armor, and Shield do not. If your AC is all Dex, Dodge, and Size (because you are an agile halfling ninja) your Touch AC is high and most misses are misses. If your AC is all Full Plate and Shield, your Touch AC is low and most misses are hits on your armor or shield (and hits on them where they offer good protection). Thus, a water balloon fight in D&D would be made using ranged touch attacks - against the touch AC - and the Paladin is going to take a bath. Against normal attacks with the same AC, the Halfling Ninja is dodging on misses and the Paladin has the attacks bouncing off his armor and shield on misses. If you really wanted to make the combat precise, you could likely figure how hits missed based on the characters various modifiers - such that depending on where the enemy rolls you would know if it was a miss from a bad attack, dodged, blocked with a shield, blocked with armor, defected by a magic barrier, etc.

[@CareerKnight]

One of the things that strikes me as odd is that the default D&D system for defense never takes into account damage types despite all weapons having a listing for what kind/kinds they do. It would add a lot more options and make it more interesting if armor defense was split into vs slashing/piercing/bludgeoning.

[@ladypaprika627]

*!!GURPS intensifies!!* But in seriousness, GURPS is pretty good on armor with clothing having DR aka damage reduction and hit locations. Certain armors protect more than one hit location and others only one. Example: a leather coat protects the arms and torso, while boots only protect the feet. Now, there is one thing GURPS does wrong in my opinion when it comes to hit locations and that is that they only apply to called shots, so every attack that’s not targeted is applied to the torso and uses the torso armor value for damage reduction. With GURPS too, there is a multiplier to different types of damage (for all damage that gets through armor) and damage types have different effects. For example, crushing damage does 1x damage multiplier and certain armor counts as half against it, while impaling/huge piercing does 2x damage modifier and certain impaling/huge piercing weapons may have an armor divisor which reduces the armor’s DR when attacking. Certain weapons also have their own special effects, such as the humble taser (though that wouldn’t or shouldn’t exist in a normal fantasy setting). Basically, GURPS is weapon and armor porn when it comes to being mostly accurate.

[@Vyrlokar]

I was about to say this. Shad, come one, get GURPS.Ask Skal for references if you don't trust me ;)

[@RoninCatholic]

GURPS also doesn't run into the silliness of "high level characters" breaking suspension of disbelief with things like warriors whose HP is comparable to that of large buildings or making entry-level characters feel like they're made of paper compared to seasoned veterans.

[@hawkname1234]

I, too, came here just to say this. Good job. GURPS FTW.

[@Vyrlokar]

@@RoninCatholic well, in my gurps superheroes game, I had a hero that could be the size of a large building (with the HP to boot) but I digress

[@RoninCatholic]

Yes, but that's not just an automatic side-effect of stabbing a bunch of orcs, but a result of intentionally designing the character to have the HP that massively dwarfs normal people.

[@CarnelianUK]

Shad, I can't believe you illustrated D&D 3.5 with a photo of MB/Games Workshop classic Heroquest

[@Mlpzeldafan011100]

you should try and find some non d&d games then, they've had damage reduction games since the late 70s.

[@Dosman0026]

maybe a video idea: how to improve full medieval armor. Maybe with our modern knowledge and materials what are things we could improve on for a full set of armor in this time. maybe not meant against guns but for sword and such.

[@phraksis]

To protect against slashing there is always the fiber used for kitchen gloves. As for armor I wonder if plastic could be better than plate. Also how crazy would it be to see a dude seemingly naked running at you. (transparent plastic).I wonder what kind of weapon we would use if armor became very hard and lightweight. How could you even defeat anyone.

[@danielantony1882]

Ugham... Enchantments? No?

[@eliparker4114]

Titanium could get you almost as much protection as steel with much lower weight. It’s the real world equivalent of mithril. Then hardened steel would be analogous to adamantine if placed in a world that primarily uses iron for armor instead of steel. In terms of pure durability and defense, nothing is going to beat steel, though there are probably some modern alloys of steel that are more effective than their medieval counterparts. If you’re willing to sacrifice a bit of defense for a lighter armor, then go ahead and look into things like aluminum, titanium, or plastics. Id be surprised if you can outperform even aluminum with a plastic, but I’d be glad to be proven wrong.

[@supercalifragic1551]

@@phraksis That's the secret to Female Armor TM in fantasy, they just use invisibility enchantments. Gotta catch them off guard.

[@Vode_ika]

@@eliparker4114 I'm not sure how it would do against melee weapons, but there's super dense plastic used for lightweight bullet resistant armour.

[@kristijanmadhukar516]

But what about dragons?

[@RokuroCarisu]

Depending on the size, a dragon could be able to just crush even plate armor. And physical armor should offer little protection against breath attacks, although shields should still work fine against any but poison and lightning perhaps.

[@kristijanmadhukar516]

@@RokuroCarisu interesting fact about plate armour, lightning breath would probably be ineffective against plate armour. Since the metal acts as a kind of faraday cage diverting the electricity away from your body. And into the ground. although if the lightning is breathed repeatedly it might heat up the plate armour mimicking fire breath. And burning the person inside the armour. And if the dragon has poison on its claws. Its Grip strength might even break the steel plate and puncture the wearer. worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/48066/metal-armour-vs-lightning-strikes/48075

[@Queen-Of-Hearts727]

You get cooked, like shrimp in it's shell.

[@atmankost3261]

Pathfinder actually has alternative rules that allows armors to use 1/2 of it's Armor Class as Damage Reduction

[@federicobrajdabruno8892]

Really appreciated the video, as the whole channel (it's just great to see how much passion you put into all this stuff). I was wondering on what's your opinion regarding GURPS (that others have cited in the comments) and how realistic it actually is (I love RPGs and like to err on the realistic side of things, now that I know about Cogent I will surely check it out). Keep up your good work!

[@QuantumLeapCosplay]

Swords DO NOT cut through armor!! Buuurrrrrggghhhhh Well, except Imperious.

[@fsmoura]

and katanas

[@noukan42]

It's d&d, a +5 keen, vorpal longsword should be able to LIGHTSABERS trought a nonmagical full plate.

[@SabirKhan-wu6je]

(I do it as striking the weak points with attacks)

[@HolyknightVader999]

Or unless if it's wielder cuts through an unarmored joint or has the strength of a dozen men.

[@ThunderClawShocktrix]

and the baguettesword and lightsabres of coruse

[@DarthBiomech]

Roleplaying games reminded me of videogames, and those reminded me of crafting sandboxes... and their OH SO IRKING tendency to form their tier progression to such ridiculous shit like gold swords being better than iron swords. _gold. swords._ Maybe you would make a video about overall bullshit like that one in videogames regarding the armor and swords?

[@Serahpin]

But what about _curved_ swords?

[@ironymaiden1089]

Curved gold swords?

[@mattes4929]

That sounds like: Minecraft actually did it better, because golden equipment is like even more useless than wooden equipment. I don't know how useful diamonds would be in a sense of tools, weapons and armor, but iff it's possible shouldn't a full suit of diamond plate armor, make one basically invulnerable against... everything, even a dragon?

[@2MeterLP]

@@mattes4929 Well, diamonds are extremely hard and can therefore be made extremely sharp, so if you hit flesh with a diamond sword, its goin through like a hot knife through butter. But diamond is also brittle. If you hit a diamond with a hammer, the diamond shatters. So a diamond sword would break if you hit an armored target. Also, just getting enough diamond to make a full blade of it is ridiculous, it would most likely be similar to the obsidian blades of the Inka, which where obsidian shards in wooden swords.

[@dutch_asocialite]

@@2MeterLP You don't even have to hit it with a hammer, just strike any one of its cleavage planes and it'll be in two pieces.

[@justino.3474]

I’m working on a light RPG board game with a very similar system. Good to know I’m on the right track! Thanks for helping the brainstorm session.

[@MirkoFailoniArtz]

Hi Shad! First of all, great channel, I'm following you with all my accounts, your fantasy re-armed series is one of my favourite series on KZbin! I'm a concept artist, and I'm working on a pen and paper RPG yet to be announced where I'm struggling to design an armor system with a good level of credibility, so I have a question for you: if you had to design an "historically accurate armors tier list" like the one on D&D, what would it be?

[@UnstopablePatrik]

Gambeson and Machicolations, the unremembered sons of pop-culture.

[@UnstopablePatrik]

@@jotabeas22 HERESY

[@ironox8480]

Thank you so much! I'm so glad I'm not the only one who rages about this for a game. From now on, every master crafted weapon shall be referred to as the strong pointy thing. And while I love your ideas for proper armor allocation. I have to ask this, how would you rule something like, some one who is placing them in holds meant to damage or destroy joints?

[@Empmortakaten]

Unless you're stupendously strong you should have virtually no chance of hyperextending the joints of someone wearing good plate armor. All the major joints (shoulders, knees, and elbows) that are typically subject to such holds are made of one-way hinges. Not only would you have to overcome the strength of the person resisting you, but you'd also have to push the steel hinge to failure while doing so. Doesn't seem bloody likely.

[@ironox8480]

@@Empmortakaten that is why I was asking about padded.

[@Empmortakaten]

@@ironox8480 You never actually mentioned padded in your original comment. Now that you mention it though, I don't think it would protect against joint locks at all.

[@ironox8480]

@@Empmortakaten ah well I'll edit that.

[@deus.et.co.5679]

I'm an apprentice DM and after reading and seeing how D&D works I tried to make a more realistic system of my own from scratch, so far so well thanks to your info and explanations. I'm stuck with the armors and weapons though, I dont find enough trustful info on the internet, or maybe I dont know where to look for. I just keep rewatching your videos hoping it will teach more than it has already done. I owe you a lot Shad, all your videos have been very helpful to me. Thnks...

[@Yggdrassal]

I'm glad you made this video. I'm currently working on a system that pretty much what your are describing. Your armor values will help me develop the combat better.

[@blainweb8675]

My inner nerd aproves this vid, #makegambisongreatagain (mgga) Also, if you think gambison is awesome, wait till you see Studded Gambison...

[@nopeno2350]

Lmao

[@KaedeLanyo]

Gambeson with very small studs can look so pretty. A rare piece of real protection which could double as a fashion statement, hahaha.

[@tyler1673]

I'd think that gambison with large flat studs would help protect against slashes if they're close enough together

[@rk90011]

I had a duskblade who used a glaive for a campaign once. A loaaad of fun. My DM kept getting mad because of my strategy. I wasn't the nicest fella and basically, I'd land a ghoul touch spell to paralyze them and then peform a coup de grace. That class is a ton of fun.

[@WolfOfMassDeath]

Can we get a video of the rant?? I like hearing ideas and rule supposition about gaming systems and am always trying to improve my homebrew gaming system.

[@CorvusSolitario]

This is an awesome guide for DM's and I thought of ways to mix your ideas with my own in regards to armour class, damage reduction, tactical maneuvers to bypass armour, and the magical "+" properties of armours and weapons (for armour the "+" value adds a slight bonus to damage reduction while increasing armour class by magically deflecting attacks, while weapons that are magical have better armour penetration values rather than add more damage overall), and how the different element types would affect each armour type, such as shock or heat affecting metal differently than leather

[@25siesta]

But Chad what about dragons? I think there is a type of weapon that you might have overlooked in your video about the best medieval weapon to kill a dragon. I think if i ever had to kill a dragon in the middle ages i would use poison. I mean who would want to actually fight a dragon and surely there was poison in medieval times right? I would either feed the dragon something that has been poisoned or shoot it with one or multiple poisoned arrows maybe even a poisoned ballista arrow. A poisoned arrow even gives new meaning to the roman scorpion. This might not be the most heroic way of killing a dragon but it would surely be the safest right just shoot it and run away.

[@25siesta]

And I've had this thought and ive never seen this in any type of dragon in fantasy but dragons might just be cold blooded just like komodo dragons (wich could explain why some dragons can go such long periods without eating ( like smaug i mean he was in that mountain for like 60 years if a snake can go for 3 months after a big meal a dragon 300 times their size might do 60 years)) anyway if they were cold blooded you would have an enormous advantage if you were to atack it at night when its basically motionless. just look at the video where steve irwin goes looking for komodo dragons, during the day they are they are going at him full speed and very early in the morning he can literally pet them.

[@johannes4123]

How about supplying your livestock with poisoned necklaces? You're still gonna lose a few of them if a dragon attacks, but it's certainly better than losing the entire herd

[@2MeterLP]

In one of the witcher books, a farmer stuffs a dead sheep with poison and gets a dragon to the brink of death, which really upsets the dragon hunters because it makes them look less epic.

[@alexkirrmann8534]

Don't dragons use magic or are magical? Mind you that poison during the medieval period would have made making large quantities of poison impossible. It would fail to kill a human sometimes. I think if they were cold blooded which is the case in my opinion due to their very reptilian features, would poison have a harder time killing them? How big of a dragon are we talking about?

[@CuriousKey]

@@alexkirrmann8534 Growing belladonna isn't very hard, getting large quantities would just take land + time. It's actually very potent for the amount you use, though obviously you'd need a bunch of it for something as large as a dragon. Even considering that though, a few square meters of land would give you enough leaves to poison pretty much anything.

[@HanFyren]

Dungeons and Dragons - Pedants Handbook.

[@lonestarr1843]

I love this part at the end Shade! I am a D.M. and new at D and D in general. I have thought from the beginning that it is really easy to die in this kind of game. Now that I know all of this about the armor and it’s well adjusted ranking system, I don’t have to ease up on my players and they will actually be ok and rather happy when I have them face all these combat situations! 👍 👍 🤟

[@markmatson]

Realistically, "leather" armor would be the best in a fantasy setting, where the hide used was from defeated monsters. To push the point, who needs to be paid to defeat a dragon? Just let me have the body when I'm done! Seems like armorer/taxidermists specializing in monster hides would be common trade in such a world.

[@fsmoura]

_Angry nerd rants about arcane RPG rules for 25 minutes_

[@davidlink3787]

And we watch it.

[@gabrielmina441]

Dumbass rants about him in the comments

[@VoltisArt]

"Angry nerd rants about..." That's more than half of social media. Welcome to Earth, visitor from a faraway place where people agree on stuff.

[@Nethan2000]

From what I've read about Chinese armor, the very first they used was made out of rhinoceros leather. They made it as one piece for a very short time, but problems with it quickly became apparent. The main one is that once it becomes damaged (and it will eventually), the whole suit is useless. So they started cutting leather into small pieces and making a lamellar armor out of them. So if one of the lamellae is damaged, you can easily replace it without needing to buy a completely new armor.

[@dynamicworlds1]

Also, you can make lamalar out of scraps left over from making things like saddles and shoe soles.

[@kisaknight626]

What about adding and writing your own Weapons and Armor supplement for D&D? That would be amazing and to be historically written with sub notes and dates of how and where the armor or weapons came into effect and creation throughout history? I would definitely buy that book!

[@douglasz.johnsonoftheaethe1045]

15:50: Picture of Hero Quest, captioned D&D 3.5. Marvelous.

[@lancemckenzie2305]

I like this idea...since a naked man has an AC of 10, this represents a total dodge of an attack. So only attack rolls that fall within 11 and your AC must suffer damage reduction from the armour in terms of slashing, piercing, bludgeoning. Certain weapons like messer, halberd etc will have damage reduction attenuation of certain damage types where they do not improve their damage directly, but they get stopped less by armour.

[@spyrofrost9158]

We all know what plate armor needs: Machicolations.

[@Kakarot64.]

The only place they would be useful on plate armour is in the crotch plate so you can piss on a fallen opponent without taking the armour of.

[@GrimoireOfJank]

I wore an accurate brigandine once, I love it. Planning on making full plate for my LARP thing (4 points brigandine def. Chainmail 3, scale is 3, lamellar 4, plate is 5 (but easy to add a point by adding 2 gauges worth of thickness))

[@lpcanilla92]

Very cool video Shad. I think a game that you'd like in that respect is Anima: Beyond Fantasy. Armor works as Damage Reduction (it blocks a percentage of any weapon's base damage) and it works differently with each damage type: Blunt, Piercing, Slashing, Fire, Cold, Electricity, and Energy, the latter one being explicitly supernatural and most armors won''t do nothing against it. It has rules to stack armor: it lowers manouverability, you cannot combine two types of heavy armor, no more than three in total, etc., and there's an ability which allows you to overcome armor's downsides, Armor Use, which the higher it is, the most comfortable you are using heavier armors. It is specified which parts they protect in case someone wants to target a specific weak spot. Helmets are listed apart and some of them reduce perception. It can be easily customizable because some stats they got wrong, and some of the art is egregiously unrealistic and fan-servicey because there's a lot of rule of cool going on. If you can surpass the quite complicated percentile system and the sometimes funny english translation, and got a dedicated crew, it's a very fun game with one of the most epic combat systems ever made. Edit: The rest of the defensive abilities happen prior to when armor comes about, which is handled by two skills, Block and Evade, which are more or less effective against different attacks (i.e. Evade will be more effective against a ranged attack, even if not 100% effective, than Block which usually sucks vs. ranged attacks). The game also features shields, which give a bonus to block, and can be used offensively, but very lightly hinder your offense.

[@koingzellkylar3175]

You can also aim in the gap of the armor, like the eyes or else :)

[@psychodrummer1567]

Answer in short: Almost everything! But for the sake of fun.

[@dynamicworlds1]

Debatably on the fun part. D&D's combat mechanics are a bloated slog on top of being unrealistic.

[@skyguytomas9615]

Shad powergamer confirmed.

[@ussliberty8898]

powergamer master race

[@benoitlabrecque4513]

In warhammer/warhammer 40k (rpg), armor is a set value you deduce from de damages and weapons have an armour penetration value, indicating a set amount of armour the weapon negates. Also, some type of armor reduce the amount of critical damages (wich represent injuries)

[@MrISIDOROS]

You really gave a lot to think about. I m in the progress of trying to create a "more realistic" system for crafting armors and weapons. This produced the need of a quality system (without adding magics in the mix) and also a durability system. I m currently play testing the in my session this system. I m getting some good feed back from the players so far. Ofc its far from complete and my goal is for this system to substitute magic (we are playing in a low magic world). I was kinda stuck, this video gave a lot of ideas :). P.s. If you have any materials for further reading up on the subject it will be greatly appreciated.

[@ShieldWife]

My gaming group has our own house rules for armor in d20 systems. The armor type determines damage reduction and coverage determines critical value, which is no longer linked to weapon. So if you had plate, you have a damage reduction of 10 and if it’s full plate including great helm the critical value is 20. If your head is only partially protected, reduce by 1, if your head is not protected, reduce by 2. The same thing applies to arms and legs. So a knight in full plate has DR 10 and critical value 20, if he takes off his helmet, he has a critical value of 18. Just a breast plate has a critical value of 14: 20 minus 2 for head, minus 2 for arms, minus 2 for legs. DR is still 10 though.

[@DaddyMouse]

Sounds like a great system! How does it change the way the game is played?

[@ShieldWife]

Well, base attack bonus now adds the Defense - the score needed to hit someone. So I think one major difference is that it makes dexterity based characters more distinctive in combat than armored characters. Armored characters tend to be easier to hit but then take less damage while dexterity based characters get hit less but take more damage. So it gives a bit more personalized feel to each character than just AC enhancements for Dexterity or armor.

[@Grifftrogg]

GURPS does a good job of armour with DR and hit locations.

[@MedMed-rq5fx]

I like gurps, but remember a "lv 1" goblin with kitchen knife can kill a "lv 10" paladin in full plate

[@Grifftrogg]

@@MedMed-rq5fx But GURPS isn't a level based system?

[@alexandercoyne5518]

As a fellow GURPS player, I fully agree. Especially in that the rules allow us to change armor to better match actual armor if the base rules do not seem to match up.

[@MedMed-rq5fx]

@@Grifftrogg from what i remember it is an XP based system

[@jlokison]

@@MedMed-rq5fx XP based and highly modifiable. Also if an experienced "Paladin" gets stupid around a bunch of basic Goblins then yes you can end up with a scene from Goblin Slayer where the Paladin dies. Especially if your game master is a nam vet, former cop, and likes to make things challenging. I learned a lot of life lessons a safe way playing RPGs with my parents and their friends.

[@zenosAnalytic]

Great video, and I LOVE you mentioning clothes cuz a simple cotton shirt is actl wonderful protection against what you might call "natural" attacks like biting and scratching, spcl from certain fantasy chestnuts like zombies or skeletons. Double stitch it and they wont even be able to tear it easily!

[@Loafusbreadmyre]

Shad, dude, I'd absolutely love to play some tabletop RPG's with you man. This realistic system sounds reeeeaaally fun to play through!

[@Sientir]

Thanks for this video, Shad! As a game designer, I love the information you've given me about how these things actually work so that I'm not stuck relying on incorrect tropes. :D Any chance for a short write-up on this subject that game designers could use as a reference?

[@hezekiahxangel]

Sientir I second this

[@WuCSquad]

Well this was very enlightening for the game I'm building and gave me a lot of things to think about, thanks!

[@dynamicworlds1]

As someone who has tried to reengineer my own system out of D&D, I'm going to _Highly_ suggest you put asside your notes and play other systems first. Even if you really want to design your own system just for the sake of doing so (and there's nothing wrong with that) getting perspective of playing at least a few vastly different systems is going to make your work a _lot_ easier. I suggest starting with Savage Worlds (here www.peginc.com/freebies/SWcore/TD06.pdf is a free, playable, abridged version of one of the slightly older editions of it) and then finding others. Savage worlds almost never uses the d20 and doesn't have HP, and is still not even close to the most different system from D&D. I can also recommend some KZbin channels for you too which will give you some theory, ideas, and other systems to recommend.

[@WuCSquad]

@@dynamicworlds1 I really do appreciate all of your suggestions however I'm not really a building a new RPG like D&D (in actual fact it's a 4X) and the main thing that made me think was how armor worked. Shad said that you could view armor as damage reduction so I'm now working on a system where everytime an unit is attacked the armor will block a certain part of the incoming damage with a certain change to damage certain parts of the armor so future attacks would be more succesfull. I wanted also to incorporate his mentioning of immobilizing enemies. That you could use several techniques to immobilize enemies (let those pesky knights fall on the ground by cavalry charge or something) to negate at least part of the armor for the next attack. This way the player can use tactics and synergy in the attacks (like a sort of combo). Last but not least he mentioned different type of equipment being more effective against different armor. I've got plenty of different unit types with a large selection of weapons so this would be pretty cool that for example a blunt weapon would be effective against one type of armor and almost useless against another. I'm thinking about doing something with switching to sidearms to deal with different troops (units having two types of weapons they can use and the player can switch between them to combat different types of enemies but sacrifices some movement points or something when choosing to switch). My game stretches from prehistoric to far into the spaceage and I think I could apply these systems in later combat. Tanks would have armor but once pierced the next shot would have devestating effects (because when a shell lands inside of a tank it's pretty much GG). Flanking shots (or even more so on the back) would have increased damage because the armor on those sides would be weaker than the front. I'm a bit rambling but I'm thinking about it a lot. :) I would very much like to have a list of new youtube channels to watch, so send away :)

[@dax7574]

This ws exactly my complaint to my group when we switched from warhammer fantasy to d&d, in warhammer fantasy the armor reduces the damage recieved directly, which felt way more realistic.

[@VoltisArt]

This is exactly why the D&D rules are suggestions and the DM is in charge of what gets used and how.

[@powerist209]

@@VoltisArt Well, not in Adventure League though.

[@mattcat83]

15:56 When talking about how AC works in AD&D3.5, he shows an image of the Hero's Quest board game, itself based upon a simplification AD&D's ruleset.

[@BrenttFease]

Thank you SO much for making this! It's the one thing I've wanted info on and couldn't easily find.

[@RagnarockerII]

If you are getting back into DnD 3.5, what are your thoughts about the alternate armor rules found in Unearthed Arcana (if that source is available to you)? The DR values you list are quite a bit high considering early levels and are only somewhat ok-ish when you are in high level games. I think a level 10 Barbarian can easily outperform the DR. I can wholeheartedly recommend the Duskblade. Alternatively Warblades/Swordsage/Crusader(Tome of Battle: Book of the Nine Swords) are also really great classes that let you be a warrior-type with both cool options and some "swordplay" like mechanic.

[@ryanblake7114]

So what i ended up doing recently was the change from strength to con requirements, lowered the total ac of all of them by 2 or 3, then gave all heavy armors resistance to physical attacks but not resistance to magical attacks, it should make being a tank or a cleric much more likeable when you dont have to worry about either getting hurt as much, or if you arent a tank cleric then having to heal the fighter for ridiculous amounts of damage

[@collinjones1767]

Pathfinder actually introduced an alternative rule set for armor as damage reduction in the book Pathfinder: Ultimate Combat. It works pretty close to the system you proposed, only with damage reduction scaled to the average dps of basic non-magical weapons from the game for the sake of balance. They didn't do the "different armors resist different damage types" thing though, but it's still pretty cool. Also rad video Shad

[@beowulfshaeffer8444]

I still haven't gotten to play Cogent, but another one that does a good job balancing ease of play and realism for armor (and combat in general) is Savage Worlds (which happens to be a contemporary to the D20 system or 3rd Edition D&D).

[@MikhailHudon_ZerithFarron]

Just for you Shad, after watching all your armour videos I've adjusted my rule book for my own Role Play. These videos are always so informative. Thanks for the quality lectures.

[@evanrule7323]

Low blow with that execution related picture Shad... Low blow.

[@Thraim.]

Ser Ilyn Payne actually hit a rather high blow since he went for the neck.

[@evanrule7323]

@@Thraim. Payne and I mean that takes no skill at all. Also I would like it more if he did and upward swing and flung his head towards Arya

[@Thraim.]

I actually read about beheading by sword. Apparently the executioners got specially made swords and exact instructions on how to use them and some still didn't even manage to kill the culprit in one swing, let alone cut off the head. It really wasn't as easy as it sounds. I even read about one guy who botched the execution of a traitor noble so hard he got sentenced to death himself.

[@lewstherinteletubby50]

These videos have been so helpful for helping me design my own rpg

[@n00bplayer72]

I'd love to see you review depictions of armour in certain games or shows. IE: The Black Knight or Camilla in Fire Emblem. But this is very informative for me as a fantasy writer. Thank you!

[@SootShade]

Your previous videos on medieval armor (and weapons) are part of the reason why I felt compelled to just create my own RPG system from the ground up, largely accounting for the things you bring up here. It's not just a matter of trying to add 'realism' either, but actually allows for vastly more interesting combat mechanics as well. Sure it ends up a bit more complex than D&D, but that's definitely not a bad thing in my view.

[@milanpospisil8024]

My rules are actually little more complex than DnD and still, combat is shorter (depends on level of detail you want to play). DnD combat is very long and boring in my opinion. Too many HP at higher levels with small increase in damage...

[@SootShade]

@@milanpospisil8024 That is part of what I'm going for as well. Making combat more lethal helps avoid it dragging on in terms of time, on top of making it more interesting.

[@grayfulbester]

Well i would say try to no go over the top with complexity, i've found that people can deal far better with a long combat because hp than long combats because the sistem makes them calculate too many things, like certain Fallout pnp games, that actually do something similar to what shad says.

[@milanpospisil8024]

@@grayfulbester Why everyone thinks that everything that is not DnD is more computanionaly complex? It is not. You can have more realistic and better combat system yet equaly simple as DnD.

[@grayfulbester]

@@milanpospisil8024 did i say that? No. What i said was to not go too far with complexity if you are going to make your own game, then i gave an example of a sistem that did that and can be very boring because you spend more time doing calculations than in actual combat, at the top of the coments there is a coment tread in wich they actually told me that i should create an excel sheet to make it faster and less boring

[@paranoidandroid1477]

"3,5 Edition is a classic version of D&D"... Oh you young people...

[@alrush34]

Anybody else remember when Elf or Halfling were classes?

[@tommihommi1]

@@alrush34 wait, why would your race be your class?

[@nilus2k]

@@tommihommi1 Basic D&D was weird like that

[@nilus2k]

I thought the same thing. Kids these days don't even know what THAC0 is

[@alrush34]

@@tommihommi1 Back then you didn't have races for characters. Unless you were an elf, dwarf, or halfling you were automatically a human who then decided a class. If you were a "demihuman" then that was what you were, with a combination of the old fighter-cleric-mage-thief abilities. As D S stated, D&D was weird back then.

[@ironnwizzard]

2nd ed actually did some of that back in the day. It still had all the same armor types, and they were about in the same proportions of effectiveness, no no help there. but it did have optional rules for different weapon types getting bonuses or penalties versus different types of armor. 2nd (and earlier) also didn't have any kind of movement penalties for the heavier armors, so they got that right too. The descriptions of the armors also discussed the historical basis (or lack thereof in some cases) for the given armor types. How accurate it was though I can't say. As for armor as damage reduction, the variant exists in Unearthed Arcana for 3.5, but it's woefully underpowered (like most armors), so no one I know uses it. Loving your videos Shad!

[@nickgray836]

i am actually working on doing a dnd 5e rework to do this. each armor has a different Armor class bonus and damage reduction against different types of damage. i want to run a realistic low magic setting that is more historically accurate to give me a break from my usual super high magic world. shad your videos really help me out and inspire me while i work on this project, Thanks a ton!

[@Murcareum]

In some of the earlier editions of D&D the gambeson had an AC bonus of 2 same as leather armor, also depending on the edition they had bonuses and penalties to ac based off of armor type vs the weapon type. Basic D&D gave clothing a bonus to ac of 1. Also not all D&D fantasy art has the weird fantasy armor for example the 2nd ed . D&D module "A Paladin in Hell" has more realistic armor...of course that was when TSR still owned it.

[@Kz-ds8gb]

2nd Edition Brown, blue and "Green" handbooks ............. :-D

[@ZXNovaBoom]

Yeah damage reduction and physical resistances is something that I always wondered about not being on armors. It's so strange to see plate not having slash/pierce resistance etc. Though to be fair, 3rd party books for pathfinder or 5e for instance often create new feats for the profeciency in question. For instance in 5e there's a feat called "heavy armor expert" or something and it reduces all damage taken from slash/pierce/bludgeoning by 3. So if you get hit by an arrow that does 3 damage, you take no damage.

[@jonnyfizzle]

Awesome vid! How would durability factor into your armor ratings? Would armor maintenance become a more important element to gameplay? Thanks for all your hard work.

[@lockwoan01]

Do you think you could do one about the Black Knight trope? You could play that as either an Anti-Hero or an Anti-Villain, or as some guy that painted his armor black in order to prevent rusting due to the lack of a squire, or as someone trying to hide their identity.