Fight Playtest, some ambiguity

[Storn]

Last week, RDU Neil and I sat down and did a bar fight with one of his characters and a quickly made up drunk.

The PC had a club, was very fast and held initiative throughout. His skill with club was B2, forking a die from Brawling.

Teh Drunk managed to get his hands on a chair, and it was club vs. club.

It felt like a real fight. Kudos to BW.

It also took 2 hours. There was a lot of looking up stuff... a lot of cross comparison and info wasn't always easy to put at hand. The fight petered out in the end... the poor drunk was sooo bruised and battered he simply gave up.

I am terrified now of doing a combat with 3 players and any number of opponents. Sure, I know we will get faster.... also, clubs didn't do much damage and the PC didn't have enough skill to move hits from the torso of the drunk's leather armor location. But we are not inexperienced gamewise folk. I've got decades of systems under my belt. I don't see combat get tremendously quicker.

Now... my rules question:
RDU Neil thought a -1d from wounds should also apply to the Armor dice.... it is an interesting thought. And here is his logic.

P.183 "Armor dice act like any other ability"

P. 194 "Wounded penalty dice are subtracted from stats, skills, relexes and steel. Health, Mortal Wound, Emotional Attributes... are not affected."

If P then Q. If Armor is like any other ability and is not exempt fromwhat is said on P. 194, then wound dice could be construed as coming off of Armor dice.

[Kevin]

So what went wrong? Was it that you just couldn't get damage to penetrate the armour?

[stormsweeper]

I've only seen one fight go on close to two hours, and it was a couple PCs up against half a dozen NPCs (ran by the other players). Often times a Steel check ends a fight, but usually for smaller fights it gets reduced down to a bloody versus test.

[Storn]

So what went wrong? Was it that you just couldn't get damage to penetrate the armour?

Blows landed, but were incidental. Neil could never roll a Mark with his weapon. Even with several sucssesive Great Blows. The drunk kept accruing minor scrapes.

Drunk also made his Steel twice, even after the finally enough minor blows to get him to -1d of wound dice.

We tried lots of different manuevers... it was fun... but it was also really, really slow. Some of it was Neil and I trying to gauge what was expected by the rules.

He had a tough time with armor, feeling that the success of the armor should reduce the sucesses of the blow. I agree that is sorta intuitive. I shudder to think what plate armor does in this system... totally realistic, totally understandable, but yikes ohmygods... will plate be effective.

I think we also both shudder at the thought of Eric's dwarf. Who's fighting ability is going to dismantle and destroy any foe that is worthy of Neil's character. Any foe worthy of Eric's character is going to dismantle Neil. Now, he might be up for the challenge... but shaky grins were exchanged by the two of us when this was brought up.

We also played with Stances, Positioning and the whole ball of wax. We put the game through its paces intentionally. Eric and Neil are both very tactical, very system saavy folk... one of the things I luv about them.

[Yagathai]

You know, if you really want to give Fight! mechanics a good workout, you could schedule a bout in the Arena. I'm available to referee...

[ChrisG]

I've run Fight! about four times now, and each time it gets faster. It might not seem like there are a lot of efficiencies, but it's the little things that seem to add up: looking up the odd manuever, working out positioning, even planning your actions--they all get faster over time.

[Ozark Tim]

Well, your results weren't terribly unrealistic for the combat. A sloppy brawl between unskilled combatants in a bar - that is the sort of scenario in which someone getting seriously hurt or killed is always a surprise. All the same, you should've managed a mark at some point.

One small thing: The drunk was wielding a chair, did you apply the unwieldy rules? Unwieldy requires a Set action before a Strike, a great strike requirees Set, Set, Strike. Not that this affects your basic problem...

[Yagathai]

Ozark, without Artha, you can't get a Mark from a club with a skill of only B2. You need at least three successes.

[ChrisG]

In bar fights, you usually see a Lock before teh win! Maybe after a few swipes with the club, one of the combatants needed to Push or Lock his way to sloppy victory.

[stormsweeper]

As much as Feints may seem like a ponce thing*, they'd be excellent tactics, as well.



* If your manhood is threatened, call them a "Strike Action Fake" or some other analog to a sports term.

[Storn]

In bar fights, you usually see a Lock before teh win! Maybe after a few swipes with the club, one of the combatants needed to Push or Lock his way to sloppy victory.

A lock was attempted and foiled by Positioning.

Still, no one has commented on if Wound Dice reduce the Armor dice.

[Storn]

As much as Feints may seem like a ponce thing*, they'd be excellent tactics, as well.



* If your manhood is threatened, call them a "Strike Action Fake" or some other analog to a sports term.


We used that move too!

[luke]

With Aggressive Stance (or even Defensive), the player should have been able to muster 5D. 2D from his skill, 2D from the stance and 1D from his field of related knowledge.

I also agree that such conflicts will go much faster. Fight! is very much about picking the right strategy for the job. In this case, giving the drunk a few good whacks so his Superficial penalty is up, and then diving on him with a Charge/Lock combo is probably about all you'd need to take the day. Two exchanges of combat, most likely. Your tactical players will pick up on this pretty quickly, I think.

Armor is not affected by wound penalties. Armor, last I checked, is an inanimate object and does no feel pain. Also, Armor has its own penalty dice mechanic which works nicely (IMO).

As for Senor Knight in Shining Armorness. You go after him with a club and B2 skill, you're dead. There's no two ways about it. You need skill and the right tools to pop his can and get at the juicy meat. An axe or a mace does nicely. Anything less is useless.

-Luke

[Yagathai]

Your best shot with peasant vs. armored knight when you don't have a can-opener handy, I've found, is to go for some combination of charge/push/throw, follow up with a lock, and hope you get lucky. Once you've got a lock in and you're on the Inside, take out that dagger or belt knife and hope you can get through the armor before you get hilt-smashed into jello.

I didn't say it was a good shot...

[luke]

I didn't say it was a good shot...

I've found this tactic works well with four to one odds. Also a fun tactic for Satyrs from the Monster Burner...