From: 8hum190@violet.Berkeley.EDU
Date: Sat 18 Aug 1990 - 09:56:33 EEST
Although they're getting a bit inconsistent about it, here's how GURPS weapons work.
Depending on your strength, you have a basic damage for thrusted and swung weapons. The latter is higher, because of the lever effect.
Each weapon has a damage listing (or two, if it can be used to attack in more than one way). E.g.: broadsword does swung+1. Heavier weapons and those with their weight concentrated at the end do more damage, so a small mace does swung+2. (This is compensated by having such unbalanced weapons require time to ready in between blows.) Since armor absorbs in GURPS, this set-up allows your maces and axes to penetrate armor more easily. But that's not all. Edged weapons get a 1/2 bonus to damage which actually makes it through armor. Pointed weapons get a full bonus. Also, chain mail absorbs less against pointed weapons.
So let's take a classic case: Guy de Troyes is fighting off a Viking raid when he gets hit by Viking triplets, each with a strength of 11, and wielding a small mace, broadsword, and spear, respectively. Each one rolls a 4 on his damage roll. The first one is doing d6+1 damage (swung), +2 for the small mace, for 7 points of damage. Subtract 4 for Guy's chainmail and he takes 3 points. The second one does d6+1 (swung), +1 for the broadsword. Subtract 4 for the chainmail, which leaves 2 points, but multiply this by 1.5 to get 3 points of actual damage. The third does d6-1 damage (thrust), +2 for the spear. Subtract 2 for the chainmail, and multiply by 2 to get 6 points of damage. (Guy collapses at this point, obviously.)
Now, suppose Guy was dumb enough to go into battle without armor. He's got zero absorption, and consequently takes 7 points from the mace, 9 from the sword, and 10 from the spear. But suppose it's five hundred years later and he's fighting Englishmen while wearing light plate armor (absorbs 6). He now takes 1 point from the mace, *nothing* from the sword, and *nothing* from the spear.
I actually tried an approach like this for RQ a long time ago--before I got RQ III. Back then, I decided that the method (damage multiplication of 1.5 for edged, 2 for pointed weapons) would work if you increased everyone's hit points by a 1-1/2 or 2 times. However, it only makes sense if you make sure that crushing weapons do more basic damage, before absorption and multiplication. I don't think this is the case (generally) with the present damage tables, so they'd need to be rewritten a bit. Quick fix: give all club-type weapons an extra +1. This only works to a point, though (no pun intended). The damages seem to have been devised originally with both the weight and the sharpness considerations in mind. (But obviously without the ability to represent the full nuances of different effects vs. different types of armor.)
The real solution (in my opinion) might just be to adopt the GURPS damage/armor values, then work from there. Unbalanced weapons could be treated as in GURPS, or else take a SR penalty.
--Elliot
[My only comment here is that you should do better damage with a weapon that is sized appropriately, so the independence of the weapon damage and the damage bonus is not that undesirable. I would like to see differing sizes of various weapons where a person is best with a properly sized (and balanced) weapon. This is, of course, getting into advanced rules. Assuming we ever get to the point of writing up a modified rules set for RuneQuest, I will probably break certain sections down based on how detailed the person wants to get.
I would also like to see size be more of a factor than constitution in a person's hit points, so you might consider 2xsize + con as the hit point determiner...
Does GURPS use hit locations? You didn't mention any in your example, but in RQ it's usually the damage per hit that's important, as opposed to the total damage.]
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