Heavy vs. Light Armor?

question
#1

Anyone have a way to do heavy vs light armor in ICRPG? Having a “heavy armor” tag would be great so I can assign certain checks as “hard” while in it (sneaking, swimming, and casting arcane spells would be the top 3). I think I will add those to shields for sure but need something for platemail.

I want to keep things simple but I would like to open up that design space. I was thinking, there is a cap on the number of weapons equipped but not armor. What if the amount of “armor” items also had a limit. I think 5 could work (or 4 if you wanted a lower AC cap). Heavy armor pieces (closed helms, breastplates, heavy pauldrons, etc) could each give 2 ac and light armor pieces (skullcaps, chain shirts, bracers, rings of protection, etc) each gave 1 ac. That makes it easy to tell the difference between the two.

Every piece could take one gear slot but wearing even 1 piece of heavy armor incurs the heavy armor penalty. You could add a bit of crunch and say you could wear a number of heavy armor pieces equal to your Strength and avoid the penalty (Muscle Wizards!).

Thats as simple as I could figure. Anyone doing something more efficient?

#2

Technically, there is no limit to the number of weapons a character can equip beyond the 10 equippable items slots on the character sheet (max 20 items carried total). And, there is a limit to armor (+10 is the maximum that can be worn from any combination of wearable items).

That being said, just give heavy armor the heavy tag. Any time a character tries something where the tag comes into play, just use Easy or Hard modifiers and move on. Trying to swim in plate? Roll hard. I’m not certain it needs to be any more complex than that.

#3

“WEAPON: Implements of destruction that can be traded. A single character can only equip 3 Weapons at once.”

Page 197

#4

Ha! Nice. I stand corrected.

#5

Ya, there’s definitely a limit on weapons.

Anywho, right now, there is little choice around armor use. Its just a scrum of grab what you can and most Loot items listed dont have a heavy armor tag attached. So, a rogue or wizard can pile on armor liberally and that just doesnt fit the fiction.

“Just keep adding those “common armor” bits”. It just doesnt seem right. There should be an INCENTIVE not to wear lots of +armor.

#6

You are correct. But there also isn’t a rogue or a wizard. You have to get more games under your belt. Your character can evolve and be whatever you want. Don’t like the idea of a wizard in armor? Ring of protection +1. Identical to common armor in every way but the name. Also you only get 3 starting gear choices. The rest of it is what you find as you adventure. If you want to spend coin, use the world book where armor is discussed for cost purposes. In most situations it is a loot roll to see what you find. I think +3 armor on a single piece makes sense for what you are suggesting but newly created players don’t have that as an option.

#7

“Having no restrictions on what REWARDS players can choose can have a downside, too. Characters can become hard to understand or categorize. “Are you a mage or a pikeman?” This problem can lead to a world or set of characters that is hard to believe, or even just silly.”

Page 14, ICRPG Worlds Book

#8

Can have. Doesn’t mean it will be so.
My players in Symbaroum chose for themselves to skin their “classes” and it was great. They really defined their heroes.

#9

I get it. I don’t like rules bloat either. But I also like it when there is a sort of rules elegance where the rules help validate player choice as well. There should be a reason why the rogue goes with leathers and the wizard wears a bath robe beyond just affectation.

Anywho, if anyone is curious, the armor rules I will be going with for my upcoming campaign (unless someone has sussed out something more succinct that fits the fiction):

Armor

  • Armor Limits.
    • 18 Max (not including base Armor).
    • Max 6 Armor items equipped.
  • Heavy Armor. Makes some checks hard when equipped. A Heavy Armor (+2) item can be purchased for the cost of three Common Armor (+1) items.
  • Shields. As Heavy Armor but its cheaper and confers a penalty even if CARRIED.

Edit: Shortened it
Edit. Shortened it even more

Edit. Final. Shortened it EVEN more - removed melee the penalty for using Shields. I made the Shield basically just like other “Heavy Armor” with two differences. First, they confer a penalty even if carried (big/bulky/etc). Second, they are cheaper than other “Heavy Armors”.

End of the day, max light armor with this is 16+Base Armor and max heavy armor is 2 more. Which is about what I wanted.

#10

Weapons
1 Slot: Small/light/simple (Dagger, Cudgel, Sickle, Staff)
2 Slots: Normal (Spear, Sword, Mace, Axe, Flail)
3 Slots: Heavy/Two Handed (Halberd, Warhammer, Long sword, Battle Axe)

Armour
1 Slot: (Small/light) Shields, Helmet, Leather, Clothing.
2 Sots: Studded leather armour
3 Slots: Chain armour
4 Slots: Half Plate Armour
5 Slots: Full Plate

Number of Equipped Gear Slots
10+CON

(Taken from Knave)

#11

I like the dude that makes Knave - Questing Beast is a fun YT channel. I think the armor stuff could work. The weapon stuff not so much since its all d6 in ICRPG. But still doesnt affect ability to sneak, cast, etc. Just inventory slots.

#12

If you are wearing clanky/heavy equipment, how about having the player roll HARD for whatever it would hinder? Super slick.

#13

Which player is wearing heavy? The one wearing one common armor piece? 3? 6? I want it to hinder arcane casting too. When does it apply?

I will just go with my solution. 1 armor per slot means light. Anything that gives more per slot is heavy. Wearing anything heavy makes certain things hard.

Very easy to communicate and adjudicate. Gives player meaningful choice.

#14

I am chiming back in so these cats on the thread know that I have never used that limitation in my games. Why? Well, it really doesn’t make much practical difference whether a character has three or six weapons. He or she can only use one at a time. Take the firearms specialty mech suit, for instance (p.175), four weapons right from the jump. That class doesn’t play any differently than any of the other classes or a character with only one weapon.

In the upcoming magic supplement, technically a character can take 3 weapons plus a mage blade as a piece of starter equipment at character creation, for a total of four as a starting character!

So, I appreciate having this notation in the core drawn to my attention, as I may recommend that it comes out in a future edition. I’m not a big fan of limitations or penalties on players. Indeed, there’s nothing wrong with having a mage in leather armor or a fighter who can cast spells in plate. These characters should be able to operate in the world without penalties and just do cool stuff. A better focus instead of trying to find ways to limit players is just to find ways to highlight the cool things they can do. After that, if you think a moment in the fiction calls for a hard roll (you can’t swim easily with an 18 AC), then just adjudicate it in the moment with an easy or hard modifier and move on.

#15

Why place a -1 to melee attempts when using a shield? Using a shield should not affect that. Having fought with sword and shield, it definitely does not affect your ability to fight.

#16

This is similar to what I use as well. For heavier gear, it just takes up more Equipped Slots. This becomes its own limitation and then just add the HARD rolls when necessary.

#17

The shield thing to model other styles being more offensive. This is similar to TWF giving +1 to hit (instead of an attack) in some OSR games. If I cared that much about realism, I would play GURPS.

#18

We can agree to disagree. I find a character’s limits and flaws more interesting than their abilities.

#19

Oh, I am all for character flaws, which are infinitely fascinating. I leave those up to my players to role play. Instead, I am not a fan of mechanical limitations, i.e., no subtraction. Notice that there are no penalties in ICRPG. I think that’s why you’ve gotten some pushback on here. Lots of folks have abandoned that way of thinking and playing and have moved to making their games more streamlined.

But I am a crusader for that style of play. I’ll freely own it and admit it. To each their own. There are infinite ways to skin a cat. :slightly_smiling_face:

#21

Again, we can agree to disagree. I like mechanics and roleplay to both respond to positive and negative aspects of character.