Armor: Average Defense with sectional Armor

[MarioTani]

Hy to all, this is my second post to these boards.

 

I'm running my first campaign with Hero, a FH campaign.

 

I've come up with a third way of calculate the Aveage DEF of a suit of sectional armor.

 

It consist on an weighted average of the def provided by the variuos sections.

 

The Weights are those of the DEF = 4 Colunm / 10, for every location.

 

This is based upon this consideration.

 

A Set of armor which provides def 4 on all locations weights 10.00 KG, so you can use the weight of that type of armor to represent the part of the body covered by the armor.

 

Surely you can even do this with some other proportion, as:

 

Sum of ((Weight of all the armor of a given Def / Weight of a Full suit of that armor) * Def)

for every given DEF.

 

but it seems to me that it is more complicate of doing the simple

 

Sum Of ((Weight of Def 4 Armor at every location / 10) Def at that location)

 

What do You think about it?

There some obviuos way to use this method to abuse?

[Legendsmiths]

If you want to calculate average armor, this is a pretty good method. I also suggest using this same method if you are applying any kind of light/med/heavy armor penalties.

 

Where you run aground however is when you have magically lightened materials.

 

Personally, I don't think avg DEF is necessary. Just go with whatever is on the torso, which is the heaviest piece anyway, and that is usually enough.

[austenandrews]

Originally posted by mudpyr8

Personally, I don't think avg DEF is necessary. Just go with whatever is on the torso, which is the heaviest piece anyway, and that is usually enough.

 

I agree. In my game an "average shot" is calculated as a chest shot, which (besides the head) is usually the location with the best armor.

 

-AA

[MarioTani]

Isntead I've found out, in past games more than this, that usually the head is one of the least protected parto of the body, sure it's more protected than thighs but it's usually far less protected than arms.

 

I believe it has to do with teh idea of the hero been seen in the face, so that the people can recognize him.

 

Or maybe it's some kind of perversion based on fantasy Illlustration...

[MarioTani]

Originally posted by mudpyr8

Where you run aground however is when you have magically lightened materials.

 

Why? I believe to usesomething like:

 

Lighter /heavier Armor co or for augmented DEF or a multiplier of the weight

 

Less /More Restrictive Armor, +/-1 on the penalty

 

it should work... but I've yet to test it

[Legendsmiths]

That's fine, but I guess it depends on the amount of realism you seek and the lengths to which you are willing to go to acheive it.

 

Certainly, a uniform area affect attack would affect all parts of the body equally... hardly a fun thing to game. I've done it before, in GURPS, and pretty much any significant blast left an undamaged, but limbless, armored torso.

 

I like my games a little more heroic, hence why I'm playing Hero.

 

If you want to do a true average, do the following:

 

Look at the armor chart in FH for DEF 4, which has a mass of 10 kg. This basically gives you the % contribution of any location. So, if a location has a mass of 4.75 kg, then it is 47.5% of the armor's DEF. Multiply actual DEF of that location by this percentage and add them up.

 

This avoids the mass or magic armor issue by determining the average DEF from all contributing pieces.