Jump to content

One person versus a starship?


lendrick

Recommended Posts

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Or another tangent. How much rED does Modern Armor REALLY have.

Probably quite a bit compared to metal armor, except where electricity is concerned. It's funny how most of our gaming mythology causes people in metal armor to be extremely vulnerable to electricity. While being a good conductor might make you more prone to being hit by lightning (you providing an easier path than other candidates), if I was going to be hit by a large electrical shock anyway I'd certainly rather be encased in a big metal skin that'd likely conduct the current away from my internals and directly to the ground.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 76
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Both of these points are untrue. While medieval steel was in general, not as good quality as modern steel - and certainly not as consistent - the best smiths were able to generate steel of hardness similar to modern steel. You're also wrong about thickness: the classic works on the subject of medival armour penetration (at least in English) are Hardy and Williams. Hardy measured multiple breastplates from the 14th and 15th century and found that the average was 2.3-3.2 mm, median for center front 2.8 mm. Williams measured different armours including a number of earlier suits and found they ranged from 1.5-2.5 mm, with a 2.1 mm median. so the median for armours was actually almost twice the thickness you suggest was the maximum (that's for Breastplates: Cuisees and guardbraces were typically thinner, Armets and simlar helmets significantly thicker).

 

If you are inteesed in the topic, I can recommend Robett Hardy's Longbow: A Social and Military History and Alan Williams The Knight and the Blast Furnace: A History of the Metallurgy of Armour in the Middle Ages and Early Modern period.

 

Edit - oh and as an aside, a musket generates about 3000 J of energy at muzzle - more than most modern small arms. The advantage of a modern assault rifle is not greater penetrating power (it doesn't, in fact, have that) but finer machining and consistently performing ammo, meaning much better accuracy, much, much lighter weight, faster firing and reloading times and ammo that you can carry around without sweating too much about it getting damp. Indeed, these advantages (apart from the ammo) are why the assault rifle replaced the much more powerful and longer ranged bolt action rifles in the first place. It's about utility, not KE.

 

 

 

Which means in fact that pulp era bullet proof vests were in fact the same thickness as the better quality medieval armour ...

 

 

 

How do you figure that? The thickness overlaps and the quality of the old pulp era bulletproof vests - often using metal that was poorly tempered, if it was tempered at all - was not a great deal better than the medieval/renaissance equivalent. Of the suits measured by Williams about 10% were of medium carbon content, heat tempered with less than 0.4% slag. These had VPH (Vickers Pyramidal Hardness) of 366-374, giving resistance to penetration about 50% greater than modern mild steel. Of course, it fair to mention that about 40% of the armour of the lower class troops he measured was simply iron, with VPN of 130-175 and perhaps half the ability to resist penetration of modern mild steel.

 

Still we can do better than that: Williams and Krenz did a series of calculations on the energy used to make dents in proofed armour. These vary widely (as does the armour: I notice that in one case the breastplate here is 7.7 mm thick! More than 4 times your supposed maximum, though to be fair, it's renaissance rather than medieval). Still, we can see that the stopping power of some of these armours was well in excess of 700 joules - not enough to stop a Casull, but probably enough to stop the bullet from a .357 magnum at close range. Though not all medieval armour was of that quality ... some of it without doubt was.

 

I'm not trying to suggest that medieval style armour is an effective substitute for modern body armour - clearly it isn't! For a start, modern rifles would blow clean through the best medieval armour even at decent ranges (the good ol' Lee Enfeld - my first rifle - generates 3000+ joules at muzzle: more than enough to defeat any of these armours). But you are underestimating the effectiveness of these, many of which are demonstrably good enough to stop modern handguns and some carbines. That suggests that modern weapons should get AP for free versus older armour of this type: that'd model reality closely enough for a working solution.

 

cheers, Mark

 

Sorry to disagree.

 

Hardy & Williams were dealing with Jousting Armor, not field armor. Measurements of field plate at the Higgins Museum in Worchester MA are where I got my figures.

Having worn 16 gauge steel plate (SCA) and having worn flak vest plus full pack (army) I can assure you plate of over 2 mm thickness (steel) would not allow a man to vault onto his horse, which was one of the critical tests for knighthood.

 

Kinetic energy is NOT all that matters for penetration. To really get into why is beyond scope of this forum, but if you look at actual test data you will quickly see that energy is only a small part. (FMJ bullets penetrate much better than lead balls.)

Modern rifles do have much more penetration than any black powder musket.

 

And hardness is not all that matters for armor. Pre-industrial revolution steel was generally much weaker in strength (both yield and tensile) and had lower toughness than modern steel. The 0.25" number for minimum steel to stop small arms assumes structural steel, which is not hardened, but is very tough.

 

If you have a source for tests of medieval (either actual or recreation) armor being able to resist modern firearms, please give the source. I have never seen one, and would have GR8 difficulty believing it if I did read it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Probably quite a bit compared to metal armor' date=' except where electricity is concerned. It's funny how most of our gaming mythology causes people in metal armor to be extremely vulnerable to electricity. While being a good conductor might make you more prone to being hit by lightning (you providing an easier path than other candidates), if I was going to be hit by a large electrical shock anyway I'd certainly rather be encased in a big metal skin that'd likely conduct the current away from my internals and directly to the ground.[/quote']

 

Heh. That's always been one of my beefs as well - being grounded (not through your body) is a good thing vs elecricity.

 

cheers, Mark

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

If I do 20 BODY damage to all the hexes of a planet-sized, megascale area some things might still survive, but what will they be standing on? If the Hulk was on Aldebaran, he would be floating in an asteroid field with no atmosphere left. HERO nukes and planet killers are dopey, and prompt the kind of DEF/DC escalation that chases its own tail until it is dizzy.

 

Weapons evolve in design to the point where they will kill their target effectively but no more. There is no impetus to "kill it a lot," nothing that has any widespread, mass-produced effect. Accurate applied force is almost always preferable to more raw power. If your shot blows right on through the target, what if there is something you wanted unharmed on the other side? You either hesitate or start dealing out the collateral damage.

 

Starships normally have the same vulnerability as battleships; if you let the outside in it usually works as well as destroying it outright. You don't have to annihilate the ship, just hole it. Now if you want that kind of total disintegration special effect and avoid the unpleasantness of vacuum exposure, just ramp up the resilience of the Life Support and sealant tech then the ships do have to knock each other to bits.

 

Like most games, figure out the maximum DC potential of your players' characters (and also their potential characters because at least one player will always want to redesign/reincarnate as the most damage-inflicting that your game will allow) and adjust the armor accordingly. You should avoid Stormtrooper armor that can't stop rocks throw by Ewoks but you also don't have spaceships brought down by Wookiees with strongbows. Unless, of course, that is what you want.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Sorry to disagree.

 

Hardy & Williams were dealing with Jousting Armor, not field armor.

 

Sorry, but that's not correct. In their analysis of battle armours, Hardy and Williams were both - very specifically - NOT dealing with jousting armour, which they discuss seperately (in Wiliam's case) and not really at all (in Hardy's case).

 

Measurements of field plate at the Higgins Museum in Worchester MA are where I got my figures.

 

Then your memory is faulty, on this point. I've been to the Higgins too: it's a nice collection, if somewhat small (Williams measured nearly twice as many harnesses for his analysis as they have their entire collection and his figures overlap with those of Hardy). Indeed, Williams used some of the suits in the Higgins for his study (for example, the Italian Harness called "Accession Number: 2607"). However even so, your figures are wrong - I still have the exhibit catalogue from our visit. The "Tapulbrust" breastplate from around 1540 has a thickness of 2.1 mm. An unnamed breastplate (just called "Accession Number: 145.c") from Germany of about the same era has a frontal thickness of 2.8 mm, up towards the top end of the scale (It's pretty durn heavy too, though not the heaviest in the collection). So the figures clearly exceed your earlier guess, even without a complete listing.

 

Note that I am only looking at the medieval/renaissance suits here: many of the suits in the Higgins are reproductions from the 19th and early 20th century, so are not necessarily accurate (the kid's armour,for example, that so many people like). I also was not counting the ceremonial armors and jousting armours which are respectively lighter and heavier than battle armor.

 

Having worn 16 gauge steel plate (SCA) and having worn flak vest plus full pack (army) I can assure you plate of over 2 mm thickness (steel) would not allow a man to vault onto his horse' date=' which was one of the critical tests for knighthood.[/quote']

 

Actually, it was not a critical test of knighthood - that's an old fairy tale, though you still run into it in the SCA. Remember, that traditions varied widely from time to time and place to place. As did the age at which knighthood was granted. Some boys became knights as young as 6 and I doubt very much they were vaulting onto a destrier in armour. In fact the armoured jump was considered "a very manlie feat" but was neither required, nor as far as we can work out, common: that was the whole point. That said, I have seen a professional re-enactor from MHS jump, perform somersaults and head stands in armour heavier than that you describe. Don't assume that because you can't do it, that nobody can.

 

And some suits of armour that we know were use din battle weighed as much as 42 kg. I agree you wouldn't be vaulting anywhere in those. And yet they exist (and in quite sizable numbers in the armoury at Graz: they were production models, not one-offs). Your argument thus becomes - those suits of armour can't possibly exist, because you can't vault in them! They do exist. We just have to deal with that.

 

Kinetic energy is NOT all that matters for penetration. To really get into why is beyond scope of this forum, but if you look at actual test data you will quickly see that energy is only a small part. (FMJ bullets penetrate much better than lead balls.)

Modern rifles do have much more penetration than any black powder musket

.

 

Agreed with this (with the exception of the point about penetration - that's dependant on target and circumstance: which is why you can't simply make a blanket statement). Still, KE is apparently the most important factor when it comes to penetrating, but it's not the only one (round composition, footprint, etc). However the point being made is that we can see that period armour did stop bullets that had far more energy - at point of impact - than modern handguns can generate. Which really makes no sense if you assume that the armour gives 1 PD. We also know that muskets - which contemporaries thought would defeat 95% of all armour - can generate around 3000 J, comparable to modern rifles. Again, the only consistent argument is that good quality medieval armour would provide decent protection against smaller firearms and little against rifles. That sounds more like 3 or 4 PD than 1 to me.

 

And hardness is not all that matters for armor. Pre-industrial revolution steel was generally much weaker in strength (both yield and tensile) and had lower toughness than modern steel. The 0.25" number for minimum steel to stop small arms assumes structural steel, which is not hardened, but is very tough.

 

If you have a source for tests of medieval (either actual or recreation) armor being able to resist modern firearms, please give the source. I have never seen one, and would have GR8 difficulty believing it if I did read it.

 

If I had one, I would have posted it :). The closest we have is the old mild steel bullet proof armour which we know was

1) reliably able to stop bullets from handguns and carbines, but not the heaviest handguns or rifles

2) of similar thickness and lower quality than the best medieval/renaissance plate (though to be fair, better quality than the bulk of medieval armours)

 

You keep making statements "Pre-industrial revolution steel was generally much weaker in strength (both yield and tensile) and had lower toughness than modern steel" - yet when presented with figures showing higher toughness for the best medieval armour simply repeat it. Cites, man, cites! Where's your data? We have data - and I have cited it - using modern toughness and tensile strength measurements that directly contradicts your belief.

 

cheers, Mark

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Probably quite a bit compared to metal armor' date=' except where electricity is concerned. It's funny how most of our gaming mythology causes people in metal armor to be extremely vulnerable to electricity. While being a good conductor might make you more prone to being hit by lightning (you providing an easier path than other candidates), if I was going to be hit by a large electrical shock anyway I'd certainly rather be encased in a big metal skin that'd likely conduct the current away from my internals and directly to the ground.[/quote']

 

Heh. That's always been one of my beefs as well - being grounded (not through your body) is a good thing vs elecricity.

 

cheers, Mark

 

I've notice the guys who do the music with Tesla Coils all seem to be wearing chain mail:

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Probably quite a bit compared to metal armor' date=' except where electricity is concerned. It's funny how most of our gaming mythology causes people in metal armor to be extremely vulnerable to electricity. While being a good conductor might make you more prone to being hit by lightning (you providing an easier path than other candidates), if I was going to be hit by a large electrical shock anyway I'd certainly rather be encased in a big metal skin that'd likely conduct the current away from my internals and directly to the ground.[/quote']

 

of course ED is more than just Electricity damage. IT's also fire/heat damage and I imagine that metal armor would be pretty decent vs Heat and fire. For electricity, it may not be that transparent. People don't wear the metal armor next to their skin, there is usually some sort of quilted cloth between the armor and the skin. So depending on how much moisture that that cloth has and whether or not the person is standing on the ground. The electricity may just go right to ground without damaging the person inside. Remember Electricity always finds the easiest path to ground.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

of course ED is more than just Electricity damage. IT's also fire/heat damage and I imagine that metal armor would be pretty decent vs Heat and fire. For electricity' date=' it may not be that transparent. People don't wear the metal armor next to their skin, there is usually some sort of quilted cloth between the armor and the skin. So depending on how much moisture that that cloth has and whether or not the person is standing on the ground. The electricity may just go right to ground without damaging the person inside. Remember Electricity always finds the easiest path to ground.[/quote']

 

I can tell from experience that your quilted coat can become just soaked with sweat after a few hours of wearing armor and fighting.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

of course ED is more than just Electricity damage. IT's also fire/heat damage and I imagine that metal armor would be pretty decent vs Heat and fire. For electricity' date=' it may not be that transparent. People don't wear the metal armor next to their skin, there is usually some sort of quilted cloth between the armor and the skin. So depending on how much moisture that that cloth has and whether or not the person is standing on the ground. The electricity may just go right to ground without damaging the person inside. Remember Electricity always finds the easiest path to ground.[/quote']

And a layer of metal is going to be the easiest path to the ground, sweaty underclothes or not. But I disagree that metal armor would be decent protection against heat or cold. THAT is the case where your (hopefully dry) underclothes will be your only real protection. The metal will simply and quickly conduct the heat right through, in whichever direction we are talking about. That's why I said earlier that modern ceramic/organic would be better protection against energy attacks EXCEPT where electricity is concerned. For LASERs I'm not sure, at least where the metal armor is highly polished. Without data, I'd say it would be a toss-up between metal's reflectivity vs. ceramic/organic materials' insulation (requiring more time and energy to burn through).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Compared to comparable amounts of non-metalic materials, metals actually take a small amount of time to heat up. Metal has high conductivity and low heat capacity, almost by definition. Now in all, some metals might be able to become hotter than other substances because they don't burn or melt until they reach very high temperatures, but that doesn't make them good protection against heat or cold.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

I think you'll find knights used a lot of different HTH weapons in period' date=' including maces, flails, war hammers, picks, swords, and so on. The standard sword was popular because it did a lot of things fairly well (cut, slash, stab, and so on) while many other weapons only did one thing very well. Swords also have a rough cruciform shape, which is a big plus for those of a religious bent. And there was a certain mystic to them. Also, one could wear a sword at the belt far easier than anything else, so it was easy to keep one with you at all times.[/quote']

 

Well...sure, they kept the outdated sword so they could slaughter unamored foes....when they needed to fight a kinight they used weapons that would be effective......as for the cruciform...I don't know if that was invented by hollywood or not....many a knight used a falcion back in the day....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Well...sure' date=' they kept the outdated sword so they could slaughter unamored foes....when they needed to fight a kinight they used weapons that would be effective......as for the cruciform...I don't know if that was invented by hollywood or not....many a knight used a falcion back in the day....[/quote']

 

Oddly enough, swords are remarkably effective against even other knights when you add the weight of a charging warhorse into the mass equation. Granted, on foot it takes a measure of work and skill to take down someone in full harness with a sword, but having studied a bit of ARMA style 15th C German Longsword I can say with confidence they knew how to do it to each other. In any case, while Heavy Cav was the traditional counter to Heavy Cav for many years, even during that period most of the heavy cav spent most of it's time running down footmen, and when they were facing their opposite numbers the lance was the primary weapon anyway.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Well...sure' date=' they kept the outdated sword so they could slaughter unamored foes....when they needed to fight a kinight they used weapons that would be effective......as for the cruciform...I don't know if that was invented by hollywood or not....many a knight used a falcion back in the day....[/quote']

 

I think you'll find the development of the cut-and-thrust sword to be part of the answer to armor. Also, a sword can be used for attack and defense for better than most other weapons. Finally, the sword was never "outdated," it changed and evolved along with armor, and was one of the few weapons to never go out of style.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Oddly enough' date=' swords are remarkably effective against even other knights when you add the weight of a charging warhorse into the mass equation. Granted, on foot it takes a measure of work and skill to take down someone in full harness with a sword, but having studied a bit of ARMA style 15th C German Longsword I can say with confidence they knew how to do it to each other. In any case, while Heavy Cav was the traditional counter to Heavy Cav for many years, even during that period most of the heavy cav spent most of it's time running down footmen, and when they were facing their opposite numbers the lance was the primary weapon anyway.[/quote']

 

And those footmen, in a square, with pole weapons, were the equal of calvary.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Some random comments on a number of items.

 

Kevlar would probably provide pretty decent ED at least against heat based attacks. Kevlar is used in a lot of fire resistant clothing including firefighters turnouts.

 

Metal armor certainly could give good protection from electricity, power company linesmen have lightweight chainmail suits they wear when working on live high voltage lines.

 

Modern body armor is much more resistant to knives and arrows than it was in the 80s. The older body armor was notoriously weak against narrow bladed weapons like ice picks, it was also basically only good for one shot, since the kevlar sheets were often displaced on bullet impact. It was supposed to be very effective against slashing weapons.

 

In the 90s there were many improvements dealing with these issues, the sheets were bonded together which made them more effective against multiple impacts, this also provided better protection against stabbing weapons. Corrections armor was available with a thin "chain mail" layer to add even more protection from ice pick like weapons (shanks). The older vests were often just front & back panels with unarmored sides, the later armor usually added side panels leaving the arm pits as the only weak points.

 

How much better is the new armor against non-bullets? I would guess it is far more resistant but it would probably still be a fair ruling to give stabbing weapons armor piercing against it. The hard body armor used by the military is probably just as tough against an arrow as a bullet, since it uses steel, polycarb and / or ceramic plates.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Well...sure' date=' they kept the outdated sword so they could slaughter unamored foes....when they needed to fight a kinight they used weapons that would be effective......as for the cruciform...I don't know if that was invented by hollywood or not....many a knight used a falcion back in the day....[/quote']

 

Actually a falchion was not considered "a knight's sword". It was a weapon of the retinue. A knight might have used one when there wa sheavy chopping to be done, just as he used a poleaxe, but if he was a gentle knight he'd almost certainly have what people of the time called "a knight's sword" - what we'd call today a long sword or bastard sword. The cruciform part is not a hollywood addition - it's mentioned in contemporary poems, and period swords sometimes have crosses or even crucifixions engraved or enamelled on the guard and blade.

 

And swords never became outdated. It wasn't the weapon of choice when facing multiple heavily-armoured foes, but as noted, using the point, you could still harm or even kill a knight in full harness. Also, we tend to underestimate the skill of people who had practiced their whole lives with the damn things. Knight demonstrated that they were quite capable - in combat - of sticking the point through tiny gaps: for example, a vizor slit to stab their opponent in the face, even when wearing a closed helm. When Jacques Lalaing fought Diego de Guzman at Valladolid, Lalaing “struck three blows, one after the other, within the eyeslots of Diego, in this way: he wounded him in three places in the face…the first stroke on the left eyebrow, the next on the bottom of the forehead on the right side, and the third beneath the right eye….”. It has been suggested by some historians that since this was a "friendly contest" and since the odds of missing the eye when stabbing through the eyeslot are actually relatively small, that Lalaing was not only good enough to stick his point through the sights on the helmet, but good enough to do so, while deliberately avoiding the eye. In other words, he was all like "Hah! Could have taken your eyes, if I wanted!". It wasn't a fluke - the day before he had taken two unnamed french knights out of the tourney by stabbing them in the face as well.

 

Last of all, the knight's sword wasn't just a weapon. It was a signal of status. Knights went on wearing swords (indeed, for formal occasions members of select orders of knighthood still do) long after their battlefield utility. In real life, weapons are not all about maximizing your dice of damage! :)

 

cheers, Mark

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Bane of cavalry' date=' sure. Equal? not even close. A pike square was awesome at holding ground and absolutely useless for scouting and attacks deep behind the lines.[/quote']

 

I mean in a fight. If a square of pike and polearms didn't break, they could hold off any charge. You can't force a horse through a mass of man if it doesn't want to go, it's not a car after all. Of course, the issue was holding one's ground, and trusting everyone else to do so as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Re: One person versus a starship?

 

Any charge is a huge exaggeration. But it's true the amount of work and sacrifice needed to break the line was quite significant. If you were among the first horseman to arrive at those pikes' date=' the odds of survival weren't very promising.[/quote']

 

This extends to the Napoleonic era as well. John Keegan in The Face of Battle mentions French dragoons charging British squares, wheeling to one side, discharging pistols, and then racing away. If the square remained a square and held its ground, it was "safe" (this being a relative term.) Lose your nerve, break, and run, and the horsemen were all over you. Of course, this was also the era where it was considered unmanly to dodge cannon balls bouncing across the battlefield....

 

Which means that a square of pikemen, backed by muskets, can hold off a starship... provided they remain together and don't run off. ^_^

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...