PvP - Getting Hit Mechanically vs. Realistically/RP-Wise

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

Alright.  I'm bringing this up cause of a PvP I was in, and lost.  But, it might help for others to think about this.

Fighter A and Fighter B get mad at eachother and A threatens B over something B said.  A and B go to the Arena to fight.

A is the better "fighter" (Fgt/Wm), B is...  (Rog/Fgt).  Forget feats and Such (like Epic Dodge >.>).  But, B has on a "shirt"  with +3 Soak 10 Damage.  A's greatsword smack him in the chest/head/arm but its only +2 so no mechanical damage, and this happens and happens and blah blah blah.

A loses.  (me)

Now the question.  Whats the realism of that?  No broken bones, bruises, anything on B's side.  A got ruined.  In an RP sense, I would Imagine even getting hit would hurt in some way/shape/form.

Why do I ask?  Cause it's an RP server, and I woulda imagines two skilled fighters having a real throw down, not a one sided ....  whatever you call that...

Any comments, thoughts... ?  Dms?

[miltonyorkcastle]

Magic... it's a... ahem... yeah... magic has the ability to make an awesome warrior look like a ninny (in this case, the magic of the clothing)... why do you think 90% of dwarves at least distrust magic if they don't outright hate it?

If you want to imagine what the fight might have looked like "close" up with all the effects our game can't render: Shiff's sword is bouncing off an almost invisible barrier before ever reaching ..err, B.... the barrier only becoming slightly visible as Shiff tries to break through it. "B" would have felt nothing as he was never actually hit.

Of course, that's only one way to imagine it. One way or the other, the magic absorbed Shiff's attacks so "B"s body didn't have to.

P.S. Advice from one killer to another: Before you throw down discover your opponents weaknesses so you can exploit them; don't trust your own strength.

[Gulnyr]

The way I see it, hit points represent more than just how many cuts you can take.  They are also a measure of training and endurance.  The tougher you are, the more hits you can take and keep going.  The better your training, the less "X points of damage" really hurt you.  The better your endurance, the longer you can last in a fight, keeping up your guard properly to deflect or dodge or whatever you do.  It's an abstraction and doesn't always make perfect sense, but it works well enough.

Damage that causes hit point loss is meaningful damage.  If a magical shirt prevents some weapons from doing damage, then the wearer isn't being meaningfully hurt.  They may be sore later, but at that moment there's no real problem.  Think of football pads.  There are people slamming into each other, and that probably should hurt, and they may be sore later, but right then on the field they are fine.

So, in my opinion, Fighter B may be tired and sore from the exertion, and may have a few minor bruises or such that don't really cause any difficulties or pain (y'know, for color, if you like that stuff), but didn't lose any hit points so didn't suffer broken bones or serious bruises or major wounds of any sort.  He was fine.  Magic is wonderful like that.

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

Then Explain Adamantium or Cobalt Or Mithril...  Or the leathers?  I always saw the metal armors as too hard and taking some of the blow, and the Dire Bear or whatever as too tough to really get through.  Think about it.  A suit of armor made of dragon skin isnt tough from magic, its tough cause dragon skin IS harder then hell...  But hey, if I smack you with a tree and your i Addy Full Plate, yer GONNA move, even if the armor takes all the damageg

[miltonyorkcastle]

Actually, unless Ed tells me otherwise (and he just might. I'm still learning how dragons work in Layo), dragonskin is magical, as dragons are inherently magical creatures.

As for the non-magical armors, or reinforced clothing, you're right. They "take" some of the blow. But in the case you cited, that's exactly what the magic is doing: taking some of the blow. In essence, it's "too hard", just like adamantium is too hard, for many physical attacks to break through.

When a mage casts Shield or Mage Armor, they are literally placing a hard, invisible barrier around them that are designed to absorb or deflect physical blows.

[Gulnyr]

In a way, the training and endurance concepts of hit points are much more important than the cuts concept.  It's a fantasy world, but there's nothing magic about flesh, really.  A good chop with an axe and you're done, right?

So, a hit doesn't necessarily mean that a wound was caused; it could be that it happened to hit the shield or deflect off the armor.  The defender "spent" some hit points to reflect his training, moving with the blow to reduce its effectiveness, getting just a bit more tired with the maneuver.  That's a hit mechanically, though, and hit points are lost.  

Adding fancy materials just makes it easier to avoid taking damage.  They combine with training to make the combatant "tougher."  Blades slide off more easily and arrows have more trouble penetrating.  Add magic and anything is possible.

[osxmallard]

Why is a greatsword hitting for less than 10 damage?

[ycleption]

I waffle between the magic explanation and a more RLish one...
Think of some historical examples...
When attacking the Aztecs, Cortés got a locally made tightly woven cloth armor because it stopped arrows better than the European steel armors.
In one of the British colonial uprisings (can't remember which) The Brits complained their swords couldn't cut through the wool jerkins the peasants wore.
Just because metal full plate is mechanically much stronger than leathers and cloth armors doesn't mean that a well-made lighter armor can't stop blows. We don't have much experience with thick leathers and cloth garments nowadays, so we tend not to think of it though.
As far as the reinforced clothing, maybe the damage reduction is kevlarish... spreads the force of a cutting blow across the wearer, so you're right, it's still going to hurt, but you aren't going to be able to cut someone wearing them in half.
And if you don't buy that, there's always the "it's magic" explanation :-)

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

The Magic Explanation is for those that don't have a brain like you Clepy  

But seriously, I agree more with Cleppy here then anything "magical"...

I dont see Kobal Casting Shield on his Mithril Armor when he makes it.  Lord of the Rings is a great example.  Mithril "Light as a feather, Hard as Dragonscales" stops a huge spear from stabbing Frodo, but KNOCKS HIM OUT in the process.  Sure it didnt go throw him, but he still got hit with all that Force.  Every wear kevlar and get shot?  It still freakin Hurts, even if you arent gonna die.

[Filatus]

Ahh, but Frodo got KD'd!

[Gulnyr]

The Frodo example is an excellent "real life" fluff-text conversion of the mechanics of damage reduction.  Frodo's low level, but wearing this fancy-pants armor.  The spear would normally have killed him (or anyone, probably - spear through the chest, ouch.  Even King Arthur died that way), but the damage was reduced so that he was only knocked out (zero hit points) and was able to recover.

[Fatherchaos]

As was mentioned earlier, and is often brought up in various other forms of discussion for DnD, hit points are less a direct representation of how much direct physical punishment one can take in combat and is more representative of the overall combat dance. Essentially, ever traded blow, parry, miss, glancing shot, dodge, roll, etc., is what Hit points are truly representative of.

Of course this all falls apart when sitting at the table and scoring "a hit" or observing another avatar poke your avatar squarely in vulnerable places. From my perspective, I would assume that character A hit character B a few times - glancing blows, sliding past a parry, etc. - but was never able to successfully penetrate the armor. At most, character B then got nudged about due to his protective armor, the likes character A might have never seen.

Before I forget, don't forget your dicebag - you could always do a called shot to the face which tends to generally be rather unprotected by copious amounts of semi-magical chain mail. Face, hands, exposed tail, all are fair game if you play it smart. You may want to dicebag future pvp combat - ignoring potentially event breaking things such as + x / soak Y - but that's all between the combatants. I don't think the mechanical nature of NWN's combat system was designed for anything more efficent in pvp then to measure one's electronic-pencil.

For me, pvp is a dicebag only affair. It gives both sides to properly act with their characters abilities.

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

Balin's Tomb - The Lord of the Rings

Ignore the Bad music, but towards the end you see my example.  Frodo gets hit with a HUGE spear and gets only knocked down and out.  (not up )  Aragorn even says "That Spear would have skewered a wild Boar" so don't tell me getting hit "and living"  Doesn't hurt.

[Filatus]

If Tolkien had respected lvl requirements, Frodo wouldn't have been able to wear that mithril chain shirt. Just an example of an unbalanced magic world. Enough said.. *shifty*

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

Shut Up Hardy, he got the Group XP for Pwning the Ringwraiths AND the Balrog, AND a HORDE of Orcs!

Plus the Quest Reward Bonus for "Epic Battle"

[Falonthas]

hmm one sided where one fighter gets ruins and the other doesnt have a scratch

id call that wolverine in the cage fights in xmen 1

shiff have you been fighting  mutants?

the b fighter should have shown some fatigue from the fight even if he didnt have a scratch just to make it more realistic

he may have thrashed you  but i bet it took a while

[miltonyorkcastle]

I think what Gulnyr is explaining and what we're saying about items or magic taking part of the blow needs to be pulled together (which may very well be what Gulnyr is trying to do anyway).

The way I see HP is, if it hurts, you use up HP. It doesn't have to be an actual wound, like Gulnyr suggests, but if the blow is good enough, you must use some manner of extra effort to prevent yourself from being skewered. That extra effort hurts, but the pain of the bodily strain is worth it if you prevent your own death.

In the case of magic or exceptional armor, some or all of the attack may be absorbed/deflected without causing the wearer pain/effort. In other words, no HP loss, because they didn't have to summon physical effort to protect themselves. Something else did the work. Of course, now we could get into armor damage that doesn't happen in NWN, but when it comes to magic, you're not going to have that damage anyway.

When Frodo took the hit and passed out, he lost HP. The mithril may have prevented him from being entirely skewered, but his own body also absorbed a great deal of the blow. In the case of Shiff and the magic shirt, "B"s body wasn't absorbing any of the blow unless Shiff did more damage than the Magic barrier could contain.

P.S. knowing who you were up against, I suspect the real issue was AC, not the DR from that "shirt." In which case "B" was simply too quick for Shiff to hit.

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

Shiff's AB is +29, and "B" Ac he told me was 36?  I didnt Roll less then 7 every time...

[Gulnyr]

What are you arguing, exactly, Shiff?  That people should act hurt when they aren't?  You seem to have gotten defensive suddenly about what should or shouldn't hurt, though I could just be misreading.  

Act hurt all you want, I say.  I don't think anyone will be upset.  I won't.  The next time a giant hits your character, stop fighting and fall down from the tremendous power behind that blow.  Probably good stuff, really.  Nice RP.  I would cheer that as excellent, once, even as I thought you were kind of a dufus.  And twice, there would be no more "kind of" and I would be rolling my eyes instead of cheering, probably.  It's easy to overdo that kind of stuff.

Magic is magic, in the end, and there can't be any requirement for people to act hurt in a world where having a single hit point remaining leaves you just as dangerous and capable as you were when you started fighting.  There are only abstractions, and nothing will be perfectly sensible within the system.  

I've been on hit points so much because I think you have to know what they represent before you can understand how something might not hurt in a 'real life' consideration of the events.  Milt's rehash is a good one.

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

The armor of B, who was Tobias btw (not using epic dodge), had on Master Adventurer's Armor with +3 Soak 10 Whatever Damage Reduction. I'm talking about If I smack him with a Freaking Tree, He's gonna feel it, even if he aint bleeding.