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Post by derv on Jun 14, 2015 18:24:43 GMT -6
I am not taking issue with weapon class. I understand that you have already agreed to the primacy of initiative, but it needs to be emphasized that in CM one hit is a kill. The pike has a 42% chance of killing an opponent on the first round every time except when facing a knight (plate armor or armed with lance). Yes, based on the weapon class and the kill value. The kill value is based on historical precedence while considering weapon class, which is directly tied to initiative. I disagree, the table presents no such assumptions. Though the assumption could be made for certain weapons such as the lance. The delineation (going back to you original proposition) is the reason why different kill numbers exist against unarmored men. That's exactly right. The table establishes an averaged probability based on historical precendence of what would be commonly encountered. Yes, there is alot of variation in skill accounted for. That's why I'm arguing it is a unified system.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 14, 2015 20:42:54 GMT -6
You've obviously got an axe to grind. Do you actually read these posts..? Yes, I do, carefully multiple times. The fact that you refused to answer a simple, direct question leads me to the conclusion that no, you've never played CHAINMAIL and you are 'white boxing' the whole thing.
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Post by cooper on Jun 14, 2015 21:42:37 GMT -6
I think its possible that the morale rules are shouldering some of the burden that say, Thac0 and hit points, will later carry in D&D as better trained fighters, in a group setting, have stronger morale and therefore greater ability to kill. Sepulchre is right that a peasant and a knight both wield a pike with similar results in the MtM rules. Also, of course, there is some differentiation between leaders and heroes and men with magic arms and armor getting better better rolls on the MtM table. The MtM table is more fine grained to be sure, but not so fine grained as to be able to tell the difference between a trained knight and a peasant, the granularity is only so fine as to distinguish truly vast differences as between those between a hero of legend and a normal man, between Excalibur and a blacksmiths blade.
However, I believe the main tool used to create a difference between a trained knight and a peasant is the armory, not the probability table. Under almost no circumstances would a peasant be wearing plate armor. So it is the armor itself which acts as a sort of "attack matrix"; to paraphrase from men and magic "subsuming the power and ferocity of the character; the wearer of plate armor is de facto the trained and more ferocious fighter.
And isn't that actually more historically accurate? Knights were not ninjas or mythic members of King Arthur's round table, they were men and men who could be killed by other men. Men who could die to a woman or a child, as any of us can be killed, with a well placed blow. this is why armor is so important in real life; so it makes sense, within the game, for armor, not "level" or "skill" to determine who dies in melee. If you put a peasant, a fit man in his prime, but untrained in plate armor against a nobleman in his bed clothes, that nobleman is probably going to die. Tony Stark is nothing without his iron man suit!
So a peasant with a dagger can only kill a trained knight on a roll of 12*, whereas the knight can kill the peasant with his dagger on a roll of 6. In effect, the trained knight has a better "thac0"; Their difference in martial training is not large enough to represent on the table. In the medieval world, like our world, wealth is the true power; the wealth to have a suit of armor.
*once the peasant knocks that uppity knight off his high horse (literally and figuratively) he will kill on a 7.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Jun 14, 2015 22:14:57 GMT -6
I generally agree with the sentiment that better armor implies more money, implies higher social class, implies better combat-training/fighting-skill. But I don't necessarily agree with this: If you put a peasant, a fit man in his prime, but untrained in plate armor against a nobleman in his bed clothes, that nobleman is probably going to die. If we're assuming the "classic" three-pillars model of medieval society (peasants, clergy, and nobles, who work, pray, and fight, respectively) and that "noble" implies a trained fighter, then I think it's unlikely a peasant in plate armor would kill a noble in his night shirt. I think the peasant would more probably surrender, or try to run away or be killed trying to. But that's just an academic quibble As cooper says; we don't see peasants tilling fields in plate armor, so the game need not account for these.
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Post by cooper on Jun 14, 2015 22:22:10 GMT -6
Peasants, in England at least, weren't obsequious serfs until the Norman's conquered and invaded and even then, the reasons the normans started building castles was fear of the native anglo-saxons. I think people are too impressed by words like "training". Training is really about holding morale in a fight not some fancy combat jujitsu maneuver. A 200lb farmer in a suit of armor is going to crush the skull of the kings best swordsman in his bedclothes. No amount of tilting at jousts or fencing in the yard is going to make enough difference, in real life, to show up on the MtM table. Propaganda I think gets played up too much, even today, concerning combat training. 90% of combat training is being taught to follow orders and being taught not to abandon the strangers next to you (aka taught to treat them as your band of brothers). Air power and modern communication makes the U.S. Army better than ISIS, not the fighting ability of the soldiers. Plate Armor = technology. Tactics of course matter in warfare, but when two men face off all they have is the length of their blade and the coverage of their armor. There are no real life Bravosi Water Dancers, or more accurately, it only matters if the other guy is also a Bravos Water Dancer (Arya's teacher died to a guy in plate armor ). Character levels really are fantasy as is combat training as a representation of the ability to kill. The gun of course, the great equalizer, was really an equalizer because of its ubiquity and how cheap, relatively speaking, to produce and the effect it had to make worthless the expensive protection provided by armor. But that only highlights how overwhelming the importance of armor was compared to any one mans skill with fighting. Interestingly enough, J.R.R. Martin more often than not shows the reality of this, which is why his world is so brutal, there are no levels and hit points and skills protecting characters. Only armor. So the next question is, all things being equal, how do you show the difference in skill between two men in plate armor wielding swords? Well, that's where D&D and strength scores and constitution and level and proficiency and weapon specialization all start to create a real granularity. Of course the knight with a 18/23 strength double specialized in the long sword is at an advantage over the peasant with a 13 strength and no proficiency in it, but that's a level of granularity not extant in CHAINMAIL.
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 15, 2015 1:43:29 GMT -6
Derve wrote:
I am aware of this, and it applies for all figures. I am not sure why you are restating it, so please press on...
Your position, if I understand correctly, is the 'kill values' imply who or what type of figure is wielding the weapon. How would one infer or 'guess'? Where we differ then is where the emphasis on training falls; I am suggesting the 'variation in skill' is assumed under the abstraction of morale, you appear to be asserting that emphasis is considered throughout. I don't see this as a tenable position. I understand why you believe this might be so. As it is unclear as to whom is wielding a dagger, an axe, even a sword in some cases (non-noble man-at-arms, a knight, maybe a Norseman) I have to assume the 'kill value' implies a uniform proficiency among all bearing weapons (barring leaders and berserkers being permitted to modify the attack dice).
This again suggests the primacy of initiative for a different yet equally plausible reason than the realism reflected in the weapon class values. It is implied that if the figure is wielding the weapon in the first place, he receives the benefits of its weapon class. It's not about which figure is wielding the weapon, but that the weapon itself is wielded at all. If this were not the case we would be bandying the argument over 'kill values' for weapon class as well. Why press for the variation of skill consideration in the 'kill values' and not weapon class? I am suggesting the unified system is in how combat itself is addressed. It's unity is that proficiency is implied in that any figure is wielding said weapon. The same goes for donning armor, something other games might more finely grain and require a proficiency system. That proficiency or skill is one of the components of morale is true, but morale is a separate albeit complimentary operation to the combat dice in MTM.
Gronanofsimmerya wrote:
The reason I didn't respond, simply is that you are so full of yourself. If you could stand to be objective and carry on a civil dialogue, I would be happy to respond. Take a lesson from our friend, Derv, he appears quite capable.
Waysoftheearth wrote:
Agreed. The problem is the MTM as presented (that is without any combatants to refer to for more information) does not give us any clue what kind of figure is wielding a weapon. One could guess, that is, when looking to the 'kill value' or weapon class for dagger or axe I might be able to infer the wielder, but that would merely be guessing. Armor would be a consideration once we had two combatants to work with, otherwise the variations of skill are assumed under the abstraction of morale. It can be argued that more information can be inferred from the attack dice values in the mass combat table, but that does not bear out on the MTM table.
I, myself, don't see this as a problem. It's rather elegant. I just disagree with the fixed 'kill values' as written.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Jun 15, 2015 5:30:39 GMT -6
I think people are too impressed by words like "training". Training is really about holding morale in a fight not some fancy combat jujitsu maneuver. "Training" is like the difference between participating in a boxing or tennis match, and watching it on TV. Who is more prepared to win the next match--the guy who participated, or the guy who watched it on TV? "Combat training", I would hazard, is more about not being killed than it is about killing
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 15, 2015 9:20:09 GMT -6
Cooper wrote:
Got it now, confusing knight and peasant in my reply - too late when I am responding to posts, thought all of your points to be well-considered.
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Post by derv on Jun 15, 2015 16:51:45 GMT -6
<sigh> I could respond at length, but it seems my points are being misconstrued for exactitude.
I will say that cooper at least has one part of the puzzle. He just needs to think this through to it's logical end.
How are we distinguishing the training and ferocity of our lighter armored Landsknecht, Varangians, Turk Sipahis, etc. when they face this same knight in plate?
They too will have to score a 12 when armed with a dagger or an 11 when armed with a sword.
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 15, 2015 18:06:19 GMT -6
Derve, I don't believe you are talking about 'exactitude', as much as you and I conceptually read the numbers differently.
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Post by cooper on Jun 15, 2015 18:55:07 GMT -6
How are we distinguishing the training and ferocity of our lighter armored Landsknecht, Varangians, Turk Sipahis, etc. when they face this same knight in plate? They too will have to score a 12 when armed with a dagger or an 11 when armed with a sword. I think it is reasonable to say that, despite pop culture to the contrary, all things being equal, a viking warrior would also get his head handed to him by a knight in plate, again, all things being equal, just as tactically, well trained and efficient german barbarian warriors got conquered by roman shield walls. There is a reason new weapons were invented specifically to attack knights in plate or men on horseback. It doesn't matter if you have bruce lee with a dagger or Samwise Gamgee, both are going to need a 12 to get through that plate armor. Tactically, the better warrior will attempt to make the knight prone or attack from higher ground, or start the fight with a longer weapon, but tactics are not what is being asked here. What is being asked is how to be granular enough to differentiate between bruce lee with a dagger and Sam, the answer is at the MtM table level their individual skill doesn't matter enough to show up (well, it does, see below, but only for people like leaders and viking beserkers). If a lighter armored Landsknecht or Turk is really a good enough warrior to make a difference noticable on the table, then that warrior is really a hero unit or at least a leader unit. I have the suspicion people still want to think of an Aragorn-like figure clad in leather defeating some beast in black plate armor. In real life there are no Aragorns or men skilled enough to make more of a difference in hand to hand combat than the weapons and armor they wield and the strategy they use to approach the fight. character skill is a rounding fraction: Plate armor beats unarmored 90.8% better unarmored fighter adjusts the number to 90.2% It's still 90% in favor of the guy in plate. Battlefields are littered with the bones of heroes. In real life tactics matter more than skill. By creating a skill/level based system one reduces the need for tactics because a hero can plunge in and make mistakes and his "skill" "hit points" or what have you will cover the cost of a foolhardy charge or poor choice of weapons. In the real world a tactical mistake (choosing the wrong weapon, losing the high ground, etc) more often than not costs you life. CHAINMAIL is about tactics so this makes sense that the emphasis is on weapons and tactics and player skill, not character skill. Likewise, nobody plays chess where one person has a 3rd level bishop who can flamstrike the other players queen; it would cease to be a game of strategy. Think of how gross the MtM system really is in its numbers. A mounted man is granted a roll of 3d6 instead of 2d6 against an unmounted foe. That translates to a +3. This means that a +3 is a massive, massive, benefit. How much more skilled can a historical man be than another man to equal the benefit of being on the back of a 600lb warhorse? A leader is granted a roll of 2d6+1. This is a veteran fighter (later the 1st level fighter). So the granularity between a normal man and a extremely well trained man is +1. It is not fine grained enough to distinguish a slightly better trained man from another. A good house rule might be "untrained" rolls 2d6-1. So, take a look at a Viking. He attacks with a dagger and he would roll 2d6+2, in effect only needing a 10 or higher to kill a knight in plate armor, but an intelligent man would use a weapon designed to fight plate armor...a mace, with that he would roll 6+ The knight might as well be unarmored because the mace can cause vital damage anywhere it lands (unlike a dagger which literally must find an exposed joint or eye hole). A viking leader would roll 2d6+3, basically he is as powerful as a mounted knight. It looks like there is actually lots of granularity and ability to differentiate skill level, but not so granular as to show the difference between one guy who is 2 inches taller and 30lbs heavier or has 2 more months of training.
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Post by derv on Jun 15, 2015 20:36:54 GMT -6
an intelligent man would use a weapon designed to fight plate armor... BINGO! I knew he'd come around And this is reflected in the probabilities and would be consistent with acceptable understanding of historic accounts. The Landsknecht would be armed with either pike or two handed swords, for example. Not daggers. I'm really not talking about nor trying to advance the idea of character skill. I am trying to say that whether a certain weapon was only used by professional soldiers or whether another weapon was used by both trained and untrained men effected how Gary perceived and then came up with the probabilities. I am not saying Gary did a statistical analysis of weapons during the Middle Ages, either. He eye balled it, then he play tested it until the results met the expectations for the time period.
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 15, 2015 21:01:29 GMT -6
Derve wrote:
Indeed, you are saying this. And it's fair to say if you want an example of someone proficient with a two-handed sword, look no further than the Landsknect. In effect though you are advancing some idea of skill, if not character skill, then skill by troop type which bears the same consequence. This is fine for a two-handed sword, it is problematic for weapons like, dagger, axe, mace and even sword - weapons wielded by both commoner and nobility. Who is being considered when eye-balling a fixed value for the first three weapons, a man of the militia, a light footman, a heavy footman, armored footman? This conception behind how the values are arrived at begins to fall apart the greater the prevalence of these weapons in use is considered. And maybe you're right Gary may have based his consideration of the weapon off a particular troop type, but we have no way of knowing which one, and that matters the greater the prevalence of the weapon's circulation.
That said, though relevant,I believe we are a bit afield of where we started. The point is the fixed values for weapons of various consequence against unarmored opponents are the same. Deciding that a particular troop type is whom Gary drew from to arrive at a 'kill value' does not clarify or resolve the question of why dagger, morning star and two-handed sword are represented by identical values.
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Post by derv on Jun 15, 2015 21:55:41 GMT -6
I can only speculate.
The first two weapons on the table are not usually regarded as primary weapons. My suggestion is to consider the table and look for 7's. That is where I would think Gary's ideal combinations normally lie. It may hint at the type of troop he had in mind.
For example, the hand axe has 7's under no armor and leather. A typical troop type that I associate with the hand axe would be the English Longbowman.
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 15, 2015 22:33:59 GMT -6
Derve:
Sure, and all of us are in that boat if this is how we arrive at the numbers. You're thinking English archers, I'm thinking heavy foot (vikings), maybe light foot (Celtic skirmishers) or even medium foot (footman during the Hundred Years War). Given that, I should also be considering these associations for weapons class, a unified system would mean considering troop type for this abstraction as well. The immediate problem is that our cast of likely suspects is too broad and again I find considering troop type more than once redundant, much like using both weapon factors and variable damage in D&D.
I am tempted to say, just imagine who might wield this weapon with proficiency and there you will find the source for the 'kill values'. After that, call it a day. However, what if my conception of who is wielding a mace is a lowly footman, while Gary's is a trained, but unseasoned knight, a non-veteran? The skill variation included in the morale ratings which is pivotal in mass combat and apparent in the morale dice for MTM becomes rather hard to recognize once we arrive at the MTM combat table with this example.
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Post by derv on Jun 16, 2015 5:28:48 GMT -6
I'm not sure it matters who or what you and I associate with the numbers.
It only helps explain why there is the variations (and apparent similarities) in the target numbers that you questioned in the beginning.
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 16, 2015 10:12:16 GMT -6
With reference to armor type, I am asserting the weapon itself is being considered, while you are advancing a particular wielder is the subject of consideration, both of us are considering the weapon's proficient use (a pointless exercise otherwise) - there is more than a semantic difference here and it goes back to understanding the similarities in 'kill values' and the later differences in weapons factors. Using the unarmored figure as a base, wielding a dagger, a morning star, and two-handed sword with lethal consequence in my opinion should not carry the same probability; moreover why a bardiche should bear a +3 adj, while a two-handed sword and a glaive receive none, all of which are heavy bladed weapons with similar speed factors exceeds my understanding. It doesn't appear to me that 'who are or what I associate with numbers' will 'help to explain' any of these iterations, as you assert above. Again, these disparities are part of the reason why I have stated our associations (like the Landsknect) or skill variations are best revealed by morale and not the combat matrices.
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Post by derv on Jun 16, 2015 15:57:26 GMT -6
If you are using troop types that are historically modelled for the time period when associating them with what's found on the MtM table, what ultimately matters is whether the game consistently produces acceptable outcomes. If Gary did his homework, we should expect representationally historical results.
If the table does not produce what you or I would consider satisfactory outcomes that would be consistent with what we know of the Middle Ages, then I would possibly start by questioning what Gary's source material was. Michael has said on a couple of occasions that Gary's primary influence was C.W.C. Oman's "Art of War in the Middle Ages".
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 16, 2015 20:36:20 GMT -6
Derve wrote: Thanks for the reference and your comments. I will take a look. I own a copy of Stone's A Glossary of the Construction, Decoration and Use of Arms and Armor which Gary has mentioned in both a positive and negative light on a few occasions. Gary's prose in Classic Warfare I imagine reflects quite a bit of Oman's scholarship. Looks like this is easily affordable, will get hold of a copy. In the meantime, for anyone else interested, here is a link for the PDF version (it may take a few minutes to load): The Art of War in the Middle Ages - C.W.C. OmanOrdered and very much enjoying the pdf read while I await the post. Reading how the Varangian guard, serving the Byzantine Emporer Alexius, drove a Norman host of foot and horse into the sea. Yet, due to their brashness impelling them to press ahead of the Byzantine ranks, they were cut off from the main army and surrounded. They took refuge in abandoned church nestled on a knoll above the sea. The Normans gatherered flammables and set the building ablaze, forcing the Varangians out of the sanctuary where they were cut to pieces by archers and cavalry alike. Speaks very much to cooper 's previous post on tactics and mortality.
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Post by derv on Jun 17, 2015 17:51:23 GMT -6
sepulchre, there are actually a couple different versions of Oman's work. The full title of the larger work is A History of the Art of War: The Middle Ages from the 4th to the 14th Century. This can also be found in a 653 page single volume pdf on the Internet Archive that covers the period from 235-1385. The same work in print is usually a two volume set. The first volume covers 378-1278 and is around 608 pages. The second volume covers 1278-1485 and is around 502 pages. I'm not sure why the time spans and page count vary between these versions.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 17, 2015 20:38:09 GMT -6
There's also a single volume abridged paperback.
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Post by sepulchre on Jun 19, 2015 1:40:38 GMT -6
Derve wrote:
Yeah, I noticed this as well, ran with the title you posted for the PDF, but for myself ordered the two volume set.
Found his prose most compelling, spare - yet dramatic, makes for great reading.
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Post by sepulchre on Sept 5, 2015 0:11:24 GMT -6
Waysoftheearth wrote:
Ways just wanted to be sure I understood your point by attempting to restate it first. As both weapons strike an unarmored person on a 6, they are equally likely to slay an opponent, i.e, there is 72% lethality with either weapon. As the dagger is the last weapon to possibly land a telling blow, there is a 28% (the remainder of chances out of 100 - 72 which represents the two-handed sword) the dagger will land a telling blow 85% of the time. The 85% up from 72%, accounts for extra attacks based on weapon class?
C.W.C. Oman's "Art of War in the Middle Ages": Predictably, it has not solved the divide over the dagger and the two-handed sword, but it is a spectacular read.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 5, 2015 1:11:18 GMT -6
Hi sepulchre. It appears that I gaffed in the quoted text: 100-72=28 (not 38), so I should have said: "Within the remaining 28% of occasions". From memory, the 85% possibility of at least one kill with a dagger was across all armor types (assuming all armor types occur equally frequently). However, if we are interested only in unarmored Men, then a dagger is 72% likely to causes exactly one kill from one attack, or 92% likely to causes at least one kill from two attacks, or 98% likely to cause at least one kill from three attacks. That aside, I believe combat results between an unarmored two-handed-swordsman and an unarmored dagger-man would fall out as follows: 1. The two-handed-swordsman would attack first (due to advantage of reach), having one attack vs the dagger-man, causing exactly one kill on 72% of occasions. 2. Therefore the dagger-man survives to reply on 28% of occasions. 3. The dagger-man, if he survives, attacks second, having three attacks vs the two-handed-swordsman, causing at least one kill on 98% of these occasions. This being (0.28 x 0.98 = 0.27) 27% of overall occasions. Therefore, despite the two-handed-sword and dagger both requiring a throw of 6+ to kill an unarmored man, the two-handed sword is actually (72 / 27 = 2.67) 267% as effective as the dagger in the first round of unarmored, dagger vs two-handed-sword, single combat.
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Post by sepulchre on Sept 5, 2015 9:48:01 GMT -6
Thanks Waysoftheearth! A question and an observation:
Mathematically, how did you arrive at the 98% effectiveness of the dagger on the second round (all occasions is clear: [0.28 x 0.98 = 0.27])? I realize one is taking the 72% effectiveness and combining it with 2 additional chances, but my statistical acumen escapes me at this point.
It's advanced by some that the chances of success in Oe were often "eye-balled", that appears a fair estimation sometimes. The design you are laying out looks rather calculated.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 5, 2015 12:46:14 GMT -6
This is an example of what my Statistics prof used to call "crunching the numbers until they beg for mercy."
Gary and Jeff Perren pulled some numbers out of their butts and fiddled with them until the game played the way they wanted, based on their interpretation of Oman and the other sources available in 1970. That is all. Especially since in 1972 all probability calculations were done with paper and pencil.
And just because Gary helped design the CHAINMAIL man to man combat matrix and also helped design the OD&D alternate combat system hit table does not repeat not repeat not repeat not mean that there is a direct mathematical correlation between one and the other.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 5, 2015 18:14:28 GMT -6
Jeez guys. I never suggested any of this was ever contemplated by the game designers. I simply sought to bring game context to the OP's assertion that: Man-To-Man(41 Chainmail): a dagger, a morning star and a two-handed sword bear the same probability 'to kill' someone without armor. I suggested up thread that identical combat factors on the MtM table shouldn't be taken to imply various weapon perform identically: I agree that, intuitively, an individual weapon factor appears to represent the weapon's effectiveness versus armor. But I'm less convinced the factors of two weapon classes are directly comparable to one another, at least not in the MtM rules. In MtM most weapon attacks are quite likely to kill an unarmored opponent, so the weapon factors are not as important as is having the first strike. I then showed an example of how the dagger vs two-handed-sword scenario actually plays out differently to what the MtM implies at first glance. Mathematically, how did you arrive at the 98% effectiveness of the dagger on the second round? Especially since in 1972 all probability calculations were done with paper and pencil. sepulchre, the above was for the the dagger-man's first round attacks, should he survive the two-handed-swordsman's first round attack. @gronanofsimmerya the math is so easy that even I can do it with pencil and paper. To answer sepulchre's question: 1. You've already figured out (by drawing yourself a 6x6 matrix indicating the sums) that on 2d6 there are 26 out of 36 possible results of 6 or more. 2. You've either calculated by hand, or looked up in a math text, that 26/36 is about 72%. Even if you've simply "hand-waved" it at around 70% that's near enough. 3. Great. You now know that one attack requiring a 6+ to kill on the MtM matrix is about 72% likely to result in a kill, and so 28% likely to result in no-kill. You have now done the hard part. 4. With this information you can easily go on to figure the probability of at least one kill occurring due to multiple attacks. For all cases, the p of at least one kill occurring is simply: 1 - the p of no kills occurring. EXAMPLE A 1. If there are two attacks, each with 72% odds of causing a kill, then the p of no kills from those two attacks is: .28 x .28 = .0784, or about 8%. If you can multiply 28 x 28 longhand with pencil and paper, then this calculation is within your grasp. 28 x 28 = 784. Then you move the decimal point appropriately to get .0784, or about 8%. 2. Now that you know there is 8% chance of no kills occurring, then you also know there must be (100-8 = 92) 92% chance of at least one kill occurring. Done. EXAMPLE B 1. If there are three attacks, each with 72% odds of causing a kill, then the p of no kills from those three attacks is: .28 x .28 x .28 = .021952, or about 2%. If you can multiply 28 x 28, and then multiply your answer by 28, you're good. 28 x 28 = 784. 784 x 28 = 21952. Move the decimal place appropriately and you're there: .021952, or about 2%. 2. Now that you know there is 2% chance of no kills occurring, then you also know there must be (100-2 = 98) 98% chance of at least one kill occurring. Done. This is all doable on a beer coaster. FWIW, the mathematical relationships arising from a game design exist whether the game designers intended them or not.
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Post by sepulchre on Sept 5, 2015 23:02:14 GMT -6
Waysoftheearth wrote:
Right, my bad - just thinking about him attacking last on the first round, yes, please proceed.
Indeed, you did not; I wondered how much thought had gone into the choice of these numbers. My 'comment' above was meant to be a thoughtful one. If the successful employment of a dagger and two-handed sword are represented by the same numerical values, mathematically something else has to be considered should one wish to rightly contrast their differences. So, as you point out, weapon class might be the variable that plays into the difference in the odds to kill with each weapon. To that point, Gygax and Perrin might have been taking full advantage of a beer coaster or two.
Obliged Ways for your savy statistics work, just not my strong suit. Very helpful to see the mathematical relationships between the numerical values respresenting the weapons. You've also given me a deeper lesson in applied statistics, one that I can do with pencil and paper ;-)
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