Ye Olde Inn

When expanding my homemade armoury with more weapons, I have concluded that I want weapons that are armour breaking. My first attempts at this failed rather big in playtesting, since the armour breaking rules were to good then.

This is a new suggestion for a kind of armour breaking that is meant to be on par with the ability to throw a weapon, or the ability to attack diagonally:
Armour Breaking: When armed with a weapon with this ability, black shields rolled in attack forces an enemy to roll one die less in defence against that attack, to a minimum stated in the weapon description (normally three).

This increases the offensive ability of the weapon, but only against 4DD monsters or higher (for normal armour breaking), while not having the flexibility of diagonal or thrown weapons. Does this seam like a reasonable trade-off?

...
And as a side note adding to this train of thought, I have also made room for three different level of armour breaking:
A) Armour breaking to a minimum of 3DD
B) Armour breaking to a minimum of 2DD (mostly two-handed crushing weapons)
C) Armour breaking, and with one extra DD always removed, to a minimum of 2DD (two-handed piercing weapons)

Is this overcomplicating things? If so, is it justifiable to use it just to get cool new weapons in the armoury?

I think having such weapons be cheap throw-a-ways like the dagger or hand-axe would be the way to go. You hit an enemy with one, and it deals regular damage or it the enemy loses a defense die and you lose the weapon. A war pick, a sprinkler, a bec de corbine, a lucerne, a misericorde or poniard would be good approximations to use.

chaoticprime wrote:You hit an enemy with one, and it deals regular damage or it the enemy loses a defense die and you lose the weapon.

Sorry, I was not clear enough I think. The enemy is forced to roll one die less in defence against that specific attack, not loose one DD for ever. I have edited the first post now to clear this up.

chaoticprime wrote:A war pick, a sprinkler, a bec de corbine, a lucerne, a misericorde or poniard would be good approximations to use.

Yes, I have the above marked (or equivalent) weapons in my list
This is why I want a balanced armour breaking rule, cause these weapon are cool, man

How about low damage weapons that are defended against entirely, or not at all. A thrusting-sword would roll two combat dice in attack, but the damage rolled cannot be mitigated by any amount. The damage can only be canceled out totally. The Elf attacks a Fimir with his thrusting-sword, and comes up with two skulls. The Fimir must roll two black shields to fully cancel the damage. If the Fimir rolls only one black shield, damage mitigation will be ignored and the Fimir will still lose two Body Points.

chaoticprime wrote:How about low damage weapons that are defended against entirely, or not at all. A thrusting-sword would roll two combat dice in attack, but the damage rolled cannot be mitigated by any amount. The damage can only be canceled out totally. The Elf attacks a Fimir with his thrusting-sword, and comes up with two skulls. The Fimir must roll two black shields to fully cancel the damage. If the Fimir rolls only one black shield, damage mitigation will be ignored and the Fimir will still lose two Body Points.

I like this idea. Is there an efficient way of explaining this on an equipment or artifact card?

Ethica wrote:

chaoticprime wrote:How about low damage weapons that are defended against entirely, or not at all. A thrusting-sword would roll two combat dice in attack, but the damage rolled cannot be mitigated by any amount. The damage can only be canceled out totally. The Elf attacks a Fimir with his thrusting-sword, and comes up with two skulls. The Fimir must roll two black shields to fully cancel the damage. If the Fimir rolls only one black shield, damage mitigation will be ignored and the Fimir will still lose two Body Points.

I like this idea. Is there an efficient way of explaining this on an equipment or artifact card?

Suggestion: "Unless all hits with this weapon are saved, the full amount of damage is suffered."

Ethica wrote:

chaoticprime wrote:How about low damage weapons that are defended against entirely, or not at all. A thrusting-sword would roll two combat dice in attack, but the damage rolled cannot be mitigated by any amount. The damage can only be canceled out totally. The Elf attacks a Fimir with his thrusting-sword, and comes up with two skulls. The Fimir must roll two black shields to fully cancel the damage. If the Fimir rolls only one black shield, damage mitigation will be ignored and the Fimir will still lose two Body Points.

I like this idea. Is there an efficient way of explaining this on an equipment or artifact card?

I am kind of an "idea guy." Also, that'll be five bucks.