I couldn't sleep at all last night, but at least I have these kinda clunky rules for broken armor to show for it:
This works for any ascending AC system, but I'm sure someone who understands descending AC (i.e. not me) could adapt it.
First, you need to know the "armor range" of your AC. This is the part that's not covered by the base AC or Dex bonus. So in LotFP for a character wearing leather armor with a Dex bonus of +1, The full AC would be 15 (12+1+2), and the "armor range" would be 14 and 15.
When an opponent rolls an attack against this character, it misses if it rolls 13 or less, hits if it rolls 16 or more, but if it rolls a 14 or 15 it strikes the armor. When this happens, the player rolls a die (d20, say) and notes the number rolled next to the armor. Numbers accumulate over time, and when the player rolls the same number twice the armor is broken and useless until repaired.
It's a fair amount to keep track of, I know. It also means that heavier armor will get dinged more often, though I kind of like that since it would dull your reflexes anyway. Characters are relying more on the armor to absorb blows and less on their ability to dodge.
For even more to keep track of, you could introduce different armor qualities by rolling different dice to check for breakage, from piss poor (d4) to absolutely legendary (d100).
Now that I think about it, you could do the same thing for weapons by checking for breakage every time you roll a 1 to hit.
You know, you could get exactly the same probability distribution by simply counting the number of hits your armour has had. Roll less than this and it breaks. Simplifies the paperwork but is clearly not as fun.
ReplyDeleteThat's a good point. Not quite as fun, but this rule is already too fiddly for its own good.
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