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Fenhorn
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 20 Jun 2022, 09:59

Firstly, this game doesn't have individual body hit locations (T2K have), having a fixed armour rating would mean that if you hit, it is assumed to hit the armour (since it is a fixed value and would always be applied).
Secondly, the uncertainty is also part of the game. You can't be sure if your body armour will protect you or if the body armour that the bad buy is wearing will protect him.
Thirdly, it doesn't take that long to roll for armour. I have done so in all other YZE-games that I have played and I can't say that slowed down the game.
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Tancred
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 20 Jun 2022, 10:11

Firstly, this game doesn't have individual body hit locations (T2K have), having a fixed armour rating would mean that if you hit, it is assumed to hit the armour (since it is a fixed value and would always be applied).
Secondly, the uncertainty is also part of the game. You can't be sure if your body armour will protect you or if the body armour that the bad buy is wearing will protect him.
Thirdly, it doesn't take that long to roll for armour. I have done so in all other YZE-games that I have played and I can't say that slowed down the game.
Sounds like it's going to come down to personal taste - I hated the armour implementation in Coriolis for example, rolling for armour was a pain and havign to get 6s on d6s meant it often didn't stop anything. I would value the faster resolution of fixed armour over the uncertainty factor and plenty of games have armour always be effective - especially given how debilitating the penalties are for wearing armour.

Even if fixed armour were an optional rule, that'd be great.
 
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Fenhorn
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 20 Jun 2022, 10:25

Firstly, this game doesn't have individual body hit locations (T2K have), having a fixed armour rating would mean that if you hit, it is assumed to hit the armour (since it is a fixed value and would always be applied).
Secondly, the uncertainty is also part of the game. You can't be sure if your body armour will protect you or if the body armour that the bad buy is wearing will protect him.
Thirdly, it doesn't take that long to roll for armour. I have done so in all other YZE-games that I have played and I can't say that slowed down the game.
Sounds like it's going to come down to personal taste - I hated the armour implementation in Coriolis for example, rolling for armour was a pain and havign to get 6s on d6s meant it often didn't stop anything. I would value the faster resolution of fixed armour over the uncertainty factor and plenty of games have armour always be effective - especially given how debilitating the penalties are for wearing armour.

Even if fixed armour were an optional rule, that'd be great.
The second and third points are my opinions and reflections but the first point isn't
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Tancred
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 20 Jun 2022, 10:59

Another potential option I was running around my head is that armor reduces the size of the crit die. So D armor doesn't reduce at all, C armor reduces once, B armor reduces it twice, and A armor reduces it three times. Anything that's reduced below a D6 can't do crits at all against this armor.
That's a good idea - makes armour more useful but doesn't increase the book-keeping very much. Doesn't solve the car punching issue though, as civilian cars and trucks have D armour. It's more to remember, but vehicles bumping the armour crit die up 2 levels versus personal scale weapons would seem to work - means best crit die will be d8 vs a vehicle, and being armoured makes that less likely. A vehicle with A or B armour can't be critted at all by personal firearms or melee attacks then.
Going back to this idea, would it be simpler to allow the armour roll to 'anti-crit' so if you roll 2 successes the armour blocks 2 damage AND the crit from happening? If the crit attack was 3 successes, it'd still be a critical, but only one dice roll instead of two, and 3 successes on the armour roll could block that, and so on.

This would also emulate that body armour may save your life from a lethal injury but you still end up taking damage to Health from the concussive effect of the bullet, etc.

It wouldn't happen that often either, as getting 2 success on type D or C armour isn't that easy/likely.

This doesn't help with the issue of punching a car til it explodes, but Grimmshade's suggestion of a d6 crit die for blunt attacks against a vehicle would work for that. Another option would be to 'degrade' a personal weapon's crit dice 2 levels versus vehicle scale targets, unless the weapon is also vehicle scale.
 
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Kaybe
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 20 Jun 2022, 13:29

Honestly, despite my earlier comment, I'm fine with rolling for armor as every other Year Zero game but T2K handles it that way. It's just the inability for armor to negate a critical hit AT ALL that irks me. Reducing a 3 damage hit down to 0 when your armor can only absorb a max of 2 damage seems counterintuitive. At that point, you may as well just write "Armor" on a piece of paper and tape it to your chest. Especially given the skill penalties you get from armor. Why dedicate a section to armor in the book if it only causes more harm than good?
 
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Fenhorn
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 20 Jun 2022, 13:48

The C armour can protect against crits from damage 1 weapons. The B armour will have a good chance of protecting against damage 1 weapons, can also protect against damage 2 weapons sometimes.

Investigators usually wear armour only in special occasions, like arresting a very violent criminal. The skills that you get a disadvantage in are perhaps not skills that you will use in those occasions.
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Grimmshade
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 20 Jun 2022, 18:26

IIRC, it doesn't take very long (in game) to don armor. I see it more like digging a vest out of your vehicle when you're about to go into a building full of baddies. The penalties generally won't be as big a deal if you're not wearing it all the time, and the bit of protection might be nice.
I do think it should negate Crits a bit better, but I haven't played this at the table yet so I'm withholding that judgement.
 
Tancred
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Tue 21 Jun 2022, 10:50

IIRC, it doesn't take very long (in game) to don armor. I see it more like digging a vest out of your vehicle when you're about to go into a building full of baddies. The penalties generally won't be as big a deal if you're not wearing it all the time, and the bit of protection might be nice.
I do think it should negate Crits a bit better, but I haven't played this at the table yet so I'm withholding that judgement.
Yeah, I quite like the idea that the penalties to use mean PCs won't routinely wear armour, just donning it before serious firefights where it's protective qualities outweigh the disadvantages.
 
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Kaybe
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Fri 01 Jul 2022, 19:36

IIRC, it doesn't take very long (in game) to don armor. I see it more like digging a vest out of your vehicle when you're about to go into a building full of baddies. The penalties generally won't be as big a deal if you're not wearing it all the time, and the bit of protection might be nice.
I do think it should negate Crits a bit better, but I haven't played this at the table yet so I'm withholding that judgement.
Yeah, I quite like the idea that the penalties to use mean PCs won't routinely wear armour, just donning it before serious firefights where it's protective qualities outweigh the disadvantages.
I absolutely agree, but the problem is that since most armor penalizes MOBILITY, a very important combat skill, while being (almost) entirely incapable of negating a critical hit from most firearms, you're better off never wearing armor at all. That's why I say that if armor is this bad, just get rid of it entirely. The danger of combat is not from having your health chipped away. It's from getting one shot by a critical hit, even if you're some beefy high health replicant. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE lethal combat. It's why I play Year Zero games. But I just have a personal dislike for including gear when the cons so outweigh the pros, those items may as well not exist. Same applies to the low health supposedly armored police spinners that can be so easily shot out of the sky by some random gang member on his balcony. I mean, K's spinner took multiple huge direct hits before it was forced down. It was not just a couple of guys with handguns.
 
Archaos
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Re: Early Access Feedback - Personal/Vehicles Armor is Useless

Mon 03 Jul 2023, 07:23

Just picked up the BR PDF. Love it! Great points on this thread made about personal armor. I think the most streamlined fix may be to say that if the armor roll is enough to negate the weapon's BASE damage, then the crit is negated, even if the total damage is not. This would make armor types C and D worth wearing in some situations.

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