(04-14-2015, 12:17 PM)Melkire Wrote: Disclaimer: I have no personal practical experience.
Something important to note that I cannot stress enough: armor is a HUGE advantage.
As a roleplayer writing for an in-fighter with extensive experience in knife-fighting, armor is hell. Yes, there are weaknesses that can be taken advantage of - joints, exposed points like the underarms, chainmail intended to cushion crushing blows from maces but not stop the piercing action of a rondel dagger - but by and large, in a one-on-one, the individual without armor is going to have a hell of a time because each opening that results in an exchange of strike and counterstrike is far more likely than not to leave the less-armored individual with more "damage" than his or her foe. The fantasy setting of XIV mitigates this disadvantage somewhat if your character is, say, a ninja or a monk, but there's still some serious difficulty in selling a victory and that difficulty lies in execution.
My character recently came up against not one but two armored individuals. My character and I had to immediately adapt - it was a big "nope" moment - and even a shift in tactics to engage them separately instead of together still resulted in massive injury to my character, because armor is JUST. THAT. GOOD.
I'm a bit of an armor nut, and I agree completely.
There's ways to DEAL with heavy armor, and plate mail, and other suits of supposed invulnerability, but you have to know AND have the tool to fix it on hand. Â
Medieval weapons like axes evolved blunt wedges designed to crimp armor, thus breaking bones like the clavical or putting a sharp point of metal in the diaphram, rather than actually piericng it. Â
A common tactic for dealing with Chain-Mail and hauberk wears was pitch, either poured (boiling oil!), or attached to a tarry rag that could be lit and hurled (Or if you were a ballsy asshole you could pull open the very loose neck of the chainmail and drop it right into the tightly cinched and fastened chest area. ). All cases coated the guy in chain mail in burning shit they couldn't wipe off.
Which cooked them alive inside a red-hot chain mail oven.
As you can see most of the REAL methods of dealing with armor involve specialized tools and making the armor into a tomb instead of a protective shell. Â You didn't just stab into someone's armpit with a noble-killer knife and pop their heart like a rotten balloon. Â You only saw opportunities like that after the guy in the armor was crippled or worse.
You fight a guy in heavy armor, you either tire them out (and stamina training was a BIG part of wearing heavy armor), you have a tool to deal with it and know how to use it, or you don't fucking engage.
![[Image: tumblr_mjwxnlcz6Q1rl52wjo2_500.gif]](https://33.media.tumblr.com/224cfbd6e79103f0520a30eabfc5085d/tumblr_mjwxnlcz6Q1rl52wjo2_500.gif)
