How much would Strength actually contribute to weapon damage (read the OP)

[Averis Vol]

Now, this is sort of a strange question that I've been thinking about, regarding a game mechanic that we basically take for granted.
Almost all game systems out there equates how strong a character is to how much damage he will be able to do in melee. On the surface this makes perfect sense, but then I thought: would being stabbed with a sword by someone of average strenght really be any less serious than being stabbed by a big hunk of a guy?
What about being smashed with a flanged mace? Would the strenght of the man wielding the mace change the outcome all that much?
Basically what I'm saying is... Don't weapons do most of the work anyway? A sword or a knife is made sharp exactly because it's able to cut into flesh even when not much force is put behind it, after all. And it's the weight of a mace that delivers the hurt.
Being strong doesn't affect much aside from your ability to wield the weapon without straining a muscle or getting tired, I would think.

Wouldn't it make more sense if the Strength score of a character represented his ability to ignore amor instead? Because that's basically the only instance I could think of when being really strong could help, when the enemy has an armor that the weapon you are wielding can't reliably penetrate.

D&D sort of does it, with Strength being your key ability score when making a melee attack to overcome the armor of the enemy, but then it also adds Strength to damage. I couldn't really think of any game that didn't work upon the assumption that most of the damage is done by the strenght of the attacker instead of being done by the weapon itself.
What do you guys think?

In real world combat, strength is actually one of the least important qualities for a good swordsman. Of course he needs to be strong enough to wield his weapon of choice, and realistically, all that a high strength means is that you can swing your weapon faster. But besides that, the ability to adapt to your opponents strikes and quickly interpose your own blade is a lot more important. So if we were to realistically stat out combat, your combat modifier would be some combination of dex, wis and int to hit. Damage would be part dex and part strength, and combat longevity would be based on con (like con score rounds of combat before you could no longer effectively fight).

Matt easton explains strength in combat amasingly in this video, if you want an idea of accurate swordsmanship, his video's will do great to point you on the right direction.

strength in swordsmanship

EDIT: Also, it doesn't matter how strong you are (in realistic means, I'm pretty sure superman could punch through full plate with a longsword) you arent going to penetrate fullplate with a sword. You will have to attack the weakspots like the joints, eye slits or the gorget. all smashing his quarter inch thick armor with your sword is going to do is break your blade. the commonality of fullplate at the end of the medieval period is exactly why techniques like halfswording were invented.