A few questions

[big teej]

greetings playgrounders, I find myself with a few gaps of knowledge within both my sourcebook collection, and the information I've picked up over the past months of gaming...

leaving me with several questions that have arisen over the past several days, none of which are really related.

1. have you ever had the group-wide expereince of EVERYONE forgetting how a rule works? (like to hit rolls... does it have to BEAT the AC? or simply equal to or greater than?) because last night a player almost died and everyone (in the tension of the moment) forgot which it was, which was funny.... has anyone had an experience like this?

2. what sourcebook are "hookswords" in? I thought I saw them in my arms and equipment guide, but I was wrong.

3. what exactly does "banded mail" look like? my google fu is weak, and I could not turn up a satisfactory definitive image.

also, feel free to pose your own questions here. these are simply the 3 I had at the moment that I needed answers.

oh one more

4. do "long term healing" (as per the heal skill) and "resting a day and a night" (as per natural healing) stack?
last night I ruled that it did because it was bogging the game down.

last

5. does miss chance apply to 'natural 20s' I couldn't remember during the displacer beast fight last night (given that it was about to om nom nom the party, I ruled ,for the night, that nat 20 ALWAYS hits... but I do not feel this to be accurate)


anyways
those are my questions for now.

have at it.

[sonofzeal]

1. have you ever had the group-wide expereince of EVERYONE forgetting how a rule works? (like to hit rolls... does it have to BEAT the AC? or simply equal to or greater than?) because last night a player almost died and everyone (in the tension of the moment) forgot which it was, which was funny.... has anyone had an experience like this?

Yes. DM, or best rules-person in the group, makes a call and we all stick with it for the purpose of the session.

2. what sourcebook are "hookswords" in? I thought I saw them in my arms and equipment guide, but I was wrong.

There's a homebrew item like that here. I don't know of an official one.

3. what exactly does "banded mail" look like? my google fu is weak, and I could not turn up a satisfactory definitive image.

Like plate, if the plate was composed of many small, light sections rather than a few massive heavy chunks. A better medieval scholar than me could say with more certainty, but I believe this guy is doing it right.

4. do "long term healing" (as per the heal skill) and "resting a day and a night" (as per natural healing) stack?
last night I ruled that it did because it was bogging the game down.

No. "Twice the normal rate" means taking the normal rate and doubling it. It's not independant of your normal healing, just an augmentation thereof, so no stacking.

5. does miss chance apply to 'natural 20s' I couldn't remember during the displacer beast fight last night (given that it was about to om nom nom the party, I ruled ,for the night, that nat 20 ALWAYS hits... but I do not feel this to be accurate)

The official wording is poor. It says "always a hit", but right above that it also says "if your result equals or beats the target’s Armor Class, you hit and deal damage", with no caveat about percentage miss chances.

My interpretation, then, is that a nat20 is a hit, but only insofar as a really high roll should be. You have to beat miss chance normally.

[Yora]

A better medieval scholar than me could say with more certainty, but I believe this guy is doing it right.

This is actually lamellar armor, which I think is closer to scale armor.
The only actual banded armor I know about is the roman lorica segmentata. But it only consisted of breast-"plates" and would be more appropriate as a medium armor in D&D.

[arrowhen]

I've always assumed that banded mail was your basic Roman lorica segmentata.

[Yora]

I did some searching and you could consider this and this to be banded armor.
But as you can obviously see, these are fantasy armor and I don't think banded armor did ever actually exist. (And even less so banded mail, which is a complete mix-up of armor terms.)

[sonofzeal]

I did some searching and you could consider this and this to be banded armor.
But as you can obviously see, these are fantasy armor and I don't think banded armor did ever actually exist. (And even less so banded mail, which is a complete mix-up of armor terms.)

Good point. It's my understanding that a lot of fantasy armors, including some things we tend to take for granted, never actually existed as such. It's my understanding that even the classic "studded leather" is wrong, and the only things ahving that appearance would have been because there were metal plates bolted onto the inside. Studs would be a horrible defense mechanism, anyway.

[big teej]

these have been most helpful.

Yes. DM, or best rules-person in the group, makes a call and we all stick with it for the purpose of the session.

I was more referring to 'everyone forgetting the rule' as opposed to the DM making a call for expediency

There's a homebrew item like that here. I don't know of an official one.
.

this may have been where I originally saw it, I was hoping there was an official one in some sourcebook (one of the oriental books perhaps)
oh well, there goes my dream of playing Kabal from mortal kombat...

Like plate, if the plate was composed of many small, light sections rather than a few massive heavy chunks. A better medieval scholar than me could say with more certainty, but I believe this guy is doing it right.


No. "Twice the normal rate" means taking the normal rate and doubling it. It's not independant of your normal healing, just an augmentation thereof, so no stacking.
My interpretation, then, is that a nat20 is a hit, but only insofar as a really high roll should be. You have to beat miss chance normally.

1. that is a very helpful picture, however, thematically, I feel some of the other images given thus far fit my 'mental image' of the character better.
(I honestly don't know what it is, but armour that doesn't cover the shoulders always strikes me as...... incomplete. outside of something like a breastplate)

2. oops, oh well, I let it stack last night because they had no healing and the entire party was at less than 10 hit points after fighting a displacer beast

3. thats how I wanted to rule it, and will in the future, they're still learning so I gave it to them.

This is actually lamellar armor, which I think is closer to scale armor.
The only actual banded armor I know about is the roman lorica segmentata. But it only consisted of breast-"plates" and would be more appropriate as a medium armor in D&D.

also a useful picture, and much closer to the idea I have in my head, minus the skirt/kilt bit.

I did some searching and you could consider this and this to be banded armor.
But as you can obviously see, these are fantasy armor and I don't think banded armor did ever actually exist. (And even less so banded mail, which is a complete mix-up of armor terms.)

I believe I'm going to use a combination of these images and the roman style armour when I pitch it to the DM/use it for description in the snippets thread. thankee much.

Good point. It's my understanding that a lot of fantasy armors, including some things we tend to take for granted, never actually existed as such. It's my understanding that even the classic "studded leather" is wrong, and the only things ahving that appearance would have been because there were metal plates bolted onto the inside. Studs would be a horrible defense mechanism, anyway.

you raise a point I was about to make, it's a fantasy game, historical 'accuracy' is all well and good, but I'm still totally willing to ride into battle in armour that "never existed" outside of dnd. I simply am curious as to how to describe the armours (after all, how can one go into detail if you have no idea what it actually looks like?)

thankyou all very much, these answers and images are quite helpful.

[Yora]

Most things people believe about premodern (and even modern) warfare is completely wrong. In movies and TV they use equipment that looks similar to actual museum exibits or actual military equipment, but they are usually used in ways that are only supposed to look cool, but have few if any similarities to how they were really used.
And then there's lots of stuf that never existed at all.

However, I don't see any obvious faults with the idea of banded armor. I think most images look like they could actually work. Unlike the mentioned studded leather armor or warhammers with solid steel heads the size of bricks.

[Greenish]

2. what sourcebook are "hookswords" in?

Secrets of Sarlona.

[big teej]

However, I don't see any obvious faults with the idea of banded armor. I think most images look like they could actually work. Unlike the mentioned studded leather armor or warhammers with solid steel heads the size of bricks.

while I concur with your assessment of warhammers.....
I really like the image..... and so half the time my characters wield said hammers (dwarvish warhammer anyone?)

Secrets of Sarlona.

aha, thankyou.... is that a splatbook or WOTC?

[Kylarra]

aha, thankyou.... is that a splatbook or WOTC?

Uh... the two aren't mutually exclusive. It's an eberron book.

[big teej]

Uh... the two aren't mutually exclusive. It's an eberron book.

ignore my ignorance please/thankyou

[Kylarra]

I'm just saying that a Splatbook isn't synonymous with third party.

[Fhaolan]

The main problem with D&D armour classifications is that it originated from attempts to allow for armour styles from both European and non-European sources across all of history, based purely on pictures, joined with an attempt to have a different armour style for each 'armour class'. Because of that there are a lot of strange glitches in the system.

If you can imagine it; someone's tried to make of armour out of it.

For those that need it, there are historical examples of pretty much every D&D armour, they just rarely look anything like the illustrations in any edition of D&D.

Famously, the images of studded in D&D were taken from misintepreted pictures of brigandine and coats of plates where the widely spaced rivets were actually holding metal plates up behind the cloth. However, once you've thrown that out, you are still left with some armour that *could* fit into this category if you're willing to do so. For example Bezanted or Ring Armour where coins/washers/rings are sewn onto the jack. Most of this style of armour was considered to be the 'poor man's mail' because it was far cheaper to make. There's even an Indian armour called 'Coat of a Thousand Nails' http://www.museumnetworkuk.org/talki...ry/rajput.html where brass nails/rivets are studded all over the leather armour. Mind you, the leather is quite thick and there are proper 'splint'-like plates over the elbows and chest, so I'm not sure how much the nails are actually doing (other than decorative).

It's usually accepted now-a-days that D&D 'Banded' represents what is now called 'Laminar armour' (not lamellar which is a form of Scale, but Laminar). This type of armour is popularized by Roman outfits, but it existed up to and including the 15th century in Eastern areas, after which it was finally renderd obsolete by 'plated mail' (sometimes called 'splinted mail' which creates all sorts of confusion as it's got nothing to do with what D&D calls 'Splint'. :) ). I swear I've seen at least one piece of 17th century Laminar armour, but I can't find it now.

[big teej]

I'm just saying that a Splatbook isn't synonymous with third party.

and I'm just saying I didn't know that