Parrying

[Hironomus]

How is blocking with a weapon represented in game? fighting defensively? but you can do that without a weapon.
What happens if you say, "I block incoming attack with my sword?"
are there rules for weapons having inherent AC bonuses that they grant while you are on the defense? has anyone houseruled this?

[Hanuman]

How is blocking with a weapon represented in game? fighting defensively? but you can do that without a weapon.
What happens if you say, "I block incoming attack with my sword?"
are there rules for weapons having inherent AC bonuses that they grant while you are on the defense? has anyone houseruled this?

2 weapon defense, parrying is included in fighting defensively, regular AC, full defense and base dex score (10 is human, which is understated).

That's the crunch anyway, but what you're actually talking about is fluff.


A players ability to parry is represented by their investment in either the above feats or enhancers for those feats or ones that boost AC, or the investment in their dexterity score.

You might think that being an expert swordsman makes you super awesome at parrying things, but that's all included in the current AC and dex systems, there are ways to improve it which lower attack rolls, but that's what being an "awesome swordsman" is all about-- keeping your relative attack bonus while fighting more defensively.

[Hironomus]

I don't really think thats the case.
Not having a weapon doesn't affect your AC in any way that I know of.
Even if you have no unarmed capability. that implies that you simply don't use your weapon to block attacks, or if you do it is no more effective than if you were totally unarmed. And yeah the existance of the shield bonus from two weapon defense only makes that harder to understand for me, since clearly weapons can be used to stop other weapons from hitting you.

[AslanCross]

For the most part, parrying is abstracted into feats like Two Weapon Defense, Combat Expertise, and attack options like Fighting Defensively and Total Defense.

However, there are more active parrying options like the Warblade maneuver Wall of Blades (make an attack roll as an immediate action, if the result as higher than your AC you can use it to replace your AC) and the feat Melee Evasion (which does something similar).

[Hanuman]

Not having a weapon doesn't affect your AC in any way that I know of.

Right, like in real life.

In dnd dodging or parrying work equally well and are used "whenever". It's fluff.

[Hironomus]

Thanks for answering so quickly.
But I am still unsatisfied.
I feel there should be some kind of rule representing the fact that when someone is trying to hit you with a bit of steel it is almost always preferable to have a similar bit of steel to interpose between their bit of steel and your fragile body. Since there apparently isn't, how would I make one?

[Hironomus]

Right, like in real life.

In dnd dodging or parrying work equally well and are used "whenever". It's fluff.

Thats my point exactly, in real life it is far better for your health, to be armed unless you are skilled in not being armed.

[Spiryt]

Not having a weapon doesn't affect your AC in any way that I know of.

It affects you by the fact that you're provoking attacks of opportunity if you try to fight unarmed against armed individual. So you're pretty screwed.

And it's quite sufficient for abstract game like 3.5.

[Yuki Akuma]

Thanks for answering so quickly.
But I am still unsatisfied.
I feel there should be some kind of rule representing the fact that when someone is trying to hit you with a bit of steel it is almost always preferable to have a similar bit of steel to interpose between their bit of steel and your fragile body. Since there apparently isn't, how would I make one?

You shouldn't make one.

And it's even more preferably to have a huge slab of steel between you and their little bit of steel (called a shield).

Fun fact: parrying with shields is and was far more common than parrying with weapons.

[AstralFire]

I do think it's fair to say that conventional (read: not ToB) D&D does a terrible job representing the defensive manoeuvres capable with both. But this is a good reason to use Tome of Battle.

[Yuki Akuma]

If you want a better abstraction for parrying with weapons and shields and so on.. play GURPS.

[Hanuman]

A little tip, the run feat, a good con score and improved base speed will always win no matter how long the other guys sword is.

In fact, the bigger the sword the easier it is to dodge, parry, or block the arm. Strength breaks through parries and arm blocks, and moves the sword faster and with more ease to account for dodging.

Monks don't seem to mind not having a weapon, but perhaps that's because they are actually trained in martial arts where as a fighter is trained in weaponry usage.

Anything that isn't already mechanical, is probably fluff.


It's preferable to have steel if you want to hurt them, which is represented in the AoO from untrained unarmed attacks and that's where the lack of AC from the sword comes in, the double hit chance-- scrambling away while not fighting doesn't require a sword to be effective.

[Hironomus]

It affects you by the fact that you're provoking attacks of opportunity if you try to fight unarmed against armed individual. So you're pretty screwed.

And it's quite sufficient for abstract game like 3.5.

That's more what I was looking for. But its not all that abstract. I mean there are rules for far more complicated things. That works for when you are fighting but what about just defending yourself?

You shouldn't make one.

And it's even more preferably to have a huge slab of steel between you and their little bit of steel (called a shield).

Fun fact: parrying with shields is and was far more common than parrying with weapons.

But they ARE still both bits of steel, and both can theoretically be used to halt the movement of other bits of steel.

A related point. The defensive enhancement to weaponry. i can't really remember what it does, but doesn't it seem like it is implying that the ability to parry is almost supernatural? I jest of course (unless we are living in a world in which the only presence of the supernatural is an innate ability of all inhabitants to block whilst weilding weapons).

[Psyx]

How is blocking with a weapon represented in game? fighting defensively? but you can do that without a weapon.
What happens if you say, "I block incoming attack with my sword?"
are there rules for weapons having inherent AC bonuses that they grant while you are on the defense? has anyone houseruled this?

It's poorly reflected in D&D. And it should be based on the swordsman's skill, not the weapon they carry. A 20th level fighter with an AC of 20 is hit just as easily as a 1st with an AC of 20.

Weapon Expertise allows parrying, and it's assumed that fighting defensively does so to a degree, too. Two weapon defence, of course...

Since there apparently isn't, how would I make one?

Throw out your books and buy pretty much ANY other roleplaying system out there! Seriously: D&D is VERY poor for 'realism' in combat, and if you want it, you should look elsewhere.

[Ossian]

Thanks for answering so quickly.
But I am still unsatisfied.
I feel there should be some kind of rule representing the fact that when someone is trying to hit you with a bit of steel it is almost always preferable to have a similar bit of steel to interpose between their bit of steel and your fragile body. Since there apparently isn't, how would I make one?

I tend to agree.

However the one thing that changes is that you lose reach. So the puny 1,5 meter drops to zero (unless you have improved unarmed strike) that is, if you try to punch someone and he has a knife, he gets an AoO. That, in real life, might really be the difference between life and death. You are both commoners (let s face it) and have 1 to 6 HPs. he gets to stab you first because he's armed, and if he succeeds (normal humans, AC 10, is a 50% chance) you get stabbed, which might result in death (1d4+STR or even worse if it is a critical). What I just said (I will diss my own point here) is totally moot though, because we are not talking about street gangsters gutting each others in dark alleys. We are talking sordboys and axe dudes, we are talking soldiers and knights and we want to be able to go into climactic battles on rooftop like the last strip just proved. We want battles where between two equally skilled and high level badass opponents, the one who gets disarmed is in serious trouble and is forced to dodge, duck and tumble like crazy, never mind attacking or winning.

I feel that total defense and fight defensively are two very limited options, and this is why I recommend to use at the very least the level/class based AC (as in Star Wars or Unearthed Arcana). Thus, the gritty veteran of middle age (who has his dex dropped to "just 10-11") still is a force to be reckoned with because of his 20 years of battle experience. It still does not cover the armed vs unarmed part, but it does make the fluff easier to bend to the kind of battle descriptions I am going for.

O.

[Hironomus]

If you want a better abstraction for parrying with weapons and shields and so on.. play GURPS.

What's that?

[AstralFire]

Highly generic and adaptable point-buy system. I'm not really enamored with it; almost anything it does, interestingly, I find another more focused system does better - just like D&D, but without the huge number of people to play with. It does have its fans, though.

I'm also going to repeat my earlier statement about Tome of Battle - Iron Heart includes a lot of traditional sword moves poorly represented by D&D.

[Yuki Akuma]

What's that?

It's an RPG.

Do a Google search for GURPS. It'll be the first result.

Instead of "armour class", they have defense scores - Block, Parry and Dodge. Block depends on shields, Parry on weapon skill, and Dodge on how quick you are.

If you want to play a character focused on parrying, you buy a high weapon skill and perhaps Improved Defense (Parry).

[Hanuman]

A related point. The defensive enhancement to weaponry. i can't really remember what it does, but doesn't it seem like it is implying that the ability to parry is almost supernatural? I jest of course (unless we are living in a world in which the only presence of the supernatural is an innate ability of all inhabitants to block whilst weilding weapons).

S'called Level 1: Dex 12 average, 18 maximum.

[Hironomus]

Highly generic and adaptable point-buy system. I'm not really enamored with it; almost anything it does, interestingly, I find another more focused system does better - just like D&D, but without the huge number of people to play with. It does have its fans, though.

I'm also going to repeat my earlier statement about Tome of Battle - Iron Heart includes a lot of traditional sword moves poorly represented by D&D.

Only problem with that is that not anyone can do it... unless they train specifically. Still blocking a sword blow is probably quite difficult. I dunno.

[Hanuman]

Only problem with that is that not anyone can do it... unless they train specifically. Still blocking a sword blow is probably quite difficult. I dunno.

Have you ever trained with swords IRL?

[AstralFire]

It's not something you do as a matter of course with a weapon. The primary point of having the weapon is to hit someone. Parrying and blocking is done by a dedicated hand - a shield, or parrying dagger (that's right, two-weapon fighting is not usually supposed to be RAAAAAAAAAAAGH KILL EVERYTHING DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS!)

[Yuki Akuma]

Parrying is not an effective way to kill someone. It's better to get out of the way and stab them, rather than just block their strike and leave both of your weapons useless until you recover.

[Psyren]

Neverwinter Nights had a "Parry" skill, which I think confused more than a few people who expected something similar to be in D&D.

[Spiryt]

Parrying is not an effective way to kill someone. It's better to get out of the way and stab them, rather than just block their strike and leave both of your weapons useless until you recover.

Recover from what?

"Blocking" with a weapon like portrayed in games and movies would be indeed quite useless, easy to avoid "defense".

However, defensive value of any bigger weapon is obviously significant, to bind, deflect and oppose your opponents weapon.

And of course, it's not really job for D&D to represent fighting in detailed way.

[Yuki Akuma]

No matter how you use your weapon to defend, the point is that it's still not ready to stab your enemy in the gut. You need to recover first.

[elonin]

Parrying is included in your ac value. If you want to parry more use the combat expertise feat. I've realized from fighting with boffer weapons that it is better to not be there instead of parrying against your opponent. If you don't mind a bit more paperwork I'll suggest playing role master. You can subtract from your attack roll to add the same amount to one attack.

[AstralFire]

Neverwinter Nights had a "Parry" skill, which I think confused more than a few people who expected something similar to be in D&D.

Honestly I think it owes more to the high amount of parrying in cinema, because it's much more dramatic and cool than dodging all the time. (Not that I'm complaining, here, let me get out my lightsaber...)

[Hironomus]

Have you ever trained with swords IRL?

No more or less than the average Australian Psychology student But I have used objects to stop people from hitting me with other objects. And usually I have been quite happy with the result.

Also it seems to me that most realistic, real life swordplay consists mostly of blocking. since getting hit typically means you lose. Though I concede I could be wrong, being a mere student and not someone who understands swords and blocking and stuff.

[The Rose Dragon]

Honestly I think it owes more to the high amount of parrying in cinema, because it's much more dramatic and cool than dodging all the time. (Not that I'm complaining, here, let me get out my lightsaber...)

In cinema, the defender doesn't parry. The attacker aims at the defender's weapon instead.