Re: (TFT) Guns in TFT... (Ignore Previous Post)

["Ty Beard" <tbeard@tyler.net>]

----- Original Message -----
From: <srydzews@ix.netcom.com>
To: <tft@brainiac.com>


> On Tue, 6 Aug 2002 10:24:02 -0500 Ty Beard <tbeard@tyler.net> wrote:
>
> [snip]
>
> > Comments?
>
> Pistols should not ignore armor.  I've read that one form of 'proofing'
heavy
> plate armor was to fire pistols at the breastplate and see if they
penetrated.
>  So not only were the pistols not ignoring plate armor, they weren't going
> through at all.  (Heck, even a modern .38 pistol round won't reliably
> penetrate a car door.  Give plate armor a little credit.)

> And while a musket round might penetrate plate, it's not as if it does so
> without losing a lot of energy.  I'd suggest something like blunderbuss
and
> pistols ignoring nothing, and the muskets ignoring 3 points at most.  Does
> this make pistols useless?  No, they still do as much damage as a crossbow
and
> you can't stick a couple of crossbows in your belt.

I'd agree that there is some resistance, but the question is whether there
is any effective reduction in the bullet's ability to injure the target.
Looking at the physics, I'd say no.

When one compares the kinetic energy (KE) of a 1-2 oz musket ball travelling
at 300 mps with a 30g heavy crossbow bolt travelling 40-50 mps, one finds
that the musket ball has from 3.3-6.7 times the KE of the crossbow bolt.
This explains why armor was so ineffective against bullets. Even if the
armor reduced the KE by half, the bullet would still deliver more KE than a
heavy crossbow bolt. I choose not to use the GURPS approach and equate
damage with KE. If I had, the result would be a weapon that does so much
damage that a normal person has virtually no chance of surviving it. The
only other option is to increase the weapon's penetration, but not its
damage. I think that the chance of killing a man with a musket is not
materially altered by his wearing of a full set of plate armor, so that is
why I chose to ignore armor.

And while I think that the same is true of a pistol, I'm somewhat persuaded
by your idea that pistols should not ignore armor. It's very hard to get
decent muzzle velocity data for black power pistols, but assuming a muzzle
velocity of 200mps (a bit lower than my few sources cite) and a 1 oz ball,
the pistol bullet still packs 1.5 times the KE of a heavy crossbow bolt. But
if the MV is say 150 mps, then the pistol's KE is .85 times that of a heavy
crossbow.

> I think the rifled musket's load times should be 2-3 actions longer.
That's
> why they weren't practical for use in battle until minie balls were
developed.

It's definitely true that flintlocks had a much lower rate of fire than
smoothbore muskets. I can't seem to verify the rate of fire from my military
books because rifled muskets were rarely used by regulars, except for
skirmish units and rifle regiments. So I would be receptive to any
reasonable decrease in the rate of fire.

<snip>

> I like your misfire rule and the reduced cost for the talent.  As you
allude
> to, ease of training compared to bows is what the early guns were all
about.
> Or such is my understanding at any rate.  If you want to take this even a
bit
> further, you could say that anyone who spends a couple weeks drilling with
one
> is proficient, no IQ required, and spending an IQ point on it gives a +2
with
> them.

I think that this would be defensible, though I'd not do it simply because
it might make them *too* attractive.

> Cost per shot may still be too high to make these guns anything but toys
for
> the rich dandys with a penchant for boisterous violence.  But since that
is an
> excellent description of the PC's in many games I suppose it's not really
a
> problem.

Agreed.

--Ty
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