RMU Piecemeal rules

[Ruffie]

Hello there, question about the optional rule for using piecemeal armor. There are two different kinds of interpretations in our group about this rule (on 21th of march we play our first game so we're learning as best we can now.) Could anybody please point us in the right direction?

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Version 1:
When attacking a combatant wearing piecemeal armor you roll the attack and crit at the same time. You look up the location of the crit and look at the AT a player is wearing on that part of his body. Then you apply the normal table for damage and follow crit rules.

Example: "Bobby is wearing an AT6 torso, AT 3 on his greaves. The crit roll indicates an attack on his greaves. In the attack table we apply the attack roll vs AT3 and the resulting crit is against the arms."

Version 2:
When attacking you look at the torso-type of the combatant. The types are light (AT2-3), medium (At 4-6) and heavy (AT 7-10), you also look if the type of other armors fall within these types. If they match you apply the torso AT to all.

Example 1: "Bobby is wearing an AT6 but wears AT4 greaves. The attack is against his greaves/arms but because AT6 and AT4 is both medium armor the attack is resolved as an attack vs AT6."

Example 2: "Bibby (no relation to Bobby) is wearing an AT 10 but is wearing AT 4 greaves (from Treasure law), the attack lands on his greaves again but because the AT4 greaves are not heavy armor (like his Torso), the attack is resolved as being against AT5 because this is counted as medium armor for the purpose of piecemeal armor."

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Follow up question. If it is version 2, doesn't this mean that a player combining a higher level AT torso within the light-medium-heavy types is at an advantage because the other pieces of armor scale upwards?

Bonus example: "Babby (Related to Bibby not Bobby) is wearin AT3 torso but an AT2 cloth helmet. He is hit on his helm but because of version 2 above the attack is resolved as against AT3 because both are withing the same type light catagory." Yet in this example the AT2 helmet only gives a -3 on perception while a normal AT3 helmet gives a -5 on perception.

I hope the wise-ones can give us guidance.

[jdale]

It's basically version 1 (roll the crit at the same time as the attack, assess the attack result based on the AT of the area struck), there are just some complications about the AT of limb and head armor.

If you are using the optional table in Treasure Law that has greaves and helms for each AT, then use the applicable AT. This is the simplest. Torso AT is based on the torso armor, limb and head armor based on those pieces, you get the protection you paid for.

If you are using the greaves and helms that are only described in Core as light, medium, or heavy, and not listed with an AT, then you need a rule to specify which AT applies. The rule is:
If the head or limb protection is appropriate for the torso armor type, use the same AT for that location as the torso. Light armor is appropriate for AT 2-3, Medium for AT 4-6, and Heavy for 7-10. Otherwise, treat Light armor as AT 3, Medium as AT 5, and Heavy as AT 9.

The intention here is that if you have the greaves/helm that goes with your torso armor, you don't need to worry about piecemeal armor. Just treat the full suit as one AT, you are done. You only have to worry about piecemeal armor if it is actually mismatched.

However it does result in a few edge cases where the same set of greaves will have slightly different AT depending on which torso armor they are worn with. If this bothers you, please use the table in Treasure Law with greaves/helms for every AT, that's why it exists.

[Ruffie]

Thanks for clearing this up for us. We can now rest easy.

[Ecthelion]

Let's say I have a Ranger wearing a full suit of AT 6. Now that character decides to replace his chest armor with a scale mail (AT 7). Can he replace only the chest armor and therefore have AT 7 chest protection and AT 6 for head, arms and legs? Or would it be necessary for him to buy a new set, consisting of AT 7 chest armor and AT 5 for the other parts, if not using the optional rule from Treasure Law?

[jdale]

If you're not using the option in Treasure Law, AT 6 would have included medium greaves and helm.

A full suit of AT 7 would have heavy greaves and helm. So if you were to replace only the AT 6 torso with AT 7, you're wearing that with medium greaves and helm which RAW would count as AT 5.

[Hurin]

But honestly... just using the optional rule from Treasure Law makes things a lot easier.