From Arms Law (1980) through Arms Law & Claw Law (1984), attack table 8.4.1 was designated as Bare Fist attacks (presumably for attacks without training), with max results ranging from 2AK to 10EK. Claw Law added attack table 11.22 for Martial Arts Strikes (presumably for attacks with training), with max results ranging from 4A to 15B for Rank 1 attacks.
With Arms Law & Claw Law (1989), several revisions were made that seem somewhat contradictory on their face. First, table 8.4.1 was renamed as "Armored" Fist attacks, with no changes to the results table. Second, optional rule 9.9 was given to allow bare-handed attacks to be made using the Martial Arts Striking table, limited to Rank 1 and Unbalance criticals. And finally, section 12.0 provided a chart with expanded historical weapons. This chart stated that the Bare Fist attack would use the Martial Arts Striking table limited to Rank 1, and the Armored Fist attack "now" uses the Bare Fist table.
The problems here are that, if one only had the 1989 printing, the Bare Fist table was nowhere to be found because it was renamed as "Armored Fist," and, even with the reduced Rank accessibility for the Martial Arts table, a bare fist attack would do significantly more straight points of damage across the board than an armored fist would. (A case could be made that the effects of Crush criticals increase the likelihood of the armored fist doing more total damage.)
Subsequent supplements continued to reference the Bare Fist attack table, even though it had technically been replaced in the 1989 Arms Law. Pirates (1990) used the Bare Fist table for Baton and Rock attacks, as well as hilt attacks for several weapons. Outlaw (1991) actually opted to use the Martial Arts table for some of the small handheld weapons (brass knuckles and blackjack). At Rapier's Point (1993) changed the Baton attack to use the Club table, but still referenced Bare Fist for a Buckler shield attack (if the Shield Bashing rules were not used). Interestingly, no weapon derivatives that I could find reference the Armored Fist attack table.
Finally, RMC5 (1991) introduced the Brawling/Untrained attack table as a catchall for bare fist and improvised weapon attacks (instead of using the Martial Arts table), with the critical types determined by the object being used to attack with. However, neither the instructions for the Brawling skill nor the associated table make any mention of certain attack types being limited by size. So, theoretically, a bare fist attack could inflict a max result ranging from 7A to 30C with an unmodified roll of 100, or from 6 to 25B at the normal max of 150.
[Side note: I'm aware that RM2 didn't have the benefit of hindsight that RMSS and RMFRP did in order to make a single cohesive game system. RM2 was making it up as it went along, with different authors interpreting the rules differently at different times.]
The Brawling attack table was re-scaled beginning with RMSS (1994), such that the whole table maxed out with Huge results from 5D to 19E, but fists were limited to Small attacks (105), with results from 4A to 11B. All criticals were Brawling criticals rather than being determined by the attacking object. (Other size maximums were Medium (120), ranging from 4A to 14C, and Large (135), ranging from 5B to 16D, all of which were slightly below the equivalent Martial Arts Rank results.)
RMC Arms Law (2007) attempted to be a hybrid solution by including both the Armored Fist table and the revised Brawling table with the attack size limitations, but using object-determined criticals rather than Brawling criticals. However, this still didn't resolve the main issue at hand that I see, namely the need to reconcile differences in the damage scales and properly assign attack tables for certain weapons.
If one looks only at AT 20, for example, an armored fist attack first gets 1 point of damage at 50, while the max result of 150 gets 2AK. A bare fist attack on the revised Brawling table first gets 1 point of damage at 43, while the max result of 105 gets 4A. It doesn't make sense to me that a bare fist could achieve higher damage sooner than an armored fist does. However, if one applies the attack size limitations from the revised Brawling table to the original Brawling table, the same maximum bare fist attack would deliver no damage to AT 20. This makes more sense to me, imagining how my fist would fare at punching plate armor. (For reference, the results after applying size limits to the original Brawling table would be as follows: Small (105), ranging from 0 to 10A; Medium (120), ranging from 2 to 15A; Large (135), ranging from 3 to 20B; and Huge (150), ranging from 6 to 25B.)
Where it gets less clear for me is after this point. It seems obvious that the 100 UM line from the original Brawling table should be removed, since normal attack tables didn't have that feature. But does it make sense, then, that no Brawling attack on AT 20 would ever deliver a critical?
How should the small weapons from other modules (baton, blackjack, brass knuckles, hilt bash, rock) be reassigned knowing that the Brawling table eventually existed?
Should the original Brawling table be discarded because it only had 3 years of use, while the revised table had 13+ years?
If so, should the Armored Fist table also be completely ignored and instead reassigned to some level on a Brawling table? (I don't think this is viable, based on the small spread of results to differentiate between attack sizes on the new table, and the large dissimilarity of maximum results of either Brawling table to the Armored Fist table.)
Please note that I'm not interested in creating a custom attack table from scratch to answer these questions, but rather determine the best fit with the existing material. I'm curious to know what others think about this.
