proposal 3 for armor

[Wright Frazier <khelek>]

Now here is a crackhead idea. =)

Proposal 3.  The reworking of DVs.
The concept of 'grapple', 'missile', and 'combat' DVs have
always bugged me and others I've heard speak about it.  You
just cannot even remotely accurately sum up all of the forms
of attack against a type of armor into such categories.  The
justification for mail to be so lousy against missile weapons
was that it sucked against arrows.  Thats all fine and good,
but what about how well it protects against blunt missiles
such as thrown hammers and bolas?  And since it does 'suck'
against piercing weapons, why does it protect fairly well
against piercing melee weapons such as spears and daggers?

Proposed changes:
 1) The dissolution of combat/missile/grapple DVs.
 2) Implimentation of Edged, Piercing, and Blunt DVs.

Benefits:
 1) Its far more accurate than the current system.
 2) Its not a difficult change, and it will only make 
	the system better.
 3) Far easier expansion of the current armor list in a
	reasonable manner without duplication or very
	questionable numeric assignments.
 4) Easier definition of what form a piece of armor takes.
 5) Its more intuitive.
 6) It lines up more with the critical hit damage system.
 7) It disolves that pesky "linear" defense value that crops
	up from time to time that few know how to calculate
	by making guns and such piecing weapons.
 8) Artillery has been a big question for awhile.  How does
	a person get an artillery DV?  Or does artillery attack
	a person's MDV?  With this the attack types will line
	up much more easily.
 9) Redefining what statistics effect the mods, and making them
	more reasonable.

Difficulties:
 1) It is a change.
 2) Grapple.  How to handle grapple?  The easy answer is to
	just lump it under blunt because of 'kicks and punches'.
	
	How does this handle things like holds and such?  The
	simple answer to this is to make it a derevation of
	Blunt DV with a slight modification to hit since it
	is a little easier to grab someone than to hurt them
	with a punch.  
	
	The upside of this however is that grapple attacks 
	fall from the current status of utter lethality to 
	something more reasonable and defendable against.

 	The last way to handle grapple is to simply add in
	a 4th DV to this proposal and just keep the Grapple DV.
	I personally don't favor it, but it is an option.
 3) Statistical modifiers.  How these do these figure in to DVs
	will require a bit of reworking.  Agility is obviously
	the prime factor still, as is mobility.  However things
	like strength and will power do not work well.  

	Perception and commonsense work the best for DVs.  By
	seeing the blow coming, and having the sense to get the
	hell out of the way.

The Proposal:

Defensive values are calculated based upon ones statistics, and
armor, and other factors.  Three statistics effect defensive values.
They are agility, common sense, and perception.  

Agility is a person's ability to actually get out of the way of
a blow and dodge incoming attack.

Peception figures in by being able to see the incoming blow and to
respond to it in time.

Commonsense is a persons ability to react to what they see in the
appropriate manner, and there by allowing someone's agility to
come into effect.

All three stats add to ones DVs by taking the statistic and dividing
it by 5, rounding down.

Thats it so far, if folks like the concept, I'll writeup some
numbers for the actual armor.