Thought about this a bit more in the car in to work this morning…

Nishra said:

On this point, I think I'd exercise a rule of thumb along the lines of "2 rounds of active exertion for every point under the the threshold" - after this, I'd slap down a Fatigue point, so there's minimal advantage to "optimising" encumbrance.

I was also wondering about where the penalty kicks in, and was thinking that maybe the first 5 points of encumbrance should be free (first 10 if you're a dwarf), and the permanent fatigue only kicks in after that? Or rather than 5 points, number of points equal to Strength?

Armour is a long debated point in RPGs.

While I will not judge these house rules, I can't refrain from adding some points to the ones expressed here.

Well WFRP doesent account the fact that Plate-armor not only replaced chain/chainmail becouse it offered far better protection but also costed a lot less time and money to manufacture. Its the superrior armour on the field of honor or was…when the longbows and later on the gunpowder-weapons were introduced and made armor kind of useless.

Well, longbows wheren't that plate killer we are compelled to believe.

Is it realy harder to hide in armor ?

Well you could say so, to balance the far better protection of plate vs leather but ! It dosent mirror reality at all. You can hide in plate as well as in leather if your plate isent polished to be shining silver…if you´d want that (and get a bonus on charm checks i.e) you will get penaltys in hiding.

1) Noise. Plate armor is noisy. Very noisy. Even a careful step will have some buckle, spoulder, kneecop to "ding" on another piece.

2) Size. Clad in plate armour you are much more cumbersame. Try walk in-house. You'll start hitting all sorts of things. Try it!

3) Kneeling or retain crouched positions. Your muscle will start hurting A LOT after small periods.

4) Stand up/crouch times: while good armours will allow you to do these things confortably, you will be slower nonethless, and you will need at least one hand to standup or crouch/go prone. In either case check point 1.

5) Visibilty is the last concern. Blackened armour was known and often used.

Is it harder to sneak in armor ?

Sure armor will moste likely give you some disadvantage due that the chain might russel or the plate might make some klanking sounds but leather itselve does that too…its more a "gnrall squish" sound but its there and will give away your position just as fine. Leather armor is just as stiff as metall if you use it as armor. True it will bend provided enough pressure but that doesent mean you can sneak better in it.

1) Well padded chain is like a glove. No sound at all.

2) plate will klang a lot.

3) Oiled leather is very quiete. But alas… no one gone in battles with leathers armour. That's an RPG novelty. leather was a complement to chain.

So when heavy armor a bad idea ? When you climb or swim ?

Well armor wont hampe you when you climb a tree or a wall if you have enough strengh and endurance, it will drown you though when you try to swim in it.

Armor will hamper you. While fitted armor are mobile, STR isn't a mobility factor. You simply can't do some movement since armor will lock in place and limit your agility. No way to reduce it. Expecially raising your arm up is troublesome, since spoulder can get stuck somevere.

Not to mention gothic armor with bevor, gauntlets and sabaton. Definitely you can climb a wooden stair, but a tree, while possibile, is not routine at all.

Swimming in armour is possibile, but expecially tiring. You will sink, exhausted, in seconds.

Well DeathfromAbove i dont know were your "quote" all came from or what kind of information your peers got to make you think they got facts not make-believs or simply theier own oppinion which they though might mirror history.

Some of the points you state there are correct, many aren´t and i wont pick every one point in detail. (But a.e "plate makes noise" ? it can as well be pattet with leather on the joints etc. no vaild points there)
The idea of a system is not to mirror the reality at all it´s designt to make it usefull the rest is up to you. If youd like a thousand rules for evey piece of armor, equipment or item feel free to do so me and my group wouldent like it.

We here tryed to desidn one house rule that is A. Simpel B. Easy to use C. covering the weight/hinderence of armor

And thus we did !

@phild

We though just about the same thing and agreed that it might be usefull but its just to much effort, is a rule of thumb nothing more. Sure you can give one free enc/perm.fatigue to your players if you´d like. The intention however was to reflect that evey ounce you carry with you will have a noticable effekt on your overall performance. Ceep in mind though you dont get 1-perm.fatigue when you carry only 4-5 enc but if you take more like 6-8 (or a plate armor) with you. So the first 5 are "free" already !

Well, I don a lot of armours, from chain, to plate, to leather, passing through brigandine, scale and lamellar and various roman lorica.

I've simply added something to your points. You are free to ignore my additions or discard them as untrue

Just one last thing: In my experience joints will not produce much noise in plate armors, and can be padded with leather and velvet (much higher cost and maintenance), but the overlapping plates of various pieces: an arm hitting the breastplate, the spoulder on the helm, gauntlet on the tight, the buckle of the armpit, the armored skirt.
Every movement you'll do that isn't walking very carfully, will make klank.

Good luck for your rules

Ieeeps! I am back from some holidays.

Good to hear that you tested the rules. I have a game shortly where I will test the rules, but I am going to aim for a higher difficulty regarding the recovering of the permanent fatigue. As a coincidence, during my holidays I have been hikking throught the Atlas in Morocco with a heavy backpack (the bastard should have been encumbrance 7 at least!), and I can tell you that it is not easy to get rid of your fatigue and muscle aching

Just a simple thought, regarding the extra exhaustion of weighted armour. The global fatigue effect is worsened, in effect.

Medium Armor: All physical checks gain "[ba]: Suffer 1 Fatigue."
Heavy Armor: All physical checks gain "[ba]: Suffer 1 Fatigue. This effect may be triggered twice."

Much less book-keeping, but provides the feel that overexerting yourself in armour is more taxing. The first round of climbing isn't so bad, but if you can't take your time, you're apt to exhaust yourself before you get to the top.

After some brain storming and play testing, me and my group of players ended up finding a set of house rules for wearing armour, and encumbrace in general that suits our taste a bit more than the ones proposed by the game.

The rules are spread in chapters 2.7 and 2.8 of the boklet, while the revised armours (old and new ones) are detailed in the table 3.5.2. I also did a new set of condition cards for my players to remember how encumbered they are, just in case they try to forget

Cheers,

Yepes