If I recall, didn't rarely people use full plate Armour besides thin chain mail, other than Knights because it was expensive?
Poll: The fantasy RPG genre needs more practical equipment
- Thread starter ninja666
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SO if...this Armour...isn't all that practical to begin with then...what's going on?ninja666 said:It's true, they didn't. A full plate armor in medieval times was often equal in worth to a village or two. But we're talking RPGs, where buying such an armor is a matter of spending your pocket moneySUPA FRANKY said:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RealityIsUnrealistic
The major issue that I haven't seen addressed in this thread is the use of fear in warfare.
Sure practicality has it's place in warfare, but if your equipment doesn't cause your enemies to shit themselves in fear then you're missing a major tool in your arsenal.
Motifs of death, hell, and the bones of their fallen comrades are all quite practical to have adorning your armor, sure you still want to move freely, but what's more menacing, a large traffic cone with a sword:
Or something that seemingly crawled out of hell for the soul purpose of ending your life?
Sure practicality has it's place in warfare, but if your equipment doesn't cause your enemies to shit themselves in fear then you're missing a major tool in your arsenal.
Motifs of death, hell, and the bones of their fallen comrades are all quite practical to have adorning your armor, sure you still want to move freely, but what's more menacing, a large traffic cone with a sword:
I didn't say impractical, I said cheap. You know, in fantasy worlds they often have so much iron, they trip over on at least five veins of it when going on a Sunday walk.SUPA FRANKY said:
Dark Souls got you covered in both cases.NiPah said:
You'd have to be really brave not to shit your bowels out when seeing something like this during battle.
What about subgenres like low fantasy or mundane fantasy, then? Just because they're closer to the real world automatically disregards them as fantasy? I think RPG devs should cater to fans of many fantasy subgenres, not just high/epic/hero/power fantasy.insaninater said:
Depends on what era you're in. Early plate didn't conform to the body and was used mainly for spot protection. As armor technology improved, full-plate was reserved mostly for members of peerages and their vassals. Mail and brigandine coats were both common among the rank and file soldiers and mercenaries, most of them being hand-me-downs or recycled from ruined plate.SUPA FRANKY said:
In general, though, a set of full-plate would be worth a town of maybe 100 people or more.
Glad I could help.insaninater said:
And about the other part of your previous post:
I personally don't think there's much of a line here. Just look at any mythology - gods, monsters, heroes etc. living and fighting amongst ordinary people. The same can be applied to RPGs - just because you have more believable equipment, doesn't mean you automatically have to make the rest of the setting believable. You could easily be slaying dragons in a "proper" medieval armor.insaninater said:
I'd have to agree. The Warhammer/Blizzard stuff can have it's place I guess, but it's all rather juvenile and tends to be overdone. Though what tends to bother me more is the character aesthetics where they all look like professional wrestlers. When I played Kingdoms of Amalur I had to make a female character because the men just looked ridiculous, and especially when every human NPC used the same model and even lowly peasants or clerics had bulging neck muscles like they're Triple H or something.
One series that was missed which deserves huge credit here is The Witcher. Geralt is great, and the game shows you don't need to devolve into simple looting mechanics for bigger & more badass equipment.
And if you are going to have this sort of armour, it's fantasy so at least write some sort of background to justify it.
One series that was missed which deserves huge credit here is The Witcher. Geralt is great, and the game shows you don't need to devolve into simple looting mechanics for bigger & more badass equipment.
And if you are going to have this sort of armour, it's fantasy so at least write some sort of background to justify it.
I agree, but while it certainly had more practical armor, there was a grand total of 3 armor sets in the whole game. Don't know about the sequel, but I'm gonna guess it's about the same. We need an RPG where there's a shitton of equipment to be bought, found, or looted off corpses (so generally - a standard RPG) and all of it is realistic and practical. Souls series don't count!RandV80 said:
This is a very old argument, but I'll pitch in long enough to say "No". The fantasy RPG genre needs practical equipment only when the designers behind the game(s) in question want characters to look a certain way (in the name of plausibility or authenticity or whatever). And it needs no such practicality when the designers behind the game(s) want their characters to look a certain other way. Simple as that.ninja666 said:
There is no way that armour SHOULD or SHOULD NOT be in fantasy RPGs or anything else for that matter.
Going to close with two of my favourite fantasy armour sets. The more like these the better in my opinion!:
I don't wanna diss you or anything, but I think JRPGs are an entirely different cup of tea. These games are all about ridiculous looking armor (or sometimes lack thereof) and honestly I haven't seen a single JRPG title with practical armor, but have seen some in the Western RPG library and that's what this discussion is about, and not about big-boobed manga girls with enormous swords and high-pitched voices.Candidus said:This is a very old argument, but I'll pitch in long enough to say "No". The fantasy RPG genre needs practical equipment only when the designers behind the game(s) in question want characters to look a certain way (in the name of plausibility or authenticity or whatever). And it needs no such practicality when the designers behind the game(s) want their characters to look a certain other way. Simple as that.
There is no way that armour SHOULD or SHOULD NOT be in fantasy RPGs or anything else for that matter.
Going to close with two of my favourite fantasy armour sets. The more like these the better in my opinion!:
To be fair it's varied a lot over the years. Sometime take a look at say the artwork for Dungeons and Dragons through the years, starting with 1E AD&D (or even basic or the pamphlets) and compare the artwork to 2E, and then to 3E, and so on and you'll notice how styles are changing, oftentimes with them re-using many of the same artists and talents. The same can be applied to a lot of other things as well.ninja666 said:I don't know if I'm the only one that's been bothered by it, but it seriously needs to be said nonetheless - the RPG genre needs more practical equipment! It has always bothered me how in fantasy RPG and action games the equipment is often made to be over the top and exaggerrated. It's always an oversized slab of iron with spikes and huge, huuuuge shoulderpads, that would've crushed your head if you raised your arms [http://www.wallpaperup.com/uploads/wallpapers/2013/11/23/178638/ac9a46163356143d638f82e834dbd705.jpg], a "sexy armor" covering so little that it makes me question its purpose [http://matthewsylvester.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/sexy-terra-tera-mmorpg-online-female-elf-warrior-costume-sci-fi-fantasy-armor.jpg], or something that's only purpose is to look badass and and emphasize your testosterone-oozing hero's masculinity [http://cs1.gamemodding.net/posts/2014-05/42852500_1399441877_54105319_TESV_2014-02-20_15-01-45-08.jpg]. And that's armor. Weapons are no better - I constantly see shitty, disproportionate, and otherwise unpractical weapon designs like this [http://static-3.nexusmods.com/15/mods/110/images/11167-4-1330154941.jpg] and aforementioned armor designs in RPGs, whether it's high fantasy, like Oblivion, or dark fantasy, like Diablo. It baffles that over the years you can count games that got equipment part right on one hand. Seriously, what's wrong with usefulness? You can make your weapons and armor practical and manage to get an even better effect than with all the spikes and pauldrons bigger than your head. I patiently await the day when the RPG devs will change their view and realize that this
looks better and more badass than this
A lot of it is creeping Asian influence on pop culture, it's ironic because basically the western world developed a lot of cool stuff, Asia aped it, and then started exporting their versions right back. Most of the world's pop culture comes from the US and Japan (there ARE exceptions so no need to correct me) and as time goes on you see American ideas, at least social ones, affecting Anime and Manga which has gotten a little less crazy conceptually, and you see a lot of Japanese artistic flourishes creeping into American fantasy art, ranging from sword and sorcery to comics. When it comes to some of these oversized weapons for example, that kind of started with our boy Cloud Strife, who stood out because he was a fairly normal looking guy who wielded a sword the size of a buick, something that made other greatsword wielding fighters look like they had toothpicks. It was pure fantasy (as even the name "Final Fantasy" attests) but it was cool, especially given that they animated him using it, and has it look almost believable (in context) at times. Since then you've seen a lot more ginormous weapons showing up.
While it's waffled in popularity over the years, one source outside of the US and Japan that has been hugely influential as well is Games Workshop, which has a very distinctive art style lifted largely from the surreal descriptions in Michael Moorcock's body of work (the way the high elves and chaos warriors look for example is pure Moorcock, and I believe this was even acknowleged a few times). A lot of their art was done so it would be both distinctively stylized, and look good in both pictures and on figures. The chunky bits make things easier to paint and recognize when your looking at tiny models. GW also had some of the most fortunate bad luck ever when a company called "Blizzard" contacted them to make a new kind of computer war game based on their universe. GW told Blizzard "no" but gave them permission to use the art style, concepts, etc... since they liked the demo but weren't interested in video games. Some GW manager is probably hitting themselves right now, because "Warcraft" became a phenomena and catapulted that type of art, big shoulder pads included, all over the mainstream where of course it sparked imitators.
That said, there is some point to the large shoulder pads and such, the big thing about heavy armor is that your not really supposed to be dodging in it, and those kinds of shoulder pads help protect you against downward strikes (a big deal since that is how people can throw all their weight and power into a swing... and in a fantasy world where lots of things are taller than you it can also be an issue). Granted they get overdone, and over used.
As a general rule more realistic styles of weapons and armor do exist within fantasy, a lot depends on the type of world/setting it is. As a general rule the crazier the world is, the crazier the warriors get to be able to compete with it. Right now tastes run towards the incredible, though there are still some more down to earth designs. Lord Of The Rings (due to the movies) is highly imitated and wasn't terrible, The Witcher also uses some fairly realistic depictions of arms and armor.
When it comes to female warriors, realistically that didn't happen (there were exceptions but very few, and those people stand out because so few women were able to do this, most female warriors were also largely leadership icons as much as anything) so your going into pure fantasy territory by definition, and that means outlandish designs. Basically it creates a conundrum because someone like a Red Sonja didn't exist in real life, as in reality she wouldn't have been able to compete in the battlefield, thus there isn't much call for realism since your pretty much entering the magical land of "gender doesn't matter when it comes to fighting". To be brutally honest most chain mail Bikinis and such are supposed to be clothing, not armor, with the lady wearing them being unarmored as opposed to relying on that for actual protection, or in the scope of a lot of stories relying on mystical factors for protection. Part of the whole point to having a character wear something like that isn't just the sex appeal, but also it's because she can obviously do it and get away with it. What's more, as much as it pains people like Anita Sarkeesian to hear it, this is pretty much the kind of character most women want, and the kind they created. You read fantasy fiction by female writers, or browse amateur fiction sites and check out the "Mary Sues" and such, the lady heroes are almost invariably good looking and a lot of time is put into what they happen to wear and going for the right look.
I'd also point out that it's been a while but Red Sonja as conceived as not actually a female Conan type warrior, but a swashbuckler type from a somewhat higher tech level. I seem to remember them having pistols and such (it's been a very long time) so really Red Sonja wearing armor doesn't fit her. Later versions that put her down as a female Conan, likewise are following the Conan trope, and just like he runs around 90% naked a lot of the time (or at least is shown that way in art) so does she. Old sword and sorcery stories were not much on choreography, and half the fun was these characters would wind up simply throwing down their enemies with say "A mighty blow" after a simple statement that there was a fight (though it varies) leaving a lot of the details to your imagination. Part of what was amusing about Barbarian heroes is the fact that these unarmored naked people were defeating more civilized, armor wearing, warriors with relative ease.... though don't get me wrong, Conan did occasionally wear armor, but it's usually not specified, and typically he pretty much just wound up wearing clothes until someone threw him in a dungeon or whatever and he had to fight his way out at which point he'd lose them. But also understand here, nobody is giving Conan points for being "realistic", fun yes, realistic no.
That said given time you'll probably see things drift back in the other direction due to the popularity of things like "Game Of Thrones" which has presented a rather popular less-than-traditionally attractive female warrior in heavy armor for example, to which I expect a few imitators... but it will probably take years passing after GoTs finally ends and it will probably never overcome the major tropes of the genere, just be an exception you see more often. Likewise the more realistic weapons will likely become more popular as you see more live action sword and sorcery, assuming the current trends continue. A lot also depends on Asia though as well, because like it or not, overwrought fantasy garb and weapons are kind of their think, I've seen a few Asian MMOs that had character models that almost made my eyes explode (one was "War Of The Immortals" or something like that) due to how decorative it was, we're talking Anime Batman statue (the one shown on the escapist) levels of overdone, if not more. Given the number of Asian art contributors, the enduring popularity of that style, etc... it's unlikely to stop creeping in entirely, especially when people hope for a product to capture both the Western and Asian eye.
It should also be noted that Mount and Blade was trying to be fairly "realistic" in it's depictions unlike fantasy. Likewise that's not a game where you fight dudes throwing fireballs, or might have to battle a passing Griffon looking to make dinner out of your horse. It's been a while, but I seem to remember it's 100% human, and all about arms and armor.
Oh, and I'm not sure how far you take things, but I'll also point out that if your looking for pure realism and historical accuracy you might want to see if you can contact one of the more strict SCA cantons, you'll find a lot of like minded people in such organizations. People that are pretty much anti-fantasy, and get picky about the authentic appearance of costumes and such down to the buttons, acting to ensure everything is properly "period". Fantasy and history are heavily at odds when it comes to this kind of stuff.
I find that it has to do with quality of story telling in general. Stories that take realism or story telling more seriously tend to give you more practical armor. Stories that want to turn you into a power fantasy usually give you shoulder pads larger than your head. These tend to be rather poorly written as well. This isn't even exclusive to fantasy. One of my favorite characters of all time is James Sunderland. Blue jeans and a green jacket. I love link. Green tunic, and sometimes chain mail underneath. These are characters I remember. I won't remember Japanese protagonist with a big sword number 127. Except Guts. But even he tends to wear conventional clothing.ninja666 said:
My point is, simplicity of design is important, and even though these characters have mundane clothing their memorable.
Edit: also, when will artists realize that women in normal armor are more attractive then skanks in chain mail bikinis and boob plates. Every time i see that all I can do is wonder at how stupid that person is for wandering into combat naked. It's like those dreams where you go to school in your underwear, except worse, cuz you die.