If APDS halves down Ballistic Armor does Edge Weapons halve down Impact?

Example of a catchers vest. It helps on getting hit from a baseball, but would suck with getting stabbed. Even with kelver, a pointed weapon can punch a whole in it.

No.

Thanks,

After your explanation, I can see how it rules just generalize it. Basically impact armor can be thought of something like chain mail that is padded.

Its more like rigid densiplast plates. Like those armored motorcycle jackets.

As I understand it, kevlar does work on knives and edged weapons, from a slash or a stab. However, if you want something that halves impact armour, then why not use a monowhip?

Kevlar does in and of itself protect against bladed weapons. It was not historically woven tightly enough to do so, IIRC, nor is it always woven that tightly today. However, that practice is becoming more common.

~J

Despite the high entertainment value of shifters with monowhips and a "fail and lose a limb" house rule, the books only state one condition where you get to slice yourself with a monowhip. Specifically, it is when the intended victim uses full defense, doesn't counter all your successes with it's skill roll, but does manage to dodge out of the way afterward.

However, rule of 1 still isn't your friend.

Selection and Application Guide to Personal Body Armor by the National Institute of Justice

I wear a IIIa vest at work. I wish I could remember what company made it, but the tag on the carriers wore off long ago.

It is actually very resistant to a stab from most knives, even with a great deal of force behind it.

However :

A double-edged knife can still get through with a good arm behind it.

Also :

Believe it or not, it actually does a pretty good job of absorbing blunt-force blows, that or I do.

When it isn't backed with anything at all? I would be quite surprised, yes, but if you've got information to the contrary I'd love to not make the same mistake again.

~J

Mail isn't ever worn without padding. It's marginally useful against anything if you wear just a mail hauberk and nothing else.

It's quite useful against any kind of cutting or sawing action without a lot of force behind it. What is protecting you from the impact as opposed to the cutting isn't to any meaningful degree the mail itself, it is the backing absorbing that (and the backing isn't very good protection against a piercing/cutting attack, usually. Fancy that).

While I agree that I am setting up a situation that will not occur in the real world, I disagree that its value as an example is lessened thereby.

~J

Having had the oppertunity (mis-oppertunity?) of backpeddelling at full sprint into a tree, I can say while is dosent keep you from getting bruised, it DOES do a good job of keeping the skin on your back. Leaves REALLY odd looking bruises though...

The mass of the mail can do quite a lot to slow down incoming blows and sap their power. The effect depends on the mail having room to travel a bit, so it needs to be hanging loose... if it's stretched tight against the body, it won't do much but make the bruises look more interesting. Swinging out away from the body, as with a turn, is even better... the mail's momentum directly counters the blow's. I've found that sometimes that effect can even go far enough to actually stop incoming blows completely before they touch me. Leg shots especially... the skirt of my hauberk swings out quite a lot when I'm moving.

Now, don't get me wrong... if someone were coming after me with a baseball bat, I'd rather be wearing my plate than my mail. But given the choice between the mail without the gambeson or the gambeson without the mail, I'd take the mail without the gambeson. And that'd be an informed decision... I've been hit both ways, and know what each feels like.

Apparently armored clothing is not just for the 2060s anymore. Presenting Ballistic 0 / Imapct 2.

I I love love double double posts posts.....

Since the late push for stab-resistant body armor by several organizations, notably the NIJ and many/most US law enforcement agencies and departments, it was only a question of time before well-concealed personal body armor which is only designed to be stab-proof and not bullet-proof became easily available on the civilian market.

I do find it interesting that the materials are supply and light enough to manufacture whole articles of clothing out of them. No mention of weight or price, unfortunately. It doesn't actually say the pieces of clothing have been tested to perform according to the NIJ stabbing standards either -- it just says the cutting test results from JSTIIF are equivalent to the cutting level III NIJ standards, which is interesting since the NIJ tests have only got to do with stabbing, not cutting per se.