[TW 2013] Body armor and Trama plates

[Michael Lewis]

I'm using the basic load from TW2000 for my TW2013 characters. What would be the equivalent flak jacket from TW2000 in TW2013?

Did they not have trama plates back then?

Do you think trama plates are too effective for beginning characters in TW2013?

What about knock down and stunning? Would a rifle bullet knock down and stun a PC if he was hit wearing trama plates?

It says they it covers the chest and upper abdomen (20%). Does that mean you roll percentile dice to see if a bullet hits or that's just the chance on the random location chart its going to hit those body parts?

Thanks

[Targan]

Do you think trama plates are too effective for beginning characters in TW2013?

I'm a bit confused by the question. Isn't the fact that trauma plates are effective the whole point? Why should being a "starting character" preclude a character from having trauma plates in their armour if having them is standard for that armour type/role of character?

[stg58fal]

I think its called a tactical vest in T2013.

Trauma plates are the ONLY reason one of my PCs lived. Multiple hits from an RPK-74, NONE of which penetrated the plates. If they had, he'd have died.

[Tegyrius]

Do you think trama plates are too effective for beginning characters in TW2013?

Depends on how often you want to kill beginning characters. Trauma plates, like soft armor, have armor values calibrated to reflect their real-world performance against specific threats. But you can't put them on limbs or the head.

What about knock down and stunning? Would a rifle bullet knock down and stun a PC if he was hit wearing trama plates?

Possibly. But my reading on terminal ballistics implies to me that knockdown and stun is as much psychological as it is physiological - some people fall down when shot because they expect they should, not because of any loss of physical control. So I might treat that as a function of CUF rather than a pure damage function.

It says they it covers the chest and upper abdomen (20%). Does that mean you roll percentile dice to see if a bullet hits or that's just the chance on the random location chart its going to hit those body parts?

The percentages reflect the fact that trauma plates don't provide 100% coverage on those body locations. Check out the diagram on page 3 of the attached PDF (swiped from sixty-six.org by way of M4carbine.net). Here's the procedure in Reflex rules:

1. Determine hit location with the standard chart (d6 x d6).
2. If the hit location is protected by armor with a percentage notation, roll against that percentage to see if the attack strikes the armor.

That help?

- C.

[Tegyrius]

I'm a bit confused by the question. Isn't the fact that trauma plates are effective the whole point? Why should being a "starting character" preclude a character from having trauma plates in their armour if having them is standard for that armour type/role of character?

I think this is an artifact of other game systems having an artificially-regulated power curve in which gaining combat effectiveness is a key component (sometimes the only component) of character advancement. And by "other game systems," I'm referring mainly to those which run on class/level scales.

It's worth noting that those systems usually are paired with settings with radically different economies. You're looking at medieval or renaissance craft-guilds rather than mass production, which means only older and more experienced combatants have the prestige or personal wealth to afford those rare "superior" weapons and armor. And the all-handcrafted nature of magical items only extends that scale to higher and higher levels of "technology," ensuring only ridiculously wealthy adventurers can afford those things. By contrast, Twilight 2000 and 2013 assume prolific modern tools, as well as the opportunity to acquire equipment from the 50-90% of the prewar population that's now dead and no longer needs it.

- C.

[Michael Lewis]

Yes, your right. Mainly for game balance. You don't want your players starting with tanks or plate armor.

Secondly, I've not played TW2013, just mainly read it. That's why the question.

[Targan]

Yes, your right. Mainly for game balance. You don't want your players starting with tanks or plate armor.

That's not the way T2K (or T2013) works. You start with the gear that is appropriate to start with. In fact in my experience T2K campaigns tend to ebb and flow in terms of equipment and often your PC's equipment gets crappier and crappier, not better and better. And in T2K it's entirely possible for a PC group to start with a tank. It's not like D&D where your stuff pretty much automatically gets gets better and better, the tank will get harder and harder to find fuel for, it's ammo will slowly be depleted and in the end in all likelihood the PCs will end up trading it or abandoning it. That's the T2K vibe.

[NanbanJim]

Targan and the others have said it quite well, but I couldn't help put my 2 cents in.

Michael, there is a way to make the campaign more "advancement" style: Make it what we called in Shadowrun a "gutter campaign," where the PCs start with nothing and you carefully mete out slightly improved gear to them by ensuring their opposition would only likely have limited gear.

A good way to do this may be with the PCs as refugees stuck in a pogrom (work camp) in a para-rural area of a higher gun-control state, say, the western bulge of Illinois (a quick Googling of "Illinois map population" told me that). In a twist of irony, the clan in the "Big House" have all caught something airborne and rather terminal (the vector for this can be a campaign element), and so while they have the bullwhips, the beating sticks, due to local law and personal need they never were all that well armed to begin with--just lucky. A couple pistols a rifle and shotgun or two would be the "big guns."

That setting is ready for the PCs to make their break from their weakened guards... and the disease could also keep the PCs from getting that far.

Add in some personal motivations, eg the PCs families were all sold to similar local pogroms (hobby farms/ranches, maybe a gravel pit and/or peat mine). Perhaps all of these were seized by the lackeys of Chicago "philanthropists" who, after the end of real central control, "stepped in" and offered to help those city dwellers starving and stranded a way to get 2 meals a day and a roof... in what turned out to be slave labour (or indentured servitude with no effective law enforcement to ensure the release after term).

This removes urban PD from the equation. National Guard may patrol on occasion, but would generally want to GTFO by this point in time as fast as possible... and potentially trigger-happy, since there's nothing worth them protecting out here (these pogroms would barely dent the governor's needs), but handfuls of people (the Philanthropist Network) very interested in keeping prying eyes away.

After freeing a half-dozen pogroms, they'll be lucky to have any longarms with even assault-rifle ergonomics, much less select-fire capabilities. Explosives would be Molotovs, improvised explosives (eg fireworks, dangerous enough in their own right), and perhaps some dynamite from the mines. You control whether or not they get better gear (and if it's available, remember they have to pry it off from someone already using it). And yet even if you don't provide better gear, it's believable enough.

If you want to "upgrade," you'll have to deal with bandit/slavers by lead or trade, assault the NG patrols (which should probably be a moral quandry, especially if they capture an NG survivor who can explain that, "hey, it's not personal, we just learned to shoot first or die for not doing so, I got a wife and wait, aren't you Uncle Denny from Becky's side of the family??"), or...

Well, the list goes on, but that's months of campaigning down the road.

That's one way to merge classic tabletopping with a modern availability curve.

[Lundgren]

About tanks, I once read a comment by a GM "the players wanted a tank; I was evil enough to give them one." I think that group, after a while, considered a bicycle to be an upgrade.

What about knock down and stunning? Would a rifle bullet knock down and stun a PC if he was hit wearing trama plates? An unprepared human is very easy to make losing his balance. There was a video a couple of years ago of a US soldier taking a hit in his west. As I recall, he got wobbly and fell down to a sitting position, looked a bit surprised for a second while his brain sorted out what just happened, and then got up and behind the vehicle he was next to.

I have seen people ending up on their ass for not having a proper firing stance while firing a 7.62N weapon or a 12 gauge shotgun. Being hit with one of those, and no penetration, would probably be like being hit with a fist (and we are not talking professional boxer here).

Most people, when they are afraid, raise their "center of gravity" and will have a really piss poor balance. If someone points a gun I know or at least have reason to suspect is loaded at me, and says "BOO!", I would most likely fall down. A loud sudden bang would be even more effective.

Pumped up on adrenalin and in the middle of being active in combat (perhaps charging over a street), I'm not sure that many would even register a round from an assault rifle if it is stopped by the plate.

Basically: the physical force of being hit by a round is equal or less than the force the the shooter receives from the gun.

[Raellus]

A good way to do this may be with the PCs as refugees stuck in a pogrom (work camp) in a para-rural area of a higher gun-control state, say, the western bulge of Illinois (a quick Googling of "Illinois map population" told me that).

I don't disagree at all with your suggestion but I'm curious about your usage of the word "pogrom".

Webster's gives the definition of pogrom as, "the organized killing of many helpless people usually because of their race or religion". I believe that it is primarily used to describe the organized killings of Jews, but may also be applied to other ethnic/religious victim groups.

Am I missing something?

[NanbanJim]

I don't disagree at all with your suggestion but I'm curious about your usage of the word "pogrom".

I think I learned the use of the word wrong. :P My memory says I picked it up from earlier versions of T2k which seemed to use the term to mean some form of relocation camp with mandatory labour work; anything from the benign "Civilian Conservation Corps" (http://forum.juhlin.com/showthread.php?t=4069) to the infamous Nazi labour camps like Buchenwald.

My 1st and 2nd Ed books are boxed up still, so I may even be wrong on where I began misinterpreting it. TL;DR my bad!

[kato13]

I think I learned the use of the word wrong.!

I had also learned it wrong, but until you mentioned T2k being the source I did not think to go back an look for it.

I found what obviously is an incorrect usage in the Eastern European source book.

The hard-liner pogrom of 1991 came as a shock for the government of Ukraine, which joined its neighbor Belarus in denouncing the new government and its new USSR. Soviet troops moved to secure both countries, allowing them to keep their governments as long as they toed the Soviet line. This hostility was returned in force in 1996, when Ukrainian troops declared their allegiance to the government of Ukraine, supporting it against the Soviets in hopes that losses on the Chinafront will keep the central government from sending military units to reconquer the country. They were wrong, of course: The Soviets sent troops to both Ukraine and Belarus, and the fighting began anew. The hostilities were put to an abrupt end by the nuclear war, when NATO bombs fell on any Soviet unit that looked like a good target.

From that usage i thought it had meant "purge".

[.45cultist]

In a T2K/T2013 world, the plates would be in a kit bag most of the time, or lighter metal plates used instead. But I actually served before they decided to uparmor soldiers like a HumVee.

[Michael Lewis]

In a T2K/T2013 world, the plates would be in a kit bag most of the time, or lighter metal plates used instead. But I actually served before they decided to uparmor soldiers like a HumVee.

Is a kit bag like a back pack? Are you saying that they had trama plates during the TW2000 time era but did not use them because they were heavy? Or did they not have them?

[rcaf_777]

Explosives would be Molotovs, improvised explosives (eg fireworks, dangerous enough in their own right), and perhaps some dynamite from the mines.

Lets not forget comerical grade explosives like those used for building demo

[cavtroop]

Is a kit bag like a back pack? Are you saying that they had trama plates during the TW2000 time era but did not use them because they were heavy? Or did they not have them?

When I was in (ad 90-92, ng 92-98), we had - quite literally - vietnam era flak jackets that are almost completely useless. I was issued them, but never once wore it in the field. These jackets had no place for plates or any kind of additional protection. I'm mostly certain that the sapi plates weren't introdced until the late 90s

[Martti]

Basically: the physical force of being hit by a round is equal or less than the force the the shooter receives from the gun.

Some of you might have visited the site box of truth where the guys running the site shoot stuff up to see how the rounds penetrate different layers of different materials, trauma plates and ballistic vest for one. They use Ballistic? clay as a background. Some rounds do leave a huge dent to the clay even if the round doesn't penetrate the armor. If I'd punch the clay or even hit it with a bat I'd barely leave a mark.

[Martti]

while firing a 7.62N weapon or a 12 gauge shotgun. Being hit with one of those, and no penetration, would probably be like being hit with a fist (and we are not talking professional boxer here).

Sorry this is what I was trying to quote.

[Apache6]

- In US usage SAPI plates (Small Arms Protective Insert) were not 'general issue until spring 2003. The first general issue occurred for USMC units just before the 2003 "March to Baghdad. At that time almost every Marine infantrymen (but not most of the combat support Marines) were equipped with one SAPI plate (worn on the chest). It should have been two plates for every Marine, but the demand outstripped the ability to produce and deploy the plates, so they were prioritized for Infantry units and worn only on chest.

- This was one time Marines actually had better kit then the Army. Very few Army units (I believe mostly SOF and Rangers) had SAPI plates during that period.

- SAPI plates will stop small arms rounds usually resulting in nothing more then bruises. The rest of the vest is still frag resistant kevlar.

- Prior to that US body armor (commonly called a flak jacket) was primarily intended to provide protection against shell/grenade fragments, though it would stop some pistol rounds (.45 reliably, 9mm "usually" (the rounds would still often penetrate the vest at close range, but it would still have 'helped') and shotgun pellets (00 shot).

- In 2013 every Soldier or Marine going into a hostile situation should have 2 SAPIs.

[Lundgren]

Some of you might have visited the site box of truth where the guys running the site shoot stuff up to see how the rounds penetrate different layers of different materials, trauma plates and ballistic vest for one. They use Ballistic? clay as a background. Some rounds do leave a huge dent to the clay even if the round doesn't penetrate the armor. If I'd punch the clay or even hit it with a bat I'd barely leave a mark.When you hit with a fist or a bat, it will spread out the force over a larger area. The force giving that dent through a vest is still hitting a much smaller area.

The body is very flexible; and to my understanding, ballistic gel doesn't bounce back when it is hit. The person will most likely have large bruises and perhaps a cracked rib or two. But hey, you tend to get those from getting hit by a fist as well ;) Cracked rib and things giving large bruises are things that can go unnoticed while being high on adrenalin.

Now, how you feel the next day is a completely different story.

If that dent takes at the right spot I assume we might have the wind knocked out of us so we can't breath for a while, heart flutter, or any other area that would give us problem if hit by a good punch.

[.45cultist]

Is a kit bag like a back pack? Are you saying that they had trama plates during the TW2000 time era but did not use them because they were heavy? Or did they not have them?

The Air Force issued gear in flyers bags. "A" was ALICE gear and a helmet, vest, "C" was NCB gear. Those were the ones I am familiar with. The bags are tough, kicked one down many a stair case.

[.45cultist]

Targan and the others have said it quite well, but I couldn't help put my 2 cents in.

Michael, there is a way to make the campaign more "advancement" style: Make it what we called in Shadowrun a "gutter campaign," where the PCs start with nothing and you carefully mete out slightly improved gear to them by ensuring their opposition would only likely have limited gear.

A good way to do this may be with the PCs as refugees stuck in a pogrom (work camp) in a para-rural area of a higher gun-control state, say, the western bulge of Illinois (a quick Googling of "Illinois map population" told me that). In a twist of irony, the clan in the "Big House" have all caught something airborne and rather terminal (the vector for this can be a campaign element), and so while they have the bullwhips, the beating sticks, due to local law and personal need they never were all that well armed to begin with--just lucky. A couple pistols a rifle and shotgun or two would be the "big guns."

That setting is ready for the PCs to make their break from their weakened guards... and the disease could also keep the PCs from getting that far.

Add in some personal motivations, eg the PCs families were all sold to similar local pogroms (hobby farms/ranches, maybe a gravel pit and/or peat mine). Perhaps all of these were seized by the lackeys of Chicago "philanthropists" who, after the end of real central control, "stepped in" and offered to help those city dwellers starving and stranded a way to get 2 meals a day and a roof... in what turned out to be slave labour (or indentured servitude with no effective law enforcement to ensure the release after term).

This removes urban PD from the equation. National Guard may patrol on occasion, but would generally want to GTFO by this point in time as fast as possible... and potentially trigger-happy, since there's nothing worth them protecting out here (these pogroms would barely dent the governor's needs), but handfuls of people (the Philanthropist Network) very interested in keeping prying eyes away.

After freeing a half-dozen pogroms, they'll be lucky to have any longarms with even assault-rifle ergonomics, much less select-fire capabilities. Explosives would be Molotovs, improvised explosives (eg fireworks, dangerous enough in their own right), and perhaps some dynamite from the mines. You control whether or not they get better gear (and if it's available, remember they have to pry it off from someone already using it). And yet even if you don't provide better gear, it's believable enough.

If you want to "upgrade," you'll have to deal with bandit/slavers by lead or trade, assault the NG patrols (which should probably be a moral quandry, especially if they capture an NG survivor who can explain that, "hey, it's not personal, we just learned to shoot first or die for not doing so, I got a wife and wait, aren't you Uncle Denny from Becky's side of the family??"), or...

Well, the list goes on, but that's months of campaigning down the road.

That's one way to merge classic tabletopping with a modern availability curve.

Also in the U.S. and Canada civvies have access to semiauto variants of military weapons. These, civvy explosives and planning can make an entertaining group.

[Degrath]

When I deployed in 2011 with the US Army. I was issued as part of my basic kit an IOTV (Improved outer Tactical Vest) with 4 SAPI plates (front, back, 2 sides). The IOTV had removable front and rear ballistic throat protection, groin, lower back/ kidney and shoulder guards called DAPs. Without the plates it was the equivalent to a flak jacket.

After about 2 months in country I had removed all the optional components from the IOTV to lighten it up. After about another month or 2 I got rid of it all together and wore only a Plate carrier with my 4 sapi plates in it.

I saw many people take multiple 7.62 hits on the plates and they were almost never fatal. Though in nearly every case they lost consciousness and or had minor to severe internal injuries from the impact.

We were told a single plate could stop 3 rounds near point blank, though after one hit the plates would need to be replaced.
I would think for game play mechanics each hit should reduce the armor value of a plate and anything over 3-4 hits would negate it completely.

[CDAT]

When I deployed in 2011 with the US Army. I was issued as part of my basic kit an IOTV (Improved outer Tactical Vest) with 4 SAPI plates (front, back, 2 sides). The IOTV had removable front and rear ballistic throat protection, groin, lower back/ kidney and shoulder guards called DAPs. Without the plates it was the equivalent to a flak jacket.

After about 2 months in country I had removed all the optional components from the IOTV to lighten it up. After about another month or 2 I got rid of it all together and wore only a Plate carrier with my 4 sapi plates in it.

I saw many people take multiple 7.62 hits on the plates and they were almost never fatal. Though in nearly every case they lost consciousness and or had minor to severe internal injuries from the impact.

We were told a single plate could stop 3 rounds near point blank, though after one hit the plates would need to be replaced.
I would think for game play mechanics each hit should reduce the armor value of a plate and anything over 3-4 hits would negate it completely.

When I deployed in 2003 for the ground war we got flack jackets, later in Bagdad we got Interceptors with out plates. At about the year mark we got front/back plates. For my second deployment in 2008 we got vest with front/back plates before we shipped out, in 2009 got front/back and side plates before we shipped out. They did not have enough plates to let us keep then when we got home. So you could go with any of the above I would think depending on the priority of what your players were before. I was EOD so not a t1 unit, and for ground war not high priorty, from 2004/5 on we were high priorty. I am now a Police officer and have had the opertunity to go to some body armor shoots. The sapi is rated to take two hits from a .30-06 AP. After the shoot we took the vest and shoot it some more all said and done it did not fail tell about ten rounds of AP and even then still had lots of spaces that would stop the rounds. The second thing about Sapi plates is they are NOT a stand alone plate, for them to work correctly they need the soft armor. That is a cost saving system as my work plates do not need it but they are more expensive than the sapi. The other thing there have been different types of vest that could hold plates, the Rangers had them in 1993 in Black Hawk Down, in 2003 some of the bases that we took over had Iraqi plates, some of my guys used them tell we got our own. The first plates that I know of were steel and used in Vitnam with helo crews, to heavy for people on the ground. As they got the tech better they made stronger/lighter steel plates and that is what the rangers used in 93', some police still use them as they work and are "cheep" they are heavy is the main issue, but can take multi-hits better than the current. There is also a new polymier plate out there that can take multi-hits better and is lighter but is last time I looked almost 10X the cost.