Head gear, bird leather

[Tom H]

I've found that a character can wear on his head, all at the same time:
1. Woolen cowl
2. Leather cap
3. Fur Hood
4. Mail cowl
5. Iron helm or a iron spectacle helm

Would this even be possible?

On another subject, I wonder about bird leather as a viable craft item. I'm having trouble visualizing a bird with skin thick enough to make leather, or large enough to make tanning it worthwhile.

[StefanPravda]

I don't like the actual system of clothing. The number of items should be either limited per slot, i.e. the head allows one piece of something, or give huge penalties, impossible to surpass. How the heck can you wear 10 thousand pants and still be able to move?

The best setup you can use now would make movement, hunting, working, fighting impossible in real life.

[jonottawa]

I think the clothing system strikes the right balance between fun and realistic. If you only had one 'best item' per slot and could only wear one item, it would rob the game of some of its charm. I LIKE that layering is in most cases as effective as buying some heavy mail or lamellar monstrosity.

What bothers ME about the clothing system is how often it's more optimal to wear heavily damaged clothing than 'brand new' clothing. In a perfect unreal world, I think that would be something to fix. But I don't see it as a really high priority. A fix would look something like: If an item is 80% of the 'brand new' weight, it would only protect 64% as much (.8*. and if an item is 40% of the 'brand new' weight, it would only protect 16% as much (.4*.4,) etc.

I'd also like to see the player be able to craft fine clothing (I think that should also be true of anything else the player can craft.) I'm glad you can only acquire masterwork items via trade, but there should at least be a reasonable chance to make fine clothing if you start with fine fur or better, have a minimal penalty, and have quality tools.

[StefanPravda]

and realistic.

Where is the realism for this? 

I've found that a character can wear on his head, all at the same time:
1. Woolen cowl
2. Leather cap
3. Fur Hood
4. Mail cowl
5. Iron helm or a iron spectacle helm

[Privateer]

and realistic.

Where is the realism for this? 

I've found that a character can wear on his head, all at the same time:
1. Woolen cowl
2. Leather cap
3. Fur Hood
4. Mail cowl
5. Iron helm or a iron spectacle helm

In total it is not. However, layers of cloth, woolen or leather were realistically worn between skin and mail and/or helm.

[PALU]

It can be noted that restricting characters to a single layer is a guaranteed recipe for toe/finger frostbite management (stay inside when it's cold, use fires every few minutes (with risk of death from hours of repeated failing to light the fires), or injury. There is also no reason to assume the iron age people didn't know about the layering principle to keep warm (as well as the principle of "padding under something hard and stiff softens blunt impact", as mentioned above).

I'd like to see the "damage" from eating food and using raw materials being separated from the damage to items, so item damage has no or very little impact on weight, as damage is typically in the form of rends, nicks, etc. rather than a huge loss of material. It would then be a bonus to the system if damaged gear had worse performance as well as having the risk of breaking completely.

[StefanPravda]

I also wear skinny cold pants under my pants when I am hitchhiking in the winter, so multiple layers would be the best solution, so single layer would be the simple solution but the less desired.

But there should be a limit to what and how many can you combine. Hard or soft, who cares.

[Acolyte]

I've found that a character can wear on his head, all at the same time:
1. Woolen cowl
2. Leather cap
3. Fur Hood
4. Mail cowl
5. Iron helm or a iron spectacle helm

Would this even be possible?

On another subject, I wonder about bird leather as a viable craft item. I'm having trouble visualizing a bird with skin thick enough to make leather, or large enough to make tanning it worthwhile.

Yep, that's possible.
An Iron Helm over a Mail Coif over a Thickly Padded Coif (3/4" to 1" in some cases) was fairly standard, although in later eras (This would not be common in the iron age, though). Sized properly the Wool Coif, Leather Cap and Fur Hood would be about the same as the Padded Coif. In addition at that a Great Helm was sometimes worn over the Helm, again in later eras.

As to the bird skin - it depends on the size of the bird. Ostrich skin is used today, for example, and lighter skins may well have been used for light items in the past. Organic matter doesn't survive all that well so the lack of examples doesn't rule it out, but in any case some of those birds in URW are quite large. These societies didn't waste much if they could help it.

   - Shane

[StefanPravda]

Sorry mate, I am a big fan of medieval everything, games, books, movies, but I have never seen soldiers with their head exploding because of the abuse of layers above their head or legs or arms or whatever. The OP list is way too much.

Yes, it's normal to wear soft clothes under an armor, but the game does indeed move this stuff to extreme. Which is not a huge issue, but I support the OP regarding it.

[Acolyte]

Sorry mate, I am a big fan of medieval everything, games, books, movies, but I have never seen soldiers with their head exploding because of the abuse of layers above their head or legs or arms or whatever. The OP list is way too much.

Yes, it's normal to wear soft clothes under an armor, but the game does indeed move this stuff to extreme. Which is not a huge issue, but I support the OP regarding it.

With all  due respect, does "Medieval everything" include RL history?  The wearing of Helm, Coif and padding is out of period for the game, but the OP asked if it was doable. It is and something like it was done in real life. It should be noted that this equipment was sized to do this - the helm would be too large without the padding.

In terms of Iron age cultures, something soft is very likely to be worn under the helm just for comfort's sake - not to mention for cold's sake. A piece of metal is a radiator in cold climates, just ask anyone who's worn steel toed boots. I routinely wear wool socks a few sizes too large so that I can fold the toe of the sock up over to give extra protection to my toes. I don't have to do that even with running shoes in the same weather.

The fact of the matter is that the weight for wearing all this increases the encumbrance modifier and that, IMO, balances the ability to wear multiple layers. Further features like the "Sweating" status having game meaning (as I believe it will in the future) should balance it more.

Perhaps increasing the penalties in such a way would be a better option?
   - Shane

[PALU]

Another point: If you feel like some game mechanic is an exploit or doesn't match realities (or your Role Playing ideas), simply don't use them.

[StefanPravda]

With all  due respect, does "Medieval everything" include RL history?  The wearing of Helm, Coif and padding is out of period for the game, but the OP asked if it was doable.

With all due respect, doable doesn't mean it's viable. I can dress now with 100 pieces of cloth but I won't be able to move, work, run, jump efficiently, not even close to that. I said that this either needs a penalty when you wear tons of pieces of clothing or if it's too complicated, to be restricted by hard limits.

I can use 5 pieces of head gear but that will block my mobility and my vision making me unable to fight or see or run or everything.

Another point: If you feel like some game mechanic is an exploit or doesn't match realities (or your Role Playing ideas), simply don't use them.

Very constructive Thanks!!!

With all  due respect, does "Medieval everything" include RL history? 

No, I was speaking about drawing books Your example of 2 combined headgear is way short of the 5 pieces combination from OP. That's a bad example.

EDIT: And it's not a matter of carried weight. It's a mixture of issues. Weight in case of armors or heavy furry items but also a lack of mobility/visibility. You can't be more protected if you are heavily dressed but a sitting duck to attacks because you can't move your hands and feet or neck properly. You will both get tired quickly while also allowing the attacker to pick his moves and hit you as in a training session. Hunting will be difficult because your field of view will be affected and your movement and again you will get tired very quickly. So on.

[Acolyte]

With all  due respect, does "Medieval everything" include RL history?  The wearing of Helm, Coif and padding is out of period for the game, but the OP asked if it was doable.

With all due respect, doable doesn't mean it's viable. I can dress now with 100 pieces of cloth but I won't be able to move, work, run, jump efficiently, not even close to that. I said that this either needs a penalty when you wear tons of pieces of clothing or if it's too complicated, to be restricted by hard limits.

I can use 5 pieces of head gear but that will block my mobility and my vision making me unable to fight or see or run or everything.

Another point: If you feel like some game mechanic is an exploit or doesn't match realities (or your Role Playing ideas), simply don't use them.

Very constructive Thanks!!!

With all  due respect, does "Medieval everything" include RL history? 

No, I was speaking about drawing books Your example of 2 combined headgear is way short of the 5 pieces combination from OP. That's a bad example.

EDIT: And it's not a matter of carried weight. It's a mixture of issues. Weight in case of armors or heavy furry items but also a lack of mobility/visibility. You can't be more protected if you are heavily dressed but a sitting duck to attacks because you can't move your hands and feet or neck properly. You will both get tired quickly while also allowing the attacker to pick his moves and hit you as in a training session. Hunting will be difficult because your field of view will be affected and your movement and again you will get tired very quickly. So on.

Point of order - my example is three layers, not two.  Helm, Mail Coif, and Padding (Padded Coif). The Fur hood, Leather Cap and Wool Hood, I feel, is roughly equivalent to the thickness of the Padded Coif. You would have to customize the layers to fit together - the Helm, Coif and Padding certainly were - but it's doable.

As to the carried weight issue - it affects your mobility, your dodge (actually all your defense rolls), your fatigue rate. So with too much weight on you are a sitting duck and tire quickly. Encumbrance also affects your attack rolls, too. Wearing too much makes hunting very hard with the reduced mobility, increased fatigue rate and lowered attack rolls not to mention reduced steath. All this is already modeled in the game. The only thing not modeled in is a restricted field of view - unless your eye gets hurt.

As you said earlier doable is not necessarily viable so even though I could wear those 5 layers in game, I wouldn't, barring very cold weather. The penalties in game, IMO, are enough, although I would like to see the "Sweaty" status have an effect on thirst and fatigue.

   - Shane

[Edico]

Sightly off topic here, but it would be nice if there was an actual gameplay incentive to wear metal body armor. As it stands it's just not worth the weight penalty versus layering clothing. Maybe if there was a hard limit of # of articles of clothing so you could still layer them where you wanted, something like 15 total maybe? Or increased penalties for equipping too many clothing articles

[Tom H]

Sightly off topic here, but it would be nice if there was an actual gameplay incentive to wear metal body armor. As it stands it's just not worth the weight penalty versus layering clothing. Maybe if there was a hard limit of # of articles of clothing so you could still layer them where you wanted, something like 15 total maybe? Or increased penalties for equipping too many clothing articles

I think the problem with wearing armor is that most randomly rolled characters are not strong enough, do not have the stats, to carry much weight at all!

I confess that I like the strongest guys because I wear full bear fur for armor and various other pieces of lamellar or chain. My undergarments are linen once I can afford it all. I routinely run with a +13 malus due to armor because the game is unforgiving. I maximize a weapon type, spear, as quickly as possible and use that skill to counter the malus.

The game taught me, early on, that inability to defend oneself is as lethal as a blizzard.