A possible minor new rule about piercing damage [STAFF ONLY]

[Antvasima]

Hello.

I and a few other members talked about in another discussion thread that we should preferably mention in one of our official policy pages that cutting something with a sharp object does not mean that the character who caused the damage automatically scales fully in terms of raw power.

https://vsbattles.com/threads/real-life-animals-crt.111630/post-3556521

Below is a rough draft text. Suggestions for improvements are appreciated.

"Due to the nature of sharp objects, it is possible for a character of a certain durability to be injured by an object propelled with less energy than would normally be required to damage them, provided that it is sharp and hard enough. As such, a character responsible for such piercing damage should not automatically scale fully in terms of raw power."

Should we insert a mention of this into the "Notes" section at the bottom of our wiki's Durability page, or place it somewhere more appropriate? That is, in case we have not written any instruction about this in some more suitable policy page previously.

 

[Antvasima]

@AKM sama @Promestein @Ryukama @DontTalkDT @Ultima_Reality @Sera_EX @SomebodyData @The_real_cal_howard @Dragonmasterxyz @Celestial_Pegasus @Soldier_Blue @Saikou_The_Lewd_King @Andytrenom @DarkDragonMedeus @Wokistan @MrKingOfNegativity @Mr._Bambu @Elizhaa @Qawsedf234 @ByAsura @Damage3245

My apologies for being a bother, but some input would be appreciated.

 

[Arcker123]

Would they be usable at all?

 

[Mr. Bambu]

I feel like this will mostly be relevant at lower tiers with smaller gaps in between them, but yeah, this makes sense. The Notes section on the Durability page works as well as anything else.

 

[Damage3245]

I think that this is a good idea. Durability is as good a page as any to mention it on.

You have characters punching each other back and forth easily without causing significant damage but if they get their hands on an incredibly sharp weapon, they can effortlessly cause more significant harm.

 

[Antvasima]

This should preferably be a staff only thread.

 

[Celestial_Pegasus]

Fine with me.

 

[DontTalkDT]

As my status says I really don't have time to handle much of anything on the wiki currently, but let me drop two suggestions of improvement really quick:
1. This isn't really just an issue of sharpness. A punch, blade, car-sized energy beam, shockwave, bodycheck, attacks with or without leverage, and attacks to different body parts are all of somewhat different... efficiency. It is likely worthwhile to present this in the general context of factors besides pure energy being relevant to AP.
2. It should be explicitly mentioned that, since Attack Potency is not Destructive Capacity but the ability to harm characters with a certain durability, a character that can cut someone with x durability will still always have x AP with his sword. I believe otherwise the formulation could easily be misunderstood.

 

[Milly_Rocking_Bandit]

I’m somewhat iffy on this. Certain parts of the body are easier to damage than others (temple, liver, etc), so automatically saying that a person doesn’t scale to the force of the knife THEY put into something seems incredibly off. Even the most skilled person has to put a bit of effort into cutting through something, consciously or not, so if they can exert that force into a weapon that actively requires said energy to be placed into it, I see no reason to change it.

Unless, of course, said weapon is ridiculously more powerful than the user.

 

[Milly_Rocking_Bandit]

Crap, didn’t see staff only.

 

[Sera_EX]

I find myself agreeing with DT.

 

[Antvasima]

DontTalkDT makes sense, yes.

Is somebody willing and able to write a modified instruction based on what he described?

 

[DarkDragonMedeus]

Well, sharp objects also can have some form of chemical energy within them, but I mostly do agree with DontTalkDT. At least I think we should separate the policy if we're comparing lower tiered characters, verses, or weapons with higher tiered ones.

• I pretty much agree all real world profiles; animals, firearms, ect should scale from their own calculations. And that attacks with more energy simply less area of effect simply have more precision; Usually calculated using PSI or J/cc depending on the type of attack rather than the raw joules of energy.
• Melee weapons such as swords, claws and clubs are a different can of worms; most of its true AP actually comes from the characters holding the weapons rather than the sharpness of the weapon itself. Swords and knives don't cut that much IRL unless someone puts more muscle into it. For animals using claws, I would still just use their own calculations but add "Higher with piercing".
• But superhuman characters in most fictions is where it gets more complicated. I already explained the sword parts; characters who are Tier 8 and above fighting on equal grounds with regular swords as I said should just be giving credit to their wielders. But human sized characters with significant levels of superhuman durability getting hurt by firearms such as bullets should just be ruled out as bad writing; PIS, CIS, Outlier, Inconsistency, ect depending on the context. The same thing can be said if a fodder character chip damages a much stronger character via stabbing them in the eyeballs with a sharp object and all it really does is make the stronger character angry.

I'm in the middle of other things, but I actually do have a lot more things to add on how pretty much most military weapons should be rated. But not ready to tackle that in full force ATM. And also not sure how to write up a general rule, but I hope the general listing helps.

 

[Antvasima]

Thank you for helping out Medeus.

 

[Wokistan]

That is how surface area works yes

2. It should be explicitly mentioned that, since Attack Potency is not Destructive Capacity but the ability to harm characters with a certain durability, a character that can cut someone with x durability will still always have x AP with his sword. I believe otherwise the formulation could easily be misunderstood.

But this isn't actually true. We can take weirdo 10-A pistols from the real world. They'll use subsonic ammo, generally. The human skull is 9-C in dura. That gun will still penetrate your skull. It would be inaccurate to say that pistol is now 9-C when it straight up does not have that many joules.

 

[DontTalkDT]

That is how surface area works yes

2. It should be explicitly mentioned that, since Attack Potency is not Destructive Capacity but the ability to harm characters with a certain durability, a character that can cut someone with x durability will still always have x AP with his sword. I believe otherwise the formulation could easily be misunderstood.

But this isn't actually true. We can take weirdo 10-A pistols from the real world. They'll use subsonic ammo, generally. The human skull is 9-C in dura. That gun will still penetrate your skull. It would be inaccurate to say that pistol is now 9-C when it straight up does not have that many joules.

As we are all aware our AP and Durability standard are vastly simplified. That's why we don't evaluate the Real World the same way as fiction profiles.
In general, the only way what you are addressing would actually be solved is to switch to an energy per area. I don't think that will happen.

I will say that I personally am starting to believe that real-world profiles do more harm to the wiki than they help, as they constantly cause trouble given that our standards for fiction are unsuited for actually doing them properly.

 

[DarkDragonMedeus]

Well, they're still valid for indexing as well as characters overpowering large animals via punching and give reference to the potency of live action movie and TV characters or FPS characters and the like. I agree AP should remained simplified as the energy yield being our main system, but adding footnotes to clarify details would be a better idea. There's also a lot of things the system doesn't take into account; like surface area being part one, but also hardness vs toughness of the attack and the target; metal is harder to pierce than fleshy creatures but the latter can be tougher in other areas.

 

[Antvasima]

Yes, I do not remotely suggest that we should overhaul our system. I just thought that some kind of footnote about that very sharp and sufficiently hard objects tend to lessen the required energy to cause damage might be a good idea.

 

[Wokistan]

"I will say that I personally am starting to believe that real-world profiles do more harm to the wiki than they help, as they constantly cause trouble given that our standards for fiction are unsuited for actually doing them properly."

Anything I use them as an example for, I can just use a random verse that doesn't shoot up super high in tiers. Subsonic ammo using pistols aren't going to change in joule output just because someone has one in worm or something as opposed to the real world, sword wielding enemies killing you in hotline miami doesn't magically make the enemies stronger than they otherwise would be, etc. It's not like reality is the only place that doesn't just throw standards totally out of the window. Hell, why would they even be assumed to no longer apply at higher levels of power? Why would surface area just stop being a consideration past some arbitrary number of joules when the whole deal with it is that it isn't directly affecting whatever energy is present but the amount of space it acts on? Because that's not something that's changing.

I'd rather list guns and shit with their actual proper values and just add a note in the tiering system telling people about the concept of surface area existing to allow sharp objects to cheat a bit.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

That's why we don't evaluate the Real World the same way as fiction profiles.

Exactly. Real life isn't fiction and vice versa.

But the actual trend is like, the reverse. Even high-tier characters will consistently treat piercing weapons and bullets as some kind of crazy threat. Good examples of this are Spider-Man and other characters in the same ballpark in Marvel who are literally allergic to bullets. Heck, it's such a common occurrence that it's listed as an example of "Outlier" on the site's terminology pages.

The assumption that bullets and sharp objects stop working at certain durabilities is something that's evaluated based on real world principles but is often contradicted in fiction.

So I don't actually think the site's treatment on the matter is "follow fictional trends", at the very least. It sounds a lot more like "follow fictional trends that agree with the system". I understand that "accepting split durability will make the tiering system implode in on itself" but all this talk on tropes/trends is nonsense.

 

[Antvasima]

Thank you for helping out with input.

 

[DarkDragonMedeus]

Most fictions, it's just being a robot or wearing full metal armor makes someone bullet proof, but uncovered human flesh is susceptible regardless of superhuman status. And others, it's just they become susceptible when distracted, but the same character tanks being impaled by sharp pikes of a high tiered character; which is honestly far more penetrative than any type of bullet. Or even Wonder Woman recently became bullet proof in Post Flashpoint continuity.

 

[Armorchompy]

bump

 

[Antvasima]

What is left to do here?

 

[Bobsican]

Reach a proper conclusion.

 

[Antvasima]

Yes, I do not remotely suggest that we should overhaul our system. I just thought that some kind of footnote about that very sharp and sufficiently hard objects tend to lessen the required energy to cause damage might be a good idea.

So would this be a good solution?

 

[Armorchompy]

I think it would be

 

[Antvasima]

What do you think @DontTalkDT ?

 

[DontTalkDT]

I think there's no harm in an acknowledgement that sharp/piercing weapons tend to overcome higher durability than blunt ones when attacking with equal energy.

Would that be placed on the AP page?

 

[DarkDragonMedeus]

I think adding a foot note about sharp objects having a damage boost is harmless. But some details about using penetration to calculate AP or claiming that it is "Durability negation" are both not quite true. As far as things on the wiki are concerned, it kind of slipped through my mind we have a page for Damage Boost. Which would be the closest thing Sharp/Pointy objects would be correlated to if anything.

 

[Antvasima]

I think there's no harm in an acknowledgement that sharp/piercing weapons tend to overcome higher durability than blunt ones when attacking with equal energy.

Would that be placed on the AP page?

Thank you.

That would be fine and appreciated, yes.

I think adding a foot note about sharp objects having a damage boost is harmless. But some details about using penetration to calculate AP or claiming that it is "Durability negation" are both not quite true. As far as things on the wiki are concerned, it kind of slipped through my mind we have a page for Damage Boost. Which would be the closest thing Sharp/Pointy objects would be correlated to if anything.

Avoiding to call it durability negation seems useful to mention in the note, yes.

 

[Agnaa]

I agree with DT/DDM here.

 

[Antvasima]

@DarkDragonMedeus @DontTalkDT

Would you be willing to apply what has been decided here please?

 

[DontTalkDT]

Would adding something like

When used with an equal amount of energy, sharp and spiky weapons tend to overcome higher durability than blunt ones. This can not be considered proper Durability Negation, though.

to the trivia section suffice?

 

[Antvasima]

I adjusted the suggested text a bit:

"When used with an equal amount of energy, sharp and spiky weapons tend to be able to overcome higher durability than blunt ones. However, this can not be considered proper Durability Negation."

However, shouldn't we mention something about that attacks with commonly used sharp weapons can recurrently only get an unspecified "higher" rating without further evidence, and place the information in a "Notes" section, rather than one for trivia?

 

[DontTalkDT]

I suppose we can mention that they could contribute to a "possibly higher"-ranking if they are calculated to have a certain energy. So:

When used with an equal amount of energy, sharp and spiky weapons tend to be able to overcome higher durability than blunt ones. However, this can not be considered proper Durability Negation. If a sharp or pointy weapon is shown to have kinetic energy on the level of a certain tier, it can contribute towards the character receiving an unquantified "possibly higher" rating.

Would making an extra notes section really be necessary? I'm not sure what else we would put there. Maybe we could just rename the trivia section to "notes"?

 

[Antvasima]

I made a few minor corrections, but the text seems fine to apply now. Thank you.

I renamed the "Trivia" section to "Notes" instead. It also fits better with our standard conventions.

 

[KLOL506]

So this is going to be applied to the Attack Potency page, yes?

 

[Antvasima]

Well, it depends on if the participants here think that the AP or Durability page is more appropriate.

 

[DontTalkDT]

I have applied it to the AP page. The durability page is not as well visited (due to being much less extensive), so when in doubt where it belongs I think the AP page is the better choice.