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Post by stevelortz on Sept 2, 2011 17:36:49 GMT -9
Anybody else here watching SpikeTV's Deadliest Warrior on a regular basis? Each episode pairs up two famous warriors from history. Their weapons and armor are assessed (with lots of dead pigs and ballistic gel dummies full of red fluid). A number of "X Factors" are also assessed, and the results are fed into a computer simulation that cranks out 1000 matches, and gives a percentage breakdown of which specific things caused victory or defeat in each iteration. Then actors give a detailed re-enactment of the most likely outcome, complete with special effects. Here's a link to the list of episodes: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Deadliest_Warrior_episodesHave fun! Steve
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 2, 2011 17:51:58 GMT -9
I've been tinkering with skirmish systems for about 36 years now, studying what I could find on weapon performances, morale and other elements that might affect the outcome of a man-on-man combat. I find Deadliest Warrior fascinating, both for confirmation of things I've thought, and for surprising things I've never considered, especially the fighting styles of obscure warriors.
I loved the Joan of Arc Vs. William the Conqueror episode, an eleventh century warrior vs. one from the fifteenth century. I called the results as soon as I saw the title, and things turned out exactly the way I thought they would: catapult vs. cannon, ordinary crossbow vs. steel crossbow and chainmail hauberk vs. full plate.
Hot dog! My rules are GOOD! ;D
Have fun! Steve
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 2, 2011 17:56:49 GMT -9
Episode 32, the final episode in the current season, is going to be the first one to have fictional combatants: one vampire vs. 23 zombies!
It oughta be a hoot!
Have fun! Steve
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 2, 2011 18:03:06 GMT -9
I thought to bring this up here now because tonight I was considering how to modify the Scurvey Darwgs! rules to run a fight between Dave Okum's Vikings and his retro-orcs!
Have fun! Steve
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Post by gilius on Sept 2, 2011 18:04:48 GMT -9
Sounds like a great series! I wonder where the amount of 23 zombies came from...
The matches you describe remind me of Anachronism (even more after I was thinking about that game while posting a reply to slimyscale's wrestling game thread.)
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 2, 2011 18:15:32 GMT -9
It's like a cross between Anachronism and Mythbusters!
Have fun! Steve
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 2, 2011 18:18:11 GMT -9
I'm sorry. I said 23 zombies. The episode guide says it's going to be 1 vampire vs. 63 zombies! Have fun! Steve
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Post by labrat on Sept 3, 2011 5:38:36 GMT -9
Yeah, I like the show. I have to say that I do not always agree with the results, but it is still interesting. I probably just get a bias once they start introducing the figures that will be opposing one another, I start to pick my favorite before they analyze everything. I don't think they always take into account how brutal, and 'Bad A' some of those guys were. I think aggression can be just as big a factor as the weapons they are using.
But what do I know, it's all just speculation after all.
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Post by josedominguez on Sept 3, 2011 6:31:32 GMT -9
It's enormous fun, totally innacurate, but I love it. Reminds me of male conversation when walking home from nightclubs. Don't know if it's a worldwide thing, but I'm sure it is. In the UK it usualy starts off with us discussing sport, then girls and rapidly gets around to 'would a badger beat a fox in a fight?' then 'what about a a badger vs two foxes?' followed by 'George Clooney Batmad vs Val Kilmer Batman'. Deadliest warrior is this conversation in TV format
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 3, 2011 11:55:02 GMT -9
I really enjoy when they assess weapons capabilities. The show's armorers try to reproduce the real thing as accurately as they can, based on surviving relics which are too precious as artifacts to subject to testing. And in my opinion, the armorers do a good job. Some of their pieces are just beautiful. And it's amazing to see just how much carnage they can actually wreak! Battles are GRIZZLY things.
Some of the match-ups seem laughable to me, like "Who was the DEADLIEST WARRIOR... George Washington... or... Napoleon Bonaparte?" Somehow that seems like a cage-fight death-match between Winston Churchill and Adolf Hitler. Not quite right. But it's still fun.
Sometimes the "trash-talk" between the demonstrators for each side seems silly. In the episode between a knight and a pirate, the knight's guys were talking about how knights were driven by a sense of honor, and would be highly motivated by their desire to rid the world of the pirates' evil. Meanwhile, the pirate guys were talking about how the pirates were really like today's SEALs, highly trained in England's wars against Spain, and driven to fend for themselves when those wars ended.
In reality, knights were more like Hell's Angels on horses, and pirates had more in common with their modern Somali counterparts than with the SEALs.
Have fun! Steve
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 3, 2011 11:58:03 GMT -9
It's enormous fun, totally innacurate, but I love it. Reminds me of male conversation when walking home from nightclubs. Don't know if it's a worldwide thing, but I'm sure it is. In the UK it usualy starts off with us discussing sport, then girls and rapidly gets around to 'would a badger beat a fox in a fight?' then 'what about a a badger vs two foxes?' followed by 'George Clooney Batmad vs Val Kilmer Batman'. Deadliest warrior is this conversation in TV format Just as our entertainments are the same conversation in game format. Have fun! Steve
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Post by josedominguez on Sept 4, 2011 1:57:23 GMT -9
The ninja one was very silly, they had ninjas down just like in the films, silent, deadly martial arts killers, stalking through the forest and charging into one on one combat. I suppose an episode where one side was beaten to death in its sleep or poisoned at a banquet would be a little dull
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 4, 2011 5:27:44 GMT -9
The ninja one was very silly, they had ninjas down just like in the films, silent, deadly martial arts killers, stalking through the forest and charging into one on one combat. I suppose an episode where one side was beaten to death in its sleep or poisoned at a banquet would be a little dull I haven't seen the Spartan/Ninja episode yet, but I read the description in the episode guide. I DOES seem kind of silly, but I'm going to watch for it anyway! Have fun! Steve
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Post by hackbarth on Sept 5, 2011 5:20:36 GMT -9
Some of the match-ups seem laughable to me, like "Who was the DEADLIEST WARRIOR... George Washington... or... Napoleon Bonaparte?" Somehow that seems like a cage-fight death-match between Winston Churchill and Adolf Hitler. Not quite right. But it's still fun. Nonsense, Churchill was a bulldog of a man and would trash that pansy Austrian with a hand behind his back. Indeed I believe he did exactly that, drooping on parachute in Soviet-occupied Berlin and returning home in time for tea before Stalin knew. Much more evenly matched would be wheel-chair-ridden Roosevelt and pos-assassination attempt, quack-medicine treated, trembling Hitler. That would be a battle to see...
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Post by josedominguez on Sept 5, 2011 7:44:23 GMT -9
I've always wondered..... what is it that Neo-Nazis are aspiring to? I could understand a Neo-Alexandrian or even a Neo-Julius Caeser, hell, even a Neo-Napolionic. But following the doctrine of someone who got his tiny little moustached backside handed to him?
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Post by okumarts on Sept 5, 2011 7:47:21 GMT -9
I want to know how the orc vs viking battle went. My orcs trounced my Vikings in less than 6 game turns.
Ouch.
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Post by hackbarth on Sept 5, 2011 9:13:14 GMT -9
I've always wondered..... what is it that Neo-Nazis are aspiring to? I could understand a Neo-Alexandrian or even a Neo-Julius Caeser, hell, even a Neo-Napolionic. But following the doctrine of someone who got his tiny little moustached backside handed to him? I think you answered your own question, if you look closely. For me it is a lack of good character-forming slaps (the application of spread-handed pressure to misbehaved children posteriors, done in a educative way, in moderate amounts, only when strictly necessary) in the childhood that create young hooligans.
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Post by stevelortz on Sept 5, 2011 12:59:49 GMT -9
I want to know how the orc vs viking battle went. My orcs trounced my Vikings in less than 6 game turns. Ouch. I haven't done the Vikings vs. orcs yet, but I can see some problems in pitting historical Vikings against retro-DnD-orcs. I was a little disappointed by the lack of armor and archers among your Vikings, but I went back and reviewed my copy of Osprey's Viking Hersir 793-1066 AD, (W-3) and I find your Vikings to be historically accurate (as far as anybody's CAN be) for the period you intend them. Other producers of miniature Vikings tend to beef them up to the point of fantasy, which is okay if a person is trying to replicate a fight from Hrolf Kraki's Saga or Beowulf. Meanwhile, I think that DnD orcs are much more powerful than Tolkien's. The physical imagery Tolkien had in mind for orcs was that of Mongols. His moral imagery for them was the baser qualities of his trenchmates in The Great War. The imagery I usually drew from reading Tolkien over the decades inclined me to set its technology at the level of the 11th century in Western Europe. I have never noticed any explicit references in my reading of Tolkien to plate armor, not even among the Knights of Dol Amroth. It seems to me that the most advanced form of armor in Tolkien is similar to the full chainmail (hauberk with aventail, sleeves, mittens, leggings and shoes) pictures by Angus MacBride in his illustration of William the Conqueror on page 35 of Osprey's The Normans (E-9), and Christa Hook's illustration of William at the battle of Gerberoi on page 42 of Osprey's Norman Knight 950-1204 AD (W-1). The DarkFast Classic Fantasy orcs are armored in leather scale mail, which seems reasonable to me. All of the Vikings have shields, and would have been trained to use them offensively as well as in shield-wall. Only two of the DFCF orcs have shields, so I think the Viking shields would offset the fact that most of them are unarmored. Northerners, who included Scandinavian Vikings as well as Germanic tribes like the Anglo-Saxons, were progenitors of the values of nobility, which were these, in this order: prowess (not just the ability to win, but to win fair and square, according to the rules of the game), loyalty (even beyond the death of the lord), generosity (in sharing the spoils) and courtesy (the skill of speaking things that need to be spoken, even if you might be killed for speaking them). Tolkien's orcs were the antithesis of nobility: where nobles valued winning, orcs valued winning at any cost, even desecration of the the rules, ( They used the infernal black powder!), where nobles were loyal, orcs were fractious and treacherous, where nobles were generous, orcs were grasping, where nobles were courteous, orcs were rude and profane. I would have to give a morale benefit to the Vikings. I think I might keep this updated on this thread, since it seems to me like an episode of Deadliest Warrior. All for now! Have fun! Steve
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