Friday, July 29, 2011

Should higher AC be an even bigger encumbrance?

I'm sure I'm not the first to pose this question, but a new study aimed at quantifying the physical strain and exertion of armored medieval knights might shed some light. Researchers from the University of Leeds outfitted test subjects with heavy armor and ran them through a battery of tests, the most telling of which was the treadmill. From io9.com:
Donning these replica suits — which were modeled on the armor of a 15th century London sheriff named William Martyn — forced the volunteers to expend approximately twice the amount of energy when engaging in cardiovascular activity.

After physiologist Graham Askew of the University of Leeds monitored the mail-bedecked volunteers trudging and jogging on treadmills, the researchers discovered that wearing the armor resulted in volunteers using 1.9 times more energy while running and 2.3 times more while walking.
Emphasis mine. It goes on to say the researchers would like to test out different types of armor, but the verdict seems written on the wall--heavy stuff is HEAVY!

Given these findings, should encumbrance be further modified? Should there be a minimum Strength score to even WEAR certain types of armor? (Some games already do this, yes?). Get your fighters back to the gym!

Check out the full article.

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