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Re: Rules Nugget (GURPS): What's a Miss?
To my mind, there is a lot of way to miss an attack.
- Hestitation is one of them, especially if the PC has a low skill. Hitting someone to hurt him, and a fortiori to kill him, can afraid someone who never did it before.
- Not being able to see the opening is an aother good reason. Even when you really want to hurt your foe, it is not so easy to see the opening in someone's guard.
- Missing the target is a third reason. Hitting something who doesn't move at all is easy. Hitting someone who moves (and strikes back!) is far much harder, even if he doesn't defend himself.
- Not being at the right distance is a fourth reason. I practice a martial art (traditional karate) and we train a lot just to be at the right distance. When you are too far, you miss your target. But when you are too close, it's also impossible to hit your foe efficiently enough.
- Making a good blow but which is so previsible that the foe will notice it and avoid it without making the least effort is another reason.
- And not being able to counter attack, because you are not fast enough, or you are not in a good position to do it, is yet another reason. In reality, fighters don't strike one after the other. there are times when one of them strikes several times in a row and times when the other do it...
So, which is the good reason?
GURPS doesn't say it, and I find this very clever. The GM can choose the reason, depending on the attacker, the defender and the precise situation. More interesting: the GM can make the reason varry to describe the fight in a much more entertaining way...
"While your hesitating he strikes you again... You want to hurt him but you don't see any opening in his guard... You move much too slowly! He attacks you again before you can act... He avoid your too much previsible blow just by making a step on the side..." is much more interesting than just one reason, always the same, repeated indefinitely.