: I'm so ashamed...
Your grammar's fine, especially compared to some of the other posts we see here.
I have a pretty big gripe with GURPS, but I'll post it as its own thread. The question of the jman's coat, however, is personal. ;)
I really, truly do not believe that it is magical. The absorbed fraction is not magically averted, it definitely connects--you see the puff of dust when it happens. (how's that for grammar?). Yes, a myrmidon's blade can cut through bare flesh and bone. A kitchen knife can do that. Have you ever tried to chop up a fur coat with a sword? I don't know how many times I've tried that (for the purposes of game research, of course) and it just doesn't work. The coat might get a little scratched in the process but it does not get cut--it moves with the blade the way flesh and bone do not and dampens the kinetic energy of the swing. In a way it acts very similar to the impact-absorbing properties of kevlar (which stops bullets, which move much faster and with much more inertia than even a myrmidon's weapon).
Second point: those coats are THICK. Look how much skinnier the Heron Guard are than the Jmen. They didn't go on a crash diet the day after Muirthemne was recaptured! My theory is they're actually wearing a pile of furs, three or four layers thick, the way eskimos do (why they would do such a thing is explained quite nicely in my upcoming jman campaign--I apologize for the shameless plug). So even if a blade gets through the first layer, it will have already lost much of its inertia, and it still has to get through several more layers. Try slicing through a pillow with your katana. Now slice through a pile of them and see how far you get.
I already see the possible exception: asylumers, as a rule, can't swing a sword as hard as, say, a shade (with the obvious exception of William Wallace, who was born with a claymore in his teeth, and whose mother never forgave him for it). This is why, despite everything I've mentioned above, the coat only absorbs twenty per cent of impacts. Also, there are thin spots in the coat, joins and seams and neckholes (although apparently it's sealed at the bottom--check the jman dead body projectile. Maybe this explains why they move so much slower than Heron Guard. Then again, maybe that's just the 1350 pounds of gold they're carrying around at all times ;) ). Again, eighty per cent of blows still get through. If I knew a powerful enchantment to make my armor invulnerable, you can bet I would find some way to make it stronger than 20%.
If all this fails to persuade anyone, let's look at where this information is coming from. Myth TFL and Myth 2 never had a problem with the jman's coat being non-magical. Nobody had a problem with this until GURPS was written. For role-playing purposes it was a problem, perhaps because every player in the game would want one of these special coats and nobody would waste money on practically useless plate mail. So the GURPS writers flailed around frantically, looking for some kind of explanation that would ensure only jmen could wear the coats and, hey, there's magic in this universe, isn't there? I've got an idea (I'm speaking for the poor author of GURPS here, who I'm sure is a perfectly intelligent and decent human being), let's make 'em magic! Sure, it makes precious little sense in terms of that there computer video game thingie, but who cares about that? We got the serious business of role-playing here to worry about!
Ugh. As far as I can tell, even if you buy this "magic coat" nonsense, there are still only two real spells in the Jman/HG arsenal: 80% heal and 20% enchant. They felt it necessary to create a whole branch of magic for these two spells? (I'm sure GURPS lists a hundred more, but they don't appear in the games, so these are the only two that interest me). I just don't buy it. If they had this ability, why didn't Alric get all his jmen together in a room (or at least all he could spare) in the newly-secured Muirthemne and have them enchant armor all day long?
Alright, sorry about the rant, but this one really bugs me. It's unnecessary, it contradicts things that were already established facts, and changes innumerable facts about the actual game I love just for the sake of making some numbers add up correctly.
