Grappling with Unearthed Arcana's Unarmed Combat

Unearthed Arcana Wrestling Summary

Gary simplified and rebalanced how Pummel/Grapple/Overbear actions interact with each other in Unearthed Arcana. Now a d20 is rolled to hit using your STR “to hit” bonus, (instead of a d100 with a half page of small percentage modifiers) All of the attacks are now based on the defender’s AC with some slight modifications. Overbear was previously based on the attacker’s AC, but that has been done away with. Here's how the three new AC’s are calculated:

Overbear AC is the defender's normal AC, modified only if there is a substantial size difference or if the defender has abnormal footing (such as 4+ legs on the ground, like a giant scorpion)

- Least accurate unarmed attack

Pummeling AC is based on defender's AC, ignoring shield bonus (unless the shield is a buckler)

- Slowest unarmed attack by far, but only attack that does damage and has a stun chance

Grappling AC is based on defender's AC but ignores all bonuses from shields and magic armor. Non-armor bonuses like a ring of protection will still apply.

- Most accurate unarmed attack, especially if they have magic armor

Overbear is the fastest of the three, using your unmodified initiative speed, grapples are done at -1 initiative speed, and pummel is the slowest at -4 initiative speed. DEX bonus applies to initiative.

There's some interesting strategy choosing which of the 3 to use in UE. In the old rules, your armor would pretty much determine what your meta was; if you had leather you would always go for an overbear into a grapple/pummel, and if you had plate mail you’d always just go for a double pummel.

Other strategies would occasionally be used to gain advantage from the terrain or if the goal wasn’t just to win the fight, but generally speaking, the meta strategy was determined in the old rules and could be gamed to give yourself an absurdly high chance of success. This made for some cool interactions, but it didn’t feel like a flushed-out system of combat with meaningful turn by turn decision making.

The Unearthed Arcana wrestling rules create combat that is like a “rock, paper, scissors chess match.” Luck always reigns supreme, but how can you maximize your chance of surviving the round and place yourself in a better position to win the fight? Do you risk a pummel at the start hoping for a lucky stun, knowing your opponent could launch a grapple with a +3 advantage to initiative speed? That grapple going off first would cancel your pummel and put you in a bad situation to start the next turn.

They might go for an overbear instead, which has an even higher chance of going off first, but at least you’ll still get to use your pummel that round (at -2 to hit), but now you’re on the ground at the start of the next turn.

Do you try for an overbear on the first round because it’s the fastest, or go for a slower yet more accurate grapple because the grapple negates their shield and magic armor bonuses? Is the target too large or tanky to hit without grappling or bringing them to the ground first? These are the questions you’ll have to ask yourself if you wish to claim the championship belt in the world of Unearthed Arcana.

Wrestlers in a room with armed opponents can rejoice, opponents with weapons are no longer entitled to a free “fending off” hit, but Grapples and Overbears will always be canceled if the wrestler takes any damage before the grapple/overbear occurs. Pummels can similarly be canceled when damage is taken, but only damage from the target of the pummel.

In contrast to the old rules, pummeling is the only unarmed combat move that does damage in normal circumstances. (You could overbear someone into a pool of flaming oil, or hold them underwater with a grapple, but generally they do no damage.) Instead, they negate your opponent’s attack and/or put you in a better position to win the fight. You can now wrestle your buddy into submission by grappling him on the ground for 3 turns, without causing lasting damage that will hinder your party’s survivability.

What about a suplex? How is that not a damaging move?? That’s actually considered a pummel now, not an overbear! Grappled opponents can now be thrown as a pummeling action, doing damage to the thrown opponent based on what they land on, and doing damage to whatever they land on as well, if applicable. Throwing a grappled opponent on their back in a wrestling ring would be considered a pummel with a large hard object, Jumping on them with a splash would be a pummel with a large soft object. Throwing them through a breaking table would hit them twice, once for the table and once on the ground.

Pummel damage is 1-2, 1-3, or 1-4 depending on your pummeling object (fist, gauntlet, metal chair for example) In addition to the damage, there is a stun chance based on your STR, pummeling object, and how exposed the target is. A bare fist on field plate has no stun chance, a 15 STR gut punch into some padded armor would have a 30% chance, and a chair swung with exceptional strength on a helmetless head has a 95% stun chance!

Now that we see pummeling isn’t just punches, but also kicks, body slams, suplexes, metal chair swings, and any other sort of hit that does damage, we can see why grapples and overbears are not damaging moves, but they certainly have their place in the strategy. A tanky fighter in magic field plate might not even be hittable until you get him in a grapple, or work as a team to take him to the ground.

Since pummels are the only damaging moves, there are only two ways to win an unarmed 1v1 fight in a kill or be killed situation. You can either chip their health down to 0, or finish the match quickly with a KO. When a pummel hits, there is a chance to stun based on your STR, what you're pummeling with, (fist, gauntlet, chair, body slam etc), and how exposed the target is.

A successful Stun lasts 1-10 segments, and a double stun will KO for 1-4 rounds. Since unconscious creatures can be slain at a rate of once per turn, a double stun KO gives the unarmed fighter a chance to outperform heavy hitting weapon users, even though the damage from pummels themselves is limited.

Pages 106-108 in Unearthed Arcana (TSR, 1985) Gygax, Gary

I would suggest reading those pages for the details, tables, exceptions, and underlying motivation for some of the rules.