Sometimes the opponent is significantly weaker or stronger than you. Then the raw strength and size starts to matter in some of the special effects where brawn is involved as this could be considered contest of strength.
Here are the updated visual tactics
Fighting against a gorilla or the strongest and biggest man of the town with this ruling could now become a quite iffy position but also a new lever in tactics. The big one might rely on his strength and start to use predictable special effects that rely on their superior strength and size – the weaker and smaller one can then start using Prepare Counter in devastating ways.
Prepare Counter has these rulings from Pete and Loz:
Prepare Counter allows the user to choose ANY special effect they want. The roll doesn’t matter, but the context does. Thus it doesn’t make sense to choose Maximise Damage if you were parrying at the time. The intent behind the rule was to make the payoff for investing a SE worthwhile and potentially decisive.’
By Pete https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/designmechanism/viewtopic.php?p=21714#p21714
‘You can actually choose attacker AND defender effects. The rule specifically allows for Offensive and Defensive effects to be chosen. So yes, you could use it with Bash, but it would need the right conditions for it to be truly effective.’
Loz at Design Mechanism forums
Found several interesting articles that one can reflect for special effects
- on Consideration of Grappling & Wrestling in Renaissance Fencing.
- on tripping your opponent in a sword fight
- on many techniques, including tripping with polearms – very cool video
Careful reading and watching these resembles things we can do in Mythras – for example via special effects.
Notes From Pavis 