The Raid at the Crossroads-Fistful of Lead

I'm hoping to release a Fistful of Lead Core rulebook first of the year. This is a stripped down "generic" set of rules that's a distillation of everything we've done before (don't worry, if you bought Galactic Heroes, you're covered). The reason? Well, I got a lot of places to go with Fistful of Lead, and rather than release completely new books every quarter that are 75% the same, I decided to make a core book, then release supplements and cards for genres/periods. I can keep those supplements shorter and cheaper by having the "guts" of the rules covered in the core book and use the supplements to deep dive into the period.

With that in mind, I have a few ideas that need play testing. In this case, how armor works in a game. I chose a small encounter between raiding Vikings against Normans. In this case, armor acts essentially as mobile cover, making it harder to land an effective blow. This is how it works in Galactic Heroes, but I wanted to see how it works on a larger scale.
The fight started with a Viking bowmen loosing a arrow at a charging mounted Norman lord. He needed a 10 with the armor minus, and got one. The wound result was "shock", sending the lord riding back the way he came, shaken.

The barbarians are all dead, time for some BBQ!

Most of shooting was ineffective at long range, and once the troops got close, it played out how you would think. Heavier, more experience troops wiped the floor with the lesser armored troops.
Although we a case where a lowly spearman kept getting wounded. He repeatedly played Queen of Hearts to heal. This made everyone suspect he was faking his wounds to get out of fighting....
The Vikings were outclassed and rolled truly abysmal dice, while the Normans didn't seem to roll anything but 10s.
Next week, I'll be trying another idea, the age old rule: armor as saves.