Armor Ratin - Making partial armor survivable in MD settings

[Killer Cyborg]

For a long time I have used the natural die roll to determine if attacks penetrate the AR of a target, however in the last few weeks of my new CE campaign (Militia heavy group), my players and I noticed that any critical hits to a partially armored target means the death or maiming of target.

Tonight we decided to try splitting the AR penetration roll from the to hit roll and it seemed to work out fine without much extra time added to the combat. This seemed to allow the players to survive some critical hits with armor damage and not an instantaneous fatal hit or lost limb.

Thoughts?

1. Using the natural roll for AR just screws over the people with skills. A 15th level ninja shouldn't have a 15% chance to hit somebody in plate armor, not if that's the same chance that a 12 year-old farmboy has.
2. In Palladium, all attacks hit the torso unless they are Called Shots. This means that if your torso is covered, you're usually fine if there is no AR specified for your armor.
3. In Rifts, MD attacks automatically hit SDC armor, not the person (unless a Called Shot is made for an unarmored part), so AR is not an issue there either.

[Glistam]

Try having all regular shots always hit the main body, and therefore the armor, regardless of AR. Then you only deal with AR during called shots. In the Rifts Game Master's Guide Kevin proposes that this is basically the same as the AR system - and while it isn't mechanically, it is in spirit.