Weapons VS Armor

This is a fundamental design decision! How should weapons be represented and how should they effect materials and how should that effect be represented and calculated?

As I see it weapons come in 2 sorts, surface destruction and subsurface destruction. An example of a surface weapon would be a bullet or a light laser. Subsurface might be a missile designed to penetrate the surface and then explode or perhaps a strong X-ray laser.

Armor or just materials will have about 2 properties, one the ability to absorb each type of energy and second the ability to reflect it or else transfer it to some other play. I guess a third type would be some sort of reactive armor or self healing armor. The important point is to make it so that the GM can have ways to control what it does with each type of attack. How that attacking energy is directed and a way to tell how much damage is done and how often.

There is also the idea of stealth to deal with. There are electronic counter measures and other possible ways of blocking or stopping an attack.