lol anyone who didnt play DF in 2009 or earlier has no idea what I am talking about here
I did play, and I can't really agree with you. The material system is not perfect yet, bleeding needs to be more severe and presist for longer for example, but it's certainly a step in the right direction. Dismembering also needs to be cut down IMO, it's pretty cinematic right now.
Try the mod posted above (
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=71494), that works much better than the vanilla values, though I think bleeding still stops too fast (is there any way to control that?).
To make GURPS analogy, I think the old system worked more like the cinematic combat rules with near one-shot enemy mobs while the new system is more akin to GURPS standard rules with wounded and incapitated mobs instead.
YES. Or, at the very least, break their necks. A mere karate chop to the neck in real life can knock you out cold, so a swung warhammer ought to do a bit more than bruise it, especially if swung directly at the throat. If i'm not horrendously wrong (which happens too often for my own liking), the neck happens to be chock full of veins and nerves, and let's not forget the windpipe and spine. It goes without saying that blunt trauma to any of those would be agonizing/paralyzing/lethal.
At least when using spear, I cause plenty of spine damage with headshots. I think they are possible for neck as well. But curiously windpipe doesn't seem to be represented at all. I mean, you can strangle sombody with wrestling and that knocks them out, but it doesn't seem possible slit the throat and permanently remove ability to breathe (and the nasty mobsies can't do that to our adventurers either, everything should go both ways).
But yeah, neck is where predatory animals go when they want to kill something fast. It's one of the most vulnerable spots for tetrapods.