axe: Axes can deliver a very brutal blow. Any hit does a minimum damage of 1 per die. If an axe misses by an amount equal to an opponent's shield bonus then the axe breaks or dislodges the shield.
pick: Penetrating, picks punch through armor. Against heavy armor the pick gains a +1 attack bonus. (think bec-de-corbin).
axe: Axes can deliver a very brutal blow. Any hit does a minimum damage of 1 per die. If an axe misses by an amount equal to an opponent's shield bonus then the axe breaks or dislodges the shield.
pick: Penetrating, picks punch through armor. Against heavy armor the pick gains a +1 attack bonus. (think bec-de-corbin).
Won't it do that anyway? What about no less than half max damage?
if you're a medieval fighter who possesses no shield, why would you ever choose to enter battle with a longsword rather than a two-handed sword?
Frankly, my experience says "you wouldn't"
The problem is this means that we are forcing people to be sword-n-board fighters and there's no place for a guy who wields a hand-and-a-half weapon without one. And some people may have a vision of a non-sword-n-board fighter.
I'd keep the number of weapons quite limited.
With 7 weapon families and six hand categories, that's 42 weapons. Plus six shield types, three unarmed, three crossbows, and two bows. A total of 56 different weapons from which to choose. I think that's more than enough. Also, each thown weapon would have a launcher. (I.e., sling for stones, atlatl for javelins, etc.)
if you're a medieval fighter who possesses no shield, why would you ever choose to enter battle with a longsword rather than a two-handed sword?
Frankly, my experience says "you wouldn't"
The problem is this means that we are forcing people to be sword-n-board fighters and there's no place for a guy who wields a hand-and-a-half weapon without one. And some people may have a vision of a non-sword-n-board fighter.
I'd keep the number of weapons quite limited.
With 7 weapon families and six hand categories, that's 42 weapons. Plus six shield types, three unarmed, three crossbows, and two bows. A total of 56 different weapons from which to choose. I think that's more than enough. Also, each thown weapon would have a launcher. (I.e., sling for stones, atlatl for javelins, etc.)
Well, again, I think you'd use a 2 handed weapon. If you never plan to use a shield, why would you do otherwise? If someone DOES do that, well, that's their unusual and frankly sub-par choice, the 2 hander guy just has a bit more reach and effect than you do, and the one hander guy has a nice big kite shield. Of course there COULD be a fighting style of some sort that makes "bastard sword used with 2 hands" better than average. Maybe it works with a grapple build (maybe fist can be used specifically this way, maybe with a feat/theme, or whatever, but it CAN be made workable easily enough).
I'm not sure you need all 7 families in all six categories. For instance there's no reach mace, there's a 2 handed mace, but 'pole mace' is kinda not sensible. There are probably other examples. There may not be hand-and-a-half axes for instance, etc.
There are also of course exotic weapons, those can be optional and maybe ALL of them are in settings, but I suspect at least a couple basic ones will exist. Frankly I'd make as many of them as possible be just refluffs of basic stuff (a shuriken is just a throwing dagger). I'd HOPE there'd be more like 20 weapons, maybe less. There are a lot of dubious weapons anyway, like 'broad sword', and even falchion (basically a short backsword, call it shortsword, it was used the same way). Is there really a half handed axe? even smaller axes don't seem terribly easy to use as an off weapon.
I'll just respond to this part right now. I never said the rapier was made for slashing. When I talked about snapping, I was refering to swords in general.
Ah, okay. When I saw snapping motion (which I still don't feel is a good way to actually cut, but that may be a stylistic choice) I read it as inclusive of the rapier, as well as other swords.
Anyway, my experience with fencing using accurate weight and balance wasters (wooden practice swords, for those not nerdy in the ways of swordfighting) and practicing with steel pieces is that any difference in speed of thrust between a long blade and a knife or unarmed punch is non appreciable.
With any blade that is useful for slashing attacks, the blade is faster than the unarmed or knife attack.
I am very likely - in fact, almost certainly - quite picky, but in my opinion, if one isn't using as reasonably close to the real weapon as possible, you will get less reward out of the techniques. Also, I still just disagree that a blade is faster than unarmed or a knife. At no time over the past nearly 20 years have I seen a sword be faster than unarmed or a dagger. In fact, I've saved my own bacon a time or two because my dagger hand was faster than the opponent's sword.
But, really, this may be something we'd have to agree to disagree on unless there would be a way to demonstrate in person. Which I suppose might be a bit of a stretch.
The striking edge of a properly made sword can, in a slashing cut, move from a position to a point two feet away from that position more quickly than a punch. Do we really disagree on that point?
I think we would have to demonstrate in person. I've done this with wasters and live steel (like I said) and the results are the same. Also, you may be thinking of something other than what I'm talking about when you read the word "snapping"?
More sex and gender equality and racial equality shouldn't even be an argument--it should simply be an assumption for any RPG that wants to stay relevant in the 21st century.
I'll just bring up old school. In OD&D all melee attacks do 1d6 damage, flat. Doesn't matter if you swing a sword, a dagger, or a fist. Very simple, and oddly probably more realistic than all the "small weapons do less damage, but you attack quicker" which is so utterly unrealistic it isn't funny and really has nothing else to recommend it. Give all weapons a weapon type and just use that to key in any advantages a specific PC might get (so if you are 'good with an axe' you might do a point of extra damage or something). Really though, nobody can tell me that being stuck in the kidney with a dagger is even the slightest bit less deadly than getting smacked in the side of the head with a 2.5 pound mace. They both kill you dead about 99% of the time. Nor can anyone convince me that some guy with a dagger has some sort of mysterious 'speed advantage' over a guy with a halbard, that's just dumb. Some weapons DO have advantages in terms of easy concealment or utility in unusually tight quarters, etc. Those are special rules though, not captured by 'damage dice' or whatever.
Agreed. I do want weapons differentiated, though. I'd actually consider making damage how you model weapons that have better precision, and are thus more likely to get the really well placed hit, if I were going to use damage to differentiate weapons.
Otherwise, I'm more interested in things like being able to trip and grab weapons and shields with an axe, and different armor types being better against different types of weapons (stabbing/slashing), various other stuff.
You could go that way, but honestly I think it all mostly comes out in the wash. I think some "mastery" things could exist, you can break a shield with an axe, you can tangle a weapon with a flail, you can wield a dagger even when you're 'squeezed' etc. Armor vs weapons could be an option of course, but PERSONALLY I think its just not that big a deal. I think mostly weapons should be fluff, like in OD&D.
I really don't want to play in that game, though. I don't want to play with weapons being mostly fluff. That actually sounds incredibly awful to me, and I've despised it in any game I've played that used it. I have no issue with a rules module that makes all weapons just be the same, but if I can't play Next with differentiated weapons, I probably won't bother. Too many of the characters I like use weapons, and it simply won't feel like I'm playing a user of a specific weapon if weapon differences are completely handwaved.
More sex and gender equality and racial equality shouldn't even be an argument--it should simply be an assumption for any RPG that wants to stay relevant in the 21st century.
I'll just respond to this part right now. I never said the rapier was made for slashing. When I talked about snapping, I was refering to swords in general.
Ah, okay. When I saw snapping motion (which I still don't feel is a good way to actually cut, but that may be a stylistic choice) I read it as inclusive of the rapier, as well as other swords.
Anyway, my experience with fencing using accurate weight and balance wasters (wooden practice swords, for those not nerdy in the ways of swordfighting) and practicing with steel pieces is that any difference in speed of thrust between a long blade and a knife or unarmed punch is non appreciable.
With any blade that is useful for slashing attacks, the blade is faster than the unarmed or knife attack.
I am very likely - in fact, almost certainly - quite picky, but in my opinion, if one isn't using as reasonably close to the real weapon as possible, you will get less reward out of the techniques. Also, I still just disagree that a blade is faster than unarmed or a knife. At no time over the past nearly 20 years have I seen a sword be faster than unarmed or a dagger. In fact, I've saved my own bacon a time or two because my dagger hand was faster than the opponent's sword.
But, really, this may be something we'd have to agree to disagree on unless there would be a way to demonstrate in person. Which I suppose might be a bit of a stretch.
The striking edge of a properly made sword can, in a slashing cut, move from a position to a point two feet away from that position more quickly than a punch. Do we really disagree on that point?
I think we would have to demonstrate in person. I've done this with wasters and live steel (like I said) and the results are the same. Also, you may be thinking of something other than what I'm talking about when you read the word "snapping"?
The real problem with the 'speed' idea of small weapons is that, sure, the stabbing motion of a dagger can be repeated more quickly than a sword stroke, and maybe even initiated more quickly. The PROBLEM for the dagger guy is that he's starting all his attacks considerably out of his reach. It takes time because he's got to get inside the swordsman's guard, whereas the active business part of the sword is right there, and as Musashi said "Every movement of the blade is an attack, and every attack is made to kill." Of course this is why if the swordsman is stuck with insufficient space or he's grappled or pinned somehow then Oops! for him, now the dagger is effectively quicker. This is the essence of any fight against someone with light weapons against a longer weapon, the game of getting in under the defense and staying there. In some cases it can be done pretty reliably. The spanish figured out that a guy with a buckler and a short sword could slide in past pikes and his short weapon would work in those close quarters. Mostly though in the open the longer weapon just wins out 9 out of 10 times.
I think Abdul's ideas for axes and picks are cool, but I was actually going the other way for axes as I have in the past described misses against axe wielders (particularly very large ones) as the defender using their axe as a sort of shield and catching the blow on the flat of their weapon's blade.
But that could be a feat for axe wielders who want a more defensive option.
I think hand and a half's main bonus is in the option to not have it occupy both hands at a penalty.
So if you're only using a buckler, you could probably justify wielding the weapon without penalty by sacrificing your shield bonus or you can wield the weapon with a peanalty to hit and keep your shield bonus to AC. So you have more flexible tactics.
I think Abdul hit on the key issue of "situational" and Wrecan's plan really highlights that. I think this could really work well. It makes the combat rules a little more dense but I think running combat might be simpler that with constant changing initiatives.
I suggest that with the spear family "pierce" ability, it be a special attack that does half damage and it also prevents the attacker from acting until they release the pinned adversary. Unless they abandon the weapon, then the adversary has the option of dislodging the spear as it's next action.
@ Chaosfang,
I don't know if I like the damage ramping up on weapons. It seems like it would just force HP inflation. I liked the idea you had about light weapons adding attacks and maybe that is something to toss around. Maybe specifically in a grapple situation they can do a quick flurry of blows?
Flattening the scaling should keep it down. * Small -> 1d4 + 8, 3 attacks = 3d4+24 (31.5 average), +10.5 when dual wielding smalls * Medium -> 4d4 + 8, 2 attacks = 8d4 + 16 (36 average), +13 when dual welding mediums * Large -> 10d8 + 8, 1 attack (48 average)
That should bring the scaling to: * Small: +1 attack at level 10 and level 20 * Medium: +1[W] at level 10, +1 attack at level 20 * Large: +1[W] at level 5, 10, 15 and 20
If Large seems much faster in scaling, remember that you could always dual wield from level 1, which means that you can easily dish out 2d4 + 8 damage with two daggers or 4d4 + 8 with two swords. Compared to the 2d8 + 4 with a greatsword you'd actually be doing less damage at the start compared to dual wielding (although to be fair, dual wielding itself results in far lower accuracy than you might like without significant investment, roughly balancing it out).
You are both rational and emotional. You value creation and discovery, and feel strongly about what you create. At best, you're innovative and intuitive. At worst, you're scattered and unpredictable.
If you're crossing the street and see a city bus barreling straight toward you with 'GIVE ME YOUR WALLET!' painted across its windshield, you probably won't be reaching for your wallet.
This is what I believe is the spirit of D&D 4E, and my deal breaker for D&D Next: equal opportunities, with distinct specializations, in areas where conflict happens the most often, without having to worry about heavy micromanagement or system mastery.
