I love the concept of the differentiating weapon by more than damage.  Its one of the main reasons I like OD&D with all weapons doing 1D6.   Suddenly, players consider other weapons than just "whatever does the most" but I also wanted something without tables to consult during play.  

ARMOR
I began by looking at the AD&D 1e tables.  I wanted all the modifiers to be the +1/-1 variety to keep useful, but not overwhelming.  I divided armor into Light or Heavy.   No armor, hide and leather would be Light and chain and plate would be Heavy.   This makes it easy for the GM to decide about a particular creatures armor without trying to figure out what part of AC is Dex, Magic or Toughness.  Instead, the monster description easily puts it into one of the two categories.    Pixies have light armor while dragons have heavy.

+1 vs. Light Armor
Dagger, Bow, Crossbow, Scimitar, Sling, 2H Sword

+1 vs. Heavy Armor
Crossbow, Flail, Halberd, Hammer, Mace, Morningstar, Pick, 2H Sword

-1 vs. Light Armor
Pick

-1 vs.  Heavy Armor
Club, Dagger, Fist, Staff

WEAPON SPEED
Looking at weapon speeds, I assumed that everything in the 4-7 range equaled zero modifier on Initiative.  That leaves the following:

+1 Initiative Bonus
Dagger, Fist, Short Sword, Bow

-1 Initiative Penalty
Polearms, 2H Sword

DAMAGE VS. LARGE
I looked over the weapon charts for weapons that showed a strong variance when striking S/M vs. L creatures.  

-1 Damage vs. Large
Club, Dagger, Fist

+1 Damage vs. Large
2H Sword, most Polearms, Spear, Sword

RESULTS OF THE RULES IDEAS

AXE
My beloved Battle Axe got no bonus!  Sure it doubles as a tool, but this makes me sad.  I am unsure what I am going to do about this.   Maybe the tool aspect needs to be emphasized.   Can't chop firewood with a sword.

BOWS
Bows have always been a problem for me.  I never liked the firing of 2 arrows because it gives the character two attacks for no good reason.  So, I feel better about the bow getting +1 Initiative and +1 vs. Light armor to represent its ability puncture deeply and swiftly loose a nocked arrow.

CLUB
The club gets -1 damage vs. Large and no bonus.   Hey, clubs are free and you get what you pay for.   Oddly, the quarterstaff did not have any damage penalty.

CROSSBOW
The crossbow gets +1 vs. Light and Heavy, aka +1 to all attacks.   However, this is offset by the crossbow needing an action to reload.   I consider crossbows to be equal to 2H weapons for damage so they roll 2D6 and take the better result.

DAGGER
Daggers truly becomes a thief's weapon with the +1 Initiative, +1 vs. Light and -1 vs. Heavy and -1 damage vs. Large.    Great for quick stabs of ordinary folk, hot so hot vs. dragons.
   
FIST (unarmed)
Unarmed combat gets +1 Initiative, -1 attack vs. Heavy and -1 damage vs. Large.
Personally, I would have all unarmed combat do -1 damage (min 1) because you want the dagger to be better.  That would make it D6-1 and D6-2 vs. Large which works out for me.  

MACE FAMILY (flail, hammer, mace, morningstar)
They all get +1 attack bonus vs. heavy armor.   It makes them good breakers against stuff too.  

PICK
The pick is an odd weapon.   It gets -1 vs. Light armor and +1 vs. Heavy.  Before you dismiss the pick, keep in mind that its the only weapon that doubles as a mining tool.  

POLEARM
The huge advantage of a polearm is its ability to strike from the back rank in battle.   Also, it doubles as a 10 foot pole without disarming yourself.  I also allow polearms to get first strike if set vs. charges.   Looking at the tables, they get a -1 Initiative, +1 damage vs. Large, but surprisingly they are very mid-range against armor except the Halberd.  

SLING
The sling gets +1 vs. Light armor, but otherwise its weak compared to the bow or crossbow which is fine.   Slings are easiliy concealable and the ammo is free.   For a thief, this is fair trade.   Surprisingly, slings do fine against heavy armor.

SPEAR
All you get is the +1 damage vs. large, but the spear does have the advantage that it can also be thrown and you can set vs. charge.

SWORDS
If you break down swords to Scimitars, Short Swords and Long Swords then you get the following
Scimitars = +1 attack vs. Light
Short Swords = +1 Initiative, (+1 damage vs. large)
Long Swords = +1 damage vs. large

Personally, I feel this makes the Short Sword too powerful and eliminates the usefulness of the long sword.  I would probably eliminate the damage bonus and let it stay as a fast weapon without the downside of a dagger.    

2H / GREATSWORD
Like the crossbow, the greatsword becomes a +1 to all attacks weapon and uses 2D6 keep better for damage.   But its heavy and slow so the attacker gets -1 Initiative penalty.   The +1 bonus damage vs. large creatures is also nice.  

So....

Thoughts / Suggestions / Comments?

While I always liked the idea of weapon speed and weapon vs armor tables in OD&D and AD&D 1E, we never requalarly used them because they were to much trouble in play. I think I really like your simplified version of the idea, but would have to really think about the specifics to make a useful comment (other than "it looks actually playable by folks who aren't into combat as the main feature of the session").

I'm doing a keyword version of this with Baseline RPG. For example, a Light, Piercing, Trip weapon is better at bypassing armor and tripping people, which is pretty much what you'd expect.

A Heavy, Piercing, Trip weapon wouldn't bypass armor so well, but armor would be less effective at blocking damage from it - If that makes sense.

Whether it's worth using might depend partly on what it's 1 out of. Out of 20, probably not so much. Out of 6, more so.

Quote from: Age of Fable;261507Whether it's worth using might depend partly on what it's 1 out of. Out of 20, probably not so much. Out of 6, more so.

You and your 'probabilities'.

Well...I was on the verge of posting a whiz-bang homily honoring the glorious Ready Ref Sheets, when I saw Spinachcat is already well stuck into it over on Dragonsfoot. Ironically, or maybe not, this place is becoming a lot more of an interesting place to talk O/AD&D than the aforementioned 'Foot. The topic gets posted there...but the actual productive discussion bit happens over here. (Much like you might purchase your drugs in a crackhouse but would never dream of actually consuming them there.)

To get back on topic...I like the "idea" of weapon speeds, size and other factors being a realistic addition to combat, but I have a real hard time imagining using them in play, especially at higher levels. The players, who only need to manage their character, will certainly benefit after gaming the system a little and learning which armor+weapon combos to use. As the DM, I can't feasibly handle another layer of armor + weapon modifiers in a combat involving more than a couple of monsters. Either I would end up just waving it off or deciding all the monsters are using similar weaponry, both of which would defeat the purpose of increased realism.

Other devils advocate-style 'factors' to consider are

 - the effective & minimum ranges and space requirements for melee weapons as well as armor encumbrance. On one hand, large weapons ARE more damaging but they also require a lot more elbow room and require recovery from missed or unbalanced attacks. Smaller weapons may be faster but require you to get much closer to the target.
-  Magic and some real world armors & shields can be both heavy in terms of protection and light in terms of encumbrance or vice versa. Armor may also be expressly designed to protect against one type of blow, and useless against others (a wicker shield for example is great vs. sling stones but not so great vs. a crossbow)
- when doing away with Btb weapon damage you may want to consider the damage ranges for monsters and alter them accordingly. The base damage is 1-8 for most 1st-3rd lvl monsters, perhaps spread across 1-4/1-4 or 1-3/1-3/1-2 etc. You could either choose to leave the ranges as is and consider it a balancing modifier for the natural weaponry or make a chart of typical monster attack forms and factor them as you do with melee weapons

Check out the Warhammer Fantasy rules.  All their weapons do the same base 1d10 + Strength damage.  Some (dagger for example) do SB-3 while others like a two handed weapon you roll 2d10 take the best one for damage.  Others give bonus to parrying, or are slow giving your opponent a bonus to parry your attacks etc....

 It works well in that it does create a great variety of weapon types but there are no really clearly outstanding weapons.  They are all valuable and viable so it allows for a character to pick a weapon that he likes not one because of statistical superiority.

In other words it does pretty much exactly what your proposing.

Quote from: Narf the Mouse;261017I'm doing a keyword version of this with Baseline RPG.

The keyword idea is excellent.  

Quote from: Age of Fable;261507Whether it's worth using might depend partly on what it's 1 out of. Out of 20, probably not so much. Out of 6, more so.

I am using this mostly for a D20 vs. AC style game so the +1 is supposed to be a minor bump to not overshadow the skill of the character.   I want to keep AC inflation to a minimal, but still give weapons flavor.

Quote from: Kellri;261530Well...I was on the verge of posting a whiz-bang homily honoring the glorious Ready Ref Sheets, when I saw Spinachcat is already well stuck into it over on Dragonsfoot.

Cross post it over here.  I think the Judge Guild Initiative system is certainly worth discussing and we may get more willingness to see the flaw and get modification ideas here.

Quote from: Kellri;261530As the DM, I can't feasibly handle another layer of armor + weapon modifiers in a combat involving more than a couple of monsters. Either I would end up just waving it off or deciding all the monsters are using similar weaponry, both of which would defeat the purpose of increased realism.

I agree.  My main conceits would be that monster's natural weapons do not have any modifiers good or bad.  Secondarily, if I am using minis, I can always declare WYSIWYG and handle weapons that way.   In general, a bunch of orcs will have similiar weapons and certainly saying they carry axe and sword will make life easy.   The sword only gives a bonus vs. large and since the PCs are medium / small, that's nullified.   The axe gets no bonus except the option to break the PCs shields.  But yes, it adds a layer of complexity that may not add to the gameplay.

I used to run D&D with the various weapon ranges and I rarely saw a player do anything but go for the biggest die his class allowed.   I tried the idea of your weapon does the damage of your hit die, aka Wizards with greatswords do D4 damage and Fighters with daggers do D10.   I was not overly satisfied with this either.

Quote from: Kellri;261530- the effective & minimum ranges and space requirements for melee weapons as well as armor encumbrance. On one hand, large weapons ARE more damaging but they also require a lot more elbow room and require recovery from missed or unbalanced attacks. Smaller weapons may be faster but require you to get much closer to the target.

Encumbrance is the path to madness!  Hmm...I will put something in the text about the GM assigning penalties in tight quarters for those with long weapons.  

Quote from: Kellri;261530Armor may also be expressly designed to protect against one type of blow, and useless against others (a wicker shield for example is great vs. sling stones but not so great vs. a crossbow)

Very true.  I gave up on the armor realism fight after my SCA days and studying the history of armors.   I like how Palladium does SDC armor with an Armor Rating and damaging the armor, but it slows down the game.

Quote from: Kellri;261530- when doing away with Btb weapon damage you may want to consider the damage ranges for monsters and alter them accordingly.

I turn all monster damage into 1D6 + half HD and the monster gets +1D6 if they have some special attack mode and +1D6 per 10 HD.  So a 10 HD demon will do 2D6+5 damage with a special attack that may do 3D6, 3D6+5 or even 3D6+10.  

I would not want any monster weapon differentiation because the GM has enough issues.  The GM can use the weapon differentiation when he wants to focus on humanoid vs. humanoid combat.

Quote from: kryyst;261561Check out the Warhammer Fantasy rules.

Absolutely!  My initial inspiration was the WFRP tables.

May not agree 100% with the actual numbers but the concept is sound and looks like it would work fine.

  I've toyed with an idea similar to yours but never got past the brainstorming proccess.  What do you think of something like this;

  All weapons ( and armor? ) have qualities.  Some examples of qualities would be Very Damaging, High Impact,  Well Balanced, Good Reach, Razor Sharp, Unwieldly, Fragile,  Quick,  Handy, Forcefull Blows  and so on.

  When making a standard attack, you use the standard rules for combat which means all weapons are the same.  The qualities of your weapons may be utilized only at certain times.  When exactly?  I don't know.  A flat number of times per day?  A number of times per level?  Once per encounter? Any time you roll a natural 20 ( or a 1 for bad qualities )?  I don't know.  

  Anyway, just come up with some cool little modifiers and or tricks each quality gives you.  For example the Quick quality might allow you to get an extra attack or Good reach would prevent your opponent from attacking you next round unless he has a reach weapon too.  Forcfull Blow will knock your opponent down unless they make a saving throw vs whatever.  Unbalanced would give your opponent a free attack againsts you if you fail your attack roll.

  These are just examples from the top of my head.

  This can be as simple or complex as one wants to make it.  If done right, I think it could work out pretty good.  Anyway, it was just an idea.

OK, good idea. The thread's already dead on DF (see, what did I tell you)...let's get going on the actual discussion.

Here's the original table from the Ready Ref Sheets.



First off, I'm not really sure anyone actually used this back in the day, but I absolutely love all the baroque sub-systems in that supplement, most with little or no explanation and some wildly divergent stuff that simply would never find its way into a published rpg book today. The Ready Ref Sheets are a grab-bag of houserules & official rules homebrewed together into a DM screen for the discerning obsessive.

The first question that comes to mind...are you supposed to roll initiative normally and add these modifiers? Or is it trying to imply a concrete initiative factor that won't change unless you change weapons?

Another issue is the initiative for long weapons. For the first round, I can understand these weapons will strike first. After that, assuming the combatants remain stuck into close combat, the actual range should decrease giving longer, more unwieldy weapons a disadvantage...the table here gives them a consistent advantage. Any thoughts?

Quote from: Spinal Tarp;261798May not agree 100% with the actual numbers but the concept is sound and looks like it would work fine.

I am unsure on the numbers too.  Much more crunching is necessary to determine balance.   I will probably create a new weapon cost chart to reflect some balance issues as well.

Quote from: Spinal Tarp;261798When making a standard attack, you use the standard rules for combat which means all weapons are the same.  The qualities of your weapons may be utilized only at certain times.  

If these are going to be minor modifiers, I say keep them always on.  But if they are going to be major, then you would want some limits.    

In a D20 game, I would say that you would need to buy a feat to unlock the use of that quality.   This may work well in True20 where you get lots of feats.

In 4e, I would make them Encounter powers.   I am hoping the new Martial book give us lots of these weapon and fighting style powers.

For Old School, I would probably make them always on and make them minor.  Like a Quick weapon would allow you to make 2 attacks, but both at -4 to hit.  The high level thief with a dagger can then decide if he wants one almost definite hit or two good chance strikes.

Quote from: Kellri;261803The first question that comes to mind...are you supposed to roll initiative normally and add these modifiers? Or is it trying to imply a concrete initiative factor that won't change unless you change weapons?

Good question.  It would work both ways.   There is something nice about a fixed initiative system where the wizard knows that his magic missile is gonna happen before most anything else.  

But, where is movement?

Quote from: Kellri;261803After that, assuming the combatants remain stuck into close combat, the actual range should decrease giving longer, more unwieldy weapons a disadvantage...the table here gives them a consistent advantage.

And this is where the Traveller charts work better.   I love the Close vs. Short distinction in the LBB and this is exactly the issue.   The problem is that if you use 1 minute, 10 second or even 6 second rounds, that is a lot of time for people to manuever and alter positioning.  

If you are using a board like 4e, then everything enters surreal game time, but if you are going freeform and abstract, then you must imagine that if a Halberd guy is fighting a Dagger guy, there is a lot of back and forth movement.  The Halberd guy would only be at a disadvantage if he could never move backwards or sideways enough to keep the reach advantage.  Tight quarters would change everything.  

Of course, if you are bringing polearms into the dungeon you are most likely carrying a close quarters weapon for when things get tight.