Quote from: AaronBrown99;963140I like the way Mythras/RQ6 has weapons of similar size having similar base damage, but adds in special effect keywords, such as 'impale' or 'bleed' depending on the weapon. Add in the size and reach values, and you get a good variety of available weapons/techniques even among nearly identical damage values.

The fact the spears are useful reach weapons even without a combat grid is a huge plus for me.

I can only concur, here;).

The physicality of the polyhedra is part of the appeal of D&D to me. A greataxe isn't just a bigger number on a page; it's a bigger die that makes a bigger thud on the table, especially when someone just stabbed you with a piddly ol' d4 dagger.

Quote from: hedgehobbit;963117The Weapon vs Armor is painful to use. I remember when running 2e that I reversed it, giving every armor type three AC values (vs cutty, stabby, & smashy). This worked fairly well and prevented a table look up as the target values were listed on the character sheet.

...that's a very good idea!

Quote from: ffilz;963138(well, Cold Iron at least used all the dice, in part because if you had a weapon that did 1d6 base, but you had +1 magic, instead of rolling 1d6+1, you roll 1d8, so all the dice end up seeing use).

I do something similar with magic weapons, giving them a different bonus to their damage. So a typical sword might do d8 damage, a magical sword could be +2/D10 or +1/d12, or +3/D8 or whatever. I tried increasing the damage die size with Strength bonus (and increasing hit dice with Con bonus) but that got out of hand a bit too easily.

Quote from: RPGPundit;962774In Lion & Dragon, I'm not listing a specific damage for each weapon (you know, like swords doing a d8, maces a d6, flails 2d4 or whatever). Instead I'm just listing weapons into certain categories, of small, medium or large, plus a couple of special categories.

I think this will encourage Players to choose the weapon they want their character to have, rather than worrying about how one weapon does a d6 while the other does a d6+1 or 2d4-1 versus large creatures or whatever.

How much does it matter to you that weapons work with the standard D&D 'weapon damage' lists where every specific weapon has its specific damage? Would you prefer something more generalized into categories of weapons like what I'm suggesting?

I've seen this sort of things countless times, and it's always struck me as odd.

There are obvious inherent advantages to a dagger that don't necessarily need to be mechanically represented. It can be concealed more easily than a sword, for example, just based on the descriptive characteristics alone. And it is more functional as a throwing weapon. That said, as much as I'd love the simplicity of all weapons do the same damage, if my objective is to truly allow the player to choose whatever weapon they want their character to have without worrying that it will be inferior in all ways to some alternative, then I need there to be some advantage to choosing the sword over the dagger. It doesn't have to be damage. Reach, speed factor, and ease of use are all things that could be statted out to give credence to a variety of viable alternatives. But as long as we're doing that, why not damage as well?

Damage is a part of differentiation and choice when it comes to weapon selection, so, yeah, I guess it's important to me, because it adds another layer to "well, what combat tool suits me?" But this only works if there are real choices in the weaponry, i.e.:

*Big weapon=I do BIG DAMAGE...once I finally swing this fat ass, heavy son of a bitch (which forces me to not have a fucking shield...)
*My trusty little, hidden shank=I attack first! (but it's just a flesh wound!).
*My RIFLE does 3d6! (it also jams and takes forever to reload).
*My bow is faster and easier to use than your Rifle! (but I ain't one-shotting a gnoll anytime soon).
*Trusty sling=AMMO EVERYWHERE! (but plink...plink....plink... [only 10 more plinks to go...]).
*My longsword is a good, middle of the road weapon (unfortunately, it's also a good, middle of the road weapon...[sniff] I'm not special...)
*Try firing that bow prone, like I can with my crossbow! (damn...I have to crank this thing...I may need to sit up...)

Dungeon World does damage by class, so the allure of weaponry is in the tags (precise=Dex; messy=tears shit up; forceful=drives your target back). Hell, if you're a fighter, even your fists do d10, but that just feels weird for some reason.

So, where was I...? oh, yeah....

I like weapons to offer choices, but I can play with static damage numbers, including saying "everything does a d6." But I'd rather have some form of differentiation, including one that's class-based. I sorta like that the fighter does more melee damage, whether it's inherent, or through the class ability to simply wield a bigger weapon.

I prefer weapons to be differentiated to a significant degree - I dont like all weapons doing d6, or similar. I like a longsword to be a bit different to a shortsword which is different to a battle axe. I just prefer a bit of crunch when it comes to weapons.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;963154The physicality of the polyhedra is part of the appeal of D&D to me. A greataxe isn't just a bigger number on a page; it's a bigger die that makes a bigger thud on the table, especially when someone just stabbed you with a piddly ol' d4 dagger.

Yeah that's a very good point. The way the physical use of the dice tallies with the in-game fiction is a big appeal of D&D style combat resolution for me. There's nothing like rolling 16d6 for that high level Fireball.

Quote from: jadrax;962799It depends:

If it is along the lines of WFRP just having maces, swords, axes etc. all be 'Hand Weapon', that is fine with me.

On the other hand, if its along the lines of the rebooted 7th Sea RPG having you to do the same damage with a teacup as you would with a halberd, no thanks.

No, definitely not the latter.  It's just classifying weapon damage not by specific weapon but by overall class of weapon; so you have light, small, medium, and large weapons, doing d4, d6, d8, and d10 respectively.  There's a few weapons (like spears/halberds, and obviously certain ranged weapons, especially gunpowder weapons) having some special qualities that need to be defined as well.