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Old 11-19-2012, 06:22 AM   #61
DanHoward
 
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Default Re: On Swords, Blades and the Song of Swords

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Originally Posted by Icelander View Post
Out of interest, what is a buff coat, in LT terms?

Even using the lighest leather available, i.e. Medium Leather, one gets a weight that is prohibitive if it has to cover both arms, the whole torso and the legs down to the knees.

I'd really like to have the option of DR 1* leather, to match the DR 1* Padded Cloth+. Sure, I guess that DR 2/1* is fair for buff coats that are thick across the chest, but if that's used for the limbs too, we get 23-24 lbs. as the lightest possible buff coat.
Medium leather on the body and light leather on the sleeves and legs. This one weighs 19 lbs.
http://www.swordforum.com/forums/sho...413-Buff-Coats
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Old 11-19-2012, 08:26 AM   #62
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Default Re: Cavalry Sabers

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I realised that cavalry sabers are still listed as being TL4 in Low-Tech. I didn't notice this in the playtest.

While the European weapon with that name is TL4, I'm pretty sure that weapons using those stats would have been available by TL2 and certainly by TL3.

Am I way off base in this? Or was this simply an oversight and ought to be reported as errata?
As far as I know, the first sabres appeared on the steppes circa 800 CE and were lightly curved. Ones with a strong enough curve to give a penalty to thrusts are much later. Earlier chopping swords were usually shorter, forward-curved, and heavy-bladed so would count as Shortswords, Falchions, or Small Falchions. Note the description in LT which makes weight and a strong curve the defining characteristics of a Cavalry Sabre.

Edit: I think that a late shamshir or a British Model 1796 Light Cavalry Sabre are examples of real swords that the Cavalry Sabre stats model. The defining features seem to be "long and heavy enough to get Weight 3 lbs and use Broadsword skill in the game" and "curved enough that they should have a penalty to thrusts relative to a Thrusting Broadsword in the game." Its not my field, but I think that such strongly curved swords first became popular around the 15th century. I suspect that their late appearance was driven by fashion not technical difficulties.
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Old 11-19-2012, 12:29 PM   #63
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Default Re: On Swords, Blades and the Song of Swords

Just a heads up:

Icelander, I have so much platonic love for you right now.
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Old 11-20-2012, 12:18 AM   #64
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Default Re: Cavalry Sabers

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As far as I know, the first sabres appeared on the steppes circa 800 CE and were lightly curved.
It's not all that necessary that the term 'saber' be used for the weapon. Makhairas are not necessarily all so heavy and forward balanced as to require Falchion stats and even if they are, what about Chinese Tang dynasty daos?

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Originally Posted by Polydamas View Post
Ones with a strong enough curve to give a penalty to thrusts are much later. Earlier chopping swords were usually shorter, forward-curved, and heavy-bladed so would count as Shortswords, Falchions, or Small Falchions. Note the description in LT which makes weight and a strong curve the defining characteristics of a Cavalry Sabre.
Heavily curved blades exist at TL1 and most probably at TL2 too. Personally, I've seen theoretical reconstructions of weapons deriving from khopeshes and maikharas that I'd give Cavalry Saber stats. I'll grant that I can't point to a specific authentic surviving specimen, but that's Dan's field. He'll know if any such weapons really did exist.

I do know that there are plenty of TL3 weapons that I'd not hesitate to give Cavalry Saber stats.

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Originally Posted by Polydamas View Post
Edit: I think that a late shamshir or a British Model 1796 Light Cavalry Sabre are examples of real swords that the Cavalry Sabre stats model. The defining features seem to be "long and heavy enough to get Weight 3 lbs and use Broadsword skill in the game" and "curved enough that they should have a penalty to thrusts relative to a Thrusting Broadsword in the game." Its not my field, but I think that such strongly curved swords first became popular around the 15th century. I suspect that their late appearance was driven by fashion not technical difficulties.
The strongly curved sabers you are talking about might be the ones most familiar to Europeans, but it's not as if they didn't have antecedents in both the Far and Near East that would use the same stats.

I've always seen Cavalry Sabers as not necessarily just an inferior Broadsword, but also Shortswords with a bonus to cut damage. Anything that looks like it would be about as good as a Shortsword for thrusting, but is better for mounted use and slashing might well be a Cavalry Saber.

Edit: I think that blade shape is more a matter for fashion than anything else and that it is inconsistent and inaccurate to make a particular shape TL4 just because that was the time period when it became popular in Europe.

As GURPS unfortunately makes no distinction in Tech Levels between highly advanced Hellenistic and the even more highly advanced Romans and much earlier and less sophisticated Iron Age societies, pretty much all the weaponry and armour of historical times is TL2 in introduction and usually remains in use until TL4.

I'd prefer moving TL3 to an earlier date and make mail, advanced artillery and crossbows, for example, emerging TL3 technology in the Hellenic and later Graeco-Roman world. At the height of their powers, the Romans, in my opinion and increasingly backed by new data, were not in any meaningful way of a lower Tech Level than was the rule after 600 CE.

If we do that, I could see Cavalry Sabers as TL3 technology. By the usual GURPS TLs, though, I think that they are just as much TL2 as Thrusting Broadswords and Falchions, even though they were not as fashionable.

That is, I would use Cavalry Saber stats to model some makhairas, drepanas or other swords that are long enough to be used comfortably from horseback, good for cutting and at least reasonably good for thrusting. Falchion stat Shortswords would give the same cut damage, aye, but less thrusting damage, and if we are using optional rules for Reach and modifiers for the Cavalry Training technique, such shorter and thicker blades would be less comfortable in anything but a very close melee.

I'd not blink at seeing one of Alexander's Hetaroi given a makhaira with Cavalry Saber stats, as a personal preference over a shorter kopis.
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Last edited by Icelander; 11-20-2012 at 04:40 AM.
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Old 11-20-2012, 08:55 PM   #65
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You can stat things however you want in your games (the Realms are a potpouri setting after all!) but I think that Low Tech is clear about what counts as a Cavalry Sabre to the authors, and as far as I know swords like that appear in about the 15th century. "A curved, one-handed slashing sword ... heavier [than a Shortsword] ... steeply curved." Do you know of any examples of those before the 15th century? If it first appears in the 15th century, then its probably TL 4 in GURPS, although I don't take the GURPS technology/economy model too seriously.

Edit: I certainly wouldn't quibble with any iron-working society making swords with Cavalry Saber stats once they have been invented. And in the Realms, any practical type of sword was probably invented a long time ago. But I think it is good for LT to note that in our history, these swords appeared later than one might think.
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Old 11-20-2012, 10:26 PM   #66
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Default Re: On Swords, Blades and the Song of Swords

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. . . what counts as a Cavalry Sabre to the authors, and as far as I know swords like that appear in about the 15th century. "A curved, one-handed slashing sword ... heavier [than a Shortsword] ... steeply curved." Do you know of any examples of those before the 15th century? If it first appears in the 15th century, then its probably TL 4 in GURPS, although I don't take the GURPS technology/economy model too seriously.
IIRC the Turks, with their scimitar (introduced to the Middle East c. 840) had a weapon not too different from the saber. There is a substantial academic discussion of this in:

gladius.revistas.csic.es/index.php/gladius/article/download/86/86

The author examines museum pieces, archaeological finds, and images on frescos, mosaics, and coins to make his determinations.

While not as dramatically curved as, say, a Blucher sabel they would, IMHO, fit the description of "saber."
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Old 11-21-2012, 02:39 AM   #67
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Default Re: On Swords, Blades and the Song of Swords

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You can stat things however you want in your games (the Realms are a potpouri setting after all!) but I think that Low Tech is clear about what counts as a Cavalry Sabre to the authors, and as far as I know swords like that appear in about the 15th century. "A curved, one-handed slashing sword ... heavier [than a Shortsword] ... steeply curved." Do you know of any examples of those before the 15th century?
There are Thracian swords that have a significant curve. Aside from that, a lot of our knowledge of ancient weaponry is extrapolated from one or two artifacts and a lot of period art. Given that a slightly lighter blade than a 'typical' makhaira or kopis would also produce a weapon that fits this definition, it's quite possible that they exist from antiquity. It's not as if we have all that many surviving specimens for any other types for sword either.

By the 9th century onwards, I have no doubts at all of the existence of sharply curved Cavalry Sabers, in Iran/Khorasan and elsewhere, including China.

Aside from that, I don't see any need for an extremely sharp curve for a weapon to qualify as a Cavalry Saber in terms of stats. If you check the TL4 Backsword, it gets thr+1 and sw+1 just like the Cavalry Saber, apparently because it is single-edged. While I wouldn't go so far as to say that all single-edged swords are Cavalry Sabers or Falchions, I think that there is a wide range of weapons at TL2+ that qualify as better than Shortswords for slashing and mounted use, while still not being Thrusting Broadswords.

Of course, such analysis is complicated by the fact that in realism terms, there ought not be any damage advantage to a slightly longer sword on the thrust. Shortswords are not worse for thrusting than broadswords. But in the system as it stands, I think we have to read the Cavalry Saber stats as applying to any weapon that is about as good as a Shortsword for thrusting, but better for cutting. That includes hunting swords, hangers and cutlasses, if they have a blade longer than 24" or so.
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Old 11-21-2012, 09:42 AM   #68
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Default Re: On Swords, Blades and the Song of Swords

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IIRC the Turks, with their scimitar (introduced to the Middle East c. 840) had a weapon not too different from the saber. There is a substantial academic discussion of this in:

gladius.revistas.csic.es/index.php/gladius/article/download/86/86

The author examines museum pieces, archaeological finds, and images on frescos, mosaics, and coins to make his determinations.

While not as dramatically curved as, say, a Blucher sabel they would, IMHO, fit the description of "saber."
Early steppe sabres were only slightly curved, especially compared to unarguable Cavalry Sabres like a shamshir or Model 1796 Light Cavalry. In Low Tech's typology, I think they would use Shortsword or Thrusting Broadsword stats with a different familiarity.

There is a popular meme that medieval Moslems all used curved swords, which seems to derived from medieval Christian art which marked "pagans" with curved swords and the fact that many "orientals" used strongly curved swords in the 19th century.
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Old 11-21-2012, 08:40 PM   #69
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Default Re: On Swords, Blades and the Song of Swords

I didn't even realize I had that stereotype, until you mentioned it. I do picture medeival Muslims with curved swords.
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Old 12-27-2012, 02:22 PM   #70
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Default Re: On Swords, Blades and the Song of Swords

Greetings all !

I have a little question about a famous sword. The Conan sword (1982 version with Schwarzy). This is a movie creation but one of my character want to use it and which GURPS stat to this ?

http://filmswords.com/conan/conan-sw...nniversary.htm

or this variant :

http://www.bronzebyjeffreyjrobinson....edeluvian.html

This is a Thrusting bastard sword ? The Conan sword looks like a little more heavier than this. And which use or technique of the long ricasso ? Conan uses it one or two-handed and event thrown it.
To match with the movie I think than it a very fine weapon and perhaps have some mystical propriety ? Ornate level...

Another question about the Long knife. The Throwing knife skill said than you could thrown any type of knife, but I haven't find the stat to thrown a long knife.
And this knife with a 8" blade is a long knife or not ? What stat give you to the Fallkniven Oden ?

http://www.fallkniven.com/en/shop/de...ive-knives/nl2

I have some difficulty to match some real knife with the stat. For exemple a knife with a 6 -7" is a large knife ? How long is the blade of a small knife or a long knife ?

Thanks for your help.
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