Weapons: Dwarven and ‡

[Johnny Angel]

The Dwarven modifier from Dungeon Fantasy is pretty straight forward in what it does. It makes a weapon which normally becomes unready after an attack and makes it so you can attack and defend on the same turn with the weapon.


Dwarven states that it does not take away the 1.5 ST requirement for weapons which have the "‡" notation as part of their ST... to be able to attack and also parry on the same turn.


I'm trying to wrap my head around how all of these pieces interact. For sake of example (and because it's the weapon of choice of one of my players,) I'll be using the Testsubo (page 70 of Low-Tech.)

Normally, the swinging attack option for a Tetsubo has a parry rating of U. It also has the "‡" notation as part of the ST rating. I believe this means that the swinging attack of the weapon would still have a "U" parry even for a user with 1.5 time the strength needed to wield it properly.

A Dwarven Testsubo would no longer have a parry of "U" for the swinging attack mode, but it would still have the "‡" notation as part of the ST rating for a swing. I believe this means that the weapon would still be unbalanced to parry with for a user who did not meet the 1.5 ST requirement.

So, am I right in thinking that the weapon would need be dwarven and the user would need to meet the 1.5 ST requirement to be able to perform a swinging attacking with a Tetsubo and still parry with it on the same turn?

[Balor Patch]

Yes, exactly so.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Johnny Angel

A Dwarven Testsubo would no longer have a parry of "U" for the swinging attack mode, but it would still have the "‡" notation as part of the ST rating for a swing. I believe this means that the weapon would still be unbalanced to parry with for a user who did not meet the 1.5 ST requirement.

I'd nitpick the description here. The "‡" notation's actual effect is that the weapon becomes unready. That does prevent parrying with it before your next turn. But it also prevents parrying or attacking after your next turn, until you take a Ready maneuver to get it back in position.

[Stripe]

What we've got here is a failure to communicate.

Weapons that become Unready after use (‡) are NOT inherently Unbalanced.

Unbalanced weapons have a Parry of U.

End of story.

That I am aware, there is no canonical way to be rid of the ‡ except through the Graceful Weapon or Quick Draw enchantment in Magic, p. 63.

This is one thing that seriously confused me in 2004 switching from Third Edition to Fourth, and it's still confusing people today.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Johnny Angel

The Dwarven modifier from Dungeon Fantasy is pretty straight forward in what it does. It makes a weapon which normally becomes unready after an attack and makes it so you can attack and defend on the same turn with the weapon.

Oh, I'd missed this before...U parry does not mean that the weapon becomes unready after an attack. I suspect you were just using 'unready' loosely, but it's got a kind of specific meaning and misusing it in this context can be confusing.

[Bruno]

I vote for finding another word for Unbalanced for some future edition. Especially since we now have Cheap (Balance) and Fine (Balanced) cluttering up the situation.

Best choices would be words that don't start with "Un", for maximum distinction from ‡-weapons.

[Johnny Angel]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

I'd nitpick the description here. The "‡" notation's actual effect is that the weapon becomes unready. That does prevent parrying with it before your next turn. But it also prevents parrying or attacking after your next turn, until you take a Ready maneuver to get it back in position.

Thanks for the clarification. I think I did know that, but the knowledge got lost somewhere in my head as I was trying to shuffle everything together. The game I'm currently running is my first attempt at meshing a lot of different rules sources together.

Originally Posted by Stripe

What we've got here is a failure to communicate.

Weapons that become Unready after use (‡) are NOT inherently Unbalanced.

Unbalanced weapons have a Parry of U.

End of story.

That I am aware, there is no canonical way to be rid of the ‡ except through the Graceful Weapon or Quick Draw enchantment in Magic, p. 63.

This is one thing that seriously confused me in 2004 switching from Third Edition to Fourth, and it's still confusing people today.

I was under the impression that you could be rid of the ‡ by have 1.5 times the strength needed to use the weapon. For example, the Warhammer has 12‡ for ST. I believe a user with ST 18 could attack without it becoming unready. (Side note: If you have 3 times the ST needed, you can wield a ‡ weapon in one hand. So, a ST 36 character could use a Warhammer in one hand.)

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Oh, I'd missed this before...U parry does not mean that the weapon becomes unready after an attack. I suspect you were just using 'unready' loosely, but it's got a kind of specific meaning and misusing it in this context can be confusing.

Poor wording/reading on my part... I was using the word loosely, but I was also not aware that I was confusing two different u-words.

Originally Posted by Bruno

I vote for finding another word for Unbalanced for some future edition. Especially since we now have Cheap (Balance) and Fine (Balanced) cluttering up the situation.

Best choices would be words that don't start with "Un", for maximum distinction from ‡-weapons.

In my case, I didn't read carefully enough when looking over the rules. Still, I think it would help to find a way to further distinguish some of the terms which sound similar.
---------------------------------------------

Ok, so let's see if I have everything right now. I'm going to switch over to the Warhammer for my example.

By default, the warhammer is a weapon which has a parry of "U" and has "‡" as part of its statistics. This means you cannot attack and parry with it on the same turn. It also means the weapon becomes unready after attacking with it.

A Dwarven Warhammer would no longer have a parry of "U." As such, you could attack after parrying with it. However, you could not parry after attacking with it because the weapon would become unready after attacking with it.

Someone with a ST of 18 could attack using a warhammer without it becoming unready. However, a regular (non-Dwarven) warhammer would still be unbalanced; as such even the ST 18 user could not attack and parry with it on the same turn.

Someone with a ST of 18 and using a Dwarven Warhammer could parry and attack with the Dwarven Warhammer on the same turn because it would no longer be unbalanced. They could also attack without the weapon becoming unready.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Johnny Angel

I was under the impression that you could be rid of the ‡ by have 1.5 times the strength needed to use the weapon. For example, the Warhammer has 12‡ for ST. I believe a user with ST 18 could attack without it becoming unready. (Side note: If you have 3 times the ST needed, you can wield a ‡ weapon in one hand. So, a ST 36 character could use a Warhammer in one hand.)

The ‡ has less effect on a high ST user, but the weapon still has the ST‡ trait. Whereas a Dwarven weapon no longer has the Parry U trait.

Originally Posted by Johnny Angel

In my case, I didn't read carefully enough when looking over the rules. Still, I think it would help to find a way to further distinguish some of the terms which sound similar.

This is only the latest manifestation of the difficulty that wording delivers.

Originally Posted by Johnny Angel

Ok, so let's see if I have everything right now. I'm going to switch over to the Warhammer for my example.

By default, the warhammer is a weapon which has a parry of "U" and has "‡" as part of its statistics. This means you cannot attack and parry with it on the same turn. It also means the weapon becomes unready after attacking with it.

A Dwarven Warhammer would no longer have a parry of "U." As such, you could attack after parrying with it. However, you could not parry after attacking with it because the weapon would become unready after attacking with it.

Someone with a ST of 18 could attack using a warhammer without it becoming unready. However, a regular (non-Dwarven) warhammer would still be unbalanced; as such even the ST 18 user could not attack and parry with it on the same turn.

Someone with a ST of 18 and using a Dwarven Warhammer could parry and attack with the Dwarven Warhammer on the same turn because it would no longer be unbalanced. They could also attack without the weapon becoming unready.

All looks right.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I vote for finding another word for Unbalanced for some future edition. Especially since we now have Cheap (Balance) and Fine (Balanced) cluttering up the situation.

Best choices would be words that don't start with "Un", for maximum distinction from ‡-weapons.

It gets worse. One of the books refers to ‡ as Unbalanced despite all effort somewhere (but not elsewhere!).

This is why I call them U-Parry and Becomes-Unready, to avoid any chance of ambiguity.

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I vote for finding another word for Unbalanced for some future edition. Especially since we now have Cheap (Balance) and Fine (Balanced) cluttering up the situation.

Best choices would be words that don't start with "Un", for maximum distinction from ‡-weapons.

Awkward? And then you can nawkward weapons and gawkward weapons. I don't know what they'd do, but you could use them with awkward weapons.