[Low-Tech/Basic] Pick: War Club or Pickaxe

[Pursuivant]

I've spent entirely too much time using a pickaxe/mattock for gardening, breaking concrete, etc. Admittedly, non-combat uses, but enough that I have a good sense of the tool's balance, reach and heft compared to actual weapons or weapon-like objects I've used in sport melee combat.

For simplicity, treat a pickaxe as a Warhammer. Despite the name, it actually does sw/imp damage and appears to be a weaponized pickaxe with sharper points. (What most people think of as a warhammer is what GURPS describes as a Maul. The warhammer looks like a militarized version of large miner's pick.)

The pick described in GURPS Basic, LT, MA, etc. is a smaller, one-handed weapon which looks a bit like a weaponized mason's hammer or rock pick but with a slightly longer handle.

What most people think of as a pickaxe is actually a pickaxe/mattock or pickaxe/adzes (depending on the exact shape of the non-pick end). It's actually what the Assyrian on the far left is using in the picture that Anthony referenced. These sorts of tools can be treated as a Warhammer which can be turned 180 degrees to do sw/cut damage like a Greataxe.

Due to duller edges/points and design optimized for all-out attacks (strong) against unsuspecting bits of rock or earth, a garden variety pickaxe or pickaxe/mattock can be treated as Improvised (-1 to hit & damage) if you carry it into battle.

If you take off the head, a pickaxe, etc. handle turns into a handy unbalanced club. Treat it as a Round Mace with no penalties for being an improvised weapon.

If you're using an ordinary pickaxe to break rock, it should get Armor Divisor (2) vs. stone and similar materials.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

For simplicity, treat a pickaxe as a Warhammer. Despite the name, it actually does sw/imp damage and appears to be a weaponized pickaxe with sharper points.

Not sure it has sharper points; for example, this has a much faster taper than this, and therefore might well be duller or harder to sharpen. In practice, neither is likely to be terribly sharp, because both armor plates and rocky ground will dull a sharp point very very fast without a lot of benefit to the user.

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by Dalillama

I'm pretty sure there's comvat stats for a lumber axe in one of the LT books; I'd apply the same differences to a mining/digging pick vs. a military pick.

I think there might be a mattock in one of the Horrors... but I could be wrong.

[Dalillama]

Originally Posted by mburr0003

I think there might be a mattock in one of the Horrors... but I could be wrong.

That may be the reference I was thinking of

[tbone]

Action 5 p29 covers pickaxes. Kind of.

A pickaxe falls under Two-Handed Axe/Mace, along with felling axe, broad axe, and splitting maul. Those weapons get Weapon Table entries with TH penalties noted (none for felling axe, -3 for broad axe and splitting maul). A pickaxe is described as "clumsy" but gets no Table entry, and no TH penalty is noted.

Suggested damage is the same as a great axe (sw+3 cut) for an edge or a warhammer (sw+3 imp) for a spike. (Those would be older damage stats from BS, not the newer sw+4 stats from Low-Tech, etc.) Weight is noted as between 8 and 15 lbs.; I'd think higher weights would call for more damage, but that's not given.

I'll suggest this:

Treat a pickaxe as a combo great axe/warhammer. Stats (using more modern damage stats):

8 lb.: sw+4 cut / sw+4 imp, ST 12‡
10 lb.: sw+5 cut / sw+4 imp, ST 12‡
12 lb.: sw+5 cut / sw+5 imp, ST 13‡
15 lb.: sw+6 cut / sw+5 imp, ST 14‡

(That's applying some of my own house rule stuff for modifying weapons; feel free to tone down those higher damages, or boost ST a bit.)

All are clumsy. (I'd go with the common -1 TH; -3 seems extreme to me. Then again, a pickaxe's exceptionally long head does look unwieldy...)

To remove the "clumsy" penalty, pay for a pickaxe that's a proper weapon/tool combo. I don't think there's a single rule somewhere covering this. As possible models to follow, the combo axe/shovel ("combat shovel") and hand weapons that double as climbing tools (Climber's modifier) come to mind. But those are for DF/DFRPG, and aren't necessarily realistic...

(But if this is for a fantasy game, you could just waive any "clumsy" stuff. The character uses a warhammer with all normal stats; it happens to look like a pickaxe.)