Stick it to 'em!

[Bill_in_IN]

Shostak,

As I read your posts, I can't help but hear them spoken in an Eastern European accent.

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by Shostak

What does the length of the spear have to do with the damage it deals? I could understand a stouter spear doing more, just as a spear does more than a javelin.

Longspear is just a name (aka. broadspear, full-spear, heavy spear, etc.), but I do believe things like length, weight, and stoutness should contribute to a weapon's damage profile. The real point of my post was that I felt spears in particular were undervalued so they received an upgrade on my Weapons Table.

[Shostak]

One more bit of info, and I'll let it rest. GURPS is considered a pretty thoroughly researched ruleset. It gives polearms like the halberd and naginata exactly the same thrust damage as a two-handed spear.

[Bill_in_IN]

Originally Posted by Shostak

One more bit of info, and I'll let it rest. GURPS is considered a pretty thoroughly researched ruleset. It gives polearms like the halberd and naginata exactly the same thrust damage as a two-handed spear.

That's an interesting point. I used to have the original GURPS rule book. It was with all of the other info that my friend's ex-wife threw away. I believe that it had some more granularity built into its system.

I'm still sticking with the TFT Weapons Table that wasn't molested via the big NERF.

[TippetsTX]

TBH, I try not to get hung up on historical accuracy in fantasy settings, though I do appreciate thorough research. On my own Weapons Table, I have tried (not always successfully) to avoid using actual historical names for certain weapons due to the inevitable baggage they carry... looking at you longbow.

So I have smallspears and half-spears, shortspears and full-spears.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Shostak

So long as we are talking about polearms, can I ask just what the heck a pike axe is?

Looking at the "Other Names for Weapons" box as I was lurking on this topic helped me here, to an extent.

What I'd probably do is:

Spear: a pointy thing used for thrusting. Spear, lance, yari (japanese for spear).

"Halberd" is something I'd use for shorter, dueling versions of "long shaft with a blade on it, be it axe, sword, or pick."

"Pike Axe" is something I'd use for longer, battlefield weapons that prioritize a long wind-up and brutal delivery, but at the expense of being able to protect yourself as easily. These are weapons for which you want a shield line, or something that prevents the other guy from running up to you and gutting during said wind-up.

Alternately, leave battlefield weapons rather than personal combat weapons out of it, and have pike axe be the stuff with a very deliberately overweight head.

So dueling glaive, naginata (but I repeat myself) and a lot of other "sword on a stick" or "light axe on a stick" maybe like a lochaber axe would fall in that intermediate category, while the big heavy halberds and pollaxes would be in the pike axe realm.

The stats are suggestive: spears and halberds are the same length; pike axes are longer. (Except spears when they're longer too...)

Some of this is head-scratchy to me due to the way I was trained on staff, long-axe, spear (1H and 2H are very different). So I try to leave that a bit out of it.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by TippetsTX

... looking at you longbow.

Heh. Snrk.