D&D 5E A matter of weapons

Ath-kethin said:

I'm really confused. How does weapon choice NOT matter?

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Because a lot of people just choose the highest damage melee and ranged weapon they are proficient with, instead of picking something thematic or interesting.

This isn't universally true, mind you. It just happens quite frequently.

If the weapons had more differentiating features, or all did the same damage, then there would be less incentive to just pick the d8 melee weapon and shield (or the d12 melee weapon and no shield) and the d10 ranged weapon (at least until you level up enough to take advantage of the extra attack feature, assuming your class gets it).

Harzel said:

Wanting to use a thematically appropriate weapon is an understandable desire, but there is something here that I am not clear on. Is this (lack of mechanical differentiation) your preference for mechanics in general, or just gear, or is there something special about weapons that I am not getting? Take armor for example. If for thematic reasons I want my character to wear leather, or, for that matter, be butt naked, but I don't want to "gimp myself", are you down with all armors having the same effect or perhaps no effect at all? (If this sounds like sarcasm or a strawman, I apologize in advance as that is not my intent - I really don't see the difference.)

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If you were a player at my table and wanted to wear no armor at all, I would let you trade your armor profs for an Unarmored Defense ability.

Sacrosanct said:

Yep. and it takes away from my verisimilitude as well. Any time a choice is being made for metagaming reasons as opposed to what the character him or herself might choose, that chips away the fun/realism for me. For example, in real life, people choose all kinds of weapons, not the one that does the max DPR. Either from cultural choices, or what just looks cool are the real reasons.

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I heavily doubt that any military force in history ever choose their weapons because of "coolness". While culture played a bit into it people chose what was effective, available and economic. So this "metagame" thinking was exactly what happened and still happens in real life and everyone who chooses an inferior weapon because it looks cool ends up dead really quick.

So what really breaks verisimilitude is the knife master running around and being as effective on the battlefield than the guy with a longsword (unless when grappling) or that a guy without armor being as hard to injure/kill as someone with heavy armor.

In the game I play with the kids (where I mess with the rules more) I have weapon categories and in each category the weapon could be a sword/dagger, axe, spear/javelin, or hammer/mace/club. The categories are

Thrown: d6 damage (ranged, light, finesse)
1-handed melee: d8 damage (finesse)
Versatile: d8 damage 1-handed and d10 damage 2-handed
2-handed: d12 damage (heavy)

Fluff dictates the particular weapon in each category.

I posted on this recently.....largely because I started a heavily reflavoured game and just let people reskin any weapon as long as it fitted thematically.....so I tried to come up with a table, which I managed to get to work for almost every weapon and property.

You start at 0
Add 1 for positive damage attirbutes: Heavy, 2 handed, loading, martial
Subtract 0.5 for every beneficial attribute: finesse (uses dex, this includes bows), reach, light, thrown, ranged.
Double it and add 6. If the number is odd, round up for martial weapons, down for simple weapon.
This is your new dice size (minimum d4).
If it is neither light, nor 2 handed, add versatile for free.
Choose a damage type.

Using this method you can almost recreate almost every weapon in the phb (trident, blowgun, and handaxe are excepitions I think). This allows the player to choose any weapon concept, and then apply whatever benefits seem appropriate. So you want to throw shoes? Add thrown...gives you a total of -0.5, double to -1. Add 6. Round down as its simple. Voila! You have a thrown bludgeoning weapon that does 1d4 and works off STR. Want to design a superior fighting shoe? Then just add the martial and ranged properties. Dice size in incresed to a d6 and you have increased range.

This frees up players to just build the concept, then work with the DM to create the weapon they want that matches the concept without having to always choose a rapier, and never pick a flail.

Eubani said:

Keep in mind that warriors throughout history have often chosen weapons because they are better at killing the opposition (the dpr of real life) this was mainly in answer to the equipment or tactics/formations the enemy used. You bring heavy armour we will bring hammers because they will do more damage for example. Damage was a concern so a character aiming for more damage is not for the most part aiming to kill "verisimilitude" (I hate that word it has killed so many good mechanics and taken so much away from martial characters, during playtesting it became shorthand for lack of imagination and I refuse to acknowledge what HP are instead of just meat).

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This isn't entirely true. I mean, yes weapons were used that were good at killing the opponent, but it's not like they went all "Deadliest Warrior" and did evaluations of every weapon design to measure the total area damage in an attack. People didn't say "Well, the greatsword cuts 1/4" inch deeper, so we'll use that from now on and no one uses an axe!" If a weapon could kill, that's all that really mattered. Didn't matter if it was a scimitar or a long sword. Rather, if you look at historical weapons, it was most impacted by culture and region. If you're going by your logic (weapons were chosen based on the "real DPR"), the most used weapon of all time was the spear, so should the spear have the highest damage over any other weapon? (Yes, I know WFRP 1e does have the spear as the best weapon).

Even with armies of the same region, we see different weapons used for cultural reasons. Some tribes used axes mainly, some used swords, some used spears, etc etc. All were deadly. So no, I disagree that warriors used the "highest DPR" weapon. History doesn't support that, largely because there isn't any significant difference between an axe and sword in the ability to kill a man. And that's my point. There shouldn't be in D&D either, because then you end up with metagaming choices of everyone having a greatsword over a great axe. And clearly our historical examples prove otherwise.

Also, I'm sorry you hate the word "verisimilitude". Probably about as much as I hate the term "player agency" (which has been used all to often as a way for a player to say they should get whatever they want regardless of what's going on in the game world or how the DM is running the game.)

Derren said:

I heavily doubt that any military force in history ever choose their weapons because of "coolness". While culture played a bit into it people chose what was effective, available and economic. So this "metagame" thinking was exactly what happened and still happens in real life and everyone who chooses an inferior weapon because it looks cool ends up dead really quick.

So what really breaks verisimilitude is the knife master running around and being as effective on the battlefield than the guy with a longsword (unless when grappling) or that a guy without armor being as hard to injure/kill as someone with heavy armor.

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I didn't say the military choose coolness, I said some people (which includes a lot of people not in the military) choose weapons based on how "cool" they think it is. And that's true. Culture didn't play "a bit", it played a lot, about as much as environmental factors. Seriously, go open a history book on the various cultures and the weapons they used. There's a reason why every culture had their own favored weapons, even cultures that were in the same region and faced the same types of enemies (like the Franks vs the Goths vs the Romans).

Also, I don't think you really know how melee combat does work in real life. My argument is to base the damage off of PC skill. And I'm here to tell you, a skilled person with a knife would wipe the floor against a lesser skilled guy with a sword because we can see it happen over and over in demonstrations. Same with unarmored against armored.

So my point stands. IMO, using metagaming to always choose the greatsword over the great axe not only takes away from verisimilitude, but history supports the opposite (and explains why it takes away from verisimilitude because it's not realistic). Metagaming, by it's very definition, can't occur in real life because it's real life.

Here is what I'm talking about. In D&D land, no one chooses a dagger for their primary weapon because it does a d4 damage. Heck, no one chooses a short sword either if they are proficient in bigger weapons (despite the Romans using a short sword). Gamers are using metagame factors to choose their weapons, which is resulting in too many cookie cutter PCs that don't reflect historical accuracy.

If weapon damage was universal, or very generic (like d8 for 1 hand weapons, d12 for 2-handed), I think we'd see a lot more variation that also reflects historical accuracy better. And to illustrate how I believe weapon damage should be based more on skill than weapon (a dagger will kill you just as dead as a sword. Once you're dead, you can't get MORE dead, so that extra 1/2" deep cut doesn't matter at all):

[video=youtube;CFqXkYdAFXs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFqXkYdAFXs[/video]

Sacrosanct said:

I didn't say the military choose coolness, I said some people (which includes a lot of people not in the military) choose weapons based on how "cool" they think it is. And that's true. Culture didn't play "a bit", it played a lot, about as much as environmental factors. Seriously, go open a history book on the various cultures and the weapons they used. There's a reason why every culture had their own favored weapons, even cultures that were in the same region and faced the same types of enemies (like the Franks vs the Goths vs the Romans).

Also, I don't think you really know how melee combat does work in real life. My argument is to base the damage off of PC skill. And I'm here to tell you, a skilled person with a knife would wipe the floor against a lesser skilled guy with a sword because we can see it happen over and over in demonstrations. Same with unarmored against armored.

So my point stands. IMO, using metagaming to always choose the greatsword over the great axe not only takes away from verisimilitude, but history supports the opposite (and explains why it takes away from verisimilitude because it's not realistic). Metagaming, by it's very definition, can't occur in real life because it's real life.

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D&D adventurers are not some gangers who saw some movie and thus choose the same weapon as the hero in there (including holding the gun sideways). Adventurers are professionals and they chose weapons that work. A skilled person with a knife might win against a sword wielder, but he has a harder time and needs to be more skilled. And thats why fighter used a sword or another weapon as primary arm and not a knife.
In history people chose the weapon that worked best. Only that it was more of a trial and error as we do not have absolute stats for weapons and combat in real life is a bit more complicated than in D&D with many other factors influencing weapon choice. And coolness etc. was not a factor. At most superstition was. But people generally chose the best weapon available which in D&D would be equivalent to the highest damaging one. That is realistic.

A 1/2" deeper cut matters as that can be the difference between hitting a vital organ and a flesh wound. Yes, Romans used short swords in the beginning but later switched to long swords as metallurgy improved and that was way before the tech level used by D&D. So another prove that in history people used the more effective weapon.
So if you want to have it realistic then everyone would chose the highest DPR weapon. If you want a different result that you have to expand the combat system so that other factors besides DPR matter.

MechaPilot said:

If you were a player at my table and wanted to wear no armor at all, I would let you trade your armor profs for an Unarmored Defense ability.

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Agreed. And admittedly, it's one of the things I really liked about 2e's Skills And Powers. One of my favorite PCs was a paladin who couldn't wear armor (he was a Paladin of Ilmatr (sp) and believed the more physical punishment he took, the more enlightened he was) but used a d12 for hit points and could cast spells at an earlier level.

Derren said:

D&D adventurers are not some gangers who saw some movie and thus choose the same weapon as the hero in there (including holding the gun sideways). Adventurers are professionals and they chose weapons that work.

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Are they though? Are you saying a PC couldn't be some Joe off the streets who saw an NPC skillfully wield a pair of scimitars like some unnamed hero, and decide that they want to emulate that style? But instead, PCs are professionals who always use the highest DPR weapon (metagaming) over any other factor? Sorry, I gotta disagree with that.

In history people chose the weapon that worked best.

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Based on their culture and region and scenario, not highest DPR. Explain this then. Why did the Franks uses axes more than anyone else? Why did the Romans use spears, javalins, and short swords if long swords had a higher DPR? Why did Arabs use curved weapons like the scimitar if the long sword has a better DPR? The list goes on and on.

A 1/2" deeper cut matters as that can be the difference between hitting a vital organ and a flesh wound.

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If you're dead, you're dead. That extra damage to another organ means nothing.

So if you want to have it realistic then everyone would chose the highest DPR weapon.

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No. Do you know what "realistic" means, because you're arguing the opposite. In real life, people didn't always choose the highest damaging weapon. They chose weapons based on the environment they expected to fight in that was from a pool of weapon from their culture. That is realistic because that is what actually happened and we can prove by looking at history.

Sacrosanct said:

Are they though? Are you saying a PC couldn't be some Joe off the streets who saw an NPC skillfully wield a pair of scimitars like some unnamed hero, and decide that they want to emulate that style? But instead, PCs are professionals who always use the highest DPR weapon (metagaming) over any other factor? Sorry, I gotta disagree with that.

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And why did the NPC use scimitars? Where did he learn to get good with them?

Based on their culture and region. Explain this then. Why did the Franks uses axes more than anyone else? Why did the Romans use spears, javalins, and short swords if long swords had a higher DPR? Why did Arabs use curved weapons like the scimitar if the long sword has a better DPR? The list goes on and on.

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Longswords are harder to make than shortswords. Once the Romans figured out how to make them they switched over to longswords. And curved weapons are better from horseback so arabs used them more as they came from a nomadic background. Axes are also more easy to create than swords and require less metal but also are less versatile. So you use them when you can't make good swords in masses. But as all this does not factor into D&D combat highest DPR it is. The principle behind it is the same.

If you're dead, you're dead. That extra damage to another organ means nothing.

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It matters when its a difference between wounded or dead. Just being poked by a dagger doesn't automatically kill. You need to get through armor (something the dagger was actually better in than the sword) and hit a vital organ.

No. Do you know what "realistic" means, because you're arguing the opposite. In real life, people didn't always choose the highest damaging weapon. They chose weapons based on the environment they expected to fight in that was from a pool of weapon from their culture. That is realistic because that is what actually happened and we can prove by looking at history.

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Do you know anything about weapons at all? Because it doesn't look like it. In real life armies constantly switched weapons based on the enemy. When heavy armor became more common armies switched to hammers and bodkin arrows etc.
That is realism instead of choosing a weapon because it looks nice.