How big is my katana?

[trancejeremy]

Peasants were shorter, because they had poor nutrition - knights were typically wealthy, so ate better (though not as good as today) and were taller as a result.

 

[Ashtagon]

Peasants were shorter, because they had poor nutrition - knights were typically wealthy, so ate better (though not as good as today) and were taller as a result.

Sure, knights were taller than peasants of the day. But to say they were taller than modern people is stretching disbelief.

fwiw, US Army records note the average modern American man as 5' 10".

 

[emoplato]

I've worked on an equation to calculate the average damage one can expect from a weapon factoring in 5% automatic fail due to Natural 1 as well as 5% crit confirm fail from the same source. It can also factor in non-auto-fail hit chance as well as crit chance and the crit multiplier. I've got it in my own Excel spreadsheet at the moment, but I'm pretty sure I can make an OpenOffice version of anyone wants to look at it and fiddle. I'll probably make a new thread here just to go over it.

Keep in mind all of these calculations assume 95% hit chance and 95% crit confirm.

A 1d6 katana with 18-20/x3 crit would have a base of 4.305 damage assuming 95% hit chance and 95% crit confirm. A Great Scimitar being 1d8 18-20/x2 has a base of 4.89375, so a difference of about .6 without extra damage.

Going up to +5 damage, the katana deals 10.455 average damage while the great scimitar is at 10.33125. At +4 damage the katana is behind with 9.225 versus the great scimitar's 9.24375. +5 is absolutely trivial to get, so that katana really isn't balanced against the great scimitar.

Changing the katana to 19-20/x3 lowers its base to 3.98125. At +5 damage it does 9.66875 compared to the great scimitar's 10.33125, which is behind. At +10, the katana is at 15.35625 with the scimitar at 15.76875.

It's not until we get to between +18 (katana's 24.45625 and scimitar's 24.46875) and +19 (katana's 25.59375 and scimitar's 25.55625) that the katana is better.

For reference, I'll compare a regular scimitar to a longsword. The scimitar has a base of 3.80625 versus the longsword's base of 4.69125. The scimitar doesn't come out ahead of the longsword until +20 damage (25.55625 and 25.54125 respectively).

Essentially, if damage is the only consideration, making the katana a 1d6 19-20/x3 weapon would roughly maintain the paradigm against a great scimitar that a scimitar has against a longsword.

Yes, you are correct when comparing medium, mundane versions of these two with two low-level characters that my Katana does win(+5 from 18 str. and it being masterwork), but D&D 3.X isn't ultimately a mundane role-play game. I kind of wish I knew what your equation exactly was but I don't think I will need it to make my point. In low level play you could probably expect your arcane caster to have an enlarge person and in lower mid level play the characters can afford Strongarm Bracers, then obviously races with Powerful Build. Either of them will give the use of a large version of these weapons. The Great Scimitar is ahead of the curve going from 1d8 to 2d6. My Katana on the other hand only goes from 1d6 to 1d8. The average damage rolls between the two can speak for themselves as the Great Scimitar increases from 4.5 to 7 while my Katana only goes from 3.5 to 4.5. So, when invested right Great Scimitar will likely deal more damage but my katana can afford to have another item or ability set.
I do admit that my katana sort of took the Great Scimitar's specialization away but it did so with less base damage. As such when at least 50% of the enemies out there are either outright immune or have items/abilities to negate criticals and the abilities that bypass this are only for skirmish and sneak attacks it is a fair trade.
Also, I really don't think that equating the average damage on a longsword vs. scimitar with this is a proper correlation. A scimitar can be enchanted with and the player can gain abilities keyed off of criticals making the higher probability at base more useful allowing the use of a different strategy.

 

[Sekhmet]

[MENTION=6690432]Dordledum[/MENTION] Anthropology tends to disagree with your assessment. Examining knightly armor of the period will clearly show that the majority of suits were built for persons between 5'10" and 6'2", most laying in the upper end of that spectrum.
Assuming the suits were made for people to wear at any point, it is clear that (at least English) knights were of a much larger stock than expected.

 

[Jackinthegreen]

Yes, you are correct when comparing medium, mundane versions of these two with two low-level characters that my Katana does win(+5 from 18 str. and it being masterwork), but D&D 3.X isn't ultimately a mundane role-play game. I kind of wish I knew what your equation exactly was but I don't think I will need it to make my point. In low level play you could probably expect your arcane caster to have an enlarge person and in lower mid level play the characters can afford Strongarm Bracers, then obviously races with Powerful Build. Either of them will give the use of a large version of these weapons. The Great Scimitar is ahead of the curve going from 1d8 to 2d6. My Katana on the other hand only goes from 1d6 to 1d8. The average damage rolls between the two can speak for themselves as the Great Scimitar increases from 4.5 to 7 while my Katana only goes from 3.5 to 4.5. So, when invested right Great Scimitar will likely deal more damage but my katana can afford to have another item or ability set.
I do admit that my katana sort of took the Great Scimitar's specialization away but it did so with less base damage. As such when at least 50% of the enemies out there are either outright immune or have items/abilities to negate criticals and the abilities that bypass this are only for skirmish and sneak attacks it is a fair trade.
Also, I really don't think that equating the average damage on a longsword vs. scimitar with this is a proper correlation. A scimitar can be enchanted with and the player can gain abilities keyed off of criticals making the higher probability at base more useful allowing the use of a different strategy.

The correlation is mostly to say "this is what the base game does" which gives a rough estimate of what numbers are expected within the game. That whole thing definitely changes once size increases become a factor, but that's also true of the non-exotic weapons as well.

A 19-20/x3 is actually more powerful damage-wise than an 18-20/x2 or even a 17-20/x2 weapon. Yes, the extra crit range has its own uses such as with a Prismatic Burst weapon, but that's somewhat hard to quantify even though it's obviously a "duh" enhancement for a weapon with a large threat range.

I haven't yet done the math for stuff like Flaming Burst.

The great scimitar also has competition from the elven thinblade which is noted as working with Weapon Finesse as well as getting the strength bonus from two-handed use since it doesn't have the rules about it like the rapier does.

As for the equation it is:
=(((wpndmg)*17)+((19/20)*(wpndmg)*2*3)+((1/20)*(wpndmg)))/20

Wpndmg should be pretty obvious, but since it's for excel use it can be replaced with a cell reference like A5. The 17 after it is the chance of being a regular hit out of 20, and of course can be changed to reflect accuracy other than "fail on a 1."

In the second set of parentheses, the 19/20 is the critical confirm chance which can likewise be changed to account for different accuracies.

The 2 after the wpndmg in that set represents the chance of rolling a critical threat. A 2 is equivalent to a 19-20 crit range. This plus the number in 17's place add up to 19, which is the chance of getting any kind of hit in this case.

The third part represents the chance to not confirm a critical hit, which in this case is 1/20 to represent a natural 1. Wpndmg is the same as elsewhere and is not multiplied because it's a failed crit.

Divide the whole thing by 20 and you get the average damage encompassing all rolls.

 

[Jupp]

A friend of mine does Iaido since 20+ years and I was on tournaments with him once or twice. From what I've seen there, and I am no expert by any stretch, is that attacks and parries with the katana are frequently done with both hands used since the grip is long enough to support this technique. In fact it looked like using the katana dual handed is an integral part of the fighting style.

Having said that you have a real world reason there to give bastard sword stats to the katana, including dual hand usage.

 

[emoplato]

A friend of mine does Iaido since 20+ years and I was on tournaments with him once or twice. From what I've seen there, and I am no expert by any stretch, is that attacks and parries with the katana are frequently done with both hands used since the grip is long enough to support this technique. In fact it looked like using the katana dual handed is an integral part of the fighting style.

Having said that you have a real world reason there to give bastard sword stats to the katana, including dual hand usage.

There is but D&D rules allow the use of one-handed weapons in two hands, so this point becomes mute. At my perspective and others like mine it seemed like the developers didn't want to look at the differences and just considered an oriental fine-crafted(masterwork) bastard sword. Though the actual bastard sword can also be considered a longsword in the real world and looking at the two the differences in how they behave is too striking to equate them.

 

[Imperialus]

Sure, knights were taller than peasants of the day. But to say they were taller than modern people is stretching disbelief.

fwiw, US Army records note the average modern American man as 5' 10".

A suit of tournament armour designed for Henry the 8th (when he was in his prime, not the fat pictures we see late in his reign) is sized for a man who is 6'4" and tips the scales at around 220 lbs. That dude could have fit right in with any modern football team no problem.

 

[Jupp]

Though the actual bastard sword can also be considered a longsword in the real world and looking at the two the differences in how they behave is too striking to equate them.

Yeah well, one is primarily a slashing weapon while the other is usually used as a thrusting weapon with the option of being a slashing weapon if the opponent is not heavily armed.

 

[VariSami]

There is but D&D rules allow the use of one-handed weapons in two hands, so this point becomes mute. At my perspective and others like mine it seemed like the developers didn't want to look at the differences and just considered an oriental fine-crafted(masterwork) bastard sword. Though the actual bastard sword can also be considered a longsword in the real world and looking at the two the differences in how they behave is too striking to equate them.

However, the Japanese katana is primarily a 2-handed weapon. Believe me - I've done some kendo and iaido. In game terms, you can use the bastard sword with 2 hands easier than with 1 hand - and as such, it resembles the katana better than a longsword which is primarily a 1-handed weapon.