D&D 5E Longswords

[Horwath]

For a home brew katana (Samauri) I was going to make a 1d8/1d10 versatile two hand finesse weapon it does not break anything it does not have the heavy property so it can not be used with GWM and it is not a pole arm. Converting the longsword into a 1d8/1d10 versatile finesse weapon does not change anything in the grand scheme. I mean if you are worried about rogues why the difference between 1d8 and 1d10 is 4.5 vs 5.5 avg damage (If they use the options available to get rapier proficiency). I am sure most the dex builds are going duelist +2 damage so why use 2h property or DW so again why would you ever use the 2h property unless you are a monk with a house rule using the weapon as a monk weapon and you still break nothing.

Just my two cents on the subject

Personaly, I wouldn't call katana a finesse weapon. Longsword is more finesse than katana. And by longsword, I don't mean D&D longsword but medieval 2handed sword(more or less greatsword).

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

Its worth remembering that longswords are more of a military weapon compared to the civilian rapier. Player Characters however are usually civilians, and so use more unusual weapons.

I don't think that anything bad will happen if you decide to just grant longswords the finesse trait as well as versatile with no restrictions about using the two together: The two-handed fighting style isn't optimal, and the heavy weapon feat requires Heavy, which the longsword doesn't have. Allowing defensive duellist to work with a two-handed weapon is the only side effect, but I don't see that as too much of a problem.
(Previously, there might have been an issue with the two-handed fighting style and sneak attack, but that was removed by a sage Advice ruling.)

Longswords are probably the most common weapon in use outside of maybe the spear and bow. As several others have said, having more magical longswords around than most other weapons would be perfectly reasonable in most campaigns.

 

[BookBarbarian]

I feel your pain. Long swords are awesome and I would also like to see more of them. I think your proposed solution is fine. I also think Versatile weapons in general could be better supported with a fighting style and a feat. I think versatile weapons personally favor grapplers, and I would like to see that aspect expanded.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

You could go the "old school" route, and make them more popular by virtue of magic. If nearly every magical sword you find in a longsword rather than a rapier or polearm, then some people might end up using them even if they aren't ideal for their build.

It does raise the question of why so many people would bother to enchant longswords, if they weren't very popular in the first place, but that tradition might theoretically date back to a time before rapiers were invented.

 

[hejtmane]

Personaly, I wouldn't call katana a finesse weapon. Longsword is more finesse than katana. And by longsword, I don't mean D&D longsword but medieval 2handed sword(more or less greatsword).

Figuring I train with them ona regular basis I would disagree the Katana is a precision weapon and the strikes and techniques for Iadio and other Japanese art is all about precision of the strike and not power. That is just my personal training

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

Most of these suggestions are good, but there's another possible approach. Rapiers gained popularity in an environment where your opponent wasn't wearing much armor. They're sub-optimal against heavily armored foes. You could rule that heavy armor (or natural armor above +5), gains resistance to rapiers (or all finesse weapons if you want to encourage people to carry multiple weapons).

It's not as simple as some of the other suggestions, but it does reflect some of the historical reasons for choosing a weapon.

 

[Krachek]

For ranged and finesse attack you use half the modifier to add to the damage roll.

 

[hejtmane]

Most of these suggestions are good, but there's another possible approach. Rapiers gained popularity in an environment where your opponent wasn't wearing much armor. They're sub-optimal against heavily armored foes. You could rule that heavy armor (or natural armor above +5), gains resistance to rapiers (or all finesse weapons if you want to encourage people to carry multiple weapons).

It's not as simple as some of the other suggestions, but it does reflect some of the historical reasons for choosing a weapon.

That is making it way to complex and then we should modify every weapon that way for what they are fighting. Some Rapiers worked against armor foes because now we have to talk about which rapiers we are talking about and what century Rapiers have different size and styles and where used on battlefields most people think of a rapier as the ones used by the italians courts and by the civilians what about the Rapiers used by the likes of the Knights of Saint John. What we consider Rapiers is not what we really think they have a lot of different styles lengths weights etc etc. That is the real problem the moderns names do not always match up to what they where called and it veried by Era. Even the Japanese Katana lengths varied etc by era and changed as fighting styles and who they fought over the centuries.

 

[Plaguescarred]

It makes for a nice change as in AD&D and 2nd edition the longsword was king

 

[Ganymede81]

I think the problem is rooted in how they implemented Finesse in 5th edition: there are multiple 1d8 one-handed weapons, but only one of them has the finesse property. This funnels everyone who wants a finesse weapon to their only real choice, the rapier.

It also speaks to a larger problem with Finesse... what exactly is the trade-off? Opting for finesse might eliminate the opportunity to use two-handed weapons, but the sword-and-board and two-weapon styles remain without significant drawbacks. Heck... if you manage to find a Sun Sword, you can even combine Finesse with all of the benefits of a two-handed fighting style.