D&D 5E The fall from grace of the longsword

[g4m3kn1ght]

I am not sure if anyone else has posted this in eight pages, but the OCD part of me likes to line my weapon dice up with my class features when playing a class if possible, regardless of optimization. So my rogues always use short bows and short swords to match up with sneak attack and my clerics and paladins almost always use a longsword or warhammers to match with smite and cure light wounds. I make an exception when it comes to superiority dice on fighters.

 

[toucanbuzz]

I'd like to see special mechanics for weapons again as well, to give a strategic purpose in selecting one, and the easiest way this could be accomplished is by a Feat. I haven't read all the other posts, so sorry if someone has already mentioned. In design, weapons are fundamentally basic for most characters unless one is a specialist in them.

For example, a Weaponmaster Feat might allow a player to choose 2 weapons from a list and add an effect, such as increasing the damage die 1 step, and/or a non-stackable crit range, or whatever might make it worth taking but not wreck the game.

 

[g4m3kn1ght]

I can see having more strategic utility for types of weapons, you could also build in social utility as mentioned above. In some cultures swords were symbols of status or impiled membership in a standing army. On the other hand the mechanics of weapon utility can easily get cumbersome and/or imbalanced.

That being said Weaponmaster and focus feats were the bane of my existence treasure assigning experience as a DM. Why do the bad guys always wield khopeshes? That type of focus is better if an adventurer uses one specific weapon over the course of their career, which kills the treasure hunting fantasy a bit. That is where modern/scifi setting always seemed to have an advantage in weapon modding systems.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

I don't think that this really holds up. Spears are generally a better weapon than tridents no matter what the level of skill. Tridents have only really been used as a weapon in one specific instance; roman gladiatorial combat. It was used there partly for thematic reasons, but mostly because it is a bad weapon, and will tend to produce superficial wounds rather than lethal ones. Thus leading to a bloodier and more prolonged combat spectacle.

There were some parallels in the form of the military fork, but yeah - the trident was almost exclusively a fishing implement not a weapon. It worked in gladiatorial fights becausenot even the more heavily armored secutor/murmillo types had any body armor, for example.

 

[Hussar]

/snip

Its true for much of what people probably think of as 'D&D era' combat. (Late mediaeval knights and footmen in Europe, The heyday of the samurai, etc.) Other times, and under pressures of other factors, swords were a more primary option. (Roman legions, civilian situations etc.)

Roman legions are a perfect example of what I mean. Your average legionnaire, sure, carried a sword, but, his primary weapon was a spear. A phalanx formation certainly didn't present swords. Samurai are another perfect example. By the time the katana was commonly carried by samurai, Japan wasn't fighting any wars. The katana was a social status symbol, not a battlefield weapon. And you can guarantee that your rank and file Japanese soldier in pre-Edo era warring wasn't carrying a sword. Heck, even the precursor weapons to the katana were far closer to a spear than a sword.

Swords were rarely the go-to weapon on any battlefield.

 

[Zardnaar]

Roman legions are a perfect example of what I mean. Your average legionnaire, sure, carried a sword, but, his primary weapon was a spear. A phalanx formation certainly didn't present swords. Samurai are another perfect example. By the time the katana was commonly carried by samurai, Japan wasn't fighting any wars. The katana was a social status symbol, not a battlefield weapon. And you can guarantee that your rank and file Japanese soldier in pre-Edo era warring wasn't carrying a sword. Heck, even the precursor weapons to the katana were far closer to a spear than a sword.

Swords were rarely the go-to weapon on any battlefield.

Swords were expensive and relatively hard to forge.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

Swords were expensive and relatively hard to forge.

Nope. Or rather that's not the reason they were used as secondary weapons. In a battlefield context, the reach is important. Past the early middle-ages it was quite easy to fit troops with swords. Most spear/pikeman still carried swords - as sidearms for use in close quarters. Even the greek hoplites commonly carried swords as backup - the xiphos, from which the xiphoid process, that little point beneath our sterna (singl: sternum), derives its name.

 

[Zardnaar]

Nope. Or rather that's not the reason they were used as secondary weapons. In a battlefield context, the reach is important. Past the early middle-ages it was quite easy to fit troops with swords. Most spear/pikeman still carried swords - as sidearms for use in close quarters. Even the greek hoplites commonly carried swords as backup - the xiphos, from which the xiphoid process, that little point beneath our sterna (singl: sternum), derives its name.

A good sword takes a week or so to make. You can crank out multiple spear heads and axes that use less metal.
It took a while for swords to get long it's why great swords turn up reasonably late. Swords aren't always the best tool for the job though and you had things like tercio and landsknect tactics so by then swords were on the way out anyway.

 

[Hussar]

Being more expensive and taking longer to make does not make a weapon more effective.

In a D&D context, the closest real world comparison would be animal hunting. There's a reason you hunt boar with a spear and not a sword. Actually, you hunt virtually everything with a spear and not a sword. Because a spear is a much, much more effective weapon vs pretty much any animal that is trying to eat you.

 

[JonnyP71]

I love the history of medieval weaponry, but it's clear to see that in D&D terms it's hard to model that history well - more than 500 years of weapon technology is shoehorned into a single table, a lot of weapons are somewhat imbalanced with regards to their real effectiveness, and some of the armour types never actually existed...

To make to more historical:
- remove studded leather entirely
- rename the Great Axe as the Bardiche
- rename the Great Sword as the Longsword
- rename the Longsword as the Arming Sword
- split Staves - the Quarterstaff is 2 handed, the 1 handed variant is the Jo
- split the warhammer, making the 2 handed variant the Lucern Hammer or Bec De Corbin
- introduce another polearm in the form of the widely used Billhook
- reduce the effectiveness of crossbows in relation to longbows greatly at range, but keep the crossbow devastating up close
- make plate armour almost invulnerable to most weapons, apart from those specifically designed to deal with it (eg Bec De Corbin)
- have multiple forms of shield, with different levels of defensive (and offensive) capabilities
- properly model the effects of wearing a Helmet (of various sizes)
- change the effects certain weapons have when used on horseback - and when used against mounted knights


and so on...

But this would make it fiddly again, and fiddly was the domain of 3/3.5E - 5E is all about tidiness.

In other words, leave it alone, 5E benefits greatly from its speed of play. Let's keep it that way.