"Authenticity" of double weapons

[Zander]

Re: Double-weapons in general

The inspiration for the "double-sword" is obviously the dual-bladed lightsaber used by Darth Maul.

Are you certain? I have a vague recollection of a D&D or FR comic in which one of the heroes, a centaur, wields a double sword. It came out several years before they started making TPM. It wouldn't surprise me if there were even earlier references to double swords.

 

[Tsyr]

Re: Re: Double-weapons in general

Are you certain? I have a vague recollection of a D&D or FR comic in which one of the heroes, a centaur, wields a double sword. It came out several years before they started making TPM. It wouldn't surprise me if there were even earlier references to double swords.

What I think he's getting at is that the reason 3E had it as a core weapon (As opposed to, say, being in Sword and Fist with most of the other odd weapons) was because of TPM. The timing is... impecable.

 

[derverdammte]

Re: Double-weapons in general

The two most ridiculous weapons, however, aren't double-weapons. They are the spiked chain and the tumbling bolt. Knowing how chain weapons are used in RL martial arts, (it frequently involves wrapping sections of the chain around your own body in order to change the direction of attack) I wouldn't want to be the cleric in any party where one member uses this weapon.

Tarek

Didn't Dr. Yang use a spiked chain in "Iron Monkey"? I don't know about realism, but it looks good cinematically.

 

[Klaatu B. Nikto]

Re: Re: Double-weapons in general

Didn't Dr. Yang use a spiked chain in "Iron Monkey"? I don't know about realism, but it looks good cinematically.

Actually I think that was more of a whip dagger. Jackie Chan used a variation of it (sort of) in "Shanghai Noon" but instead of a dagger, it was a horseshoe.

Now that I think about it, an example of the spiked chain is in the Jet Li movie "The Swordsman 2". One of the characters was kept imprisoned with giant hooks in his shoulders and later used them when freed. But I'm sure a spiked chain was used in many other Saturday Afternoon Kung Fu Theater type movies.

But the weirdest weapon I've seen was in "The Heroic Trio". The main henchman had a 'guillotine' on a chain (looked like a bird cage) that would get tossed on someone's head and with a quick yank, off came the head.

 

[Corinth]

That's the Flying Gulliotine, and it's an actual portable execution weapon.

 

[Nim]

2) Set up an attack -- you gain a +2 bonus to one attack that round (your first melee attack), although you can do nothing else with the off-hand weapon. Off-hand weapon-use penalties do not apply.
[/B]

Rather than creating a new game mechanic for this, I think we can accomplish this with a small modification of an existing rule: consider allowing the character to sacrifice their off-hand attack to make a Bluff feint attempt.

For that matter, you could just make feinting something that can be done in the place of any attack, rather than requiring a standard action. It seems reasonable for a character with two attacks per round to be able to feint with the first and strike with the second. The sneak attack implications, though, might make this seriously unbalanced.

--N

 

[Henrix]

The dwarven urgrosh, silly name aside, is the only exotic double weapon I think has had any real world counterpart. Long axes with a sharp thrusting end have been used in many parts of the world.

All the pictures of the weapons in the PHB are more or less ridiculous, as are some of the descriptions.