Bastard Sword, Mighty Bows et al.

[Kerrick]

HEAVY WEAPON PROFICIENCY [GENERAL]
Your great strength allows you to use massive weapons with ease.
Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +1, Str 13
Benefit: You may use Heavy weapons in one hand.
Normal: A character must wield a heavy weapon two handed or take a –4 penalty on attack rolls.
Special: The Strength prerequisite varies based on a character’s size. Small characters require Str 11 while Large characters require a Str 17. Add +4 to the prerequisite for each size above Large and subtract 2 for each size below Small.
A fighter may select Heavy Weapon Proficiency as one of his fighter bonus feats.

Compare this to Monkey Grip (Sword and Fist):

Prerequisites: BAB +3, Weapon Focus with weapon, Str 13+.
"Benefit: You can use one melee weapon that is one size larger than you in one hand. For example, a halfling with the Monkey Grip feat can use a longsword in one hand. ..."

1-Why should there be mighty bows when there are not mighty crossbows? Certainly, a crossbow can create the same force.

There are no mighty crossbows because crossbows don't rely on strength - they're purely mechanical.

A Str 10 halfling with a longbow does 1d6 damage. A strength 10 human with a longbow does 1d8. The halfling should be able to use a bow that had the same pull as the human since they have the same strength. Same pull -> Same damage.

Halflings can't use longbows, because they're too big. They use Small longbows, which are... SHORTBOWS. Hence the 1d6 damage rating. Likewise, a Small bastard sword would be the equivalent of a longsword, which is still a Medium weapon and thus requires two hands to wield by a halfling. Really, this whole thing about different-sized weapons is stupid, but that's another topic altogether.

 

[Aaron2]

Compare this to Monkey Grip (Sword and Fist):

Prerequisites: BAB +3, Weapon Focus with weapon, Str 13+.
"Benefit: You can use one melee weapon that is one size larger than you in one hand. For example, a halfling with the Monkey Grip feat can use a longsword in one hand. ..."

I'm not sure what the comparison is supposed to mean. Monkey Grip gives a -2 penatly to hit. My proposed Heavy Weapon Prof. does not.


Aaron

 

[Kodam]

Hi!

Mechanically, I can create a crossbow that has a significantly stronger pull than any bow a human can use. Why does a +4 mighty longbow do more damage than this more powerful crossbow? As said before, if you could make mighty crossbows, I probably would never have gone down the road I did.

Ok, just to prevent any misunderstandings: I'm NOT talking about more powerful crossbows. Nothing against THAT! But I am against linking this additinal damage to your Str.

A longbow has a higher die than a shortbow. A Bastard sword has higher die than a longsword. Same with javelins vs. darts. Actually, what there isn't much precedence for is a weapon that has a mimimun strength requirement.

Alright, but these are Weapons of different sizes! Bigger Weapon - higher die.

Also, my campaign is kinda Greek/Romanesque so I want spears and javelins to be common.

In real ancient greek wasn't any crossbows by the way...or Longswords, Maces, Full Plates... That would solve all the problems...

 

[Norfleet]

There are no mighty crossbows because crossbows don't rely on strength - they're purely mechanical.

The "mechanical" strength of a crossbow is simply the conversion of work done by your own muscle power to mechanical tension. It is possible (and I have actually done so) to create high-tension crossbows which will hurl bolts harder and further than an ordinary crossbow. The key here being that in order to properly reload a high-tension crossbow, that much more work must be done by the user, either through less force applied over a longer distance/time, as with a crank, or through more strength on the part of the user.

As such, I'd definitely allow "mighty" crossbows: They inflict their mighty strength bonus regardless of who is firing them, but cannot be reloaded without the appropriate strength, or if designed to be reloaded without strength, requires additional time.

Anyone who says "crossbows are purely mechanical and don't rely on strength" has never used one. Crossbows *DO* rely on strength, but can be built such that they can be reloaded by individuals of lesser strength through the basics physics of work: Force times distance.

As Aaron pointed out, you can definitely make a mighty crossbow to be so mighty, in fact, that a normal human would be unable to operate it without a specially designed mechanism designed to allow it to be used by less force, which would therefore require so much time to operate this mechanism that it would mostly be a one-shot item as far as combat is concerned. Still, something like a mighty +15 crossbow could see use in defensive siege situations where the defender is able to cower entirely behind a wall while cranking back his unwieldy high-tension machine.

 

[Grayhawk]

I agree with Norfleet's post above.

But as I'm not looking for that level of complexity in my game (making mighty crossbows that require a certain strenght to load within a certain time, but which can also be loaded slower by characters with less strength), here's what I've done with crossbows in my campaign:

Light Crossbows deal 1d6+2 HP's of damage.

Heavy Crossbows deal 1d6+4 HP's of damage.

My reasoning: I wanted to give crossbows a boost and I wanted to make it simple. Since a bolt is pretty small (shorter than an arrow, anyway) I went with a lower damage die that the ones currently used for crossbows. The +2 and +4 to damage comes from the crossbow's strenght (the Heavy Crossbow obviously gets a bigger bonus as it confers more power to it's projectile).

While the maximum possible damage remains the same as with the current rules, I like the thought of the increased minimum damage. This way a crossbow is a greater force to be reckoned with without stepping too much on the toes of a short- or longbow specialist, due to their increased rate of fire. (Which to me is close enough to what I believe is the reality of a crossbow being deadly, even in the hands of a novice, but not comparable to a real bow in the hands of a specialist.)

If you use this house rule, I guess you could also implement a rule that allows you to fire a Heavy Crossbow once each round if you have a strenght of 18 or greater, as the +4 to damage could imply that if your bonus from strenght was +4 or greater, you can load a Heavy Crossbow as fast as you can load a Light one. As you propably can tell, I haven't really thought this through, as that might also imply that you should be able to load the Light Crossbow faster with a strenght of 14 or higher... And how would Rapid Reload fit in with this... Hmm, I guess that's why I didn't go down that road...

But if any of you have ironed out the details, please share

 

[Aaron2]

While the maximum possible damage remains the same as with the current rules, I like the thought of the increased minimum damage. This way a crossbow is a greater force to be reckoned with without stepping too much on the toes of a short- or longbow specialist, due to their increased rate of fire. (Which to me is close enough to what I believe is the reality of a crossbow being deadly, even in the hands of a novice, but not comparable to a real bow in the hands of a specialist.)

I prefer a larger die rather than a small die with a damage bonus. 1d4+3 will do the same average damage as 1d10, but with the bonus damage your guaranteed to always kill a first level warrior with every hit. There is no chance for a wound. That's the main reason I prefer bigger dice for mighty weapons rather than bonus damage. At highter levels the difference will be negligable but I prefer low level play.

That being said, the other thread in the General forum, has convinced me to just start from scratch and redo all the missile weapons. So, I am "officially" withdrawing my Mighty Bow House Rule.

Anyone have thoughts about allowing all hand-and-a-half weapons through one feat? Or is it just too boring to matter?


Aaron

 

[hong]

As Aaron pointed out, you can definitely make a mighty crossbow to be so mighty, in fact, that a normal human would be unable to operate it without a specially designed mechanism designed to allow it to be used by less force, which would therefore require so much time to operate this mechanism that it would mostly be a one-shot item as far as combat is concerned. Still, something like a mighty +15 crossbow could see use in defensive siege situations where the defender is able to cower entirely behind a wall while cranking back his unwieldy high-tension machine.

Aka, ballisti.[*]


[*] The correct plural of ballista, of course. This is not ballistae, which is a mistake commonly promulgated by persons who are too familiar with the usual bacteria-bacteriae/katana-katanae/ninja-ninjae convention. Notice that a Google search for "ballisti" turns up 10,500 hits, a search for "ballistae" turns up 4,800 hits, and a search for "ballistas" turns up 4,700 hits, which should put the truth of the matter beyond doubt. HTH!

 

[Grayhawk]

I prefer a larger die rather than a small die with a damage bonus. 1d4+3 will do the same average damage as 1d10, but with the bonus damage your guaranteed to always kill a first level warrior with every hit. There is no chance for a wound. That's the main reason I prefer bigger dice for mighty weapons rather than bonus damage. At highter levels the difference will be negligable but I prefer low level play.

As I prefer low level play too, I've already thought about this and I don't mind a heavy crossbow being lethal to a first level warrior (and it's only a given if you don't roll for their HP's).

Anyone have thoughts about allowing all hand-and-a-half weapons through one feat? Or is it just too boring to matter?

Haven't given it much thought, but I don't see why not.

Btw, my last PC was a dwarven fighter with a (DM sanctioned) Dwarven Warhammer (1d10, x3) that he wielded one-handed at the cost of an Exotic Weapon feat.

 

[HeavyG]

Aka, ballisti.[*]


[*] The correct plural of ballista, of course. This is not ballistae, which is a mistake commonly promulgated by persons who are too familiar with the usual bacteria-bacteriae/katana-katanae/ninja-ninjae convention. Notice that a Google search for "ballisti" turns up 10,500 hits, a search for "ballistae" turns up 4,800 hits, and a search for "ballistas" turns up 4,700 hits, which should put the truth of the matter beyond doubt. HTH!

While checking this out, I found this page : http://208.44.124.43/~mo/chics_dig_ballistas.htm

 

[Tzudralkor]

A Str 10 halfling with a longbow does 1d6 damage. A strength 10 human with a longbow does 1d8. The halfling should be able to use a bow that had the same pull as the human since they have the same strength. Same pull -> Same damage.

same pull -> same force
bigger arrow -> bigger hole