Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Greenstone.Walker" data-source="post: 6767267" data-attributes="member: 6788312">The people who designed D&D 5E were not designing a combat simulator. The combat system they designed has some complexity, but not much. It allows for some tactical choices without being overwhelming. As far as detail, D&D breaks weapons down into three general groups: size, damage, skill.Size: Light, one-handed, versatile, two-handed, heavy.Damage: bludgeoning, piercing, slashing.Skill: Simple, martial.To use the OP's example, a dagger is a light piercing simple weapon. Whether you call it a dagger or a knife or a stiletto isn't really relevant. What is relevant is that it is the smallest (1d4 damage) stabbing weapon. If you want a more stabby damage then you go for a martial weapon (short sword, 1d6 damage) or a bigger weapon (javelin, 1d6 damage).However, not every combination is covered. There are no one-handed slashing weapons, for example. There are also no two-handed slashing weapons either.Some categories are overcovered. For example, there are two versatile martial slashing weapons (longsword and battleaxe). There are three one-handed martial piercing weapons (morningstar, rapier, pick). There are minor differences in weight and price but otherwise, no reason to choose a pick over a morningstar, or an axe over a sword. Then again, rapier is a finese weapon, so for a DEX-based combatant, there's no reason to ever pick the others.I have been playing for a while with a simplified weapon table, where you pick a size, damage and type, and then just call it what you want. So, instead of choosing "spear", you choose "medium, piercing, martial", and call it a "spear" or "short pike" or "assegai" or "spike staff" or whatever you want.D&D doesn't really need any more complexity. All you need is "how many hands does it take to use it?", "what amount and type of damage does it do?", and "do I need martial proficiency?".</blockquote>

Verification