Did the Witch King use a morning star or flail

[p0ison_elf]

A good example is also from Quentin Tarrantino's Kill Bill vol1. When Uma Thurman challenges Lucy Liu (o-ren-ishi), one her lackies (the chick with the school girl outfit) comes out weilding a morning. The only exception was her's was all chain (atleast 3 ft in length) and a small spiked ball attached to one end. So, I guess, you can consider that a morning star. The spiked balls vary? I guess depending on how big the spiked ball, it might be considered a flail.

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

I actually think that that girl's weapon would be closer in stats to a D&D spiked chain. No WAY that was 3 feet of chain, I'm thinking between 5 and 7 feet.

I'd say that the witch-king's weapon in the movie was a Large light flail that he was wielding with something like Monkey Grip.

 

[andargor]

A good example is also from Quentin Tarrantino's Kill Bill vol1. When Uma Thurman challenges Lucy Liu (o-ren-ishi), one her lackies (the chick with the school girl outfit) comes out weilding a morning. The only exception was her's was all chain (atleast 3 ft in length) and a small spiked ball attached to one end. So, I guess, you can consider that a morning star. The spiked balls vary? I guess depending on how big the spiked ball, it might be considered a flail.

Go-Go Yubari. In this page they actually call it a morningstar. Funny, I thought they were bolos.

Andargor

 

[Pax]

The weapon you describe from Kill Bill is an actual, real-world thing - called a manriki-gusari. That's a lengthof chain between ~4 feet logn and ~8 feet long, with a weight at one or both ends (and yes, the weight can be spiked, or not).

Calling it a "morning star" isn't accurate, it just shows the describer's nonfamiliarity with the arsenals of bygone days. ^_^

 

[ruleslawyer]

And I believe that it would be a "chain" according to D&D terminology, judging by its OA description and illos.

Going by 1e/2e weapon descriptions (which actually provided physical descriptions of the weapon; how nice!), the Witch-King's weapon is a flail, not a morningstar. The morningstar in D&D (or at least in AD&D) is basically an iron-headed, spiked club. The flail is the thing with the chain on it (and, in the interests of differentiating weapons somewhat, I'd probably go with Thanee's imagined distinction between the light and heavy flails).

 

[Lord Pendragon]

Calling it a "morning star" isn't accurate, it just shows the describer's nonfamiliarity with the arsenals of bygone days. ^_^

Well, in all fairness the page cites it as a "morning star chain weapon"...so the describer isn't exactly giving it a definitive name. My guess is that he knew full-well that he didn't know what the heck it is.

 

[Pax]

Yep. ^_^ I never meant to cast aspersions on that person's integrity - just point out that "X page calls it a morning star" doesn't make "morning star" a definitively-correct classification for the weapon in question. ^_^

FWIW, I agree - the Witch-King was wielding a heavy flail...

...

... a LARGE Heavy Flail, no less; got to love that epic feat "Wield Oversized Weapon" ... and if you don't think the leader of the Nazgul was definitely epic, then I just dunno what I can (civilly) say to you ... ^_^

 

[Sidekick]

Well my two cents is that its a heavy flail either monkey gripped or a large heavy flail using the epic feat mentioned above.

Sad thing is that as soon as I saw that film I thought to myself mmmm .... monkey-gripped heavy flailliscious...... mmmmmmm, drool.

 

[MerakSpielman]

D&D players often get the impression that a mace is a blunt weapon because that's how it's done in D&D - and way back in OD&D (or one of those old versions) a cleric couldn't wield a weapon that drew blood - and a mace was their typical weapon.

Real world maces vary a great deal.

From things like this:

To things like this:

Or even this (a typical flanged mace):

In D&D, where we're really worried about which specific weapons cause what kinds and amounts of damage, it's important to state that a mace does bludgeoning damage, while a morning star does piercing damage. In real life they weren't so picky. "So my mace has points and yours doesn't, big deal."

 

[glass]

I think the term 'morning star' was used to mean both spiky mace (as it currently is in D&D) and spikey flail in different historical periods.


glass.