Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7910091" data-attributes="member: 4937">Lots of good answers.The vast variety of D&D weapons can be attributed to a number of factors:1) Changing technological abilities: D&D weaponry tends to cover weapons used for a period that varies between 500 and 2000 years, depending on just how broadly you are looking. Over that period, not only did the materials you could make a weapon out of change owing to technological advancement, but the relative costs of producing a weapon out of that material changed. This changed what sort of weapon was most cost effective to produce, as well as what sort of weapon could be produced. For example, axes were often favored as relatively inexpensive weapons. You don't need nearly as good of quality of metal to make an effective ax or spear, nor nearly as much of it, as is required by an effective sword. 2) Evolving Defenses: Offensive arms are always in a race with defensive armor. Over the course of those same 2000 years, what you could make armor out of, how much it cost to make armor, and the actual sophistication of the armor evolved. Weapons evolved in response to specifically counter the sorts of armor that they faced, which in turn lead to further evolution in the armor to counter those specific weapons. So for example, mail offered very good protection against slashing weapons, but this protection could be overcome by sturdy thrusting weapons. Plate armor on the other hand, not only protected against slashing attacks, but all but the heaviest thrusting blows. Faced with different sorts of opponents, warriors used weapons intended to overcome the armor of the opponents they expected to face. Quick and wieldy weapons make sense against unarmored or lightly armored foes, while heavier weapons capable of crushing blows make more sense against heavily armored foes. Weapons like military picks, bec-de-corbins, warhammers, and maces evolved to face plated armored foes. 3) Different Purposes: Just as today, a weapon can exist for either military or civilian purposes.  Most militaries are armed with assault rifles, but most civilians prefer handguns for self-defense because they do not expect to regularly be in a full combat situation and want a more readily concealable and easily carried weapon.   In the same way, medieval and early modern battlefields were dominated by pole weapons of various sorts - spears, lances, poleaxes, halberds, pikes, and so forth - but civilians tended to prefer much less bulky weapons for self-defense - usually a variety of daggers or short swords.   And, as in the modern world, laws regarding what sort of weapons a civilian could carry, further inspired the creation of new weaponry that could skirt the law and allow self-defense to groups otherwise denied that privilege.   For example, the staff or stick is a simple tool that can double as an effective weapon, and so many cultures have a long history of martial arts around staff and stick fighting.   Many of the Eastern weapons we are familiar with are evolved from weaponized civilian tools, and this is also true of many Western medieval weapons.  Peasants took up arms to defend themselves or to revolt, and these resulting weaponized tools inspired purpose built military weapons.  So you see a lot of medieval pole arms that are of the form: "tool on a staff", such as "hammer on a staff", "axe on a staff", "pruning hook on a staff", "cleaver on a staff", "knife on a staff", "scythe on a staff", "sickle on a staff", etc.  where the original weapon may well have been that very thing, slightly modified and strapped on to a peasant's staff.   Likewise, just as a modern soldier may carry an assortment of weapons for special purposes, a medieval knight may have carried a lance as a primary weapon, and one or more sidearms to serve in different circumstances, such as the lance breaking or needing to fight dismounted.</blockquote>

Verification