The underdog of weapons: the short sword

[koteko]

Since Sami has been tweaking weapon values for the next release, I think it's important to discuss how this poor little weapon, the short sword, can be valorised.

Right now:

• Handaxe is beaten ONLY by the battlesword in all three damage categories. I love handaxes dearly, but they are OP when compared to swords (and, IMHO, other axes as well)
  
• Short sword has the same point damage of bastard sword and battlesword, where it should shine, and is beaten by all other swords in cut damage (fair). It also has the worst bonuses in the sword category. And even more weird: it's worse at stabbing than the Handaxe!
• Three knives have more point damage than the short sword, and other three knives have exactly the same point damage, while all six of these are MUCH lighter. Also three of these knives have the same attack/defence bonus compared to the short sword

So, briefly, the short sword sucks. Which in itself is not a huge deal (of course some weapons are going to suck) but coupled with the fact that it's crazy expensive, it becomes a "useless weapon", so to speak.

My proposal would be:

• nerf Handaxes slightly: 3-5-4 is probably more than fair for a tool that is in everyone's inventory. Perfect if associated with a shield.
• up point damage of short swords slightly: 5 instead of 4. This makes it the best stabbing sword, on par with the three best knives

If you are asking yourself whether giving 5 point damage to short swords is unfair to the three best knives, I would argue that:

- all of those three knives are MUCH lighter and cheaper (which is the point of using a knife). Also if I'm not mistaken, light weapons should consume less fatigue when fighting
- they can double as tools, whereby the shortsword is a pure weapon

The only knife that I think gets the short end of the stick is the Skramasaksi, which is supposed to be a Seax, thus essentially a short sword. I have a small suggestion for this, too:

- instead of having damage 2-3-4, make it 2-4-4. That is, exactly equal to the current short sword but slighly worse than my suggested shortsword (but lighter!).

[Theroleplayer]

The roleplayer wishes to contribute.

I strongly agree with this post and would like to add several things. One, I'm not sure about it's attack values, so this might already be true. But if it isn't then shortswords should have a higher attack value than the knives, as it is longer and a thrusting weapon. If the Skramasaksi is a seaxe, then it's more for slashing than thrusting, and slashing attacks are easier to see coming than stabbing ones.

Secondly, Should handaxes even be able to deal point damage, that doesn't make much sense to me, I have used multiple handaxes when camping, and I do not see how one would effectively stab with one. THe only example I can think of is if the handaxe had a a sharp point on the opposite side to the chopping bit. But as far as I know, such a thing is more for a war-axe, not as much for a handaxe. And as far as I can tell the graphic does not have such a head.

[koteko]

You find the values here: https://www.unrealworld.fi/wiki/index.php?title=Weapons

The short sword has indeed the same attack&defence then the three best knives, but it's better than all the others. So maybe it's best left at that.

Regarding the Scramasaksi, you suggest to make the damage 2-4-3, instead of the current 2-3-4 (and of my proposed 2-4-4). This would make it worse than both the current and my suggested shortsword, but the best slashing knife available. It might make sense (also considering it would cost and weight almost half the short sword) but I'm not sure.

It's already most heavy and costly knife available, and three knives already have bigger stabbing power, so making it 2-4-4 might still be better (it's called a "power knife", after all).

Secondly, Should handaxes even be able to deal point damage, that doesn't make much sense to me, I have used multiple handaxes when camping, and I do not see how one would effectively stab with one. THe only example I can think of is if the handaxe had a a sharp point on the opposite side to the chopping bit. But as far as I know, such a thing is more for a war-axe, not as much for a handaxe. And as far as I can tell the graphic does not have such a head.

Yeah, it's weird. I can understand the sickle of course, and even the carving axe having 3 point damage (looking at some pictures online, the edge ends up in two points up and down, they could be used almost as a pickaxe). But the handaxe? Unless it's similar to this:



But even in that case, point damage 4 might still be too much. Maybe drop it at 3, so that the handaxe becomes 3-5-3?

[Theroleplayer]

I don't suggest the changes to the hard to spell and pronounce knife's actual damage scores. It is worth thinking about but my point is different: I'm talking about the attack value, it seems strange that a seaxe, which is a half tool half weapon designed for slashing, which in combat is much easier to parry/block, has the same attack score as a shortsword, designed for stabbing, an attack that is much harder to defend against unless your using a shield.

[koteko]

I don't suggest the changes to the hard to spell and pronounce knife's actual damage scores. It is worth thinking about but my point is different: I'm talking about the attack value, it seems strange that a seaxe, which is a half tool half weapon designed for slashing, which in combat is much easier to parry/block, has the same attack score as a shortsword, designed for stabbing, an attack that is much harder to defend against unless your using a shield.

I'm fine either way (eg, leaving it untouched or bumping attack score), but note that attack/defence is unrelated to the type of damage, as of now, otherwise axes and swords would have very low attack values.

Not knowing exactly how Sami thinks of Attack/Defence, I prefer to focus on the damage values.

[Theroleplayer]

note that attack/defence is unrelated to the type of damage

True enough, I was just trying to think of a way to compensate for the fact that the average attack from a seaxe would be easier to block than the average attack from a shortsword, considering the nature of each weapon.

Also I seriously doubt a handaxe in unrealworld would look like that, and even if it did, as you said, the point damage wouldn't be very high. The actual points of an axe would require quite a bit of skill to use properly, so yeah I don't really understand what saami is thinking.

[koteko]

In the old forum, Sami recently fixed several weapons that had wrong values. Several axes were nerfed but the handaxe got away with it I think it's just hard to do a global rebalance.

[LoLotov]

The point attack on axes is supposed to represent (in my opinion) using the lowest point of the sharpened edge in a kind of downward pull or hooking motion, rather than a straight chop (an edged attack) or hammer-blow with the back of the blade loop (blunt). It should do much less damage than it currently does, but it seems to work as well on legs attacking as blunt defensive counter-attacks from spears, suggesting a kind of acknowledgement of the entangling properties of these particular targets, weapon aspects, and situations, which doesn't necessarily need to be changed in and of itself. Hand-axe and woodsman axes are the only ones other than the battle axe that deserve decent combat ratings, as these two are built for utility and ease of use, and strength and durability, respectively. The battle axe has no utility whatsoever, it's utility is reflected in its attack bonus, its strength is reflected by its excellent edge damage, and its durability is shown in its ability to deal decent blunt damage, which I imagine is simply using a purpose-built weapon in a less technical way to pierce armor more efficiently.

The various body parts of humans and animals being more or less effected by different weapon types can be explained away by base armor values for animals bodies'/their particular skins' strong and weak points, and weak overall armor coverage on humans, both of which seem realistic.

Overall, I like the OP's suggestion though, shortswords are only viable if your sword skill is your best weapon skill, which would be silly of you.