Today, I am working hard on one of my homebrew systems. This particular system has evolved from my very first roleplay over ten years ago, using a system I designed myself. It is also the system for the world in which we are currently playing within in our DragonQuest campaign. I decided to use DragonQuest while I design my next edition, which is modelled heavily on DragonQuest, as its the best damn system I've ever played.
Anyway, for some reason I decided that I was going to design weapons first. I have no idea why, really, except that game balance always seems to come down to how much damage weapons deal, so I suppose its a good place to start.
Although the game exists in a fantastical setting, I am trying to come as close to real medieval weaponry as possible. Obviously, assigning damage values cannot truly equate to realism, as being cut with a sword of one type is probably exactly the same as being cut by a sword of another type. Unfortunately, I've only ever been cut with one sword in my life, and it wasn't from a swing, so I can't use personal knowledge in this regard.
To the internet I went, as it is the ultimate and truly the only form of research left in this modern age. Or so I thought. Man, what I would give for a good book on weaponry right now. Did you know that the only information of bow weight on the internet seems to be the weight of the draw? This information is useless to me, as I have already determined damage based on game mechanic variables. I need to know how much a longbow physically weighs.
All my troubles thus far seem to come from the ranged weapons, as it is also difficult to get an answer on how far the effective range of a weapon is, and be able to confirm it from another source or two. And wikipedia - surprise, surprise - is totally useless beyond giving me names and pictures.
So, if anyone can help me out, I could use it. Until then, I'm just going with what feels like with limited comparison.
In my attempt to cover a large base of medieval weapons, here is the current count: 6 types of Axes, 7 types of Blunt, 9 types of Daggers, 9 types of Polearms, 10 types of Swords, 10 types of Missile-based ranged, 3 types of Thrown-based ranged (not including any weapons of other types can may be thrown), and 8 types of Special weapons that don't really fit into a category. At first, I only had two daggers, and they were under Swords. I took them straight out of DragonQuest: the Dagger and the Main Gauche. But, then I got to thinking.
Most RPG systems have one or two "daggers." The options are very limited for characters that would like to use small, concealable blades. If you want to use a sword or axe, you've got choices. I decided I wanted to give dagger-users some options, too. I hit the internet and found, not really to any surprise, a bounty of dagger types. I settled on nine, using the Rondel Dagger as the basic "Dagger." I'm actually quite proud of myself, as they all have different statistics and various uses. The only one I'm a bit concerned with is the Seax, as my equations to determine accuracy gave it a 95% chance to hit, but hey, that's what's play-testing if for - amiright? I have a few close relatives in the dagger family, but each is unique is some way. The Cinqueda and the Poignard are exactly the same, except the Cinqueda is a slashing weapon and the Poignard is a piercing weapon, etc.
Well, I just thought that since today was Wednesday, I need to post, and since my mind was on my work already, why not post about it. I'm sure I'll have more leaks on my new system in posts to come and, who knows, maybe you'll see it hit the shelves one day. If not, then suffer as I will suffer, as this system has taken years of my free-time to develop and it would nice to see some returns on it in the future.
Back to work!
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