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A morningstar is a spiked metal ball, affixed to the top of a long handle.
That sounds like a hammer to me, hell, even the developers seem to agree they don't belong in the flails group at one point.
The only reason they seem to be in the Flails group is they would invalidate the Heavy Mace (same damage, same crit, cheaper, lighter, Bludgioning and Piercing dameage) in the hammers group.
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There's still a lot of differing opinions over what makes something a morningstar. Probably, the D&D designers that first categorized the weapon into a weapon category envisioned the chained version, and the first person to officially define it for D&D envisioned the mace-like version.
Historically, it's possible that the term was used for both versions.
But yeah; it's weird that the discrepancy between category and definition still exist.
In real world historical weapons, depending on where the researcher/writer comes from, a spiked metal ball on a stick can be called a Morningstar, or a Spiked Mace, or even a Morningstar mace. Now that same spiked metal ball, now attached to a chain that is attached to a stick, can be called a Morningstar, a Ball Flail, a Morningstar Flail and whatever else the writer considers is the "correct" descriptor.
This ambiguity has been brought into game descriptions, since the game-writers will be working from different sources.
King, so is the heavy mace you are asking about a smooth mace, a spiked mace ar a flanged mace? The types of wounds inflicted are different. Interestingly, all the maces are less affected by armor than bladed weapons. Puncture describes spiked mace damage as well as anything, since shredding is not a damage type.
Because that's the way Baldur's Gate classified them.
Was that meant to be helpful?
Are there any good sites that discuss the development of weapons from the Western Middle Ages?
Just an observation.
OK, valid observation. Once is an idea, twice is a precedent, and thrice is a tradition.
There are lots of good or goodish sites, but all tend toward personal or organizational bias. You just need to find one that makes sense to you, and remember that there is no universal agreement on any of this. Look at more than one, and veer towards educational sites.
Yes, but historically, historic accuracy has nothing to do with game mechanics.
Depends on the game, and what era of design history we are talking about. Even in the DnD/D20 line there have been attempts at accuracy, with varying degrees of effectiveness.
Weapon special abilities, reach, trip, entangle ... Are attempts at historical accuracy. Balance and Bias affect but do not negate these attempts.
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we can talk about DnD history all we want, or the distinction between different Morningstars. The Morningstar described in the weapon discription is not a Flail.
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That sounds like a hammer to me, hell, even the developers seem to agree they don't belong in the flails group at one point.
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That is a pretty misleading statement. You found a single, eight-year-old post from one person who is now a Developer but wasn't at that time.
That is a pretty misleading statement. You found a single, eight-year-old post from one person who is now a Developer but wasn't at that time....
That sounds like a hammer to me, hell, even the developers seem to agree they don't belong in the flails group at one point.
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Sorry, didn't knopw he wasn't a developer at that point