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I have been tossing this idea around for a bit and wanted to see what you guys might think. I doubt it would be too terribly crazy, but then again, I might be missing the long term implications.
Basically, this idea came about while reading the Mummy's Mask AP (don't worry, no spoilers). A lot of the NPCs are forced to sacrifice a feat to pick up Exotic Weapon Prof for various weapons, especially the Khopesh, which is an Osirian weapon. It also came up in my group's Jade Regent campaign, when a character had attached herself to Ameiko's family and felt she should know how to use a Katana because of it.
Several races get traits or alternative traits that allow them to treat certain weapons as simple or martial. As opposed to Dwarves and Gnomes, who are always proficient in their racial weapons, being a half-orc could make you proficient in chain weapons, but only if you have Martial Weapon prof.
So the new rule would be this: Move a bunch of the simple and martial weapons into the Exotic Weapon tier. Then, during character creation, players choose, in addition to a race and class, a culture. Different cultures focus on different weapons and a weapon in that culture may be considered martial or even simple, while others consider it exotic.
For instance, the Osirion's use the Khopesh a lot. (A lot of the NPCs in Mummy's Mask do, at least). Therefore, if a player is Osirion, they would treat the Khopesh as a Martial Weapon, but to them, the longsword is an exotic weapon.
While I haven't sat down to make an extensive list, some ideas off the top of my head include Varisians treat Star Knives as simple and Minkai treat the Katana as martial. Your chosen culture would grant you access to a handful of weapons. I would have to sit down with the equipment lists and try to figure out which fits where, as well as what is kind of culturally universal (Short swords? Probably daggers? Crossbows are seem to be the same design all over the world, from what I have seen).
Basically, the idea is so that if you want to play something that isn't "European", you aren't penalized for it.
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I was thinking about doing something like this for my homebrew world.
Basically, scrap many of the normal traits and instead use the category Culture Traits, with every culture offering +/- 3 traits, one of which is a Weapon Familiarity, with the others usually being bonuses to skills for which the culture is famous. Also, you're allowed to take traits from only one culture, but more than one culture trait from that culture if you want.
I say go for it. Exotic weapons aren't exotic for their power, they're exotic for being from a non-European culture. Exotic weapon prof is a pretty weak feat to begin with, and its pretty silly when the guy from katana land can't use katanas because they're exotic for him.
Then whole weapon system could probably use a revamp probably.
for katanas though, I would still treat them like bastard swords as far as feat requirements; martial to use two handed, exotic to use one-handed. That said, I would also have those classes that have it listed as a class proficiency (samurai and ninja) be proficient with both styles.
Why?
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I think some weapons are simple, martial or exotic for their power, but that the standard hasn't been applied consistently. Some exotic weapons are no more powerful than martial weapons (falcata vs. falchion), and some martial weapons are more powerful than other martial weapons (falchion vs. nodachi).
Edit: I should have read that link first.
Especially since the longsword can be used either one handed or two handed, why force someone with a Katana to sacrifice a feat to do it?
Katana's are just better.
More seriously, bastard sword only gets .5 damage on average better than a longsword per hit. Same with the katana compared to a scimitar, and it gets .5 less than the nodachi, its 2h counterpart.
I think some weapons are simple, martial or exotic for their power, but that the standard hasn't been applied consistently. Some exotic weapons are no more powerful than martial weapons (falcata vs. falchion), and some martial weapons are more powerful than other martial weapons (falchion vs. nodachi).
Aye, comparing them is sort of awkward. That's why I said it could use a revamp after my initial statement. Fauchard and Falcata are pretty amazing, but other items can be pretty meh, such as the spiked chain, kama, or battle ladder can be pretty bleh. Sometimes its at best an extra quality or small bump in damage, usually pretty minor either way.
You could use weapon groups and have no exotics. Or make fighters proficient with all exotic weapons because they are fighters and good at fighting.
This is a far better idea than racial weapons proficiency, and should replace it.
I don't have a problem with katana being Martial 2 handed, Exotic 1 handed. Most people used the katana two handed.
This seems like a feat or even an alternate racial trait.
Cultural Weapon Familiarity
Due to your exposure to the weapons of your homeland, you are skilled in combat with unusual implements.
Benefit
You can treat the weapons of your home region as Martial weapons, rather than exotic.
Brevoy/Mivon- Aldori Dueling Sword
Minkai- Katana
Osirion- khopesh
Taldor- Falcata
etc
If it is just one weapon, I would make it an alt trait.
If you expand the list, so regions had several weapons each, I think it would be okay as a feat. Since most non-humans already have racial familiarity, it seems this would be more human focused.
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This is a far better idea than racial weapons proficiency, and should replace it.
I've always felt that racial traits tended to be a mix of genetic and cultural traits. Dwarves are Stable genetically, but get their racial weapons culturally.
Personally I would've preferred if racial traits were all-genetic, and then every PC selects a cultural package. So that you could have a couple of different dwarven cultural packages, instead of having one "dwarven world culture" before you start undoing that with later books with variant races.
It might also make stuff like reincarnating/shapeshifting into different races more lucid.
Personally I would've preferred if racial traits were all-genetic, and then every PC selects a cultural package.
I agree completely and wholeheartedly. It is literally not possible for me to agree more with this statement.
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Koujow - I see the sense in what you're trying to do, though I'm not sure the end product will justify the amount of house-ruling necessary. In the same way that dwarves treat an exotic weapon with "dwarven" in its name as a martial weapon, you could call the khopesh an 'Osirion khopesh' and rule that creatures from the Osirion region treat it as a martial weapon.
It's not complicated house-ruling. You just make a new one-page list of martial vs exotic weapons, and a few short lists of cultural weapons.
Splitting cultural traits off from races would be quite a bit more house-ruling, but would be really cool.
You could also use the half-feat kind of trait as a patch - spending a trait on getting proficiency with one or two cultural weapons is not as significant a tax for most characters as a full feat, and for most Exotic weapons it's not really a power boost.
Either way, you'd want to be careful not to make any of the exotic weapons that are actually unusually powerful (eg Falcata) into martial weapons. Depending on how thoroughly you want to overhaul the weapons lists that could be a lot of double-checking.
Is the falcata actually more powerful than the no-dachi?
Isn't a 19/x3 equivalent to a 18/x2 crit weapon?
18/x2 is the equivalent of 20/x4, but 19/x3 is the equivalent of 20/x5. Falcata is the only weapon in the book with that crit range. It might also be the only exceptionally powerful weapon in the book, which is one of the bleh things about exotic weapons. The fauchard I named earlier has x4 reach friends in the martial department, but its the only 18-20x2 reach weapon.
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18/x2 is the equivalent of 20/x4, but 19/x3 is the equivalent of 20/x5. Falcata is the only weapon in the book with that crit range. It might also be the only exceptionally powerful weapon in the book, which is one of the bleh things about exotic weapons. The fauchard I named earlier has x4 reach friends in the martial department, but its the only 18-20x2 reach weapon.Is the falcata actually more powerful than the no-dachi?
Isn't a 19/x3 equivalent to a 18/x2 crit weapon?
Could you explain that a bit more? I'm not seeing it.
What Weirdo said. Adopted wouldn't apply ... though, in retrospect, it probably should be rephrased to a cultural instead of racial thing.
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Adopted should be rephrased? I'd agree. As-is, it doesn't make a distinction between traits that are essentially cultural (eg Brewmaster or Shift the Blame) and ones that rely on racial physiology or innate magic (eg Bent Body or Snap Ignition). Interestingly, most of the latter seem to belong to ARG races, while the core races appear to have entirely cultural race traits, with the possible exception of Almost Human.
Of course, that seems to be an extension of the general state of PF where physical, magical, and cultural racial features are mixed together with no clear lines between them, as you and Ascalaphus mentioned above.