| RickDias |
One thing that has always bothered me about Pathfinder melee weapons is they often cannot do damage types they by all rights ought to be able to do. There are lots of weapons that are clearly better at one type, but can do the other kinds.
Accordingly, I would like to propose that in PF2E melee weapons can do multiple damage types... just at less damage for some. I offer the following examples of this premise, plus an explanation of what benefits it offers the game.
Longsword or Scimitar: These classically slashing weapons (1d8 or 1d6 respectively) are perfectly capable of thrusts in real life. They might not be as good at it, but there should be an option. Likewise, they can do bludgeoning damage. I would suggest the following,
Longsword / Scimitar
Slashing: 1d8 / 1d6
Piercing: 1d6/ 1d4
Bludgeoning (representing either pommel strikes or flat-side bashing): 1d4 / 1d3
Polearms in general: Should be capable of staff-fighting adjacent foes. This is basic polearm combat; if someone slips past your spear-tip then the sensible things to do are either footwork backwards so you can try again, or if they're overtaking you too quickly for that to work... you hit them with the big stick already in your hands.
Accordingly, I would advise some kind of 1d4 or 1d6 bludgeoning attack against adjacent foes if Reach rules remain similar to how they were in PF1E.
What's the Benefit?: It would cut down on characters carrying a truly silly amount of weaponry. Sure, a main weapon and a backup make sense. Carrying three or four different ones to make sure all damage types are covered is a bit odd.
It would also reduce the need for Feats that permit this behavior in PF1E, when competent combatants should be learning how to do this stuff as part of their early training.
Also opens up some design space for polearm fighters that don't need armor spikes for close combat, because they'd already be doing it with what they have in-hand.
Hopefully this idea has some merit; I'd love to see martials show off various alternate ways of fighting with a weapon!
| Crayon |
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, it has been confirmed that certain weapons (Keith Slashmaster's longsword) can be made to do Slashing or Piercing damage without apparent penalty so that's done.
Bludgeoning, would probably represent a blow with either the pommel or the flat of the blade and could very reasonably be considered 'Non-Lethal' damage instead...