| RazarTuk |
Simple and martial weapons make enough sense. Simple means it's hard to mess up, like jabbing someone with the pointy end of a spear, while martial is most other weapons that require a bit of training. Then there are exotic weapons. At least in 1e, most exotic weapons fall into one of two groups:
- The weapon is overpowered compared to other martial weapons. As an example, the elven curve blade is a two-handed finesse weapon that does 2d6 damage and has an 18-20/x2 crit range. If that were martial, there would be zero reason to take a greatsword instead.
- The weapon belongs somewhere like Tian Xia or Vudra instead, and
normal peoplepeople from the Inner Sea region probably wouldn't know what to do with it. For example, wakizashis, katanas, and nodachis are basically short, long, and greatswords, but with a Japanese cultural skin.
That latter category has unfortunate implications. By default, a Tien fighter wouldn't know what to do with a katana. The 1e samurai can only use one because it's specifically called out in the proficiencies. But want to upgrade to a nodachi? You'll have to buy it with Exotic Weapon Proficiency. You could always get around the problem with "Tien Weapon Familiarity: Tiens treat any weapon with the Tien trait as a martial weapon", but now you're just reminding everyone of the unfortunate implications of calling species races.
2e somewhat remedies this with Common and Uncommon, but the problem still remains. At least in the playtest, there are provisions for making an uncommon weapon count as common, but not the other way around. It's also odd that characters can gain access to uncommon items, because rarity is suddenly dependent on the character, not the setting.
And finally, weapon proficiency is a weird feat. It buys simple or martial weapons, but singular exotic weapons. That in and of itself isn't weird, but we see martial weapon proficiencies being handed out on a per-weapon basis to most classes.
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As a result, my proposal for a weapon system that simplifies things, avoids the issue of Tien Weapon Familiarity, and allows for more customization in what weapons characters use:
- Common and uncommon just refer to how rare it is in the setting. For example, a game in Avistan could have longswords be common and katanas be rare, while a game in Tian Xia could have katanas be common and longswords be rare. Because this is at the setting level, characters can no longer "gain access" to uncommon items.
- All characters, even monks, are trained in simple weapons.
- The Monk item trait is removed, nunchaku become simple weapons (because they're evolved from threshing flails- a farming implement), bo staffs and kamas become normal staffs and sickles, and the Monastic Weaponry feat instead applies to simple weapons. (Not sure what to do with sai and shuriken)
- Alchemists, sorcerers, and wizards pick one weapon group to be trained in.
- Bards, druids, and rogues pick two weapon groups to be trained in.
- Clerics are trained in the weapon group of their deity's favored weapon, plus one other group of their choice.
- Barbarians, fighters, paladins, and rangers pick three weapon groups to be trained in.
- Fighters pick one of their three trained weapon groups to be experts in instead, and weapon mastery, specialization, and legend let them advance their proficiency in two groups.
- Critical specialization effects are unlocked at expert proficiency.
- The Weapon Proficiency feat lets you become trained in an additional weapon group.