Multiple Weapons, MAP, and Agile


Playing the Game


How exactly does conventional multiple weapon fighting work now? No, not talking about the specific class feats that Fighters or Rangers may have for two-weapon fighting. I'm just talking about a character just straight-up attacking with more than one weapon in a turn. Is he even allowed to, or do we have to have one of those feats? Is it allowed, but practically pointless (attacking with one longsword is "normal, -5, -10"; attacking with two longswords is "right hand normal, left hand -5, right hand -10") however aesthetically fitting?

What happens with Agile? If I have a longsword and a shortsword and I alternate between the two, would it be "normal, -4, -10" or "normal, -5, -8"?


As far as I know..
if you attack with weapon a then weapon b.
its treated the same as weapon a twice.


Yes - there is no benefit for a non-agile second weapon unless you have class etc abilities or weapon traits that are helpful (e.g. parry, twin, thrown). Using two identicall weapons is rarely useful unless it has the twin trait or you plan to throw one.


Note: if you are going to use two weapons, you'll want your off-hand one to be agile. The +1 attack (comparatively) is better than the increased damage die.


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Tectorman wrote:

How exactly does conventional multiple weapon fighting work now? No, not talking about the specific class feats that Fighters or Rangers may have for two-weapon fighting. I'm just talking about a character just straight-up attacking with more than one weapon in a turn. Is he even allowed to, or do we have to have one of those feats? Is it allowed, but practically pointless (attacking with one longsword is "normal, -5, -10"; attacking with two longswords is "right hand normal, left hand -5, right hand -10") however aesthetically fitting?

What happens with Agile? If I have a longsword and a shortsword and I alternate between the two, would it be "normal, -4, -10" or "normal, -5, -8"?

Straight up attacking with two weapons is allowed, but if the two weapons are exactly the same and you don't have feats then they attack as if you're just using the same weapon. If e.g. you have a Frost longsword and a Flaming longsword then you can pretty much attack with whichever one you think is most useful at that exact moment.

Mundane two-weapon fighting works well when you have a nasty one-handed weapon like a trident in one hand, and an agile weapon like the light hammer in the other. As you can strike once with the stronger weapon for no multiple-attack penalty, and another one or two times with the agile weapon, which has a lower penalty.

Main-gauche is actually doubly useful here, as it's an agile one-handed weapon with parry, adding more choice in the moment as to offence or defence. Thematically it meshes well with the rapier, for historical reasons.

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