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It's a balance thing. If it had Versatile P in addition to Two-handed (d12) it would be stricly better than the greatsword.
The extra text is such because it had versatile P (or S?) in the playtest, iirc.
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Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...
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Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...Isn't a Bastard Sword what's also known as a hand-and-a-half sword? Which is different from a Longsword, isn't it?
In reality there is a continuum of size and length. A bastard sword would be indistinguishable from a longsword made for someone a bit shorter than you.
Throughout history, naming and classification of different weapons was super rare, and everyone kind of just commissioned the weapons they wanted. That being said, a longsword was always a two-handed weapon. A bastard sword would be a bit shorter and flexible in one or two handed use. An arming sword is what PF1 calls a longsword.
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This is also ultimately a fantasy universe, and the world itself may have different terms for each of these things then the historically accurate names of our universe.
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Should at least errata that flavor text then, since it is misleading, all balance concerns aside.
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This is also ultimately a fantasy universe, and the world itself may have different terms for each of these things then the historically accurate names of our universe.
Right, and having said THIS, there is a 40 year continuum from at least AD&D, through 2nd edition, 3rd edition, 3.5, Pathfinder, and now PF2, wherein the longsword is a one handed 3ish foot blade, the bastard sword is a hand-and-a-half sword with a 4ish foot blade, and the great sword is two-handed with a 5ish foot blade.
IMO all blades should have the versatile, buff Greatsword with another trait if you dont want to be at the same ground as bastard sword. Most of the two handed are underperforming compared to the Greatpickaxe
This makes the bastard sword tread on the longsword niche.
IMO all blades should have the versatile, buff Greatsword with another trait if you dont want to be at the same ground as bastard sword. Most of the two handed are underperforming compared to the GreatpickaxeThis makes the bastard sword tread on the longsword niche.
Takamori's suggestion would essentially require you to add one trait to every weapon in the game (which would be fine by me, tbh).
IMO all blades should have the versatile, buff Greatsword with another trait if you dont want to be at the same ground as bastard sword. Most of the two handed are underperforming compared to the Greatpickaxe
At that point the Greatsword would just be better than all the other 2-handers.
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Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...Isn't a Bastard Sword what's also known as a hand-and-a-half sword? Which is different from a Longsword, isn't it?
longswords are technically supposed to be two-handers(a weapon designed to be wielded in combat with two-hands, wielded as so), greatswords aren't a real thing(in that swords larger than longswords didn't really exist at the time to be used in general medieval combat), and shortswords historically were anything up to like a 4 foot long sword with a single hand grip(couldn't find a good picture, but see how the grip only has space for a single hand). anything short of like 3 or 2-1/2 would be called a dagger(or if curved a cutlass).
Length is king, and so all swords in the medieval era were designed to be long.
so in DnD what happened is basically, daggers became like 1 foot long modern utility combat knifes, daggers were called shortswords, shortswords were called longswords, and longswords were called greatswords.
THEN bastard swords got introduced as an in between from two-handed to one handed weapons and so ended up between longswords and greatswords. Also bastard swords might not nessarily have a two-hand grip, but a "hand and a half grip" which basically lets you hold onto the pommel and not have it be that uncomfortable/unmanagable.
to reiterate, medieval longswords are generally what you'd call a greatsword(more or less), medieval shortswords are swords with a single hand grip and are usually 4ish feet long, what you'd probably currently call a longsword, and bastard swords were shortswords with a two-hander grip. the whole point of a bastard sword was to allow you to use the sword both with and sans a shield. say your shield gets broken, you can just swap to using your sword two-handed, which you can't do if there isn't normally enough room to put your hand there.
on two-handing, wielding a sword two-handed is about creating a pivot, so when you pull back on the pommel the blade come down on the enemy harder, it's not just about using two arms to push into someone but allows you to get a sizable increase into the force with the hit. normally this all comes from the wrist if you're one-handing, but you can use your 2nd arm instead for this with the right grip.
more on the Greatsword, they were mostly made in the renaissance and early examples of them were more or less designed to be a sword but also a pike, and medieval techniques for using them usually had you using them like pikes but then also let you slash at people closing in, which you couldn't do with an actual pike or halberd. You'll notice that on greatswords they have pretty huge grips and that's so you can wield them like pikes while also being able to maneuver the blade as you would need.
IMO all blades should have the versatile, buff Greatsword with another trait if you dont want to be at the same ground as bastard sword. Most of the two handed are underperforming compared to the GreatpickaxeThis makes the bastard sword tread on the longsword niche.The bastard sword is quadruple the price of the longsword. Maybe that should count for something.
Nobody complains about composite longbows invalidating longbows by getting an extra free trait.
Composite longbows being an upgrade for cash is something I personally don't like. I prefer approx balancing trait count by weapon tier rather than by cash. If a weapon is expensive I'd rather that be more due to an exceptionally handy combo of traits that straight up having more.
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Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...
The same reason as most weapon oddities- Gary Gygax had a rather bad book about medieval weapons, and then mixed in some movie fight logic in the mix. And everything was grandfathered from there.
Seriously though? Versatile doesn't seem worth considering in balance terms. The only damage type combo that would be 'strong' would be slashing/bludgeoning- unless something has changed in the monster list, those are the only ones that matter in most situations.
Having some extra piercing doesn't affect much. I somewhat believe that piercing damage is a grand fathered nerf from an older D&D edition (it is on the ever powerful bows, the rogue martial weapons tend to do piercing, and a lot of simple weapons are piercing- although some bludgeoning is in there too because SKELETONS).
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Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...The same reason as most weapon oddities- Gary Gygax had a rather bad book about medieval weapons, and then mixed in some movie fight logic in the mix. And everything was grandfathered from there.
Seriously though? Versatile doesn't seem worth considering in balance terms. The only damage type combo that would be 'strong' would be slashing/bludgeoning- unless something has changed in the monster list, those are the only ones that matter in most situations.
Having some extra piercing doesn't affect much. I somewhat believe that piercing damage is a grand fathered nerf from an older D&D edition (it is on the ever powerful bows, the rogue martial weapons tend to do piercing, and a lot of simple weapons are piercing- although some bludgeoning is in there too because SKELETONS).
Piercing has a major, albeit niche, advantage of working far far better around water.
And it is an excellent choice in skull and shackles as a result. But otherwise, it is not a routine concern.
In comparison, undead can be thrown into pretty much any situation- regretful remains of failed preceding heroes, creations of the lich, toys of the demon cult, left over that the dragon left in his fridge for too long, etc. their ubiquitous role as fodder makes bludgeoning and slashing take a much higher importance.
Of course, in the new system, the stat differences between weapons often plays a smaller role. So if I had to choose between a scimitar or longsword... I might be more inclined to use the longsword so I don't have to worry about switching weapons during the niche situations.
In PF1 there was a type of bloated zombie that was weak to piercing, though it was obviously less common and may have only been made to balance out how bad piercing is.
Piercing weapons do get the oddly unique ability to reveal invisible foes through martial means via Revealing Stab, though given that requires you to release your weapon I think it's better used with a backup dagger than your proper longsword.
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on two-handing, wielding a sword two-handed is about creating a pivot, so when you pull back on the pommel the blade come down on the enemy harder, it's not just about using two arms to push into someone but allows you to get a sizable increase into the force with the hit. normally this all comes from the wrist if you're one-handing, but you can use your 2nd arm instead for this with the right grip.
push-pull can be useful for winden, but it's a weak way to cut. similarly, with a one-handed sword, cutting with the wrist will result in a quick but very weak strike. wrist cuts can be useful for harassing attacks at your opponent's hands or face, but that's about it. for a strong cut (with both two-handed and one-handed grips), your wrist shouldn't really be rotating or breaking at all-- most of the motion of the cut comes from the elbow and arm, and most of the power comes from the hips, core, and legs.
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Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...
And why is Studded Leather still around?
In PF1 there was a type of bloated zombie that was weak to piercing, though it was obviously less common and may have only been made to balance out how bad piercing is.
Rakshasa also have a weakness to piercing. But much like water rules, they are often not used unless they are a main focus of the whole campaign.
Piercing has a major, albeit niche, advantage of working far far better around water.
True, and this reminds me of a houserule I've often used which allowed Piercing to ignore an attack penalty for cramped spaces or difficult terrains which would interfere with swinging a slashing or bludgeonining weapon. Sometimes I just applied that to 2H weapons, at least an advantage for 2H Piercing. Could have helped Piercing, but doesn't look like anything like this is in CRB.
Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...And why is Studded Leather still around?
Grandfathered, it's just too iconic. Plus it has a stylish punk rock look. Also it fits a niche of being highly flexible but better than padded and normal leather. Of course it wouldn't be all that useful as described and it's just a misinterpretation of images of brigandine, coat of plates, etc, where those studs were rivet heads holding in metal plates. Some of the other bad armors have gradually fallen out, but studded leather has staying power.
The misuse of the term mail for things that aren't maile (chainmail == maile == mail) still bugs me. I cringe whenever I hear "platemail," although it hasn't been in the lists since AD&D 2nd. Banded mail is thankfully gone, joining other non-existent armors like ringmail. And splint mail's new description is much better. It's no longer described as some kind of weird armor made of vertical strips (a full suit of splints, which were historically just used along limbs to augment mail), and instead is now describing an actual real-world armor sometimes called splinted mail. This is a change I suggested in the playtest, so I'm feeling a bit smug (it almost certainly isn't based on me, but I'm going to pretend Paizo listened to my infinite wisdom in this case).
The armor naming bugs me much more than the weird sword names. Because swords never really did have standardized names. But mail always meant armor made of linked wire when it was in use. And some of these other armors are things that only existed in the minds of Victorian historians. Pretty much all swords were just called "sword" in the local language. And even now the distinctions often vary depending on who you're talking to. I would like to see naming a bit more in line with HEMA usage, so I don't have to add extra descriptions when describing real-world weapons to D&D/pathfinder players. "The most popular HEMA weapon is longsword. Well longsword in he HEMA sense, in Pathfinder it'd be called bastard sword. But some consider a true bastard sword a bit distinct from a longsword. But anyways as I was saying..." Having unified terminology across interests would be helpful.
on two-handing, wielding a sword two-handed is about creating a pivot, so when you pull back on the pommel the blade come down on the enemy harder, it's not just about using two arms to push into someone but allows you to get a sizable increase into the force with the hit. normally this all comes from the wrist if you're one-handing, but you can use your 2nd arm instead for this with the right grip.push-pull can be useful for winden, but it's a weak way to cut. similarly, with a one-handed sword, cutting with the wrist will result in a quick but very weak strike. wrist cuts can be useful for harassing attacks at your opponent's hands or face, but that's about it. for a strong cut (with both two-handed and one-handed grips), your wrist shouldn't really be rotating or breaking at all-- most of the motion of the cut comes from the elbow and arm, and most of the power comes from the hips, core, and legs.
sure but at the same time you're using two hands to orient a blade, while I only explained it in manners of applying force to the enemy, it lets you orient the blade faster and with more precision. AS WELL, it makes guarding with the sword less jarring on your wrist, etc. as you say with winden(basically german for winding your blade), for the layman, it lets you have better control over your blade and the enemies' blade and you have better leverage when they collide. you can more quickly and precisely counter and wind a block into a strike.
I wasn't quite expecting to have this level of discussion.
edit: and the server just ate half my post
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** spoiler omitted **...Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...Isn't a Bastard Sword what's also known as a hand-and-a-half sword? Which is different from a Longsword, isn't it?Very good analysis, though I would suggest that the primary distinction between “short*,” “long,” and “bastard” sword actually has more to do with the length of the hilt than the length of the blade. Also the terms referred more to the technique than to the sword. Longsword fencing involved the use of two hands, but there are depictions in treatises of swords with clearly two-handed grips being wielded in one hand, with shield in the other.
If I had my druthers, the breakdown would go:
Simple, 1-handed
Knife: 1d4 p, agile, finesse, thrown 10, versatile sMartial, 1-handed
Dagger: 1d6 p, agile, finesse, versatile s
Bastard sword: 1d6 p, two-hand d10, versatile s
Arming sword: 1d8 p, versatile sMartial, 2-handed
Longsword: 1d12 p, versatile s
Greatsword: 1d10 s, reach, sweep*I prefer the term “Arming sword” over “short sword,” personally
i had written a bunch more on this but i'll just quickly recount what i said.
Longswords were called warswords, why? they're unfit for general protection or travel as they're very heavy, but are very deadly.
oh and longswords are called longswords because they're unique feature is how long they are.
arming swords were called arming swords, because they're cheaper and could more easily be used in the creation or arming of an army.
a cutlass is called a cutlass because it was basically a big knife to cut rope on ships while also usable as a sword.
blah blah, humans are great at naming things.
I think for the sword stats i'd replace greatsword's sweep with backswing or shove, as the weapons benefits were it's ability to control people that moved beyond your reach and it's a fairly large weapon and thus hard to get past what with most of the weapon being a sharp edge.
The armor naming bugs me much more than the weird sword names. Because swords never really did have standardized names. But mail always meant armor made of linked wire when it was in use. And some of these other armors are things that only existed in the minds of Victorian historians. Pretty much all swords were just called "sword" in the local language. And even now the distinctions often vary depending on who you're talking to. I would like to see naming a bit more in line with HEMA usage, so I don't have to add extra descriptions when describing real-world weapons to D&D/pathfinder players. "The most popular HEMA weapon is longsword. Well longsword in he HEMA sense, in Pathfinder it'd be called bastard sword. But some consider a true bastard sword a bit distinct from a longsword. But anyways as I was saying..." Having unified terminology across interests would be helpful.
oh please, they weren't just called sword, they were usually called X-sword or Y-sword or a lot of the time they were just called a "CULTURE WHERE THIS SWORD IS FROM"
Because swords never really did have standardized names.This is why all of the "this sword is named wrong" discussions frustrate me. The idea of classifying swords into discrete categories is a fairly modern concept. You have people declaring certain swords to be named in historically inaccurate fashions when the terminology they themselves insist is better is apocryphal too.
I mean, the more modern in time you get the more specialized swords got. and some sword usages are just kinda weird.
like rapiers are a renaissance thing, and estocs are not just big rapiers like dnd would have you think, but mini-lances. there's more than just the ordering of bastard sword or the shrinking of sword classification in general that ruffle's my jimmies.
also (about dnd naming conventions) who calls something a longsword when it's like the 2nd smallest sword you can get?
The PF bastard sword should simply have stats of the Katana. As such it doesn't compete with the "great-sword" aka the real life Two-handed sword/Slaughter-sword/Montante. The Katana stats feels very appropriate it was well executed by Paizo.
Maybe I would replace the Deadly Trait with the Versatile (B) to represent using the pommel, quillions etc as club/war-hammer. It also differentiates the Bastard Sword from the Katana ever so slightly
The PF bastard sword should simply have stats of the Katana. As such it doesn't compete with the "great-sword" aka the real life Two-handed sword/Slaughter-sword/Montante. The Katana stats feels very appropriate it was well executed by Paizo.
Maybe I would replace the Deadly Trait with the Versatile (B) to represent using the pommel, quillions etc as club/war-hammer. It also differentiates the Bastard Sword from the Katana ever so slightly
NGL I'm still a little internally smug that the final version of the katana closely resembles how I homebrewed it before the full version of PF2 came out the only real difference is that I gave it the monk trait for anime nonsense.
EDIT: I didn't give it versatile though. I actually kind of think versatile is overkill here.
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Composite longbows being an upgrade for cash is something I personally don't like. I prefer approx balancing trait count by weapon tier rather than by cash. If a weapon is expensive I'd rather that be more due to an exceptionally handy combo of traits that straight up having more.IMO all blades should have the versatile, buff Greatsword with another trait if you dont want to be at the same ground as bastard sword. Most of the two handed are underperforming compared to the GreatpickaxeThis makes the bastard sword tread on the longsword niche.The bastard sword is quadruple the price of the longsword. Maybe that should count for something.
Nobody complains about composite longbows invalidating longbows by getting an extra free trait.
Composites the Strength requirement from Propulsive, though it's easier to use than 1e's version.
Composites the Strength requirement from Propulsive, though it's easier to use than 1e's version.Composite longbows being an upgrade for cash is something I personally don't like. I prefer approx balancing trait count by weapon tier rather than by cash. If a weapon is expensive I'd rather that be more due to an exceptionally handy combo of traits that straight up having more.IMO all blades should have the versatile, buff Greatsword with another trait if you dont want to be at the same ground as bastard sword. Most of the two handed are underperforming compared to the GreatpickaxeThis makes the bastard sword tread on the longsword niche.The bastard sword is quadruple the price of the longsword. Maybe that should count for something.
Nobody complains about composite longbows invalidating longbows by getting an extra free trait.
Sorry, I'm not quite sure what your phrasing is intended to mean here.
I don't actually have a serious with composite bows and non-composite bows both existing, as both serve different characters. The thing I'm not a massive fan of is the price difference for something which is a buff for a large proportion of characters. That's all.
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Sorry, there was supposed to be a “have” after Composites. I had more written up but deleted because i saw you were just comparing composite vs non so it doesn't make as much sense, what I get for writing just after waking up.
Ah, no worries.
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While I get the balance consideration, being unable to stab people with a sword that, in everyone's mind's eye, clearly as a tip for stabbing, is a bit immersion-breaking. Like, if a player saw that they were up against a creature with DR slashing and decided they were gonna stab them instaed with their bastard sword, it'd feel very weird to say no. Like, oh, your sword is in this sweet spot were it's simultaneously too short and too long to be able to stab properly.
This applies to quite a few weapons, of course, lots of weapons had tips for piercing or small little hammer heads to deal with plate armor, even if that part of the weapon probably wasn't as dangerous as the others. But the lack of a piercing attack on the bastard sword just really sticks out to me as weird even if I can see why the greatsword needs to have some theoretical reason to exist.
It's a balance thing. If it had Versatile P in addition to Two-handed (d12) it would be stricly better than the greatsword.
The trouble is that it makes no sense that there would not be a version of the "bastard sword" that didn't have a pointy end that you could stab with.
Also, the text in the rulebook describing the bastard sword is as follows:
"Bastard Sword: This broad-bladed sword, sometimes called the hand‑and‑a‑half sword, has a longer grip so it can be held in one hand or used with two hands to provide extra *piercing* or slashing power."
Even the rule book's descriptive text says that the bastard sword is versatile - piercing!
If they wanted balance, they should have made bastard swords more expensive than great swords, or given greatswords an extra trait. Sweep would be appropriate for a greatsword-- if you look at how the Montante (Iberian greatsword) is used in HEMA recreations, it would be reasonably described as a two handed slashing weapon with the sweep trait.
** spoiler omitted **...Game mechanics aside, why is there even a Bastard Sword in the game? It's literally a Longsword IRL. They're the same weapon...Isn't a Bastard Sword what's also known as a hand-and-a-half sword? Which is different from a Longsword, isn't it?Very good analysis, though I would suggest that the primary distinction between “short*,” “long,” and “bastard” sword actually has more to do with the length of the hilt than the length of the blade. Also the terms referred more to the technique than to the sword. Longsword fencing involved the use of two hands, but there are depictions in treatises of swords with clearly two-handed grips being wielded in one hand, with shield in the other.
If I had my druthers, the breakdown would go:
Simple, 1-handed
Knife: 1d4 p, agile, finesse, thrown 10, versatile sMartial, 1-handed
Dagger: 1d6 p, agile, finesse, versatile s
Bastard sword: 1d6 p, two-hand d10, versatile s
Arming sword: 1d8 p, versatile sMartial, 2-handed
Longsword: 1d12 p, versatile s
Greatsword: 1d10 s, reach, sweep*I prefer the term “Arming sword” over “short sword,” personally
The bastard sword in that example struggles to find a niche, just as it did in PF1 because why use a weapon that sucks both as a one-handed and two-handed weapon when you could just use a weapon that just deals more damage in either? In particular, your arming sword would be JUST as good as the Bastard Sword with the Dual-Handed Assault Fighter feat, which largely eliminates the use for a bastard sword at all.
That said, I really enjoy the idea of a two-hand only sword that's got reach, because that's really the core fantasy of someone using a giant f$**off sword. I think that would make a great martial weapon, and a D12 version would make for an excellent advanced fullblade.
