Armour & weapon designs - a plea (part III).

[Woldan]

Axillary artery unprotected? Me no likey!

 

@ Elerond: That black plate armor is awesome, looks like its made of plates of black chitin which have been salvaged from a giant beetle corpse.

[Merlkir]

That's Toby Capwell's custom made suit. There's a whole album of photos of it on Flickr. (you can also see him run and fight in it in that museum documentary which has been posted a few times on here. "Mounting a horse and etc...")

[Sheikh]

Id like to see different cultures in poe have as different armor and arms looks as possible.

[Karranthain]

Id like to see different cultures in poe have as different armor and arms looks as possible.

 

It is my hope as well; I'd personally prefer it if magical items were rare and that we'd instead see a wealth of cultural variants of arms & armour.

 

I'll make a more detailed post, focused on this very matter, at a later date.

[Lephys]

Axillary artery unprotected? Me no likey!

But leaving holes is like taunting the enemy's aim! You've lulled the enemy into thinking they've found your weakness, when really, you've trained your entire life specifically to counter attacks to your axillary artery. 8P

[J.E. Sawyer]

Even the often cited "can openers" like military picks or poleaxes didn't penetrate deep enough to hurt too often. Tests suggest that a heavy hit from a poleaxe would likely damage the wearer by sheer impact and shock wave going through armour and body, without actual penetration.

 

It's an understatement, honestly.  A solid blow from a pollaxe (or poleaxe, if you prefer) could really devastate victims even through plate armor.  Mail offered very little protection against it.

 

Pollaxes: bad news.

[Lephys]

It's an understatement, honestly.  A solid blow from a pollaxe (or poleaxe, if you prefer) could really devastate victims even through plate armor.  Mail offered very little protection against it.

 

Pollaxes: bad news.

That's what I was thinking. I mean, I claim noobness when it comes to knowing the details of what was actually historically used, and how exactly it was designed and wielded, etc. But, I didn't think plate armor was meant to nullify the effectiveness of any direct blows, but rather to mitigate the force of blows with weapons that would normally annihilate the human body (like a blade). Basically, blade cuts flesh, but blade does not cut plate. Now the enemy must use something else.

 

I mean, you can pierce a truck door pretty easily with the right tool, and I didn't think full plate weighed 174lbs and was 1-inch thick. Obviously, MOST things aren't simply going to puncture your armor. That was the point. But it wasn't because no one could conceive of any way to puncture such impenetrable material.

 

It's kind of like how, in World War 2, everyone was all "Oh no, tanks! Better use explosives to get past that tank armor!" And Russia was all like "Pssh, we're gonna use rifles to just pierce it if that's okay. u_u"

 

[Merlkir]

Yeahm. You could train your soldiers to attack in teams of three - they take the target to the ground, one holds him down, another aims a hardened metal spike and the third man hammers it in with a massive maul. 

 

Giving them all poleaxes is just easier. :D

 

edit: I'm a swordophile, but I think I'll be making an exception in PE, if it does have polaxes.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Merlkir

[Spiritofpower]

Agreed; poleaxes are ****ing awesome.

 

On that note, poleaxe pictures!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The wikipedia page claims that they could, via interchangeable parts and rivets, have axes, spikes, hammers, and flukes on the heads, in addition to the stabbing point at the top, making it a very customizable weapon on top of its innate versatility. Perfect for an adventurer who might want to change weapons as the enemy demands, reducing the size and weight in comparison to carrying a backup weapon.

 

Edit: Just to clarify, I think the wikipedia page was referring to interchangeable heads, not actually interchangeable axe blades and stuff, because that does sound a little bit unlikely.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Spiritofpower

[Merlkir]

You could probably also make it into a staff sling. I never thought of that.

[Woldan]

Agreed; poleaxes are ****ing awesome.

 

On that note, poleaxe pictures!

Roger that!

 

 

The character in my fighter playthrough is definitely going to wield a good oldschool halberd like this one.

 

Edited May 23, 2013 by Woldan

[Lephys]

You could probably also make it into a staff sling. I never thought of that.

I now have a mighty need for staff slings to be in the game. o_o

[Merlkir]

I wonder how useful one would be in a situation where a normal sling suffices. IIRC they were mainly a siege type weapon, with the staff added for range. Adventurers would use slings for hunting, most likely. Knowing slings were in the Infinity games, they might appear in PE, which'd be neat.

[Woldan]

Well, according to the old testament David killed Goliath (probably just a very tall soldier) with one shot from his sling, it penetrated his forehead and killed him instantly. At medium ranges a sling could definitely be a plausible weapon. 

Edited May 23, 2013 by Woldan

[Merlkir]

:D Hmph. ))) Slings are ok, I've used them quite a bit, but excuse me if I'll base my sling assumptions on tests I've done rather than a fairytale book.

 

(slingshots make quite terrible wounds btw, very deep and quite wide. I used to have a link to a Roman material on how to treat these wounds so that they heal properly, it's very gruesome. I'll see if I can find it.)

[Kubilayhan]

I really like the Turkish armour and scimitars. So, i hope to see stuff similar to these:
 
 These are Seljuk era Turkish warriors:
 

 
 
This is the scimitar they use called ''Kilij'' in turkish. It's not a shamshir, the shape is different. So please, no mistakes people.
 

 
A demonstration of kilij from Deadliest Warrior.

 

 I like seeing European armours, claymores, warhammers, bastard swords and other stuff, but i think we should start adding some eastern culture to the military equipment. In all RPGs we always see claymore, katana and a viking axe. Where is the steppe culture and it's weapons ? I hope some of the developers consider this and give a chance.

Edited May 26, 2013 by Kubilayhan

[Merlkir]

There seems to be some kind of sabre in the latest video, so there probably will be eastern looking stuff.

[Rostere]

Well, real Eastern often becomes very cheesy. We could definitely use some near-East inspired clothes and gear, though.

[PrimeJunta]

I'm starting like the sound of pollaxes. Sounding more and more like the ultimate melee weapon.

 

For you weapon geeks, what's the tradeoff? Why didn't it displace other melee weapons altogether? Or, put another way, when would I rather be holding, say, a sword, mace, or hammer instead?

 

Edit: Also, @Kubilayhan,cool tower of skulls in the background. Makes a bit of a statement, that.

Edited May 27, 2013 by PrimeJunta

[Woldan]

Theres always drawbacks. When you wield a polearm you're in deep *beep* when someone gets really close to you with a small maneuverable weapon, you can't hit him and you'll get raped by a short sword/mace. But when wielding a polearm first rule is to keep your enemies at distance so they cant reach you but you can reach them.....and you'd be carrying a backup weapon anyway.

 

Another drawback is polearms with wooden shafts can be damaged and rendered useless by one solid blow of blade (yes, even those polearms protected with some steel just below the tip/head), thats what the soldiers with the huge greatswords did, hack away the pikes, break the formation and let the guys with the smaller weapons in to slaughter the pikemen.

 

Also, polearms are a *beep* to carry, ever dragged a 8ft long halberd through a dense forest? And good luck with sheating them...

 

Oh, and blocking with polearms is very difficult, the rather vulnerable wooden shaft being one reason for that. You better be protected by a good plate armor when wielding polearms.

 

And last but not least, maneuverability at close quarters can be very bad with polearms. (BUT, they can also be excellent weapons when fighting in - for example- a narrow alley, swordsmen cant use their weapons except for stabbing, and thats where polearms really shine.)

 

All weapons have drawbacks, halberds/spears are just another tool in the toolbox. Personally, I'd be happy with a halberd or a Lucerne hammer, I'm tall and strong, when I'm doing my job I could smash, hack and stab my attackers before they could even reach me.

Edited May 27, 2013 by Woldan

[Jarmo]

Yeah, juggling priorities when choosing a weapon.

 

Swords and other light slashing weapons are ideal against unarmored or lightly armored opponents,

quick strikes and effective parrying, but not effective against heavy armor.

 

Axes are something like a half-way towards maces and hammers.

Not as agile as a sword, not as effective against heavy armor as a hammer.

But makes nasty cutting wounds unlike a mace and can penetrate light armor or do blunt trauma against heavy.

 

Ditching the shield and taking a 2-handed weapon (or 2-handed grip) enables either faster & harder strikes,

or effectively wielding a heavier or longer weapon.

 

Knights started doing without shields and relied on armour for protection when plate started to become commonplace.

Both because plate gave good enough protection, but also because they wanted to wield big enough weapons to hurt the other guy.

[Merlkir]

All manner of polearm weapons actually were primary weapons for men at arms and even knights. Swords were sidearms. There were of course exceptions when some considered pole weapons to be glorified peasant tools and rather stuck to knightly swords and maces. And of course, all of this changes a lot with fashion and trends in warfare.

 

BTW, I'd seriously love to see someone cut a shaft of a polaxe with a sword. They were made so that you couldn't do it, even without steel reinforcement, cutting tough wood like that (when it's moving in the hands of your enemy) is nearly impossible. Maybe with an axe if you pinned the polaxe down.

 

Also "blocking" with polearms isn't that difficult (not more difficult than with a sword), nor are they defenseless when the opponent gets too close.

 

There are techniques to deal with all kinds of stuff.

 

Edited May 27, 2013 by Merlkir

[Woldan]

Wooden shafts are eeeasy to cut with a bladed weapon, I used to cut down small trees approx the diameter of a human wrist with ONE thrust of my machete. I think it would be rather easy to cut a pollaxe shaft with a great sword. 

 

And they also break. 

 

I already broke a 5cm wide fireaxe shaft when splitting some firewood, I missed the log, did not hit it with the blade but with the shaft instead, right below the head.

Even though it has a metal protection there the shaft snapped in two. Replace the log with a blunt weapon and you'd get the same result. And thats just a two handed axe, imagine the leverage effect with a shaft three times longer with a head 50% heavier. 

 

I'm not trying to make polearms look bad, they're my favorite medieval meele weapons, but they have their limitations and weaknesses, like any other weapon system. 

Edited May 27, 2013 by Woldan

[Jarmo]

 

BTW, I'd seriously love to see someone cut a shaft of a polaxe with a sword. They were made so that you couldn't do it, even without steel reinforcement, cutting tough wood like that (when it's moving in the hands of your enemy) is nearly impossible. Maybe with an axe if you pinned the polaxe down.

 

 

 

Wooden shafts are eeeasy to cut with a bladed weapon, -----

 

And they also break. 

 

 

Cutting polearms. This is something I've been thinking of lately.

Especially after viewing a youtube of sword vs spear sparring, where the guy with a spear had real, real big advantage all the time.

 

Basically.. I can't see how it could be done. I've cut wood and yeah, I can chop a treebranch or a couple of cm thick tree easily enough

with various woodcutting instruments like a handaxe or a ... vesuri.. umm.. bill?

But hard dried wood, that's in someones hand, not stationary, and the somebody doesn't try to help me? Can't see how that works.

 

But then.. it's so commonly depicted and I seem to recall that's a funcion of 2-h swordmen.

But is it historical or just the movies or books?

 

Breaking polearms, yeah. Overhand hit on hard surface and you'll need a real strong pole to not break it. 

[Woldan]

If you want to cut a small tree, wooden shaft or pole the trick is not to cut it a 90 degree angle, make it 70 degrees, that way it cannot bend as much and absorb the energy. Even if you can't make it all the way through the shaft is going to be split and seriously damaged. 

 

 

 

 

 

But hard dried wood, that's in someones hand, not stationary, and the somebody doesn't try to help me? Can't see how that works.

Mass inertia. When you just hit hard and fast enough it doesn't matter if the heavy polearm is held by someone or resting on two bricks. Also, with an overhead blow the polearm is going to hit the ground if the sword cant make it through it and the mass of the sword will still break or damage it. 

Edited May 27, 2013 by Woldan