Push and pull are weak, with their strongest being a forward thrust into the center of the target most of the time, they're attacks of opportunity a miss.Īrmor works by preventing penetration via skip-off or spreading the force, and by absorbing some energy.Īxes put a heavy mass at the end of the lever, and the swing accelerates it, and concentrates all that mass onto the very narrow contact patch along the blade edge. Swing of arms, and twist of hips, allows using the principle of the lever to amplify generated force. Penetration of armor relies upon maximum force on minimum area.ĭamage to tissue requires dumping force into the target. ![]() The minor differences in appearance hide the unity of use.Īll melee weapon use boils down to putting energy into a target for effect. attributing regional names for multiple weapons that are considered the same thing both in the period of use and in informed history.įor example, naginata and glaive - they are functionally the same weapon: A meat-cleaver on a stick with a thrusting point. ![]() The panoply of weapons, especially the lists in AD&D, are generally done from ignorance. That was for example a big problem once ships started to carry cannons as they ended up with 10 different calibers and had to match the cannon balls to the cannons which tended to be all of a different length and even a mix of muzzle and breech loader. Word of mouth might lead to some regional standartization but you still end up with one weapon type per region which is basically the same thing but different enough to have its own name. Tell ten smiths to make a stick with a blade on the end and you end up with 10 different weapons. Thus swords were harder to make, making them more expensive and a status symbol but also meant you won't meet many enemies with metal armor.Įxcept for highly organized nations there usually was no standartization. The samurai evolved from mounted archers, thus they only used 2 handed weapons (I think the only culture that did not use some sort of shield?).īut it was not only because of culture. But warfare never stopped to evolve so the weapons evolved with it. For example the Romans with their gladius+square shield combination or Huns and Mongols with mounted archers. Some cultures found a tactic that worked for them, either to counter the other nations around them or because it matched their social structure and equipped their armies accirdingly. Often people tended to weaponize the tools they had which resulted in things like scythes reforged into polearms. Spears are easy to make so thats another reason why they are used so much. Making a sword requires a lot of knowledge so often people made axes instead. Some weapons are harder to make than others. Some weapons are specifically made to counter certain types of equipment like curved blades that go around shields.Īnd of course when you do not have a shield you can use different weapons than with a shield or when you use them from horseback. Spears are good when fielded in large numbers. Sames for daggers because if their short range. Maces are even better against armor but otherwise rather bad. An axe is better in that situation, but has only limited ways of how you can attack with it. ![]() There are many reasons why there are different weapons.Ī sword is good against lightly armored enemies, but fares poorly against heavy armor. The ranged infantry will obviously have some sort of missile weapon such as bows.įinally, perhaps you have someone that just simply prefers to go around with a staff regardless of what is normally best or required. You may have nobles or officers with swords as status symbols. They may have hammers to hit through bones more efficiently or perhaps small picks and daggers to poke between the joints of armor. Someone may have the job to go after the infantry to ensure the wounded are dead. They may also have shields to try to counter others trying to stab at them. ![]() An individual in the forest who chops wood may have an axe as the most useful item, plus a small dagger that can be used for many multiple uses as a tool.Īnother may be part of the infantry and have polearms or spears to counter charges as well as for reach and stabbing into the enemy lines. The same could be held for Weapons in the past. Sometimes it just boils down to preference. Others are because they want them for various things (to wound or stop, to kill, to blast the biggest wound, to be able to fit different items on it's nozzle, etc). Some are because various nations have their favored version or type of firearms for their soldiers. If we just look at firearms and the different number of them, there are an enormous amount of them. Just like today, different weapons for different things which you wish to accomplish.
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