Melee Weapons
Valerick still does practice the martial arts in its military culture, even with the advent of more....modern options to fight battles and wage war. In fact, this has done little to dissuade such practices and instead made them a novelty, and seen technique and schools of thought, and a wider diversity of weapons and skill sets. As with the armor their will be a table for reference, but each weapon category will be briefly described below first for your convenience.
Brawling: These sorts of weapons are meant to be used as almost a martial art's aid, meant to be used in the sorts of motions one would make in a fist fight anyway, for the most part. They include things like knuckle dusters, trench knives, switch-blades, cestus and more. These have become some of the most favored weapons of the criminal elements in large cities because they are easily concealed. .
Basic Hand Weapons: Clubs, arming swords, hand axes, maces, these weapons are your basic one handed weapons that all are used in effectively more or less the same methods. Some of the finer details might change but for the most part they are sort of interchangeable, and mostly only a question of how they are balanced. Swords are nimble, meant to be wielded with a more flexible approach to combat. Hand axes or maces are like pendulums, its all about gravity and momentum and heavy hits. Clubs and the like are that happy middle ground. You will also find daggers here as well as the targe spike. These are also about the biggest weapons one can maybe, depending on the city in Valerick, get away with carrying within settlement walls without a special license or being military or law enforcement (and even then you need special orders or a warrant you are executing).
Cavalry Weapons: These are weapons designed in specific for use off horseback, or another mount, meant for the charge. They are oft cumbersome to use on foot, but absolutely devastating when used properly atop a charging steed, for they are designed to allowe a rider to pass along a maximal amount of the force of their mount's forward motion into the target of their attack.
Fencing: These are weapons designed for a particular style of swordplay. Rapiers, Sabres, Cutlasses, the Main Gauche, and their ilk. Meant for swift, full controlled cut and thrust fencing, one handed, oft with nothing or some sort of other weapon in the other hand. Unlike simple arming or long swords they are designed to maximize this very particular approach to swordplay, not having quite the heft of some arming swords, nor the hilt size, to allow those two handed strikes some more basic hand weapons can offer. These weapons are designed with a very particular style of fencing, of swordplay in mind.
Flexible Weapons: These refer to weapons designed to create distance and strike at their apex. Flails, whips, spiked chains, that sort of thing. These are oft seen more as gimmicky weapons, but are dangerous nonetheless, and in the hands of someone truly skilled, allow a warrior to control a large amount of space around them with terrifying ability. These weapons are oft able to work around the standard laws in most settlements because they are flexible, they can be wound or folded and made small enough by effective definition.
Great Weapons: These mammoths are generally seen as soon to be relics with the advent of more modern armaments. Large heavy hitting striking weapons, like warhammers or mauls, great axes, or of course, longswords (known as hand and a half swords as well or sometimes bastard swords) or true zweihanders. But despite that generally view between militaries, they still see plenty of use in frontier lands, for those whom learn to use them can basically become a walking apocolaypse to a band of wandering orks or their ilk.
Polearms: The category that has seen the most growth, from the humble spear, to the efficient and optimized halbred, here is where you find where melee warfare has evolved, its story told through the last few centuries. Pike blocks, halbrediers, these are the sorts of melee troops whom came to dominate most armies, at least on land. These weapons are versatile, offering reach, nimbleness, the ability to fight even at close range by 'choking' your grip up or down the haft, something many great weapons with similar reach, like a zweihander, does not allow for. It insures even if foes get inside your initial engagement distance, you can still be just as deadly. They are seen, militarily, as the apex of developments in melee combat.
Weapon Qualities
Besides those in base 5e, there are a few listed here that should be defined that are all new so these are defined below;
Brace: On your turn as a move action, you may brace yourself in a direction, basically creating a pike block, the idea being if anyone charges at you, they automatically take a hit. You get an automatically successful attack of opportunity, that does not consume your reaction, against the first target to charge at you head on. You still roll to attack, but the roll is merely to see if you score a critical. If you do score a critical they also do not make it into range to attack you, halted instead at reach distance by your weapon, as they take damage. This may only effect one enemy on any given time using it.
Cavalry: Weapons with this property are used one handed while mounted, and add your mount's Strength Modifier on a charge attack and damage, in additon to adding your own. However if dismounted they become Two handed, and Heavy.
Concealable: Weapons with this quality are easily hidden. You have advantage to Sleight of Hand to secret them about your person or in any other place
Dismount: Weapons with this quality are literally designed to oppose cavalry. When you attack a target, if you score a critical hit on them, you may force them to roll an Acrobatics Test of DC 11+your proficiency bonus+your strength modifier, and if they fail, they are dismounted forcefully and are prone. This is in addition to the normal effects of a critical. You may only use one such weapon property on any given critical hit.
Double Weapon: Weapons with this quality are naturally designed in pairs or meant to attack twice. Whenever you declare an attack, before rolling you can declare a double attack. If you do so, you are denied your Dexterity to your AC until your next turn, however if you hit with your attack, you basically roll damage for two attacks, but it counts as one instance of damage. If you roll a critical or a critical fumble, it effects only the first attack and in that case you roll a second attack roll.
Trip: Weapons with this quality are well designed to not just harm, but control those around you. Specifically yank people's feet out from under them. When you attack a target, if you score a critical hit on them, you may force them to roll a Dexterity Save of DC 11+your proficiency bonus+your Strength Modifier, and if they fail, they get tripped. This is in addition to the normal effects of a critical. You may only activate one such weapon property on any given critical hit.
Special Weapons
Some weapons have unique and special ways they are intended to be used, or unique drawbacks. These are listed here. Any weapon with the property 'Special' come down here to read the descriptor.
Katar: These clawed gauntlet like punching dagger weapons are made uniquely to also allow the wielder a great deal of dexterity and offensive and defensive capability. As a reaction, when attacked in melee, you may choose to roll an Acrobatics Test against their attack roll, instead of merely using your AC. If you roll better, you disarm the target and take no damage.
Flail, Whip, Spiked Chain: All these weapons have the same special. They aren't meant to be used at melee range. You are at disadvantage to attack any target directly adjacent to you. But beyond that, targets you attack are denied any bonus from any shields unless they are a Tower Shield, as the flexible nature of the weapon will just cause the weapon to go around it.
Pike Pikes are near twelve feet in length. These massive polearms are not meant for melee combat. You are at disadvantage to attack anyone adjacent to you. Also you can reach 10 feet, not just 5 feet.
Brawling: These sorts of weapons are meant to be used as almost a martial art's aid, meant to be used in the sorts of motions one would make in a fist fight anyway, for the most part. They include things like knuckle dusters, trench knives, switch-blades, cestus and more. These have become some of the most favored weapons of the criminal elements in large cities because they are easily concealed. .
Basic Hand Weapons: Clubs, arming swords, hand axes, maces, these weapons are your basic one handed weapons that all are used in effectively more or less the same methods. Some of the finer details might change but for the most part they are sort of interchangeable, and mostly only a question of how they are balanced. Swords are nimble, meant to be wielded with a more flexible approach to combat. Hand axes or maces are like pendulums, its all about gravity and momentum and heavy hits. Clubs and the like are that happy middle ground. You will also find daggers here as well as the targe spike. These are also about the biggest weapons one can maybe, depending on the city in Valerick, get away with carrying within settlement walls without a special license or being military or law enforcement (and even then you need special orders or a warrant you are executing).
Cavalry Weapons: These are weapons designed in specific for use off horseback, or another mount, meant for the charge. They are oft cumbersome to use on foot, but absolutely devastating when used properly atop a charging steed, for they are designed to allowe a rider to pass along a maximal amount of the force of their mount's forward motion into the target of their attack.
Fencing: These are weapons designed for a particular style of swordplay. Rapiers, Sabres, Cutlasses, the Main Gauche, and their ilk. Meant for swift, full controlled cut and thrust fencing, one handed, oft with nothing or some sort of other weapon in the other hand. Unlike simple arming or long swords they are designed to maximize this very particular approach to swordplay, not having quite the heft of some arming swords, nor the hilt size, to allow those two handed strikes some more basic hand weapons can offer. These weapons are designed with a very particular style of fencing, of swordplay in mind.
Flexible Weapons: These refer to weapons designed to create distance and strike at their apex. Flails, whips, spiked chains, that sort of thing. These are oft seen more as gimmicky weapons, but are dangerous nonetheless, and in the hands of someone truly skilled, allow a warrior to control a large amount of space around them with terrifying ability. These weapons are oft able to work around the standard laws in most settlements because they are flexible, they can be wound or folded and made small enough by effective definition.
Great Weapons: These mammoths are generally seen as soon to be relics with the advent of more modern armaments. Large heavy hitting striking weapons, like warhammers or mauls, great axes, or of course, longswords (known as hand and a half swords as well or sometimes bastard swords) or true zweihanders. But despite that generally view between militaries, they still see plenty of use in frontier lands, for those whom learn to use them can basically become a walking apocolaypse to a band of wandering orks or their ilk.
Polearms: The category that has seen the most growth, from the humble spear, to the efficient and optimized halbred, here is where you find where melee warfare has evolved, its story told through the last few centuries. Pike blocks, halbrediers, these are the sorts of melee troops whom came to dominate most armies, at least on land. These weapons are versatile, offering reach, nimbleness, the ability to fight even at close range by 'choking' your grip up or down the haft, something many great weapons with similar reach, like a zweihander, does not allow for. It insures even if foes get inside your initial engagement distance, you can still be just as deadly. They are seen, militarily, as the apex of developments in melee combat.
| Weapon | Rarity | Cost | Damage and Type | Weight | Properities |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| - | - | Brawling | Weapons | - | - |
| Knuckle-Dusters | Common | 1 gold sun | 1d4/Bludgeoning | Less than 1 lb | Double Weapon, Concealable |
| Cestus | Uncommon | 1 gold Sun | 1d4/Bludgeoning | less than 1 lb | Concealable |
| Scissor | Scarce | 8 gold suns | 1d6/Piercing and Slashing | 3 lbs | +2 AC |
| Trench Knife | Scarce | 6 gold suns | 1d4/Piercing or Bludgeon | 1 lb | Concealable, Finesse |
| Switchblade | Rare | 12 gold suns | 1d4/Piercing | less than 1 lb | Concealable, Light, Finesse |
| Katar | Rare | 31 gold suns | 1d6/Piercing | 3 lbs | +1 AC, Finesse, Light, Special |
| - | - | Basic Hand | Weapons | - | - |
| Club | Common | 4 silver moons | 1d4/Bludgeon | 2 lbs | Light |
| Fighting Dagger | Common | 2 gold suns | 1d4/piercing | 1 lbs | Finesse, Light, Thrown (range 20/60) |
| Handaxe | Common | 5 gold suns | 1d6/Slashing | 2 lbs | Light, Thrown (range 20/60) |
| Javelin | Common | 5 silver moons | 1d6/piercing | 1 lb | Thrown (range 30/120) |
| Light Hammer | Uncommon | 3 gold suns | 1d4/bludgeon | 2 lbs | Light, Thrown (range 20/60) |
| Mace | Scarce | 7 gold suns | 1d6/bludgeon | 4 lbs | - |
| Targe Spike | Uncommon | See Targe Shield | 1d4/Piercing | See Targe Shield | Is a Shield |
| Arming Sword | Scarce | 18 gold suns | 1d6/piercing or slashing | 2 lbs | Light |
| - | - | Cavalry | Weapons | - | - |
| Cavalry Hammer | Rare | 65 gold suns | 2d8/bludgeon | 6 lbs | Cavalry, Heavy, Reach |
| Calary Sabre | Rare | 45 gold suns | 1d10/Slashing | 4 lbs | Reach, Cavalry |
| Lance | Scarce | 12 gold suns | 1d12/piercing | 6 lbs | Cavalry, Reach |
| - | - | Fencing | Weapons | - | - |
| Rapier | Scarce | 14 gold suns | 1d6/Piercing | 3 lbs | Light, Finesse |
| Main Gauche | Rare | 25 gold suns | 1d4/Piercing | 1 lb | Light, Finesse, Defensive (+1 AC) |
| Sabre | Scarce | 21 Gold Suns | 1d8/slashing | 3 lbs | Finesse |
| Cutlass | Scarce | 18 gold suns | 1d6+1/slashing | 2 lbs | Light, Finesse |
| Cane Sword | Rare | 45 gold suns | 1d6/piercing or bludgeoning | 2 lbs | Light, Finesse, Concealable |
| - | - | Flexible | Weapons | - | - |
| Flail | Scarce | 10 gold suns | 1d8/bludgeon | 4 lbs | Special |
| Whip | Common | 2 gold suns | 1d4/slashing | 3 lbs | Finesse, Reach, Special |
| Spiked Chain | Rare | 15 gold suns | 1d6/Pierce and Bludgeon | 4 lbs | Reach, Special |
| - | - | Great | Weapons | - | - |
| War Club | Uncommon | 4 silver moons | 1d8/bludgeoning | 8 lbs | - |
| War Hammer | Scarce | 15 gold suns | 1d8/bludgeon | 3 lbs | Versatile (1d10) |
| Maul | Rare | 10 gold suns | 2d6/bludgeon | 9 lbs | Heavy |
| Greataxe | Scarce | 30 gold suns | 1d12/slashing | 7 lbs | Heavy |
| Longsword | Scarce | 40 gold suns | 1d8/slashing | 4 lbs | Versatile (1d10) |
| Zweihander | Rare | 70 gold suns | 1d12/Slashing | 5 lbs | Reach, Finesse |
| - | - | Polearm | Weapons | - | - |
| Quarterstaff | Common | 8 silver moons | 1d6/bludgeoning | 3 lbs | Double Weapon |
| Spear | Uncommon | 3 gold suns | 1d6/Piercing | 3 lbs | Versatile (1d8), Reach |
| Pike | Scarce | 40 gold suns | 1d10/Piercing | 8 lbs | Reach, Brace, Dismount, Two-Handed, Special |
| Halberd | Rare | 65 gold suns | 1d10/Slashing or Piercing | 5 lbs | Brace, Reach, Dismount, Trip, Two-Handed |
Weapon Qualities
Besides those in base 5e, there are a few listed here that should be defined that are all new so these are defined below;
Brace: On your turn as a move action, you may brace yourself in a direction, basically creating a pike block, the idea being if anyone charges at you, they automatically take a hit. You get an automatically successful attack of opportunity, that does not consume your reaction, against the first target to charge at you head on. You still roll to attack, but the roll is merely to see if you score a critical. If you do score a critical they also do not make it into range to attack you, halted instead at reach distance by your weapon, as they take damage. This may only effect one enemy on any given time using it.
Cavalry: Weapons with this property are used one handed while mounted, and add your mount's Strength Modifier on a charge attack and damage, in additon to adding your own. However if dismounted they become Two handed, and Heavy.
Concealable: Weapons with this quality are easily hidden. You have advantage to Sleight of Hand to secret them about your person or in any other place
Dismount: Weapons with this quality are literally designed to oppose cavalry. When you attack a target, if you score a critical hit on them, you may force them to roll an Acrobatics Test of DC 11+your proficiency bonus+your strength modifier, and if they fail, they are dismounted forcefully and are prone. This is in addition to the normal effects of a critical. You may only use one such weapon property on any given critical hit.
Double Weapon: Weapons with this quality are naturally designed in pairs or meant to attack twice. Whenever you declare an attack, before rolling you can declare a double attack. If you do so, you are denied your Dexterity to your AC until your next turn, however if you hit with your attack, you basically roll damage for two attacks, but it counts as one instance of damage. If you roll a critical or a critical fumble, it effects only the first attack and in that case you roll a second attack roll.
Trip: Weapons with this quality are well designed to not just harm, but control those around you. Specifically yank people's feet out from under them. When you attack a target, if you score a critical hit on them, you may force them to roll a Dexterity Save of DC 11+your proficiency bonus+your Strength Modifier, and if they fail, they get tripped. This is in addition to the normal effects of a critical. You may only activate one such weapon property on any given critical hit.
Special Weapons
Some weapons have unique and special ways they are intended to be used, or unique drawbacks. These are listed here. Any weapon with the property 'Special' come down here to read the descriptor.
Katar: These clawed gauntlet like punching dagger weapons are made uniquely to also allow the wielder a great deal of dexterity and offensive and defensive capability. As a reaction, when attacked in melee, you may choose to roll an Acrobatics Test against their attack roll, instead of merely using your AC. If you roll better, you disarm the target and take no damage.
Flail, Whip, Spiked Chain: All these weapons have the same special. They aren't meant to be used at melee range. You are at disadvantage to attack any target directly adjacent to you. But beyond that, targets you attack are denied any bonus from any shields unless they are a Tower Shield, as the flexible nature of the weapon will just cause the weapon to go around it.
Pike Pikes are near twelve feet in length. These massive polearms are not meant for melee combat. You are at disadvantage to attack anyone adjacent to you. Also you can reach 10 feet, not just 5 feet.
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