OK, so we all know flails are some kind of blunt weight attached to a chain and a haft. You swing, the weight swings around, hits someone, hurts. They do great damage and are quite effective against armor.
One question though: what happens when you parry one? Lets say I've got my trusty flail and I'm fighting someone with atwo handed sword. I swing at them and they parry. Assuming they are successful what happens? If they intercept the chain part of my flail the weighted end is still going to keep moving. Most likely it will either wrap around their blade, or it will swing and hit one of the two of us.
If they parry just the haft the weight will keep swining and probably hit them anyway, but probabily not as hard.
The only way I can see to get a true parry against a flail is to parry the weight itself, which strikes me as extremely difficult.
Any thoughts on this?
I'd say all this is excellently covered by flails ignoring 2 successful blocking dice.
edit: You must've posted like 2 seconds after me...
If you're parrying the fantasy type flail w/long chain, then you're right. In the flail stats it says it ignores 2 blocking successes, so there ya go.
If you're parrying a more historical type flail with a short chain or joint, it's not such a concern as long as you don't parry or block right in front of your face.
Quote from: TashOK, so we all know flails are some kind of blunt weight attached to a chain and a haft. You swing, the weight swings around, hits someone, hurts. They do great damage and are quite effective against armor.
One question though: what happens when you parry one? Lets say I've got my trusty flail and I'm fighting someone with atwo handed sword. I swing at them and they parry. Assuming they are successful what happens? If they intercept the chain part of my flail the weighted end is still going to keep moving. Most likely it will either wrap around their blade, or it will swing and hit one of the two of us.
If they parry just the haft the weight will keep swining and probably hit them anyway, but probabily not as hard.
The only way I can see to get a true parry against a flail is to parry the weight itself, which strikes me as extremely difficult.
Any thoughts on this?
I'm not gonna waste my time parrying your flail. I'll either void, parry your arm, or cut to your arm. Actually, I would more than likely void and counter cut to your arm, you can't swing at me a second time if the arm holding the flail is lying ruined on the ground. If not the arm, then the leg, or the hand. Or as a last resort, I'll wait 'till the foe is in recovery, drop my sword and grapple/use a dagger to throw him on his head/stab him in the eye.
Flails are dangerous weapons in all rights, as are almost all other weapons derived from farm implements. Also, since the flail is so flexible, I don't want that chain or chord to wrap around my blade that would hang me up too long if you had friends I didn't know about. Last thing, don't fixate on the weapon, don't attack the weapon, attack the man behind the weapon.
Ahhh, I'd forgotten about the "ignores two blocking dice" part, thanks for reminding me.
It was a highly hypothetical question really, in an realistic case I'd do exactly what Salamander says, but since you CAN do it I was wondering what would happen if you actually DID.
Hmm.. Knowing absolutely nothing about fighting with flails and stuff..
"Ignores two blocking dice" is very cool way to handle sword parries etc. However, isn't blocking something you do with a shield? I see how the ball is very difficult to parry with a sword or staff, but a shield should be able to do it much easier.
My rule: flails ignore two parrying dice. Blocking is done normally.
Overdrive,
The reason for the ruling, I believe, is to represent the intentional use of the flail's short chain to wrap around to the inside of the shield and strike the target anyhow.
I think it would make sense to "Ignore two blocking or parrying dice.
I think Turin is on the right track. But I would personally still try to steal initiative and cut your arm off, or go for a counter or full evade and start the round over.
You might, but the NPC noob conscript with his first shiny pike probably wouldn't :)