Weapons Designs

[Mike Holmes]

About time for a weapons post. Give us your favorite. This thread had a lot of interesting notes about designing weapons.

Here's one to start it off:
Atlatl - spear throwing device. In general use the thrown stats for the spear or javelin used, and modify as below.

ATN: Thrown spear +1
Range: double the range of a thrown spear before reducing ATN
Damage: Same as spear thrown +1
Prep Time: As readying thrown spear, then 5 rounds to load and cock back the weapon properly

That's all just off the top of my head. Someone correct it.

Hey can bows and such be used as clubs to defend?

Mike

[Valamir]

5 Rounds to load?

What are you loading?
Isn't this device simply a lever?
You hold a short rod in your fist with a hook on so that its parallel to the ground.  Set the spear on top of it so that the butt end is up against the hook, and then fling.  <insert variants using wound cords and such>

I doubt it would require any noticeable time to prepare for someone well trained with it.

[Mike Holmes]

Rounds are very short in TROS. As I recall an arrow takes a few rounds to ready from the quivver and to nock and fire. Atlatl's are pretty clumsy; I've tried it myself. I was actually worred that I hadn't made it long enough.

Readying time is zero if you have on in hand. Or a round if there's one stuck in the ground nearby. Something like that.

Anyone else? Am I way off here?

Mike

[Thirsty Viking]

Rounds are very short in TROS. As I recall an arrow takes a few rounds to ready from the quivver and to nock and fire. Atlatl's are pretty clumsy; I've tried it myself. I was actually worred that I hadn't made it long enough.

Readying time is zero if you have on in hand. Or a round if there's one stuck in the ground nearby. Something like that.

Anyone else? Am I way off here?

Mike

I have no experience with this myself, but ....Standing here and trying to go through the motions I imagine were use to prep...  I think that the quiver of javilins would be worn on the hip,  if worn on the back the javilin would need to be flipped if the points were down.

pull javilin   1 rd from hip/ground
set javelin   1 rd
cock javelin 1 rd
Reduce Prep time by one rd reflex/TN of 8   costs 2 mp
refreshing begins with cocking
Quiver on back  +1 rd
Flip javilin          +1 rd

I'm not familiar with javelin fletching there may be a reason they have to be fletching up....   wear the quiver on your hip.  It makes less difference with an arrow,  but go through the motions of lefthanded draw and javelin knocking and youll feel what i'm saying.
Anyway this gives a prep time of 2-5 rds ...  a rate of fire 1 rd slower than a long bow.  then again it hits harder too.

From a time trade off, it's harder to shorten the prep time for the thrown spear, and since it takes two hands to propperly knock you don't have the in hand advantage for a second shot.   I also assume that people doing this to feed themselves on a regular basis, or training for military overcome the clumsy feeling and get quite profiecent at the knocking...  Feel free to assess  time penalties to novices.

Just my take on the weapon....

[Jasper]

I tested out an atlatl a few months ago, and although I was, like Mike, pretty clumsy at first, I watched a guy who wasn't too bad, and I would say that Thirsty Viking's estimate is pretty ressonable.

[Mike Holmes]

I tested out an atlatl a few months ago, and although I was, like Mike, pretty clumsy at first, I watched a guy who wasn't too bad, and I would say that Thirsty Viking's estimate is pretty ressonable.

Yep, sounds pretty good to me.

C'mon, people, more weapons!

Mike

[Thirsty Viking]

C'mon, people, more weapons!

Mike

Thanks for the vote of confidence on the atlatl timing...  hmmm ok here is my weapon submission for FoB.

BlowGun

Hollow tube used to launch a needle dart at an opponent.

Prep time  4-5 rds
1 rd get needle  2rd if needle is already poisoned
---  2 rds to Coat in poison  1 rd if poison is in open container conviently placed
1 rd to load in blowgun
1 rd to drawbreath and cock gun starting MP refresh

2mp dice to reduce prep time 1 sec at  Reflex/Tn 9 to shorten the time by 1 sec..  failure jams needle in blowgun... Fumble you poisoned yourself.

Efective STR N/A
DR according to poison used on needle.
Armor effectivness:  chain can only be penetraed where no gambeson is employed  such as a typical chain cowl.  Treat this chain as AC3.  
Plate is impenatrable but a blowgun.

The blow gun is relatively silent.  Percepton to hear usage TN 7 + 1 per each RANGEMODIFIER yards range from the wielder.

On the odd though that EN might have something to do with lung capacity I offer the following odd ruling and open myself to criticism :-)

RANGEMODIFIER = 1 +  (EN/3  as alway round DOWN)
ex.    En 3,4,5  have range modifer of 2
ATN 8 + 1 per Range modifier

Hitting with the poisoned needle is not affected by toughnes, the NEEDLE does no more than damage level 0 though ... allow 5 success to the back to feel like a bug bite where the Target can't scratch.


No personal experience with blowguns...  but this was a fun concept