Question RE Sword, War

SableWyvern said:
As to simple/martial/exotic not being based on ease of use, I find that somewhat difficult to accept. In fact, I think that this is exactly what the categories represent, and the only thing I have come across that does not fit into this system is the crossbow in Conan.

Weapon categories are, like everything else d20, an abstraction. They are based on a combination of both ease of use and availability/prominence, the theory being that even if a weapon is difficult to use it is "easy" to learn how to use it if you are exposed to it every day and that is what weapon proficiencies really represent: learning to use a weapon regardless of how difficult it is (and this is espically true for proficiencies gained from your first class level which represents all your childhood trainning.)

For example, consider the Staff (simple weapon) and the Bill (martial weapon). It isn't really all that much harder to learn how to use the Bill than the Staff, in fact many of the forms are quite similiar (this being attributed to the commonly held theory that "all martial arts are one martial art" or put another way "there are only so many ways to kill a man with a sharp pointy stick" 8) ). However, any schmuck can find a straight piece of wood and practice with it and indeed many people probably do just that growing up, it is probably not unreasonable to imagine that many people can learn a thing or two about staff fighting from an uncle or an older brother or something and recieve trainning that way. But you are not likely to own a Bill, nor recieve any trainning with it, unless you are part of, or trying to become part of, some fighting force. IOW take levels in a class with martial weapon prof.

Which brings us back to x-bows. In Hyboria x-bows are specalized weapons designed to bust armor (light x-bow takes a full round action to reload in Conan, the heavy takes three) and most people are not likely to even see one, let alone handle one, unless it is being held by a soldier or guardsman. Regular folk use hunting bows or throwing spears for killing game. It is totally a flavor thing, in Conan's world you just don't run into that many x-bows so they are martial weapons.

Hope that helps.
 
Sutek said:
That's a Finesse attack, not a called shot. Unless you somehow use the Cover rules to simulate called shots, it also doesn't look like such an attack is an option in Conan.

Where are the rules on Called Shots in Conan?

Calle shots make baby Conan cry :cry: :x :evil:

And they are an even worse idea in Conan than in normal DnD because they would step on the toes of finesse fighting.

Now a feat to make a ranged finesse attack sounds more like what I would expect. Man I hope I get my copy of AE soon.

Later.
 
That was kinda my point. Called shots dont' exist in the Conan RPG. The way you manage the same effect is to use a Finesse weapon.

The Atlantean edition existance of a ranged feat (above via Shonuff's kindness) makes me smile though. Bow user seem to tend to get the short end in most d20 games.
 
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