While I can accept your point it is very much the fantasy convention that "two handed weapons = more damage but less finesse". 40k is basically a fantasy setting. Now, I accept that it is based off flawed stuff created during the 19th century, but that doesn't bother me. Now, if a "realistic" Medieval setting (or one which is meant to reflect it more accurately) carried out the same transgressions I could see the reason for the ire, but 40k isn't one. Heck, its one where swords are meant to be an acceptable alternative to shooting someone in the face, so isn't really a setting concerning itself with realism much.
so let me get this straight...
Frostfire said:
Well it isn't hard to be more realistic than 4e and more simple. You also forgot more fun. It's really easy to be more fun than 4e.
But I digress. Well written my friend, well written You touched on a lot of very good points *clap* *clap* *clap*
Thanks.
Pounding every bone in my hands flat with a hammer would also be more fun that 4e, though...
Gargarath said:
I think you are greatly overrating the weapons in the dark ages and so on. First off, none of them were ever sharp, neither two-handers or one handed blades. They were mostly used as clubs, especially if the opponent had armour, which then the weapon would bludgeon him to death. The reason to why swords have an edge isn't to cut, but to diminish it's striking surface. Operating on the principle that the lesser the area, the more force is channeled into that area, as a knitting needle could penetrate plastic easily while the back end of a pen would have more difficulty.
Digression on pet subject (again):
Erm. No I'm not. I'm not sure where you got your data, but it's completely incorrect and founded on massively out-dated Victorian ideas that have been proved wrong. The only swords that aren't sharp that spring to mind (barring parade, wooden, or training pieces) are Tucks.
The people 500 years ago were not any less capable of thinking and creating the right tool for the job than we are. If you want to pierce the bit of plastic you mention, do you do so by hitting it with the edge of the ruler? No, because it's clearly completely the wrong approach, as would be hitting mail with a blunt sword. The people of the era created a variety of VERY sophisticated tools for killing people with. If they wanted to beat someone to death through armour with a blunt weapon, they would use any of the dozens of tools created for the job, such as flanged maces, warhammers or poleaxes: All of which do a great job of putting a MASSIVE amount of force over a small area in a way that's far more effective than using a straight, blunt bit of steel.
Anyway: You tend not to bludgeon people in heavy armour to death. You put them on the ground after stunning, sweeping, tripping, or grappling them, and then put something very pointy in their armpit or face (after the initial lance-charge, full-face helms were normally discarded in favour of something open-faced, because it's a nightmare to fight in a full-face helm, as well as massively exhausting). Or move on, and let your men at arms do it for you. Blunt weapons can stun or kill on head-strikes, but that's the number one location where people don't want to get hit, and so is well defended. Knees, elbows and other joints are the best target zones for blunt weapons: The armour is poor at protecting such joints and the bones are near the skin, making them easy to break.
Swords have edges to cut people who are not wearing much armour. If your foe is wearing armour, then there is no point slapping the edge of a blade into them, blunt or not, as armour is designed to stop blades (real swords don't cut through mail), and in the course of 2000 years of armour development, people figured out that it was a good idea to wear padding in conjunction with armour to stop blunt trauma. If swords could hurt people through armour, why would people walk around wearing 30lb of mail? People wore armour because it worked really, really well. The only thing that you get if you hit mail as hard as you can with a katana is a katana which needs looking at by a swordsmith. If you want to kill someone in heavy armour with a blade, you do it by hitting the places where there isn't any armour with a thrust. Or you use any of the other parts of your sword in order to stun them, trip them or otherwise get them on the ground.
tl;dr: No. Swords are sharp.
Additional: You mentioned 'Dark ages' specifically. That was 400-1000AD ish. We hadn't got around to inventing blast furnaces then, so if you wanted a good sword you'd need to scrape together the small fortune to buy a composite pattern welded one. Part of the point of pattern welded blades is to have a very sharp, strong edge, in order to cut with. Pattern welded swords are works of art that take enormous effort to create; they have a flexible composite core, with stiff, brittle edges, just like Japanese blades. If you just wanted to beat someone with it, why spend two months making a composite steel blade when you could just use a softer blade of iron?
Of course, as soon as we invented blast furnaces, it all became a bit moot. We could make better blades in much less time. The Japanese never got around to creating steel in the way we did so were forced to spend another 800 years fiddling around making folded steel blades long after we moved on to better things.
Siranui said:
tl;dr: No. Swords are sharp.
I now know your weakness, and will use it against you should I find the need to derail you in the future
Repeated stuff unnecessarily.
In the grim darkness of the nightmare future of the 41st millenium
There is no attempt at realism
There is nothing even coming close to real world manufacturing techniques
There is only, the rule of kewl.
Oh, and war.
Orrrr..Everything you have been told is a lie.
borithan said:
Repeated stuff unnecessarily.
Clearly it wasn't, considering that someone was still holding onto the idea that people of 500 years ago were any less smart at figuring things out than us.