The cut down weapon selection with double ups like the halberd and glaive tells you everything about how martials are treated in a system made by wizards.
Absolutely love the musical and narrative vibes of this video. Very Ahoy-esque. I’d also be interested in a further exploration of possible reflavorings of weapons that match a similar profile. After all, it’s RAW: “Certain monasteries use specialized forms of the monk weapons. For example, you might use a club that is two lengths of wood connected by a short chain (called a nunchaku) or a sickle with a shorter, straighter blade (called a kama).” You did mention guandao and war scythe, but there are many other possible options like the billhook, partisan, atgeir, or bardiche (among several other dozen sword-staff type Polearms) that could inspire players with interesting options for their characters weaponry beyond simple statistics.
Much like another commenter here, I stumbled across your videos randomly one day I don't regret it at all! You managed to split the balance between weapons history and role-playing tabletop gaming applications without going too heavily in one direction or the other.
some ideas for: Long Sword: Half Sword technique switches the damage to stabbing, perhaps with less damage, but better chance of hitting and less range. But advantage in wrestling Greatsword: good against multiple opponents. Swords could also have a defensive component because you can parry better with a sword than with other weapons Polearms could also have a bonus if more than one person in the group uses one
Yes, the Glaives and Halbards should be different. Different number of dice should help. Glaives can be 2d4. They do less max damage but are more consistent and critical damage would be more consistently higher too due to more dice.
So my 2 copers on tbe whole "3d10 could be overpowered" bit, low level fights are kinda meant to be swingy and most low level fights are already trivialized with a good crit Also an advocate of handing enemies the same upgrades, the dice giveth and taketh all parties bits away
One thing to consider is that you can stab with the glaive; obviously, you can (probably) stab with a halberd, but the top spike is technically separate from the axe blade and could follow separate rules (as per improvised weapon rulings). Since the glaive would be used to stab with the same blade that it cuts with, it would make sense to include a piercing attack as part of its design. Another option is putting your "Cleaving" mechanic onto the Glaive and Greatsword, rather than the Axes; as I mentioned, the narrowness of most axe blades is fairly constraining to a weapon's ability to hew through a target. Longer blades with a more completely flat profile could more easily slash through a target and deal damage to adjacent enemies. My last idea is mostly for flavor, focusing on synergy for a single particular build: Samurai, historically, were mounted archers; favoring the use of the Daikyu ("long bow"), they specialized sniping their enemies through gaps in armor. In turn, when they engaged in hand-to-hand combat, they opted for the long naginata, using it to slash at the undefended legs of an enemy samurai or when combatting other lightly armored adversaries. If the Glaive (and potentially, Longsword) were a finesse weapon, it could theoretically fit into the arsenals of Dex based fighters looking to emulate the feel of a Samurai.
Halberds getting a damage versatility option (Variable is the keyword my current googledoc mess uses for this property) seems to be a pretty common tweak to make them more fancy in other's works, whereas pikes tend to get more brunt damage abilities in kind. I assume it's in many ways part of the weapon fantasies tied to the three martial reach weapons that lead to this, much like Glaives tending to get Finesse.
@@gratuitouslurking8610 I mean, I would argue that the Glaive is the most potentially deadly, given its tendency to slice off limbs. By contrast, pikes would offer better range and halberds tended to be better against armor. Unfortunately, D&D can't really simulate the comparative lethality of glaives and swords without more comprehensive armor, range and crowd control systems to offset the superior damage of decapitating slashes. Plus, then you're competing with the greatsword as well...
Brought by the algorithm, glad I stayed. Great video, sir. Well done. The glaive is my favorite Fighter weapon and I've loved the guandao, naginata, and other such weapons for years as a lifelong Guan Yu/ kung fu/ samurai film enthusiast, . You made good recommendations, but I would have included one more: a sweeping attack of some sort. I've skinned this cat before, but I'll let others figure it out. As for glaive vs halberd, I've always been of the mindset that both are about reach and power, but the former is about dynamic momentum while the latter is about multifunctional shock. Regardless, well done.
To add my 2 cents: russian "sovnya" on 4:15 is a bit of a nothingburger. It was coined by a historian officer in early XIX century, with no concrete evidence to the word ever being used in relation to a weapon.
One of the tweaks I've seen pretty commonly is tweaking the Glaive to make it fit under the Monk Weapon categories, making it a Finesse weapon option for polearms due to it's strong ties to the eastern side of the weapon inspirations. This does admittedly usually come with the cost of removing Heavy, and thus in theory offering an easy way for smallfolk races to up their damage with martial weapons, but alternatively you can also choose to remove the Heavy property limitation off your Monks later somehow as well.
