Sidearms

[WITCHCRAFT]

I'm not going to research and write a thesis on why this should get changed, but many warriors from different lands/periods would carry a smaller sidearm in addition to their primary weapon. If you were fighting in a tight corridor or grappling with someone, a more maneuverable dagger or similar weapon would be better than your unwieldy sword.

Every now and then you'll see someone running around a server with a katana and wakizashi (their sheaths match up and look real cool!) or very rarely someone with a long dagger to compliment their cut-only 1H sword. 2H and polearm users would have to give up some of their chosen WPF to one handed if they wanted to do this, and in most cases it's not worth it.

Is there some way to make this play style more viable? Buffs to "sidearm" type weapons might make archer/melee hybrids a little more doable as well.

Just throwing an idea out there. Anyone else think it would be a nice little flourish to the melee combat system? Or would it be a worthless sink of devs' time? Would it actually add any complexity to combat?

[Shatter]

What do you mean by buff or make viable? It's easy to say "this needs a buff," but if you don't say how, it's hard to judge your idea.  The thing about sidearms though is that you only use your sidearm when you lose access to your main weapon (ex: your katana is knocked out of your hands, you draw your wakizashi or you are an archer, so you draw your sidearm in melee). Sidearm weapons are not supposed to be as good as main weapons or they wouldn't be sidearms. I don't think buffing them would add anything to the game. The only result I can see is that  they are buffed enough that people would use them as a main weapon, which defeats the purpose.

[ArchonAlarion]

Sidearms would be more effective if most other, larger items had longer sheath and unsheath times.

[H3ADSH0T]

They would be viable if the game wasn't based off of statistics. If your wooden practice sword had 50 cut you'd still be using it. Its all pretty arbitrary and nothing escapes to add variety outside of speed, damage, and length.

[FRANK_THE_TANK]

You can use a long dagger with no PS and no WPF and still fuck a fool up in a tight space.

Long dagger is viable, just like half swording but most people don't bother. A good player just won't put them selves in a situation where a dude with a dagger can blow them away. If your running into a gate house up stairs with a massive polearm your a bit wrong in the head TBH.

[Okkam]

It's simple, just make all weapons breakable. This will make any sidearm an important thing.

[HUtH]

It's simple, just make all weapons breakable. This will make any sidearm an important thing.

this would be good(maybe) from gameplay point of view, but it's too much unrealistic...

I run with simple dagger(cause long does not fit the belt ) always, just for fun, and i used it only few times, because there was no reason, even fighting in some corridors with 2h...

[Okkam]

this would be good(maybe) from gameplay point of view, but it's too much unrealistic...

I'm quite sure that I can break any spear-like weapon with axe or maul for example. Also weapon can stick (and it takes time to extract sword or pick, so any fast player can kill you in one stroke), someone can disarm you, every knockdown must force you to drop weapon et cetera.

Sidearm is RL term. Not our fantastic unbreakable wepons (at least we have breakable shields)

[Ptolemy]

I would carry a waki for the style if it wasn't for how expensive the damn thing is. I'm not paying upkeep for a weapon I never use and only slows me down, just because it looks cool.

[Ronin]

Vikingr mod has breakable spears. I can't see why we can't have something similiar.

[JennaHaze]

You can block great long axe with wooden stick

[WITCHCRAFT]

I guess it all boils down to a secondary weapon being dead weight (it's not much weight but still, if you aren't ever going to use it...) and the fact that people are more skilled with their main weapon they've been using forever than a random fast weapon.

I don't know what would be "buffed" or "balanced" because players don't want to bother adding equip weight and they don't want to switch weapons in the middle of close combat.

e: Tried carrying a dagger as light lancer cav. With light lance and a decent shield you have 4/4 slots used. Sometimes the light lance is effective when you lose your horse, but against some builds you won't land a single hit. Managed to down two people by dropping my lance and thrusting with a dagger when I got de-horsed. Guess it's "viable" in the sense that you can carry 0 slot weapons as a backup when your main items are not suited for fast 1v1 fighting.

[Phew]

Only slightly related to the OP, but I think repair chance should be proportional to how frequently you actually used the item in combat. Daggers and stuff shouldn't break from sitting on your hip the whole round.

[zagibu]

I think if hit distances and angles were fixed, sidearms would already be a lot more viable. Currently, all you have to do in a tight situation is bend over and slash your opponent's feet and you have a high chance of a successful hit, even when he's right in your face. Imagine polearms for which only the head does damage, and the shaft just bounces when you are too close to the enemy.

[ArchonAlarion]

I think if hit distances and angles were fixed, sidearms would already be a lot more viable. Currently, all you have to do in a tight situation is bend over and slash your opponent's feet and you have a high chance of a successful hit, even when he's right in your face. Imagine polearms for which only the head does damage, and the shaft just bounces when you are too close to the enemy.

Yes, although the hafts of polearms are useful in checking opponents, tripping them, and knocking them down.