Cost is one of the few statistics actually provided for weapons in the LBBs. I had an idea today for using cost to differentiate weapons when they all do d6 damage:
On an attack roll of 1 (natural), a weapon must make a saving throw to avoid being broken. The score for the save is 16, which is extrapolated from the saving throw tables in Monsters & Treasures, where a +1 weapon saves with a 14, +2 with a 12, etc. Each weapon can add its initial cost per Men & Magic as a bonus to the save. So a club (not listed with a price) would get no bonus, a spear (1 gp) would get a +1, a battle axe a +7, a sword +10, etc. This would give an incentive to buy more expensive weapons if possible because they would less likely to break, and also to have back-up weapons. I like the idea of weapons breaking and needing to be replaced after a while, so this would simulate the wear on weapons - the more times used, the more chance for eventual breakage.
[cross-posted to OD&D Discussion]
This is actually a pretty decent idea! I may have to borrow this for the upcoming S&W game I'm trying to get together
ReplyDeleteReminds me of the old German "Das Schwarze Auge" system where weapons could break on a successful parry. But yours is easier to manage, that's for sure.
ReplyDeleteThat, or something like it is a great idea. Though even a starting character with only 30-180 GP's would be STRONGLY advised to buy a two-handed sword--it breaks only 1 out of 400 times, as opposed to a regular sword that breaks 1 out of 67 times or a spear that breaks 1 out of 29 times.
ReplyDelete[cross-posted to OD&D Discussion]