warhammer

[Jusmak]

Which spirit magic spell is right for warhammer?

a) bladesharp

b.) bludgeon

c) neither

d) both

[soltakss]

Normally Bludgeon, as a War hammer is normally treated as a crushing weapon.

Of course, turning it around and hitting with the spike would need Bladesharp and means it could impale, but generally RQ warhammers aren't treated that way, for simplicity's sake.

[styopa]

By gut I'd have said bludgeon but I see your point. 

[Jusmak]

10 hours ago, soltakss said:

Normally Bludgeon, as a War hammer is normally treated as a crushing weapon.

Of course, turning it around and hitting with the spike would need Bladesharp and means it could impale, but generally RQ warhammers aren't treated that way, for simplicity's sake.

Yes, this is what I thought. I have not actually used warhammer in runequest before with my characters, so I read actual weapon description. There it says. "This weapon often has a spike rather than a flat head at one end, and so is used like a pick instead."  What I remember reading about historical warhammers and use of those, those really are and used like a pick. Got confused a moment. 

If I spefically want to use it like a pick, impaling with it, but have bludgeon-spell, do I receive any bonuses from spell? Or other way around, cast bladesharp and use blunt head...?

Maybe simpler solution is to use spell only to one or other end of the weapon...

 

[Mankcam]

Bladesharp for the pointy end, and Bludgeon for the blunt  hammer end

Edited March 7, 2017 by Mankcam

[styopa]

8 hours ago, Jusmak said:

Maybe simpler solution is to use spell only to one or other end of the weapon...

Maybe a simpler solution is just to have a SINGLE spell that enhances "a weapon's" to hit and damage, instead of having particular flavors for 'edged' and 'blunt'?  It's magic.  

Besides (for example) the bulk of the damage a 2h sword is doing has nothing to do with the keenness of its blade.  In fact, many historical 2h sword techniques would be impossible with a razor-sharp edge.

Which spell are you using for a morningstar?   Or a garrotte (there's no 'blade')?  What about a shovel?

I know, it's against the sacred canon but whatever.

[Jusmak]

1 hour ago, styopa said:

Maybe a simpler solution is just to have a SINGLE spell that enhances "a weapon's" to hit and damage, instead of having particular flavors for 'edged' and 'blunt'?  It's magic.  

Besides (for example) the bulk of the damage a 2h sword is doing has nothing to do with the keenness of its blade.  In fact, many historical 2h sword techniques would be impossible with a razor-sharp edge.

Which spell are you using for a morningstar?   Or a garrotte (there's no 'blade')?  What about a shovel?

I know, it's against the sacred canon but whatever.

Huh, luckily question is about warhammer.  But I'll come back with question about spade, if situation rises. That may be particularly tricky... Or just skip spirit magic and use boost damage instead. I am not really understanding what bludgeon-spell actually does to a weapon. By making a blunt weapon more blunt is not easy to follow logically...

 

[g33k]

1 hour ago, styopa said:

Maybe a simpler solution is just to have a SINGLE spell that enhances "a weapon's" to hit and damage, instead of having particular flavors for 'edged' and 'blunt'?  It's magic.  

Besides (for example) the bulk of the damage a 2h sword is doing has nothing to do with the keenness of its blade.  In fact, many historical 2h sword techniques would be impossible with a razor-sharp edge.

Which spell are you using for a morningstar?   Or a garrotte (there's no 'blade')?  What about a shovel?

I know, it's against the sacred canon but whatever.

I am willing to abandon canon, but this isn't one of my preferred places to do so; in fact, I might even add MORE spells to the standard suite...

Because Runes.

===

Bludgeon comes from Darkness.

Swords - Death Rune (and Separation).  It's the "Bladesharp" spell, clearly!  And I note with interest that (I suspect unintentionally) blunt "mortar & pestle" is used not only to crush, but to mash-things-together, opposite in many ways.

What then Fire/Sky?  Speedart.

I'm really seeing a very Gloranthan pattern here!

###

Hence my thought to make MORE spells rather than combine to a single spell.... it would need an Earth/Axe spell, and a spell for the flexi-waterweapons.

I confess that differentiating an "axe" from Bladesharp & Seperation seems... inobvious.    Possibly WRONG.  <sigh>  

And it had seemed SO promising, since for whip / flail / net we could create a spell "Wrap" or "Bind" and apply a bonus to immobilization or suffocation ...

So maybe the single-spell approach is the right one, after all?  

 

[styopa]

10 hours ago, g33k said:

I am willing to abandon canon, but this isn't one of my preferred places to do so; in fact, I might even add MORE spells to the standard suite...

Because Runes.

===

Bludgeon comes from Darkness.

Swords - Death Rune (and Separation).  It's the "Bladesharp" spell, clearly!  And I note with interest that (I suspect unintentionally) blunt "mortar & pestle" is used not only to crush, but to mash-things-together, opposite in many ways.

What then Fire/Sky?  Speedart.

I'm really seeing a very Gloranthan pattern here!

###

Hence my thought to make MORE spells rather than combine to a single spell.... it would need an Earth/Axe spell, and a spell for the flexi-waterweapons.

I confess that differentiating an "axe" from Bladesharp & Seperation seems... inobvious.    Possibly WRONG.  <sigh>  

And it had seemed SO promising, since for whip / flail / net we could create a spell "Wrap" or "Bind" and apply a bonus to immobilization or suffocation ...

So maybe the single-spell approach is the right one, after all?  

 

I'm fine with that, just make the full set of associations with (as you say) Death Rune solely and uniquely for swords - nothing else buffs swords, and the Death rune can't buff anything else.

It makes a very nice sense, I like it.

[Jusmak]

13 hours ago, g33k said:

I am willing to abandon canon, but this isn't one of my preferred places to do so; in fact, I might even add MORE spells to the standard suite...

Because Runes.

===

Bludgeon comes from Darkness.

Swords - Death Rune (and Separation).  It's the "Bladesharp" spell, clearly!  And I note with interest that (I suspect unintentionally) blunt "mortar & pestle" is used not only to crush, but to mash-things-together, opposite in many ways.

What then Fire/Sky?  Speedart.

I'm really seeing a very Gloranthan pattern here!

###

Hence my thought to make MORE spells rather than combine to a single spell.... it would need an Earth/Axe spell, and a spell for the flexi-waterweapons.

I confess that differentiating an "axe" from Bladesharp & Seperation seems... inobvious.    Possibly WRONG.  <sigh>  

And it had seemed SO promising, since for whip / flail / net we could create a spell "Wrap" or "Bind" and apply a bonus to immobilization or suffocation ...

So maybe the single-spell approach is the right one, after all?  

 

This actually sounds more way of Glorantha and like it. So, to find right spell (in my case of warhammer) is to find out runes it carries with it. So, there comes a little story... but seems to require a bit more work. (and maybe ending up with failure) But anyway I got idea how bludgeon could be explained logically, by "mashing things together."

[styopa]

6 hours ago, Jusmak said:

This actually sounds more way of Glorantha and like it. So, to find right spell (in my case of warhammer) is to find out runes it carries with it. So, there comes a little story... but seems to require a bit more work. (and maybe ending up with failure) But anyway I got idea how bludgeon could be explained logically, by "mashing things together."

It does require more work, but I think it nicely supports and sustains the runes that suffuse Gloranthan existence.

Of course, we also have to be willing to set aside precepts from a nearly 40-year-old game that - let's be honest - wasn't nearly as deeply dissected (like this) as we're able to do collaboratively today.

I almost guarantee you that if we set, for example, a key rune to each weapon group (spears, swords, axes, bows, etc) we will find incongruous cults whose favorite weapon doesn't match metamythically...That's a place for a retcon, imo, in pursuit of an OVERALL better rq4.

[Al.]

Warhammer seems appropriate to Lodril (Smith - Earth and Hammer and Fire - Lava and impaling)

The broader question I think (unusually to me) is to leave almost as is: Bladesharp makes the edged weapon sharper, Speedart the impaling weapon pointier, reducing resistive forces and so I'd apply to Spears as well, Bludgeon adds mass or possibly velocity but certainly momentum to blunt weapons (so I'd include rocks)

Maybe the Lodril Cult version of Bludgeon applies to Warhammers, but everyone else has to choose Bludgeon for the Blunt end or Speedart for the spike?

Edited March 11, 2017 by Al.

[g33k]

Speedart is missile-specific, not pointy-stabby-specific.

If it flies through the air -- whether shot or thrown -- Speedart enhances it.

[styopa]

6 hours ago, g33k said:

Speedart is missile-specific, not pointy-stabby-specific.

If it flies through the air -- whether shot or thrown -- Speedart enhances it.

FWIW the more I think about it, at least in my conception, I could see Spirit Magic being inconsistent and wonky - ie a "weapon buff" spell from a local cult that uses warhammers might just work on both the pointy and bludgy bits...but not on a sword or a mace.  Bladesharp for any bladed thing (whether or not the sharpness of the blade) bludgeon for blunt (unless it flies through the air like a sling bullet) etc....spirit magic is, by its essential nature, inconsistent from place to place, and from cult to cult.   

Divine spells are easy, they only work for whatever weapons that cult uses, end of story.  I could see a cult where the favored weapons are broadsword and bow have a single buff spell that works on both, and only those.  Or maybe only those if wielded by a cultist, etc.

SORCERY, on the other hand, *has* to be about runic relationships and a logical underpinning. The sort of rune = weapon relationship you were talking about before.

[Joerg]

9 hours ago, Al. said:

Warhammer seems appropriate to Lodril (Smith - Earth and Hammer and Fire - Lava and impaling)

I wouldn't bother to give a hammer separate weapon stats from a mace or weighted club. The warhammer that has been discussed was a special weapon designed to penetrate full body plate armor, which is not something anyone practicing Spirit Magic in Glorantha is going to encounter.

Unlike in a Viking setting, we don't have any deity wielding a hammer as their weapon, either.

Spiked maces or clubs work exactly like the beak of a mediaeval warhammer.

The huge hammer used in Roman gladiatoral games to shatter the head of a supposedly slain combatant (in order to avoid fake coups-de-grace) is a big, two-handed maul. It didn't usually figure as a weapon in combat situations.

9 hours ago, Al. said:

The broader question I think (unusually to me) is to leave almost as is: Bladesharp makes the edged weapon sharper, Speedart the impaling weapon pointier, reducing resistive forces and so I'd apply to Spears as well, Bludgeon adds mass or possibly velocity but certainly momentum to blunt weapons (so I'd include rocks)

Bladesharp adds a point of Separation damage, Bludgeon adds a point of impact damage to a wielded weapon.

Speed(d)art is about accelerating missiles and doesn't apply to hand-held weapons. Both Bladesharp and Bludgeon require the weapon to be wielded, not thrown.