D&D cultures make no sense

[Talisman]

I did read the entire thing. I was merely pointing out that "forest elf" works just as well as "plains elf." "Some elves do live in forests" and "Elves should really live in the desert and the plains" is considerably different from "Elves can live in the forest just fine."

Forest anything as a universal trait is really dumb, because forests try to kill you.

So does every other environment on the earth. The only ones without big nasty wildlife are the ones where the environment itself is trying to kill you. Add in things like shapeshifters, mindscrew monsters and the myriad horrors of the Underdark and there are, literally, no safe places.

My take on this is that elves learn to use the rapier to fight each other. Bows are crappy to duel with, and elves typically eschew heavy armor. Rapiers are dueling weapons that elven nobles poke at each other with; when they have to fight dwarves, humans or monsters, they use longswords (their other racial proficiency).

This is a decent rationalization for it, but it still doesn't explain how the tradition got started. The idea here was that we backed out of the D&D/Tolkien cultures and tried to figure out what they would definitely arrive at. Their arbitrary dueling weapon could just as easily be bare fists, knives, or greataxes.

Why do they use bows instead of bolas, boomerangs, spears, atl-atls or yo-yos? Because they do. Rapiers are basically scimitars that can be finessed; with their racial Dex bonus, it makes perfect sense that elves would invent them and use them.

Lets assume they started with knives. As civilization progresses, knives give way to big knives and then to swords (spears exist as well, but since swords and spears coexisted in the real world, this works). Elves, being high-Dex and average-Strength, would naturally favor weapons that could be finessed - weapons that played to their strengths. Elven smiths crafted thinner and lighter blades until the rapier was born.

This makes as much sense as spear-wielding dwarves.

Given that it's a fantasy world with flying, fire-breathing lizards in the first place, I'm not too worried about whether forest elves are logical or not. Forest-dwelling elves and axe-wielding dwarves may not have ever actually worked in the Real World, but they're fantasy archetypes and they're kinda cool.

Using flying, fire-breathing lizards as an excuse for nonsensical humanoid cultures is for sissies!

[Orion]

All that's needed to make Rapiers reasonable is Elves having good metal.

Seriously, the Estoc was a thin thrusting sword way befor erapiers were invented. It was shorter and thicker, sure, but designed to punch through armor. Presumeably a mithril or adamantine rapier would work fine against armored opponents.

[name_here]

I did read the entire thing. I was merely pointing out that "forest elf" works just as well as "plains elf." "Some elves do live in forests" and "Elves should really live in the desert and the plains" is considerably different from "Elves can live in the forest just fine."

Forest anything as a universal trait is really dumb, because forests try to kill you.

So does every other environment on the earth. The only ones without big nasty wildlife are the ones where the environment itself is trying to kill you. Add in things like shapeshifters, mindscrew monsters and the myriad horrors of the Underdark and there are, literally, no safe places.

Well, he's something to consider: in the desert or on the plains you can see them coming. it also makes using bows harder, because while you can use your longbow from treetops, you can't shoot it as far because of the trees and you can get ambushed by a jaguar

My take on this is that elves learn to use the rapier to fight each other. Bows are crappy to duel with, and elves typically eschew heavy armor. Rapiers are dueling weapons that elven nobles poke at each other with; when they have to fight dwarves, humans or monsters, they use longswords (their other racial proficiency).

This is a decent rationalization for it, but it still doesn't explain how the tradition got started. The idea here was that we backed out of the D&D/Tolkien cultures and tried to figure out what they would definitely arrive at. Their arbitrary dueling weapon could just as easily be bare fists, knives, or greataxes.

Why do they use bows instead of bolas, boomerangs, spears, atl-atls or yo-yos? Because they do. Rapiers are basically scimitars that can be finessed; with their racial Dex bonus, it makes perfect sense that elves would invent them and use them.

or maybe they do because they have the hight to use an even better longbow than was used to utterly massacre French knights at Agiencourt, which is a superior weapon vs. armored people to the above.

Lets assume they started with knives. As civilization progresses, knives give way to big knives and then to swords (spears exist as well, but since swords and spears coexisted in the real world, this works). Elves, being high-Dex and average-Strength, would naturally favor weapons that could be finessed - weapons that played to their strengths. Elven smiths crafted thinner and lighter blades until the rapier was born.

This makes as much sense as spear-wielding dwarves.

no, because while a phanlax is a deadly force if it can guard it's flanks, the rapier does not punch through armor. it did not exist until after knights finally admitted they had been made obsolete for a very good reason.

[angelfromanotherpin]

no, because while a phanlax is a deadly force if it can guard it's flanks, the rapier does not punch through armor. it did not exist until after knights finally admitted they had been made obsolete for a very good reason.

Um, what?

Dude, the rapier emerges during the 16th century and hangs on through the 17th. Neither heavy cavalry nor plate armor are admitted obsolete by the 16th century, or even by the 17th.

Plate armor could be made proof against musket fire from as close as 30 yards. Knights stopped being the mainstay of armies because they were more expensive than they were worth, not because they stopped kicking ass.

Rapiers are a poor battlefield weapon against enemies in formation, but that's not usually a problem in a wooded environment, since the trees will break the formation for you.

[baduin]

Rapiers proper are a specialised duelling weapon which can be used ONLY to duel unarmed opponents. It is useless against shields, armor, in forest, during battle etc. It can be taken as given that no D&D character will use a rapier ever.

Generally, when somebody speak about "rapiers" they mean weapons called today "sideswords" or "cutting rapiers" or "sword rapiers". They could have typical rapier guard, but had bit broader and shorter blade, which could be used both to cut and thrust. It was a very popular military weapon, used often against armored opponents.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Side-sword

[name_here]

Browsing around wikipedia makes the issue of weapon classifications more confusing, because it looks like the only major diffrence between a side-sword and a longsword is average blade length is 10-30 cm shorter than a longsword and it is used in one hand more often than two hands, although the pommel of a side-sword can't be used as a club.

[Talisman]

Rapiers proper are a specialised duelling weapon which can be used ONLY to duel unarmed opponents. It is useless against shields, armor, in forest, during battle etc. It can be taken as given that no D&D character will use a rapier ever.

...except in a duel.

I get that rapiers aren't useful for armies or for monster-whackin'. But they are great for dueling with an unarmored opponent. To me, this fits elves perfectly.

[name_here]

alternatly, the elves simply do not use rapiers, nor have invented them, because they are only good for dueling and elves are just fine with using longswords for that.

[Surgo]

Why do we give a shit how weapons were historically used in the real world?

[angelfromanotherpin]

Why do we give a shit how weapons were historically used in the real world?

Suspension of disbelief?

[Surgo]

All this bitching about how the rapier is sooooo unrealistic the way it's used in D&D, and not even a mention of the spiked chain or even the scythe? Come on.

(As for me, I don't care a whit about its realism or lack thereof.)

[JonSetanta]

This is why I hate elves so very much along with dragons. Hobgoblins could one day reach this level of hatred, but since they're not sexually fetishized as much as elves and dragons I can deal.

But it's OK, you see. They get a 'dead level' in the form of a Level Adjustment, which makes then equal to every other character of the same total level. This makes it balanced.
Ha! Haha. Ha.

Agreed. OnePiece's biggest strongpoint is its uniqueness. Note that I didn't state 'originality': nothing coming out of Japan is original these days.

[Caedrus]

Why do we give a shit how weapons were historically used in the real world?

Suspension of disbelief?

If it's suspension of disbelief you're after, you have to keep the Rule of Cool in mind: The limit of the Willing Suspension Of Disbelief for a given element is directly proportional to its degree of coolness.

This is why it's totally okay for you to, say, break the square cube law constantly to fight giant monsters or have Charles Atlas superpowers for your higher level "mundane" classes or to have, you know, outright magic. So, the real question isn't just if it's historically accurate for rapiers to be used just for duels or not... it's also if you think rapiers are "cool enough" or not. Same goes for scythes and spiked chains and such.

In any case, I think I'm going to put my vote in the "not cool enough" crowd. *Shrug*[/i]

[baduin]

Spiked chains I won't comment upon. The problem with rapiers and scythes is mostly due to misunderstanding.

Most people distinguish the rapier from the sword by the guard, not by the blade. Everything with a rapier-like guard is usually called rapier. There is no need to use the "technical" definition of rapier in D&D. And the swords with rapier-like hilt handle quite differently from typical longsword, because you hold them differently - with the finger over the crosspiece, on the blunt part of blade called "ricasso".

http://weaponsofchoicetheatrical.com/rapiers.htm
http://www.armor.com/2000/Catalog/item111.html
http://www.armor.com/2000/Catalog/item142.html
http://www.armor.com/2000/Catalog/item164.html
http://www.armor.com/2000/Catalog/item162.html
http://www.artchive.com/artchive/V/vela ... s.jpg.html

As a contrast, a civilian duelling rapier:
http://www.armor.com/2000/Catalog/item127.html

Scythes were very popular as weapons, but always set upright, with the blade parallel to the staff.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_scythe

The idea of using an unmodified scythe as a weapon came probably from people reading about war-scythes without realizing that they were not identical with the farm tool.

[Amra]

Good catch, baduin 8)

[Judging__Eagle]

The cool thing about medieval scythes is that they're traditionally a metal blade tied to the wooden handle via four holes arranged in a square in both the pole and the base of the metal blade.

Untie the rope, rotate the blade 90 degrees, then retie the blade to the handle. Instant polearm.

All peasant armies are automatically equipped with polearms.

[duo31]

I was referring to elves having enough wood to make the ammo, not the bows themselves. What with ammo rules in 3.5 and all.

Elves aren't awesome, they make shoes. They should all be named Al and hate their lives.

Long lived races like the elves should be treated like Galapagos Tortoises or Olgier. They take forever to make decisions about the world outside their little enclaves and otherwise are distracted by hugging/ singing to trees/rocks/water holes/etc. And thus rarely reach high level. They take 150-200 years to reach sexual maturity and have extremely low fertility. Thus they are cautious and hide from the world lest they go extinct.

[Crissa]

Why are races that are short-lived automatically awesome and long-lived ones insular and lame?

Look, I don't care either way, but there's no reason to say long-lived characters wouldn't reach awesome any faster than anyone else - if they learn as fast as anyone else.

Old dogs can be taught new tricks.

-Crissa

[Judging__Eagle]

As a species, the fast-breeding ones are 'awesome'. They have few individuals who are awesome however.

As individuals, the long-lived species are awesome, b/c they have the time to get there.

Also, a bodyguard of Ogre Gardeners is both hilarious and awesome. I mean, Ogre Gardeners, as an elite combat unit?

Of course, Robert Jordan simply made his elves and dwarves into Ogres; his anthro-humanoid monsters into 'orcs' that he called trolls; he used the Fremen and made them .... irish? (why are desert dwelling people red-headed at all? it makes no sense, selective skin pigmentation and their environment would make them tanned as hell, they'd constantly be dehydrated due to having low nasal air intake (yeah, big noses help keep you from dehydrating, while mouth breathing dries you out).

Anyway, jordan just stole shit and used it poorly. Everyone buys it b/c it's long and not as bad as a Mack Bolan pulp or the unreadable trash that is .... ron hubbard (I seriously forgot L.Ron's name, then I remembered it to my dismay).

[angelfromanotherpin]

Of course, Robert Jordan simply made his elves and dwarves into Ogres.

I'm pretty sure the elves of the Wheel of Time are the Aelfinn and Eelfinn.

Elves aren't awesome, they make shoes. They should all be named Al and hate their lives.

There's no 'one true way' to do any element of a fantasy setting, but I think if you're going to include something, make it awesome instead of lame. If the only way you'll include something is to make it lame, just leave it out.

[Username17]

There is a profound difference between being able to bring enough power to avenge an attack vs. having enough power on hand to stop an attack as it happens. Small numbers of powerful heroes are great for the first, and not that useful for the second.

-Username17

[Crissa]

...Although, if the attackers know there are a number of heroes there, that probably works better to prevent an attack.

I dunno, do you attack the port with the hero or the one without?

-Crissa

[Draco_Argentum]

Attack the one whose heroes are in some dungeon leveling up.