The Big Boring Dual Wield Thread

Yes, as long as I get my mates around...

For what it is worth, Shield Bash at -1 Str as a Strength skill is on
the list for the next campaign's testing.

I really like the shield-bash idea. It was used in historical battles, so it makes sense.

I still like the idea to make sheild bash a permanent weapon skill instead of a skill which can be obtained with an upgrade..

I believe this could solve the dual wield drama AND the armor problems.

Setup:

• -1 to hit when using both arms
  
• +1 AS for one-handed weapon and shield or buckler
  
• Shields and Bucklers grant +1A just like using two weapons if the weapon is neither two-handed, unwieldy or difficult to use. The extra attack is resolved at -1S (or probably half S rounded up?) and -2 on injury rolls (resulting in knocked down and stunned only).
  
• Armor grants post-battle injury save
  

What do you guys think?
A problem if have not yet thought about is the viability of morning-stars, THWs and Spears.
Hm.. this set of rules would probably make all henchmen carry club+shield for reliable stuns..

So maybe something like this:

• -1 to hit when using both arms
  
• +1 AS on all armors in hand-to-hand
  
• Shields and Bucklers grant +1A just like using two weapons if the weapon is neither two-handed, unwieldy or difficult to use. The extra attack is resolved at -1S (or probably half S rounded up?) and -2 on injury rolls (resulting in knocked down and stunned only).
  
• (Armor grants post-battle injury save?)
  

Any input?

Well, it only makes Shield/bucklers better than DW, and everyone will go Shield + handweapon.
Who will want to pick a halberd or DHW now? Everyone will go for Shield and axe basically. I mean, for the price of 5g?
I can see Shield bash as a skill perhaps, but not anything more.
I still find the so called training rule the most reasonable sollution. Though -1 to hit to both A are a close runner up.

I cannot understand your argument concerning THWs and halberds. Would you care to elaborate that a bit closer?

On the one hand you say "-1 to hit on all A is a close runner up" but in my proposed ruleset suddenly they are underpowered. The ruleset also has the -1 to hit modification. Why are THWs and halberds worse then?
The availability of a very weak second attack with shields shouldn't have impact on the dual-wield/THW decision.

With the DW training option you get +1A with concussion for 18g.
In my sencond proposed idea you get +1A with -1 to hit on all attacks at -1S which cannot OOA (and a 6+ save) for 5gc.

I have mainly fluff-related problems with the training for gc rule. It doesn't seems to fit into the style of rules in which mordheim was written (imo). Furthermore it keeps DW as the best option one wants to get. It is just harder/more expensive to get, but doesn't make the weapon options more equal.

I have no problem with ditching the idea if it is a bad one. But please try to elaborate why you think its bad in addition to THAT you think its bad

Edit: Imo THWs, halberds and morning stars still have their place as armor negators. And armor will be more prominent when shields are more common. Furthermore the axe might be favored above the usually picked club..

Well, I never said that your whole concept stunk, and neither do I think it does.
what I meant is that it is my belief that your suggestion encourages shield + hand weapon instead of DW, thus making it the best option and still excluding the Double handed Weapons. But maybe I'm missing out on something here?
I was hoping to find a, not completely balanced, but more dynamic sollution.

Well, that isn't really fluff wise, the fluff is quite clear. Fighting with a weapon in each hand is a difficult and a warrior need an adequate training to be able to this. Therefore any warrior may at any time

Game wise however I agree it might feel a bit corny, but as RationalLemming pointed out it is slightly similar to the mutations of the Possessed. And I mean, it is not that radical, really!
Well, even if the option is really good, you now have a relation to a price, as earlier pointed out, and therefore it will compete with other options.
When standing between an extra man or having a 2 man henchmen group dual wield, the choice gets complicated. One might argue that later on in the game everyone will get the DW training. I don't think this, it will still be attractive, but as pointed out, when you get more attacks, and perhaps your enemies have better armour and more toughness DW will hardly be something everyone purchases for each model.

Well then the axe and the shield is the most prominent combination. Axe for the armour, and shield for the extra attack/defense. I like pumping up the shield, but I really don't see why the extra attack is positive? To me it makes it to attractive.

I reworked the idea a bit and would like to point you to this thread, or rather this PDF

The shield bash now hits on a fixed 5+ and suffers -2 on injury rolls.
And the model counts as using two weapons, hence the normal attack suffer -1 to hit. (to balance out THWs, etc)

Axe and shield now results in:
5gc: Axe attack at -1 to hit and with -1AS modifier
5gc: Shield armour save 6+ and an attack that hits on (a fixed) 5+ with -2 on injury rolls

Popmouth wrote:

Well, that isn't really fluff wise, the fluff is quite clear. Fighting with a weapon in each hand is a difficult and a warrior need an adequate training to be able to this.

This is not quite accurate.

Fighting with a weapon in each hand and fighting equally well with both = difficult. Adequate training would be WS 4-5 and a skill, maybe two.

Fighting with a weapon in each hand and just using the offhand when opportunities arise = not that hard at all. Adequate training would be WS2, certainly less than WS3.

I don't know how it is for eastern martial arts, but in western martial arts fighing with the off-hand is an integral part of the training and starts shortly after you are comfortable with the basic drill moves. You don't *do* much with the off-hand weapon until you get *very* good - it is pretty much just there to parry and block - but, even if you aren't actively trying to make opportunities, from time to time an opportunity will just open up for you to strike with the offhand.

One thing I would like to see is that wielding two hands worth of weapons should pretty much *always* be better than fighting with one hands worth of weapons because it really is just better.

I suppose that's the real issue - how hard is it to fight with two weapons?

I feel that my group's houserules reflect what you've stated fairly well. If you choose to attack with both weapons, you suffer a -1 to hit with all attacks. That doesn't stop you from only attacking with a hammer in your "good" hand and holding a sword in your off hand that you only use for parrying (and you can do this without penalty, you just have to forgo the sword attack).

To attack with both without penalty, you need the skill.

Lord 0 wrote:

One thing I would like to see is that wielding two hands worth of weapons should pretty much *always* be better than fighting with one hands worth of weapons because it really is just better.

Isn't that how it is now?

Hah, silly me, I knew I would make that mistake sooner or later. I have to keep reminding myself that shields and bucklers are technically armour.

By "two hands worth of weapons" I meant either two one-handed weapons, or one two-handed weapon. Shields and bucklers are weapons that have been optimsed for blocking and parrying and you forget that they are weapons at your peril.

What I was trying to say was that, regardless of what rules we adopt, I would not like to see using one hands worth of weapons ever being better than using two hands worth (shields and bucklers counting as weapons here).

My group is currently trialling the -1 on both attacks, and I am seriously considering trying -1 only on the offhand. -1 on both seems to be working well from a balance perspective, but -1 on the offhand only fits much better for me from a background perspective. I would very much like it if the game could work when it matches background, but if it won't work it won't work. I will have to test it and see...

Well IRL it isn't necessary better. Now, my only real reference is kendo, and I know that rules for kendo doesn't apply to everything, still you see a lot more winning with the more common "one sword" style than two sword. This is mainly because it is more difficult to use two weapons, and it does tend to get confusing. But then the "normal style" is two hands for one weapon...

And for using, say both a hammer and a sword, each quite heavy I believe this would prove quite difficult, and require some extra training. A sword and a dagger I can see...

I really think there should be some penalty or limitation to begin with, and maybe a skill that can ignore this negation. Or as I proposed earlier a cost for it – this isn't totally fluffy if you consider that "anyone who can hold a weapon in each hand can use them". Still, to use them accurately I think adequate training would be necessary – though we know already that we tend to disagree on this matter

Actual weapons are often a lot lighter than generally thought.

I have seen people fighting in what (I think) you are calling the 'normal' two sword technique. From what I can see it is a beautiful, fluid, style with a great deal of interaction with both weapons and must be bloody hard to master. It is also not at all what I have in mind. To me, someone who practices dual wielding at this sort of level is someone that has, say, WS4 at a minimum, Sword Fighter, Dual Wielder, and possibly even that prototype skill I mentioned earlier where you get bonus offhand attacks.

Also, there is a difference in the swords themselves and how you can use them. Someone using two Asian one-handed swords against an Asian two-handed sword will have a harder time than someone using two one-handed European swords versus a two-handed European sword.

Because of various factors (mostly metallurgical design properties rather than skill) Asian swords of the period tended to be more vulnerable to chipping so the style of using them involves a lot more dodging and different foot work to fighting with European swords. If you listen to a bout between Asian swords and a bout between European swords the European bout will involve a lot more clanging.

Popmouth, something just occurred to me - the swords you guys use, what sort of hilt and cross-guard do they have?

Well, the weight issue is hard to debate. Sure 4 pounds doesn't sound much, but using in one hand it becomes quite heavy – still most would be trained to handle such waits, so I give you a point.

When I'm refering to kendo we use bamboo swords, so there's no "metallurgical design problem". I don't see how that would matter? Sure styles are different, but I feel that these assumptions are slightly taken out of thin air.
I mean, most of our image of sword fighting mainly comes from fiction i.e. films where sword fights tend to stretch much longer and have much more clanging than an actual sword fight would. As soon as you try to hit you expose yourself, so I think many where quite cautious when to strike.

Our swords have a quite small hilt guard, not often used, you use the blade to parry and block (though one should rather strike than block in general, or block and follow up with an attack ;P)

But really, outside kendo (and not really there either) I'm no expert. Maybe you are right that in medieval fighting bumping up to DW wouldn't be such a big leap – though I have hard to see this.

The fact remains still that DW is overpowered (or the rest underpowered) in Mordheim. At least if you measure it towards aviability.

Four pounds is a bit much. Heck, that is more than a lot of the DHW's . 2.5-3 pounds is closer to the mark. Even 1-h *axes* weren't that heavy. Remember too, that back in the day the people wielding the weapons tended to be a *lot* fitter and stronger (if somewhat shorter) than us puny atrophied future-people. This guy says it better.

While Japan had *excellent* sword-smiths their iron ore (and China's too, to a certain extent) was poo. Because of that they had to compensate for the weakness of the ore with the whole billion-folds technique (the endless folding and beating also helped remove a lot of the non-metalic impurities). Anyway, the upshot of all this was that they ended up with a blade that was plenty strong and sharp enough, but was more vulnerable to chipping than most European swords. That, combined with the whole the-blade-is-the-soul-of-the-warrior thing let to a martial art where the blade is treated with a lot more kindess than in the European martial arts.

The lack of a proper cross-guard is significant, because there are all manner of tricks you can do to tie up your opponents blade if you have one, giving you opportunities to strike with the other.

You are also right in that television combat involves a lot more clanging than IRL, but even so, western sword fighting still involves more blade contact than many medieval Japanese and other Asian styles.

yeah, I read that article actually.

Your analyzes are probably more or less correct; I believe that we are slipping away from the subject however (I hold myself responsible too).
Earlier you mentioned that DW IRL would always be better than fighting with one weapon, though I might argue slightly with that the point is that this is represented in Mordheim.
Now as the vanilla rules are the DW is not only the best, but also the only really sensible Melee choice... Now I know that you also wish to penalty this somehow, your suggestion is the common -1 to hit on both. I think it is a reasonable fix.
I thought the training cost to be good, and still do, and I can see your fluffy aspects, and somewhat I agree. Most who could pick up two weapons could use both, not good however (and this is represented with the -1 to hit.)
Still to use DW efficient one would need extra training, so I thought the training would be adequate. And more important, it put a price two that extra attack.
I think a price of 15GC would prevent many people just throwing an extra weapon to anyone, and this would solve a lot of the DW problems. For even if it is a really good choice, the price do affect the value of it.

Agh - don't have enough time to properly respond these days! So I don't have my full thoughts on 15gc-DW nor on another two DW proposals to lay out yet.

However, two points I do want to respond on:

1. "DW gives -1 hit to all attacks." Please dig back through this thread when we initially analyzed this option. The base issue is that this penalty becomes worse to the warrior as his Attacks characteristic increases, leading to the opposite of what we'd want to see with DW. This option results in unskilled (low-A) warriors using DW, while more highly-skilled (high-A) warriors dropping it.

2. The primary reason we use -1S offhand and -1S daggers is this: when attacker has same Str (e.g., 3) as defender's Tough (e.g., 3), and offhand dagger attack cannot cause a critical (requiring a 6 to wound), and therefore cannot bypass armor. This neatly closes the Critical Wound issue with armor, which is statistically significant, and should not be ignored when balancing DW/armor.

Just to clarify, always better than fighting with one *one-handed* weapon. Dual wielding vs, say, a spear I can honestly say I would rather have the spear in most circumstances.

And yes, I am going off on a tangent. I do that - particularly on subjects that are so fascinating to me.

IRL there were a wide variety of weapons used on the streets and by mercenary companies (Well, the ones that were more like gangs than military companies anyway) and if there were real life reasons to do something other than dual-wield then what can we do to model those reasons?

Also, I much prefer to make the most interesting and fun behavior in games also the most effective and nerfs and penalties are seldom fun. In any case, I am still in the middle of a round of testing so I should probably wait and see how that turns out before I start more meddling .

The more I think about it though, the more I think I will be trying just -1 to hit on the offhand and have a serious think about making the other options better.

good clarification!

Haha, I know the feeling – I tend to wander of as well.

How would you make the other options better?

wyldhunt wrote:

1. "DW gives -1 hit to all attacks." Please dig back through this thread when we initially analyzed this option. The base issue is that this penalty becomes worse to the warrior as his Attacks characteristic increases, leading to the opposite of what we'd want to see with DW. This option results in unskilled (low-A) warriors using DW, while more highly-skilled (high-A) warriors dropping it.

This, in my opinion, is mitigated by the skill option that allows you to ignore the penalty - if the warrior really wants that extra attack, he'll get the skill as soon as he can. It basically puts dual weapons in the same boat as double-handed weapons; warriors will think twice about choosing it unless they have the skill that removes the penalties but in this case dual wielding is better for low A models while great weapons are better for high A models.

Add to that the fact that it (quite fluffily) essentially limits serious dual wielding to models capable of learning combat skills, and I am a happy camper.

I feel it works quite well.

Well, at the moment the making the armour better seems to have increased all weapons except for flails and maces. Noone takes these unless they have to, eg Flagellents.

What I am thinking of trialing is making a parry a fixed 5+ save and giving Flails and Maces the special rule Cannot Be Parried. I may or may not give the same modifiers to Parry that close combat has, i.e. +1 if your weapon skill is higher, -1 if *their* WS is higher. That is going to take a *lot* of balancing though.

On the plus side, it also increased the value of DHWs and Halberds because S4 with a DHW and S4 with a Halberd and mighty blow cannot be parried by anyone S3 or less.

Also considering making shields attack offhand only at -1 Str *and* +1 armour save. Bucklers would be -1 Str, does not Strike First when charging. If it has that last thing then daggers would get that too. Both of these may or may not be a skill. If they are, Buckler Bash would be a Combat skill and Shield Bash would be a Str skill. Or possibly anyone would be able to do it, but if you have the skill then it removes the Str penalty.

May or may not give spears and halberds Support Attack. Almost certainly adding Staff: Strength as user, 2 handed, parry, concussion. Probably going to make spears and morning stars 5 gold and halberds and flails 8. DHW down to 10 perhaps. Maybe 10 + the cost of whatever they are, e.g. DH axes are 10+5=15 gold and benifit from the armour piercing rule.

All kinds of mad ideas really, but I think I will wait until I see how things turn out at the end of the campaign before I go nuts changing things.

That sounds good to me, Lord 0 - I like the idea of flails and morning stars not being parryable...

But this thread is dedicated to the rules implications of dual wielding weapons, so I'll save my other comments!

Lord0, the ideas seems nice, but the rules seem really... tangled. A lot of new stuff to keep track of and exceptions to take into account. I mean, it is a lot easier to just nerf the DW slightly and perhaps fix armour, and your quite ready to go. IMO.


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So I just finnished a couple of games using the "training" rule. Now my mate had a far more experienced Beastmen warband. My newstarted Kislev got quite the beat.
When hiring my crew I suffered at least one model for the training rule, so it definitely had affect, and locking back it would be smart to buy it later. He had to buy the upgrade retro-active.
The rule seems to prevent the habit of giving any warrior at least two weapons, though however, it doesn't seem to be a great limit for more experienced warrior.
Since we where on such different terms (a hefty 80 in difference of warband rating) it is not clear how it would tend to affect a campaign after certain length.
Still, I'm having second thoughts.

Well of course they are tangled - I haven't even *started* refining them . Heck, I barely did more than make sure the punctuation and spelling was right as it all just poured from my mind. Who knows what ideas they might trigger from you guys, hence the exposure to them now.

What I would like to see in a campaign (and therefore what I am trying to encourage by balancing and therefore relevant to the balancing of Dual Wielding) is people taking a significant diversity of weapons. Now, that doesn't have to be everyone takes one of each, or all weapons used equally, but I would like to see each weapon have a use and not just taken because there is nothing else.

I mean, in the bad old days of vanilla Mordheim, everyone did dual wielding if they could because it was just better. Further more, they would mostly dual wield spear and club.

Axes were never taken unless they were the cheapest you could afford (because clubs were not on your list). Swords were taken by casters that could not wear armour and by people that had a special rule (Mostly the Swordsman skill).

Noone ever took shields unless you had gromril armour, and noone ever bought armour unless it was gromril. Heck, often people wouldn't even wear armour, even for free - they would rather sell it than use it.

At the end of the campaign though, everyone is using DHW with Strongman if they can get it, or Halberds if the can't and *none* of the heroes dual-wield any more.

What I am aiming for in my balancing is about half starting with dual wielding, and the rest a mix of two-handed weapons, and weapon and shield. Ideally the weapons chosen will all be a roughly equal mix, but I will be happy with 1/3 one weapon, 1/4 a different weapon, 1/5 another, 1/6 another etc. Especially if what those weapons are shifts over the course of the campaign.

With the current rules trial weapons diversity has drastically increased, likewise shield use, but I would still like to see flexible weapons (flail, etc) and spears taken a bit more often. Once I get that, I will probably leave well enough alone.

My house rule for this is the second attack has -1 WS and +1 to enemy armour save, (like daggers have), and this can be negated by a new skill Ambidextrous in the combat list.