BRONZE Weapons/Armor? | EN World Tabletop RPG News & Reviews
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What effects would BRONZE have if I wanted to impliment BRONZE Weapons and Armor instead of the usual metals they are made of? Less damage? Easier to break (less hardness/hp)? Higher armor check penalty? Less weight? More weight? Bigger/Smaller Arcane spell failure???EDIT: Doh, changed Brass to Bronze. Was thinking one thing and wrote the other, heh...
Last edited: Sep 8, 2004
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Brass or bronze? I don't think I've ever heard of brass weapons.
Either way, weapons would be softer, and much easier to break - so definitely less hardness, probably fewer HP as well. You'd see a lot more hafted weapons - spears, hammers, axes - than swords, since the latter tended to be really easy to deform and break before steel came around. (not just on armor - IIRC, a bronze sword very easily bends after hitting bone)
For armor, you'd need to use a lot more material to achieve the same degree of protection, so everything would end up being heavier, with a higher armor check penalty... I'm not sure whether you'd be able to make wire with either metal that'd be useful for making chainmail, either, and complex articulated armor like full plate seems right out as well.
Yeah, I think I mean Bronze, lol... I was thinking Bronze but wrote Brass for some reason... Ok, same question then, but insert Bronze instead of Brass...
From the Arms & Equipment Guide:
Bronze weapons get a -1 penalty to hit and damage (instead of the normal -2 penalty for non-steel weapons). Bronze has hardness 9 and 20 hp/inch.
Bronze shields have hardness 9 and fewer hp than steel shields.
Bronze breastplates have -1 AC but +1 max dex compared to steel breastplates.
Nice rules for bronze, iron and top quality steel weapons and armours are in the new Goods&Gear from Kenzer as well 
Thanks, I have Arms and Equipment at home so I will take a looksee
Spatula said:
From the Arms & Equipment Guide:
Bronze weapons get a -1 penalty to hit and damage (instead of the normal -2 penalty for non-steel weapons).
This rule bothers me. If a club, which is just a blunt stick, doesn't have a penalty to hit, why should a bronze sword? I give bronze weapons the same stats as steel ones but if you roll a 1 to-hit, the edge is blunted and its critical drops to 20/x2. If you roll a 1 again, it breaks.
Anyone care to post the Kenzer rules?
Aaron
The to-hit penalty is due to the fact that D&D rolls both the chance to strike and the chance to penetrate into a single "to-hit" chance. It's the same reason why heavy armor = higher AC = less chance "to hit", while in RL heavy armor means you get whacked more (harder to dodge), but fewer of the whacks do significant damage.With bronze, you do get swords, quite a lot of them in fact, but they're all short swords. Bronze works OK for short, heavy blades but doesn't have the necessary stiffness/springiness for a long, thin blade.
Oh, and bronze weapons are cast in a mold, not hammered into shape on an anvil. So you tend to get a lot of identical swords (and spears, and axes...), and a one-of-a-kind, masterwork/magical weapon tends to really stand out from its fellows.
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