11/10 would buy again since the Alpha 0.1 
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You are not correct here! There are A LOT of evidence in history of European swords breaking in combat.
You can’t assume that every sword in the Middle Ages was forged from pure steel, neither it was heat treated with utmost success.
And I meant that steel back then was of very poor quality compared to MODERN steel, not between Europe or Japan or anywhere else. Modern steels are way better in every aspect (wootz steel aside), but even nowadays there are some rare cases of sword breaking when cutting very hard targets or in stage combat (check youtube).
So, don’t say it is impossible to break a sword in battle, because it is fully possible, although rare.
And as @213 nicely said I didn’t meant just random breakage, but logical and comprehensive possibility of breaking instead.
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There were even common tactic for breaking ones sword. If it got stuck on enemy shield that guy with shield would take a step or two towards you thus bending sword a lot and if not really good made sword it would brake.
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Well maybe not bend since Longswords or European swords were not designed like katanas. They didnt have soft middle part to have the swords as sharp as possible. Katanas, people say are amazing, but if you hit a hard surface with them, then they will bend and you wont be able to use them. Samurai warriors usually had two swords with them, knight had one and a dagger/knife. European sword if well made would not shatter on impact, it would take long time for a sword of a good quality to break. It was not easy to break them, you would have to hit a hard surface the WOULD NOT MOVE, in a sword fight when you parry or block with your sword, it often softens the impact. However there are cases of swords breaking in battle, one of the reasons the knights were also trained for hand to hand combat, as in my sword breaks, I have to take down my opponent and stab him in his face with my dagger or im dead.
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That’s why they would most likely break when stuck to shield and pushed from shield guy cause they were not made to bend at all. Ulfberht for example was made with similar steal like damascos swords had.
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This is like 400 years before the game took place though. Although i dont completely agree with @ThomasAagaard that swords never broke it would be way less common for them to break in the 1400s then to break when the vikings were still around. Most vikings used axes anyway for the reason someone said above if a low quality sword got caught in a shield it could break. Only the rich vikings used swords which were high quality.
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You have some strong points. Metallurgy in 1400 is way better than metallurgy around 900, but consider the fact that famous “Ulfberht” swords were forged probably from wootz steel (the so-called true damascus) which is considered one of the best steels of all time used for swords. A recent scientific study has discovered nano particles in the steel which has much to do about its renowned properties. Unfortunately, the ancient technology of wootz steel is forever lost to mankind, but I hope someone would figure it out eventually just like that person in the video does.
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As from my experience we broke 3 swords in 5 years of heavy usage. And i think they were broken because of wrong angle on hitting and material failure. Swords are flexible and can take a lot of punishment, there are swords in our group that took 6 or more years of punishment and didn’t break. And some that broke after a month because of material failure. If swords will be degraded in this game after sword fight they can not be simply resharpened, after taking some dmg the sword will have damaged edge. And the swords of lesser quality should break more often than higher quality swords. As you sad much depends on material that will be used for the sword.
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my hema group breaks quite a few of swords, and it is pretty much at random, for all intents and purposes. there’s usually an obvious cause but you never know when the material is going to fail, and thats with modern steel.
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Some of you should reread the original post.
yes, he did suggest that things break at random.
Did things break in combat? offcause. But it did not break randomly like the OP suggests.
Weapons are made to work. If you buy a new sword and know that it is so likely to break at random…
Would you be willing to trust it with your life?
We already know that sharpening will be in the game.
Sure add durability so weapons and armor do break with time. But the risk of breakage should not be there until an item gets low on durability.
HEMA:
when a sword break it often look random, but it should be weapons that have been used for training for years. so well used.
(if not, then you should get hold of you smith and get him to replace it)
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Yeah, by “random” I meant just like what you said above.
Weapons and armor should have some form of durability and after a prolonged use (abuse) they should be prone to breaking. I in no way meant that equipment should break all the time, nor that it should break completely out-of-the-reason.
For example - you buy/forge a new quality sword and you use it wisely (not hitting plate armor with it) and it should probably last you a gameplay. But if you get/make a low quality sword and abuse it all the time against plate armor and heavy shields without maintaining it, the sword should be more prone to breakage.
The breaking chance should depend on the quality of the item, abuse it takes from battle and a small random percentage just for intense - not to be a fixed situation where your item’s durability is low and you know exactly when it would break, because that’s not very realistic nor interesting.
That was my initial idea.
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But please Warhorse i beg of you don’t make it like Dead Island where your weapon brakes after hitting a zombie twice with it. This was incredibly annoying and time consuming. I had to constantly be running to some place to repair my weapons and it would take me for ever to kill a zombie because of the low durability.
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Breakage mechanic is a pretty complex thing - like all other physical phenomena when we try to model it scrupulously. I am by no means an expert of the field, and especially have much to learn in historical metallurgy, so although I gave a thought about the issue, but take everything I write with a grain of salt. 
Durability would be a nice feature indeed, but I’m sure about one thing: No HP (or anything like that) for weapons, like as it is present for example in Dark Souls - I am basically okay with everything else, even with no weapon breakage at all, but HP is the worst.
Basically, metals can have in theory two different states and everything inbetween: either rigid or tough. I am saying “states” and not “properties”, because even a tough metal (I’m unsure if this is the correct term in english, when the material’s breakage surface is something like a pasta, and the energy required to break it is relatively high) can become under various circumstances (irradiaton, repeated bending, cold temperatures [steels of this time might not even need extremeky cold weather to do so, but I don’t have any hard data on hand] etc.) hard but rigid, so the suface of the breakage is crystaline.
What I am saying is that failure can’t only look like hollywoodish “Oh hey, look, my sword broke just in the middle of the blade!”, but I remember many bent swords from museum photos as well (the time frame, of course, is another question). That kind of a serious breakage may indicate material failure, like slag remains inside the material from the smithing, cracks, micro-cracks from the heat treatment or a thousand other things which I totally forgot about and probably less plausible, like hydrogen in the material.
People tend to believe too that when you throw the glowing blade into water, it will become amazing, but naturally, not every material can be hardened, and even if they do, results may vary depending on the initial parameters. We have to also keep in mind that the metallurgy of the era had simply less means of controlling and reproducing the same exact quality of the material itself, without any processing.
Lastly, I would also point out, that simply mechanics-wise (so pretending homogeneous material) almost any swords most critical point in terms of breakage is the connection of the tang and the blade, so this point, where the stress gathers up, when we add force to the blade:
Anyway, a bent sword (how easily it bends, it depends on the geometry of the blade also, of course) is easy to repair (but it’s material might stay the same, and the more flexing, the more possibility to actual breakage), a broken one not so much, but with a grindstone really you can just repair the edge - and even with a sword with a f*cked up edge is still dangerous enough to not simply downgrade its damage to half of it’s original’s.
Gameplay-wise as of creating new blacksmith’s wares, maybe Henry might have a freedom of selection between different material qualities from different locations, different mines, this and the simplicity or ornateness of his works could influence the prices, but it’s all just wild ideas and guessing without historical backing, and I doubt it will come into play anyways. My main point is still only: No HP for equipment! Rather a quasi-random (low) percentage of chance of some sort of damage that slightly goes up with heavy use. Or really, anything but HP.
I would like to make a shout-out for something almost no game handles at all though, and it is faaar more of an issue than exploding swords under a very short amount of time:
rust.
Yup! I would love to see rusting in the game, even with a simple(?) texture overlay. It doesn’t have to affect too much, but it could be a pain in the ass, as it is in reality, going out in the rain, and just after one day I have to clear all my sh*t again, because the longer I wait, the worse and deep it might get.
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Your post is very educational!
And your suggestions about rust is purely awesome!
I was wondering @TobiTobsen will you have to maintain your bows? Like waxing the string and will you have to replace the string? Because that would be really cool.
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Good idea!
At the moment you can damage the arrows,… you have an broken arrow.
It would be much cooler if there is a visual differenz between an broken and an “good” arrow.
The arrow should break at an “bad” impact into pieces or if they stuck somewhere and you try to remove it (but not often). Maybe you can recycle parts of the arrows and set it up again.
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I would like to see some splintered and broken arrows myself, but someone reminded me the first time I mentioned it that damaged arrows don’t always have visual damage.
Arrows can split inside of the shaft compromising the arrow you may now notice it until you attempt to fire it again.
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I was recently playing Fallout 3 and i think it has a really good armor and weapon damage system. Its not too extreme like dead island and finds a good balance.
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I’m currently replaying the System Shock 2 (modded) and i have to admit that the weapon degradation feature is a bit limiting/infuriating (especially with randomly generated enemies) - unless you invest at least few experience points into the repair/maintenance skills - you can be left very soon with very little… (come on - how quickly the usual gun can really degrade?!)
On other hand - it prevents the rambo style game-play & adds to the suspense - it happened few times that the weapon got stuck before the last moment… and i had to run and try to wrench it
so although there is that realistic feel to be considered, I think it shouldn’t dampen the game-play fun - there is tight balance to be kept
Finally - what I read is the swords can get stuck in the opponents body rather easily - would you prefer to have this in game as well (for the sake of reality)?!
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Yeah they really need to find a good balance between dead islands weapon system (weapons break every five seconds) and like the game you mentioned. I hope you have to go back to a forge every time you need something repaired because that would add a lot of realism.
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