Just wondering how this is going to work in game, particularly with swords. Obviously in the more fantasy RPGs like skyrim, you start off with a metal sword and upgrade through glass and end up somewhere around dragon bone with increases in stats necessitating these upgrades. Since this is aspiring to historical accuracy do you just have your sword that you can, theoretically, keep for the whole game? Or do we have to keep upgrading based on quality of blacksmith?
Yeah i am wondering that too, i suppose some historical inspiration might be taken in that regard, iron->refined iron->steel->refined steel->Wootz->Damascus steel.
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I guess Iâm hoping for an upgrade path in the form of the weapon type. Start off with a pitch fork and work your way up to a steel sword that you keep for the rest of the game since. Maybe have it be a unique design that shows nicks in the blade and general wear as time goes on? Have them be really expensive so if you lose it somehow you have to use a crappy rusted sword until you have saved enough to buy a replacement.
I suppose this could be similar to KOTOR. Where you start with a viroblade and then get a lightsaber pretty early on, and pretty much stay with it for the rest of the game.
The high tier backers are given special swords. Could see the sword being given at the start of the game, meaning the upgrades would be by reinforcement or by giving access to new types of weapons (pikes, axes, etc).
Are the special swords also in-game swords? I thought they were, you know, actual swords. Something to hang over the mantelpiece to go with the dead bear on the floor.
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Went to Kickstarter to confirm. Seems like the swords are real, not ingame. Sorry, my mistake. http://i.imgur.com/UeRVZ1w.png
Gave the Kickstarter page better look while at it. Under âSkill-based mini-gamesâ it says you are able to forge, sharpen, and repair weapons. There is also talk about potions and ointments in the same section. Would this mean something akin to Witcherâs weapon system where you can sharpen the blade and then apply venoms? There is a mention that you have multiple weapons to choose from, which gives me the same impression, as in Witcher you change between silver and steel sword to gain advantage, but here you would change from warhammer to sword for instance.
Guessing there isnât any equipment progression outside of unlocking better gear and applying buffs.
I didnât see anything suggesting high-tier backers will get special in-game swords.
Those are real swords, i would never spend that much money on something that doesnât exist.
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Exactly! Maybe sharpening it would be the equivalent of changing your lightsaberâs crystal. Maybe you donât get to tinker with stats at all. Will be interesting to see.
Well, they already said youâll be able to forge your own weapons (youâre the son of a blacksmith after all), and they also said that crafting will be âskill-based and affected by the playerâs statsâ.
Most likely you will need to learn how to craft the different types of weapons. Maybe another blacksmith can teach you if you pay him enough, or maybe you can find âblueprintsâ in the world (though iâd prefer learning from NPCs).
Then there could be different materials as suggested by AhmadKhan, so a steel sword will certainly have better stats than one made of iron.
Also, since crafting is skill and stat based, your first one handed steel sword will most likely deal less damage and have much less durability than, say, your 20th one handed steel sword (even though itâs technically the same type of weapon, made from the same type of material).
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Yeah sounds sensible. I do like the idea of having my sword, unique to me, that stays with me through the whole game, perhaps the whole trilogy but I suppose that stifles progression like you outlined.
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I feel that it may be possible to have one sword through whole game and not impact the progression. Crafting isnât just making new sword from scratch. It can be also improving and sharpening your current sword.
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I think you should be able to improve any given weapon to a certain degree. Maybe you canât take your very first dull sword and upgrade it all the way to expert level (that would be slightly unrealistic), but it would be nice if you could upgrade it like 1 or 2 âlevelsâ, so you donât always have to forge (or buy) a completely new sword (same goes for armor of course).
Also i think it would be nice if the NPC blacksmiths themselves had a certain skill level. So letâs say you are in this little village, and the local blacksmith âCrappyâ can make decent horseshoes, but his weapons are barely good enough to kill animals or defend yourself against bandits. Heâs cheap though, so if you donât have a lot of money you still might want to buy one of his swords, because a crappy sword is still better than nothing. Or maybe people told you that there are two blacksmiths âFancyâ and âShinyâ in the next town, so you may want to save your money until you get there (or you can buy the sword from âCrappyâ and get an upgrade from âFancyâ, which would probably still be a little cheaper than his swords).
I like the sound of that. maybe get Shiny and Fancy to show you their technique so you can forge your own high quality swords. Also I like the idea of quality being shown by reliability, e.g. a crappy sword is ok for fighting people with pitchforks but will snap in half if hit by a Fancy two-handed sword.
I think it would make sense if they had dual standards for weapon qualities. That way you could make dull low quality short sword into sharp low quality short sword by sharpening it, but into not sharp excellent short sword since that would involve reinforcing it. Also it would make sense if you could reinforce the weapon only up to a certain level.
Could be probably doable for armors too. The durability of fine armos would go down slower than of low quality, meaning you need to repair more often.
Yeah, so a sword can be dull or sharp (or anything in between) and obviously even the best sword needs to be sharpened now and then (but less frequent than lower quality swords).
And it would have a quality level, which can also be improved, but only to a certain degree.
so a âlow qualityâ sword can be upgraded to âmedium qualityâ, but thatâs it (a sword that was medium quality to begin with, could be upgraded to high quality). On the other hand, you wonât be able to change the material, so you canât turn an iron sword into a steel sword.
Well, no weapon is unbreakable. Every sword will fall apart at some time and some damage is beyond repair. Better and more expensive sword has better durability, but even it will deteriorate. âImmortal swordâ would be a pure fantasy!
I donât think it would make much sense to âupgradeâ weapons in the context of a realistic setting. I mean how would that actually work in reality? Repairing and sharpening them, sure, and possibly adding poison or something⊠but that doesnât seem like quite the same thing.
Sharpening, changing pommel and wrapping. Custom fitting the part you hold (I donât know proper English terms). There are some possibilities of reforging the weapon, but as far as I know this is problematic if the steel was tempered.
Realistic option would be switching individual parts of the weapon, like a blade, grip, guard or a pommel. It is mainly about alternative appearance, but it could also alter balancing or different finesses with a guard. But Iâm afraid, it would be difficult.
Sword +2 is so last yearâŠ
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