Modular "polearm" option

[sharp lantern]

I've seen a lot of talk about weapon customization or custom weapon creation, and while that DOES sound like lots of fun, a slightly more simple option, with still tons of potential would be a bit of modularity on some weapons.

Instead of having a specific bardiche, spear or halberd, you could have a standardized 'polearm' option, wherein you can both alter the shaft it has and the head attached to it. Like this, you could combine the available polearm heads with the different sets of shaft length to make weapons that play differently, their cost being the sum of the pole's cost and the head's cost.

As an example, something like this has a lot of potential permutations, with only 2 sets of variables that are simple-ish:

• Very short pole (Bardiche size) 8 points

• Short pole (Twin Blades Size) 10 points

• Medium Pole (Dane axe size) 12 points

• Long Pole (Spear/Halberd size) 16 points

• Pike Pole (Stupid long, unwieldy) 18 points

• Dane axe head 1 points

• Short spear head (twin blades style) 1 points

• Sica hook head 2 points

• Battle Axe head 3 points

• Bardiche head 5 points

• Naginata head 7 points

• Long spear head 8 points

• Partisan head (Similar to a short sword)10 points

• Halberd Head 12 points

An advantage this system could potentially have as well, would be the ease of adding variants along the development journey. Awl pike heads, partisans, winged spears, tridents, naginatas, glaives, billhooks, you name it.

[sharp lantern]

A thing that slipped my mind is:
The options this enables only grow when things like blunt damage are in the picture. Suddenly the same system makes sense for hammers, maces, or just regular ass bashing your fellow man with a big stick

[night lintel]

big stick go brrr

[sharp lantern]

Welp, now that blunt damage is in the roadmap, this really starts feeling like it can expand that way

[gilded relic]

omg this is actually great

they can also add more blade/heads

• lucerne head
• Italian billhook
• hammer head
• flail

they can even make everything modular

but longer handles / heads cost more points to construct

[sharp lantern]

Heh. Imagining a comically long poled flail now..

[vapid olive]

Take inspiration from Exanimas new "weapon factory" it uses a modular system to randomly generate an innumerable amount of combinations in game.

[sharp lantern]

Was using the weapon resizer mods a bit, and even something as simple as scaling down a spear by 25 to 30%(in length only) drastically altered how it played along my more close range focused spear moveset.

A slightly shorter spear really feels like no other weapon we currently have, sure it does not carry the same inate value in reach as the longer variant, but the ability to be effective at a slightly shorter distance, while keeping some agility and taking advantage of sudden one handed thrusts really makes me want to be able to see the possibilities we could unlock by allowing people to change the lengths of their weapon's poles.

[sharp lantern]

Honestly, something like just being able to choose the current weapons, but have a pole length slider(not a float value kind, like a stepped one where each step is one point in the cost) and being able to have longer/shorter weapons like that would be very nice.

[rustic jungle]

I mean, a float value is probably easier to make than predefined models

[sharp lantern]

I don't mean predefined models, just set lengths within a float system so a polearm doesn't end up costing 21.22134 points

[rustic jungle]

Ah yes

I mean it can be solved by forcing the point usage to be a "round number"

So if it ends up costing 21.22134 points it would get rounded to 21

[night lintel]

i'd be worried abt folks trying to get, for example, 21.49999... to get as long of a polearm without an increase in point

[rustic jungle]

True

Maybe it should snap Inch by Inch

Like the slider would be from MinLenght in inches to MaxLenght in inches

Or cm

And each inch could cost a point (?

[night lintel]

unless it sets the polearm length to the length corrosponding with the rounded number (a 21.499... point polearm would round its length alongside the point value)

so when a 21.4... point polearm length is in effect, it snaps its length to 21 points too. it'd be somewhat inconvenient though probably

[sharp lantern]

Considering the spear and halberd we have are a little over 2 meters, i'd say each point should be about equivalent to 10 centimeters, so reducing the halberd pole from 2.2m to 1.7m makes the price go from 24 to 19, for example

Actually maybe even a little more, like 12 to 15 cm, but i wouldn't know without being able to play with an actual slider to size thing.

[night lintel]

it's both a price and utility exchange. for a shorter range, you have more points to use on armor, as well as more utility in short range fighting

[sharp lantern]

Yeah

[night lintel]

my big worry would be folks pumping multiple dozens of points into the shaft length to make their spear or halberd stupidly long, and abusing high speed retreating/kiting to make it physically impossible to get them, at least with current leverage

[sharp lantern]

I feel like that would be mitigated with a min/max size for them, as well as the weight changing a bit

[night lintel]

that would work

[opaque moss]

posting to show my support! this is a great idea

[sharp lantern]

Updated the lengths reference to something that preserves the current cost of polearms, of course this is all speculation but it would look about like this:

• Very short pole (Bardiche size) 8 points

• Short pole (Somewhere in between) 10 points

• Medium Pole (Dane axe size) 12 points

• Long Pole (Spear/Halberd size) 16 points

• Pike Pole (Stupid long, unwieldy) 18 points

• Short spear head (twin blades style) 4 points

• Dane axe head 3 points

• Bardiche head 6 points

• Naginata head 7 points

• Long spear head 8 points

• Halberd Head 10 points

But if we're considering balance changes i would alter the Dane Axe head price to 1, reducing it's overall price to 13, and the bardiche head to 5, reducing it's assembled price to 13 as well.

With altered prices

• Very short pole (Bardiche size) 8 points

• Short pole (Somewhere in between) 10 points

• Medium Pole (Dane axe size) 12 points

• Long Pole (Spear/Halberd size) 16 points

• Pike Pole (Stupid long, unwieldy) 18 points

• Short spear head (twin blades style) 3 points

• Dane axe head 1 points

• Bardiche head 5 points

• Naginata head 7 points

• Long spear head 8 points

• Halberd Head 10 points

[rustic jungle]

This is actually such a good suggestion ❤️‍🔥 , I hope it gets implemented someday 🥹

Like, Being able to customize your weapon would be like having 3000 different weapons

[limber marsh]

Agreed. Failing that, they would need to "group" weapons together and just have a dropdown list with an image of the head/tip, etc.

[sharp lantern]

• Very short pole (Bardiche size) 8 points

• Short pole (Twin Blades Size) 10 points

• Medium Pole (Dane axe size) 12 points

• Long Pole (Spear/Halberd size) 16 points

• Pike Pole (Stupid long, unwieldy) 18 points

• Dane axe head 1 points

• Short spear head (twin blades style) 2 points

• Sica hook head 4 points

• Bardiche head 5 points

• Naginata head 7 points

• Long spear head 8 points

• Halberd Head 10 points

This would give access to a bill style weapon

[neon pond]

I cant wait for hammer ti be added

[sharp lantern]

I hope we do get some form of this sooner or later

[sharp lantern]

With people asking about different lengths of naginata in the threads, i got reminded of this, having a way to alter the length of the polearm shafts(with point changes) would be very neat

[sharp lantern]

https://discord.com/channels/1176885784473776199/1435679540788592791 this idea showed up again