Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Commander of Chaos 09-27-06, 03:29 PM	Is the bastard sword worth the feat to make it one handed?
RobbyPants 09-27-06, 03:54 PM	Depends. Generally, I'd say no. To go from a longsword to a bastard sword, your max damage increases by 2, and your average damage by 1. If you're playing a fighter, Weapon specialization is more bang for your buck. You could take both if you wanted to squeeze out a bit more damage, but that's 2 feats. If you're looking at just 1 feat, I'd take weapon focus(longsword) over EWP(bastard sword). Although, 2 bastard swords with oversized TWF can be nice. For 2 feats (EWP (bastard sword) and Oversized TWF), you can deal 1d10 damage per hand, and have it be the same weapon (so you only need one weapon focus, improved crit, etc...). Edit: this is assuming you already had TWF to begin with ;), so it's really 3 feats.
Bulletproof_Condom 09-27-06, 04:57 PM	I second the Two-Weapon Fighting + Oversized Two-Weapon Fighting + Exotic Weapon Proficiency ([illegitimate child] sword) combo. It's very ability-heavy as a build, though, because you need a high Dex to keep taking the TWF feats and a high Strength to deal decent damage and to get Power Attack (which you really should get to take full advantage of two one-handed weapons).
Tony Vargas 09-27-06, 05:07 PM	Feats aren't worth the same to all characters. If you have a lot of other feats with similar preqs that have a higher priority to your concept; or if you just don't have many feats to begin with, feats are high-value. If you have many feats available and few that are vital to your concept, they're 'cheap.' For the Bastard Sword, yes, /if/ you're committed to using a one-handed weapon (perhaps not the best choice in games where things like animated shields are easily available), you want to do as much damage as possible with that weapon, and you have plenty of feats (you're a fighter for instance), /and/ you're not a Dwarf (they wield the Dwarven Waraxe one-handed as a martial weapon), then it's well worth one of those many feats to be able to use a slightly more damaging version of a longsword.
PhaedrusXY 09-27-06, 05:09 PM	It is almost never worth the feat.
jaelis 09-27-06, 09:16 PM	It's a good deal for a TWF ranger. They don't have the ability conflict that BC mentioned (dex is no longer required), and for them it's just a single feat requirement.
Thorak 09-27-06, 10:48 PM	I've only bothered to once, for a concept character, and only for RP purposes. Statistically, it's a pretty poor choice; you're trading a feat for essentially an extra 1 damage, compared to a longsword on average. It's a good deal for a TWF ranger. They don't have the ability conflict that BC mentioned (dex is no longer required), and for them it's just a single feat requirement. I disagree. If you're going to TWF, your best bet is either twin weapons, or a double weapon. For a ranger, with no Dex requirement, a double weapon is great, since you can use it as a two-handed weapon whenever you're not making a full attack, to squeeze out some extra damage. If I had to invest an EWP, as a TWF ranger, I'd take a Two-bladed sword, get -2 penalties for TWFing, and be at 1d8/1d8 rather than 1d10/1d6, the best you could get with a bastard sword/short sword. And with the ability to use it two-handed for 1.5x Str damage on any single attack, such as a charge or after a move. And if you mean taking Oversized TWF as well, to get twin bastard swords, I still think the two-bladed sword is better for the flexibility.
jaelis 09-27-06, 11:01 PM	I did mean with OTWF as well, though I should have said you need two feats, not one... sorry. I agree the double weapon is also good... I think it's about even. The dual bastard swords do more damage and work better with power attack. And when you know you'll be charging, you can just fight with one in two hands and still get your extra point of damage. It's close, but I think it's worth the extra feat. (Though it is also too silly for me, personally. I don't need big swords to compensate for anything.) Now if you're a dwarf ranger, you're all set either way... though the urgrosh is not really as good as the other doubles.
runestar 09-27-06, 11:10 PM	It's not too bad if your character does not have martial weapon prof, since taking exotic weapon prof: bastard sword also confers the marital weapon prof: bastard sword as well.:)
demon666fast 09-28-06, 12:18 AM	It's not too bad if your character does not have martial weapon prof, since taking exotic weapon prof: bastard sword also confers the marital weapon prof: bastard sword as well.:) Yeah, people really should have some marital weapon proficiency to get married!!! Even more when you are a guy and you wife suffers from PMS. :P
Krevon 09-28-06, 12:31 AM	I did for a tempest PrC....i was a human blender!
Joush Mark 09-28-06, 02:07 AM	Human fighters do well with bastard swords. Any fighter really has more then enough feats that the minor incrase in damage is well worth it. Orther then that, just go with your gut. Fighters tend to use feats to make themselves as good at useing one weapon as possble, so useing a feat to get the best 1 handed weapon isn't bad. Bad choice for a dwarf. Two guesses why.
__DnD4Life__ 09-28-06, 02:22 AM	Instead of taking EWP, take TWF and fight with a longsword and a sheild. Then take Improved sheild bash from the PHB, and you have rocking high AC, and can still do an average of 8 damage, with 2 feats. Alot better for a low level non-human ranger. Or, if you are dwarf, you can use a waraxe, and do 9 damage average.
Subedei 09-28-06, 02:45 AM	There is ONE and ONLY ONE instance in which I have ever found it to be worth it. The bastard sword can be used with Exotic Weapon Master to benefit from some of their nifty special abilities. You could be using a spiked chain, sure, but spiked chains are just too dumb for our tastes. Oh yeah, there's actually one other instance in which it's a good idea - If you think it'd be cool for your character to fight with a bastard sword.
Johannixx 09-28-06, 02:51 PM	The only character I've ever played with a bastard sword is a Dornish barbarian/fighter/wildlander from the Midnight campaign setting. Dorns use bastard swords as martial weapons as a racial ability, so I didn't have to spend the feat. It was useful at low levels, when I really needed the AC from a shield, and now I only lose about 1.5 average damage compared to a greatsword when two-handing it. When you're talking about an 11th-level character with a 24 Str while raging, and a +2 bane bastard sword, it's not that much. I will, however, be taking a level or two of Exotic Weapon Master, which makes the bastard sword slightly better than a greatsword. Now, instead of getting +10 damage from Strength while raging, I'll be getting +14. Boo-yah! Without the racial proficiency and the EWM class, I wouldn't think the bastard sword is truly worth the cost of admission. The one exception would be a TWF'er with Oversize Two-Weapon Fighting. At that point, you end up saving feats by only having one weapon in which to focus, specialize, etc, but it's a long-run build, not a low-level build.
Karma 09-28-06, 03:49 PM	My House-rule: The Bastard Sword is not an exotic weapon. It is a martial weapon the requires a STR score of 14 to wield one handed. Did I just nuke the longsword? I feel no remorse.
Optimator 09-28-06, 04:19 PM	I kind of like the idea of having one feat allow a character to wield the 1-and-a-half handed weapons with one hand.
Jhaelen 09-28-06, 05:10 PM	My House-rule: The Bastard Sword is not an exotic weapon. It is a martial weapon the requires a STR score of 14 to wield one handed. Why 14? What about the other exotic weapons that cannot be wielded one-handed without the feat?
Neutronium_Dragon 09-28-06, 06:12 PM	The only glitch with that is that prereqs are supposed to be odd numbers. I'd say 13+ Str, which puts you in line for the Power Attack tree at the same time. (15+ just seems too high. It's not *that* heavy.)
Fargren 09-28-06, 06:28 PM	Exotic weapons are underpowerede. The only exoticweapon that is wortha feat is the spiked chain. One point of damage for a feat is just a waste of a feat. Grab a longswod and sayit looks like a bastard sword, and call it a bastard sword, if you want it for flavor reasons.
Karma 09-28-06, 08:58 PM	Why 14? What about the other exotic weapons that cannot be wielded one-handed without the feat? Aribitrary, it could just as easily be 13 like the prereq for power-attack. Other weapons? I am assuming you are refering to the dwarven waraxe? Dwarves get that for free. I could give it to everyone for free but why take away from dwarves? I hate to invoke realism in D&D but there is a basis that we need to tie ourselves to and the simple fact of the matter is that historically, a bastard sword never was an exotic weapon... at least not exotic to anyone that had any experience with swords in general. The differences between a longsword and a bastard sword are not really that vast... but rather than restricting things because the flavor is off, I allow them with less or slightly more fitting, discrimination. An adverage of +1 damage is not going to break my game.
Karma 09-28-06, 09:02 PM	Exotic weapons are underpowerede. The only exoticweapon that is wortha feat is the spiked chain. One point of damage for a feat is just a waste of a feat. Grab a longswod and sayit looks like a bastard sword, and call it a bastard sword, if you want it for flavor reasons. I am actually a big fan of the whip myself and we've ported dagger-whips from 3.0. That can definitely worth the EWP if you work things right... and the flavor is just right.
Fargren 09-28-06, 09:29 PM	I am actually a big fan of the whip myself and we've ported dagger-whips from 3.0. That can definitely worth the EWP if you work things right... and the flavor is just right. Well, the whip may and whip-dagger may also be balanced. However, the bard in our party always tries to use a whip and always fail because of armor/natural armor, and that always maed me concider it underpowered.
Commander of Chaos 09-28-06, 09:55 PM	The only really good whip is the one that the pyrokineticist makes.
Xeviat-DM 09-28-06, 10:08 PM	I've never thought it was worth a feat. I'd much rather see the bastard sword be given some sort of small advantage; a feat for +1 damage is just not good enough. Perhaps it could be given some of the advantages of a two-hander, like +2 vs. sunder (because it's larger and has more mass). I don't even know if that would be good enough. Sadly, I can't think of anything else to balance it. Pitty.
Mecha_Pope 09-28-06, 11:33 PM	Well, i feel that the whip was never ment to be used to hurt people anyways (in dnd) You make a fighter, put a melee weapon in one hand and a whip in the other hand, and disarm, trip, attack! Oh and get combat reflexes and hold the line! As long as some uber wizard doesnt show up and make you feel useless, youll feel pretty smart when everything in 15 feet of you is unarmed and lying on the ground, and wth are they gonna do when you full attack them then? they got nothin! Heres somthing else, get two whips and a lv 20 trip master, and just walk into a goblin camp ant trip everthing! keep it up untill they just collapse from exastune and coup de grace them for fun!
Xeviat-DM 09-29-06, 01:30 AM	Exotic weapons should be cool and rare. Currently, only the spiked chain, double weapons, and whip really warrent being exotic (and even then, the doubles aren't that complicated, aside from the dire flail; and don't say the double axe is that bad because it shouldn't be two double headed axes, they should each have a single edge).
Xan_The_Smart_Assimar 09-29-06, 03:43 AM	No! The feat is not worth the small increase in damage unless you are going down the TWF tree and then you can save feats by only having 1 weapon to take focus/spec/greater focus and so on in. As someone else mentioned, the bastard sword really shouldn't be an exotic weapon. The fact is it grew naturally out of the longsword when some thing better was needed. Plain and simple, slap your DM around some so he sees the truth and lets you use it as a martial without the feat.
Joush Mark 09-29-06, 04:05 AM	It's martial when used in two hands. Exotic use is to use a hand and a half sword one handed.. And really, bastard swords were never used by everyone that needed a sword. Really it was a cavlery weapon intended for use in one hand on horseback, and with one or bolth hands on foot. It offered a small advantage of the more typical arming sword, but never replaced it. Two edged arming swords were around before and after. It is a marital weapon. Like orther western swords anyone that has been trained in combat will likely be able to use it as intended with no problem. Useing it in one hand requires a specal feat and str 13 to reflect that single handed use is tricky, and to make it mechanicly better then the longsword. Only really worth the feat to people that have more feats then they know what to do with. Anyone that goes pure fighter has no reason not to grab it. (Anyone going pure fighter is also doing something that is mechanicly less then ideal anyway.) RAW works fine for the bastard sword, makeing it a vary specalized fighter weapon for people with lots of feats that want a high AC.
Grey_Mage 09-29-06, 04:22 AM	Aribitrary, it could just as easily be 13 like the prereq for power-attack. Other weapons? I am assuming you are refering to the dwarven waraxe? Dwarves get that for free. I could give it to everyone for free but why take away from dwarves? I hate to invoke realism in D&D but there is a basis that we need to tie ourselves to and the simple fact of the matter is that historically, a bastard sword never was an exotic weapon... at least not exotic to anyone that had any experience with swords in general. The differences between a longsword and a bastard sword are not really that vast... but rather than restricting things because the flavor is off, I allow them with less or slightly more fitting, discrimination. An adverage of +1 damage is not going to break my game. Why not give humans "weapon familiarity, bastard sword" ? Seriously... a little more flavor, and it makes sense- dwarves are a bit short of the hand a half bastard sword... as are elves for that matter... half elves might have a case, but it would be far from game breaking to give it to them too.... same thing for half orcs.
Finfreeze 09-29-06, 08:54 AM	No, but there aren't really any weapons that are really worth the feat in the Core Rulebooks except for maybe the Spiked Chain, and even then you could get by with a guisarme and spikes (you'll probably want spikes even if you're using a chain). Well, the dwarven waraxe is also good if you're a bulky dwarf, but that's because you can get it without a feat. Maybe increase the damage to 1d12 and change the weapon type to martial 2-handed. Make the EWP grant the ability to wield the sword in one hand without penalty. That way, if you take the EWP, you get the two-handed power attack bonus while freeing up the other hand for a nice shield. If you don't take the feat, then it's basically a .5 damage weaker greatsword. I'm liking the idea of a multiweapon-fighting character with this new bastard sword, a spiked shield, and spiked armor...even if it sounds prohibitively expensive.
Tetsubo 09-29-06, 08:57 AM	What about a Dwarf with two Waraxes, TWF and Oversized TWF? Only need two feats for that... What are the prereqs for the Oversized TWF?
Orchomenos 09-29-06, 09:17 AM	I think wielding an heavier weapon in one hand is worth a feat. The problem is the Bastard Sword is badly described. With equal warriors, the one with the bastard sword doesn't over the one with a dagger, beside more damages. But technically, the warrior holding a 4' blade in his hand will have a better reach than the one with a 6" blade. However, in D&D 3.5, a bastard sword is not enough to modify one's reach; even an halberd is too short! You need a longspear, guisarme, ranseur or glaive for that. (side question: why does a 3' gnome with a dagger has the same reach than a 7'6" gnoll with a greataxe?) In addition, shields provide more penalties than benefits. In short, two rule that simplified the combat system completely nerfed the bastard sword...
striderII 09-29-06, 10:37 AM	And really, bastard swords were never used by everyone that needed a sword. Really it was a cavlery weapon intended for use in one hand on horseback, and with one or bolth hands on foot. Um....what? I've never read that longswords (D&D bastard swords) were intended for cavalry use. Do you have documentation to that regard? It offered a small advantage of the more typical arming sword, but never replaced it. I disagree, because using a two handed weapon with more force allowed the point of said weapon to pierce the gaps in the heavier armour that appeared in later periods. So I strongly disagree that it was only a "small advantage". The fact that there were entire fechtbuchs, etc, on the subject bears this out. (And yes, I'm aware that there were manuals for single-hand weapons, but that's not my argument. My argument is that the longsword was just as important, if not moreso - certainly more than you're claiming.) strider
Finarin Panjoro 09-29-06, 11:44 AM	I consider the bastard sword to be a two-handed weapon wielded in one hand with exotic weapon proficiency. This has a few implications that haven't been specified in this thread as advantages. In addition to the higher damage than the longsword a bastard sword also gets +5 hit points and a +4 bonus to resist sunder and disarm attempts. This is definitely subject to interpretation, but the rules seem to allow for this. That makes ewp: bastard sword a little more viable. A house rule that I've also implemented is that a bastard sword or dwarven war-axe wielded in one hand does 1.5 x power attack. This pushes ewp into the realm of a decent feat to me.
jaelis 09-29-06, 12:11 PM	In the realm of improving the feat, I make it so there was just one feat: Weild Hand-and-a-Half Weapon, that lets you weild the all the hand-and-a-halfers in one hand. And I added the spear to that list as well. I think that makes for a decent feat.
PhaedrusXY 09-29-06, 12:17 PM	I've never thought it was worth a feat. I'd much rather see the bastard sword be given some sort of small advantage; a feat for +1 damage is just not good enough. Perhaps it could be given some of the advantages of a two-hander, like +2 vs. sunder (because it's larger and has more mass). I don't even know if that would be good enough.This is one of my many house rules. :P I treat the bastard sword as a 2-handed weapon that can be wielded with one hand if you take the EWP feat. This changes it subtlely, but signifigantly. Edit: As Finarin Pinjaro pointed out. Great minds think alike, eh?
Karma 09-29-06, 05:39 PM	Well, the whip may and whip-dagger may also be balanced. However, the bard in our party always tries to use a whip and always fail because of armor/natural armor, and that always maed me concider it underpowered. I dig that. The whip-dagger is completely unrealistic as a weapon but the concept is appealing since it will get past armor (just like a dagger) can be used to trip and disarm. The reach is nice but you don't threaten any squares. Mechanically, it is basicly a shortbow that can trip and disarm and only has a 15 ft reach. As far as the bastard sword bit goes, as a DM, I prefer to let my players get a freebie for things that add flavor more than function. I have some general house-rules that cover weapons. They are not precise, but you'll get the idea. I give all characters weapon familiarity with their racial weapons. Dwarves already have this, Elves and Half-Elves raised by Elves treat the Lightblade, Thinblade and Court Sword as Martial weapons. Gnomes get hooked hammers, battle picks and other such Gnomish oddities. Half-Orcs get the Orc double axe for free and maybe another freebie, Humans and Halflings get to make a request but will definitely get something on par with the other racial freebies. Sometimes I just give a bonus to an ability score that is lacking, extra languages... whatever seems fitting that. The reason, I have no problems with giving out these freebies is because I will place TPK blenders in various places. They aren't too hardcore, but they have to be played smart... and often enough, that means running away or guerilla warfare.