Fun and pointy [Weapon]

[kailin]

This is the distinctive weapon of a character I'm working on: Planemo Tusken, the rowdiest, randiest, dodgiest martial adept there ever was. He moves from town to town, armed his fearsome Pokey-Hacky, righting wrongs and wronging them back again and then stealing your mule.

Tell me what you think of the crunch.

Pokey-Hacky, Exotic double weapon
1d6 piercing/bludgeoning (crit: x3) / 1d6 slashing (crit: 18-20)

When wielded as a two-handed single weapon, the Pokey (piercing/bludgeoning) end has 10 ft reach. Shifting to this grip is a move-equivalent action that does not provoke AoOs and can be done as part of a move, just as drawing a weapon.

cost: 300 gp

[Fax Celestis]

Piercing and bludgeoning together seems counterintuitive to me.

[UnrealTiger]

Don't forget that a Morningstar is a Piercing/Bludgeoning weapon too, p'raps the Pokey bit of the Pokey-Slashy is somewhat like that. I could see something like that easily myself.

However I do think that since you have all three types of weapon damage combined into one weapon that the crit range of the Slashy end should only be 19-20, with all the other stuff it has an 18-20 threat range seems a tad too good for only one feat.

[kailin]

Piercing and bludgeoning together seems counterintuitive to me.

Think of a weighted spear. Anyway, morningstars, for instance, do piercing and bludgeoning. I see that's been mentioned already.

As far as the crit ranges and damage types, I used a double-bladed sword as the basic template and moved points around to make it more versatile and entertaining. Or, to make it do more than one thing, less reliably.

So 1d8/1d8 (19-20) became 1d6 (18-20), and 1d6 x3, reach. I was figuring x3 was basically equal to 19-20, and 18-20 balanced the drop in die size, as did reach on the other side. Frankly, I didn't think having all three damage types on one weapon was really worth much at all, since type-based DR comes up so very rarely, compared to magic or materials-based. Who thinks I'm wrong here?

[paddyfool]

The damage and crit stats don't seem overpowered to me; comparable to a two-bladed sword or dire flail, as you say. Likewise I have no problem with the combination of bludgeoning and piercing damage (although it would make it more of a whackey-hacky, imo, based on the precedent of the morningstar; not even the heaviest of spear-like weapons get bludgeoning damage).

But what on earth does this thing actually look like?
Also, you've said it's for a "martial artist" - are you treating it as a monk weapon for purposes of flurry of blows etc? If so, that would tip it over into being definitely overpowered, since the only other double weapon that has this is the rather weaker Quarterstaff. Also, I don't know of any double weapon that can also be used as a reach weapon... seems a bit of a nasty combo. Normally, medium-sized reach weapons are over 7' long, and almost all of them are too ungainly to be used at all within 5'; how is it feasible that your character can use this as both a reach weapon and a double weapon?

Sorry to be so negative, but... I don't like the weapon, much as I don't like a lot of other perfectly valid double weapons, like the gnome hooked hammer or the Urgrosk, only a little more so. Any picture I try to make of it in my head just seems ludicrously silly.

[kailin]

Thanks for the input! It's actually supposed to sound a little silly. It's a 5' long stick with a crescent-shaped blade on one side and a heavy block and spike on the other. It's most definitely not a monk weapon, or weapon-finessable, or anything like that. The character's a martial adept from the Tome of Battle, either a swordsage or a warblade.

And I love the name Whacky-Hacky.

[Fhaolan]

So it's a crescent moon with a morning star on the butt end.

Actually, as double-weapons go, this is far easier to visualize than some I've seen...

[Abd al-Azrad]

The weapon amuses me greatly. It seems like you've tried to make a weapon that can perform any function at all- good threat ranges, reach, and double bladed at once. Frankly, it's not too powerful a weapon- we know D&D is a game about specialization, and the feats required to take advantage of this weird weapon (EWP, TWF, Combat Reflexes, Two-Weapon Defense (or, better, Improved Buckler Defense), Improved Critical, Power Attack) eat up the vast majority of even a Warblade's feats- and we're not even taking into account Focus, Specialization, Mastery, those sorts of performance-enhancer feats that are generally regarded as subpar. Regardless, if your build can pull it off, I imagine the weapon will perform exactly as you imagine it will- weirdly. ;)

Note the Short Haft feat (PHB II) gives the ability to use a reach weapon to threaten adjacent squares (akin to your Pokey bit) although it allows you to transfer between reach and not-reach as a swift action. Similarly, there is a CAd weapon, the Longaxe, that allows you to use it as a reach weapon so long as you devote 3+ points to Power Attack that round. Just so you have an idea as to the work on transferrable reach already accomplished in the system.

Planemo Tusken will be required, of course, to max Craft at first level to have constructed (or at least conceived of) this wacky weapon.

[Randomman413]

Sounds like a Shaolin Spade...
Has someone been reading The Zombie Survival Guide?
It features prominently in the weapons section of the book. If I've got the mental image right, then you might want to check the book out on how it's commonly used in combat (if you haven't already)

[paddyfool]

OK, I like this weapon much better now that I can picture it. But I don't think any five foot-long weapon should have reach (after all, that would make it shorter than a quarterstaff, which doesn't have reach, and besides, although you could threaten a person more than five feet away by grasping one tip of the shaft with your arms at full extension, how on earth could you control the thing without a counterweight?). I'd personally favour giving the hacky end more damage instead. But this is fantasy, after all...