Short sword Variants

[White_Drake]

I was wondering what different variants of short sword are out there, because the Sublime Assassin (thank you, Zakaroth!) gain proficiency in all short swords. The only one I can think of is the broadblade from Complete Adventurer, which doesn't really benefit the character. At any rate, I would greatly appreciate it if anyone else can remember additional variants.

[LTwerewolf]

Ninjato and wakizashi from OA.

[Coidzor]

Well, if it's all short swords you might be able to finagle exotic materials that require exotic weapon proficiencies otherwise.

Like Kaorti resin/ribbon weapons or Heavy weapons.

[Ashtagon]

Complete Adventurer(>) had the broadblade shortsword.

[Darrin]

Butterfly Sword (A&EG/Oriental Adventures, exotic)
Sapara (A&EG, exotic)
Ninja-To (Oriental Adventures, exotic)
Elven Thinblade (Races of the Wild, exotic)
Straightblade (Planar Handbook, martial)
Knee Blade (Complete Scoundrel, martial... I think?)
Swordcane (Cityscape Web Enhancement, martial)
Drow Long Knife (Secrets of Xendrik, exotic)
Desert Throwing Knife (Sandstorm, exotic)
Dragonsplit (MMIV, exotic)
Lesser/Unawakened Sunsword (Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, martial)

[Ashtagon]

Desert Throwing Knife (Sandstorm, exotic)


The desert throwing knife bears about as much resemblance to a shortsword as a battleaxe does to a crossbow.

[Darrin]

The desert throwing knife bears about as much resemblance to a shortsword as a battleaxe does to a crossbow.

It's a piercing blade that does 1d6 damage (presumably as a light melee weapon). I'm assuming the blade is straight-ish and somewhat leaf-shaped, but there was no artwork for it in Sandstorm.

[Ashtagon]

It's a piercing blade that does 1d6 damage (presumably as a light melee weapon). I'm assuming the blade is straight-ish and somewhat leaf-shaped, but there was no artwork for it in Sandstorm.

Here's some sample artwork:

http://extra.listverse.com/amazon/ancientweapons/hungamunga.jpg

http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb194/i010001/HungaMunga.jpg

http://images.wikia.com/thehungergames/images/6/66/Hunga_Munga!.jpg

About as straight and leaf-shaped as a pot noodle.

[Axier]

Here's some sample artwork:

http://extra.listverse.com/amazon/ancientweapons/hungamunga.jpg

http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb194/i010001/HungaMunga.jpg

http://images.wikia.com/thehungergames/images/6/66/Hunga_Munga!.jpg

About as straight and leaf-shaped as a pot noodle.

While the Desert Throwing Knife has a similar statistical melee hinderance to the Hunga Munga, it is not specifically described as a Hunga Munga. So it could look like a realy fat, somewhat leaf shaped short sword. We can't really verify.

Just sayin'.

[Darrin]

Here's some sample artwork:

http://extra.listverse.com/amazon/ancientweapons/hungamunga.jpg

http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb194/i010001/HungaMunga.jpg

http://images.wikia.com/thehungergames/images/6/66/Hunga_Munga!.jpg

About as straight and leaf-shaped as a pot noodle.

That looks a lot like the Thrombash in Sandstorm, another exotic thrown weapon.

[Ashtagon]

The D&D thrombash and the D&D desert throwing knife are both D&D inventions. "Thrombash" only appears in google searches related to D&D (although "trombash" is referenced by wikipedia), and the only images related to "African throwing knife" bear no relation to the weapon described in the rulebooks, which is:


A desert throwing-knife is unwieldy for melee combat. Even if you are proficient with this weapon, you take a –2 penalty on attack rolls and damage rolls when using it in melee.

I'm assuming here the above quote is a straight take from the rulebooks, as I don't have the book to hand. "A throwing knife that is unwieldy in melee combat" certainly is a valid description of the knives in the wikipedia article I link to below.

Based on rulebook descriptions and illustrations, I believe both of them were inspired by a family of weapons collectively called african throwing knives (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Throwing_knife#Central_Africa). Although most well-known from examples from the Congo and similar jungle areas, they originated in southern Sudan and spread as far north as Libya.

Note that the vast variety of native names (kulbeda, pinga, trombash, hunga munga, danisco, goleyo, and njiga, probably others) for these weapons owes as much to the large geographical area the weapon type spread to as it does to the linguistic diversity of Africa. Despite the

[Ardantis]

{Scrubbed}

[LTwerewolf]

Elven Thinblade is a longsword mixed with a rapier