Making Reach weapons work

[kieza]

So, I'm trying to write an RPG system which may or may not ever see the light of day--I've got a bunch of houserules and homebrew and setting material that my gaming groups came up with over the years, and I've finally bit the bullet and decided to write them down in a cohesive form that I might be able to publish.

Now, in the process, I'm running into the occasional snag--things that I remember not working well in play, that I want to try and polish up while I'm doing this. One of the big ones, that I think I've finally gotten a solution to that I like, is Reach weapons. To explain why this is a sticking point, a brief summary:

--In D&D 3.5, reach weapons were less damaging, couldn't attack adjacent enemies, or required exotic weapon proficiency. Sometimes, all three at once. Ostensibly, this was to balance the fact that you could get an AoO against creatures moving in on you. In practice, my groups' consensus was that the balancing factors made them subpar and thus unpopular.
--In 4e, reach weapons could attack adjacent creatures, but you no longer got to make OA's against creatures not adjacent to you--at least, not without some feat investment. They were also still subpar compared to other two-handed weapons: less accurate, less damaging, or both at once. The general consensus at my table was that it made them, again, subpar--plus, the bit where you couldn't make OA's as people charged was viewed as silly, because that's what reach weapons are for.
--In Warmachine/Hordes (which I realize is a tabletop wargame, not an RPG, but I did dabble in it), Reach has few to no drawbacks: you get all the benefits and none of the penalties outside of some niche situations. And as a result, Reach is one of the more prized advantages for a model to have, as it improves damage projection, allows them to tie up more models in melee, helps to get more models in range of a target, etc. The balancing factor here is point-cost: models with Reach cost a little more, and I don't see a good way to implement that in an RPG: it would mean making polearms improbably expensive, or requiring feat investment so that they're only available or effective at higher level. That strains credulity a little too much.

So, obviously, there needs to be some kind of balancing factor with reach weapons, and I think I might have hit on one that I like. Most reach weapons receive the Bulky quality:

--A Bulky weapon cannot be used to attack more than one creature per round. If you attack someone on your turn, you can make AoO's against them, but not against any other creature. If you don't attack on your turn, you can get one AoO as a creature closes to melee with you--but not against any creature that moves in after them.

By default, my intention is for characters to get multiple AoO's per round, so the balancing factor of reach weapons is now that, while you can get an AoO before someone closes to melee, that's the ONLY AoO you get that round.

Reach weapons with the Bulky quality are otherwise equivalent to similar two-handed weapons: same damage, same accuracy, same other qualities. A glaive is a greatsword with Bulky and Reach, a halberd is a greataxe with Bulky and Reach, etc.

A minority of Reach weapons--I'm thinking flails--would not be Bulky, but these would have the reduced damage, for the sake of weapon diversity.

I'm also thinking of applying Bulky to certain powerful ranged weapons, like heavy crossbows and long rifles. It would make them a sniper's weapon (more damage, extra properties, slightly extended range), but less useful for crowd control (no Manyshot, no using your iterative attacks to pick off four minions in a turn).



So, since my campaign is on hiatus and I can't ask my group this, here's my question to the Playground:

--Is this at least as effective a balancing mechanism as making reach weapons do less damage, have less accuracy, or not have other special qualities? Would it suffice to create a meaningful tradeoff between reach and non-reach weapons?

I realize I'm not giving any hard numbers for damage or accuracy or anything, which, I'll be honest, is because I haven't settled on any yet. If there's information I've neglected to mention, just ask and I'll tell you what I'm thinking.

[CharonsHelper]

I must step in and say that in 3.5 (or Pathfinder for that matter) reach weapons are awesome. Past the first several levels the lesser damage is pretty negligible, 5ft stepping makes it so that you rarely can't attack during your turn (if small/medium sized) and the extra AOO is very handy if you build characters to take advantage of it, especially in combination with combat maneuvers. (Nothing is quite so funny as something charging at you losing their weapon 5ft back and ending up punching you instead of chopping at you with a greatsword.) It also lets you protect the squishies better.

Also - while the weapons themselves in Warmachine have no inherent disadvantage, that's because units with them cost more points than they otherwise would. There is also no disadvantage of using two weapons to get a 2nd attack, that doesn't mean that an RPG should work the same way.

Edit: I think you may be too into basing it reach as all-or-nothing. In a system I've played around with - all melee weapons have a Reach quality (vary from polearm having 14, fist having 0) which gives you a bonus to opposed rolls in the first round of a combat. In general, weapons with less reach (axe/mace etc.) do more damage, and the polearm actually has less of a to-hit bonus, so after that 1st round they're at a substantial disadvantage. Makes for interesting tactical problems, especially with another few rules which ignore Reach mixed in.

[VoxRationis]

This comes up with the situation that you can't fight off two halflings (coming from the same direction) with a pike, but can perfectly fight a guy who comes up from one direction and tries to flank you while moving at high speed (say, with a magical speed boost, or on roller skates, or who knows what). I feel like facing is one of the most critical issues with polearms—polearm-using armies typically are vulnerable to flanking maneuvers and don't handle rapid turns very easily.

[ComaVision]

I must step in and say that in 3.5 (or Pathfinder for that matter) reach weapons are awesome. Past the first several levels the lesser damage is pretty negligible, 5ft stepping makes it so that you rarely can't attack during your turn (if small/medium sized) and the extra AOO is very handy if you build characters to take advantage of it, especially in combination with combat maneuvers. (Nothing is quite so funny as something charging at you losing their weapon 5ft back and ending up punching you instead of chopping at you with a greatsword.) It also lets you protect the squishies better.

This. My melee characters in 3.5 always use a reach weapon.

[Telok]

Back in AD&D I don't recall any separation of 'reach' from normal weapons. Some weapons were longer, which allowed a free attack against someone closing in to a range less than that, and others could be braced against a charge for triple damage. But these things were based more on historical 'accuracy' (more or less, it was pretty hit and miss) than any consideration of 'balance'.

Two things that were noted in the rules but left for the DM to adjucate were that thrusting weapons took less room to use than other types of weapons (you could fit two to four spear wielders in a corridor taken up with a single person using a two handed sword) and that the whole reach thing applied to all situations with a significant length descrepancy (a two handed sword guy could get the free attack against a dagger user) and wasn't limited to the 'long stick' weapons.

[HammeredWharf]

Keep bonus damage bloat in mind. In 3.5e, reach weapons deal less damage, but there's usually no difference between d8+54 and d12+54, so using a longspear over a greataxe tends to be the smarter option.

[Ashtagon]

A minority of Reach weapons--I'm thinking flails--would not be Bulky, but these would have the reduced damage, for the sake of weapon diversity.

Are there any historical flails that would logical have reach? broadening the category to flexible weapons in general adds in the whip and the urumi (a metal whip with a sharp edge, basically). But the need to be able to swing a flail in a tight circle to build up a spin would limit the length of both pole and chain.

In my homebrew rules, I'm contemplating giving reach weapons an attack bonus against targets that don't have equally long weapons.

[Telok]

Are there any historical flails that would logical have reach? broadening the category to flexible weapons in general adds in the whip and the urumi (a metal whip with a sharp edge, basically). But the need to be able to swing a flail in a tight circle to build up a spin would limit the length of both pole and chain.

In my homebrew rules, I'm contemplating giving reach weapons an attack bonus against targets that don't have equally long weapons.

Historical flails are as much reach weapons as historical halberds. The descendants of the original D&D never did any meaningful research into what weapons were actually called. So your D&D 'flail' is pretty much a 1970's nerd's translation of a Victorian historian's opinion. If you want a measure of the quality of that historian's opinion you can ask in the real world weapons and armor thread on this board.

[Hytheter]

Spoiler: For those confused about flails as reach weapons

Show

So basically like a big spear with a club that swings around where the point should go

[kieza]

I must step in and say that in 3.5 (or Pathfinder for that matter) reach weapons are awesome. Past the first several levels the lesser damage is pretty negligible, 5ft stepping makes it so that you rarely can't attack during your turn (if small/medium sized) and the extra AOO is very handy if you build characters to take advantage of it, especially in combination with combat maneuvers. (Nothing is quite so funny as something charging at you losing their weapon 5ft back and ending up punching you instead of chopping at you with a greatsword.) It also lets you protect the squishies better.

Also - while the weapons themselves in Warmachine have no inherent disadvantage, that's because units with them cost more points than they otherwise would. There is also no disadvantage of using two weapons to get a 2nd attack, that doesn't mean that an RPG should work the same way.

Edit: I think you may be too into basing it reach as all-or-nothing. In a system I've played around with - all melee weapons have a Reach quality (vary from polearm having 14, fist having 0) which gives you a bonus to opposed rolls in the first round of a combat. In general, weapons with less reach (axe/mace etc.) do more damage, and the polearm actually has less of a to-hit bonus, so after that 1st round they're at a substantial disadvantage. Makes for interesting tactical problems, especially with another few rules which ignore Reach mixed in.

Keep bonus damage bloat in mind. In 3.5e, reach weapons deal less damage, but there's usually no difference between d8+54 and d12+54, so using a longspear over a greataxe tends to be the smarter option.

You bring up a valid point, and HammeredWharf has already hit on the counterpoint.

I'm planning to keep damage bonuses (and health) fairly low--bonuses would scale from about +3 at the low end, to +8 or 10 with the highest possible ability scores, a feat, and a magical weapon (which is not guaranteed to be available). Situational bonuses might give you an extra +2 to +4, but I have a different mechanic in mind to deal with most situational damage increases.

Borrowing some weapon stats from 4e, here...

We'll say that a greataxe does 1d12 and has a High Crit property.
A halberd (without bulky) does 1d10 with no other properties.

We'll say that you have an "average" damage bonus of +5.

Assuming that you crit about 10% of the time that you hit...

I'm seeing about a 14% loss of damage if you go for the unmodified halberd instead of the greataxe.

So, for that range of numbers, the damage die is still pretty relevant. My goal with this mechanic is that Reach weapons should be just as accurate, just as damaging as their closest non-Reach counterparts--the balancing factor is the restriction on AoO's.

This comes up with the situation that you can't fight off two halflings (coming from the same direction) with a pike, but can perfectly fight a guy who comes up from one direction and tries to flank you while moving at high speed (say, with a magical speed boost, or on roller skates, or who knows what). I feel like facing is one of the most critical issues with polearms—polearm-using armies typically are vulnerable to flanking maneuvers and don't handle rapid turns very easily.

Yes, that's pretty much how I want this to work:

--If two people charge you at once, you can only attack one of them.
--If one person charges you while you're already fighting someone else, you can't attack the new guy because you're distracted.
--If one person charges you while you're disengaged, you can get an AoO before they reach melee range.
--If you attack someone on your turn, you can attack them if they move, but it ties you up and everyone else can move freely.
--If you don't attack on your turn, you're free to attack one creature of your choice that moves.

And unless I'm missing something about my RAW, that's how the Bulky quality would work.

[VoxRationis]

Yes, that's pretty much how I want this to work:

--If two people charge you at once, you can only attack one of them.
--If one person charges you while you're already fighting someone else, you can't attack the new guy because you're distracted.
--If one person charges you while you're disengaged, you can get an AoO before they reach melee range.
--If you attack someone on your turn, you can attack them if they move, but it ties you up and everyone else can move freely.
--If you don't attack on your turn, you're free to attack one creature of your choice that moves.

And unless I'm missing something about my RAW, that's how the Bulky quality would work.

I guess my issue with that is that it seems to me as though doing a 180 degree turn to deal with a single opponent from an unexpected direction should be harder than poking at a second opponent standing right next to one right in front of you.

[Ashtagon]

Historical flails are as much reach weapons as historical halberds. The descendants of the original D&D never did any meaningful research into what weapons were actually called. So your D&D 'flail' is pretty much a 1970's nerd's translation of a Victorian historian's opinion. If you want a measure of the quality of that historian's opinion you can ask in the real world weapons and armor thread on this board.

Spoiler: For those confused about flails as reach weapons

Show

So basically like a big spear with a club that swings around where the point should go

Still not convinced.

I did a bit of image searching, and that was the only illustrated flail weapon (outside of obviously fantastical drawings) that approached that apparent length. There are no modern 'reproduction' flails approaching that length either. Here's a couple more images of footman's flails:

http://oathofiron.com/armaments/the-...ns-2-purposes/


http://myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=17245


In these two images, the staff hovers between chest and shoulder height in length, with the head being about knee-height in length. Curiously, that corresponds to the length of the footman's flail as described in the (somewhat cryptic) table in the 1e PHB.

The only other source that indicates how large the larger flails would get is wikipedia's descritpion of agricultural (i.e., not built for fighting) flails.

The precise dimensions and shape of flails were determined by generations of farmers to suit the particular grain they were harvesting. For example, flails used by farmers in Quebec to process wheat were generally made from two pieces of wood, the handle being about 1.5 m (4.9 ft) long by 3 cm (1.2 in) in diameter, and the second stick being about 1 m (3.3 ft) long by about 3 cm (1.2 in) in diameter, with a slight taper towards the end. Flails for other grains, such as rice or spelt, would have had different dimensions.

The larger agricultural flails reached 8 feet in total length.

I also did a bit of searching around that drawing posted upthread. It is from a book by Paulus Hector Mair [link, including more flail illustrations], who lived in the 16th century. What do we know about his work in compiling that book? As was customary at that time for a man of his wealth, he was at some point in his life a cavalry officer. He collected fechtbücher (European martial arts manuals) and used those as the basis for compiling his own. So he probably had little to no personal knowledge of using a footman's flail, although he would certainly have had physical access to them. So the paintings are probably a fair representation.

But note the poses in that specific image. Both men are have knees bent, lowering their apparent height, which makes the weapons look larger in comparison. If you look at some of the other flail images in his codex (see the link by his name in the previous paragraph), you can see from those images where the warrior's knee is straight that the flail staffs are about chest-height and the heads about knee-height, again corresponding to an overall length of 6 feet, and matching both the other illustrations I found and the 1e PHB.

What other weapons are six feet in length and do not have reach? Greatclubs, greatswords, heavy flails (nb. the 1e/2e "footman's flail" and "horseman's flail" were rendered in 3e as the "heavy flail" and the "flail"), halberds, scythes, and quarterstaffs. So it's in fairly good company as six-foot-long-non-reach-weapons go. Yes, footman's flails were on the longer end of melee weapons, but they weren't quite stand-off weapons with reach. Note too that in those illustrations from Mair's codex, the warriors are standing closer to 5 feet apart than 10 feet apart, again suggesting that by D&D standards these are not reach weapons.



can I drop the mic now?

[kieza]

Don't think of it as doing a 180. Think of it as having your polearm held in the air, ready to turn in whatever direction the next attack comes from.

Whereas if you've been attacking someone already, your polearm is down and pointed in their general direction. If someone did come up from behind you, or even a little to the side, then you'd have to turn your weapon around.

And if it's from an "unexpected" direction, I would take that to mean that the attacker started their charge hidden from you, or so incredibly far away that you hadn't kept an eye on them, in which case you wouldn't get an AoO even if the weapon weren't Bulky.



I feel this is a reasonable compromise between verisimilitude and reducing the necessary bookkeeping, which is one of my big goals here. I don't want players to say "wait, what?" and lose their suspension of disbelief on a regular basis. I also don't want to make them track facing, or what angle you can threaten with your polearm, or a number of other minutia. If all they have to keep track of is who they attacked on their last turn...I think that's fine. Plus, I think that the Bulky rule makes for a better tradeoff than "Do I want to threaten a small area with effective attacks, or do I want to threaten a large area with subpar attacks?"

[Sol]

In 4e, reach weapons could attack adjacent creatures, but you no longer got to make OA's against creatures not adjacent to you--at least, not without some feat investment. They were also still subpar compared to other two-handed weapons: less accurate, less damaging, or both at once. The general consensus at my table was that it made them, again, subpar--plus, the bit where you couldn't make OA's as people charged was viewed as silly, because that's what reach weapons are for.

Hmm. I quite like reach weapons in 4e.

The greatspear is +3/1d10, which is otherwise comparable to a Bastard Sword, only it has reach (and is two handed).

I guess that's less damage than a Fullblade at +3/d12/high crit, but Spears/Polearms have excellent feat support, including Polearm Gamble, which re-adds that OA from people charging you....or moving adjacent to you for any reason. Other excellent spear/polearm feats include Polearm Flanker, Polearm Momentum, Spear Push, Hafted Defense, and Surprising Charge.

The Spiked Chain is an interesting beast at +3/2d4 (which averages at .5 damage/[W] less than 1d10), since it can be used as both a flail and a light blade, and as both a double and a two-handed weapon. This allows it to mix the best support from all four of those usually mutually exclusive options, but it eats your multiclass slot to do so, which limits which classes can do so super-effectively.

Sure, there's some bad reach weapons, but >90% of all of 4e's feat/item/power/PP/ED choices are bad, so this isn't any different than any other category.

I think my biggest criticism of 4e, as a system, is that it's exceptionally hard to have any semblance of a complete character at level 1. Building an effective reach-weapon user requires at least mid heroic, maybe even paragon. But again, that can be said for most any schtick.

[nedz]

I thought that the point of the medieval flail was to be able to hit someone standing behind a shield wall or to bend a blow around a parry - much like a modern whip foil.

Reach weapons were common on medieval battlefields because you can hold someone off with one — also horses — but this is about line fighting not skirmishing. Most RPGs assume skirmish style combat for which reach weapons are slow.

Reach weapons are also a pain in confined areas - like forests.

It all depends what style of combat you are trying to simulate ? D&D is about giving the players gamist options not recreating mediaeval style combat accurately. Verisimilitude is important but so is making the game work.

[Knaight]

Reach weapons were common on medieval battlefields because you can hold someone off with one — also horses — but this is about line fighting not skirmishing. Most RPGs assume skirmish style combat for which reach weapons are slow.

The majority of reach weapons are still fairly fast in a skirmish condition. There's a reason that medieval texts emphasized their efficacy in a duel situation, and having personally used some of them I can attest that while a lot of them are heavier you do get a lot of leverage, and being able to change grip lengths in combination with said leverage produces pretty impressive speed.

[nedz]

The majority of reach weapons are still fairly fast in a skirmish condition. There's a reason that medieval texts emphasized their efficacy in a duel situation, and having personally used some of them I can attest that while a lot of them are heavier you do get a lot of leverage, and being able to change grip lengths in combination with said leverage produces pretty impressive speed.

Well speed is a relative thing and, whilst two hands does help with speed and control, their inertia is a hindrance if someone pulls a feint with a light blade.

[kieza]

The greatspear is +3/1d10, which is otherwise comparable to a Bastard Sword, only it has reach (and is two handed).

It's also an exotic weapon, and if I include exotic weapons in this system, I'll be steering clear of weapons that are just bigger, nastier versions of martial weapons. Exotic weapons should involve some sort of unique functionality--like the kusari-gama, for example.

I'd model exotic weapons...not exactly like the Spiked Chain multiclass feats, but sort of similar, in the sense that there would be an actual "Kusari-Gama Proficiency" feat that included rules for how you could entangle someone in the chain, how you could reel them in, and what bonuses you would get for attacking someone while they were entangled. Additional feats might allow you to disarm someone using basic attacks with a kusari-gama, or use it as a double weapon, etc.

I think my biggest criticism of 4e, as a system, is that it's exceptionally hard to have any semblance of a complete character at level 1. Building an effective reach-weapon user requires at least mid heroic, maybe even paragon. But again, that can be said for most any schtick.

This is my experience as well.

Part of my goal here is to have reach weapons be functional--not great and not terrible--compared to other weapons, right out of the gate. Feat support can then improve upon this foundation, as it would with any weapon group.

That's part of a larger design goal as well: I want characters to be able to pick up the core of their weapon/spell/tactic "schtick" at level 1 or shortly after that. That is, if you want to be a polearm fighter/crossbow rogue/pacifist cleric/pyromancer wizard, you should be effective at it at level 1, and you should be able to pick up at least one feat that sets you apart from other specializations, also at level 1. (Of course you don't have to take one of these feats, but they're cool, and they're effective.)

I'm talking about more than "Weapon Focus (Polearms):" feats like Polearm Gamble, Heavy Blade Opportunity, and Inescapable Force, that can be used to define a character's schtick, should be available as the first thing a character picks up. Subsequent feat slots can be used for the less game-changing feats, and the boring but practical +1 attack, +2 damage, etc. kind of feats.

[Sol]

It's also an exotic weapon, and if I include exotic weapons in this system, I'll be steering clear of weapons that are just bigger, nastier versions of martial weapons. Exotic weapons should involve some sort of unique functionality--like the kusari-gama, for example.

It's a Superior weapon, not an Exotic one, but I understand your point.

In that case, you can solve the problem of the Longspear being worse than the Greatsword as simply as just not making your Longspear worse than your Greatsword.

I'm all for further specialized baked-in properties, though. IMO critical dice, crit range, and some of the weapon-specific feats could all be baked in to weapon types rather than into feats and enchants.

I think the reason it isn't that way in 4e is, in part, to show that there's a substantial difference between being able to proficiently use a spear (or a sword, or a flail, or a dagger) and having mastery over using one.

You could maybe make weapon/implement type selection part of the character creation process, with a variety of options per class, and each class can pick 1 (or sometimes more) to specialize in, which 'unlocks' the specialization properties of that weapon/implement type?

That may just feel like bloat, not sure.

[kieza]

It's a Superior weapon, not an Exotic one, but I understand your point.

In that case, you can solve the problem of the Longspear being worse than the Greatsword as simply as just not making your Longspear worse than your Greatsword.

Yeah, that's the general idea! Although, maybe not the Longspear--I'm thinking that should be a simple weapon. But I'm trying to balance Glaives and Greatswords, Halberds and Greataxes, etc., not on the basis of accuracy and damage, but using this Bulky property.

I spent a while thinking about it, and this is part of the (tentative) weapon list I came up with:

Greataxe	+2	1d12	High Crit
Halberd	+2	1d12	Bulky, High Crit, Reach
Greatsword	+3	2d6
Glaive	+3	2d6	Bulky, Reach
Falchion	+3	1d10	Critical Threat (Score a critical on natural 18-20)

Also, not to cut off the discussion of flails, but I'm using the term in the inaccurate, colloquial sense, which refers to a "mace-and-chain" or "chain mace." You know--a heavy spiked ball attached to a handle by a chain.

[nedz]

Also, not to cut off the discussion of flails, but I'm using the term in the inaccurate, colloquial sense, which refers to a "mace-and-chain" or "chain mace." You know--a heavy spiked ball attached to a handle by a chain.

That's a light flail — which were very rare.

The two handed, heavy, flail was the agricultural implement weaponised by peasants.

[Elxir_Breauer]

Simply using a Facing mechanic would cut a ton of issues from the 3.P combat mechanics. It would even make stuff like All-Around Vision qualities far more useful as well. As an example: Everyone has a 90 degree arc where they can see and attack with full focus, from there, they get another 90 degrees on each side of that arc in which they can do stuff, but take a penalty of some kind to do it, and if there's someone in their Rear arc, they can't do much about it without changing their facing on their turn. Some abilities would then become more useful, such as Uncanny Dodge and flanking immunity.

[JoeJ]

Have you thought about what role you want polearms and other reach weapons to play in the game? That is, how common do you want them to be? In a lot of modern fantasy nearly every character uses a sword, so in a game inspired by that kind of setting any other weapon probably should be sub-par to some degree. If you're going for a Trojan War feeling OTOH, spears should dominate. And if you're doing something inspired by Robin Hood, the longbow should be best. Without knowing what you're aiming at, it's hard to know how to balance different classes of weapons.

[CharonsHelper]

Simply using a Facing mechanic would cut a ton of issues from the 3.P combat mechanics.

Yes - and it would add twice as many different ones.

[kieza]

Have you thought about what role you want polearms and other reach weapons to play in the game? That is, how common do you want them to be? In a lot of modern fantasy nearly every character uses a sword, so in a game inspired by that kind of setting any other weapon probably should be sub-par to some degree. If you're going for a Trojan War feeling OTOH, spears should dominate. And if you're doing something inspired by Robin Hood, the longbow should be best. Without knowing what you're aiming at, it's hard to know how to balance different classes of weapons.

A large theme of the setting is the conflict between romanticism and enlightenment.

On the side of romanticism, you have the dwarves and the wood elves. They're firmly, in some cases consciously, stuck at varying points in the High to Late Middle Ages, compared to the real world. On the enlightenment side, you have the majority of humans, who have had their industrial revolution and are basically Victorian, and the high elves, who are moving more towards magitek and thus have no real-world counterpart.

Most of the world is somewhere in the middle, though: on average, they're around 1700 CE, in terms of real-world tech levels, which is right about the time that pike squares and other polearms really died out. Hence why I want to make them viable weapons: about half of the world would still be using them.

That's a light flail — which were very rare.

The two handed, heavy, flail was the agricultural implement weaponised by peasants.

I'm not sure I'd say "very rare." I realize that there were never entire military units that used them as standard equipment, but they were widely-known, and were depicted in a variety of medieval art, which suggests that they weren't vanishingly rare. In any case, they did exist, and I've had players who really wanted a character with one before--so, in they go.

For the sake of variety, I'm splitting them into the Peasant Flail, a two-handed simple weapon with Reach like you're talking about, the Chain Flail, a one-handed ball-and-chain variety, and the Heavy Chain Flail, a two-handed ball-and-chain with Reach.

[JoeJ]

Your Bulky quality sounds somewhat similar to GURPS, where most polearms can't be used to both attack and parry in the same round, and require a Ready maneuver to change the distance at which they're being used to attack.

[gtwucla]

Game mechanic aside, reach weapons and weapons that can be sheathed and easily carried are two very different things. Reach weapons are for war or guard duty. Swords and such (and obviously there are plenty of exceptions to this) are the sort of thing adventurers would walk around town with. I don't think there's anything wrong with having a reach weapon have all sorts of benefits, but game-wise what do you think about just having a general rule that in most towns these weapons are not tolerated, so either left with the gate guard or best left at home, lest you run into trouble with the town guard. Otherwise reach weapons are only really limited by their durability and fighting space. As long as they have room, reach weapons generally always beat out non-reach weapons.

[neonchameleon]

The major advantage of reach weapons doesn't fit a D&D party. It's that the second and even third ranks can fight and it helps focus attacks on one person til they go down. It did in oD&D - but it was the mass battle that the spear normally ruled. One on one the sword was excellent.

[CharonsHelper]

Otherwise reach weapons are only really limited by their durability and fighting space. As long as they have room, reach weapons generally always beat out non-reach weapons.

It totally depends upon the rules involved. Myself, I like the idea of reach weapons getting a significant advantage in the first round of combat, but if someone can get in close the reach weapon user then is at a disadvantage. This would make it especially useful for mooks with few HP (or whatever) who likely can't take more than 1-2 hits anyway. (outside of the spartans, most historical polearm users weren't professional warriors, so it gets the right feel)

[Knaight]

Simply using a Facing mechanic would cut a ton of issues from the 3.P combat mechanics. It would even make stuff like All-Around Vision qualities far more useful as well. As an example: Everyone has a 90 degree arc where they can see and attack with full focus, from there, they get another 90 degrees on each side of that arc in which they can do stuff, but take a penalty of some kind to do it, and if there's someone in their Rear arc, they can't do much about it without changing their facing on their turn. Some abilities would then become more useful, such as Uncanny Dodge and flanking immunity.

Facing mechanics and 6 second rounds really don't work well together. 6 seconds is more than enough time to turn around repeatedly while doing things like fighting multiple people. With that said, from a simulationist perspective more in depth flanking rules could accomplish a great deal, with flanking being more effective against some weapons and weapon combinations than others. There is unfortunately a bit of mechanical load there, and that does bring in a whole bunch of issues regarding flanking being too easy to pull off because the target stands still on the attackers turn.