Weapon Stat Discrepencies

[BahamutZ3RO]

So I've just noticed that a lot of our weapons don't actually align with 3.0 stats. For instance, warhammers on PotM are 2d4 x2, whereas in 3.0 they're 1d8 x3. I could make a list of all of the ones that are off, if someone would like?

[ASymphony]

They are 1d8 x3 in vanilla nwn too, this is a POTM-adjustment.

[EO]

Yeah. We rebalanced them in the early years of the server to add more variety.

[BahamutZ3RO]

Yeah. We rebalanced them in the early years of the server to add more variety.

Doesn't that mostly make these items worse than they used to be? I mean 2d4 on a warhammer is slightly more reliable damage than 1d8 but the loss of the x3 crits makes a lot of these weapons unappealing and kinda really similar to the longsword (to me, anyways).

[EO]

I rechecked and actually they were rebalanced five years ago following a balance discussion with damage output comparisons. No reason to change that.

[McNastea]

I'd be interested to know the reasoning behind it at least, as I'm sure there was a good discussion about it. It's strikes my curiosity is all. I look at some of the weapons and barring choosing them for flavor don't see why they would be taken over others.

The only reason I see for the warhammer, for example, is that it works well against undead - skeletons in particular, which are unaffected by critical strikes. By making it 2d4 instead of 1d8 you're making it even more so a weapon of choice against them and trading it off with a lower crit multiplier so that it's even more so a specialized weapon.

that or the fact that it would otherwise be identical to the battleaxe, or perhaps a combination of both!

Again I'm just curious, I'm not looking to have anything changed   

[immasturgeon]

Well not quite equivalent.... Over the long haul the 2d4 is going to average an extra half point of dmg per regular hit compared to a 1d8 weapon.

Which might have a closer break even point to a battle axe even taking into account the lower crit multiplier...just thinking of the max rolls doesn't get into the numbers as they would work out over many hits.

[Hypatia]

Wow in x20 stikes,that war hammer does 105dmg w/ crits while a battle axe or long sword do only 99.  Damage never evens out until you’ve got a +6 damage modifier. 

Against anything crit immune, it’s 100 vs 90 damage over 20 hits. That’s a huge advantage for the warhammer.

Suddenly I understand Grizzle. Crazy.

[APorg]

One thing that's worth noting is that bludgeoning resistance is perhaps one of the easiest to get for players (or at least, it was 5 years ago). So bludgeoning was going to be relatively weak in PvP.

I'm not sure of what resistance looks like across hostile mobs on the server; though obviously warhammers are good when going up against skeletons.

[Disorder]

Only thing that has significant bludgeon damage reduction is dry lich.

[APorg]

Yeah.  So bludgeoning is probably a great PvE choice but depending on the loot tables, maybe not such a great PvP choice.

Not that I'm saying that's what influenced the re-design, but for anyone looking to make characters, might be worth bearing in mind...

[BraveSirRobin]

There's a /5 belt for Slashing, Piercing, and Bludgeoning in the module, all of which seem to be about as common as the others. I wouldn't say that any of the belts are more common than the others from my experience, and the belt slot tends to be used for bigger, better things later on in the game. It's more like rock paper scissors.