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Mace/Axe-Transcend to Swords


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Ive never really played the original exile games that much but one of the things that i never understood about jeff's games was how he got rid of some weapon classes. I understand that maces and axes were not as prevalent as swords and spears in real life, but why did he have to eliminate them from all the games. I can get why he didnt want them in geneforge as the setting doesnt support that, but avadon and avernum 2nd trilogy?

 

What was his reasoning behind that?

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Second trilogy? They stopped showing up as soon as the Exile series ended.

 

I think there were a couple of reasons. One was that there was a handy spear-sword dichotomy: the former did more damage but were usually two-handed and were a bit rarer. It wasn't clear where maces fit into that, and they had just been worse. Having three categories of weapons meant more weapons no party members could use. Swords are iconic and spears were too closely tied to the sliths, so they stayed.

 

Axes probably got axed when the graphics started showing the weapons being used. The edged weapons became swords because axes were never very prevalent anyway (what are the iconic artifact axes?). Dropping maces also saved on art and cut the number of PC sprites required by a third.

 

—Alorael, who also likes maces. The archetypal priest casts Divine Thud and follows up with a mundane thud from a blunt weapon. But sacrifices must be made, and everyone knows swords are the nobler weapon.

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Originally Posted By: What's left afterwards?
Second trilogy? They stopped showing up as soon as the Exile series ended.


There were still axes as late as Blades of Avernum, but they were lumped into the category of "melee weapons" along with swords.
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Originally Posted By: What's left afterwards?
Having three categories of weapons meant more weapons no party members could use... Dropping maces also saved on art and cut the number of PC sprites required by a third.


This. I mostly use singleton parties, so I hate having to sell really good weapons simply because I can't use them. Having three weapon types would mean more sacrifices, and less artifacts one could actually use, assuming the number of weapon artifacts in the entire game stayed the same.

Other games (I'm thinking Skyrim) have this problem too. Since it is a waste to specialize in all weapon types, it would be irritating to have too many to choose from.
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