Weapon Use (Physical special)—It's fairly obvious that there is a huge difference in the attack potential of an unskilled novice and a trained swordsman. The level of skill with which a character fights is divided into eight categories: nonproficiency, familiarity, proficiency, expertise, specialization, mastery, high mastery and grand mastery.

Physical skill points are used to acquire each level of mastery. Nonproficiency and familiarity cost no skill points, normal proficiency costs 50 physical skill points, expertise and specialization cost a total of 100 skill points, and mastery costs 150 skill points or more.

Nonproficiency: If a character has never had any training or practice with a weapon, he is nonproficient. He can only guess at the proper way to hold the weapon or attack his opponent. Anything fancier than a simple hack, slash, or bash is beyond his abilities — the character cannot attempt any attack options such as disarming, blocking, or sapping.

In addition to his inability to make special attacks, the character also suffers an attack roll penalty based on his character class (see Table 5.9.4). Warriors tend to figure out weapons of any kind relatively quickly and have a small penalty for attacking with weapons they're not familiar with. Other characters don't have the warrior's affinity for weapons and are more severely penalized.

Any weapon wielded by a nonproficient character is considered one initiative phase slower than it really is, and missile weapons have their rate of fire halved. An untrained character wielding a long sword has an initiative phase of slow, not average, and an unskilled character wielding a long bow would only fire once per round instead of twice.

Familiarity: All characters are automatically familiar with any weapon that is related to a weapon they are proficient with. Weapons are considered to be related if they are part of the same tight group. For example, a character who is proficient in the use of the light crossbow is automatically familiar with all other types of crossbows because they're part of the same tight weapon group.

Familiarity is not as good as proficiency, but it beats not knowing anything about a weapon at all. Characters only suffer one-half the normal nonproficiency penalty when attacking with weapons they are familiar with (see Table 5.9.4). They may attempt any normal attack maneuvers possible (the familiarity penalty still applies, of course), and suffer no initiative or rate of fire penalties.

Familiarity does not allow the user to make use of any special weapon attack modes that require proficiency in the weapon.

Proficiency: This is the basic level of competence most characters achieve with their weapons training. Proficiency allows the character to use a weapon with no penalties and employ all attack options and special weapon properties to their fullest extent. Any character can spend 100 physical skill points to become proficient in a tight weapon group or 150 physical skill points to become proficient in a broad group. Otherwise, characters have to spend 50 physical skill points per weapon they wish to be proficient with.

Weapon Groups

As noted above, weapons can be classified into tight and broad groups. All weapons in a tight group are considered to be related to one another; a character proficient in one automatically has familiarity with the rest. Note, a weapon proficiency includes stone or bone versions of the same weapon.

In the listing below unrelated weapons which are part of a broad group are listed in their own category. Unrelated weapons must be learned individually, they are not tight groups. If a weapon does not appear in the following listings, it belongs to no weapon group. For example, weapons such as the boomerang or the mancatcher are so unique in their employment that nothing even comes close to being similar.

Expertise: Weapon expertise is a form of specialization that is available to nonfighters. Regular weapon specialization (described below) is only available to single-classed fighters and gladiators, but weapon expertise can be learned by paladins, rangers, crusaders, assassins and multi-classed fighters and gladiators. There's no reason a single-classed fighter couldn't learn expertise instead of specialization, but expertise is just as expensive as specialization and isn't as good.

Weapon expertise allows a character to gain extra attacks as if he or she were a weapon specialist. At first level, an expert with the long sword gets to attack three times per two rounds. Weapon expertise also allows the use of any unusual weapon properties reserved for specialist use. Weapon expertise does not grant the character extra attack or damage bonuses, as weapon specialization does.

Weapon expertise may only be learned for a weapon that a character is already proficient with and costs 50 physical skill points to attain.

Expertise for Assassins and Crusaders: In Fälgorna, assassins have a rate of attack equal to a fighter of the same level. Crusaders have a rate of attack equal to a fighter three levels below their own as shown on the following table. To reflect the extra time spent studying priestly magic, the crusader may not acquire expertise with a weapon until he reaches third level.

Specialization: By spending an extra 50 physical skill points on a weapon, a single-class fighter or gladiator can become a specialist. Fighters and gladiators may specialize in as many weapons as they wish, provided they have sufficient skill points.

The exact benefits of weapon specialization vary with the particular weapon involved. Generally, the types of benefits fall into one of four categories: melee weapons, missile weapons, bows and crossbows.

Melee Weapons: Specializing in a melee weapon provides a character with two main benefits: first of all, he gains a +1 bonus to attack rolls and a +2 bonus to damage rolls with that weapon; secondly, he gains an extra attack once per two rounds. A 1st-level fighter normally attacks once per round, but a 1st-level long sword specialist attacks three times per two rounds.

Missile Weapons: This category includes slings and thrown weapons. Generally, specialists gain an increased rate of fire with these weapons and a +1 bonus to attack rolls. If a character specializes in a weapon that can be used either for melee or as a missile weapon (spears, daggers, hand axes, etc.), he gains the melee benefit described above when using the weapon for hand-to-hand combat and the increased rate of fire for using the weapon for ranged attacks.

Refer to the table below for the exact number of attacks available to the specialist for the various types of missile weapons.

Bows Characters who specialize in the bow gain a +1 bonus to hit at any range (normal range penalties still apply, of course), an increased rate of fire, and a new range category: point-blank. Point-blank is any shot of 30 feet or less. At point-blank range, the character gains a +2 to damage. In addition, bow specialists can automatically fire first as a very fast action if they have their target covered.

Crossbows Specialists with crossbows gain a +1 bonus to hit at any range, an increased rate of fire, and a point-blank range category, just like archers. For crossbows, point-blank range extends out to 60 feet. Crossbow specialists have a +2 bonus to damage rolls against any target at pointblank range. In addition, they share the archer's quickshot benefit when covering an enemy.

Weapon Mastery: There are swordsmen, and then there are swordsmen. A warrior who devotes his life to the study of martial combat and the characteristics of a single type of weapon can become a weapon master — a fighter whose precision, quickness, and skill are virtually unequaled.

Weapon masters are rare characters. Only single-classed fighters and gladiators can ever achieve weapon mastery, and even then they do so with time, study, and sacrifice. To achieve mastery in a weapon, a character must first specialize in the use of that weapon. Then, at any time after he reaches 5th level for a fighter or 4th level for a gladiator, he can spend another 50 physical skill points to become a weapon master.

Generally, only weapons that require some skill to handle or that have a history of cultural identification are chosen by weapon masters. Swords of any kind are the most common weapons mastered, followed by bows and then axes or spears. Polearms, crossbows, and firearms are the subject of weapon mastery only in rare cases. The DM can decide that a weapon isn't appropriate for mastery at his discretion, but he should do so before a character chooses to specialize in it.

Effects of Mastery: A character who becomes a weapon master’s attack and damage bonuses increase to +3 and +3, respectively. For bows and crossbows, his point-blank bonuses increase to +3/+3 as with melee weapons, and he gains an additional +1 to hit at all other range categories, for a total of +2. (Remember, this bonus doesn't take range modifiers into account, so the archer has a total of +2 at short, +0 at medium, and -3 at long range, if the penalties are factored in.)

High Mastery: A fighter of at least 6th-level or a gladiator of at least 5th level may spend an additional 50 physical skill points on mastery to become a high master. By this time, the character has spent a total of 200 physical skill points. High masters increase the speed factor of their chosen weapon by one category; for example, a slow weapon in the hands of a high master is automatically considered to be of average speed.

High masters also have a chance based on their critical hit percentage score to score a critical hit on to hit roll of a natrual 19 or 20. The chance to score a critical hit on either roll is equal. For example, a fighter with a critical hit percentage score of 50% would have a 50% chance to score a critical hit on a roll of 19 and a 50% chance to score a critical hit on a roll of 20. If the character had a 75% critical hit percentage score, he would have a 75% chance to hit critically on either roll.

High masters who specialize in missile weapon of any kind gain a new range category: extreme range. For all weapons, extreme range is one-third farther than long range. For example, if a weapon has a normal maximum range of 18 squares, in the hands of a master it has a range of 24 (18/3=6, 18+6=24) squares. Extreme range shots have a -10 penalty to hit before adjustments are made for the effects of mastery.

Grand Mastery: High master fighters of at least 9th level or high master gladiators of at least 8th level who spend an additional 50 physical skill points on studying the are of wielding a weapon of high mastery can become grand masters. Grand masters are capable of feats of weaponplay that border on the fantastic. Grand masters gain one additional attack per round above and beyond a specialist's rate of attacks for their level, so a 12th-level melee weapon grand master would attack three times per round with his weapon of choice.

Grand masters also increase the amount of damage and the chance of a knockdown when they employ their chosen weapon. The weapon's base damage die and knockdown die are increased to the next greater die size against all opponents. A long sword thus inflicts 1d10/1d20 points of damage in the hands of a grand master, and its knockdown die is increased to a d10. If the weapon causes multiple dice of damage, all of them are increased. Thus, a two-handed sword in the hands of a grand master inflicts 3d8 points of damage on large targets. Needless to say, grand masters are extremely dangerous opponents.

Special DM Note: Weapon mastery is hard to come by, and even harder to perfect. It's not very rare for a character to become a master, but the quest to become a high master or grand master could take years. Unlike the previous levels of specialization, which can simply be selected as an advancement choice, high mastery and grand mastery require a great deal of time and personal sacrifice on the part of the character. A character who wishes to become a high master or grand master must locate someone who can teach him and spend several months or more of campaign time in training — possibly “sitting out” an adventure or two while he hones his skills.