Notes:
- durability : I think that weapons and tools would be better if they were separate. Using a battle-axe to chop wood or hammer to mine should count as an inappropriate use and double the durability cost. This way people still craft axes for harvesting, rather than just making battle-axes to do double-duty.
Axes : if axes have higher damage and reach than a sword, and no drawbacks, why would anyone make a sword? Maybe if there was a trade off. Some thing the axe did better than a sword and something it didn't/ What if Axes did more damage but were shorter (smaller reach)?
Hammers : What if Hammers had a knockback effect?
Spears : I like what you have here. Kudos on the throwing idea. They're retrievable like arrows, right?
Daggers: I like the trade off of having the daggers super easy to make / have low material requirements. with only 2 components, you can make them in the 2x2 inventory window instead of a crafting table. I'm not sure I agree with throwing them though. Arrows, Spears AND daggers? It might be too much. IMHO the trade off of easy crafting makes up for the low damage and range without making them a ranged weapon.
Instead of looking at this first as a way to add more variety, I'd look at it from a game balance perspective. Doing this, the game's main weapons seem to already satisfy a lot of what the weapons here have:
Sword: High damage, high rate, short range, expensive to make, hard to enchant. The battle-axe in your suggestion has the same rate and range as the sword, but higher damage! It kind of makes sense because it uses twice as many materials, but I'd go for a different approach, like lowering the rate and improving critical hit chance/damage.
Bow: High damage, low rate, high range, cheap to make, expensive for arrows, easy to enchant. Now, the crossbow has 3/8ths of the range of the bow, and the bow has 3/8ths of the damage of the crossbow. This amounts to the same damage per second. And when it comes to hitting mobs, I know I won't be able to get them in one hit, so it seems the bow will always be the better option. Charging an arrow already takes a long time. The slingshot (dapo290793's idea) seems like a good alternate weapon, however, especially for the early game. Its short range and lower damage make it inferior to the bow, but using cobblestone as ammo is a lot more economic than arrows. Just bring one into the mines with you and you'll be set.
Axes/Other tools: Low damage, high rate, low range, expensive. Obviously not good for fighting. The hammer breaks this a little by making a dual purpose weapon. It even does higher damage, and has a higher rate, than the sword! This is not something you should be able to buy with 4 extra iron.
Spears/Polearms: Very high damage, medium range, high rate, very expensive. This is how these weapons should work, in my opinion. They do more damage than arrows at close range, and there should be a chance of killing an enemy in one shot. At the price of one iron per projectile, it's worth it.
So with these weapons, we now have many variables: damage, rate, range, cost, upkeep (cost of repairing a sword, or getting new arrows for a bow), availability of good enchantments, chance of critical hits, and damage of critical hits. With all these, there should be no clear choice of what weapon to use, but one that depends on the player's style, the resources they have, and what situation they are in. Whenever you come up with a new weapon, think, 'when would I use it'?
Damage = How many hearts per hit!
Speed = How fast (Higher is better!)!
Range = How many blocks away!
Melee
Sword 5
Standard weapon. Good against slower opponents.
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Damage: 2
Speed: 2
Range: 1
Special: None
Battle-Axe 6
Higher damage than sword.
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Damage: 3
Speed: 2
Range: 1
Special: Acts as axe of same material.
Hammer 7
High damage and pick ability make this a good mining buddy.
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Damage: 5
Speed: 1
Range: 2
Special: Acts as pick of same material.
Polearm 6
Better than spear, but can't be thrown.
[] [] [sword]
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Damage: 2
Speed: 1
Range: 3
Special: Extra damage against armor.
Ranged
Bow 5.5
Much faster than Crossbow, but with less speed and range. Easier to make and maintain.
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Damage: 1.5
Speed: 4
Range: Medium
Special: Requires arrows, made from a flint, stick, and a feather.
Crossbow 5.5
Harder to make, harder to maintain, harder to reload, but with lots of damage and range.
[}] [bow]
[ ] [iron] [ ]
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Damage: 4
Speed: 1.5
Range: High
Special: Requires bolts, made from 1 iron, a stick and a feather.
Hybrid
Spear x2 5.5
High range, low damage and throwing ability make this great versus spiders.
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Damage: 1.5
Speed: 1.5
Range: 2.5
Special: Can be thrown for 2/3 damage. Throwing range: Short
Dagger x4 5.5
Low damage but fast speed and throwing ability make this weapon great for quick combat.
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Damage: 1
Speed: 4
Range: 0.5
Special: Can be thrown for 1/3 damage. Throwing range: Short
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Notes:
- durability : I think that weapons and tools would be better if they were separate. Using a battle-axe to chop wood or hammer to mine should count as an inappropriate use and double the durability cost. This way people still craft axes for harvesting, rather than just making battle-axes to do double-duty.
Axes : if axes have higher damage and reach than a sword, and no drawbacks, why would anyone make a sword? Maybe if there was a trade off. Some thing the axe did better than a sword and something it didn't/ What if Axes did more damage but were shorter (smaller reach)?
Hammers : What if Hammers had a knockback effect?
Spears : I like what you have here. Kudos on the throwing idea. They're retrievable like arrows, right?
Daggers: I like the trade off of having the daggers super easy to make / have low material requirements. with only 2 components, you can make them in the 2x2 inventory window instead of a crafting table. I'm not sure I agree with throwing them though. Arrows, Spears AND daggers? It might be too much. IMHO the trade off of easy crafting makes up for the low damage and range without making them a ranged weapon.
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crossbow and bolts, harder to build than a bow (needs iron). bolts do more damage and travel faster (and therefore farther).
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=56267
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crossbow: more accurate than bow and slightly stronger but shoots slower; also the bolts can only stack 16.
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recipe for bolts
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[] [>>-i>] []
recipe for fire arrows
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[] [>>-i>] []
just throwing my spin on it out there.
+2234
Sword: High damage, high rate, short range, expensive to make, hard to enchant. The battle-axe in your suggestion has the same rate and range as the sword, but higher damage! It kind of makes sense because it uses twice as many materials, but I'd go for a different approach, like lowering the rate and improving critical hit chance/damage.
Bow: High damage, low rate, high range, cheap to make, expensive for arrows, easy to enchant. Now, the crossbow has 3/8ths of the range of the bow, and the bow has 3/8ths of the damage of the crossbow. This amounts to the same damage per second. And when it comes to hitting mobs, I know I won't be able to get them in one hit, so it seems the bow will always be the better option. Charging an arrow already takes a long time. The slingshot (dapo290793's idea) seems like a good alternate weapon, however, especially for the early game. Its short range and lower damage make it inferior to the bow, but using cobblestone as ammo is a lot more economic than arrows. Just bring one into the mines with you and you'll be set.
Axes/Other tools: Low damage, high rate, low range, expensive. Obviously not good for fighting. The hammer breaks this a little by making a dual purpose weapon. It even does higher damage, and has a higher rate, than the sword! This is not something you should be able to buy with 4 extra iron.
Spears/Polearms: Very high damage, medium range, high rate, very expensive. This is how these weapons should work, in my opinion. They do more damage than arrows at close range, and there should be a chance of killing an enemy in one shot. At the price of one iron per projectile, it's worth it.
So with these weapons, we now have many variables: damage, rate, range, cost, upkeep (cost of repairing a sword, or getting new arrows for a bow), availability of good enchantments, chance of critical hits, and damage of critical hits. With all these, there should be no clear choice of what weapon to use, but one that depends on the player's style, the resources they have, and what situation they are in. Whenever you come up with a new weapon, think, 'when would I use it'?
I agree. The whole focus of Minecraft is not weapons, we do not need twenty different sorts.
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