House rules are house rules, but...
The historical jitte I've seen could not be used in such a manner. What
hook they have was designed to catch a sword blade, not a body part. And
its hook is placed very inconveniently to hook a shield.
Jeu de la Hache describes many plays in which the opponent is taken down
with a poll ax. All are done with the straight butt end of the haft.
Fiore de Liberi's works also show many such plays. Usually done with a
longsword. But his basis for weaponed combat was wrestling. The sort of
wrestling that breaks bones.
For myself, when fighting with two swords against a shield, I've often
used the pommel of one sword to keep the shield from moving into a line I
wanted to attack through. Another shield works just as well, or the blade
of the word for that matter. It is entirely unnecessary to pull a shield
out of position. Just keeping it from moving works wonders.
As for the use of the hooking tactic being better against lower-skilled
opponents, well duh! Everything easier against them! Personally, I don't
bother with such fancy stuff against those sorts, I just hit them because
that's very easy. In TFT terms, I'll get the first attack anyway due to
higher adjDX.
These maneuvers don't really require specially made weapons.
I'm not sure how this balances. It's probably particular to the campaign.
In mine, it would either be worth the couple points less damage and
everyone would take the hooked weapons, or it wouldn't be worth it and no
one would bother. The only time I could see it being used in the middle
would be by specially trained teams who would have one hooker and the rest
very heavy weapons.
If I were to implement this, instead of the divide by 4 mechanic, I'd
probably allow a hooking maneuver either in the first action after
engagement (if the figure moved first) or any action after the opponent
missed his attack or did not attack (within reason, I suppose there could
be circumstances under which the opponent dfidn't attack but couldn't be
hooked). If he attacked you successfully, then your next action can't be a
hook.
Neil Gilmore
raito@raito.comOn Wed, May 1, 2019 7:26 pm, Rick wrote:
Hi all,
A number of weapons were intended to hook shields, pull enemy off of
horses, pull enemy off balance or pull shields out of position.
Examples of such weapons are: The Egyptian Khopesh, Halberd, Pike Ax,
Shuang gou (hook sword), Kusari, jabajabba, battle axes, Jutte (or
Jitte), Hakapik, Guisarme, and no doubt many of have missed.
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