Oriental Weapons Rework

Now that we have redone the Oriental Adventures armor, we will tackle the weapons, unlike the armor page, I will not be redoing the entire chart. While my Magi-tek engineer chart came out perfectly with very little editing, my firearms charts and armor charts do not appear at all how they do on the draft page once I publish it. I am only including the weapons that I'm changing, with some explanations for reasoning.

Handy Reference Chart

First off, general change, all oriental adventures items are considered exotic weapons, unless you are from Oniboros.

We are pretty much going in order from the linked chart.

Starting with Nunchaku. (Or nunchucks for us Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle fans.) I'm actually making this item weaker... Nunchaku are mainly training weapons that have become kind of mythologically powerful. (Thanks Soul Caliber and Ninja Gaiden...) 1d6 weapon with a x3 crit? That is the same damage as a hand axe... take a set of nunchaku from your local martial arts place, and go buy a hatchet from home depot. Hit something with both of them. Which one did more damage? Yep, the steel head hatchet. This doesn't mean that the nunchaku are a bad weapon, they just aren't a 1d6x3. Nunchaku now are a 1d4 weapon, with a x2 for crit, but they add an extra attack at the highest base attack bonus -2. This will stack with flurry of blows for monks, and in addition, a monk may substitute unarmed damage for the poor nunchuck damage. In addition, the nunchaku grant a +2 to disarm attempts.

Simplified: 1d4 damage. x2 critical, +1 attack, (Flurry style) +2 to disarm.

Moving on with our ninja turtle weapons, the sai I'm enhancing. I'm keeping the +4 to disarm, but I'm also changing some other things around, first, it is now 1d6 x2 crit. Also, if you are dual wielding sais, you gain +1 to AC passively. (This can stack with a buckler or shield spell) If you have the 'two weapon defense' feat, you will gain +3 AC. To offset this power up, I'm increasing the base price from 10 silver to 10 gold each.

Simplified: 1d6 damage, dual wielding bonuses, 10 gold base price.

*Update* Cho No Ku, adding the Chinese rapid firing crossbow which I very stupidly forgot to include. This weapon is a truly awesome feat of engineering, it has a top loading 5-8 bolt clip, (For game purposes, all Cho No Ku are set at a 6 round clip by default) and it self-reloads and fires faster than an archer with a bow, which is crazy for a crossbow. This weapons hits as hard as any standard light crossbow, with the amazing ability to benefit from the rapid shot and rapid reload feats, as well as from ranger combat styles. This weapon can make an additional attack every round, like the nunchaku above. It is considered a martial weapon for anyone who lives in Oniboros.

Simplified: 1d8 19-20 x2 crit, 6 bolt clip, may make an additional attack, which functions like rapid shot. (Stacks with rapid shot, thus a level 1 fighter with the rapid shot feat would get 3 attacks per round, all with a -2 penalty.)

Flute Knife, 19-20x2 crit, like all other knife/blade weapons.

Nekode, +2 unarmed damage, and +1 climb.

Neko-te, +1 unarmed damage, and +2 climb.

Parangu, x3 crit. (Altered sword crit.)

Shinobi-Shuko/ashiko, +3 unarmed damage, +2 climb, must be bought in pair, 40 gp now.

Masakari, x3 crit.

Ninja-to, damage is now 1d8. Ninja and Samurai may perform Iaijutsu with this blade.

Wakizashi, as I've said in previous posts, I hate that this and the katana are just masterwork short swords and bastard swords. The wakizashi is now considered a non-magical +1 weapon. It gains a +1 to both hit and damage, this stacks with any magical bonus. (Example, a wakizashi +2 does 1d6+3 damage, and gain +3 to hit) To augment this, I'm increasing the base cost from 300 to 400. (All wakizashi and Katana are still masterwork weapons.)

Katana, a bit out of order, but doing the exact same change, it is now 1d10+1 to damage, as well as to hit. The base cost for a Katana has gone from 400 to 550.

Kusari-gama, (And everything that says kusari-gama like weapon.) all damage is set to 1d6/1d6, with a x3 crit. (ALL WEAPONS!) Also, getting rid of the mamukigama. A kusari-gama with a snake head... the only way I would ever do a weapon like this would be if a yuan-ti were using it, so get rid of that from the chart. The Manriki-gusari is set to these stats as well.

Nagamaki, giving this one a bit of a work over, in reality, this weapon was a slightly longer katana blade with a much larger handle. It was meant as a defense against mounted soldiers. Oda Nobunaga (Legendary general, anyone who has played Onimusha or Dynasty Warriors will know this name) is said to have had an elite squad of bodyguards that armed themselves with nagamaki. The weapon is now a two handed weapon exactly like the katana, (1d10+1 damage, with a +1 to hit) I am having it change the crit as well to 19-20 x2, and the other bonus is unlike any other weapon, this weapon deals DOUBLE strength instead of 1.5 when wielded with two hands. Unfortunately, the super long handle does not allow this blade to perform Iaijutsu. Base price is now 575 gold.

Naginata, this incredibly capable weapon is actually one of the most battle versatile in the traditional samurai arsenal. Samurai would wave this about almost as fast as a monk with a quarterstaff and deflect arrows in much the same fashion. I'm buffing this weapon in 2 ways, first, 1d12 damage, (just because I love them so...) and +1 ac vs ranged weapons. (Passive bonus) Base price becomes 200 gold.

No-Dachi, the Sephiroth sword. This incredibly impractical weapon is legendary for a few samurai that could wield it properly, but like the European claymore, in real life combat this weapon was too bulky and slow to be widespread. It is slower than the katana, and can not perform Iaijutsu. It was originally made to counter horsemen, but was later replaced by the nagamaki. The No-Dachi was expensive to make, and while the reach was similar to the nagamaki, it was not nearly as easily handled. It takes a truly capable warrior to wield a No-Dachi. This weapon now deals 2d8+1 damage, has +1 to hit, has 19-20 x2 critical range, the base price is 600 gold.

Ono, this is now identical to the halberd in every way. All actual pictures of this weapon make it look like an inferior halberd. (Some weapons Europeans did make much better, and the halberd is one of them.)

*Clarification* The Ono uses standard halberd stats, not the buffed ones in the PHB post.

Testubo, this is the same as the kanabo, and is in essence a giant war club with iron studs. This incredibly heavy item is a special weapon meant to smash armored foes to bits. I'm changing several aspects of this item, first off, it now weighs 35 pounds, not 15. the damage is now 2d8, and it has an added effect, if this attack lands a blow, it deals a -2 AC penalty to the foe. If the attack misses, you suffer a -2 penalty to AC. Attacking with this weapon is very draining, and a warrior may only swing this weapon equal to 3 times his strength mod (per battle) before suffering muscle fatigue, inflicting a -4 penalty to strength until the warrior has time to rest. Each hit/miss compounds the effect of the AC penalty, for example, a  fighter has 3 attacks in a round, he hits twice and misses one, the wielder suffers -2 to AC, and the opponent would suffer -4. If the same warrior had 18 strength, (+4 modifier) he could swing 12 times before suffering muscle fatigue. The price of the Kanabo/Testubo is now 100 gold base. This weapon also requires at minimum 16 strength to wield. (Halfling sized versions of this weapon weigh 20 pounds and require 15 strength.)

Dai-Kyu, this from horseback only bow now deals 1d10 damage.

The Lezam bow, a bow that uses chain? Really? This weapon no longer exists. I even looked it up to see if my instincts were right that this couldn't work... and yeah, the whole point of a bow is a tight string, and chain, while it can be tight, it can not physically be as tight, and able to be pulled back, like a traditional string. The area in the middle is still leather or cloth, and thus the tension is being split between multiple points before even getting to the arrow. The entire reason a bow works is tension on the string, if that tension is not even, it won't fire properly, which it pretty much can't be when you go wood to chain to leather, as opposed to just wood to string.

The Shigeto-Yumi is the same as a composite longbow.

All the Yumi bows have +20' added to their range increment.

Naga Blade, this rather expensive two handed sword is an Indian influenced weapon, and is now slightly more powerful. It deals x4 damage on a crit.

Shuriken and Tsubute are now 1d3 each.

Thus concludes our oriental adventures revamp. Many of the items in this list are better than standard items, but they are more expensive, and to have the standard price, you have to be from Oniboros. Otherwise, with the x2, x3, or x4 cost increase, these weapons will be very expensive.

“You should not have any special fondness for a particular weapon, or anything else, for that matter. Too much is the same as not enough. Without imitating anyone else, you should have as much weaponry as suits you.”
― Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings