Posted By Maulvorn at 10:12 AM - Tue Jul 25 2017

Nice drawings, but the brudvir sword doesn't really look like it is made for cleaving or hacking IMHO, same with the Hrothi. In my opinion the Brudvir sword looks like a normal 2h sword and would be used as such. The Hrothi sword looks like a Gladius almost which is a almost purely stabbing weapon, sure you can hack but most damage would of been via stabbing.

First of all, thanks for giving me the possbility to comment on this thread without only criticising the artist.

Let me start with you though. The Brudvir sword looks like a very good sword for chopping etc. it has a broad, heavy blade, same goes for the Hrothi sword.

The gladius is definitely not "almost purely a stabbing weapon". The gladius is a good sword to chop with, but because the roman soldiers usually also carried a scutum, stabbing was the thing you did when fighting other 'roman' soldiers, which might be where this misconception hails from.

Now to the swords themselves:

The Brudvir sword lacks a pommel, and is made out of bone(?!). Could maybe be used as a ceremonial sword, but, as someone already mentioned bones don't really lend themselves to cutting weapons. Besides, the Brudvir are allied with the Hrothi, so metal should be easy enough to come by. Since this also implies that metal armor might be relatively prelevant in the north, it would also make sense to have a slimmer blade, so the point can thrust through mail etc.

The janoan sword has some of the same problems (bone, no pommel) as the brudvir's, but also has no kind of handprotection e.g. a crossguard. Its length also makes it unwieldy, and keep in mind Janoa might want to climb with their weapons.

The other swords have typical fantasy problems aswell, namely too heavy blades, useless crossguards, and too many spikes.

There are three that are good though: the Hrothi, the Dras and the To'resk swords.

Not to say the others don't look cool aswell, but those three are functional weapons, without glaring issues.

Edit 1: the 'reversed' handle on the Dras sabre is something you can find on for example the falcata.