The Fantasy Armory · Chapter 4

Unarmed Weapons

Every character already owns this family. The Exodus NDS core rules give an unarmed attack Damage equal to Might, Crit 5, Range Engaged, and no qualities. The six entries here modify that profile rather than replacing it.

Every close-combat weapon in this book scales the same way, a dagger at +1 no differently than a cestus at +2, because a held weapon still answers to the arm swinging it. What makes this family different is that a character owns the baseline for free before spending a coin: Chapter 2's core Unarmed profile is +0, and every entry here is a purchase against that starting line rather than a weapon built from nothing.

Two qualities carry the family. Concealable is on half the entries, because a weapon worn on the hand goes through a gate that a knife does not. Stun Damage is here because taking someone alive is usually a job for a fist.

Damage is the lowest in the book. Nothing here will drop an armoured opponent, and the two entries that try are priced accordingly.

Skill: All entries use Unarmed. At tables that fold unarmed attacks into a general Melee skill, use that skill instead; nothing else changes.

Worn weapons resist disarming. Every entry in this chapter is strapped, worn, or gripped inside the hand rather than held. Disarming one costs 2 additional Boon. Taking it off is a maneuver the wielder chooses to make, and nobody else can make it for them.

Hand Wraps

Brawler's Wrap, Boxing Wrap, Hand Binding, Linen Wrap

Linen or leather strips wound over the knuckles and through the fingers. They add nothing to the damage and they are not armour. What they buy is the ability to keep punching: a bare fist splits and breaks against a jaw long before the jaw gives, and Crit 4 instead of Crit 5 is the whole of what wrapping the hand is worth.

The cheapest entry in the book that is not improvised.

Sap Gloves

Weighted Gloves, Lead-Filled Gloves, Loaded Gloves

Ordinary-looking gloves with powdered lead sewn into the back of the hand and along the fingers. They read as gloves at a glance and they hit like a cosh.

Stun Damage sends everything they deal to strain rather than wounds, so a target dropped by sap gloves is unconscious and intact. Crit 5 is the worst rating in the book, which is correct: these are not for winning fights, they are for ending them quietly and leaving someone to answer questions.

Bagh Nakh

Tiger Claws, Iron Claws, Hand Claws, Cat's Paw

Four or five curved blades on a bar held across the palm, with rings for the first and little finger. Closed, the hand looks empty. Opened, it takes the front off a face.

It is the only Cutting weapon in the family and the only unarmed entry that keeps working after the exchange: Bleed 1 costs the target wounds every turn and someone an action to treat. An assassin's tool, and in most cities the possession of one is evidence of intent.

Iron Knuckles

Knuckle-Duster, Brass Knuckles, Tekko, Fist Iron

A shaped bar of iron or brass carried in a fist, with finger holes and a palm swell to stop it driving back into the hand. It concentrates a punch onto four small faces, which is where Pierce 1 comes from.

It fits in a coin purse, it is legal almost nowhere, and it is the standard answer for anyone who expects to be searched before a fight and not after one.

Gauntlet

Plate Gauntlet, Mailed Fist, Gadlings, Armoured Glove

An articulated steel glove with raised knuckle plates. It is the only entry in this family that is also a piece of harness, and the only weapon in the book a character can be wearing while holding a different one.

A steel hand can close on a blade. Disarming 1 is what that is worth, and Reinforced means the gauntlet cannot be broken by Sunder or degraded by anything short of deliberate destruction.

Cestus

Caestus, Myrmex, Arena Glove, Spiked Glove

Leather strapping to the elbow with lead sewn through the wrap and iron studs across the knuckles. It is not a boxing glove and was never intended to soften anything.

+2 is the highest damage in the family, and Vicious with Brutal gives it the highest ceiling: it does nothing extra on an ordinary roll and a great deal on a good one. The hand inside it can hold nothing else, which is the Awkward 1.