Are you saying that a 2hander cannot be unsheathed from a 1/3 sheathe?
I'm saying that a 1/3rd sheath like that is going to fall apart, the design is not even remotely close to the simple durability of a wood and leather one-piece scabbard.
Its going to get rainwater running down the blade (especially a fullered blade) and collecting in the bottom of the sheath, damaging the blade. As it would be medieval leather, it would have to be vegetanned leather, not a chrome-tan - an entirely modern process. That contains tannins, which will chemically react with iron/steel, making the blade get stained black in areas it touched. if the leather's wet, it will corrode the steel significantly; active rusting. If the weather wet it will also deform and warp, because there's no underlying structure to it, like a proper scabbard.
Because its an all-leather construction, there's no support for the bottom of the sheath, meaning when its drawn, it flops all over the place. Due to the length, that's going to end up tangling between the user's legs, getting in the way. That's a common problem that reenactors who use soft leather sheaths, instead of rigid wooden-cored scabbards, by the way. And that's very much also something you really don't want in a real fight when your life's at stake. You also dont want something that's attached over your shoulder with great big hooks on it that are screaming "use me as a grappling point" to your opponent, who can use the stuff you're wearing to your disadvantage.
Then there's the whole space issue. to draw over the shoulder means you're going to have to turn the blade at shoulder height. lets say for simplicity, you're 1m 80, and the sword blade is 1.10m long, with a 40cm hilt Well, I just did a quick check with a 14th C longsword that's got a 97cm blade... and I hit the 2.5m high ceiling. If you're in a rush, you need to easily have a 3m ceiling height to practically draw over the shoulder (plus a metre of clear space behind you), or you're going to be hitting the roof. Now ingame we might not have a ceiling, but I cant really envisage the gloomy dungeons of SG and Exanima are blessed with high, bright airy ceilings in every corridor...
Outdoors it would be fine. But guess what? Outdoors, you can use a normal scabbard, and carry it on your horse.
When drawn, it will also lose rigidity, meaning it makes it utterly impractical to sheath. Unless you're wanting to play "stab myself in the back of the leg" while poking around blindly like a drunken virgin, you're left having to unstrap the thing, turn it round so its facing your front, use both hands, one holding your sword, the other the scabbard and thread the tip into the gap for the bottom part of the sheath, then line up the top, notch it over these two oversized hooks, and secure it. then take the assembly, sling it over the shoulder, and tighten up the baldric so you dont have it slip.
Or... you just prop it on your shoulder.
Hmm. I wonder which is more practical?
And, all, meanwhile, while the contraption fails to provide any actual protection for the edge of the weapon, or protection from the elements - the two most important elements of the purpose of a scabbard. In this regard, its about as much use as a chocolate teapot.
That's what I mean that it wont work.
Equipment is designed to perform certain tasks. the criteria of performance. An F1 car goes fast. an arming sword is an excellent weapon for defence, a helmet deflects blows. And a scabbard covers the blade, and protects it while not in use.
stick tractor tyres on a f1 car, and it doesn't go fast, it fails its criteria, it gets scrapped. Put a massive "final fantasy" blade on the arming sword, its no longer agile for rapid movement, it fails its criteria. The user dies, the weapon gets scrapped. Stick horns on a helmet, and the blow that would be deflected instead gets hooked, and transfers all the force into the guy's head. it fails the criteria, the guy dies. Horns on helmets are only used on parade, show helmets from then on.
And the same with this design. it fails the essential criteria of its purpose. its as simple as that.
It works fine for someone prancing around a Renfair. But that's a weekend of fun carrying a shiny toy prop. its as far removed from the reality of medieval warfare, as playing "call of duty" is to being stuck in a warzone in the Ukraine while being showered with body parts from your comrades-in-arms who just got hit by a mortar.
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Incidentally, the whole practicality of large weapons stowed on the user's back is also the reason I dislike archery with arrows on the back - all the same problems.
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Now. Gameplay.
How an object works, from a gameplay point of view is something entirely different. Physical reality, and gameplay reality are not the same thing.
So the question there must be:
"what game-play elements does the sheathing and unsheathing of swords confer to a player during play?" Further to that:
"what unique elements will the sheathing of a two-handed sword confer?"
Well, here we reach the problem. Sheathing, or making safe a weapon has no gameplay benefit currently. We are, therefore talking about entirely hypothetical added features. Accepting that problem, we can conclude that this action can be designed to have in-game benefits;
- social interaction with NPCs in both positive and negative manners.
- possibly ease of access for a weapon through a quick-select interface,
- visual immersion during the toggling of combat mode.
#3, Visual immersion is the easiest one. you see the player draw a sword (undoubtedly accompanied by the rasp of metal on metal that real medieval scabbards dont have...), its a visual metaphor for "the fight begins". Action drama, etc. But that does not need to be a scabbard. there are more than swords, after all. A 1h war-hammer or mace does not have a scabbard. Nor does a lucerne hammer. or a crossbow. Or a plank witha nail in it. Only a sword has a scabbard, and not all swords have scabbards. Of these, only the very largest 2h sword would even have need of a scabbard on the back - a 1m 30cm two-handed longsword comfortably sits on the hip.
Therefore we can conclude: if hammers, crossbows, polearms and wooden planks do not need a scabbard, then a scabbard itself is not an integral part of the sheathing and unsheathing gameplay mechanic. Therefore, the gameplay mechanic is not Sheathing and unsheathing. The gameplay mechanic is the transfer between an active state (weapon readied), and a passive state (weapon put away.). The use of a sword on back or not on the back is irrelevant to gameplay for point 3.
#1 is the most obvious application for future use, and also the one least used for Exanima. From the determining of the purpose and the differentiation from point #3, we can again note that the scabbard is of limited use, other weapons remain in the game. Therefore, when we look at the social interaction, we must conclude that all equipment must possess a passive state. The single-handed sword is sheathed. but is the crossbow is held by its stirrup? does the character's stance shift, to lean nonchalantly against his pollaxe? does the player hook their mace onto the belt? In the same way, a relaxed pose with a two-handed sword, the player leaning on the point, arms draped over the cross-arms, or point up, over the shoulder, is as viable as a passive stance during social interaction stages. Again, gameplay is not in any form defined by if the 2h sword is sheathed or not.
#2 is the most complex, and that requires a huge amount of work on the UI in general. I'm honestly not sure what the logical answers and gameplay elements there are - it would require a much more wide-ranging consideration of the entire inventory system, than just the concern of sheathing and unsheathing. I dont feel that this is the thread for that discussion, but my recent post in the Feedback forum:
http://www.baremettle.com/forums/index.php?threads/observations-from-demo-areas-that-could-be-improved.2236/
has a number of points ( #3 and #3b), that I hope best touch on some of the thoughts I've had over the Inventory system, which would best be addressed in a much more comprehensive, and integrated design solution which benefits gameplay as a whole, rather than a single gameplay element of ease of access.
Therefore in conclusion, I would strongly disagree that there is any logical grounds on which a 2h sword's sheathing or unsheathing makes any difference to gameplay, over any other weapon. Therefore, any design decisions made should be integrated to all weapons, not just those specifically edged and oversized.
Which leaves only one element for the inclusion of back scabbards the likes of which we've seen: aesthetics. That's all down to personal opinion. And opinions are like arseholes, most are full of shit. I've given my reasons, for the realism of the tangible, physical world the game is set in, to determine the practicality of weapons and equipment. In this, the back scabbards fail miserably to perform effectively. Does that outweigh any sort of "cool" element of a sword on the back that is suspended from an outlandish contraption? Personally, I say no, for the reasons given.
That's my case for why they should'nt be in there. Apologies for it having to stretch to Ohgod how many words?