Poll: why no polearms?

[Denamic]

Try 1v1 combat sword vs spear. The spear is light and will easily be parried, and the sword will devastate at the short range that is easily attained.

Polearm =/= spear.
Polearms encompass a number of different kinds of weapons.
Try parrying a poleaxe.

 

[Broderick]

I love polearms. I like the idea of all the action happening at the sharp end of the long pointy bit.
No, using melee mechanics with polearms defeats the purpose of having them. Keeping enemies away is the most important thing if you fight with one. Should they get past your tip they will murder you with any weapon. Hell, they can grab the shaft, making the weapon useless, and start pounding your face with a gauntlet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5VwLWp0zok
Enjoy.

I know you are meant to keep your range but games like the elder scrolls can very easily add spears to their combat mechanics, though I would like to see a game with more complex fighting mechanics for all of their weapons.

If I remember right, morrowind did in fact have spears, but unforunately for spear lovers, they sucked as a weapon in the game, stats wise. Maybe in Skyrim they will bring back spears and they will be better? Seeing where the game is set though, I wouldnt count on it (lore wise)

 

[Bobbity]

Try the game "Mount&Blade" if you're looking for pole-arms. It has about the best mounted combat you'll find as well, so you can fight either mounted or on foot. If you really want to see a shining example of them, look no further.
As for why other games don't have them: They're basically instant-kill-driving-a-fucking-pole-through-the-other-guy's-spine on a horse, or get chopped to pieces on the ground - balancing is a bit of an issue.

 

[veloper]

There's no point in including long spears unless the game has proper mechanics for range.
Usually it's just a different picture and some extra damage stat for the weapon.

 

[Vryyk]

Try the game "Mount&Blade" if you're looking for pole-arms. It has about the best mounted combat you'll find as well, so you can fight either mounted or on foot. If you really want to see a shining example of them, look no further.
As for why other games don't have them: They're basically instant-kill-driving-a-fucking-pole-through-the-other-guy's-spine on a horse, or get chopped to pieces on the ground - balancing is a bit of an issue.

You saved me a post. Seriously, everyone needs to play this game. You will love it. Also, polearms are the most interesting and diverse weapons in that game (as they actually were in the time period).

 

[havass]

There're polearms in Assassin's Creed. They're just deviously hard to find. And using them is frankly cheating, cause the enemies will never touch you. T'is why they make it so that you can't carry them, on the basis that Ezio can't free run with them. The counter-kill scenes are epic though.

 

[Andantil]

Just "polearms" is pretty vague; you could mean spears, halberds, glaives, lances, voulges, poleaxes, etc.

Some of these would work well in games, others would not make sense. I think a glaive, halberd, or spear would be an excellent weapon in many fantasy themes games. The only reasons I can think they aren't included are that people don't like them or developers don't want to make more animations than necessary.

 

[Kair]

I do not understand where people think thing that

Polearms are usually only good in mass combat.

I'm not attacking you or anything, but what makes them good in mass combat? One of the advantages of a pole arm is that the user can threaten more area around himself than the shorter lighter weapons. Only in mass combat, there are SO many people around you, the effectiveness of that long of a weapon becomes a weakness instead of a strength. This is in my opinion since I'm no history of medieval weapons major.

It would seem to me that pole arms are situational weapons. They are great for certain scenarios, but as an everyday all purpose weapon they fall short.

Try 1v1 combat sword vs spear. The spear is light and will easily be parried, and the sword will devastate at the short range that is easily attained.

In mass combat, there is need to equip many troops, and swords are difficult to manufacture as opposed to spears. Spears were the main armament of most armies in the medieval period.

There is also less room to swing a sword in tight formation. A tight formation of spears used in somewhat of a phalanx will win over a loose formation of other weapons.

Spears cant swing to ones flanks very well, therefore you need supporting troops on your flanks, this is the power of the phalanx.

in 1 on 1 combat the spear can easily keep the sword man at ranged if both fighters are equally trained with their weapons and the spear can easily go for many attacks before the sword man would get in range.

Do you know how easy it is to hold off a spear 1v1?

 

[Scout Tactical]

The only games I have found to have polearms are dead rising 2 and morrowind (and I just find morrowind unplayable) there should be some in skyrim and any other medieval game as well as sci-fie games that have lazer swords and clubs.

Try playing an MMO, most of 'em have polearms as a weapon class. All of the Fire Emblem games have spears, javelins, halberds, and lances. Starcraft 2 has the Thermal Lance (though that's actually a laser beam), I've heard MapleStory has an assortment of polearms of all kinds, too. The entire Warcraft series had a surfeit of polearm-wielders. League of Legends boasts several champions, including Jax, who use polearms. Assassin's Creed 2 not only has polearms, but has special techniques for their usage.

You're far more likely to see spears in games set in medieval times (i.e.: the time period you'd see swords in). Just don't expect to see many in gun-style games like Left 4 Dead or CSS, even if they boast melee weapons.

 

[LawlessSquirrel]

Maybe a little underused, but not majorly from what I've seen. Boomerangs, whips and wind-and-fire wheels seem much more neglected in my humble opinion.

 

[SimuLord]

Play mount & blade for all of your polearms needs.
And no, polearms have never been common in rpgs

I was just about to say, you want polearms? On horseback, even? I guess "Mount&Lance" doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

 

[nuba km]

snip

OK a skilled spearman can easily keep people at a distance because if you get in his range (normally between 5-11ft) they will get killed long before they could get close enough (1-3 ft) to strike the spearman and you can't parry a spearman easily because he does jabs not slashes which take less then 1 sec to do you have to have very fast reflexes to grab the spears handle or hit it down with the sword(which is way more difficult considering the angle you would to have to hit it at) as well as that there are more polearms then spears halberds, pole axes, Yari, trident(though they are mainly for fishing) and there are more from different places with many variation in length of handle and length of blade as well as material and weight.

 

[nuba km]

The only games I have found to have polearms are dead rising 2 and morrowind (and I just find morrowind unplayable) there should be some in skyrim and any other medieval game as well as sci-fie games that have lazer swords and clubs.

Try playing an MMO, most of 'em have polearms as a weapon class. All of the Fire Emblem games have spears, javelins, halberds, and lances. Starcraft 2 has the Thermal Lance (though that's actually a laser beam), I've heard MapleStory has an assortment of polearms of all kinds, too. The entire Warcraft series had a surfeit of polearm-wielders. League of Legends boasts several champions, including Jax, who use polearms. Assassin's Creed 2 not only has polearms, but has special techniques for their usage.

You're far more likely to see spears in games set in medieval times (i.e.: the time period you'd see swords in). Just don't expect to see many in gun-style games like Left 4 Dead or CSS, even if they boast melee weapons.

I played WoW till lv 22 and I saw there was a polearm skill (as well as fist weapons which are also awesome) but I never actually saw any of these weapons Never actually seen a fire emblem game but I would give them a go if I could find one. played maple story but between lag an hackers I got board of it and I actually never saw polearms. I'll check out league of legend and in assassins creed 2 you can't free run with them so you only really use them if you end up killing a guy that has one and have time to pick it up and then continue combat.

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

Sure, for versimilitude or realism. The main reason why spears were used to equip armies wasn't that they were cheap and inferior, it was that a guy with a spear was MUCH more dangerous than a guy with a sword. It's especially true of unskilled fighters and was even true of elite fighters. If you look back at actual history rather than trying to make guesses or comparing modern techniques with modern reproductions of the weapons, most elite fighters (in pretty much all cultures: Japanese, Chinese, European) carried swords as BACKUPS either to bows or polearms. Groups of people with spears are also remarkably more useful than groups of people with swords.

Unfortunately, the other side is that it's really hard to make combat with polearms look cool. You want vicious in-fighting in most media, not long-range poking. Fighting games and such make use of spinning and even vaulting with polearms, but a lot of that looks ridiculous even for a video game. Your range of motion and ideal range of engagement with a polearm just makes combat decidedly less dramatic.

So in short, yes to polearms for variety and realism, but only when the combat isn't intended to be too flashy. Or when it's intended to be so flashy that you can add ridiculous-looking moves into the mix. Polearms are great for games like Morrowind (and they WOULD have worked well in Oblivion), but they're not what you want for games that are trying to be realistic (ruling out the ridiculous moves) and dramatic (generally favouring close-up, more intense fighting).

 

[Penitent]

Use them in Demons souls. They they are unbelievably awesome weapons. They get plenty of love in that game.

As this man and KungFu_Teddy have said, Demon's Souls has a great use of spears. They behave realistically, and are excellent in many engagements. They can put up a powerful shield wall.

 

[hwarang]

There were polearm/spear wielders in Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven that were a bloody bugger to kill 1on1 and a nightmare against more than that. Course as a stealth kill game that's supposed to be the point, but you could to a degree fight against the swordsmen or the archers.

And they'd always put the spearmen guarding the gates or rooms you needed to get through.

 

[spectrenihlus]

I really loved using my dragon polearm back when I played runesape.

 

[John the Gamer]

Try Mount and Blade: Warband.

 

[Layz92]

Polearms are usually made to fit a purpose. Lances on horseback, spears/javelins/pikes in phalanx, halberds and larger spears against cavalry and infantry charges etc. Used for their correct purpose it ruins someones day but in free open combat they become more of a liability. Although in games the actual room needed to move and attack is disregarded frequently so I suppose it would really just be another weapon model like Diablo 2 etc.

 

[nuba km]

Polearms are usually made to fit a purpose. Lances on horseback, spears/javelins/pikes in phalanx, halberds and larger spears against cavalry and infantry charges etc. Used for their correct purpose it ruins someones day but in free open combat they become more of a liability. Although in games the actual room needed to move and attack is disregarded frequently so I suppose it would really just be another weapon model like Diablo 2 etc.

that is pretty much how I see it but why won't game developers to that?