So fantasy games usually have the same "collection" or say swords, like short, "normal", two-handed, scimitar, broad.
Instead of pre-defining sword types, you could instead definte the parameters that make up a sword (and a hammer, an ax, etc.), and then allow the game to randomly create any kind of sword within these parameters.
That means swords would be unique from place to place and from game to game. Names could also be unigue % procedurally generated, like elf-sword or [civ name]-sword or [name of inventor]-sword.
Now probably it would take a lot of research in weaponry to do this,
I imagine for swords it would be like
- how broad is the sword
- how long is the blade
- where is the balance point (AFAIK this decides if a sword is good for stabbing or slashing or both)
- how thick is the blade
The parameters would then define stuff like how likely is a sword to break during combat, how good does it slash/stab (balance point placement), how fast are attacks by using the sword (the shorter the faster), how much damage does it do (heavy means more damage and less speed), do you need two hands to use it or will one do, what body size is needed to use it, how strong do you need to be to be able to use it good. (I imagine a weak dwarf with a super heavy sword should struggle to fight well with it, so maybe you'd want to make light swords for the non-combat trained dwarves that are weaker.)
So you'd have like a huge variety of swords, some of them being fast but break easily others being slow and sturdy,
Then you'd do the same for all weapon types, and you'd get like hammers with a long handle and a medium head and hammers with a very short handle but a humoungous head and so on - and the weapons would all work somewhat differently.
Could be a thing that the player designed parameters for swords etc. and got the dwarves to make them. Some designs probably failing horrobly, (like a sword with max length and min broadness probably being super fragile).