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[psychologicalshock]

I decided to arm my reserve troops with the daggers I have laying around and they seem to perform far better than I expected - are daggers the equivalent of spears?

[Niyazov]

Daggers are excellent against armored enemies and def. superior to standard-quality spears. However, they don't get quality modifiers and you can't get steel or adamantine daggers, which limits their usefulness once you have a good weaponsmith.

[Glanzor]

They have nothing to do with spears. They are essentially less effective swords.
They are better then nothing I guess, but if you have other weapons lying around then you should use those instead. Even picks make better weapons than daggers.

[nanomage]

let's take a look at the raws:
[ITEM_WEAPON:ITEM_WEAPON_DAGGER_LARGE]

...
[SIZE:200]

...
[ATTACK:EDGE:1000:800:slash:slashes:NO_SUB:1250]

[ATTACK:EDGE:5:1000:stab:stabs:NO_SUB:1000]

[ATTACK:BLUNT:20:600:strike:strikes:pommel:1000]

[ITEM_WEAPON:ITEM_WEAPON_SPEAR]

...
[SIZE:400]

...
[ATTACK:EDGE:20:10000:stab:stabs:NO_SUB:1000]

[ATTACK:BLUNT:10000:6000:bash:bashes:shaft:1250]

Looks like daggers are better than spears against small opponents in tough armor due to extremely small contack area (1/4 of spears' while having 1/2 mass).
Slashing attack makes them also better against completely unarmoured small enemies, i think.

Versus megabeasts and FB's spears are definitely better, as they have much larger penetration depth.
If we consider a goblin in iron breastplate and helm (it's the best they get), stabbing attacks from dagger will be not weaker than those of the spears. Slashing attack will glance of armour but severely hurt limbs.
I think this makes daggers overall better than spears against goblin combatants.

not sure about trolls, it must depend on whether dagger's penetration depth is enough to cut off a troll-sized limb or stab through a troll-sized head.

Still, one should remember that daggers are no better than -large iron dagger-, while spears come in masterfull steel varieties.
   

[Niyazov]

They have nothing to do with spears. They are essentially less effective swords.
They are better then nothing I guess, but if you have other weapons lying around then you should use those instead. Even picks make better weapons than daggers.

Ever tried daggers in the arena? They are actually extremely effective weapons because of:

Attack    Attack type    Contact Area    Penetration    Velocity
Stab       Edge          5          1000          1.0x

That's the smallest contact area for any edged weapon with about 100X the penetration of a whip. Contact area affects armor penetration, which makes daggers very, very good against enemies wearing armor. They can inflict serious internal injuries even when wielded by unskilled users; they are unlikely to dramatically sever limbs the way that swords do, but they don't need much training to bring the hurt. That's why pathetically weak kobold thieves (which are smaller than dogs!) can still cause red wounds when cornered.  If they were wielding short swords they would basically never cause injuries at all.

Unfortately, as nanomage pointed out, you are unlikely to find daggers with quality modifiers. The best use for daggers after early game is probably to put them in weapon traps.

[CinnibarMan]

Gonna stab a bitch.

[TheeBaconman]

Gonna stab an elf.

fix'd

[Alastar]

Daggers are possibly the most effective dwarf killers: Any slashing attack will kill unarmoured civilians quickly, and their very fine points mean stabs will easily penetrate superior armour.

However, you're unlikely to get high-quality good-material daggers and they wouldn't be great for levering a quality advantage anyway: With steel or especially adamantine you don't need as fine a point to defeat any armour you're likely to face and you'd prefer something that causes bigger wounds.

[Flying Dice]

They have nothing to do with spears. They are essentially less effective swords.
They are better then nothing I guess, but if you have other weapons lying around then you should use those instead. Even picks make better weapons than daggers.

Ever tried daggers in the arena? They are actually extremely effective weapons because of:

Attack    Attack type    Contact Area    Penetration    Velocity
Stab       Edge          5          1000          1.0x

That's the smallest contact area for any edged weapon with about 100X the penetration of a whip. Contact area affects armor penetration, which makes daggers very, very good against enemies wearing armor. They can inflict serious internal injuries even when wielded by unskilled users; they are unlikely to dramatically sever limbs the way that swords do, but they don't need much training to bring the hurt. That's why pathetically weak kobold thieves (which are smaller than dogs!) can still cause red wounds when cornered.  If they were wielding short swords they would basically never cause injuries at all.

Unfortately, as nanomage pointed out, you are unlikely to find daggers with quality modifiers. The best use for daggers after early game is probably to put them in weapon traps.

Or you could change the raws so that dwarves can make daggers, among

Spoiler: other things (click to show/hide)

greataxes and 2h swords with min size 60000 are the best anti-bronze collosus tools ever created.

.

[BigD145]

Gonna stab an elf bitch.

fix'd

Sounds like daggers are good for melting or spike traps.

[Lagslayer]

They are small, light, and fairly good at penetrating armor (but not as good as a spear). It's a good option for weak, unskilled dwarves, but your military dwarves can almost always do better. Further, since they are foreign, any you get off of invaders will be of base quality, however, kobolds are known to be able to use any weapon material, so you could end up with anything from a silver dagger to an adamantine dagger in rare circumstances. Mooded daggers are a rare treat.

[Jothki]

Is there currently no penalty for lack of reach? In real life I'd imagine that using a dagger against anyone armed with anything else would be a bad idea, since you have to close it to use it.

Maybe a hit/dodge penalty for weapon length/wieldiness might be a good idea. That might fix some of the issues with material weight as well.

[EveryZig]

They have nothing to do with spears. They are essentially less effective swords.
They are better then nothing I guess, but if you have other weapons lying around then you should use those instead. Even picks make better weapons than daggers.

EVEN picks? A steel pick (oddly better than either addy pick or silver pick) is comparable to or possibly slightly better than an addy battleaxe. Training mining is also much easier than training weapon skills.

[Alastar]

Less assumptions, more serious pondering/testing! Not working well in most RPG settings where bigger/flashier is better and not being designed as weapons don't matter in DF. Things like control and reach don't matter either, the game concerns itself with impact calculations and little else.

I doubt that anyone claiming daggers are 'essentially less effective swords/spears/whatever' has tested them thoroughly. Full steel or adamantine armour generally protect well against most iron blades including swords and spears - but dagger stabs will get through easily. Against lesser armour, daggers become less attractive: If spear stabs are good enough to penetrate they will cause bigger wounds... and daggers waste half of their attacks on slashes that will probably still bounce off.

I've been recommending picks for long enough and haven't been the only one. One look at the RAWs should keep one from dismissing them outright, testing confirms their strengths easily enough unless you pit novice miners against grandmasters because you can't set mining in the arena.

*

Simulation subtleties aside, we shouldn't confuse 'serious threat to our dwarves' with 'good weapon for dwarves'. Invaders need can openers, bonus points if they dispatch naked civilians quickly. Dwarves need something that works well against humanoids in partial iron armour and beasties. Whips, scourges, morningstars and daggers can take down opponents in superior armour but don't fit dwarven needs. Disappointingly, dwarven needs are quite simple... 'picks only, mix in some axes once you have adamantine' is probably going to be more efficient than trying to be clever.