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[Rhenaya]

The idea is simpl around the roman legions: they used a short sword, tower shield and 3 pilliums (throwing spears) each soldier.

Same i think for dwarfs, they should be able to equip a few throwing weapons to their standard ones. also a specific melee weapon to their crossbow. this is instead of the secondary weapon, so one with throwing weapons, or a marksman with a ordinary melee weapon cant get another weapon.
all throwing weapons use the throwing skill for accuracy, but the weapon skill for melee and ranged damage.
like with bolts and arrows there is a change to break, get stuck on ground or enemy and some are reuseable.
also dwarfs will try  to use bone/wood weapons to train on archery targets to improve their throwing skill and a little the damage skill too, but they gain more weapon skill for using it in melee (or a proper melee weapon anyway)

weapons could be:
throwing knifes, dagger skill, used by kobolds and humans, up to 10 equipable
throwing spear, spear skill of course, used by elves and dwarfs, up to 3 equipable
throwing axe, na guess what? axe skill :p, used by dwarfs, up to 5 equipable
throwing hammer, hammer skill, used by dwarfs, up to 5 equipabel
throwing disc, sword skill, used by goblins and humans (you know the thing xena is using ;p), returns to thrower if not getting stuck (in a tree, wall or the goblin throat), up to 2 equipable
boomerang, sword skill, used by elves and kobolds, basicly same as disc

the raw could look something like that

Code: [Select]

[ITEM_WEAPON:ITEM_WEAPON_THROW_DISC]
[NAME:throwing disc:throwing discs]
[DAMAGE:90:SLASH]
[WEIGHT:10]
[SKILL:SWORD]
[RANGED:THROWING:RETURNS]
[TWO_HANDED:0]
[MINIMUM_SIZE:4]
[MATERIAL_SIZE:2]

[ITEM_WEAPON:ITEM_WEAPON_THROW_AXE]
[NAME:throwing axe:throwing axes]
[DAMAGE:110:SLASH]
[WEIGHT:10]
[SKILL:AXE]
[RANGED:THROWING:NO_RETURN]
[TWO_HANDED:0]
[MINIMUM_SIZE:4]
[MATERIAL_SIZE:2]
[CAN_STONE]
in combat the dwarf(or whatever) will throw one weapon and try to charge into melee, if he doesnt reach it, he throws another and so on, until he could cripple the target and get into melee range, the target was charging itself, or he run out of throwing weapons. same for marksdwarf with an melee weapon, they will try to shoot if the target is not in melee range yet, but focus on getting into melee.

also the addional weapons should be mount on the  lower torso (belt etc.) and not in the offhand, so they can use a shield properly too.

[Jack_Bread]

An interesting idea, Tree Sister.

[Derakon]

Sounds good to me. It should probably wait until restacking is implemented and crossbows' firing speed is rebalanced. Then you get bows/crossbows, which have good range and power, plenty of ammo, but require both hands and (in the case of crossbows, anyway) have slow firing rates. And in contrast, you have the various throwing weapons, which have short range, only moderate power, little ammo, but can be used in conjunction with a melee weapon and can be fired relatively quickly.

[Justyn]

Hey, what a coincidence, I was thinking about something like this myself.

[bjlong]

Not to mention the multiple strategic uses--pilums for making shields useless, for example, and throwing axes as a surprise to an enemy who's thinking that this is a melee unit.

This can certainly wait a bit, though.

[chucks]

...and throwing axes as a surprise to an enemy who's thinking that this is a melee unit.

That reminds me so much of the Screeching Women units in Rome: Total War.  They would just scream and brandish their cleavers, but it would have been so much cooler had they _thrown_ the cleavers at their enemies!

[bjlong]

That was basically a French tactic in the dark ages. It's bad enough when you're facing a roaring mass, armed with axes. It's worse when they chuck their axes at you and then pull another, bigger axe out.

[Felblood]

I think the main thing keeping this away from us is the fact that thrown weapons do preposterous amounts of damage, regardless of what they actually are.

See Also; Spinning Vomit.

Creating suitable quivers for them should be trivial, once we have re-stacking, but until that shows up, these things are going to be brutally expensive to use.

[Rhenaya]

actually the thing about expensive as intended as thrown weapons seem to be strong.
but i also recommend the damage is based on the weapon skill, so need an overhaul anyway, maybe "daily" stuff do damage based on its weight.

and why should it make shields useless? you still can use your own shield to defend yourself againt enemys and the enemy also can use the shield to block a throwig weapon (as they fly way slower than the bolts should) its for sure not more gamebreaking than high agility machine bolters now, then again they get an overhaul so why not throwing weapons too.

it was a common taktik in the dark ages and from the antic romans, it got less valuable in the medivial as the weapons got expensive and the smiths better, so noone would throw his beatiful axe, maybe the same for dwarfs, you wnt make throwing weapons out of adamantite and steel, as long your not in an multiple magnatite custer inside a huge fux layer with magma pipe :p

[chucks]

I like throwing hatchets, daggers, stars, and darts.  Varying degrees of power and weight.  Carrying one or two hatchets, 3-5 daggers, 5-10 stars, and 10+ darts wouldn't weigh a sturdy fighter down very much.

[bjlong]

Chucks: At that point, it's more a matter of space than weight.

Rhenaya: Pilums were specially designed lead javelins made to puncture large tower shields and then bend, making them unwieldy and useless for the massed formation fighting that the Roman armies liked to do.

I tend to think that throwing weapons fell out of favor as armor became cheaper and more widely used. Throwing weapons generally don't have the ability to hack through any sort of armor, but they are very effective against unarmored or shield-bearing opponents.

E: IMO, at least. There are a lot of things that people generally can't come to a solid consensus about in terms of changing warfare between the Dark Ages and Medieval times--the disappearance of shields, for example. Some say it was the lengthening of the sword, some say it was the prevalence of armor.

[a.random.persona]

While throwing weapons looks like a great idea, its something thats more suited to adventure mode. Dwarves don't throw things unless they are tantrumming.
Dwarves muscles are formed for digging not for throwing.

[Fossaman]

Dwarves don't throw things unless they are tantrumming.

Using what's in an alpha release of the game to determine what should or should not be in future releases is silly. Anything fortress mode dwarfs can do an adventure mode dwarf should be able to do, and vice versa.

[Impaler[WrG]]

throwing disc, sword skill, used by goblins and humans (you know the thing xena is using ;p), returns to thrower if not getting stuck (in a tree, wall or the goblin throat), up to 2 equipable

That would be a Chakram, and If we want to keep their use historically accurate they would be a thrown once like every other type of missile weapon, but because they are light many could be carried perhaps upwards of 12.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chakram

[Sabre_Justice]

Actually, Axe Throwers generally kept their best axe for melee use, and threw the cheaper ones first. (thanks, Age of Empires II manual!) In fact, Throwing Axes could well be a new weapon category of their own, being smaller, better balanced and cheaper than regular axes, with the tradeoff of being less useful in melee combat.