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[Rowanas]

Neonivek, you're ignoring the main use of fire. It's not meant to do raw damage, it takes an awful lot to destroy a body using fire, but it's very good against living things because of the shock and pain it causes. Not much can withstand the pain of burnination even though a small child could keep going on a purely physical basis. On another forum someone had looked up that it would take about 15 minutes to burn through sinews and muscle enough to stop someone moving, so the pure force of fire isn't an issue here.

[Neonivek]

Well think of it this way.

The Fire on the sword is like enhancing a Revolver by attaching a BB-gun. It is like enhancing a Tranq gun by playing soft music.

Not only is the fire weak relative to the blows of the weapon, but it actually takes away from the weapon's destructive power by closing wounds.

[Pilsu]

Having an axe wound does wonders on taking your mind off the momentary singeing

Unless it sticks, it doesn't really work better than the bleeding

[Funk]

the other time to use fire arrows is for range finding shots or signs at night.

how the substance need to be stored is base a lot on how your using it

(i.e. gunpowder is no gun for gun when it get damp and cakes but is even better for blowing stuff,guy was no fool)

mixed substances may separate back and need to be remixed.
maybe a check store labor
 the rare items and skill need to make the more potent substances may be the best way of keeping them under control.
a lot of early gunpowder killed powder mixers all the time. 

if you Burning Sword was so hot as to be more deadly the metal will be a lot softer and the temper ruined by the heat.
as a sword blade is not in contact with the enemy for more than a second at a time bar if you get it stuck in the heat has only a small window in witch to do the damage,the heat has a lot longer in which to make the handle to hot for you to hold.

note that hot pans are to hot to handle long before there danger hot.
yes you can try and fight with oven mitts on.

[darkflagrance]

I have a suspicion that the difficulties inherent in attaching fire to a sword may be why there are no historical occurrences of them.

Clearly flaming swords are inherently magical anyway. They exist purely for the rule of awesome, to intimidate your opponents. The use of flame on a sword would be similar to the use of wyrd women who howl at your enemy from behind your lines to utterly disconcert them.

[Neonivek]

This topic isn't about magically flaming swords.

It is about dousing your sword in oil and lighting it on fire.

[The Architect]

Yeah, as long as it's resistant to extreme temperature, I imagine it would be fitting.

Spirits of Fun with flaming swords is a bit much though.

What? are you crazy?

It's perfect! Besides, if you have clowns then you have clownite, so you have no excuse not to outfit yourself properly.

[darkflagrance]

This topic isn't about magically flaming swords.

It is about dousing your sword in oil and lighting it on fire.

I'm actually saying in a subtle way that they are impractical as actual weapons (not much historical benefit) but are better at intimidation, and that previous implementations of flaming swords, by using magic, avoided all the hassle of melting blades etc.

Also, isn't it in Pirates of the Caribbean or something where the main character douses his sword in fire to fend off undead fiends? Sure, flaming swords might be useless against the living, but while we're arguing over the benefits of having a flaming weapon, we should note that DF includes enemies against which they might be very effective.

[The Architect]

It's an old motif that flames scare the undead. A Tolkien theme, partly. It doesn't actually make a ton of sense in physical terms vs zombies and skeletons.

A flaming sword won't melt; that is ridiculous. Unless you use a highly unusual chemical flame that burns hot enough. What will happen is that your sword will lose its temper, and become soft and ineffective.

[Felblood]

Those talking down flaming arrows because they aren't useful against goblin raiders need to expand their paradigm beyond the current sieges. Someday, we will get to siege other people, and we'll want flaming arrows.

Imagine using flaming arrows against people in dwarven wooden armor, fighting to defend and elven tree city. Even assuming that the elven AI is as nonplussed by being on fire as the dwarven one, in this hypothetical time, a flammable fort full of flaming elven tresses and robes and armor and swords is going to become a massive collateral damage issue. A small party of torchmen or fire archers could devistate their population and economy for decades to come.

Hairy, hostile titans might also be good victims for such a weapon.

Again, adding fire to a melee weapon that isn't designed for that (like a torch, that burns way out at the end) isn't a good idea. Even then, if the non-magical flames are hot enough to do any real harm on flame contact, then they're going to slow roast the user like a pig on a spit with radiant heat.

Aside from managing the fuel, safety and heat exhaustion issues, you don't really want to be setting fire to things that are going to grab on to you the next second, or buildings that you are inside.

i"m all for weapon upgrades, but fire is just really impractical to keep that close to you.

[xdarkcodex]

How about a really cold sword that can help shatter plate armor?Maybe something other than an ice sword because ice will chatter upon impact. A bow shooting out liquid nitrogen would be awesome but will never be possible.

[Eztuzt]

My thoughts:
           As posted earlier, weapons shuld dull. I don't know if it's coming or not, but when it does there should be a sharpening stone of some sort (A construction) that off-duty military dwarves would automatically use to re-sharpen their blades, or possibly (Probably not) give to slaves (from another post) to do the hard time-consuming manual work. Fighting and time wears down a blade in real life, and it should happen in DF. There also should be an alternative to the sharpening stone that's run by mechanical energy instead of muscle, much like a quern and a mill. Instead, it would sharpen the blade much faster than manually(Unless, of course, the sharpener is a legendary 'Blade Sharpener')



Also, Toady apparantly plans to change the characteristics of artifacts to more magical-ey things. So !!Flaming Swords of Toning!! and The Eternal Death Whisper the Plate-Shattering Ice War Hammer (Fucking epic!) could come soon, probably with the next update. Though I'm not sure, this is from vague memory.

[kalida99]

My thoughts:
           As posted earlier, weapons shuld dull. I don't know if it's coming or not, but when it does there should be a sharpening stone of some sort (A construction) that off-duty military dwarves would automatically use to re-sharpen their blades, or possibly (Probably not) give to slaves (from another post) to do the hard time-consuming manual work. Fighting and time wears down a blade in real life, and it should happen in DF. There also should be an alternative to the sharpening stone that's run by mechanical energy instead of muscle, much like a quern and a mill. Instead, it would sharpen the blade much faster than manually(Unless, of course, the sharpener is a legendary 'Blade Sharpener')

I'm quite sure Toady's doing a complete weapon haul with this update, taking into affect material weight, flexibility, and its ability to hold an edge, IE: a heavy mace is better than a light one.

As for the sharpening stone, i think they're called "Whetstones". I could imagine a new squad order, "carry Whetstone: y/n" where squads would carry around one or two, and sharpen when off duty.

Not sure what the construct version would be called, but it should be faster, and better than the normal whetstone, and require an experienced user.

[Pilsu]

Wood isn't that easy to set ablaze. Thatched roofs are another story. Forest retreats are presumably alive so that makes it even harder. Moisture and time should be factors, not just the material

Not all materials can be resharpened if memory serves

[Vester]

Also, won't enough wear eventually make a weapon irreparable?