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[fivex]

In real life a silver war-hammer would be the most powerful melee weapon you could field in a battle...  for one swing.   As said, it's too brittle to actually work.  Mind you, it would really suck to be the guy on the wrong end of that one swing.

I am now picturing dwarfs with a quiver full of silver war hammers, swinging one, throwing it away and then taking another one.

[dennislp3]

In real life a silver war-hammer would be the most powerful melee weapon you could field in a battle...  for one swing.   As said, it's too brittle to actually work.  Mind you, it would really suck to be the guy on the wrong end of that one swing.

In real life if the weight of the weapon hinders your speed and maneuverability then it wont do anything....IRL there needs to be a balance of weight...not just the heaviest thing....also if its to heavy you tire yourself out (you pointed that aspect out though)....battles IRL take hours and often times even days (modern warfare and ancient warfare)

[Shoku]

In real life there's a balance point for optimum weight. You can't muster the strength to swing it fast enough after it exceeds this and below this you reach the limits of how fast you can swing but don't actually have much inertia to the thing you're swinging. Speed matters quite a bit for things like being parried or dodged but at the same time you obviously want to leave your mark when you do connect.

Hammers will make more sense when you can dent the other guy's armor to reduce his mobility or even hinder his ability to breathe.
Or of course cave in the skull of unarmored opponents and maybe specifically attempt to break other large bones. At that point I'm sure the soft parts will also be suitably affected by a hammer strike.

[veok]

You can't wind up with a rock hammer from a strange mood... can you?

[gopa4]

You could with a tiny bit of modding just make platinum war hammers available. They work pleasantly.

[AngleWyrm]

Bang bang, Maxwell's silver hammer came down upon her head
Bang bang, Maxwell's silver hammer made sure that she was dead

[Zaik]

You could with a tiny bit of modding just make platinum war hammers available. They work pleasantly.

To be a little more specific, go into the inorganic_stone_metal file in the raws and under platinum add [ITEMS_WEAPON]

[Traece]

Bang bang, Maxwell's silver hammer came down upon her head
Bang bang, Maxwell's silver hammer made sure that she was dead

Urist McMaxwell, major in medicine, called her on the phone.
"Can I take you out to the pictures, Urist McPataphysical?"

Also, I somehow doubt that the dwarves really care how heavy a silver hammer is. You're debating whether or not creatures determined enough to slaughter an entire planet using magma pumps can wield silver hammers. If they could make hammers with magma inside of them (or hammers made OF magma) they would.

[Hydra]

In real life a silver war-hammer would be the most powerful melee weapon you could field in a battle...  for one swing.   As said, it's too brittle to actually work.  Mind you, it would really suck to be the guy on the wrong end of that one swing.

Silver is soft, not brittle. It's soft and mallable like gold. Lead is close but a bit harder, and we all know what a lead pipe to the head does

[Alastar]

Adamantine is entirely too light and the only useless material for blunt weapons; apart from that anything works. Differences in effectiveness tends to be minor, and there isn't a single regular material that dominates any other in all relevant entries.

Steel is too light and flexible, but it's strong. From my testing this makes it suck least against unarmoured opponents.
Silver is too fragile but dense. From my testing this makes it best against well-armoured opponents.

Iron is weaker than steel and copper is less dense than silver, but they're ahead on stiffness. Bronze is a good compromise but doesn't stand out anywhere.

*

Personally, I like to use silver because if I don't need to open cans I wouldn't want a blunt weapon in the first place.

[WrathNail]

Quite right.  And once Toady implements weapons degrading, that'll be taken into account.  Until then, silver is king.

Silver is king? Hardly. It's true that silver is better than it used to be. But the advantage of silver over steel vs. armored opponents is marginal at best and very much depends on the type of armor you're up against (i.e. steel > silver vs. bronze armor). And the advantage of those two over the rest of the non-adamantine metals is also ever so slight.

Calculations here:
http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/DF2010:Metal#Weapon_.26_Armor_Quality
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=53571.0

[jei]

Well then. Thank you, now im happy that I was stripping my map for ore. Also, is gypsum supposed to be amazingly rare? I need it for casts because when you assign metal armor to a squad, they will apparently take WOOD instead of the nice steel or bronze things you have. Why is wood even able to be equipped when they are told to take metal?

Make sure their equipment is specified as Exact Matches, so they won't make compromises.

[Burning_Iceman]

For hammers, the heavier the material, the better. Platinum hammers own everything in the testing arena. As do slade ones.
Don't use maces, hammers are better in every way.

How/why are hammers better?

[Argembarger]

Type	Size	Attack	Attack Type	Contact Area	Penetration	Velocity	Skill Used	Metal	Wood	Bone	Obsidian
Mace	800	Bash	Blunt	20	(200)	2.0x	Mace	Yes	No	No	No
War Hammer	400	Bash	Blunt	10	(200)	2.0x	Hammer	Yes	No	No	No

I submit this data from the wiki purely for !!science!!. I can make no conclusions myself other than that the difference must lie in size and contact area, and the fact that they have the same velocity and penetration.

I leave it to an expert to give the real reason.

[celem]

Also as i understand it, the mace swings a little faster than the whammer......likewise though i dont know enough to crunch numbers and say why 1 > other