Beveled Blades

[seldon]

Belegarth has no specific rules I know of about the beveling of blade edges. Dag has the rule that the blade edge needs to be 1.25 inches wide, but still does not specify curvature or beveling.

I started encountering beveled edge weapons when they showed up with one player who had made the bevel on the edge with a triangle of open cell foam. He argued that it did not concentrate the impact of the blade since this triangle collapsed instantly to the more standard closed cell foam sword construction underneath. This seemed a pretty useful way to do it, so I allowed it in my local group. The problem was that others saw what he had done and they started to bevel the edges of their closed cell foam swords a bit. This has actually not been a problem since they are only slightly beveled and not at a very steep angle.

So what do people think? What have others experienced? Anybody have any recommended guidelines?

Seldon

[Soo Ma Tai]

I used to do beveled blades about 9 years ago, never had a prob with them passing. they were basically the thickness of two sheets of blue foam at the blade edge.

[barley]

I make 2" wide reds and bevel the striking edge at 45 to make a 1.5" red. At 2", they were wayyy to stout, so the beveling helped them not hit too hard.

However, if they are beveled to far below 1.5" (like 1 1/4 to 1") then they just start getting nasty, as it is almost like hitting with core....

Barley

[Tiberius Claudius]

Progressive foam densities will also help to counter the loss of striking surface. As long as its passing template and hit test, its fine.

[Forkbeard]

I feel this is a waste of time as it adds no performance to the sword and in the end the sword still looks like a cloth covered foam sword.
like a air plane tail added to your car.

This experience is also a good example of why we do not let people break rules. This guy did it one way, you allowed it, then a bunch of other idiots copied him in a slightly less safe way. The next idiots will copy them in a slightly less safe way, ect. Ect.
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[Atman]

As was stated before NOTHING about edge beveling is outside the rules so long as the weapon passes hit and template. Personally I would not use open cell to achieve the desired profile as it limits how tight you can make the cover. My feeling is that a snug cover will make a weapon last longer because of the extra support it provides (think ace bandage on joints). Since there are not many people currently beveling their edges and it sounds like you have a variety of beveled weapons at your disposal, you should be able to easily figure out roughly where the line for too much bevel lies. One thing to keep in mind is that what passes on a short weapon may not on a longer one.

[LoganSteele]

I have contemplated doing something like this. I was thinking of placing a sheet of blue up the flats with a beveled edge. This way i keep the edge the blade the same and maybe lend some strength to help prevent a stab tip from blowing out. I figured this would add too much weight and thickness to be worth it but i might make a blue one day like this.