Blades Shall Be Broken!

Shields Shall Be Splintered is a common house-rule to improve the efficacy of shields and likewise improve the survivability of player characters in old school games. Its ubiquity is likely a result of its age - linked is the oldest reference I can find to it - and of its simple utility: sacrificing your defense in order to stay alive. However, in a recent anonymous online interchange, the idea was presented that there is no corresponding rule to perform the opposite - sacrificing your weapon in order to kill something else! And thus, after some limited discussion,

Blades Shall Be Broken
A fighter may, upon successful hit with a melee weapon, opt to break said weapon in exchange for rolling double damage. Thus, a character striking a giant with a battle axe, the player may opt to have the soft iron of the axe head dramatically fracture, embedding shards of jagged metal left to rust in the giant's rib cage: in so doing, the player rolls 2d8 instead of 1d8 in determining damage dealt.

One of the selling points of Shields Shall Be Splintered was/is that it has a foundation in history. Specifically, in the article linked, references are made to Viking tradition regarding having a three-shield limit when dueling. Blades Shall Be Broken? Not so much - but it'll totally make a good forum story, won't it?

To speak to use and utility, I could see this ruling being useful when facing a large, high-damage foe - trying to take it down before it gets a chance to swing - or potentially against a spell-caster for the same reason. From the economic perspective, some weapons cost more or less than a shield: as such, splintering said shield to prevent damage might be a cost-effective (or cost-ineffective) mechanism to reduce the HP tax of the encounter on the party.

In the next couple of months, I have an Old School Essentials campaign lined up to start; I will aim to include both of these house-rules in it and report back here as to how it goes.

Keep gaming!