early game speed boost for daggers.

[siprus]

Btw what about making daggers develop to minimum delay faster than other weapons. This in addition to stabbing this would give branded dagger niche as early game weapons for casters. Who don't want to invest much in weapon skill, but still benefit from being able to hack down weak opponents.

I think daggers basic damage is low enough to make it balanced. Generally even at weapon skill other weapons you might use would be comparable to mindelay dagger. This wouldn't effect daggers scaling with weaponskill much, as the only other reason to use dagger is stabbing bonus (and maybe early electrocution brand)

[tedric]

Uh, daggers already get to mindelay faster than other weapons (except quickblades): http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Weapon_Speed. And since their base delay is lower, you are hitting faster the entire time you're working down to mindelay too.

[siprus]

Uh, daggers already get to mindelay faster than other weapons (except quickblades): http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Weapon_Speed. And since their base delay is lower, you are hitting faster the entire time you're working down to mindelay too.

Obiviously they reach the mindelay faster than most weapons, but since their base damage this doesn't make them scale any better at low skills than other weapons.

At anyskill level dagger is worst weapon. If we don't take account for addative brand. I would bet that even with additive brand dagger would lose to other fast weapon expect whip. Obviously daggers aren't used for damage they deal, but for stabbing bonus they provide. Making them reach mindelay even faster would give them another niche. (though this niche wouldn't be strong enough to make them non-brainers even if you could take benefit from that niche)

[Siegurt]

JFYI: whip == short blade == spear (In terms of damage, accuracy, and speed)

a +0 dagger of electrocution is better than a +0 short sword of electrocution at skill 0, and equal to it at skill 1 against a goblin or adder.

[duvessa]

At anyskill level dagger is worst weapon. If we don't take account for addative brand.

1. no it's not. at 0 skill, clubs and many large weapons are worse against most enemies. daggers are usually better than short swords or cutlasses at 10 skill, at least if they are not +0.
2. well it turns out that additive brands do, in fact, exist. so pretending they don't is not a great way to make your arguments convincing.

[siprus]

At anyskill level dagger is worst weapon. If we don't take account for addative brand.

1. no it's not. at 0 skill, clubs and many large weapons are worse against most enemies. daggers are usually better than short swords or cutlasses at 10 skill, at least if they are not +0.
2. well it turns out that additive brands do, in fact, exist. so pretending they don't is not a great way to make your arguments convincing.

What i meant was that there are always better weapons available, so daggers wouldn't be overly powerful compared to other weapons. I'm just had this idea for additional niche for daggers. (that niche being side weapon for primary caster when they want to save mana)

[Viashino_wizard]

At anyskill level dagger is worst weapon. If we don't take account for addative brand.

1. no it's not. at 0 skill, clubs and many large weapons are worse against most enemies. daggers are usually better than short swords or cutlasses at 10 skill, at least if they are not +0.
2. well it turns out that additive brands do, in fact, exist. so pretending they don't is not a great way to make your arguments convincing.

What i meant was that there are always better weapons available, so daggers wouldn't be overly powerful compared to other weapons. I'm just had this idea for additional niche for daggers. (that niche being side weapon for primary caster when they want to save mana)

Daggers are supposed to be worse than other weapons for anything besides stabbing. The "side weapon for primary caster" niche is already filled by elemental enhancer staves

[Amnesiac]

also, dagger of electrocution(and distortion, but it's not always as handy)

[tedric]

I get by just fine in the early game using higher-tier weapons with 0 skill on most of my casters. Even if it only took 4 or 5 levels to hit mindelay on a dagger, I wouldn't bother. I'd rather get my starting spell skill from 6 to 8 than put 5 levels in SBl at that point in the game.

[Leafsnail]

So daggers:
- Generally do most damage with stabbing, making them useful for taking down creatures with higher HP
- Can sometimes be a good option at very low skill
- Are good for their rarity/skill needed when spawned with certain brands

That actually seems like enough of a niche to me. It's certainly a more interesting one than a lot of other weapons have.