A gentleman would simply ask his opponent to step outside to settle the matter rather than sully the hallway with blood and entrails and bit of loose brain matter.

I think having rules about weapon use in confined spaces might have one impact but I'm not sure that I like it. It turns out that most of the weapons we picture being used by heroic adventurers were mere side-arms. When on foot, even knights used polearms if they weren't using spears and people carried swords and maces, except for big two-handed swords, for backup. People even used polearms in personal combat and occasionally even in duels. They did that because the damn things were that effective. So you can write rules making them less effective than they were or you can mention that they would be nearly impossible to use indoors or in the dungeons, which would be true. Lugging the thing around might be problematical too but people did it.

Quote from: Headless;986679What did Gygax do about indoor fighting.  Were there rules about how much space you need to swing a sword in early editions?

This has been mostly covered, but let me sum up. The first printed rules for this occur in the Greyhawk supplement for OD&D and in 1st edition AD&D. In AD&D, each weapon had a listed size. GH for OD&D had simple 'weapon requires not less than X' of space on each side of wielder,' or 'not usable in dungeons as a general rule due to length. ' To the best of my recollection, the only rules on what that meant, however, was the -2 penalty for confined space that Doom mentions for AD&D, and simply-can't-use for OD&D+GH.

Of course, this was very much the era of 'DM as adjudicator' (what we now call 'rulings, not rules'), so I think the assumption was that 'and the DM will make a judgment call on when a space becomes too confined to use this weapon at all.' 2nd edition kind of backs this up, in that the weapon length listings were dropped, but example characters still had the fighters pick up a dagger weapon proficiency for fighting when crawling through tunnels (even though the rules didn't explicitly say that they couldn't fight with their awl pikes or longspears).

Other editions certainly had references that make clear that the designers realized that weapon length was an important factor, although the application differs between them. Holmes notoriously had you able to attack 4xs as frequently with a dagger than with a polearm (although this is widely acknowledged to be a genuine error). I forget the Holmes initiative system, but B/X and BECMI let an unsurprised individual with a polearm or other long weapon attack first against a charging opponent, even if the opponent had a higher initiative check (something of a proto-reach-based-AoO). 2nd edition AD&D, despite losing the weapon length chart column, got reach effects in Player's Option: Combat and Tactics, closely resembling what WotC would later do with 3e and 4e.

QuoteIt got me thinking.  I don't know that I have ever been in a game where large weapons and wide swings were penalised.  And if we ever were we told the DM that was no fun, it was probably just too much book keeping.

I would say that it is too much bookkeeping to make a wholly consistent and universal rule system for this. However, I think it wholly appropriate for the DM to give a -1--4 penalty (or disadvantage in 5e), all the way up to a flat-out 'no, you cannot use this here,' depending on the specific circumstances.

QuoteAnyone play where narrow corridors are actully an encumbrance to fighting?

Honestly, I don't think I've ever player where it wasn't at least theoretically in effect. Of course, if your players have daggers at the ready, and pull them out instead of their spears when they get into a fight in a narrow alley, in all likelihood you might never have to even figure out what kind of penalty you would invoke.

I use the space required numbers (in original D&D and in 1e AD&D) as a rough guideline (I allow some wiggle room in the numbers). If I deem there isn't sufficient space, I apply the non-proficiency penalty (this means that fighters can adapt to such situations better than other classes, which I like) to "to hit" rolls.

In a 10' wide passage, this typically means that three PCs can fight abreast with no penalties if they're using weapons like spears or short swords. If they're using longswords, perhaps only two could fight abreast. If a fighter is swinging a footman's flail around in such a space, he needs no one on either side of him to fight without the penalty.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell;988055The D&D 5E way:  If it's borderline, allow it, no changes.  If it's an obvious disadvantage, apply the disadvantage rule to attacks with the weapon.  Net result is that a character will only use such a weapon in a situation where they really don't have much choice.  Which means, most of the time you get the effects of a more complicated rule with no overhead.

This! I've added the advantage mechanic to my game liberally, and in actual play it is perfectly smooth and appears to achieve very similar results to a more complex rule, without any of the fuss.

Inspirational side note on the thread topic: The movie The Take (a.k.a. Bastille Day) has an absolutely sick fight scene involving 5 people in the back of a van.

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament;988213In a 10' wide passage, this typically means that three PCs can fight abreast with no penalties if they're using weapons like spears or short swords. If they're using longswords, perhaps only two could fight abreast. If a fighter is swinging a footman's flail around in such a space, he needs no one on either side of him to fight without the penalty.

This was my understanding of the old rules.  They only really applied when trying to fight in tight order in confined spaces.  With smaller parties in modern D&D it is unlikely to come up.

In Earthdawn 4E I would apply the Harried modifier (used for a lot of things, 4+ opponents, entangling attacks, etc): -2 to Actions, -2 to Physical and Mystic Defense. If the space was really tight, I would apply movement penalties during the round the weapon was used (-5yds/round for light, or for heavy impairment -10yd/round plus succeed at a Dexterity Test vs an appropriate difficulty or lose all movement that round).

So you could do it, but you would get wailed on. Depending on length of weapon and opponents (hallway full of zombies?) I'd rather have something with a little reach, even if it means retreating slower than usual.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;988211Honestly, I don't think I've ever player where it wasn't at least theoretically in effect. Of course, if your players have daggers at the ready, and pull them out instead of their spears when they get into a fight in a narrow alley, in all likelihood you might never have to even figure out what kind of penalty you would invoke.

The tricky bit is that it really would depend a lot on the specifics. If it's a 3-4 foot wide alley, one good fighter who's has a spear pointed the right way is going to have a huge advantage over people coming at him there with daggers, unless they also have shields or armor or some way to avoid getting gutted by the spear before they can get near the spearman. But if the ceiling is also low, it might be hard to turn around a spear there, or there could be tight corners where a spear is tricky or impossible to get through. Which is mainly to say, that broad rules don't really cover such situations very accurately - sometimes if you can get a long weapon into the right tight space, it could actually be really effective, and while a dagger wouldn't be obstructed, the path needed to get the dagger to a foe might be obstructed, and the only ways covered by big long weapons that work very well in a particular tight space.

Sure, and that's where 'DM as adjudicator' comes into play, since making an exhaustive rule-structure to cover said wide array of potential situations is somewhere between exhausting and foolhardy.

Yep. This is the sort of thing I really like having a map for, and personally I really want my hexmap and counters, and find they go a long way but even so, I end up using rulings even when I've tried to make detailed house rules for long weapons in close spaces. But at least many of the rules are already there and work well - that is, the system covers the knife guys trying to charge up an alley at a spear perfectly, but say nothing about turning around with the spear, and it has rules for getting a halberd stuck in a foe, but not for what happens when other people then try to move through the hexes between them, where the pole is... though there are rules for where you'd need to be to hack at that haft, but not for the bonus you get for it being stuck... etc.

A dozen men with pikes can hold a dungeon corridor forever. Which is a good thing, because they will probably be there forever.   With an 18-24' pike in a 10' wide dungeon corridor you are going to have great difficulty turning any corners...

Shield and stabby sword is possibly the best corridor fighting combination. It gives you offense and defense and doesn't require a lot of either overhead or side clearance.

Grid based combat systes are probably the best simulators of close quarters fighting, if the map scale is right it is prety clear if the wall or a weapon shaft is in the way. I remember playing Melee and with the right maps it was possible to retreat into small spaces that large creatures couldn't enter, or spears turn the corner to get you.

Yep, exactly.

Narrow single-file corridor turning sharply into a wide open space also means attackers enter one at a time and get attacked by many, especially if they have long weapons and are arranged to strike at the doorway.

Quote from: WillInNewHaven;988150When on foot, even knights used polearms if they weren't using spears and people carried swords and maces, except for big two-handed swords, for backup.

I think that depends on which period of knights. I don't think William the Conqueror's men or the knights with Godfrey of Bouillon on the First Crusade used polearms much. Nor (as depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry) did the knights at Hastings all couch their lances. Knightly weapons varied from time to time and place to place.
   

Quote from: Philotomy Jurament;988213If a fighter is swinging a footman's flail around in such a space, he needs no one on either side of him to fight without the penalty.

No no one. Just no one he minds hitting.

Quote from: DavetheLost;988251A dozen men with pikes can hold a dungeon corridor forever. Which is a good thing, because they will probably be there forever.   With an 18-24' pike in a 10' wide dungeon corridor you are going to have great difficulty turning any corners...

Shield and stabby sword is possibly the best corridor fighting combination. It gives you offense and defense and doesn't require a lot of either overhead or side clearance.

Grid based combat systes are probably the best simulators of close quarters fighting, if the map scale is right it is prety clear if the wall or a weapon shaft is in the way. I remember playing Melee and with the right maps it was possible to retreat into small spaces that large creatures couldn't enter, or spears turn the corner to get you.

In this way, tight spaces resemble shield walls. Stabbing swords, short spears, very long knives.

Quote from: Bren;988292I think that depends on which period of knights. I don't think William the Conqueror's men or the knights with Godfrey of Bouillon on the First Crusade used polearms much. Nor (as depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry) did the knights at Hastings all couch their lances. Knightly weapons varied from time to time and place to place.

All true. But they switched, over the next few centuries, to using polearms (and to couching their lances) because they considered them more effective. Armor getting heavier was a factor, of course.