Considering the new addition of weap and player attack being used together I think it's an unspoken thought that the weap and player defense should be merged to. In light of these details I think it's important to have the weapons have some kind of weakness so that the use of free hand attacks don't dissapear completely. So I thought about doing something like this:
Lvl 1/starter weaps: max attack (150) max defense (150) Damage Limit (200)
Lvl 2/trained weaps: 2-10 post / max attack (250) max defense (250) Damage Limit (300)
Lvl 3/adv. weaps: 11-20 post / max attack (350) max defense (350) Damage Limit (400)
So on and so forth. Obviously these max attack, defense, and damage Limit are all based on the stat equation thing, so those numbers are just to give an idea of about how strong you can get with that level weapon based on the quality/quantity of your post.
Now i'm sure by now your thinking, "Wtf is a Damage Limit?" and the answer to that is what I think could be a solution to the reason to continue working on both your weapon, and your strenght. Damage Limit would be how much Damage your weapon can take before it's unuseable. Your weapon receives damage whenever something with a higher attack than the weapon hits it. Once your weapon's DL reaches zero it becomes unuseable. (look to examples at end)
Now just because it's unuseable doesn't mean you can't keep using it (for all you stubborn people out there) you can continue to block (but not attack) with your weapon till you hit -half your total DL. Meaning: If your DL is 200, your weapon can continue till -100, if your DL is 300, -150, 400, -200. so on and so forth.
BUT once you hit the point of -100, -150, -200, and what not, your weapon breaks. When your weapon breaks, you have to either post to have it fixed or pay someone to fix it for you. The higher the negative, the more it cost to repair it, so be wary. In general to return 25 DL after a weapon breaks requires 1 post. So for a weapon broken at -100 it would require 4 post to fix it.
In Summary:
Weapons start off with 200 DL
As weapons advance to different levels, thier DL increases. (as long an aspect of the weapon advances your DL will increase)
DL is calculated by the difference between the difference between the attackers attack and weapons defense.
DL is reset back to it's proper level after a fight.
Once DL reaches zero it is 'unuseable' (not able to use to attack)
When DL reaches a certain negative the weapon breaks.
Repairing broken weapons requires a certain amount of post or paying a certain amount of money.
DL is a stat and should be treated like one when making specials involving it.
Also even though Weap and player stats mix to do damage, DL will only be calculated between the weapons and player stats separately depending on how the person attacks. So if you use your sword to attack, the difference between your sword attack and the opponents sword defense would be the DL, not the total attack minus the sword defense.
EXAMPLES (W/ Arnovis [hope ya don't mind I used ya
])
Turn 1Arnovis attacks Izaruz with his Tengoku (225 attack)
Izaruz defends with his Ice Staff (125 defense)
Izaruz Ice Staff recieves 100 DL.
Izaruz attacks Arnovis with his Ice Staff.
Turn 2Arnovis attack Izaruz with a punch (252 attack)
Izaruz defends with his Ice Staff (125 defense)
Izaruz Ice Staff recieves 127 DL.
Izaruz' Ice Staff is unuseable, Izaruz attacks regularly.
Turn 3Arnovis attacks Izaruz with a punch (252 attack)
Izaruz defends with his Ice Staff (125 defense)
Izaruz' Ice Staff receives 127 DL. It breaks and cannot be used for attacking or defending till it's repaired.
And thats the basic idea, if you have any questions ask and i'll try to answer. Love your weapons people