Longsword

The longsword is a melee weapon that does a large amount of damage, has a long cooldown, and deals sharp damage.
== Acquisition ==
Longswords can be purchased from any outlander and orbital combat suppliers, or obtained from outlander and pirate raiders.
== Analysis ==
The longsword has the highest base DPS out of any melee weapon in Core RimWorld. 
In the Royalty DLC, they are surpassed by the monosword and other ultratech weapons, though those can't be crafted by your colony. A masterwork plasteel longsword beats a normal persona monosword and excellent monosword, at least before considering .
==Comparisons==
===Comparison to maces===
The longsword is naturally compared to the mace - the mace is the strongest craftable Blunt weapon in Core RimWorld, while the longsword is the strongest Sharp weapon. Maces cost 50, half as much as the sword. They require only Smithing research, rather than Long Blades. In addition, blunt weapons are best with uranium, while sharp weapons are best with plasteel. Uranium is a cheaper material, and generally less useful throughout the game.
In terms of raw damage, the longsword has more base DPS than the mace. However, most enemies with armor will have much more Sharp armor than Blunt armor. For example, a flak vest has 100% Sharp armor, but only 40% Blunt armor. While the mace has less , most enemies have little blunt armor, resulting in an "armor-piercing" effect.
Breakpoints for when each weapon is better vary by quality and material.
* In general, a plasteel longsword beats the same quality uranium mace against unarmored humans and lightly armored humans, such as flak jackets without the corresponding vest. The sword is also better against light mechs like scythers and lancers.
* The uranium mace would do better against flak vests and all sorts of power armor, as well as larger mechs like centipedes. For example, a normal uranium mace deals + to a centipede when compared to a normal plasteel longsword. (In raw DPS, before intricacies documented below) 
Similar comparisons can be made between steel longswords vs steel maces.
Damage and AP are easily the most important factors for performance, especially at lower qualities. Regardless, this comparison can get significantly more complicated, even without factoring material cost. These details are documented below.
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====Sharp vs Blunt====
There are a large amount of mechanics surrounding the damage types of the longsword and mace. For their "Best" attack, maces deal Blunt damage. Longswords deal either Stab or Cut damage. Best attacks are the most likely to hit (75%); for sake of simplicity, "Mid" attacks are ignored. They are listed in rough order of importance.
*Cut damage deals bonus damage. Specifically, if a Cut damage activates a cleave, then total damage is multiplied by 140%, then split between body parts. This means that a Cut attack inflicts more pain on a pawn, causing pain shock. Pain shock is the most common way to down / kill enemies in combat. Even with painless mechanoids, dealing enough HP of damage will cause a pawn to die, even if you never destroy a vital body part. 
: The chance to cleave is 40%. This improves sword DPS by 116% on average, and the sword already is better in terms of raw DPS.
: Spreading the damage between body parts may prevent outright destroying body parts, which could be more devastating than extra damage.
*Blunt weapons have superior overkill damage mechanics. If a Stab would destroy a body part, then any further damage is wasted. If a Blunt attack would destroy a body part, damage is spread to the parent part. In other words: if a sword would stab off a finger, the mace would smash the finger and damage the arm in the process.
:Meanwhile, Cut damage has a chance to cleave an opponent. If cut damage happens to get a part to 0 HP, then it is much more likely to destroy it. The mace remains superior - it is more likely to cripple/destroy larger body parts whilst not wasting damage.
:Overkill is unlikely to matter for weapons below masterwork quality. Plasteel / uranium weapons at excellent quality will barely be able to destroy larger body parts, like the arms, in 1 hit, meaning overkill damage is almost nonexistent. Lower qualities won't be able to destroy large parts in 1 hit. With lower qualities, overkill is only relevant if a body part is hit twice in a row. This is much less important than DPS and the pain it inflicts.
*Blunt weapons can stun enemies, though the chance is small. If a blunt weapon hits the torso or a equivalent body part (a scyther's thorax, a centipede 1st body ring...), then the target has a chance to be stunned for a short time. This is completely independent from EMP and mechanoid adaptation. Stun chance depends on the target's health scale and the damage done. A normal uranium mace hitting a human would have a 2.7% chance to stun per hit to the torso.
: Blunt weapons can also stun if they hit the brain. But a uranium mace of at least Poor quality will always one-shot a human brain (unless it is fully negated by armor, in which case it wouldn't stun).
*Sharp weapons cause bleeding. However, bleeding is unlikely to help the player, since melee engagements are usually over long before combat penalties due to blood loss can kick in. This may even be a disadvantage, as it makes it harder to save prisoners and causes infections.
== Version history ==
* 1.5.4062 - Texture recreated with higher quality.
Longsword Old.png|Texture prior to 1.5
Category:Equipment Category:Weapons Category:Medieval Weapons
Category:Melee Weapons Category:Sharp Weapons Category:Swords