@Pieter Boelen the fame boost sounds good as a long term plan, in the meantime, reward swords were already quite good. Really, the only reason the player won't love them is he probably already has some god-like quest sword like Sharp's Sabre.
@Pillat you are describing this like weapon variety or tradeoffs between thematically designed swords is a new idea you are just now implementing, that simply isn't the case. There is huge variety in the original balance, swords better or worse at some things, with all sorts of interesting choice. And almost entirly they reflect the sword's style in a consistent way (I fixed the 1 or 2 exceptions I could find already). Past modders understood every principle you are talking about, and already implemented them in a balanced and well-tested manner. Just compare the swords without a hilt guard to defensive swords at any given weapon tier, look at their block stats. There are swords better at damage, piercing, block, or worse at them, with all different strategic choices at all levels, and balanced with restraint and good judgement. This isn't a new idea, and the old system was great, and players had plenty of progression in sword strength to give fun rpg feel (all preserved by my rebalance, since it mainly consists of very moderate and limited changes to the low end of swords).
Well my post immediatlly got buried on the previous page. So I'll just include my finale concluding plea here, and then I give up on trying to defend anything:
-----
There is enough modding work to be done here that we don't all have to experiment with the exact same files at the exact same time, no? Because I think mine should be tried out before being entirely replaced with something entirely different. I am all for people tweaking my experimental rebalance within its own principles, but entirely and immediately reverting my tightened weapon tiers with a new "vastly increased weapon differences" mod doesn't seem right, before we've had any chance to see how it works. Especially since the moderate and limited nature in which I've done the experiment preserves the previous variety and general sword balance, with all its interesting tradeoffs and strategic choices designed by past modders, and is needed to balance some very interesting other experimental systems that would become unabalanced otherwise (AI armor and expanded weapon selection).
And I do not find pursuasive claims that somehow a new complete overhaul would automatically be balanced with the other experimental systems, especially when it was designed under version 4.0, without my AI armor system or the expanded weapon variety, and under personal modifications of Pillat that include drastic modifications to the way HP works for AI. That just isn't a recipe for balancing something for general use.
There really is enough work for modders in POTC that we don't have to immediatelly come in and create conflicting experiments that replace other modder's hard work before it has even been tried. That just doesn't seem fair, and the instability completely kills motivation to spend vast hours working on something for everyone.
Alright, that's enough from me on this topic. Either the above is convincing or it is not, I won't be around to argue it further.
