Wrymslayers - How do they work?

[Quiver]

I understand the point of wyrmslayer weapons from a gameplay perspective; they offer a particular threat to Avatar and Kanna, and make the player re-consider strategies and planning. Okay.

But how do they work in a narrative sense?
(Insert joke about Fate's narrative here)

So, Wyrmslayer weapons first appear when Avatar has transformed into a dragon and is rampaging following Mikoto's death. And Azura's warns "Hey, Protag, watch out! Those weapons will be especially dangerous against you!"
I can overlook how Nohr can obtain weapons which are especially dangerous to dragons; given Garon's position, I can imagine him ordering them commissioned and distributed, even if it's a little difficult to understand how he justified that to his army considering they are only super effective against one enemy in the known world who, at the time of their commission, didn't exist as a force yet... but hey. Whims of a mad king, and they seem to function as normal weapons anyway.

The fact they first get used against dragon!Avatar seems to suggest to me that they are designed specifically to counter dragons; that is, that they hook into scales and pull them out, or they shred a dragons wings and cause more damage to them that way. Of course, they also cause  a lot of damage if Avatar and Kanna are using their swords rather than their dragon stones... but let's just chalk that up to Schrodinger's Dragon; they could be using the dragonstone, therefore the game assumes they are for reasons of balance. Okay.

Except...
Except, you can reclass into classes that don't have dragon stones. I have an Avatar who is a swordmaster; they can't use the dragonstone at all. They are fighting exclusively with the Grim Yato. And the wyrmslayers are still super effective against them. Which would suggest that the wyrmslayers are effective against dragon!humans, rather than being designed to fight dragons specifically.

So... my question is, what is it about wyrmslayers -otherwise normal looking weapons- that turns them into the bane of an Avatar's existence? Is there a solid, in-game narrative excuse for it, even if the excuse is something along the lines of "Magic"? Or is it the kind of situation where you have to accept gameplayer/story disambiguation and just roll with it?

[Emeraldfox]

You know how silver works on werewolves? It's like that.(actually silver weapons being effective against Wolfskin would have been neat). It's some sort of metal or substance that brings harm to dragonkin is all I can think of.

Also the Beastslayer works on Keaton/Velouria/Kaden/Selkie(Kana) regardless of their class too.

[Elieson]

IMO the material of the weapon is probably made up of some sort of metal that reacts dangerously with skin, blood or whatever that are dragon-based.

[VincentASM]

Back in the days of Mystery of the Emblem, Wyrmslayers were forged from the horns of divine dragons, if memory serves me right. Fates doesn't have divine dragons, but it does have first dragons, who may be the ancestors of the divine dragons.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

As others have speculated, it may be a type of metal or enchantment that harms a dragon's unique physiology. And I think it's pretty neat there's a whole weapon class designed to cut the strongest character in the game. It does beg the question why wyrmslayers don't work on the other Royals who can command the power of dragon veins. They have dragon blood, so we can assume it's not an allergic reaction when the blade makes contact with their blood vessels.

The wyrmslayer in previous games was pretty weird considering it shows up in FE worlds where dragons are not commonplace or at least are so rare that scholars knows not of their existence or lore. Eliwood's ultimate blade was designed as a dragon slayer, but that game also has basic wyrmslayers simply meant to combat wyvern units. Wyverns in general sort of cheapen the idea of dragons being some ultimate threat.  They may be dragon mutts, but they must have similar physiology.

[Roflolxp54]

According to the artist's notes in either the Awakening or Fates artbook, the Wyrmslayer has a jagged edge meant for cutting through dragonskin.

[Twilightmage]

13 hours ago, VincentASM said:

Back in the days of Mystery of the Emblem, Wyrmslayers were forged from the horns of divine dragons, if memory serves me right. Fates doesn't have divine dragons, but it does have first dragons, who may be the ancestors of the divine dragons.

If the characters from awakening are in fates wouldn't that mean tiki/nowi/nah are in the same world?

[Palasid]

I know in a couple games, the Wyrmslayer is effective against wyvern knights.Giant dragon riding knights, usually using axes, are a pretty good reason to use anti-dragon swords.

[VincentASM]

16 hours ago, Twilightmage said:

If the characters from awakening are in fates wouldn't that mean tiki/nowi/nah are in the same world?

The Outrealms is fiddly; it's essentially a multiverse. So if you treat that multiverse as one world, then what you say is true.

Either way, I guess the main point is that even if a Wyrmslayer (or anything, be it an item or character) doesn't exist in X world, it could come from Y world via an Outrealm Gate.

[Xenomata]

I remember FeMorgan and Nah talking about the Wyrmslayer in their non-sibling support conversation (it being the basis of the entire support line), but otherwise it should simply be no more than being a blade designed with dragons in mind, like the Armorslayer and other unit weakness weapons.

[NekoKnight]

I always assumed them to have specific dragon-slaying magic, in the same way certain weapons are blessed to slay evil. 

[Acacia Sgt]

Hehe, maybe dragonsbane is a thing in FE universe.

[Slumber]

8 hours ago, VincentASM said:

The Outrealms is fiddly; it's essentially a multiverse. So if you treat that multiverse as one world, then what you say is true.

I mean, that's not how it's explained in the context of the games. They're definitely presented as multiple, distinct worlds that happen to be connected through Outrealm/Dragon's Gate, with the Fates world being explicitly separate from the Archanea/Jugdral and Awakening world that has Divine Dragons. They're not like, mirror worlds with equivalent events and people. They all have pretty clearly defined rules that are different than the others(IE Tellius has actual Gods, Magvel has Satan). It really doesn't work to say it's all "one world" just because they're connected through the Outrealms/Dragon's Gate. If you're suggesting that maybe Divine Dragons went through the Dragon's Gate into Fates' world, there's not really enough to support that idea. Plus, the Dragons in Fates' world seem to work on entirely different rules all together.

HOWEVER, for whatever reason (Who am I kidding, we all know the reason), Tharja, Cordelia and Gaius were reincarnated in the Fates world, so who knows anymore. Maybe there is some cross-jiggering going on with the Fates world.

Edited April 28, 2017 by Slumber

[maninbluejumpsuit]

Pretty sure Azura mentions the wyrmslayers in Fates are effective at rending dragon scales in the chapter she tells you to look out, so it's likely just a combination of an optimal choice of metal, and serrated edge design.