Broad Sword

A Broad Sword is a common Long Sword-class weapon available throughout the Golden Sun series.

In and
In Golden Sun, when first shopping at Bilibin, the Broad Sword may come across as overwhelmingly expensive and powerful among the common weapons being sold at the weapon shopkeeper. With a price tag of 1000 coins, you most likely won't be able to afford it unless you sell off the Bandit's Sword artifact for 525 coins and the Water of Life gotten at Vault for 2,250 coins.

While the sword is very useful for its potential wielders Isaac and Garet once you have one, be sure to retrieve the even stronger weapon artifact Elven Rapier from Bilibin Cave, which does not require spending coins to access. This essentially means you only have to worry about getting one Broad Sword for whichever warrior-style Adept isn't holding the Rapier. Following Bilibin, the Broad Sword will likely remain in your party's inventory until you complete Fuchin Falls Cave and retrieve the Arctic Blade. Broad Swords remain on sale throughout Imil, Kolima Village, and Xian.

In The Lost Age, the first town to sell Broad Swords is Alhafra, but there is no reason to actually buy one because the party will have already gotten artifacts like Pirate's Sword and Blow Mace along the way there. Future dungeons will only continue to dispense even stronger weapons that far outclass the Broad Sword and other weapons sold at shops, like the Storm Brand at Air's Rock, so Broad Swords should never actually be relevant to an ongoing game file. Broad Swords technically will remain available at Garoh and Naribwe, and they can technically be equipped by Piers.

In
In Dark Dawn, Broad Swords gain two new unleashes that are randomly chosen between, within the context of the redesigned Unleash system: Critical Strike and Berserk Rush. Both Unleashes are very similar in that they amount to non-elemental physical strikes that deal 50% and 60% increased resulting damage, respectively, with Berserk Rush additionally carrying a 70% base chance to reduce the target's Defense by two 12.5%-increment "stages" for several turns (up to a maximum of four stages totaling -50%).

In a situation oddly reminiscent of The Lost Age, the Broad Sword will be outclassed by the Blow Mace the player will already have found in this game as well (at Passaj Mountain Climb, one of the earliest locations in the Ei-Jei arc of the game). Furthermore, the upcoming Barai Temple dungeon at Ayuthay will let you pick up the stronger Storm Brand for free.

Until that point in time, there is something to be said about the value of the Broad Sword consistently unleashing either a 50%-stronger or 60%-stronger version of a standard physical attack whenever you happen to Unleash with it. Other weapons are prone to producing wildly divergent types of Unleashes at random, which can make them seem less reliable in comparison. Mastering the Broad Sword can also help whichever of the game's two Long Sword-wielding Adepts holding this — Matthew and Tyrell — master the Storm Brand more quickly, so buying a Broad Sword at Kaocho can be worthwhile if you have coins to spare.

Gallery of Dark Dawn unleashes