Saurons Weapon of Choice?

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by Dark Lord

But, when you ask someone 'What was Sauron's weapon and what did it do?', most people would reply with the description of what showed in the movie, not say 'It wasn't stated'. - That's if they know much about LOTR.

But if they know more, they are likely to say, “it wasn’t stated (in the book)”.

Originally Posted by Alfirin

Your are correct that, again, as far as I know, there is no specific reference to what weapon Sauron used (if any) and any guess is speculation, but what else is the forum for? If the answer given to most questions asked here is never anything more than "Tolkien never said, so we should not guess or presume" then this would be a sparse forum indeed.

Alfirin, of courseyou can think of Sauron as having whatever weapon you like– and as you say a mace is “as logical a weapon as any”. However, the OP asked whether it was true “in the books”– and again, that does require specific evidence.

To put it another way: guessing is fine, presuming– to this extent– really isn’t.

[Nerwen]

And look, I’m sorry if I’m sounding nitpicky and pedantic (as usual!), it’s just that I really was not sure what you and Andsigil were trying to say up there.

[Alfirin]

It's fine, learned discourse requires a antithesis along with a thesis in order to try and reach synthesis. you just hit a raw nerve in me; the whole thing reminded me of a period on another literature related forum where a person arrived who had decided that only that which the original author had said was canon (and unlike tolkien this work had mutiple sucessor authors who were generally aknowledged as being canon as well) and that therefore all other works should neither exist nor be discussed and the original authour should not be discussed and explored either, his words should simply be accepted at face value as the literal gospel. That occurance ended nastily with the individual hurling curses (not swear words actual curses of the "may all your family get cancer and may you be flayed alive and burn in hell" type) at everyone else in the discussion, usually before they had actually said anything (he decided that anyone who had stayed out of the whole thing was against him as well). I NEVER want to go through one of those again, so I get edgy when I think another one is coming.
Anyhow getting back to the discussion, if I may go to the movie for a second (i actually wasn't focusing on it previosly, I was simply offering a little support to the original guess.) I feel fairly sure that Peter Jackson (or at least whoever did the design) may have been cribbing a bit from some of the previos Tolkien Illustators for his ideas. Specifically I am thinking of Battle Sauron's crown/helmet. To me it looked eerily like the one John Howe (that is his first name right, I don't have my book with me and this old computer I am on doesn't all me to open two windows at once to double check) gave Melkor in his painting of him meeting with Ungolient. Since I'm not sure that the canon mentions Sauron having a crown either (it says Melkor has one (where he keeps the Silmarils) and the Witch king has one, but I'm not sure about Sauron)