Weapon families and their upgrade lines
Eight weapon families, how the game names their variants, and how to pick upgrades.
There are eight weapon families
The upgrade data contains dedicated lines for Axe, Sword, Dagger, Gauntlet, Hammer, Blunderbuss, Chain and Shield. Chain appears in the text as Flail. Each family has its own set of named variants, so a weapon you are offered belongs to exactly one of these eight.
Variant names follow families
Within a family the game reuses a naming pattern across types. The Bane prefix exists for Axe, Sword, Dagger, Gauntlet, Hammer, Blunderbuss, Chain and Shield, and the Bane description is the same for all of them: destroying a dead body can release a ghost that attacks nearby enemies. Godly and Merciless variants recur the same way. Learn the family pattern once and you can read an unfamiliar weapon.
Upgrades live per family
Upgrade entries are keyed per weapon, for example an axe upgrade is separate from a sword upgrade. That means the upgrade pool you are offered is tied to the family you are holding. Decide the family early and take its upgrades rather than splitting attention.
Shields are their own family
Shield has its own upgrade line and its own Bane, Godly and Merciless entries. A shield is not a slower sword: it has its own attack profile and its own upgrade path. Judge it by the shield line, not by comparing it to the sword you used last run.
Transformations and fusions exist
The weapon data contains entries for transformed and fused weapons — for example a Gauntlet entry named Defiler of the Divine, and Blunderbuss entries named Fate of Plimbo the First. These are specific named results, so check an unfamiliar weapon name against the weapon tables before assuming what it does.