anyone else think the Adamantine mind blade feat from 341 is overpowered?


Dragon Magazine General Discussion


So I thought this would be an appropriate place to post this. The Adamantine mind blade feat seems pretty overpowered. This feat allows a soulknife of 3rd level (prereq of base attack +1, and soulknifes have cleric base atk) to wield an adamantine weapon that if destroyed or disarmed can be reconsituted a round later. This also acts as adamantine in all ways meaning it has increased hitpoints and hardness as well as getting through damage reduction.
Now monks get a class feature like this at 16th level, and normal players can buy an adamantine weapon for 3,000 gp, which most characters couldnt do until 4th or 5th and then they would be spending a majority of their money on that one item. An item which could be turned against them if taken, and could be destroyed (although not easily).
Also the Soulknife would have the advantage of being able to change the weapon from a shortsword up to at leats a bastard sword, at a later level. Combine this with shapable mind blade feat and this soulknife would have several different adamantine weapons at his disposal.
I just think that this feat is overpowered, its a great idea but shouldn't be available until higher levels.

Any thoughts?


It's really not. Because the soulknife can reconstitute his blade every round, hardness is not a factor; no matter what he has it is indestructible, because he can make a new one.

Aside from that, the only bonus it has is to overcome damage reduction. At level 3 that won't be neccessary often. Furthermore, the soulknife's blade is his MAIN weapon. He uses it all the time, so you have to realize that it needs to be able to overcome DR. The most it cold do is allow him to hit certain guys his friends couldn't. Not game breaking in any way.

Liberty's Edge

The reason the feat is overpowered is probably not the fact that the soulknife will have a reasonable chance at defeating constructs. It has more to do with the way D&D treats inanimate objects.

A sword, no matter how "hard" is not well designed to hack through stone walls. There are reasons that picks and shovels are traditonal digging intstruments and swords are not, regardless of the softness of the material.

Personally, I'd like to see the rules fix this problem in the next version, but the rules as written allow a character with an adamantine weapon to carve a path through any traditional dungeon.

Essentially, players are no longer bound by the walls and doors of a traditional dungeon. This is the same problem some DMs have with high level magic (Dimension Door, Teleport, and even Fly), but potentially even earlier.

If the players and DM can reach an agreement regarding the nature of hardness and adamantine weapons, it isn't so overpowered.


If the player wants to spend hours hammering through dungeon walls, that's his perogative. Exaustion rules and wandering monsters should help stymie this. If not, placing things on the other side of walls or doors that make the player sorry for not being choosy about his demolition should, by all rights, make the player think twice about hacking through doors with his mindblade for fun.

Oh yes, ask me if I'd tolerate Find The Path abuse in my games. Then, ask me if I haven't already considered ways to stymie Find The Path abuse...


Luke Fleeman wrote:
It's really not. Because the soulknife can reconstitute his blade every round, hardness is not a factor; no matter what he has it is indestructible, because he can make a new one.

Yes, but a fighter of the same level who spent all of his hard earned money buying an adamantine can be disarmed and can have his weapon destroyed. The only other character class that gets an indestructible adamantine weapon (the monk) gets it at 16th level not 3rd with the cost of a feat.

Luke Fleeman wrote:
Aside from that, the only bonus it has is to overcome damage reduction. At level 3 that won't be neccessary often. Furthermore, the soulknife's blade is his MAIN weapon. He uses it all the time, so you have to realize that it needs to be able to overcome DR.

Yes I forgot how the fighter or barbarian or anyone else doesn't use one main weapon to fight almost everything. Only soulknifes do. Yes I realize that a fighter could very well pick up a different weapon but so could a soulknife. Just because its his main weapon doesn't justify him getting access to overcoming certain damage reductions much earlier than any other playable class.

The simple fact is that one of the main limiting factors of a barbarian or fighter or any weapon reliant class is that their one awesome weapon that they've spent tons of money on and taken many feats to get better with, can be disarmed or sundered. The soulknife doesn't have this limitation and now with this feat and others like it we're allowing him to gain access to certain weapon properties and apply them to his indestructible weapon. this is understandble and this feat is pretty cool, however the soulknife has access to these feats at far too early a level. He should instead get this feat at later level, 6th or 9th perhaps. It just makes more sense and balances him out with the other classes.


Listen, Soulknives are underpowered as it is. I think it's fair for them to have Adamantine Mind Blade, plus he's excluding his mind blade from ever having silver or cold iron properties.

Also, there's a Sor/Wiz and I believe Clr spell too that grants the properties of adamantine.

There is also a +1 bonus weapon special ability called "metalline" from FR Underdark that allows you to transform your weapon into any metal.

My feelings on Adamantine Mind Blade? Not a real problem at all.


The question isn't whether a soulknife could use other weapons or not. It's about whether he should or not. All of his class abilities go into the blade, so he really HAS to use it as his main weapon. This is like a wizard not using spells.

Aside from overcoming DR (which many things have DR other than adamantine) and hardness, how does adamantine offer a benefit?

In fact, there is the staement about a fighter buying an adamantine blade and being disarmed, but a soulknife can't. That has nothing to do with the adamantine feat- it has to do with the soulknife. A soulknife can manifest a magical bastard sword every round, too, while a fighter's similar weapon is disarmed. That is a soulknife power, not a power of this feat.


Jay wrote:
He should instead get this feat at later level, 6th or 9th perhaps. It just makes more sense and balances him out with the other classes.

Suppose he takes it at level 3. What monster, with a CR of 5 or below (before the level 6 you suggest) has DR with adamantine? Is there alot of monsters that he will face that this feat will be helpful against?

Its adamantine. Not vorpal or a holy avenger.


I can think of a player in my campaign who will *love* this feat.

Soulblades are incredibly weak against constructs. Their ability to Psychic Strike doesn't work against them. The actual mind blade is dealing a extremely small amount of damage. Spending a feat to correct this lack is very welcome.

I agree that it may be a little on the low-level side, but it doesn't bother me overmuch.

Argh. Another month until it comes into Ballarat!

Cheers,
Merric


Don't forget the feat says it has all the properties of adamantine, which means it bypasses hardness less than 20. It'll help Soulknives with sundering.


Luke Fleeman wrote:
Jay wrote:
He should instead get this feat at later level, 6th or 9th perhaps. It just makes more sense and balances him out with the other classes.
Suppose he takes it at level 3. What monster, with a CR of 5 or below (before the level 6 you suggest) has DR with adamantine? Is there alot of monsters that he will face that this feat will be helpful against?

How about every npc wielding a weapon that he can now very easily sunder?


If he wants to take the feats to customize himself to do it, super. Sundering doesn't work on everyone. That's fine.

It's a good feat. It's defnitely not overpowered.


You also have to remember that Soulknives are essentially a melee class that wears light armor, gets 3/4 BAB and gets no bonus feats. If they cross-class into fighter for the armor and the feats they lose progression in their blade.

In fact, the only time soulknives are balanced is when you are playing a low-magic campaign. But under normal PC wealth rules, their blade is generally behind the weapon a Barbarian might have looted/bought.

As for the level at which the feat is available, I'd say it's fine. The argument that a monk doesn't get their feat until much later is like saying rogue's Evasion is overpowered because they get it other classes do.


DeadDMWalking wrote:
Essentially, players are no longer bound by the walls and doors of a traditional dungeon. This is the same problem some DMs have with high level magic (Dimension Door, Teleport, and even Fly), but potentially even earlier.

I had trouble with a stoneshaping cleric once upon a time, until he caused the dungeon to cave-in.

As for doors, PCs will always be able to bash a door down as long as they have a strong character withe a 2-hander around. It's useful when the rogue is already dead, anyways...

I probably wouldn't bother taking this feat, consider this build: Power Attack, Improved Sunder, Adamantium Mind Blade... If you aren't human, that is where you are at level 6, and you haven't taken any nifty XPH feats.


Oath wrote:
I probably wouldn't bother taking this feat, consider this build: Power Attack, Improved Sunder, Adamantium Mind Blade... If you aren't human, that is where you are at level 6, and you haven't taken any nifty XPH feats.

That was the build I was thinking about for an NPC I had in mind.

It wouldn't bother me if a PC did that with his Soulknife because all the better. I think Soulknives are underpowered as it is. And adamantine is only a bother if the hardness is less than 20. Magically reinforced stone, steel, whatever or using the Hardness spell (forgot the exact name, but there's 2 D&D spells that increase hardness in fact, and even a psionic power that does so too I believe) will block adamantine like a brick against a butter knife.

Liberty's Edge Contributor

I think the feat is balanced. For an soulknife, a feat is a lot to give up. They aren't the strongest combatants, so the more options you can offer them the better. As far as the usefulness of adamantine weaponry, its only a slight advantage. A typical wall still has a lot of hit points, even if you bypass its hardness.
Does it matter if you cut through manacles with a mindblade or make a successful Escape Artist check to wiggle out of them?
The break or burst DC of most items is low enough for the strong guy in the party to smash anyway.


Jay wrote:
How about every npc wielding a weapon that he can now very easily sunder?

That was the first thought that I had. NPC's that are based around weapon specialization become pretty trivial once they lose their main weapon.

Of course once the party loses out on a few expensive magic weapons they might kick the character out of the party.


Adamantine soulknife is fine. All adamantine does is let you beat construct damage reduction and ignore hardness when sundering objects. That's good, but it won't help you fight most monsters, and it's nothing any normal fighter can't buy. In fact, it costs pocket change for a high level character to gain the same ability, whereas it costs the soulknife a feat slot, which he only gets one of every three levels.


Jonathan Drain wrote:
Adamantine soulknife is fine. All adamantine does is let you beat construct damage reduction and ignore hardness when sundering objects. That's good, but it won't help you fight most monsters, and it's nothing any normal fighter can't buy. In fact, it costs pocket change for a high level character to gain the same ability, whereas it costs the soulknife a feat slot, which he only gets one of every three levels.

Same reasoning I came to, pretty much.


It could afford to be overpowerd, the soulknife falls under one of the "cool but weak" classes, so soulknife intended feats can afford to be broken..

Course then again a player could just abuse this by taking a level in soulknife and rolling with it, but then that's when we use our ultra-DM powers to deny them! Boo yah!


Koga: The Ninja Trick wrote:
Course then again a player could just abuse this by taking a level in soulknife and rolling with it, but then that's when we use our ultra-DM powers to deny them! Boo yah!

Adamantine weapons only cost 3,000gp though, so this is hardly unbalanced.

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