BPorter wrote:
Mistah Green wrote:
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Thieves' World, Conan, and Game of Thrones were hardly failures. My players and I have enjoyed many a session with those games. None of those games believed they were going to supplant D&D. Not. A. Single. One. :)
The only reason I'm not porting mechanics over from those games is I'm teaching Pathfinder to my children and am attempting to go with PF RAW as much as possible so that I can teach them that system prior rather than system + ton of house rules.
Your "unharmed by weapons" comment I presume is to show that magic items have always been a part of the game -- a point I don't refute. However, the quantity, and in particular the stat-boosting items, proliferated under 3.x and is continuing under PF. A comparison of a Slave Lord from AD&D (character level 9-13 on average) vs. an equivalent-level PF NPC from just about any AP will show a huge increase in magic items.
Unless the Potterverse uses the D&D/PF spell system, trying to equate spells from PF to spells in Harry Potter books is a wasted exercise. For the most part, it's a wasted exercise even in the gaming fiction put out by TSR & later WotC.
Also, spell level is irrelevant to the point. Magic use and magic items are ubiquitous - they're effectively replacements to technology in many cases. That's high magic/high fantasy by definition.
One of the things I did in my gaming group to get over the "GEAR IZ TEH AWESOME!!" mindset is to only give it significance when it should have significance. You don't need to take away the player's toys. You need them to recognize how awesome these gifts are. My wife's psychic warrior has a +1 Deep Crystal Longsword that was given to her by her mentor. She's 10th level now and by all rights should be looking to upgrade her weapon and "cast" that one away. She'll never do that because her weapon is special to her. She'd much rather upgrade the weapon itself rather than find a new one.
Perhaps you could try coming up with a history for some of your more significant weapons. One of the things Neverwinter Nights 2 does really well is give certain weapons names and backgrounds. Heck, Khelgar has a whole chapter about his weapons. Take this example:
'"The Orcsmasher" is just a +2 warhammer, but it was wielded by the great Dwarven Paladin of Helm Gurngold Fireknee in the defense of Mithral Hall. The hammer is wanted by orcs, the Fireknee clan, and the clerics of Helm.'
It took me less than 5 minutes to write that background and now I have at least 3 story hooks off of it. They don't have to be epic artifacts to have a history.
Addressing the issue of DR/SR/Resistances, the players go up against the creatures as is and win. Congrats, you guys overcame adversity and won despite not having the optimal setup. OR...The players lost and now have a bitter taste in their mouth. You just accomplished 3 things: First, the players now know they can't just steamroll every encounter and may have to do some planning. Second, the players now have a potential villain, rather than a stat block. Third, now the players are going to go on an epic quest to research said creature and/or find the Sword of a 1000 Truths in order to defeat the monster. I gotta tell you, BPorter, I'm getting pumped as a GM just creating this story.
