Why would anyone ever use specific magical weapons? Most of them are completely worthless for the reasons outlined below:
- They are often too expensive for the levels in which they would be most effective.
- There are no rules anywhere for scaling them (such as increasing the enhancement bonuses) and many GMs are either stingy and won't allow it, or are clueless on how to handle such an upgrade.
- DCs for otherwise cool abilities are often laughably low, what's more such abilities are often limited to 1/day in addition.
- If found as treasure, they will invariably be sold by the party so they can craft weapons better suited to them (if for no other reason than the lack of scaling guarantees it will one day be obsolete).
- The customizable weapons (enhancement bonuses and enhancement-equivalent abilities) are strictly superior in nearly every case.
Discuss your thoughts.
They seem to be overpriced or underpriced. I guess we agree here.
I think they are scalable and most GM's I know would allow it. How to scale them is up to the GM though. I do admit I like to customize my own weapons so I would probably not buy one. I would use one if it were given to me as treasure though.
I agree with the abilities. That also applies to many artifacts also.
We pretty much agree that apart from RP they are inferior.
I only highlighted that to avoid any nerdrage that may come later.
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Sun blade? Rapier of puncturing? Several others?
Nice non standard powers that are worth the extra cost.
Seeing how you can normally scale up the enhancement of the weapon using Greater magic weapon having them, starting with a low "straight" bonus is not a problem generally. (it can be for the Sun blade, but if you use one of those generally you have a lot of evil enemies)
Other then pointing out the obvious that not everyone plays a min/max kind of game. Those unique armor and weapons are given out as treasure and used because it is better then the normal or +1 weapon they have managed to find. Some folks also love the flavor of having something unique.
If your would has several party members that can make magic items, or a magic mart where you can go buy anything you really want... then yes over time getting "the perfectly built weapon for your character" is going to happen. Just like every character will have Mithril Full Plate, Mithril Breast Plate, or Mithril Chain Shirt (maybe Celestial, Dragonhide, or Adamantine for some builds too.)
What goes on a build is not the same as what a character users in game. This applies to skills, feats, and magic items. ;)
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I know this idea is a bit alien but a lot of groups use the items they find. So if they find a Sunsword or a Belt of Dwarvenkind they don't hold up their nose and say "Ewww, yuck this is sub-optimal gear", they debate who the item suits best and that character uses it.
Also, it's fairly easy to figure out how to price upgrading specific items.
Edit: As a GM it's nice to throw in things like this also. It gives the party a little more flavor than the generic goto items offer.
Edit: Edit: Custom items often work well as story seeds too.
I use this sort of thing a lot for NPCs. On occasion the group might find one in a treasure trove that is better than what they currently have.
I don't have a lot of "magical Wal-Marts" in my world, you have to get to a pretty big city to be able to walk into a store and say "Can I see your flaming weapons please?"
Actually, I think there is only one city in my entire world where you could do that....
Holy Avenger.
Beyond that however a rod of lordy might is a great weapon for a magus.
with the exception of a few (sunblade, the star knife lightning one, the beastclub)specific weapons are teh lame
Shatterspike-a sword made specifically for sundering... Except with only a +1 enhancement it can't sunder anything +2 or better. Cuz that's useful.
Don'tcha love how easily the last portion of a specific weapon's text is conveniently forgotten?
shatterspike for wielders with the Improved Sunder feat counts as a +4 longsword when attempting to sunder an opponent's weapon. [It] can damage weapons with a +4 enhancement bonus or lower. <-- CRB p. 475
Which is pretty darn sweet for a 4k gp and change weapon! Given the almost universally cruddy gear allowances for NPCs, this means you'll be mowing down their weapons like so much wheat before a scythe.
Other reasons: there's no other "as written" weapon that does what that weapon does. Nothing else does what a dwarven thrower, flame tongue, frost brand, life-drinker, luck blade, mace of smiting, nine lives stealer, oathbow, rapier of puncturing, shatterspike, sun blade, sword of subtlety or sylvan scimitar does.
It's not exactly rocket science to upgrade them or believeably make them as other weapons, although a few are thematically appropriate to their particulars - such as a trident of fish command.
Example: Sunblade. Upgraded market price is the difference between the regular +2 cost and the new cost plus 50,335. A +5 sunblade has a market price of 92,335 gp. Making the blade from adamantine adds 2,700 gp. Making one with a cold iron blade adds 2,035 gp. So a +5 adamantine sunblade has a market price of 95,035 gp.
I would MUCH rather "upgrade" that spiffy frostbrand we looted from the Glacier Rift of the Frost Giants than wave around yet another +3 frost weapon.
I love the specific weapons! Heck I have a fighter who uses a Boulderhead mace for FSM's sake. I will happily take a sub-par but FUN weapon over a generic weapon with a better bonus.
But then I love to play sub-optimal.
Man that frostbrand, thing is like a mini artifact.
I love the specific weapons! Heck I have a fighter who uses a Boulderhead mace for FSM's sake. I will happily take a sub-par but FUN weapon over a generic weapon with a better bonus.
But then I love to play sub-optimal.
Man that frostbrand, thing is like a mini artifact.
"Guys, I really don't want to keep taking damage chasing that fire-immune bad guy through the walls of fire. Why the HECK did I let you talk me into selling the frostbrand again?!"
There's something viscerally satisfying in stoving in skulls with a magic rock on a stick. All cave-manly...
Also, it's fairly easy to figure out how to price upgrading specific items.
I can link to a number of debate threads on the matter that will show otherwise.
I don't ever see them in use, but I think I have an insight why that is. PCs usually spend their treasure when it comes available. Upgrades.
First you start with a mundane weapon. Then you loot a masterwork one off of something you defeat. Then you have it enchanted to +1. Then you add flaming. And so on.
It's rare that a PC saves up to retire their weapon to pick up a named/specific weapon all in one shot. Given that specific weapons tend to be expensive, that acts against their use. You usually don't take your +1 whatever and turn it into a specific weapon. So again, incremental upgrades are what kills specific weapons and armor.
Meh I'm using celestial armor currently on my magus -- mainly for the free fly spell once a day. The rogue in the group is using a short sword of subtlety, while the paladin has a dwarven thrower. The fighter is waiting on her demon plate to be finished too.
Meh I'm using celestial armor currently on my magus -- mainly for the free fly spell once a day. The rogue in the group is using a short sword of subtlety, while the paladin has a dwarven thrower. The fighter is waiting on her demon plate to be finished too.
Did your rogue get that sword of subtlety as found treasure?
I made a rogue once based around the sword of subtlety. Purchased it with starting funds as soon as it was possible to do so.
At lower levels when you can finally afford it, it is too expensive (taking up too much of your starting funds). At higher levels, a normal +X short sword with a comparable price is better in almost every way.
Also, it's fairly easy to figure out how to price upgrading specific items.I can link to a number of debate threads on the matter that will show otherwise.It's good that I don't game with the whole internet then.
Just cause your group may have house ruled a solution doesn't mean the rules are clear cut for anyone else.
We found it and he kept it -- was mainly range based and needed a good melee weapon.
Honestly a 'normal' +x weapon isn't better in most ways -- once you are flanking having that sword of subtlety means a +5 to hit and damage -- just like a +5 weapon (though not with the DR penetration) but without the full price of it. Also when I drop the greater magic weapon spell on his sword he now has a total of +7 to hit and damage when flanking... which isn't a bad deal at all.
Other armors and weapons I like:
Abrogalian Corset
Soothsayer's Raiment
Breastplate of Command
Demon Armor
Rhino Hide
Battlement Shield
Lion's Shield
Winged Shield
Assassin's Dagger
Frost Brand
Grudge Blade
Life-Drinker
Luck Blade
Mace of Smiting
Slaying Arrow
Sun Blade
Sword of Life Stealing
Sword of the Planes
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3.5 had a version of the Sun Blade somewhere called the Sun Sword (return to Castle Ravenloft?) that had the awesome short-sword-that-hits-like-a-bastard-sword property, without the other garbage that makes it cost more.
That's my idea of a fun specific weapon, 'cause the cost then suggests how much that property would cost on another weapon, such as a hand crossbow that hits like a heavy crossbow, or a dagger that hits like a longsword, or a longsword that hits like a greatsword.
The Dagger of Venom is my least favorite. With a flat DC 14, it's +6000 gp for a dagger that pisses off the player once / day by failing to poison something.
I use them as guidelines for making my own cool magic items with unique benefits.
3.5 had a version of the Sun Blade somewhere called the Sun Sword (return to Castle Ravenloft?) that had the awesome short-sword-that-hits-like-a-bastard-sword property, without the other garbage that makes it cost more.
That's my idea of a fun specific weapon, 'cause the cost then suggests how much that property would cost on another weapon, such as a hand crossbow that hits like a heavy crossbow, or a dagger that hits like a longsword, or a longsword that hits like a greatsword.
The Dagger of Venom is my least favorite. With a flat DC 14, it's +6000 gp for a dagger that pisses off the player once / day by failing to poison something.
The 3.5 Sunblade had that property...it's directly taken from the 1E/2E Sun Blade in pretty much all respects. The best dual wielding combo is 2 Sun swords (which some character in the 1E FR The North book could do).
The original Dagger of Venom you got to choose the venom to fill it with. You could get some nice poisons in there that way.
===Aelryinth
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Just cause your group may have house ruled a solution doesn't mean the rules are clear cut for anyone else.Also, it's fairly easy to figure out how to price upgrading specific items.I can link to a number of debate threads on the matter that will show otherwise.It's good that I don't game with the whole internet then.
I love the way "House Rule" has become a dirty word on the forum. You don't game with the whole planet, you just have to figure out how to work with your GM.
They use upgraded versions of these items in organized play so it's not brain surgery. If it's too much for you to work a compromise with your GM use them as written. Not a big deal.
I love the way "House Rule" has become a dirty word on the forum.
And I just love how people see "House Rules" as a valid enough reason not to fix known problems within the system. /sarcasm
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How is this a problem?
You have
Option 1 - Use what is there and whine about the problems with it.
Option 2 - Use stuff, play with it, expand on it, build new stuff.
I'll take the whine free version of the game.
If you want a game with straight forward rules that spell every little nuance out you are using the wrong system. D&D is built on years of obscurity and tradition.
If you don't house rule stuff you can't
You are missing half the fun stuff in the game.
And I just love how people see "House Rules" as a valid enough reason not to fix known problems within the system. /sarcasm
I love the way "House Rule" has become a dirty word on the forum.
There are not even universal rules that make for making simple magic items. They are only really guidelines so how can you expect rules for things like these weapons which have multiple abilities.
All you can really do is ad hoc it.I have guidelines for how I would do it, but there is nothing that will pass as acceptable for every GM.
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The Magic Item Compendium had rules for scaling specific magical weapons which I'm going to use.
Still, of all the characters in my group probably only the cavalier will take one of them. The number of specific falcatas and scimitars is not very good, especially if you want a weapon that isn't awful.
So, even with scalability, the fact that most of the base weapons are rather suboptimal prevents characters from using them.
I had a cleric of Pelor in a 3.5 run thru of Age of Worms. I used my same armor and weapons from character creation (lvl 9 replacement of my first character).
I found a Sun Blade towards the end of the campaign and I picked it for obvious Pelorian-themed reasons. But, hey... I never swung a melee weapon till I picked that bad boy up and when we rode into Alhaster at the end-game I actually meleed things and killed a couple Kyuss knights.
I promptly went back to Turning/Healing/Blasting but it was a nice change to hurt things with a weapon. The Sun Blade is cool.
Specific magic weapons from the book rarely make it into the games we play. But we often have customised specific weapons (and items) in our games.
And by customise I don't mean we upgraded a specific weapon, but used the weapons as guidelines what is possible and tailored a weapon for our needs.
So, I see the specific weapons more as examples how to make your own (occasionally you get exactly what fits too ^^). Without those how would you guess the powerlevel of an artifact or an item you came up with on your own? With the rather numerous items you can find something that has at least some similarities and use it as a guideline.
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i am very disappointed ultimate magic failed to have new wonderous items. magic weapons/armor likly would have accompanied them. guessing they are saving weapons/armor 4 uc swing a weapon classes.
i feel almost all the special weapons are garbage and never have or would spend mony on them. i do like the luck though.
And I just love how people see "House Rules" as a valid enough reason not to fix known problems within the system. /sarcasm
I love the way "House Rule" has become a dirty word on the forum.
how is ogre even using a houserule? he never stated how he figured pricing. There ARE rules for upgrading magic items and it does not say that specific magic items are exempt...
Adding New Abilities
Sometimes, lack of funds or time make it impossible for a magic item crafter to create the desired item from scratch. Fortunately, it is possible to enhance or build upon an existing magic item. Only time, gold, and the various prerequisites required of the new ability to be added to the magic item restrict the type of additional powers one can place.
The cost to add additional abilities to an item is the same as if the item was not magical, less the value of the original item. Thus, a +1 longsword can be made into a +2 vorpal longsword, with the cost to create it being equal to that of a +2 vorpal sword minus the cost of a +1 longsword.
It seems Turin the Mad figured it out. it can't be that difficult if a person out of his mind managed to do so within the rules LMAO!
Why would anyone ever use specific magical weapons? Most of them are completely worthless for the reasons outlined below:
- They are often too expensive for the levels in which they would be most effective.
- There are no rules anywhere for scaling them (such as increasing the enhancement bonuses) and many GMs are either stingy and won't allow it, or are clueless on how to handle such an upgrade.
- DCs for otherwise cool abilities are often laughably low, what's more such abilities are often limited to 1/day in addition.
- If found as treasure, they will invariably be sold by the party so they can craft weapons better suited to them (if for no other reason than the lack of scaling guarantees it will one day be obsolete).
- The customizable weapons (enhancement bonuses and enhancement-equivalent abilities) are strictly superior in nearly every case.Discuss your thoughts.
And I just love how people see "House Rules" as a valid enough reason not to fix known problems within the system. /sarcasm
Look, it is no secret that RD is a powergamer/optimizer through-and-through. And that is okay. But I would seriously like to see tables, charts, graphs, formulae and other relevant supporting evidence.
Is a +3 shortsword really better than a sword of subtlety? Bring me the numbers. And if the difference is less than 20% I don't reckon it falls in the "known problems within the system" category.
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Although I do agree that many of them are a little over priced, some have a variety of abilities you normally can't buy. One example I can think of is the Dwarven Thrower.
This weapon functions as a +2 warhammer in the hands of most users. Yet in the hands of a dwarf, the warhammer gains an additional +1 enhancement bonus (for a total enhancement bonus of +3) and gains the returning special ability. It can be hurled with a 30-foot range increment. When hurled, a dwarven thrower deals an extra 2d8 points of damage against creatures of the giant subtype or an extra 1d8 points of damage against any other target.
Yeah it's 60k and some change but the extra enhancement bonus, returning, increased range increment, and extra damage dice is really nice. Yeah you'd only want it for a dwarven character but it's still a fun and completely useable weapon.
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How is this a problem?
It's a hole in the system. The items are out of whack for their pricing, and because of that many of them, when they are available are neigh useless.
Now if you and your campaign are ignoring the prices of items then that part's not an issue for you. Likewise it wouldn't matter to you if they were omitted entirely in the rules.
Prices only matter when you buy and sell items. Most of these items are found and are often only sold if they can't be put to use.
I've seen people change their characters because they found an item like the Dwarven Thrower. When you find an item like that it's value is largely dependent on the situation and the character who winds up with it. In the hands of a dwarf in Rise of the Runelords book four it could be pretty awesome.
But for those DMs that want to have roughly the wealth by level that is suggested they are misled by these items and how miss-priced they are.
You are also making the assumption that wealth by level assumes players have 'optimal' gear as opposed to typical gear based on found items. Considering many of the comments from the developers and many of the pregens and found items in Adventure Paths I think you are incorrect. The +1 Ghost Touch sword (expensive and arguably sub-optimal for a 4th level party) we found in a recent 3rd level module certainly contradicts your assumption. As does the collection of oddball gear Xanesha has at the end of the second Rise of the Runelords book.
I don't think the designers plan on players liquidating all this oddball gear. I suppose we could take a survey on the respective forums and see whether players generally keep those items or not. The players in my group have historically kept most of the strange (arguably 'overpriced') gear and they do just fine.
Maybe it's not such a gaping hole in the game as you think.
If you let your PCs sell items (and in post 2 I addressed disallowing this was a quick fix for most of this) then you can give them a 'cool' item only to find that they are pressured into selling it as they can do better with half the gold...
It's funny, quite often when our group distributes treasure we don't even discuss the price of items. If no-one is interested in an item we'll sell it but often we don't. Mostly we try and figure out who would benefit most from getting an item and who has the fewest items.
The pressure to 'do better' (aka optimize) is largely based on the group.
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Many of the specific items (and many wondrous items) are there due to traditions of the game. If you don't value those traditions you likely won't care for the items. That said, they are also important for a few other reasons.
Sometimes oddball items can make a corner piece to an NPC (An important NPC in the first book in Kingmaker has such an item) and these items give GMs a basis for helping create new, similar items. Sometimes items like this can be essential to defeating specific foes (this is the case in Carrion Crown). Similarly they make a good basis for story hook items for players.
how is ogre even using a houserule? he never stated how he figured pricing. There ARE rules for upgrading magic items and it does not say that specific magic items are exempt...
I never claimed 0gre was using house rules. I merely stated my opinion that just because something can be house ruled to work correctly, doesn't mean it shouldn't be fixed by errata/FAQ.
A broken system is still broken even if everyone makes house rules to fix it. Why go through all the extra work when we can get a working product to begin with?
I'm speaking generally of course, not in relation to specific magic items.
As for specific magic items, you are right in that there are guidelines for upgrading magic items, but in regards to specific magic items they are so vague that it isn't really possible (other than by coincidence) for people to make the same ruling from one game to another. This doesn't necessarily break the game, but it does leave some holes in the rules that should probably be clarified at some point.
If your game spends a lot of time on the edges of civilization, treasure can be the ONLY reliable source of magical goodies other than scribe scroll. I've played games that went multiple play sessions and levels without an opportunity to shop at S-Mart. This is especially true is you have a GM that is tracking time and will allow bad things to happen if the group doesn't act with alacrity.
True Confession: Found an ancient religious complex below a church in an abandoned town and spent several days exploring only to have the GM point out we'd completely forgotten about our now long-gone horses.
I add 1/2 BaB and the weapon enhancement (natural, not from boosting spells like gmw) to the DC of the special effects.
I agree they could have gotten better scaling abilities. I disagree that they somehow are useless.
As for specific magic items, you are right in that there are guidelines for upgrading magic items, but in regards to specific magic items they are so vague that it isn't really possible (other than by coincidence) for people to make the same ruling from one game to another.
Its really simple to price upgrades for these items. Just look at the vanilla part (+2 dagger in an Assassin's Dagger, for example) and pay the proper cost to upgrade a +2 dagger to a +3 or whatever (10,000 gp, or 5,000 if you craft it yourself).
Not all campaigns are run the way you apparently have yours run. Not all worlds have a convenient MagicMart Trade-In Center.
And sometimes they're just good enough to get the job done.
Actually by the rules, no campaign should have a Magicmart. Have you seen the community size and gold piece limit rules in the core rulebook? They are roughly a tenth of what 3.5 was. I like it!