Endless ammunition enchantment and non "standard" arrows

[Albosto]

I searched but could not find this asked boefore: Can the endless ammunition weapon enchantment make:
1: special material arrows (e.g. cold iron, mithral/silver, adamantine)
2: alchemical arrows
3: blunt arrows

d20pfsrd wrote:

Endless ammunition

Only bows and crossbows can be made into endless ammunition weapons—firearms and other projectile weapons cannot. Each time an endless ammunition weapon is nocked, a single non-magical arrow or bolt is spontaneously created by the magic, so the weapon's wielder never needs to load the weapon with ammunition.

Since these are all "non-magical" and the entry only says it makes a single non-magical arrow.

For those that say these three would be overpowered, please look in the spoiler as to why they should be allowed.

A bit more on the maths:

This enchantment costs at least 16,000gp, and more if you want to have an enhancement bonus of more than +1 (At which point it may start to overcome some of the special material DR's anyway).

the minimum 16000gp equates to ~
266 adamantine (~1600 utilizing the adamantine weapon blanch)
533 mithral arrows (~32000 utilizing the silver weapon blanch)
160000 cold iron or blunt arrows
320000 normal arrows
varying amounts for alchemical arrows
These values increase approximately half again for each extra +1 bonus on the bow.

For special material arrows this does not seem overpowered. the only two alchemical arrows that I could see potentially abused (price wise) by this are:
slow burn 150gp (1d6 fire damage next round, but you could have just got flaming for a +1 enhancement)
Bleeding 360gp (1 bleed damage, but compared to a archers full attack damage that is a pittance)

This enchantment also potentially lowers the archers damage per hit by 7 on average as it takes up slots that could be spent on merciful, aligned or elemental enhancements.

[Avianfoo]

It says non-magical arrow or bolt. Not non-magical alchemical arrow or bolt, or non-magical blunt arrow or bolt. Nor does it say anything about changing its material to anything other than normal.

So its just a normal arrow or bolt. That is by RAW. House rule away if you can convince your GM.

However Abundant Ammunition will do exactly what you want.

[Kyra Clone #3,785]

Is there a piece of gear with Abundant Ammunition built in to it?

[MordredofFairy]

by RAW, i'd go with standard ammunition.

But i'll gladly allow "variations" on that.

Either way, only ONE type of ammunition will be made per bow. No swapping around. If it shoots "endless" cold iron arrows, they always will be.

Also, I'd expect a flat price increase for certain types of that. Homebrew all, but the idea is not bad.

Obviously, a Bow shooting "endless" adamantine arrows that phase out of existance shortly after hitting their target will cost more than one doing this with "normal" ones....same as alchemically treated ammunition.

[blackbloodtroll]

Avianfoo wrote:

It says non-magical arrow or bolt. Not non-magical alchemical arrow or bolt, or non-magical blunt arrow or bolt. Nor does it say anything about changing its material to anything other than normal.

So its just a normal arrow or bolt. That is by RAW. House rule away if you can convince your GM.

However Abundant Ammunition will do exactly what you want.

Are you saying it doesn't work on these types of ammunition?

[Avianfoo]

Full description:

Endless Ammunition Weapon Special Ability wrote:

Only bows and crossbows can be made into endless ammunition weapons—firearms and other projectile weapons cannot. Each time an endless ammunition weapon is nocked, a single non-magical arrow or bolt is spontaneously created by the magic, so the weapon's wielder never needs to load the weapon with ammunition.

If the wielder attempts to load the weapon with other ammunition, the created arrow or bolt immediately vanishes and the wielder can load the weapon as normal. This ability does not reduce the amount of time required to load or fire the weapon. The created arrow or bolt vanishes if removed from the weapon; it persists only if fired. Unlike normal bow and crossbow ammunition, these arrows and bolts are always destroyed when fired.

So I am saying, by RAW, it only creates standard arrows or bolts. They still can fire the non-standard ones but then the wielder must provide them. I would think that it would have specifically stated that it shot arrows made of a specific non-standard material(s) or could change between them.

For a +2 special ability that seems quite a bad deal. I would definitely house rule it to either a +1 ability or have it fire adamantine arrows.

[MordredofFairy]

I am in agreeance that by RAW, it is not possible.

This is because it is based on "Minor Creation" which states:

"You create a non-magical, unattended object of nonliving vegetable matter. "

Unlike Major Creation, which states:

Major Creation:

This spell functions like minor creation, except that you can also create an object of mineral nature: stone, crystal, metal, or the like. The duration of the created item varies with its relative hardness and rarity, as indicated on the following table.
Hardness and Rarity Examples Duration
Vegetable matter 2 hr./level
Stone, crystal, base metals 1 hr./level
Precious metals 20 min./level
Gems 10 min./level
Rare metal* 1 round/level

* Includes adamantine, alchemical silver, and mithral. You can't use major creation to create a cold iron item.

So to create adamantine even for a few rounds, you need the more powerful spell. Cold Iron is flat out.

In that respect, it seems beyond what "minor creation" can provide...since only non-living vegetable matter is possible, most alchemical options also seem right out.

All of that being said: I do agree that a +2 bonus seems step for the weapon ability.
It should probably be a flat price increase of, say, 10k Gold.

The basic idea, however, seems to make sure you NEVER run out of ammo, not to save you money on it.
Several Campaigns may take you into places(Certain Planes, below ground, wide deserts...) where replenishing ammunition may be difficult/impossible.
While you could, theoretically, just fill up some extra-dimensional container with tons of arrows and retrieve them now and then, it's a lot more stylish and your arrows cannot be stolen ;)

[Albosto]

MordredofFairy wrote:

I am in agreeance that by RAW, it is not possible.

This is because it is based on "Minor Creation" which states:

"You create a non-magical, unattended object of nonliving vegetable matter. "

If you went by the RAW for minor creation, technically you could only make blunt arrows (fully made out of wood/feathers); as common arrows have a metal head, which cant be made using minor creation.

Ignoring the problem of the iron tip. You could also argue that some of the special arrows could be valid under minor creation, e.g. whistling arrows.

Arrow(s), Whistling wrote:

These arrows come with specially designed grooves and fletching that cause them to emit a loud keening sound.

Benefit: The sound is audible within 500 feet of the flight path. They are sold in quantities of 20.

[MordredofFairy]

Albosto wrote:

MordredofFairy wrote:

I am in agreeance that by RAW, it is not possible.

This is because it is based on "Minor Creation" which states:

"You create a non-magical, unattended object of nonliving vegetable matter. "

If you went by the RAW for minor creation, technically you could only make blunt arrows (fully made out of wood/feathers); as common arrows have a metal head, which cant be made using minor creation.

Ignoring the problem of the iron tip. You could also argue that some of the special arrows could be valid under minor creation, e.g. whistling arrows.

Arrow(s), Whistling wrote:

These arrows come with specially designed grooves and fletching that cause them to emit a loud keening sound.

Benefit: The sound is audible within 500 feet of the flight path. They are sold in quantities of 20.

the iron tip is somewhat of a problem. But maybe it's densed-up wood in perfect shape of an arrowhead with the hardness of wood?

Maybe it's a different vegetable matter with the hardness of stone?
And maybe it IS just normal wood, treated with an ironwood-effect?

Either way, they are majorly wooden creations.
On the other hand, stuff like Adamantine gets specifically called out for being the upper limit of Major Creation, which makes it unlikely minor creation has that kind of power.

As for the whistling arrows, sure. I didn't say ALL special arrows need to be out, just that many of the alchemicals also would be, alongside the special material ones.

As you mentioned, blunt arrows would also be a option.

Though again, there has to be a table-variant decision as to wether the bow is fixed to ONE type of arrows(ALL your arrows are whistling arrows, wether thats convenient or not), or the mode can be switched....and if so, HOW.

That aspect alone, that no information is provided as to how to "change the ammunition type", be it as a swift action, per command word, as a move action, or by nocking a valid arrow that henceforth gets replicated until another valid arrow is nocked....anyway, since NOTHING in the spell explains how this is done it reinforces my belief that only ONE type of ammunition was intended to be fired from this bow, and minor creation heavily suggests that one kind of ammunition was supposed to be standard arrows(with different tips and fletching).

Of course, that makes the enchantment way overpriced in most campaigns and situations and should probably rather be a flat price increase rather than a +2 bonus.

[savokk]

My thought is that you can use it to make special material, alchemical, or blunt arrows. However you would have to decide which type of arrow you would have it create upon adding the enchantment. So you could have adamantine arrows but would not be able to change the type of arrow again. Also I would rule that it can not be used to make an arrow with a blanch on it (this would really only affect ghost salt I think as all other blanches have solid arrow equivalents), but would prevent someone from having multiple special materials.The wielder could still nock other types of arrows.

Alchemical arrows would be allowed as the enchantment only states "non-magical" and not "non-magical, non-alchemical".

[Seraphimpunk]

do abundant ammunition and then cast versatile weapon.