| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Normally, you can't modify the black blade of a bladebound magus beyond what it naturally grows into. However, the whole point of Sins of the Saviors is to get runeforged weapons. At the time of forging, the black blade will be at +4 with the ability to add +4 of enchantments more via the arcane pool. I'm looking for some advice on how to handle it. Here are the options I could use:
0) The magus may permanently enchant his black blade in the runeforge pool as if it were a normal magic weapon and it also follows normal black blade progression, becoming a +12 equivalent weapon when fully activated. Hahaha—no.
1) "Sorry magus, you're out of luck. Your sword's cool enough already." Don't like this either.
2) The magus may permanently enchant his black blade in the runeforge pool as if it were a normal magic weapon, but since it's already at +4/+4, this +2 bonus will make it +10 and cap the sword where it is. It will not increase to +5/+5 at level 17. This hurts a bit, but the game's ending at 17 anyway. He can still use arcane pool points to get the sword to a +5 enhancement if he likes.
2.5) As #2, but the blade advances to +5 at level 17. This leaves only +3 worth of enchantments that can be added with the arcane pool. Least favorite of the three reasonable choices.
3) Enchanting the black blade in the runeforge pool adds the runeforged ability to the list of weapon properties the magus can add to his blade with his arcane pool. The blade advances as normal. This seems a bit too flexible at first, but that is the point of the arcane pool, plus he won't get the passive bonuses of having a runeforged weapon unless that property is active at the time. My current favorite option.
What do you think about these? Any other suggestions?
|
Out of the three options you gave, I agree 3 is far and away the best.
Personally, though, I'd go for 0. It's assumed to go over the top of whatever enchantments are already there, so I don't have any problem with it doing that.
If you really think it'll be too powerful (not just breaking the rules but actively too powerful), I'd tend towards nerfing it for everyone. For example, removing the bane or reworking how shrugging off effects works.
Cheers!
Landon
I actually didn't even think of #0 until I was typing this and rejected it out of hand, which is why I made it #0. But now I think I'll see what the other players' weapons look like when we get there before I finalize that decision. So thanks for that.
As a Bladebound Magus in my RotRL campaign, my opinion is a little biased. Personally, I'd go for #0. Yes, it means that the Magus can get a +12 equivalent weapon, but it's not exactly gamebreaking. It's a unique weapon that nobody else can use and it's only +12 in special circumstances, not exactly world ending.
That being said, if you feel like it is too much power, then I see #3 as being reasonable too. I very much dislike 1 and 2.
I'm with Landon and Desril on this. Have a Bladebound in my campaign, and I'm planning on him just enchanting his weapon as normal. The players have no way of knowing their weapons will get enchanted as such, and if they did, maybe the Magus player wouldn't have chosen the Bladebound archetype.
If I let the black blade get a free upgrade via #0, then I have to allow the other players to ignore the enchantment when upgrading their weapons, including pricing, in order to be fair. Would anyone who has actually gotten this far and done this care to comment? Does this work, or is the +10 limit there for a reason?
Im very new, so I apologize for my ignorance.
it seem to me that doing something for others would be a nice way to balance things.
Perhaps Making any weapons that go over +10 into intelligent items
that use the virtue/vice to determine their Ego would help
Forgot about this. What I ended up doing was giving the blade the ability to absorb harmful transmutations as a passive, like a normal runeforged weapon, and then the +2 to saves and the bane would be activated by spending the arcane pool.
Wondering if anyone went and finished testing the ideas here or not?
I recently had a player roll a Bladebound Magus and am wondering how to handle the Runeforged weapon side of it myself.
I like the idea #3 as other said but I'm interested in knowing how it worked for others.
I did not have a bladebound magus, however I did give the Runeforging enhancement as a free top up onto existing weapons (2 of the characters had Holy Avengers so technically they should not have been upgradable)
I would vote strongly in favor of #3 if you are going to allow this. Part of the problem is that Paizo never explains the rationale/mechanic for the Ego progression used for the Black Blade vs. the normal Ego progression for an Intelligent weapon. I haven't looked at the tables in the Magic Item section, but I suspect the Black Blade's Ego progression is more favorable for the wielder staying in control than the basic mechanics. Using any option other than #3 seems likely to seriously skew that balance.