Creating Weapons That Can Level

[S. Selcouth]

I've been toying with creating a campaign that I feel pretty strongly about, and both the writing and the narrowing down of things likes races and classes is going strongly. One of the things I've kind of hiccuped over, however, is the idea of weapons that grow in strength; specifically, how this can be done from a 3.x perspective.

The idea is simple in theory: weapons and items that are named but when first picked up might be of only average use. However, as experience is put into them, talents of those items can be "unlocked." Since these would essentially (and at times, actually be) magical items, the idea of a player choosing to put some of his character's exp into the item to unlock what's available in the item seems fair. However, the scale that they should be expected to spend, coupled with what would be considered a "fair" progression, eludes me.

For example, let's say Mahk Gnorl the half-orc ranger has a family weapon. For the sake of this, we'll make it a Bastard Sword. Normally, a bastard sword is a weapon that deals d10 damage and has a 19-20/x2 critical range. It's a masterwork weapon (why else would a family pass it on?) but it seems normal and unmagical. But then, with enough use (experience) something happens. At the first level, it shows its magical potential. It's now a +1 weapon. At the second level, it's bloodthirst becomes apparent. It's now has the keen property. At the third and final (for this weapon, anyways!) level, it gets Bane of Humans.

These weapons (and items, when applicable) would have proper names, so they'd be unique, but they wouldn't in and of themselves be craftable.

Any ideas of where to look for resources that would help with this, or any ideas in general?

[Azten]

3.5 had Weapons of Legacy that did exactly what you're looking for.

[Kalriostraz]

Weapons of Legacy did indeed do it in a very similar way to what you're speaking of. You had to pay XP at certain points, within rituals to 'upgrade/unlock' the weapon. The system wasn't that great, and it was a bit cumbersome. Not to mention the bonuses it suggested/gave were rather lackluster.

I'm currently actually running a homebrew campaign based on it though. We play a bit higher in power than average, so what I'm doing is having it level with them, and gaining some unique special qualities. I mean, why bother to stick with the +1 Flaming Longsword of the mighty giant Gothor, when you could just go out and buy one you actually like? Especially of getting to that with the Gothor weapon costs XP.

What it boils down to is two options in my experience. You either make a low wealth game, so not having to spend money on a weapon is a real boon in making the money you're getting stretch farther. Or you actually make the weapon unique.

Weapons of Legacy suggest having the weapon tie into the history of your world, turning up and being involved in key turning points that the PCs get to 'see' through visions as they level it up. I've taken it a step further in what they're going to see is also going to be pivotal in figuring out the larger mystery and stopping what is happening in the present day.

Their bonuses also tended to be just +2 to stats, and rather boring things. Since I want them to have a reason to use this, I'm going with the bonuses to be roughly equal in power to class abilities. So the assassin like character might get something like Poison Use early on, and later the blade will increase the DC's of poisons applied to it, or make a poison applied last longer than just one strike. Something unique, and relatively powerful/potent. I've had each of them help me with this by giving me a list of things they like the idea of that they think are roughly in line with that power level. Of course, this only really works if you and your players are experienced with the system and comfortable making changes.

If you're really interested in this I would love to help you out if you wanna shoot me a PM sometime. I'm rather passionate about the rules, and Weapons of Legacy was such a fun looking book I would love to help another group make it into something memorable!

[Ascalaphus]

I've been thinking about doing something like this with intelligent weapons. Basically, the weapon gains an amount of "XP" equal to that gained by its wielder. The weapon then buys upgrades with this "XP" (with 1 XP = ? GP), which in turn results in increased Ego and such.

The difference with Weapons of Legacy is that WoL have powers that are unlocked by the character as the character increases in level; if your son picks up your legacy weapon he has to start unlocking all over again.

In my system, the weapon doesn't just "forget" what it is if a new wielder takes it. So the sword that's been used by generations of paladins is probably an extremely badass sword by now.

I think that if a weapon is intelligent in its own right, that justifies it advancing "automatically" as it experiences, rather than being upgraded through spending money.

(As a balance measure, you can reduce WBL.)