Question Regarding Magus Blackblade and Enchantment.

[Hiwamari]

Just want to be sure:

So you can spend your arcane pool to give your black blade an ability (I.E: Keen) but you can't upgrade it via money and crafting, yes?

I was wondering about this because if I can use my arcane pool to give my rapier black blade a keen ability, I might as well be a normal kensai instead of the Bladebound Kensai.

[Gisher]

No, you can't upgrade a Black Blade using money and crafting. All you get are the abilities on the chart.

You can add temporarily add abilities using spells, your Arcane Pool, or any of the usual ways.

I have a list of ways to add temporary special abilities if you are interested.

[kestral287]

Yeah, the inability to add any special abilities the old fashioned way, thus restricting you to only the abilities the Arcane Pool can add, is one of the biggest drawbacks to the archetype.

[Chess Pwn]

If you're in a low gold campaign it's awesome! If you're in a high gold campaign it's not so good.

[LazarX]

kestral287 wrote:

Yeah, the inability to add any special abilities the old fashioned way, thus restricting you to only the abilities the Arcane Pool can add, is one of the biggest drawbacks to the archetype.

Drawback? Having played a Bladebound for 10 levels of the PFS campaign, I love the blackblade for the money i've saved on weapons and for the inherent flexibiliy. The arcane pool covers most of what you need for a weapon, and with a bit more expenditure, covers those nasty incoporeal types rather nicely.

[kestral287]

LazarX wrote:

kestral287 wrote:

Yeah, the inability to add any special abilities the old fashioned way, thus restricting you to only the abilities the Arcane Pool can add, is one of the biggest drawbacks to the archetype.

Drawback? Having played a Bladebound for 10 levels of the PFS campaign, I love the blackblade for the money i've saved on weapons and for the inherent flexibiliy. The arcane pool covers most of what you need for a weapon, and with a bit more expenditure, covers those nasty incoporeal types rather nicely.

*Shrug* You're entitled to your opinion on that front.

I see not being able to use extremely powerful abilities like Spell-Storing and Heartseeker as a drawback. If you don't, cool.

[LazarX]

kestral287 wrote:

LazarX wrote:

kestral287 wrote:

Yeah, the inability to add any special abilities the old fashioned way, thus restricting you to only the abilities the Arcane Pool can add, is one of the biggest drawbacks to the archetype.

Drawback? Having played a Bladebound for 10 levels of the PFS campaign, I love the blackblade for the money i've saved on weapons and for the inherent flexibiliy. The arcane pool covers most of what you need for a weapon, and with a bit more expenditure, covers those nasty incoporeal types rather nicely.

*Shrug* You're entitled to your opinion on that front.

I see not being able to use extremely powerful abilities like Spell-Storing and Heartseeker as a drawback. If you don't, cool.

The problem with both spell-storing and heartseeker is that they lock you in. as again you're restricted to having +5/+5 worth of abilities and enhancement in your weapon. The beauty of a blackblade is that you can customise it each battle for what you need. Need ghost touch? you've got it, Keen, speed, and some energy damage, you're covered.

[kestral287]

Unless, of course, what you need is to penetrate concealment.

Or what you need is simply more firepower in a shorter span of time.

Or, to really hit the low-hanging fruit, what you need is a flat +4 to initiative that won't 'restrict' anything.

A Magus packing, say, a +2 Spell Storing Heartseeking rapier and the Bane Blade Arcana can still easily customize his weapon to suit the battlefield. There's nothing stopping him from putting Ghost Touch on his weapon, any more than there's something stopping the Bladebound Magus.

Now yes, if you construct a situation where the Magus absolutely needs Bane, Ghost Touch, and three different elements to be active on his weapon at the same time, then you're being 'restricted' by not having a black blade. And I'll congratulate you on creating a totally artificial situation and move on.

Using those two enhancements means you have room for another +3. Thus the only things left on the table are Dancing (useless for a Magus), Vorpal (useless for everybody), and Brilliant Energy (requires a Magus to go out of the way to get in the first place and is incredibly replaceable by other arcanas). If you use only one of those two, you still have access to an ability that the Black Blade can never access, but can access everything the Bladebound can save Vorpal-- which is, again, useless.