A couple of ideas have struck a chord with me about how to redo some of the weapon oriented ideas. In particular the massive decrease in power of primarily weapon using classes when they no longer have access to their higher level weapons. While I liked the idea of making damage be based on the level of training/expertise a character had in a particular weapon I didn't feel like it worked as the 'whole story' so-to-say. Overall, the idea is to decrease the reliance on the "magical" part of the leveling treadmill, a non-magical weapon will be quite effective and the magical portion will be a nice bonus rather than a requirement. This is an idea I came up with (and of course pulled from other suggestions on this forum, sorry for not referencing you, I read posts a couple days ago and can't remember the handles of those who I'm borrowing parts of this from).
Weapon effectiveness comes from 3 different aspects of the weapon and the character wielding the weapon: Skill level, quality and potency. In this suggestion the only part that double dips is the skill level.
Skill level determines the number of dice rolled to determine the overall damage of the weapon. (not sure if the strength mod should be multiplied as well, nor the potency, though I'm leaning towards yes for the strength mod and no for the potency damage)
Untrained weapon damage is equal the the weapon die -2 plus strength modifier damage. (So a longsword would do 1d8-2 + str mod damage)
Trained weapon damage is equal to the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 1d8 + str mod damage)
Expert weapon damage is equal to two times the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 2d8 + str mod damage)
Master weapon damage is equal to three times the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 3d8 + str mod damage)
Legendary weapon damage is equal to four times the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 4d8 + str mod damage)
The quality of the weapon determines the ease of use of the weapon being used, effectively adding a small bonus or penalty to the attack roll.
Poor (or crude) quality weapons levy a -1 penalty to the attack roll.
Normal quality weapons do not effect the attack roll.
Expert quality weapons grant a +1 bonus to attack rolls.
Master quality weapons grant a +2 bonus to attack rolls.
Legendary quality weapons grant a +3 bonus to attack rolls.
The potency of a weapon is a magical effect that increases the damage the weapon deals. (My intention with this is that it isn't entirely necessary for magic weapons to keep up with the AC of enemies, but the damage is potent enough to make up for the change)
Tier 1 +1 damage
Tier 2 +3 damage
Tier 3 +6 damage
Tier 4 +10 damage
Tier 5 +15 damage
Good ideas? Bad ideas? Too much? Too little? Too different?
