Is there any reason we cannot have shield specific runes?

[thorin001]

Yes, potency runes are a non-starter but is there any reason that there cannot be property runes for shields? Energy resistance and fortification are obvious candidates for existing runes. The various sturdy shields could instead have sturdy runes of varying level and effectiveness. Some other potential runes are:
Arrow catching- Allows blocking of a missile weapon with a free action
Guarding- Allows you to grant the shield bonus to AC to an adjacent ally
Heraldic- Acts as a holy symbol
Radiant- Acts as a light spell of various levels

[Gloom]

I'm 100% behind this one. It feels somewhat awkward to me that Weapons and Armor can have all of these amazing properties and magic applied to them but Shields are pretty much just disposable ablative armor.

You can do some great things with them, and at super-high levels they can get to the point of being damn near indestructable.. with a single shield not actually able to be destroyed.

I'd love for Shields to change in a couple ways.

Using the Shield Block option, you should be able to shrug off damage equal to the hardness of the shield. Anything beyond that will get applied to you. In normal circumstances I don't think that this should dent your shield.

Sunder attacks against the Shield should allow it to be dented and broken.

Shield Potency Runes and Shield Property Runes should totally be a thing. I can see Potency adding more hardness to the shield and additional dents that it is able to withstand. For Property Runes I can see things like Dancing or Reflective.

All in all though, this is a minor gripe. With the way that they changed shields they at least made them pretty cheap compared to Weapons. So at least there is that!

[Vidmaster7]

How about a rune that absorbs a hit or more when the shield would take a dent?

OOo or a higher level self-repairing shield rune.

[thorin001]

Vidmaster7 wrote:

How about a rune that absorbs a hit or more when the shield would take a dent?

OOo or a higher level self-repairing shield rune.

For the first, that is what making a sturdy rune would effectively do. For the second, you use craft to repair your shield while the healer is using medicine on you. Also that would copy a fairly high level paladin class feat.

[Gaterie]

Why can't any item have runes? Including potency runes: cloak could grant +stealth, boots could grant +acrobatics, gloves could grant +thievery, wand could grand +to hit with spells... With no resonance cost nor investment, of course: weapons don't cost resonance.

[shroudb]

I'm on the opposite side really.

As much as I love runes mechanically, I loathe them narrative wise.

"let me slap this rune on a weapon"->magical weapon, "let me remove the rune from my axe and put it in my bow", "let me apply this rune over this, and when I get over 9000 runes it will be a great weapon"

All sound silly to me.

I mean, atm we're using magical stickers...

I would love runes, especially potency ones, to be completely remade (preferably substituted by level bonus showing weapon expertise)

[Vidmaster7]

Man magic runes on weapons is sooo fantasy. I think most people will be happy that they can be moved around as well.

[shroudb]

Vidmaster7 wrote:

Man magic runes on weapons is sooo fantasy. I think most people will be happy that they can be moved around as well.

Don't get me wrong, I love etched runic scripts on blades as much as the next geek.

But we don't have that. We literally have stickers that we can slap on and off things.

[Vidmaster7]

I haven't actually looked into the rules for moving runes around. What does it actually take?

I personally keep thinking of them as the Gems in Diablo that you can move around but in rune form Which I guess they had runes like that in Diablo 2 expansion with the druid,.

[shroudb]

Vidmaster7 wrote:

I haven't actually looked into the rules for moving runes around. What does it actually take?

I personally keep thinking of them as the Gems in Diablo that you can move around but in rune form Which I guess they had runes like that in Diablo 2 expansion with the druid,.

A craft check, 1 day, and 10% market price of the rune (I guess part of the sticker tears off when you pull it off :P)

The gem idea is interesting, but then again, a gem isn't a "rune".

Even with that, we're somehow assuming that all expert quality and higher equipment magically have "gem inserts" slots of the exact same shape and size "just in case".

Plus, upgrading potency, isn't just replacing a +1 "gem" with a +2. It's adding a +2 on top of the +1.

Add the property rune slots, and we're having legendary equips coming off with base 8 empty gem inserts...