Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Bone_Yard 12-31-07, 03:10 PM	Okay I've been pondering the subject of a light crossbow that wasw animated so it could reload itself without the charecters help. So this leades me to ask how would someone go about making the item any ideas that would make this easier please post 'em.
blade265 01-01-08, 12:15 AM	have a look at these, they may give you a good start repeating crossbow in the PHB Quick-loading in The Arm & Equipment Guide p97
celestialkin 01-01-08, 01:02 AM	Well, personally I would have a crossbow especially crafted with two wooden humanoid like hands with five fingers each sticking out from the sides of the weapon's body/shaft. Remember that this thing needs to be able load new arrows onto itself as well. Also, I would probably animate a quiver to follow the crossbow. I picture it kinda cartoon like. The little crossbow is hopping around firing and reloading itself from arrows it pulls out of it's little buddy who is tagging along behind him.
Sledgerosaur 01-01-08, 09:25 AM	or you could train a monkey to get style points :D
Talcon 01-01-08, 09:59 AM	take a look at the Arbalester in Magic of Ebberron (page 152) it not only load it self but shoots too.
Bone_Yard 01-01-08, 10:23 AM	well thank yall for the ideas
Tema69 01-01-08, 11:20 AM	In Heroes of Battle, there's the self-loading propriety. I guess it could apply to normal weapons as well as siege weapons. I'm pretty sure there's an unlimited ammo propriety, or an extradimensional space where an insame amount of ammo can be stored.
Bone_Yard 01-01-08, 01:38 PM	thats exactly what i was lookin for thanks :bounce:
mvincent 01-02-08, 02:17 PM	Okay I've been pondering the subject of a light crossbow that wasw animated so it could reload itself without the charecters help. So this leades me to ask how would someone go about making the item any ideas that would make this easier please post 'em.Using just the core rules: Animate object (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/animateObjects.htm) and permanency (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/permanency.htm). Example: A 16th level cleric (or a lower level one with prayer bead of karma, orange ioun stone, candle of invocation and/or death knell) could animate 16 crossbows with a single casting of animate object (16*6*10=960 gp), which can then be made permanent via a single casting of permanency (14*5*10+3000*5=15700gp) for an average price of about 1042 gp. However, I recommend creating them at caster level 20 (so a regular dispel magic cannot effect them) for a cost of 860 gp each. Note though that many DM's may feel that this is too inexpensive, or that an animated object wouldn't be smart enough to recock and load itself. As a compromise. I personally allow animated crossbows to continually recock themselves, but not reload... requiring the use of an animated repeating crossbow (and the associate exotic weapon proficiency) to pull off the 'John Woe' style of continually firing crossbows in each hand.
Dheran 01-02-08, 03:55 PM	In Heroes of Battle, there's the self-loading propriety. As described, this isn't exactly portable to non-siege equipment. But there's already a self-loading crossbow in Arms and Equipment Guide on page 116 (and picture on page 118). This is only hands-free as far as cocking the crossbow; you still need to add the bolt manually. From the pricing it looks like the self-loading property is a flat +10,000 gp. You could add quick loading (Magic Item Compendium, pages 41-42) and get a fully functional semi-automatic crossbow.