Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Dakota 05-29-04, 07:58 AM	Hi, I've been mulling over a few things for my up-and-coming campaign and started to do some work on the magic items section. Like for instance, mainly because I don't like them and I don't think I've seen an anime with them Animated Shields are going to have a cost linked to their Enhancement bonus (need to work on the formula) as I think they are too nails and it makes the sword and shield style pointless if a guy with a big double handed weapon can use a shield like that, however, as its core I don't want to ban it, and I know one or two of my players will want one if they take martial classes. The next thing to be changed is Deathward armour is having its Enhancement bonus increased to at least a +4 (maybe +5) as I have seen what it does - neutralises a lot of the wizard spells and like in our party, it neutralises the Cleric's inflict and Harm spells (always nice for evil or neutral Clerics). In fact I may still ban it and allow only Clerics to have access to it. Now onto the enhancement that I want for weapons in my campaign. I know of this in other games systems and I tried to write it up for D&D, so give me your views on this. Name to be announced at a later date when the brain is up to full speed. This enhancement animates the weapon and gives it minor intelligence to allow it to find the weak spots of its owner's enemies. As a result this weapon will always hit no matter what the defence of the target, and if its target has a way of making the attack miss through a percentage effect (for example displacement) then this weapon grants its owner a re-roll of the dice to try to confirm a hit and will automatically bypass illusions such as mirror image. However, because the sword is finding the spaces it is in control of the wielders limbs during the combat and as a result the owner of the weapon may not execute any of the following actions - add Power Attack to the hits, use Combat Expertise or fight defensively. However, if the wielder wishes to make a total defence then the weapon will respond and will shield its owner to the best of its abilities granting an additional +2 bonus to AC. I'm also tempted to make it that this blade, even when sheated, or carried on the characters back or whatever they do with it will look for a combat, but I doubt it as I'd have to make sure that this wasn't too controlling as I don't want my characters attacking random NPCs. So any idea from people on what the bonus should be for this ability as I'm thinking a +5. That and if anyone has any suggestions then I'm all for them.
Seeker95 05-29-04, 09:00 AM	You don't need a new weapon property to have an intelligent, dancing, always hit weapon. The item is redundant in the first two parts and broken in the third. Intelligent items is already covered in the DMG, pages 268-272. Animated is covered by dancing on page 224 of the same text. An always hit item is broken, period. Anime is occasionally a good source for concepts, but rarely for mechanics.
Addi83 05-29-04, 09:09 AM	An always hit weapon? Even if it was a +8 enhancement it would be grossly broken. No weapon hits every time, every player everywhere would want it. If you feel this is neccessary for a game, try making it a Major Artifact. That's the only way it could be even remotely playable. Couldn't you just make a sword that's intelligent and moves on it's own and maybe has the defensive property, and can cast true strike 2/day as a free action, and maybe true seeing 1/day. Still very powerful, maybe even broken, but not nearly so much as what you're proposing.
tarkin 05-29-04, 12:33 PM	You want an always hitting weapon? Fine. Make it do 1d4+1 damage, unaffected by strength, can not critical, can not be used for sneak attacks, can not be affected by Power Attack (Yeah like that would be fair), or any other damage increasing thing. In other words, Magic Missile.
Dakota 05-29-04, 02:23 PM	Oops, I think that this morning was a case of major brain meltdown as I forgot some other things about the weapon which are there to balance it out. Right you still need to roll the dice when you attack. If you hit the critical threat range of the weapon then you automatically score a critical hit. However, don't roll low with this weapon. If you roll a natural 1 to hit then your movement interacts with the weapon in a catastrophic reaction and you take the damage you were about to deal criticaled by the weapons critical modifier, which ignores any class damage reduction and any concealment that you have. Also as a result of this you may not use the sword until you remove it from your body which takes a number of rounds equal to the enhancement bonus of the weapon. While the weapon is stuck in the wielder's body he takes d6 x weapon's enhancement bonus points of damage every turn. On a natural roll of a 2-5(6) the wielder's limbs have again interacted badly, but not to such an extent that the blade is disrupted entirely. As a result the wielder of the weapon and the target both take the same damage. Again this ignores all damage reduction and concealment of the wielder. Right now that you know of this anyone's ideas on what the weapon enhancement is like now?
Dakota 05-29-04, 02:29 PM	before I forget. I'm thinking that the spells that the wizards need to create this item are true seeing, true strike, animate object and one or two others once I properly sit through the book. that and I'm not too worried about most people in my campaign getting a hold of it as the shops in my world will be very picky and variable, with about the only place that can order items being the chain of gnome shops around the world. so my only worry would be the party wizard making a whole load of these for the party, but given that I know what the attitude of the character is supposed to be I doubt it very much.