Returning Magic Weapons + Full Attack

Tony Vargas · Oct 28, 2017

I took considerable pains to build a 'knife thrower' character in 3e, cobbled together from fighter, ranger & rogue. The result was not exactly awesome, and it did end up carrying plenty of normal daggers in addition to a pair of returning daggers (made of different materials, natch), for exactly the reasons this thread goes into. You had to stand relatively still to make those full attacks, anyway, so that wasn't a big deal, and, if you did end up in melee, well, TWF/Finesse with those two magic daggers.

In 4e, there was nothing to the same character: a rogue (DEX for ranged & melee), a magic dagger (all magical thrown weapons returned, the moment the attack roll was resolved), a gonzo power like Blinding Barrage (up to 25 victims!), and off you go.

I don't recall if 5e has a generic throwing dagger in the same class as the Dwarven Thrower Zapp mentions, above, but that's all it would take. Well, a thrown-weapon fighting style would be nice. But finessing the daggers for melee isn't even a feat, and TWFing is straightforward...

CapnZapp · Oct 29, 2017

Tony Vargas said:
I don't recall if 5e has a generic throwing dagger in the same class as the Dwarven Thrower Zapp mentions, above, but that's all it would take. Well, a thrown-weapon fighting style would be nice. But finessing the daggers for melee isn't even a feat, and TWFing is straightforward...

Nope, the only magical throwing weapons are the javelin of lightning (and that works... differently) and the dwarven thrower. So all we can hope is that this indicates that the developers think like I do (as posted above) ☺

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CapnZapp · Oct 29, 2017

As for throwing style, I would be inclined to give an initiative bonus. (What else distinguishes thrown weapons from melee or ranged, but the ability to "surprise" your foe?)

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Random Bystander · Oct 29, 2017

CapnZapp said:
Looking at this from the year :2017:, I am slightly amused.

Of course "Returning" is only cumbersome and unfun if you can't use a single weapon for all your attacks in any given turn. Not to mention if you forgot you couldn't move, or if you no longer have a free hand. Cumbersome. Unfun.

Luckily, in 5th edition this was fixed, since the Dwarven Thrower sets a sensible precedent:

"Immediately after the attack, the weapon flies back to your hand."

You throw it to make an attack, and then you... wait for it - hold it again, ready for your next attack. You never have to catch it, you never have to keep track of from where you threw it, you never have to consider what each hand is holding, and you never have to have more than one weapon.

All this thread's questions simply evaporate. Talk about an improvement!

A generalized "returning" D&D magic item quality should be exactly like this, IMNSHO, regardless of edition.

To address your post - This seems part of a rather sad trend in 3.X supplements, where items, special abilities, and feats given to non-caster classes not only often lag behind the abilities of spells, they are "nerfed" compared to what a reasonable person would expect that ability to be able to do.

On the other hand, items, special abilities and feats given to casters are not only buffed beyond those given to the non-caster classes, they generally address a wider, if not much wider, range of, for lack of a better word, "stuff".

Weapon Focus, on the one hand, provides a +1 bonus to hit with one single weapon. Spell Focus, on the other hand, provides essentially a +2 bonus to hit with an entire school of spells.

~~Natural Spell and Eschew Material Components~~ Ignore Your Class's Only Real Weakness, Druid and Wizard Editions, are simply the injury on top of insult.

And the worst part is that there's a beautiful, balanced, and well-built system under this pile of mechanical garbage.

CapnZapp · Oct 29, 2017

Random Bystander said:
And the worst part is that there's a beautiful, balanced, and well-built system under this pile of mechanical garbage.

True, dat.

Still doesn't change that from over here, in 2017 using 5e, where the grass is simply greener, that beautiful system looks awfully similar to a pile of garbage...

I kid, I kid. And not just because I don't want to do edition-warring either; I do think:

True, dat.

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Tony Vargas · Oct 30, 2017

Random Bystander said:
To address your post - This seems part of a rather sad trend in 3.X supplements, where items, special abilities, and feats given to non-caster classes not only often lag behind the abilities of spells, they are "nerfed" compared to what a reasonable person would expect that ability to be able to do.

It's hardly unique to 3.x supplements.

CapnZapp said:
As for throwing style, I would be inclined to give an initiative bonus. (What else distinguishes thrown weapons from melee or ranged, but the ability to "surprise" your foe?)

Nice. Clear/obvious & simple. Incentivizes the realistic practice of walking around with a throwable weapon in-hand.

...mixing melee & ranged, I suppose, is the other obvious advantage of a thrown style. A realistic advantage of throwing a weapon is that you don't have to absorb any of the shock of impact, yourself - so thrown weapons usually hit harder than melee. Historically, thrown weapons like the francisca were used to good effect when combined with a charge, and the pilum was designed to sick in an enemy's shield and hamper it's use. So there's a variety of possibilities, from simple to hard-to-model, and generally-applicable to overly specific.

Random Bystander · Oct 30, 2017

Tony Vargas said:
It's hardly unique to 3.x supplements.

3.X was, however, by far the largest offender. In AD&D and earlier, fighters enjoyed rather good saving throws against all magic at higher levels; powerful spells nearly always had a corresponding cost; and a magic-user's entire spell list could not be prepared in a single hour, unless they were low-level. In 4e, all classes were (nearly) equal. In 5e, the gap is quite a bit smaller, especially with the introduction of the concentration requirement for many otherwise game-breaking spells.

Greenfield · Oct 30, 2017

In first edition our standard round was the "Four Ms", in order: Missile, Magic, Movement, Melee.

Movement and Melee could be reversed, in some cases, but Missile attacks went first. Not a true "initiative bonus", in that the numbers didn't change, but since they were resolved first it acted like one.

In 3.*, where the timing of damage in the round is more significant for spell casters, it makes sense to muddle that a bit. (In 1st ed any damage taken in the round, at all, fouled a spell, no dice roll. In 3.* it has to occur *while* the spell is being cast, either through AoO, Readied Action on the part of the attacker, or ongoing damage.)

Tony Vargas · Oct 30, 2017

Random Bystander said:
3.X was, however, by far the largest offender. In AD&D and earlier, fighters enjoyed rather good saving throws against all magic at higher levels; powerful spells nearly always had a corresponding cost; and a magic-user's entire spell list could not be prepared in a single hour, unless they were low-level.

Then again, a high-level magic-user had so many spells he rarely had to re-memorize all of them.

But those were the core rules, not the supplements, which included a lot of magic items and spells, over the years, but only one perk for the fighter - weapon specialization.

In 5e, the gap is quite a bit smaller, especially with the introduction of the concentration requirement for many otherwise game-breaking spells.

The gap in 5e is smaller than it was at it's most egregious - as you point out in 3.5 - but it has widened quite a bit since the last edition - even concentration, the one seemingly-non-trivial limitation left on 5e casters is on very few spells, and, unlike comparable sustain requirements in 4e, requires no action.

In 4e, all classes were (nearly) equal.

Initially, and the martial power books were even first in the supplement rotation, so by 2010 the fighter still edged out the wizard for class with the most powers.

Still, supplements gave away unique perks of weapon-use, like superior weapons, or the epic-level improved-crit feats, to implement users a lot more than vice-versa. And, Essentials saw wizard schools & sub-classes, and thus new spells, in every 'Heroes-of...' supplement, while the fighter got zip after the two cut-down daililess sub-classes in HotFL.

Random Bystander · Oct 30, 2017

Tony Vargas said:
Then again, a high-level magic-user had so many spells he rarely had to re-memorize all of them. But those were the core rules, not the supplements, which included a lot of magic items and spells, over the years, but only one perk for the fighter - weapon specialization. The gap in 5e is smaller than it was at it's most egregious - as you point out in 3.5 - but it has widened quite a bit since the last edition - even concentration, the one seemingly-non-trivial limitation left on 5e casters is on very few spells, and, unlike comparable sustain requirements in 4e, requires no action.

Initially, and the martial power books were even first in the supplement rotation, so by 2010 the fighter still edged out the wizard for class with the most powers.

Still, supplements gave away unique perks of weapon-use, like superior weapons, or the epic-level improved-crit feats, to implement users a lot more than vice-versa. And, Essentials saw wizard schools & sub-classes, and thus new spells, in every 'Heroes-of...' supplement, while the fighter got zip after the two cut-down daililess sub-classes in HotFL.

Some of that, I was not aware of. However, I am not contesting it.

I do have some familiarity with other editions, and that all of the editions have caster bias; just not the extent of it.

Thank you for the edification.

Returning Magic Weapons + Full Attack

Tony Vargas

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