How come there are no masterwork weapons?

[Triangleman27]

I've been considering to houserule weapons made of magical materials that have minimal enhancement bonuses of +4 and +6. Incremental bonuses from the masterwork materials would be +1 since you always add an ability modifier to the attack roll (just like you add Dex or Int modifiers to AC with light armor).

However, my grasp of 4e's technical nuances are admittedly wanting when it comes to making houserules so I've been wondering if WotC had a good reason for not including masterwork weapons. Would high-level PCs already have access to an array of stacked attack roll bonuses that masterwork weapons would only be unbalancing? On the other hand, they seem to already have no shortage of Defense bonuses aside from masterwork armor.

 

[Prism]

Masterwork armour serves a specific purpose to balance light armour wearers with increasing dex/int bonus's and heavy armour wearers who don't get this benefit. I guess the +1 and +2 bonus for light armour is so they aren't missing out or maybe so they don't have to push what is often their secondary stat quite as much

As you pointed out weapons don't have this balance issue. However if you feel you want to give an extra +1 or +2 to hit with weapons then I'm sure the system will cope although fights will be a bit easier/quicker. Also, you will need to decide what to do about implement users as they might feel left out unless you have m/w implements too

Some of the weapons in adventurers vault have the old masterwork properties such as adamantine and cold iron. These however don't stack with other magic properties

 

[CapnZapp]

Some of the weapons in adventurers vault have the old masterwork properties such as adamantine and cold iron. These however don't stack with other magic properties

A clarification would be to continue "because they are in themselves magic properties".

That is, just as you can have a Longsword of Flaming +2, you can have a Longsword of Cold Iron +2.

Of course, this beggars the question if there can be an Iron Longsword of Cold Flames +2

 

[Nail]

... so I've been wondering if WotC had a good reason for not including masterwork weapons.

Yep.

Currently, the "numbers" (both attacks and defences) are pretty well-balanced, though-out all levels. Giving away additional bonuses to hit would throw this off. For example, you'll notice that there aren't any feats which give a constant +1 to attack rols.

In addition, the scale of when PCs get +1 weapons has changed.

In 3.xe, Masterwork gave a +1 enhancement bonus to hit (which didn't stack with the enhancement bonus from magical weapons). Since masterwork was cheaper than a +1 magical weapon, lower level PCs could get that +1 to attack. So masterwork weapons were a sort of a "poor man's" magic weapon. Later (by level 4 or so) you could ditch the non-magical masterwork and go for the magic weapon.

Would high-level PCs already have access to an array of stacked attack roll bonuses that masterwork weapons would only be unbalancing?

Yes, it might unbalance the game; no, high-level PCs don't have access to an array of stacked attack roll bonuses. Stacking doesn't play the same role in 4e that it did in 3.xe.

 

[Prism]

AOf course, this beggars the question if there can be an Iron Longsword of Cold Flames +2

You know I'm with you on this as long as there is DM approval per item. The minor artifacts in FR aren't really artifacts - just powerful items that can't automatically be made with the standard ritual. However, if a player has a great mutli power item idea or the DM wants to put one into the hands of an enemy then why not

So in this case a +2 cold iron cold flaming sword sounds like no problem

 

[Aloïsius]

I think a house rule for special material/masterwork weapon can been done exactly the same way as it exists for armor... special material/masterwork just don't stack with magic enhancement bonus : it explains the magic enhancement bonus. Exemple : a +1 sword is masterwork. A +2 sword is mithral. A +3 sword is adamantium... And a +6 sword should be godforged with astral iron, or something like that.

Now, it means that the enchant ritual can't enhance the "+" of a weapon...

 

[Triangleman27]

I think a house rule for special material/masterwork weapon can been done exactly the same way as it exists for armor... special material/masterwork just don't stack with magic enhancement bonus

But it does stack with armor.

"Magic armor adds an enhancement bonus to AC, so a
set of +5 black iron dragonscale adds a total of 15 to the
wearer’s Armor Class (10 from the scale armor and 5
from the enhancement bonus)." -PHB page 227

 

[CapnZapp]

You know I'm with you on this as long as there is DM approval per item. The minor artifacts in FR aren't really artifacts - just powerful items that can't automatically be made with the standard ritual. However, if a player has a great mutli power item idea or the DM wants to put one into the hands of an enemy then why not

So in this case a +2 cold iron cold flaming sword sounds like no problem

Cheers!

(I just couldn't resist replying in a way that allowed me to sneak in the link

 

[CapnZapp]

I think a house rule for special material/masterwork weapon can been done exactly the same way as it exists for armor... special material/masterwork just don't stack with magic enhancement bonus : it explains the magic enhancement bonus. Exemple : a +1 sword is masterwork. A +2 sword is mithral. A +3 sword is adamantium... And a +6 sword should be godforged with astral iron, or something like that.

Now, it means that the enchant ritual can't enhance the "+" of a weapon...

In other words, pure reskinning. This shouldn't be problematic at all.

I'm slightly annoyed on how Wizards have introduced masterwork armors. Initially, it's kind of hard to realize there's two completely separate factors at work here: one is to provide a reason why platemail (say) gives a higher AC bonus at high levels than at low levels, while the other is the more easily digestible "different materials provide different (minor) properties".

What would have been much more useful is to introduce one general name for each layer of masterwork, so that all (generic) +4 masterwork armor is called one thing, all (generic) +6 masterwork armor is called something else.

Then those masterwork materials that adds little things on top of the AC bonuses could have their fanciful names all they want...

Perhaps I'll start up a new thread and do exactly that.

 

[77IM]

Masterwork armor fulfills a specific design goal of keeping AC in line with attacks at high levels. It occurs to me that they could have done something similar with Masterwork weapons.

Have you noticed that many at-will powers deal an extra [W] at 21st level? Instead, the 4e rules could have said:

"Masterwork Weapons: A weapon of 21st level or higher deals an additional [W] of damage when used to make an attack with an at-will power or basic attack."

(Or, they could have the extra [W] apply to all attacks, and decrease the [W] of many epic-level powers by 1. This would also increase the utility of many paragon-level powers because they would get boosted by 1[W] as well.)

(A problem with this approach is masterwork implements. Implement powers don't deal [W] damage, they just have dice. Adding "a die" is confusing for powers like magic missile that deal 2d4 damage -- is "a die" equal to 1d4 or 2d4?)

Maybe they'll do it this way for 5e, which is due out in 2012.

-- 77IM