D&D 5E Keen Weapons in 5th Edition?

[Hrothgar Rannúlfr]

Hi, everyone.

Although I've had the 5E DMG for a few weeks, now, I haven't had an opportunity to really dig into it, yet.

Did any magical weapons with the keen property make it into 5th edition? Something like the old 3X/PF keen weapons that score criticals on double the normal range or, at least, an improved range?

 

[Hrothgar Rannúlfr]

OK. Still searching. Haven't found it, yet, but...

One possible property of the sentient Moonblade is the ability to score a critical hit on a roll of 19 or 20.

So, it seems reasonable that the keen property for magic weapons exists, but might be extremely rare.

 

[agamerspov]

Magic weapons really harken back to 1st and 2nd edition. Weapons don't have "properties" like 3/3.5 anymore.
You could easily homebrew something, but they aren't figured into the math of the new rules.

 

[Hrothgar Rannúlfr]

Thank you, agamerspov.

That's kind of the idea... Figuring out the math of the new rules for conversion of 3X/PF stuff. I'm a real fan of the bounded accuracy underlying 5E and I don't want to break that math by importing things that are too powerful from previous editions. Realizing that without the 3X/PF crit confirmation roll, 3X/PF threat ranges are too powerful, I wanted to see how 5E handled keen weapons.

 

[agamerspov]

You could easily break the game introducing something like keen into this rules set, at least in my opinion. Since there are no feats or abilities associated with threat ranges it could get out of hand quickly.

 

[Hrothgar Rannúlfr]

For expanding the crit ranges, other than the moonblade, the closest things that I've found are the Fighter (Champion)'s Improved and Superior Critical abilities. This lends itself to the idea that the system can support threat ranges of 18-20, but it's so powerful, it ought to be really rare.

 

[Ahrimon]

There aren't threat ranges in 5e, but if you wanted to import a keen weapon I would simply increase the threat range by 1. So 20 becomes 19-20. If you're a Champion you would go from 19-20 to 18-20, etc. I would make it expensive though. That's a pretty nice weapon there.

Also, consider that this weapon steps on the toes of the Champion quite a bit in my opinion. One of the big draws of the champion is the expanded crit range. So by giving this out to someone else it could make a champion in the group wonder why they're picked their subclass. If there aren't any champions, then it really doesn't affect as much.

Rather than increasing the threat range though, perhaps you could consider taking a page from 4e and instead make keen weapons do more damage on a crit instead of increasing the crit range? Something like add the weapons damage die(dice) again when scoring a critical. So a keen longsword would be 3d8 on a critical instead of 2d8. Just a thought.

 

[Hrothgar Rannúlfr]

Thanks for the reply, Ahrimon. Much appreciated.

I get what you're saying about stepping on the toes of the Champion. I'll have to weigh that out.

As to increasing damage with a keen weapon, rather than crit range... I think that would be just as likely to step on the toes of the Barbarian's Brutal Critical ability. Of course, a barbarian with Brutal Critical would really step on the Champion's expanded crit range if the barbarian had a keen weapon (just as much as a Champion would step on the barbarian's toes if he somehow got a brutal weapon). But, there are already several magic weapons that do extra damage on a crit. So, maybe a keen weapon isn't really outside the bounds of the ruleset (at least not game-breakingly outside of it, anyway).

 

[Rocksome]

Brutal Critical isn't nearly as defining a feature for barbarians as Improved/Superior Critical are for Champions though.

 

[Reynard]

Another possibility is that you could have keen grant advantage for critting only. The way that would work is that you would make your normal attack (whatever your crit range) with advantage but with the "advantage die" noted ("the blue one!"). You only use the advantage die if it comes up a crit. Just a thought.

if that seems too weak, you could combine it with an increased threat range and/or an extra weapon damage dice on a crit.