D&D 5E Oct playtest magic items are legend---wait for it--ary!

[Jeff Carlsen]

Armor rarity also seems to make no sense. E.g. if magic leather is "uncommon", and you roll 1-7 for that, but displacer beast leather is "rare" and yet you can get it on the table on a percentile roll of 8-21. Does not compute.

Also, on the other end, plate is quote "very rare", rolled on 89-00, but splint is just "rare" and 82-88. If anything, it should be reversed. Resizing plate should cost less and / or be not do-able unless you're already very close to the original person's size.

I agree. If magic items are rare, powerful, and masterfully crafted, then they're going to tend to be the best type of armor in a given category. Chain and plate would be more common than leather or splint.

I did just notice one problem item: belts of giant strength. Considering that PC ability scores can't go above 20, having a magic item that can boost your Strength to 29 is absolutely ridiculous.

That's one of the things I love. That's how the Belt of Giant Strength used to work. It is supposed to be an amazing item that characters yearn for but probably never find. If they do, it's because the DM wants that to play out in the campaign.

I'm in love with these magic items. My only concern is that the eventual artwork will detract from the descriptions. The artists have their work cut out for them.

 

[FireLance]

I did just notice one problem item: belts of giant strength. Considering that PC ability scores can't go above 20, having a magic item that can boost your Strength to 29 is absolutely ridiculous.

Well, technically, if you read the fine print, THE Belt of Storm Giant Strength is an artifact, which means that only one of it is supposed to exist in your campaign. Even Belts of Fire Giant Strength (25) and Cloud Giant Strength (27) are supposed to be legendary and possibly unique.

Belts of Hill Giant Strength (Rare, Str 21) effectively grant a Strength modifier equal to the normal mortal maximum, and Belts of Stone Giant Strength or Frost Giant Strength (Very Rare, Str 23) allow you to exceed the normal limit by one point.

Of course, a DM is free to ignore the rarity rules and flood his campaign with multiple Belts of Storm Giant Strength, but a DM is also free to never introduce any of the giant strength belts into his campaign because he thinks they would unbalance it.

It seems to me that these are a number of ways to approach this:

1. Have magic items of only moderate power, so that the DM can give the PCs any items the players want without worrying that they are going to unbalance his game; or

2. Have magic items of great power, but leave it to the DM to decide how to manage this, possibly by: (a) giving the PCs whatever items the players want, and run the risk of unbalancing his game; (b) keeping the players ignorant of certain magic items so that they do not ask him for them; or (c) managing the players' expectations so that they understand that even though they may want their PCs to have certain items, the DM may or may not give them the chance to obtain them.

 

[thewok]

That's one of the things I love. That's how the Belt of Giant Strength used to work. It is supposed to be an amazing item that characters yearn for but probably never find. If they do, it's because the DM wants that to play out in the campaign.

I'm just worried what the introduction of these items will do to the bounded accuracy. I'm not a DM that uses a random table. I plant items for the group based on how they like to play and what I think they would enjoy using. So, I can certainly just say there are two versions of the giant belt and call it a day, with the 23-strength version being the artifact, and the 21-strength version as a Legendary.

I think I would rather the belts affect saving throws, carrying capacity, ability/skill checks, and so on, but leave bonuses to attack and damage squarely in the camp of weapons.

Of course, I haven't seen high level monsters yet. I really need to see the monsters before I can make a real judgement on these items. Right now, monsters are way too easy to hit anyway. Add in a 29 Strength with a +3 weapon, and you're pretty much just rolling to see if you crit miss. That would be fun for all of one encounter. But then it would get really boring.

I would like to see "suggested level" on these items for newer DMs. Like, Gauntlets of Ogre Power are cool for level 2 or 3 characters, and they're not going to break the math too much, as some people may even have 20 Strength at level 1. But, the Storm Giant belt is probably best saved until the last couple of levels of the progression, where the characters might be fighting things like Imix or Orcus.

 

[Raith5]

Interesting stuff. I love the flavour. But everything seems so dreadfully compressed. At level 3 +1 swords are around and at level 9 +3 vorpal swords are around. Cant we stretch this out and make things interesting for higher levels?

Also, what I do not understand, in playtest terms, is that most of the items are uncommon or above (more common items coming later it says on page 2) but the PCs only go up to level 5. Great, but how can we test them?

 

[Lanefan]

Side note not related to magic: 10 encounters per level gives WAY too fast of an advancement rate!

Put in perspective: most decent-size adventure modules have around 20-30 or more encounters not counting wandering monsters. That's 2-3 levels or more per adventure, hardly much use if I'm looking to run a 20+ adventure campaign!

Lan-"on topic, is this how 5e is disguising wealth-by-level?"-efan

 

[Truename]

Side note not related to magic: 10 encounters per level gives WAY too fast of an advancement rate!

It seems fast to me, too. But I do get the impression that WotC is trying to pick up the pace of the game quite a bit. Also, has anyone else noticed that level 10 feels like a very definite cap? I think we're going to see it be "name" level and a bunch of rules modules that only apply to high level, a la BECMI.

But I also think they're not sweating the numbers too much at this stage of the playtest, so we may just be overanalyzing placeholder math.

 

[Ultimatecalibur]

Side note not related to magic: 10 encounters per level gives WAY too fast of an advancement rate!

Put in perspective: most decent-size adventure modules have around 20-30 or more encounters not counting wandering monsters. That's 2-3 levels or more per adventure, hardly much use if I'm looking to run a 20+ adventure campaign!

Then either halve, third or quarter the xp gains or figure out how to expand level growth to level 60.

Plus I think 10 equal level normal encounters is the standard average with short adventures having 1 to 3 encounters and long adventures being up to around 15 encounters. It is only multi-level mega adventures that tend to have more than 20+ assumed encounters.

Lan-"on topic, is this how 5e is disguising wealth-by-level?"-efan

I'm not seeing wealth-by-level, just that the longer you work (adventure) the more junk (magic items) you collect.

 

[Falling Icicle]

I think I would rather the belts affect saving throws, carrying capacity, ability/skill checks, and so on, but leave bonuses to attack and damage squarely in the camp of weapons.

Yeah, the biggest problem with the belts is that they offer such an enormous bonus to hit and damage. The mightiest enchanted sword gives a +3 bonus, but you can put on this belt and get +5 to +11 (depending on what your Str score was before putting on the belt, assuming the typical range of 8-18 for PCs). That takes the entire bounded accuracy thing they're going for in this edition and kills it dead.

 

[Li Shenron]

(Moved from duplicate thread)

Overall I like pretty everything I read:

I like the fluffy but not overboard descriptions.
I like (A LOT) the optional random tables for adding minor effects and details.
I like the simple but sometimes open-ended mechanics.
I like the warning guidelines on buying and selling magic items, and price vagueness.
I like the recharge rules (although the rates could be slower).
I like the negative sides or some items, the cursed items, and the optional potion/scrolls mishaps rules.

Some room for improvement, for my tastes:

- Enhancement bonuses could be less common (about 2 every 3 weapons still have them, and more if you count the "mobile" bonuses).

- Also, I'd like more items to have situational / circumstance-based effects.

Things I'm still undecided about:

- Attunement rules, this is a GREAT concept, but the execution is currently not so interesting

- More freedom in "item slots", sounds OK but open to player's abuse in a magic-heavy campaign

 

[Li Shenron]

I did just notice one problem item: belts of giant strength. Considering that PC ability scores can't go above 20, having a magic item that can boost your Strength to 29 is absolutely ridiculous.

In fact it's listed as an artifact-level of rarity.

I think the whole point of this chapter's guidelines is that the DM is free to use these examples as she wishes, and is responsible for unwise choices. Depending on the campaign, this item can either be fine or totally wrong.