Pricing for weapon unaffected by magic

[drnuncheon]

I'm looking for pricing advice and wording advice for creating a weapon that is unaffected by magic defenses. By that, I mean that it would ignore AC bonuses derived from magical sources: enhancement bonus of armor/shield, magical deflection/armor/shield/profane/sacred/natural armor bonuses. Dodge bonuses would still be in effect, as would dexterity bonuses (even if from magically augmented dexterity), mundane armor, natural armor, and shield bonuses.

So my first question is, is there an easier way to word that?
And second, about what enhancement-equivalent would such an ability be?

It's got a lot of similarities to brilliant energy (which ignores mundane armor and shield bonuses), so that's the starting point I'd use - however, brilliant energy has the drawback of not being able to affect unliving objects. Does this enhancement need a drawback to make it more reasonable? (possibly something like 'the blade may have no other magical properties, and loses its current nagical enhancement bonus'?)

Thanks for your input.

 

[ARandomGod]

The Black Sword.

Does this enhancement need a drawback to make it more reasonable? (possibly something like 'the blade may have no other magical properties, and loses its current magical enhancement bonus'?)

Thanks for your input.

I'd say price it the same as brilliant, and yes, add that penalty.
That way you're paying essentially one more than for brilliant (as you don't get the +1 bonus)... and make it the opposite OF brilliant, drawing light into itself. I'd go so far as to say that no magic whatsoever can effect it thereafter. This is also good and bad. You can't cast magic weapon or bless weapon on it. You also can't telekenetic it away... a sword trying to disarm it would lose it's magical enhancement for this purpose, it can't even be wished from your hands... Someone could still summon acid to throw on it, of course... and it couldn't be repaired with magic.
An interesting idea.

 

[jaker2003]

Why not just give the weapon a Disjunctive ability? You know, like the Spellgaunt's Disjunctive Bite (Su) [Monster Manual II, page 189]. Perhaps set it up so that other magic items struck by the weapon must succeed on a Will save (DC=10+this ability's CL) or loose their magical abilities (spells, intelligence, etc...). Creatures (that cast spells or use magic) that are struck must succeed on a Fort save (DC=10+this ability's CL) or be unable to cast spells or use their magical abilities for 1d4 rounds. Also any spell in effect on the struck creature is subject to a dispel magic effect as if the weapon had cast the spell of the same name.
As for deflection, sacred, and profane bonuses, if they are unique to the creature, they were part of the creature's concept, and shouldn't just be pushed aside to kill it easier. But, if the creature fails its Fort save, it would lose that bonus for 1d4 rounds, just the same .
As for hitting the creature in the first place, there's always the Power Attack feat. Or I suppose the above mentioned weapon ability could automatically sacrifice the bonus damage from the weapon's enhancement bonus to increase the bonus to the attack roll (+2 Longsword would have a +4 to attack roll and a +0 to damage instead of the normal +2 to attack roll and +2 to damage. just an idea

 

[drnuncheon]

Why not just give the weapon a Disjunctive ability?

Because, well, that's not what I'm looking for. I don't want it to destroy magic so much as ignore it. Hitting someone with it isn't going to remove their bull's strength, or even their mage armor - it'll just pass through the latter as if it wasn't there.

J

 

[kitsune9]

Such an item

If I was to price such an item that get through magical defenses, it would almost be assuredly a gamebreaker in my opinion, but we can run some comparisons to see what we should do. Brilliant energy at +4 bonus only gets through two defenses--armor and natural armor which if you take a fighter-type decked out in full AC on his own at 20th level, he has an AC of 46 (mithral full plate armor +5 [+13 armor bonus], tower shield +5 [+9 shield bonus], Dex 16 [+3 either through guantlets of Dex or other magic], ring of protection +5 [+5 deflection], amulet of nat armor +5 [+5 natural armor], ioun stone [+1 insight AC]). We could get this higher, but that would involve feats like Combat Expertise and maybe some spells, so let's just stick with what he can buy.

If you're running a game with a 20th level cap, brilliant energy alone would knock off 18 points off the AC, dropping the AC from 46 to 28; however with super weapon if it bypasses the magic only then it knocks off 21 points (or more if the Dex is aided by magic instead of being a natural 16). If you want it to include what brilliant energy does and get through all other magic bonuses then it knocks off at least 33 points so AC goes from 46 to 13 (assuming that Dex is natural). Any fighter whose fighting a creature that has that kind of weapon will get hit everytime unless the creature rolls a 1 (assuming the encounter is appropriate for the level of the party). If you put that kind of bonus in the hands of your player characters (particularly the fighter types), then they aren't going to miss unless they roll a 1 when fighting NPC's or creatures that rely on armor and magic. Monsters that have huge natural armor bonuses for their thick hides will last longer than a round or two in combat, but they are very few and far in between. The others will go down in the first round of combat.

So, how would you price this item then? I wouldn't, I would make this an one-of-a-kind artifact (this is definitely a kind of weapon nations would go to war over), but if I had to price this item, then obviously it would be a +5 bonus. If we wanted to go into an epic campaign, we could offer a range of dynamics to make this attainable weapon for epic campaigns, and my suggestion would be a minimum of +8 bonus or even more since it really does a better job than what brilliant energy does.

The other thing is that playing field would no longer be slightly in the monsters favor and would heavily swing in the PC's favor once they have this kind of weapon on hand. Such a case would be that the encounters then should be dramatically scaled higher for the PC's than they would normally have otherwise (if you got a weapon named god-killer, you should be fighting gods, not kobolds ).

Well, just wanted to offer a comparison study if such an item was around. Good luck with your gaming!

 

[Geoff Watson]

Brilliant Energy only bypasses Armour bonuses, not Natural Armour. It also has a disadvantage that certain creature types are immune.

I don't think I'd allow it, except as a one-off artifact.

Geoff.

 

[jaker2003]

So your wanting an 'anti-magic' magic weapon?

 

[Andre]

If I was to price such an item that get through magical defenses, it would almost be assuredly a gamebreaker...(snip)

I agree. Even if the item only negated one type of magic bonus, it would be potentially very powerful. As is, it's a complete mage-killer, monk-killer, killer of anything that avoids regular armor. (Interestingly enough, it's not terribly powerful at low levels - but at high levels...watch out!)

The only balancing factors I can think of are:

1. Only a perfectly dull weapon can be so "enhanced". Thus the weapon, no matter what it's shape, does only 1 point of damage plus any applicable bonuses (Strength, Sneak Attack, etc). Also, the weapon can have no other enhancements or abilities. The weapon can never crit.

OR

2. The weapon has no effect on any creature with any form of armor other than magical. In effect, it's effective only against monks, wizards, and such - and even then, that assumes the target doesn't run around in a mithril chain shirt or some such (and some casters do).

BTW - have you considered how difficult it would be to calculate AC's vs this weapon? We already have AC, Flat-footed AC, and Touch AC. You would need to keep track of yet another type: Non-Magic AC. Is it really worth the trouble?

 

[ARandomGod]

I agree. Even if the item only negated one type of magic bonus, it would be potentially very powerful. As is, it's a complete mage-killer, monk-killer, killer of anything that avoids regular armor. (Interestingly enough, it's not terribly powerful at low levels - but at high levels...watch out!)

The only balancing factors I can think of are:

1. Only a perfectly dull weapon can be so "enhanced". Thus the weapon, no matter what it's shape, does only 1 point of damage plus any applicable bonuses (Strength, Sneak Attack, etc). Also, the weapon can have no other enhancements or abilities. The weapon can never crit.

OR

2. The weapon has no effect on any creature with any form of armor other than magical. In effect, it's effective only against monks, wizards, and such - and even then, that assumes the target doesn't run around in a mithril chain shirt or some such (and some casters do).

BTW - have you considered how difficult it would be to calculate AC's vs this weapon? We already have AC, Flat-footed AC, and Touch AC. You would need to keep track of yet another type: Non-Magic AC. Is it really worth the trouble?

Meh. I say it evens the playing field along the same lines as an antimagic shell, but with a lesser effect... IE it only antimagics defence bonuses. And it's own weapon bonuses. It couldn't hurt a dragon at all, really, what with that natural armor. And it couldn't have a magical attack bonus to compensate...

That's actually a good place to start looking. Look at how much a sword with a permanent antimagic field around it would cost... and then lower the radius of the antimagic field to, say one foot around the sword, and lower the cost to create the sword appropriately.

No need to go with the magic weapon bonus rules, at it won't be a magic weapon at all, but an antimagic weapon.

PS, I like the thought of it dulling the weapon in question.. Not completely to 1, that's silly, a quarterstaff is completely dull and does more than one. But say it makes the weapon slightly duller and slightly less "hard", so that it gives an effect of -2 (or minus whatever) to damage, and maybe a minus to hit as well.

GM: "You see a blackish, slightly dull and pitted sword"

Player "Does it look finely crafted?"

GM: "No.. as I said, it looks rather dull and pitted. Not well balanced either. And it's not a 'light absorbing' black. It's more a dark grey, really."

Player: "Hrmm... I detect magic"

GM: "Nope, no magic at all"

Snicker. An extremely powerful magic item, and they left it there!

 

[jaker2003]

As is, it's a complete mage-killer, monk-killer, killer of anything that avoids regular armor.

A Monk's bonus to AC isn't magical, it represents their seeing the attack coming so they can get out of the way.