Throwing Munchkins?

[the_bruiser]

Greetings all. I've been DMing a campaign for two years now and we're around 18th level. Trust me, this is the lowest-powered 18th level campaign you've ever seen, or probably close to it - highest caster level is 8th and the highest attribute anybody has is a 22.

Anyway, because of the low-powered nature of the campaign, I've got to be careful that a new guy joining us isn't way-overpowered compared to the party. So he presented me two versions of his concept: (i) a fighter shuriken thrower who was trained early to hunt evil monks with their own weapons, and (ii) a monk shuriken thrower who just likes 'em. Basically, he wants to play a guy who's awesome at throwing stuff.

So I have two questions for everyone: (i) is the stuff below legal, and (ii) how's the balance? I can already tell you it's "too good" in my campaign, so I'm curious about its position in more "normal" powered campaigns.

The questions:
1) He's starting off with 50 +2 returning shuriken. I've looked this up, looks legal to do for equivalent cost of one normal weapon. But since shuriken count as 'ammunition' for this purpose, and usually 'ammunition' (like arrows) is destroyed on a hit, this seems squirrelly - all the benefits of ammo, but not the big problem?
2) He's stacking improved two-wpn fighting, rapid fire, and greater specialization with the fighter variant for +21/+21/+21/+16/+16/+11 for d2+10 each (inside 30 feet). For the monk variant he's adding flurry onto that, so the BAB is a few lower but he has two MORE attacks at the highest bonus. As far as I can tell this is legal.... right?
3) Manyshot. This looks like it should work with shuriken, right?
4) Anything else I'm missing? As far as I can tell, shuriken are the only weapon upon which you could put this much cheese... is that right, too? (Daggers / darts pay individually for magic, other ammunition breaks, etc.)

I apologize if this topic is already beaten to death. I don't have search. Speaking of which, how can I contribute? What's a good contribution, $10? $20? I'm a bit leary of online credit card transactions...any other way?

 

[Saeviomagy]

Greetings all. I've been DMing a campaign for two years now and we're around 18th level. Trust me, this is the lowest-powered 18th level campaign you've ever seen, or probably close to it - highest caster level is 8th and the highest attribute anybody has is a 22.

So far that's just low magic. Tell us a bit more, or we can't make any sort of decision.

What's the most damage you've seen a PC deal in a round? What's that characters normal level of damage?

What's the ac spread of the party look like?

what's the highest skill?

What's the highest number of hitpoints?

What would you consider a normal challenge for the party. Please give
1) A single big monster
2) A big monster and 4 lower level monsters
3) 8 lower level monsters

Please avoid anything with instant death attacks.

Anyway, because of the low-powered nature of the campaign, I've got to be careful that a new guy joining us isn't way-overpowered compared to the party. So he presented me two versions of his concept: (i) a fighter shuriken thrower who was trained early to hunt evil monks with their own weapons, and (ii) a monk shuriken thrower who just likes 'em. Basically, he wants to play a guy who's awesome at throwing stuff.

So I have two questions for everyone: (i) is the stuff below legal, and (ii) how's the balance? I can already tell you it's "too good" in my campaign, so I'm curious about its position in more "normal" powered campaigns.

The questions:
1) He's starting off with 50 +2 returning shuriken. I've looked this up, looks legal to do for equivalent cost of one normal weapon. But since shuriken count as 'ammunition' for this purpose, and usually 'ammunition' (like arrows) is destroyed on a hit, this seems squirrelly - all the benefits of ammo, but not the big problem?

All his ammunition will still be destroyed on a hit. Half of it will be destroyed on a miss. Them's the rules.

2) He's stacking improved two-wpn fighting, rapid fire, and greater specialization with the fighter variant for +21/+21/+21/+16/+16/+11 for d2+10 each (inside 30 feet). For the monk variant he's adding flurry onto that, so the BAB is a few lower but he has two MORE attacks at the highest bonus. As far as I can tell this is legal.... right?

Yeah, it's legal. How often do you expect him to hit?

3) Manyshot. This looks like it should work with shuriken, right?

Certainly not. It only works with arrows. If you want to bend it, sure, but that's not how it works as written.

4) Anything else I'm missing? As far as I can tell, shuriken are the only weapon upon which you could put this much cheese... is that right, too? (Daggers / darts pay individually for magic, other ammunition breaks, etc.)

Shuriken are treated as ammunition for what happens to them after they are thrown, so they break on a successful attack, and also 50% of misses.

The guy will be effective, but he's expending an expensive resource to be competetive.

Total possible damage in a round will be
154
with every hit as a crit.

That's pretty pathetic, especially since he just spent 2520gp on it. He's (a lot) better off using regular or just plain masterwork shuriken.

 

[Corlon]

I think that's the one thing I always hated about shuriken, they don't count as ammunition. I think every one of them is its own thrown weapon.

If it is ammunition, then it wouldn't be able to have returning on it...that whole thing just seems a bit fishy.

where does the +10 damage come from?

It doesn't seem too overpowered for an 18th level campaign, but if as you say it is really underpowered then I guess you'd just have to compare his combat abilities to the others...

 

[the_bruiser]

So far that's just low magic. Tell us a bit more, or we can't make any sort of decision.

What's the most damage you've seen a PC deal in a round? What's that characters normal level of damage?

What's the ac spread of the party look like?

what's the highest skill?

What's the highest number of hitpoints?

What would you consider a normal challenge for the party. Please give
1) A single big monster
2) A big monster and 4 lower level monsters
3) 8 lower level monsters

Please avoid anything with instant death attacks.

Well, to be honest, I'm more concerned about the rules than the balance... consider that 'flavor' text - I'm pretty aware that it's unbalanced in my campaign . The party's best AC is 27 and the best all-in attack bonus is +23. Most foes are below that. So trust me, this guy would be good.

But since you were kind enough to consider my question, I'll still respond a bit if you're interested:

Most damage dealt is hard; let's say the 3-sigma damage in a round is probably in the 40-50 range. Our best two fighters are +23 / d8+8 and +22 / d6+4.

AC spread is 21-27.

Highest HP 138.

Highest skill +24 (balance, by our rogue/swashbuckler/duelist).

Can't really help you with monsters, it's an almost exclusively human campaign. A very difficult encounter - the last one we had - was a troll with 8 levels of barbarian, a 12th level fighter, and an 18th level monk. None of those had more than 20,000 gp of gear.

All his ammunition will still be destroyed on a hit. Half of it will be destroyed on a miss. Them's the rules.

Yeah, it's legal. How often do you expect him to hit?

Certainly not. It only works with arrows. If you want to bend it, sure, but that's not how it works as written.

Shuriken are treated as ammunition for what happens to them after they are thrown, so they break on a successful attack, and also 50% of misses.

The guy will be effective, but he's expending an expensive resource to be competetive.

Total possible damage in a round will be
154
with every hit as a crit.

That's pretty pathetic, especially since he just spent 2520gp on it. He's (a lot) better off using regular or just plain masterwork shuriken.

So in your mind shuriken definitely 'break' on a hit. I'll look in the rules and make sure I can support this before I go back to him. I'll admit I was going on gut here; it doesn't SEEM like shuriken should snap in two, but rules is rules .

 

[CRGreathouse]

So in your mind shuriken definitely 'break' on a hit. I'll look in the rules and make sure I can support this before I go back to him. I'll admit I was going on gut here; it doesn't SEEM like shuriken should snap in two, but rules is rules .

If you don't want them to break on a hit, rule that they don't... but then have them priced as normal weapons, not as ammo. No fair double-dipping.

 

[Sandain]

Remember that you can throw 3 shuriken for each attack, so thats 7 attacks (with flurry) = 21 Shuriken. Max damage with crits is 224?

 

[Yig]

Remember that you can throw 3 shuriken for each attack, so thats 7 attacks (with flurry) = 21 Shuriken. Max damage with crits is 224?

That was removed in 3.5.

You can now only throw one shuriken per attack but you add your Str mod to the damage.