D&D 5E A single +1 armor for a level 10 party

ad_hoc · Jan 31, 2018

Emirikol Prime said:
He clearly said he thought it wasn't enough for him. So I said ignore it.

Every table determines what is DnD for themselves.

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You said that magic items are part of D&D. The implication of your comment is that playing without having tons of magic items isn't D&D.

It is possible to think that magic items are part of D&D and not have a Christmas Tree of a PC.

Here are the OP's questions:

"Did I miss or miss-read something?

Are you playing with those guidelines? "

The OP is asking if this level of magic items checks out for 5e. The answer is that yes, it does (and for traditional D&D as well).

The OP isn't asking for permission. No one is going to call the D&D cops on the OP if they want to add more items to their game.

Emirikol Prime · Jan 31, 2018

ad_hoc said:
You said that magic items are part of D&D. The implication of your comment is that playing without having tons of magic items isn't D&D.

It is possible to think that magic items are part of D&D and not have a Christmas Tree of a PC.

Here are the OP's questions:

"Did I miss or miss-read something?

Are you playing with those guidelines? "

The OP is asking if this level of magic items checks out for 5e. The answer is that yes, it does (and for traditional D&D as well).

The OP isn't asking for permission. No one is going to call the D&D cops on the OP if they want to add more items to their game.

Then there's nothing to worry about. Not sure why you made a good thing of it to begin with.

No one said anything about a Christmas tree. I feel one item between a group of PC's is ludicrous and against what original DnD was as module included far more per adventure than that. If you think otherwise awesome. It's your table. And it's my table. No one is asking for permission at all.

A group of level.10 Charas should clearly have more than one item like that. It's ludicrous.

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Enevhar Aldarion · Jan 31, 2018

I do not have the book available right now, but I would think it is referring to one rare magic item per character in a party of 10th level characters. There is also an optional rule, in the DMG, for creating characters above 1st level and what kind of wealth and magic items they should have and I think that states similar for a character created at 10th level.

Quickleaf · Jan 31, 2018

lud said:
Looking at the table at the bottom of page 135 in Xanathar's we get the suggestion that a party of level 10 characters should have a total of 1 rare major item.

Since a +1 armor is a rare major item, this gives a total of 1 armor for the whole party. Or none if they have a a weapon +2, (or most rings, staffs or wands).

Did I miss or miss-read something?

Are you playing with those guidelines?

I agree that the DM should be a bit circumspect about awarding too much magic armor in particular.

However, these are the guidelines I generally use when determining each higher level PC's starting magic items:

1 common consumable every level from 1 to 5.
1 uncommon consumable every level from 6 to 10.
1 rare consumable every level from 11 to 15.
1 very rare consumable every level from 16 to 19.
1 legendary consumable at level 20.

1 uncommon permanent item at level 4, and another at level 7.
1 rare permanent item at level 10 and another at level 13.
1 very rare permanent item at level 16.
1 legendary permanent item at level 19.

[SBLOCK=What this means in treasure table rolls]One roll on Table A for every level from 1 to 5.
One roll on Table B for every level from 6 to 10.
One roll on Table C for every level from 11 to 15.
One roll on Table D for every level from 16 to 18.
One roll on Table E for levels 19 and 20.
One roll on Table F at level 4 and again at level 7.
One roll on Table G at level 10 and again at level 13.
One roll on Table H at level 16.
One roll on Table I at level 19.[/SBLOCK]

Read more: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showth...al-quot-Magic-Item-Distribution#ixzz4DWLNm6VT

For example, a 10th level PC might have 2 uncommon items and 1 rare item, and a couple potions/scrolls of common or uncommon rarity.

CTurbo · Jan 31, 2018

I am a very giving DM. My players usually find a lot of magic items. I especially love magic trinkets. I just almost never hand out magic armor. You'll get a +3 weapon from me before I give you some +1 armor.

delericho · Jan 31, 2018

CTurbo said:
I actually recommend NOT giving out any +1, +2, or +3 armor at all. I will never at any point give a magic shield.

Yep, this.

I can readily see giving out more rare items than the book suggests - the game seems to be mostly pretty forgiving about such things. But I would tend not to give out armour +X as treasure.

+X armour is some of the most powerful (and therefore most desirable), but also some of the least interesting, items in the game.

If you do want to give out magic armour, I think I'd be inclined to give out armour that has other special features, instead of a flat +X bonus to AC.

(All that said, the armour table in the PHB is one of the bits of the game that really bugs me. But that's another rant...)

Warmaster Horus · Jan 31, 2018

Suggestions are just that, suggestions. Play your game.

Jer · Jan 31, 2018

delericho said:
If you do want to give out magic armour, I think I'd be inclined to give out armour that has other special features, instead of a flat +X bonus to AC.

This. One of the things that I liked about 4th edition is that, because of how the math worked and how magic items were expected to be part of character progression, the bonuses on magic items were the least important feature about them. To make them special, t was much more important to come up with something interesting about the item because the mechanical bonus wasn't the draw. Now, that's old advice - I think I'd been reading advice about making magic items more interesting since the 80s - but I'd never been "forced" to put it into the game mechanically before 4th edition. Typically I'd follow that advice by giving the item some interesting narrative property, which it turns out isn't really the same - mechanical properties are always interesting to players and can lead to emergent narrative properties at the table once my players start interacting with them, but that isn't always the case with explicitly narrative properties (which they're as likely to forget about or ignore if it isn't directly relevant to what they think their story is at the moment as they are to pick up on and run with).

werecorpse · Jan 31, 2018

Would those of you who wouldn't give out magic armour also not give out a ring of protection? Same reason - bounded accuracy breaking? I am thinking of making the ring of protection not increase AC above 20 (saving throw bonus still applies) in a bit of a nod to the old AD&D limitation.

I am thinking that say attunable +1 chainmail of Fire resistance would be a decent item. It is a weaker overall AC but with some extra ability that makes it attractive. Do you give up your full plate and a point of AC for fire resistance? Or adamantine splint

Dragon hide armour has some nice abilities to be attractive to PC's and doesn't seem likely to break bounded accuracy.

If you want to give them magic full plate make it grant a bonus to saving throws not AC or give out a shield that allows the wielder to use their reaction to halve damage taken from an attack a couple of times a day. A Lion shield that doesn't add to AC. There's lots of stuff magic can do just keep an eye on bounded accuracy.

delericho · Jan 31, 2018

Jer said:
This. One of the things that I liked about 4th edition is that, because of how the math worked and how magic items were expected to be part of character progression, the bonuses on magic items were the least important feature about them. To make them special, t was much more important to come up with something interesting about the item because the mechanical bonus wasn't the draw.

Yep. My position for the last few years is that plain +X items simply don't exist - I'll never place a sword +1 as treasure, you can't purchase one, and you can't even craft one. What you can do is find/buy*/craft a sword +X of something else (so a sword +1 dragonbane, or whatever). But that "something else" isn't optional.

* I've put the asterisk on buy because it's edition dependent - I discourage but allow it in 3e; it somehow hasn't come up yet in 5e.

When placing treasure, I tend to err slightly on the generous side when it comes to magic weapons as a result - where the tables say "sword +1", the party will get a slightly more powerful item as a result. But that's fine, both because the first "something else" tends to be quite minor, but also because I'll then delay upgrades a bit to compensate - so a bit more power now, but not much more in the longer run.

In the specific case of armour in 5e, though, I'm gradually leaning towards removing the armours +X entirely.

D&D 5E A single +1 armor for a level 10 party

ad_hoc

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