The Magic Items that WotC cannot publish

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

My impression of the referenced article is that the author is basically daring fans to ask for a book of "minor artifacts," slated to appear near the end of the 4e development cycle. Thereafter, it will become obvious that certain shifts in design herald 5e's imminent arrival. 5e will turn back the dial, reject 4e's ruthless balance and assumptions.

Why do they need a 5E for that?

Breaking balance is easy. You don't need a new edition for that. If they want "minor artifacts" and create items, feats, powers or rituals with a "stop sign" on it, they can do it now.

 

[Tallifer]

Wait a minute, doesn't 4E have artifact rules of it own? Doesn't that fill the desire for "magical" magic items?

Quoted for truth. And yes it does.

 

[avin]

This pretty much shows why I have a problem with 4E.
WotC choose balance over fun. Its better to have boring but balanced things instead of interesting but hard/impossible to balance things.

Thats good for a tabletop wargame, but not for an RPG.

You play a Wizard, don't you?

I disagree. Balance is good for RPG. Balance is bad for my munchkin friends that need to exploit rules in order to have fun.

I don't wanna go back to the time the Fighter started reading a comic book everytime a combat started, because the caster single handed won it.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

It is always difficult to figure out what 4E is about. "It's all about fun, it is a tyranny of fun!" say some. "It's all about balance, sacrifcing all the fun" say others.

I suspect the error of the 4E designers was to give the impression they know what everyone likes. But they just know what many people like. And also what many people disliked.

It is the error of others to think that fun is ever not the goal of playing D&D.
There is no badwrongfun. But people are different and they have fun in different ways.

Balance is not detrimental to fun. It can be, sure. But it can also enable fun!

 

[Dice4Hire]

There is badwrongfun, which is mostly taking away the fun of others at the table.

 

[Dausuul]

It's not a very good proposition, even for a bunch of people who have no concern in the world except the consumption of cheap alcohol (and those sorts of people are not common in most fantasy mileu).

Actually, in medieval times ale and beer were important food sources, making up a substantial part of a peasant's diet.

 

[Nebulous]

And how would these "mini-artifacts" factor into the mechanical treasure parcel scheme? Personally i'm not a fan of parcels and only give them a fleeting glance. But i suspect a lot of DMs abide by them strictly, so throwing new items in would throw it askew. I imagine combining parcel slots into a single slot would solve that. Towards the end of 4e i do expect to see them testdriving 5e rules just like they did at the end of 3.5/4e. Unless, of course, the game gets shlupped off to another company!

 

[Stoat]

And how would these "mini-artifacts" factor into the mechanical treasure parcel scheme? Personally i'm not a fan of parcels and only give them a fleeting glance. But i suspect a lot of DMs abide by them strictly, so throwing new items in would throw it askew. I imagine combining parcel slots into a single slot would solve that. Towards the end of 4e i do expect to see them testdriving 5e rules just like they did at the end of 3.5/4e. Unless, of course, the game gets shlupped off to another company!

If WotC wanted to fit them into the treasure parcel scheme, all it would need to do would be to assign a level/gp value to them.

Or, it could go the same way it did with full-blown artifacts and just put them outside the system.

 

[Dausuul]

If WotC wanted to fit them into the treasure parcel scheme, all it would need to do would be to assign a level/gp value to them.

Or, it could go the same way it did with full-blown artifacts and just put them outside the system.

I would prefer to go with the latter option. If they're given level/gp values, that opens up a can of worms. Put them outside the regular system and just assign them power levels, so that DMs can balance what they hand out.

Here's a possibility: Give each item a "level adjustment." The idea would be that a PC with such an item is effectively X levels higher than a PC without. Then the DM can plan encounters accordingly.

 

[Stoat]

I would prefer to go with the latter option. If they're given level/gp values, that opens up a can of worms. Put them outside the regular system and just assign them power levels, so that DMs can balance what they hand out.

Here's a possibility: Give each item a "level adjustment." The idea would be that a PC with such an item is effectively X levels higher than a PC without. Then the DM can plan encounters accordingly.

I agree with your preference. Break the "sub-artifacts" up by tier, give some words of warning to the DM, and go to town.

I think the level adjustment idea would fail. Level encompasses too many things: Attack bonus, AC, NADs, Hit Points, Skills, etc., etc. Unless the level adjustment is very small (1-2 levels max) or the item in question gives bonuses to almost everything, the character will get out of whack very quickly.