Break my game: Indestructible sword at level 1

[jonesy]

I'm toying with the idea of offering an indestructible sword as a level 1 quest reward in our Al-Qadim campaign set for the summer.

What would you do if you were the player? If you wanted to abuse it as much as possible? I'm looking for the best and worst ideas you can come up with, scenarios where it could be especially useful, and also objections to why this might not be a good idea. Assume that the characters have already found out what the sword is.

 

[Janx]

you might need to clarify what indestructible means.

So I have a sword that can't be destroyed. Barring rust monsters, sunder or disintegrate spells, all the objects in the game are indestructible by lack of weapons getting destroyed.

How often are regular weapons destroyed? Not too often in my experience.

If you mean a sword made of adamantium, with implications that it cuts through anything like Wolvie's claws, that's a different factor.

Firstly, wolvie is allowed to cut through anything, despite the fact that it would have been impossible to sharpen is claws to fine enough edge.

And it seems improbable that he'd have the strength to force his claws through an object. A large/massive object offers physical resistance, if nothing else by virtue that it has weight and must be moved to the left/right of the blade for the blade to continue cutting through.

So it must be true of the Adamantium sword. it could probably scratch a big iron door. But it can't readily chop or stab through it. Because being sharp doesn't make the target malleable.

frankly, without knowing the meaningful qualities, I wouldn't lose sleep over the sword.

 

[jonesy]

Barring rust monsters, sunder or disintegrate spells..

No, no. I mean, indestructible.

 

[Janx]

No, no. I mean, indestructible.

you might be being vague on purpose. You do have that winky thing going on....

My point is, if your GM isn't making all the normal stuff get destroyed on a regular basis (or even infrequently), than the effect is that all items are indestructible.

I've never had a sword break or be destroyed. So why seek out your "indestructible" sword if my sword will never be proven to be destructible.

Maybe I'm ruining the fun of your goal. I see it as thwarting whatever munchkinism of an indestructible sword by applying my definition that an indestructible sword is one that simply can't be destroyed, and that since most other regular swords don't get destroyed all that often, it's not really that big a deal.

 

[jonesy]

..since most other regular swords don't get destroyed all that often, it's not really that big a deal.

I was trying to be vague because that is precisely the premise I am going to go after to hunt it down and kill it.

At least in this campaign.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I would be sundering crap left and right.

 

[Wycen]

I'd use it to thwart traps, especially crushy type traps. So the stone block is slowly lowering from the ceiling. Just wedge the sword up so when the block meets the point with the pommel on the ground - the trap stops. Yeah, getting the sword out would be problematic.

You could stir up lots of things, like acid, lava, spheres of annihilation (though the fact it didn't vaporize would possible conceal the true nature of the annilhilating sphere).

You could thrust it into wagon wheels or moving gears and watch the machines bust up.

I'm sure given time and inspiration we could come up with more ideas.

 

[Janx]

I would be sundering crap left and right.

some player would argue that you don't craft a dull sword, let alone an indestructible one. Therefore, it should be keen, if not have Sharpness or Vorpal on it.

and that since Sharpness chops of limbs and stuff, effectively modeled as a crit, that it should be able to crit on anything with limbs and stuff, not just humanoids with organs.

If braced with immovable rods, I reckon there's some way to force something else into it, as some kind of auto-hit effect. (immovable rods + sword in the path of a moving dragon. if it don't dodge, it must needs be punctured as the sword CANNOT move, bend or break.

use it for chopping firewood, as seen in Ladyhawke, which is a terrible way to misuse a sword.

giant-sized toothpick that never wears out or breaks, thereby shutting down the toothpicks for giants industry. Pine forest population increases year over year, resulting in crowding out other species due to the acidic nature of their needles.

Overall magic economy depletion as the wielder uses it to sunder all items used by foes. Especially bad in the hands of a Forsaker. they love wreckin stuff.

Since a sword leaves sword wounds on a victim. An indestructible sword would leave indestructible sword wounds. These wounds would thus be indestructible and thus never heal.

Much like the lift the Mjolnir scam ran on yokels, the owner of the sword might have a "sunder this sword, win a prize" scam. Thereby winning much gold and exceeding the GP by level recommendations.

 

[Mort]

No, no. I mean, indestructible.

I think what Janx was getting at is that "indestructible" in and of itself is not all that meaningful from a game point of view. Sure, the sword can't be sundered (which depending on campaign may or may not be a big deal), and you can do all kinds of gimmicks with it - use it as an unbreakable lever etc. But, as most games (or at least most campaigns) are not that nitpicky about weapon breakage, the sword won't necessarily be any better that other swords - at least for what a sword is supposed to be used for. So in that regard an indestructible sword won’t have that big an impact at all.
Now the sword being indestructible leads to all sorts of avenues for giving it an incredibly rich history (preferably bloody with lots of deaths both of its wielder and others) so that’s definitely something going for it. But again, mechanically, not necessarily a huge impact.
Which leads to the real point (as Janx mentioned) – does the sword being indestructible make it a better sword? Does it sunder better, does it penetrate damage resistance better, is it any better balanced than other swords, etc?
I think a good way to do this would be to make the sword scale with level (the more powerful the individual wielding it, the better the sword becomes etc.) Something like – at 1st level the sword is an indestructible magic sword (no bonus) at higher levels it’s a +1 sword then a +1 keen sword etc. all the way up to +5 vorpal sword (Kind of like weapons of legacy – without all of the wonky mechanics).

 

[Mort]

I would be sundering crap left and right.

While the sword itself could not be sundered, that does not necessarily (at least from rules or mechanical perspective) make it better at sundering other weapons. You could of course, do that - give it the properties of adamantine for the purpose of sundering. Or for the purpose of sundering - it's considered a +5 weapon (and thus could sunder even highly magical weapons, unlike most swords), but the fact that it is "indestructible" does not by itself mean anything on this regard.