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D&D 5E Hand cannon?
- Thread starter abe ray
- Start date
Ancalagon
Dusty Dragon
... why? It took years to master the bow. Learning how to use a hand cannon took days at most.
Perhaps exotic in the sense that they are quite rare?
I'd need some more information. What, exactly, do you want this hand cannon to do? Are we talking about a standard pistol? If so, from what era? Single shot? Black powder? Do you want it to have the potential to out perform conventional D&D weapons, or is it just an interesting missile weapon?
For what it's worth, I had a PC discover an ancient artifact peacemaker in a campaign once. It did 1d10 damage, and on a roll of 10 you got to roll again, and again for every roll of 10 thereafter. Bullets were scarce and magical and required the blood of albino gnomes and could only be crafted by a particularly mean spirited alchemist.
Ancalagon
Dusty Dragon
You definitely are correct that the OP needs to define his "vision" of early firearms.
At one extreme, you have something like the UA artificer/gunner, where a gun is a very powerful, wondrous thing that is partially magical and only usable by a very trained expert.
On the other, you have... well, reality, where early firearms won favor because they could be mass produced and were easily trained. And while yes they did defeat armor better than most other weapons, they were also wildly inaccurate and had equivalent damage to other weapons. An arrow in the chest was just as bad as a bullet...
I'd probably have it take an action to use for a single shot (no extra attacks with other weapons), do 8d6 in a 120' line (like lightning bolt, but all bludgeoning/piercing), and take 2 actions to reload it. Also explodes on a natural 1 (8d6 piercing damage in 20' radius centered on the user).
Magical ammo could create a stinking cloud at the end of the line (or centered on the first creature hit in the line), or could explode with each creature it hits, causing smaller AOE's as it passes through, or could "bounce" allowing you to send it around corners.
abe ray
Explorer
Ancalagon
Dusty Dragon
You might want to look at this early weapon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_lance
And this one too https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_arrow as well as consult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huolongjing
And this one too https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_arrow as well as consult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huolongjing
Eltab
Lord of the Hidden Layer
The Sun Soul Monk (in SCAG) gets what amounts to Han Solo's blaster at L3, but can multi-shot if he spends ki. The damage die goes up with levels, same as his Martial Arts damage. You might be able to blend this in - or balance with it - usefully.
In general, a "hand cannon" should be a one-shot big BANG which also wipes out Stealth &c. (It might wipe out you too, with knockback or backblast - so not just everybody picks one up for use in ambushes.)
In general, a "hand cannon" should be a one-shot big BANG which also wipes out Stealth &c. (It might wipe out you too, with knockback or backblast - so not just everybody picks one up for use in ambushes.)
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