[ELH] Magical Weapons

[DerianCypher]

Okay, the epic weapon cost rules are thoroughly confusing to me.

What would a +5 Wrathfull Healing (+3) Holy (+2) Keen(+1)

weapon cost?
DC

 

[Crothian]

Since the total ability plus is greater then +10 you would use the ELH rules and it would coast a total of 2,420,000go.

 

[DerianCypher]

thankie much Crothian

 

[Archer]

Anyone else think the price jump for weapons is rather excessive? After all, another +1 is a pretty tiny increment. Obviously a +1 weapon with GMW cast on it with +9 worth of enhancers on it is so much more cost effective. In fact, all epic gear is so expensive you pretty much have to be level 30 to be able to afford any of it but long before that you can emulate epic items with spell effects. Epic items should be considered artifacts for the purposes of disjunction.

 

[Crothian]

Ya, it's a little ridiculus. I understand they had to draw the line somewhere, I just think the jump is a little excessive.

 

[Victim]

Yep, the costs go up way to fast. It's far more effective to take lots more non epic items in almost all cases. Fighting characters need Penetrate DR at level 21 anyway because there's no way they can afford to get +6 weapons with the difference between level 20 wealth and level 21 wealth.

 

[Orco42]

Yes it goes up too fast. That +900% to epic item cost really sucks because the treasure rate from encounters goes down by 67%.

However it is really not a problem to get by DR at any of those levels. For 20,000gp you can make any weapon ignore all DR and Hardness and you can crit on constructs (See Mace of Ruin).

 

[Dagger75]

As a DM getting ready to DM epic level and with 2 magic item making mad men in my group I am quite happey with the fast just in price

 

[ichabod]

I too think the huge jump in magic item prices is a pain, but I think I know why they did it.

First, what does WotC consider an appropriate item value for a given level? Looking at the NPC fighter, his main weapon generally costs the NPC equipment value for his level, subtracted from the NPC equipment value for the next level.

Let's take an average 20th level player character. He's got a BAB of +15, and a +5 weapon. That gives him an enhancement bonus of 1/3 his base attack bonus. For the past few levels, he's been able to purchase a +1 market modifier to his weapon every level. If this continues, by 30th level he'll have a BAB of +20 and a +15 weapon. That gives him an enhancement bonus of 3/4 his base attack bonus. Eventually, the weapon becomes more important than the character.

Now if we want to keep that 1/3 figure, we have two choices: decrease the ammount of money coming in or increase the cost of magic items. Decreasing the ammount of money makes very little sense. You're fighting more powerful creatures for less money? It is easier to rationalize increasing costs for epic items by saying they're harder to make because they are epic. IIRC, when you run the figures it turns out that an epic PC can buy a +1 enhancement bonus about every 6 levels. So after every 3 bumps to his BAB, he can get one bump to his weapon, maintaining the 1/3 figure.

Personally, I don't like this. As pointed out, you end up with epic characters with no epic items and a butt load of non-epic items. Why get a +8 to one stat when you can get a +6 to all of your stats for a third the cost? To me part of D&D is getting goodies. If you can't get new goodies that part of the game falls flat. I think it is evidence that the game as designed breaks down after a certain point. No big deal, these things happen. For my campaign I adjusted the item pricing so you still get lots of goodies, and put a level cap of 40 so that it doesn't get too far out of hand. After that you have to ascend. That give 20 normal levels, 20 epic levels, and 20 divine levels. It works for me. YMMV.

 

[Orco42]

Why get a +8 to one stat when you can get a +6 to all of your stats for a third the cost?

You are very right.

I just finished converting all of our 2e characters (they average level 42-43).

The first thing on everyone's shopping list is an item of +6 to all stats.

I think I will keep the cost of epic items the same but increase the amount of treasure from baddies to +30% per CR (like it is in non-epic levels).