How to enforce low magic item count

[Kyramus]

try bonded weapon made by a psion.
When not touched or on the owner, it's just a pile of gello.

 

[BigFreekinGoblinoid]

To further explore a previously mentioned idea that may be a PARTIAL answer to your problem:

Even if you do not want to assign an alignment to an item, it could till be styled so that no "good" person would ever wear it! ( or buy it )

The magic armor is black with bloody spikes - The shield has a demonic facade - the hilt of the sword is the symbol of an evil god - etc...

If a character chose to keep/use such an item, you could have them encounter a great frequency of negative/failed charisma related checks that could cause some major problems

 

[Acmite]

There was an article in Dragon about "leveling" magic items that gradually improve as the characters went up levels. I think the bonuses increased when you spent XP on the item, with some limits.

Can anyone remember what issue this was?

It's the issue with Oriental Adventures, I think.

I think this is the best way to accomplish what you're after, Infinite Monkey.

You have two basic options when you approach levelled items: 1. The PC is activating the inherent abilities of the item through continued contact and bonding (ie: XP expenditure)
2. The weapon is "living" and develops powers in response to the characters actions and desires. Example: If teh character has suffered greatly at teh hands of fire-creatures, teh weapon might manifest a Bane quality that targets those creatures, or if the character is defense oriented, teh weapon may develop the defending enhancement, etc.

There are different ways to "trigger" the effects once enough XP has been inputed. These are all noted in a sidebar and include such things as: requiring a specific bit of information or activation word, undergoing a ritual of some sort, killing particular creature, etc.

One of my characters just recently recovered his dead father's sword and is slowly trying to figure out how it flamed for his father, but not for him. I think it adds a lot of roleplaying to a simple item, and it helps keep magic special and unique.

 

[Broken Fang]

Maybe we could get a list of items started.

Item or Weapon Name
Background/History
Abilities

Then we could all have a list of items and weapons to pull from when our brains are not working.

 

[Infinite Monkey@Work]

Thanks for all your replies. Some clarifications:
1) The clerics hammer 'Mercy' has the merciful ability, which means that it does +1d6 damage, but all damage is subdual. The power can be turned off, turning the damage into normal damage.

2) I'm not wanting to enforce 'low-magic' so much as 'low-mook-magic'. That is, the PCs and major NPCs have the usual recommended amounts of magical stuff, but Joe Badguy doesn't, which means that NPC badguys (as opposed to monster badguys) are weaker than their level would indicate.

Heres a list of the magic items the PCs are getting/finding out about next session:

Cleric has Mercy, the warhammer once owned by a warmaster of the (only good) church, which has a philosophy of not killing certain evil races. (Merciful, plus some kind of minor healing power equivalent to +1)

Duelist finds out that her inherited rapier was blessed by its original owner on her death bed to bring firey doom to the enemies of her bloodline (flaming) and that her pistol once slew a great orc chieftain in one shot (keen).

Monk A finds out that his short sword was once used to kill an evil fire elemental lord. The person who did so chanelled all his icy hatred of the creature into his blade, giving up his life force to do so, but empowering the blade with an icy touch. (Icy burst)

Monk B finds out something about his longsword (don't know what yet). Hes rather grumpy and antisocial and walks a fine line of becoming evil (either because he was cursed or because the player is grumpy, I'm not sure which)

Barbarian finds out that her longbow has thundering (don't know why yet).

BTW, any ideas for the unknown parts of the list above?

 

[Larcen]

... In the D&D game I'm running, all items will have an alignment and will drain sanity from people who use them unless the alignment is the same as the item. (The players don't know this, yet.) It's crude, but I fully expect it to be effective.
...

I have been playing around with the idea of aligned magic items too. It makes sense too since during the creation process life essence (XPs) are transferred into them. For example, if a Lawful Evil person put his XPs into an item, it follows that it should forevermore be tainted Lawful Evil too. Only an LE character will get it's full benefits. For anyone one step away, alignment-wise, it's just an ordinary item. For anyone two steps away, it functions in REVERSE. A +2 sword would work like a -2 for them. If you do this though, I would give anyone handling the item some kind of WIS based detection roll to see if they get an unnatural tingle or something everytime they use it. Good aligned characters would certainly do Detect Evil on stuff and destroy them when found, as they should.

...
Likewise, Byzantine level, skill or feat requirements could be placed on items -- and don't tell the players! ("Unbeknownst to Rolf the Barbarian, to use the Savage Mace of Withnow requires a person to be able to cast 3rd level divine spells and Knowledge (Religion) with 5+ ranks," or what have you).

This is a cool idea too. But how much of these requirements will Identify reveal?

To further explore a previously mentioned idea that may be a PARTIAL answer to your problem:

Even if you do not want to assign an alignment to an item, it could till be styled so that no "good" person would ever wear it! ( or buy it )

The magic armor is black with bloody spikes - The shield has a demonic facade - the hilt of the sword is the symbol of an evil god - etc...

If a character chose to keep/use such an item, you could have them encounter a great frequency of negative/failed charisma related checks that could cause some major problems

Wow. What a simple, non-magical, roleplaying solution this is. Good job, I like it!

...
One of my characters just recently recovered his dead father's sword and is slowly trying to figure out how it flamed for his father, but not for him. I think it adds a lot of roleplaying to a simple item, and it helps keep magic special and unique.

Another cool, story-like idea. Someone should put all these ideas together in a book called "Your Magic Item and You" or something.

... Barbarian finds out that her longbow has thundering (don't know why yet).

BTW, any ideas for the unknown parts of the list above?

Here's one: The Barbarian's longbow could have been made from the split branch of a sacred tree that was mysteriously struck by lightning on a clear day.