I come bearing gifts

[Quip]

Hello all, I am a long time lurker who has decided to come out of hiding and say hi and share some of my work.

So... hi!

Well now that that's done with, onto the good stuff!

Today I give you two new weapons... well not exactly new, just have a look:

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Dire Longsword (Exotic)
Damage 1d8, Crit 20/x4, Melee, Slashing, Medium

Dire Greatsword (Exotic)
Damage 2d6, Crit 20/x4, Melee, Slashing, Large

A dire sword is one that exchanges ease of use and finesse for the potential of dealing devastating strikes. They are often outfitted with numerous edges, spikes, or jutting protrusions - all designed to tear flesh (and almost anything else) to pieces. Some also have a other unusual shapes or properties, such as an oversized blade tip or an internal tube of flowing mercury.
These weapons (and their related feats) replace and supercede those of their similarly sized mercurial weapons.

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The purpose here is twofold: to have a somewhat more practical alternative to the mercurial weapons while not removing them completely, and to have warriors with those really cool freaky swords that you see in fantasy art sometimes.

My favorite thing about this is that you can describe these kinds of swords in pretty much any way imaginable. I think its great to leave as much as possible to the imagination...

So what do you think? Would anyone bother to use this variant? What kind of swords would you have?

 

[LightPhoenix]

Dire Longsword (Exotic)
Damage 1d8, Crit 20/x4, Melee, Slashing, Medium

Dire Greatsword (Exotic)
Damage 2d6, Crit 20/x4, Melee, Slashing, Large

A dire sword is one that exchanges ease of use and finesse for the potential of dealing devastating strikes. They are often outfitted with numerous edges, spikes, or jutting protrusions - all designed to tear flesh (and almost anything else) to pieces.

Well, off hand I'd say the crit is a little odd compared to the normal longsword and greatsword... however they both seem to be fine.

 

[Quip]

Well yes the ciritical range is different, its supposed to mirror the mercurial weapons from sword and fist. After errata anyways.

It seems that a little flavor text change didn't pique much interest so far, so now I'll put up some more interesting stuff.

The following are brand spanking new weapon enhancements, enjoy!

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Black Energy
A black energy weapon has its significant portion-such as its blade, axe head, or arrowhead-transformed into jet black energy, although this does not modify the item’s weight. A black energy weapon cuts through any living flesh with ease. It ignores half the natual armor and bypasses the damage reduction of any living creature it hits. (Dexterity, deflection, dodge, normal armor, and other such bonuses still apply. DR confered by spells or equipment is not bypassed) It has no special effect against constructs, undead, or incorporeal beings. Bows, crossbows, and slings cannot be enchanted with this ability. No weapon can be have both the black energy and brilliant energy enhancements.
Caster Level: 16th; Prerequisites: Craft Magic Arms and Armor, gaseous form, deeper darkness; Market Price: +4 bonus.


Discordant
This weapon is a bane to all spellcasting foes. It creates a disruptive. shockwave in its target that interferes with the casting of magic. All damage dealt by this weapon counts as continuous damage for one full round after a successful hit for purposes of invoking contration checks from spellcasting.
Caster Level: 16th; Prerequisites: Craft Magic Arms and Armor, antimagic field; Market Price: +3 Bonus


False Power
A weapon with this enhancement always has the appearance of being incredibly well made and seems to nearly radiate power. Actually, the weapon has the forces of illusion and shadow weaved in it, and thus its strength is only quasi-real. Any creature hit by the such a weapon is dealt an additional 6 points of damage unless a will save vs DC 15 is made. Those who make the save only take 1 point of additional damage thereafter, and need not save again for this weapon for another 24 hours.
Caster Level: 10th; Prerequisites: Craft Magic Arms and Armor, shadow evocation; Market Price: +1 Bonus

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I'm a little concerned about the power levels of these, a little feedback would be appreciated.

Thanks!

EDIT: changed the benifit of black energy to halve natural bonus instead of negate, added some descriptive text to discordant, and added a note about false powers saving throw.

 

[Happiest_Sadist]

Black energy worries me. Its ignoring of natural armor affects most of the toughest creatures in the game, like dragons, most outsiders, the tarrasque. Brilliant energy effectivly effects only humanoid opponents. However even humanoids can have natural armor. So I think its too powerful for even a +5 bonus.


False power is nice. I might want to make the save 18 or 20, but any person who makes the save automatically makes any future saves for 24 hours.

I have a question about Discordant. What happens to a wizard who is hit multiple times by a discordant weapon in one round. Is the save 10+1/2 of total damage+spell level? In that case it can make spellcasting nigh-impossible. Do they have to make one save per attack? Do they only have to make one save at the highest difficulty?
Also, what if a wizard is casting a spell when they are
hit with a Discordant weapon? Does the enchantment have any effect?

However I love the discordant concept.

The two "dire weapons" seem balanced, using the point system I worked out a couple of months ago they are perfectly balanced.

 

[Quip]

Hmm... well a brilliant energy weapon goes right through all armor and shields like butter, for a set of +5 equipment its something like 20 points of AC ignored. Looking at the tougher creaures it says... 40 AC. Ouch. Guess I was thinking of more average creatures hehe. I'll change it.

How about this? Since black energy still cuts through flesh, and not completely ignoring it like how brilliant energy ignores armor, have it instead cut the natural armor bonuses in half? That way something with ultra hard skin gives some defense still, but the weapon has an advantage thats worth the cost.


The DC for false power isn't very high, but its only a +1 modifier. At lower levels, it could be almost a constantly maximised flaming/frost etc type enhcntment, but that cant be resisted by endure elements and such. I almost want to lower the DC a bit... but it would be almost useless at moderate levels then.


It works however continual damage works, which I belive uses a single check with the most recent damage dealt. Getting hit while actually casting should be a seperate check if I understand it correctly.

But even if it did stack, were talking about a wizard getting hammered by a full attack, he's in enough trouble as it is. Concentration checks are usually a joke at higher levels anyways, this makes them worth something.


Ah I just realized that I didn't define discordant and false power as being melee or ranged or whatnot. I'd say that you could use them both on ranged weapons and they should effect ammo, but if the contration checks do stack discordant should be melee only.



Point system? Sounds interesting, mind sharing it? It seems easy enough to figure that an exotic has a one better crit range than martial, but I'd like to see how you handle speicial rules...

 

[Happiest_Sadist]

Point System, this assumes all weapons do at least d4 damage.
I have put in parenthasis what I think should work, but isn't used.
Also, the values under special are the least certain part or the system.

This determines the points used to build a weapon.

Weapon size
Tiny: 1
Small: 2
Medium: 3
Large: 5 (because most everyone must use these two-handed)
+1 for martial weapons, +2 for exotic weapons

You use these points to buy abilities.
Damage
d4: 1 pt
d6: 2 pts
d8: 3 pts
d10 or 2d4: 4 pts
d12 or 2d6: 5 pts
(2d8: 6 pts)

Crit
20/x2: 0
20/x3 or 19-20/x2: 1
20/x4 or 18-20/x2: 2
(19-20/x3: 3)

Special (only available on martial or exotic weapons)
Can be used to trip: 0.5
+2 to disarm: 0.5
Reach: 0.5
Double damage when set against a charge: 0.5
Reach + Adjacent: 1

For double weapons by eace head seperatly at -3 pts (-2 pts if the weapon is smaller than large because it always takes 2 hands to use both heads).

This is a rough guideline to see if a weapon is balanced. It works for every weapon in the PHB except the following.
Dagger: 1 too many points (d4=1pt, 19-20 crit=1 pt; as a tiny simple weapon it only has 1 pt to spend)
Longspear: 1.5 too few points. (d8=3pts, x3 crit=1 pt, reach=.5 pt; It only uses 4.5 out of the 6 it has)
Greatclub: 2 pts short.

 

[Shirt Guy John]

Coolness! I was gonna start using a point system of my own to make some new exotics, and It's good to know that it works...

I could guess the dagger was overpowered.... as part of the Sword group, it's damage dice would have make it a martial weapon from a rules standpoint, but from a logic standpoint, it's where it belongs.

I love the weapons (though, I thought murcurial weapons already worked like that?)

As for weapon enhancements, I still suck at judging those. I believe the Black Energy weapon is very similar to Sean Reynold's Grey Energy weapon, and you should go check out his site (I'd give you the adress, but i don't remember it)

 

[Rune]

Sorry, but I think you've got the crit ranges and multipliers wrong for the dire swords.

Broader ranges represent the ability to rend more flesh, while heavier multipliers represent the ability to bring massive amounts of force to bear on one focus point, thereby crushing or piercing deeply.

The mercurial swords are given the crit numbers that they are given because the mercury is supposed to turn them into chopping weapons, effectively.

This is not so with your dire swords, at least according to your flavor text. I would change them to have particularly wide ranges, but no increase in multiplier for the crits.

Otherwise, pretty spiffy, though.

 

[Quip]

That point system is pretty good HS, and fits the majority of the weapons fairly well.

Daggers are fairly powerful, I think its probably the best simple weapon. Perhaps the dagger should be a martial weapon, while simple weapons have a "knife": 1d4 damage, 20/x2 crit, no throwing. Of course, rogues would automatically get access to the now martial weapon dagger.

I dont think that the longspear should be considered underpowered copared against the other polearms, for its special abilities all it lacks is the ability to trip and/or bonus to disarm, and instead is the only weapon to have both reach and set to recieve a charge. I think that combo should count higher on your list.

As for the greatclub... well its basically just picking up a large peice of wood. I think that something they took into account. You could make it x3 crit I suppose, but then those giants that swing around trees would be even more frighting...

Like to see some more specials on the list though, especially with weapons like the harpoon, the bolas, and maybe the caber (that one is very unique though...). Your point system also seems to indicate that the orc shotput is overpowered... that cant be right!


SHJ, yeah mercurial weapon works *exactly* like that, but more than a few people feel the concept of mercurial weapon is ridiculous and dissallow it on that basis. This gives a somewhat more realistic alternative to what is statwise a very solid weapon.

And I am familiar with Sean's grey energy property, and it was in fact the inspiration for this one.


Rune, I see what you mean but dont really agree. A high crit multiplier simply means that when you damage them, you do so very well. That may mean bringing down more force, but a weapon designed to rip up flesh that it would usually only cut through represents that as well.

A high crit range is for more finesse weapons, those that are more easily wielded into damaging positions. Not that they rend more flesh, just that they do so more often.

In any case, dire swords are supposed to be as unwieldly as swords can get, all for the purpose of dealing devastating blows. I'd much sooner change the flavor text than the stats...

 

[comrade raoul]

I just want to note that, overall, I'm really quite impressed with both the dire swords and the new weapon enhancements. The dire swords seem quite appropriate to the overall feel and tone of a high fantasy game -- much more so than the mercurial weapons -- and can be a fitting addition to many player characters or NPCs. All the weapon enhancements seem balanced, useful, and cool, as well.