Monsters with Fancy Equipment

[Imban]

Says who? Choose an amount of gold you want them to be worth, deduct it from the monster's treasure package, and tell your players "well, it's magic, but it doesn't seem to work unless you're a <insert monster here>, but you might be able to make something else out of it". Then if you want to add some flavour, narrow down what can actually be made a little (or a lot - up to you really).

I think my players would look at me with a look somewhere between confusion and horror if I informed them that a sahaugin's trident or a banshrae's blowgun was magic that didn't seem to work unless you were a sahuagin or banshrae, or suggested that they were valid targets for the Disenchant Item ritual. Then they'd probably ask me to repeat myself, all the while readying the ropes in case they need to keelhaul me...

 

[Saeviomagy]

I think my players would look at me with a look somewhere between confusion and horror if I informed them that a sahaugin's trident or a banshrae's blowgun was magic that didn't seem to work unless you were a sahuagin or banshrae, or suggested that they were valid targets for the Disenchant Item ritual. Then they'd probably ask me to repeat myself, all the while readying the ropes in case they need to keelhaul me...

I think you misunderstood me - there are some items on the list that are plainly nonmagical, or would have a function without magic. The blowguns do 1d4, even the dartswarmer's. The tridents are treated as a spear (and spears can be thrown...). Special powers like "bonus necrotic damage" and the like are the things that maybe don't work for players, and those items might be the ones that can be disenchanted (because originally they're enchanted with "allow my natural ability to cause necrotic damage to be channeled through my weapon" or whatever.

Or you could make them full-fledged magic weapons and take them off the 'loot remaining' list if you feel like it (and the PC's won't be getting them by the cartload).

As for things that aren't strictly a magical item being valid for disenchant item, or being already useable as residuum - sounds like it's something that's core to a lot of fantasy: "Fetch me the pincer staff of a sahuaguin and I shall make for you a mighty staff of power!"

 

[Imban]

The tridents are treated as a spear (and spears can be thrown...).

That (much like whips - the closest thing to a whip in 4e is the spiked chain, which isn't really very much like a whip at all...) is a strange issue, because spears cannot be thrown, and why I wrote up tridents as a totally new weapon in my houserules.

For a minor book quote, uh... bah, it's a pain to represent the table easily, but they're all simple one-handed melee weapons.

Spears deal 1d8 damage, +2 proficiency bonus, and are versatile. They can't be thrown.
Javelins deal 1d6 damage, +2 proficiency bonus, and can be thrown as heavy thrown weapons with a range of 10/20.
Per the stats the sahuagins use, I made tridents deal 1d8 damage, have a +2 proficiency bonus, and be able to be thrown as heavy thrown weapons with a range of 3/6.

(To complicate the issue further, Mezzodemons use tridents for normal attacks but can't throw them, so those look just like spears. I missed those in my first reading. Thankfully, their stats are close enough to the same that I can say they both use the same tridents and Mezzodemons just never throw them.

Even further, War Devils use it but only for an /encounter power, which inflicts 4d4 damage... which would seem to imply their tridents deal 2d4 damage instead of 1d8...

...yeah. Uh, three cheers for exceptions-based design.)

 

[Kraydak]

Let us not forget the amazing gear of the lowly kobold slingers.

 

[Imban]

Let us not forget the amazing gear of the lowly kobold slingers.

I suppose those could have made it into my list, but it's pretty obvious how to adjudicate those - the ability description states that it deals normal sling damage, plus the below effect.

Assumedly it thus deals normal sling damage, plus the effect...