New article Design and Development Article on Magic Item Slots

[Professor Phobos]

I'm thinking about house ruling the system so that there are no +X items in the game. A 10th level character holding a magic sword would gain +2 whereas a 20th level character would gain a +4 (or whatever bonuses are appropriate) would allow weapons to grow with the character. I'm considering it, at least, until I see how the rules are in the game as to whether or not it would work.

What I'm hoping is that the DMG has their expectations explicit on these things. Like a chart of "By this level, we expect magic items of this much power" so it'd be pretty easy for me to just have the handful of magic items they'll get upgrade themselves at the appropriate times.

 

[Zamkaizer]

Guys, Mr. Bonner's sample character obviously needs a preponderance of magical items because he's a gimped Gnome that doesn't have the benefit of racial feats since they're also-rans from the Monster Manual!

More specifically, he's a Gnome Warlock...like they have in World of Warcraft!

Also, Succubi.

 

[The Human Target]

In one of the recent podcasts, the designers explain the how they view the Star Wars Universe and the D&D Universe differently in terms of the importance of items (I believe it's in the 'Tell me about your character' episode but it could have been the 'You may already be playing 4e' episode) . IIRC they explained it as follows: In Star Wars characters are likely to use the same light saber through their entire career. In D&D they had a different design philosophy (i.e., no 1st level characters with a magic greatsword and magic full plate) and therefore they implemented slightly different game mechanics to accommodate that.

I would have preferred characters to each have a slightly smaller cache of magic items, but from the sound of things, I'm easily going to be able to adjust the math. At this point I'm more concerned about fighter type characters needing an item of flying, teleporting, etc. to be viable at high level.

Which is odd when you think about it. If you consider DnD to be a game designed to replicate " generic" fantasy (which may or may not be true), having characters either start with magic items or gain them while adventuring and then keeping them forever would be a lot more representative of the fiction.

I completely agree with this. +X weapons are D&D, both to roleplayers and the wider world. Everyone knows what a +1 longsword is.

Some people who aren't DnD players may have a slight idea that a +1 sword may have somthing to do with "geeky stuff."

But to say everyone knows what a +1 longsword is? Really?

 

[Upper_Krust]

Howdy ThirdWizard!

I'm thinking about house ruling the system so that there are no +X items in the game. A 10th level character holding a magic sword would gain +2 whereas a 20th level character would gain a +4 (or whatever bonuses are appropriate) would allow weapons to grow with the character. I'm considering it, at least, until I see how the rules are in the game as to whether or not it would work.

Thats basically how I thought 4E would work (or even still does...its hard to tell at this stage).

Weapons that evolve with the character.

Hows this idea:

You have a hilt AND a blade (or similar equivalents of handle and 'the bit you hit them with' for other items).

The Hilt is the magical bit, it gives you the power. This power scales up when you reach Paragon Tier and again at Epic Tier.

The Blade is the physical bit. It can be reforged with different materials each giving a better bonus to hit:

-3 Bone
-2 Wood
-1 Bronze
+/-0 Iron
+1 Steel
+2 Mercurial
+3 Meteoric Iron
+4 Mithril
+5 Adamantine
+6 Diamond
+7 Orichalcum (Star Metal)

That way instead of having someone saying I whip out my +5 Flaming Longsword, they instead pull out their Adamantine Flaming Longsword.

 

[Slander]

What I find amusing, is that they say the 'christmas tree' is a bad thing and characters will be 'less dependent on magic items'.

The keyword is "dependent". WotC said they would reduce dependency on items, and they did. A character is now only dependent on three items. Of course characters are going to want more items ... its DnD. But they only need 3 of them to be balanced according to RAW.

Even looking at the character in the example, does he need any of the following to be effective for his level:

Arms: Bracers of the perfect shot. Let's say its a reroll or +4 to attack usable once per encounter. Nope, doesn't need that. Damn sure nice to have, but not a necessity.

Feet: Wavestrider boots. Let's say he can walk on/swim in water. Not particularly necessary, but useful nonetheless.

Hands: Shadowfell gloves. Let's say its similar to 3x Ghost touch. Again, very nice, but far from a must have.

Head: Diadem of acuity. Bonus on Spot/Appraise checks maybe? Or can't be suprised? Spiffy item to be sure, but he certainly isn't going to be inappropriately challenged without it.

Waist: Belt of battle. Let's say it grants one extra healing surge per day. Again very useful, but a character without a Belt of battle is not going to be at a disadvantage.

Wondrous Items: Bag of holding. No need to comment.

All of the optional item slots are effects or situational bonuses. They are all very cool effects, but a character is not going to be shorted if he is missing any one of these items. Each character is likely going to want a different set of effects. But if there is no single effect in the optional list that is required to make an effective character of X level, then WotC has done the job they said they would do.

Whether WotC did the job we would have liked them to do is an entirely different matter.

 

[ThirdWizard]

I'm not 'missing' anything. Heck, I ike magic items as much as the next guy. I'm just saying, that's not the best way to highlight the new non-magic-item-dependency factor.

Ahhh, I don't think they're trying to highlight that. I think they're trying to highlight the new slots. Showing what items they'll have for the slots makes far more sense than showing off all the new slots and then showing a PC who doesn't actually use that. They would only show off a PC with few magic items if the article was specifically aimed at people who that resonates with. That isn't true: the article is aimed at all D&D players.

Hows this idea:

You have a hilt AND a blade (or similar equivalents of handle and 'the bit you hit them with' for other items).

snip rest

I haven't been reading the Dark Sun thread, but that seems like a great idea for that setting. I have plans to run a Dark Sun campaign under 4e eventually, and that would work really well.

 

[FireLance]

We really don't need to have the discussion about the rules as written driving the expected playstyle do we? Again? Every single change we've seen has dredged up that argument.

Yes, individual DMs can always change things "back" to how they want them. Thanks for pointing that out... again.

You asked how we got to where we are and I answered. I'll say it again. If the "official" rules permit a particular playstyle, it is the nature of players to push that permission as far as possible. That's just how players think. In a larger sense, it is how human beings think.

Inch, mile, all that. I didn't coin the phrase.

Not trying to dredge up old arguments, but as far back as I can remember, we've always had magic cloaks, boots, gauntlets, belts and rings. What changed in 3e was essentially:

1. The calling out of specific slots, e.g. the cloak slot, the boots slot, etc.

2. The assumption that specific magic items can be easily obtained through purchase or creation.

Now, the article confirmed that [1] will still be in 4e, and the argument that Christmas tree characters will still exist seems based around the idea that players will ask for magic cloaks because they know that there is a cloak slot. This to me does not seem very different from previous editions. There may not have been an explicit cloaks slot, but many players knew that magical cloaks existed.

In my view, [2] was the greater contributor to the Christmas tree syndrome because of the relative ease that players could fill the empty slots on their characters. I don't think that WotC has addressed this issue yet.

 

[Darkwolf71]

Ahhh, I don't think they're trying to highlight that. I think they're trying to highlight the new slots. Showing what items they'll have for the slots makes far more sense than showing off all the new slots and then showing a PC who doesn't actually use that. They would only show off a PC with few magic items if the article was specifically aimed at people who that resonates with. That isn't true: the article is aimed at all D&D players.

Theoretically you're right. But, if that's the case why doesn't he have a ring? This isn't a sample character that got thrown together for the sake of showing us cool items. It's an in-play character.

Slander: Nice examples of what the items may be, but the question I have is; "How is the game being balanced?" Once per day items aren't going to shift balance much one way or the other, however per encounter abilities have the potential to affect balance drastically.

 

[rkanodia]

All of the optional item slots are effects or situational bonuses. They are all very cool effects, but a character is not going to be shorted if he is missing any one of these items. Each character is likely going to want a different set of effects. But if there is no single effect in the optional list that is required to make an effective character of X level, then WotC has done the job they said they would do.

It's also important to remember that characters are going to have an array of at-will and per-encounter powers. Magical items which cost an action to activate, rather than boosting an action which you are already doing, will seem a lot less powerful in comparison, even if you load up a character with tons of them.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

In my view, [2. The assumption that specific magic items can be easily obtained through purchase or creation.] was the greater contributor to the Christmas tree syndrome because of the relative ease that players could fill the empty slots on their characters. I don't think that WotC has addressed this issue yet.

Agreed 100%.