Residuum: A Re-Fluffing

[Boarstorm]

Which takes all the craftsmanship out of it and reduces it to raw components. It isn't worth 1/5 of a masterwork weapon; it's worth a few cp.

Granted, but the forging IS removed. It's the same as removing the magic from the sword. It's no longer worth 2k gold, but merely the 15 gold you'd have spent on the sword itself.

I dunno, it seems a pretty valid metaphor to me.

 

[Rechan]

The question is whether enchantment is something that you add to an item, or a process you perform on an item. Residuum implies the former; I prefer the latter.

Then allow me to try a different approach, but with the same end result.

In the Dresden Files novels, there are three holy swords. These swords each have a nail from the Crucifixion worked into the hilt. They cannot be destroyed, because they are not merely swords; the physical presence of the sword is a pale comparison to the symbolic presence, the Soul of the sword, if you will.

However, the soul of the sword can be stripped away, just like the soul of a mortal can be corrupted.

The main character got ahold of one of these swords, as he was holding it for his friend, the true wielder. Well, the Main Character tried to use it to attack a creature that he had made a deal with, and he was trying to reneg on the deal; this sword was used to betray an oath. It made the sword inert, because its purpose (A holy sword meant to do just battle against evil) had been corrupted in a selfish manner.

The sword could then be destroyed because it had no more protection; it was just metal because the magic that made it more had been violated.

In another instance, the sword could have been rendered inert after the wielder used it to attack first under a veneer of parlay and peaceful diplomacy.

So, a weapon could be disenchanted if it is used against its purpose (such as a rightful wielder of a Demon Bane sword giving it freely to a demon). And when it's disenchanted, the power that had enchanted it has to go somewhere.

If you want to make disenchantment more meaningful because the magical items themselves are more meaningful, then you should have the ritual to disenchant relate to the item itself. You can't just destroy The One Ring; you gotta take it to where it was forged, in Mount Doom. Etc etc. Disenchanting becomes a quest in and of itself.

 

[Dausuul]

Then allow me to try a different approach, but with the same end result.

In the Dresden Files novels, there are three holy swords. These swords each have a nail from the Crucifixion worked into the hilt. They cannot be destroyed, because they are not merely swords; the physical presence of the sword is a pale comparison to the symbolic presence, the Soul of the sword, if you will.

However, the soul of the sword can be stripped away, just like the soul of a mortal can be corrupted.

The main character got ahold of one of these swords, as he was holding it for his friend, the true wielder. Well, the Main Character tried to use it to attack a creature that he had made a deal with, and he was trying to reneg on the deal; this sword was used to betray an oath. It made the sword inert, because its purpose (A holy sword meant to do just battle against evil) had been corrupted in a selfish manner.

The sword could then be destroyed because it had no more protection; it was just metal because the magic that made it more had been violated.

In another instance, the sword could have been rendered inert after the wielder used it to attack first under a veneer of parlay and peaceful diplomacy.

So, a weapon could be disenchanted if it is used against its purpose. And when it's disenchanted, the power that had enchanted it has to go somewhere.

Ah, see, I'm with you right up until that last sentence. The way I see it, if you disenchant an item, you're not extracting the enchantment from it, you're just wrecking the enchantment, destroying it. It's like melting down the sword; you're not extracting the forging from it, you're just wrecking the work the blacksmith put in to turn the iron into a sword in the first place.

In the example you gave above, the holy sword has been rendered inert, but the wielder has not extracted a divine blessing that he can then put towards making a holy mace. All he's accomplished is to ruin a holy sword. (If that was his goal, of course, there's no problem.)

If you want to make disenchantment more meaningful because the magical items themselves are more meaningful, then you should have the ritual to disenchant relate to the item itself. You can't just destroy The One Ring; you gotta take it to where it was forged, in Mount Doom. Etc etc. Disenchanting becomes a quest in and of itself.

Now that's a whole different question.

Obviously, this is all a matter of personal taste. There's nothing mechanically wrong with residuum, it just doesn't sit well with me. I feel kind of the same way about residuum that I do about (and apologies to folks who will be offended by this comparison) midichlorians in Star Wars; I feel it's making something quantifiable and measurable and concrete that should be mysterious and mystical instead.

 

[Boarstorm]

Obviously, this is all a matter of personal taste. There's nothing mechanically wrong with residuum, it just doesn't sit well with me. I feel kind of the same way about residuum that I do about (and apologies to folks who will be offended by this comparison) midichlorians in Star Wars

To that, at least, I shall say a hearty "Amen!" and wish you well with your spirits idea.

 

[Duelpersonality]

Then all you've got is a lump of iron. If your goal was to take a lump of mithral and turn it into a sword, this does not help you. You do not have an "essence of forging" that you can apply to the mithral.

Melting down a sword to make another sword does seem pointless. But what if I want an axe or a spear? Could I not take the material and remake it to suit my purpose? Why do I have to find another hunk of metal?

Moving this into the enchantment argument: if there is magic in this sword, and I have the knowledge and skill to force magic into an axe, why would I want to pay for the materials to create a new source of magic rather than taking the magic from the sword?

 

[Jer]

So, a weapon could be disenchanted if it is used against its purpose (such as a rightful wielder of a Demon Bane sword giving it freely to a demon). And when it's disenchanted, the power that had enchanted it has to go somewhere.

Actually, I think that this example supports Dausuul's idea of magic items more than it weakens it. I can't begin to imagine Harry Dresden even contemplating using a ritual to pull the "magic" out of one of the three swords and repurpose it. Even the bad guys in the books mostly want to eliminate the power of the swords, not suck the power out and then use it to make their own magic items.

Again, though, I think it mainly comes down to how you want to handle magic in your own campaigns - the mechanics can support a lot of different fluff hanging off them. If you want to have Dr. Strange-style magic energy imbuing your magic items with power, that seems to be the "default" assumption in the core books this cycle. If you want your magic to be less "energy" and more subtle (as Dausuul seems to desire) it's an easy enough tweak to the assumptions to make it work. At that level it's just a matter of personal tastes.

 

[Jer]

Melting down a sword to make another sword does seem pointless. But what if I want an axe or a spear? Could I not take the material and remake it to suit my purpose? Why do I have to find another hunk of metal?

Moving this into the enchantment argument: if there is magic in this sword, and I have the knowledge and skill to force magic into an axe, why would I want to pay for the materials to create a new source of magic rather than taking the magic from the sword?

There are two places that the "magic" could be in the sword - the metal could be magic or the manufacture of the sword could be magic. If your campaign style supports the first assumption then there's nothing wrong with melting the sword down, extracting the "magic" and repurposing it for something else.

OTOH - if your campaign assumptions about magic say that it is in the construction of the sword that the magic happens, then melting it down can't give you anything but a trashed sword.

It's the difference between viewing magic as a physical energy that can be manipulated vs. viewing magic as the "cheat codes" that let you put yourself outside the normal rules of the universe to do something extraordinary. Both styles have precedent in fantasy fiction, and neither is really better or worse than the other outside of personal preference and campaign vision.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I must admit, I'm a bit mystified by the purpose of this residuum stuff (and I wish it had a less silly name). Surely players have access to whatever items the GM wants them to? Why introduce a whole other system (and associated fluff) unless we're looking at a game that's intended to be potentially GM-less?

Personally I think tiny bit of fluff we have for this so is dreadful, in that it's uninspiring and diminishes the status of magic rather than exalting it, and generally further Eberron-ifies D&D (not WoW-ifies). I'm sure, if you like the "magic is technology" angle of Eberron, that's totally rocking. If you like, y'know, medieval high fantasy, though, like D&D kinda was once, it's kind of grotesque.

I think the idea of spirits a lot than the idea of dodgy magic essence (eugh) being extracted from things.

Duelpersonality - But it makes no sense to regard magic that way unless you don't regard magic as magical, but merely a kind of energy, like electricity or what-have-you. If you do, then that view has some sense, and essentially what you're doing is a kind of engineering.

If, on the other hand, you view magic as actual magic, as something that bends and breaks the laws of reality rather than being subject to them, it doesn't necessary follow that you can simply "draw out" the power of one object and put it in another. It would actually make somewhat more sense if you regarded the item as having a kind of spirit which was perhaps transferrable.

To me it seems like this issue splits people because some people see magic as magical, and other just see as a kind of energy or force that exists in the D&D universe, and that's as vulnerable to harnessing and control as any other.

 

[Boarstorm]

It's the difference between viewing magic as a physical energy that can be manipulated vs. viewing magic as the "cheat codes" that let you put yourself outside the normal rules of the universe to do something extraordinary. Both styles have precedent in fantasy fiction, and neither is really better or worse than the other outside of personal preference and campaign vision.

I find your choice of terminology biased, but otherwise agree.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

It's the difference between viewing magic as a physical energy that can be manipulated vs. viewing magic as the "cheat codes" that let you put yourself outside the normal rules of the universe to do something extraordinary. Both styles have precedent in fantasy fiction, and neither is really better or worse than the other outside of personal preference and campaign vision.

This is a good way of putting it that you typed at the same time as me, dammit!

I think one of the major problems with 4E for me is that it completes the transitition from magic in D&D being pretty clearly the latter ("cosmic hax") to a more, dare I say, comic-book-ish "energy control" type of deal. They both do have precedents in fantasy fiction, that's true. I know that I've always disliked novels where magic was "just" energy control. Of course, in some settings, it could be argued to be both (like in The Prince of Nothing series), and I'd bet there are other settings where where both types are present separately.

Personally I think it's kind of irritating for D&D to come down so firmly on the "it's just a kind of energy lol", especially as I'm not sure that's going to fit entirely well with some of the setting they've proposed to bring back (it fits perfectly with Eberron, though, and that's first up after the Realms, where magic has been portrayed both ways).