Should rings be able to function for low level characters?

[Deep Blue 9000]

I suspect level based requirements for items is the most arbitrary rule possible. I cannot fathom how anyone could defend it.

Why not just make all rings expensive? Or have their effects scale up with level? They're are plenty of solutions that have the same end result and aren't arbitrary.

Someone linked this comic in the other thread and I think its appropriate here too. http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=215

 

[Stalker0]

I see no reason to rings level requirements, we already have that with gold piece suggestions.

You don't give a 2nd level character a 20,000 gp item (unless you really want to). Just make rings very powerful and very expensive, and then the dm can determine if he wants to put it in or not.

 

[The Little Raven]

I suspect level based requirements for items is the most arbitrary rule possible. I cannot fathom how anyone could defend it.

The same why I can defend not giving a +5 vorpal longsword to a 2nd level fighter. But, of course, I'm operating from the assumption that rings will be powerful items, just like some spells are powerful and subject to level restrictions, as well as some feats that require level as an arbitrary requirement next to the four other requirements it throws at me (like Greater Weapon Specialization, which requires Fighter 12, no matter if you meet all the other requirements first).

 

[Voss]

The poll is just as bad as the rule, and the rule is really bad. Because really, a Ring of Dirt Doesn't Stick to Your Clothes requires an eleventh level character? WotC can bite me.

 

[Irda Ranger]

Congratulations on the worst wording of any 4e poll to date.

I have agreed with Wormwood before, but I have never agreed with Wormwood more.

 

[Arkhandus]

Huh? Well that's one godawful poorly-thought-out decision.

Poor Frodo, all that time, deluding himself into thinking he was invisible wearing the One Ring, while Gandalf and Samwise and the others were all laughing their arses off behind his back as they humored him.

Do Pointy Hats of Authority require level 30 to function? I'm not sure if I'm anywhere quite near being a 30th-level Dungeon Master yet........

Though, curiously, I have to wonder if someone on the 4E design team watches the anime MÄR. In which powerful ÄRMs (magic items) won't work for anyone without enough magical energy, or will only work briefly for them, or turn into guardians of terrible, useless fragility for them.

 

[Rechan]

That is different though.

That restriction dates back to 1st edition D&D (not just AD&D btw), where characters would not be having so many complex "item slots" (another MMO term). Aside from the reason Gygax gave in the original rules (that the auras would conflict) it was not so blatantly arbitrary. (. . . like Clerics being unable to use edged/pointed weapons.)

Item slot was used in 3e as well.

What's next? Magic items = MMO?

 

[The Little Raven]

Poor Frodo, all that time, deluding himself into thinking he was invisible wearing the One Ring, while Gandalf and Samwise and the others were all laughing their arses off behind his back as they humored him.

I know it seems to be too much to expect people to read the entire article, but is it too much to expect them to read the half-dozen posts that point out that the One Ring is an artifact and artifacts don't follow the same rules as "normal" magic items?

Or since you want to bring up Gandalf and LotR in general, how about the fact that every ring bearer that says anything about wearing a ring of power says that it's not something taken lightly, and requires a good deal of personal power to master?

 

[Rechan]

I voted yes because I have no problem with the ring thing.

 

[Lizard]

The same why I can defend not giving a +5 vorpal longsword to a 2nd level fighter.

Not *giving* it to him, or giving it to him and having it somehow not work? One method trusts the DM to scale his campaign as he sees fit; the other makes the game that much more mechanistic and banal. It is a poor DM that gives a high level magic item to a low level character. It is a poor game designer that feels the only way to stop this is to import 'leveled' magic items from MMORPGs. The people designing D&D 4e are *not* poor game designers. Therefore, something else is going on.

It seems pretty bizarre to me that rings just can't work if the wearer is below 11th level. There are more elegant solutions -- rings require a Use Magic Device check (to 'master' the ring), and most characters below 11th level won't make the roll reliably, for example. This has a much higher level of verisimilitude than rings having built-in level detectors, but serves the same design purpose. I'm sure a dozen other posters could come up with a dozen other methods to control the power of high level items without resorting to something as arbitrarily stupid as "Well, they just don't work! Deal!" I can't believe the designers couldn't, so it makes me wonder why they didn't.