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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Maerdwyn" data-source="post: 1611753" data-attributes="member: 835">Longish answer to this. There are magic weapons - most of the cultures of this era have no problem with using arcane magic to construct them. By contrast, the Israelites have few actual priests, and those they have aren't spending much time or energy on making weapons - maybe a few, but not on the whole. True magic items are very rare indeed among the Israelites. Enhanced weapons are a little more common (throughor the region, actually, not just among Israelites.) When I ran a Celtic campaign in which sorcerors were hunted, we used this feat (as well as leveled weapons) to explain the magic items present in the setting. I was mor a behind-the-scenes system, rather than one meant for PC use, but it's available if you want it: Forge Enhanced Arms and Armor [Item Creation]Prerequisite: Knowledge (Metallurgy): 4 ranks. Craft (Weaponsmith): 9 Ranks and/or Craft (Armorer): 9 Ranks.  Benefit: The character can create any magic weapon, armor, or shield whoseEnhancement bonus is equal to or less than the character's Knowledge(Metallurgy) rank divided by 4. To craft a magic weapon or piece of armor, thecharacter must first (personally) smelt the alloys to be used for the weapon from raw materials costing 1/2 the finished item's gp value. Because of the opportunity cost of the time and effort spent on the item, the smith must also expend 1/25 the item's GP value in XP. Once the alloy is properly creeated, the smith must forge it into a materwork-quality weapon, at which point the enhanced weapon is finished.  As with other feats dealing with magic item creation, the smith must work daily on such items until they are completed. Characters wishing to forge Magic Armor must have at least 9 ranks of Armorsmithing, and could not also forge magic weapons without at least as much skill in weaponsmithing. The same holds true for those forging magic weapons. This feat does not replace "Craft Magic Weapons and Armor ," but is, rather, an alternative choice for a non-spellcasting smiths. The extra time for creating the weapon from scratch is the trade-off for not taking a spell casting class. New Skill:Knowledge (Metallurgy) (Trained Only): The character understands the intrinsic nature of metals and their alloys. The character must still have sufficient quantities of the ores/metals he want smelt on hand in order to successfully use this skill. This skill may also be used to esitmate the strength of a particular piece of metal, be it a pair of shackels, a gate, or a bridge. The DCs of smelting various metals and alloys are as follows: Lead:10Copper: 15Bronze: 25 (Standard for Israelite culture)Iron: 35Steel: 50 Once a particular metal becomes the "standard" for a culture - that is, there is a pool of craftsmen proficient in smelting a particular metal, the DC for that metal drops by 10 or to 20, whichever is lower. Thus the DC for an Israelite smith to smelt bronze is 15. (25 minus 10)   Other Magic items exist, created solely by divine casters - and rarely at that - among the Israelites, but all types among other cultures. Items that mimic existing ones form the DMG are fine (Tzizit of Protections, for example, but they cost more - gp and xp value to create - if they don't use up one of the standard magic item slots).  We won't go into too much reworking. Because the majority of your opponens will be humans equipped with a similar level of magic, removing a certain level of magic is not as big a deals as if I was going to be throwing an unending mass of DR15/+2 undead at you. EDIT:  I think I need to expand slightly on the previous two paragraphs - there are, of course, people among the Israelites who don't follow all the teahings of their religion, and those who have picked up customs and practices of their Egyptian masters - figure that there are at least a few adepts and maybe some love level sorcerors around, as well as some charms and potions made by arcane magic.  They aren't out in the open, however.    Finally, on equipping your characters: At this point, create your chracters with bronze weapons and armor (if any), all non-magical. The people may grant you access to better stuff later if you mission warrants it - but we aren't there yet, and things may go different than I expect. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> If your family is wealthy, or you think ther eis something else about the PC that justifies owning a masterwork weapon or armor, go for it.</blockquote>

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