D&D 5E The Door, Player Expectations, and why 5e can't unify the fanbase.

[Lanefan]

I think this is an interesting approach (it's mirrored somewhat in the Magus class in Pathfinder, who can temporarily add magic abilities to a particular weapon several times per day), and that it could work really well: at 15th-level, your fighter character can treat every magic weapon as if it had the vorpal property, or he can change a weapon between a flameblade and an icingdeath, ferinstance.

Interesting - so the weapon's "extra" power comes from the wielder...who in turn gets this power...how?

I'd rather it not just be a straight factor of level, but it could be an interesting effect from touching an artifact, receiving a special blessing, or some other story-based event.

Lanefan

 

[RangerWickett]

Given the opposition they go against, it is silly to say that a high-level D&D party are not themselves demigods, at least in terms of power.

Why can't I give you XP twice in one day?

 

[Imaro]

I want to keep them as fighters, increasing their strength and toughness way beyond the human limit and allowing them to behave like fighters running first on action movie physics then on anime and celtic myth physics. And if they need to be supernatural to behave as fighters then so be it. You want them to explicitely be able to manipulate a form of magic wizards and sages can't.

I'm not getting the distinction here... you want them to have the type of powers that are common in anime and myth... which according to your description of my weapons and armor idea would also just be a different form of magic. The only difference is that I'm giving a fictional justification for their "magical" powers and you're not.

 

[Imaro]

Interesting - so the weapon's "extra" power comes from the wielder...who in turn gets this power...how?

I'd rather it not just be a straight factor of level, but it could be an interesting effect from touching an artifact, receiving a special blessing, or some other story-based event.

Lanefan

My suggestion was along the lines of the fighter becoming something akin to an "Avatar" of combat, where he is basically able to become one with the weapons and armor he uses (possibly even the tactics and strategies he uses as well now that I'm thinking of it) to defeat his enemies to the point that he is able to do things in combat with these items that other less dedicated men cannot. I guess if I had to name where his power comes from... it would come from his dedication and single-minded focus to the art of combat, as well as his physical prowess and training.

Edit: Now this was just a default that I suggested but I along with other posters also discussed having alternate defaults and/or advice on reskinnig the fighter's justification for other genres such as wuxia, sword and sorcery, anime, etc.

 

[billd91]

You miss my point. Aragorn doesn't cast spells, but he is definitively super-human. He lives for like 200 years and can heal people with a touch (at least, the "hands of a king" are ascribed particularly potent healing properties). Yet, none of these qualities are segregated out from the norm as "magical". They are just a natural part of the world he lives in. Likewise, he lives in a world where birds can talk, but this isn't considered weird or magical, only natural and normal.

Aragorn's healing abilities can easily be spun 3 ways - healing spells, herbalism and mundane healing skills, and divine providence (laying on of hands). The herbalism is most strongly suggested, or would be, if he didn't also chant and call to the afflicted as if casting a ritual (spell).

And you're right, none of them are segregated out. Yet there are characters who don't seem to be able to do it while others can - perhaps Aragorn is multiclassed or he's gotten high enough in level as a 1e ranger to be able to do it. Elves seem to be able to work magic with lots of the crafts they make. Again, this isn't called out as separate because they don't seem to understand the hobbits' questions about magic as something separate. It's just part of what and who they are. That's one of the reasons a number of different methods in games might model it and picking the "right" one is a question of art and interpretation.

Given the opposition they go against, it is silly to say that a high-level D&D party are not themselves demigods, at least in terms of power.

See, I would say that because they aren't actually divine, it's silly to call them demigods. In the terms of Deities and Demigods from 1e, they're not gods nor demigods. They're heroes. That covers a lot of ground, by the way from the relatively mundane Arthurian knights to the heroes of the Finnish Kalevala.

 

[Imaro]

You miss my point. Aragorn doesn't cast spells, but he is definitively super-human. He lives for like 200 years and can heal people with a touch (at least, the "hands of a king" are ascribed particularly potent healing properties). Yet, none of these qualities are segregated out from the norm as "magical". They are just a natural part of the world he lives in. Likewise, he lives in a world where birds can talk, but this isn't considered weird or magical, only natural and normal.

The idea that "magic" is something that only comes from "spells" which are used by "spell-casters", while things that are not touched by this "magic" are "mundane" and thus bound by real-world physics, is a paradigm that is practically a complete invention by D&D. It isn't even totally true within D&D. D&D still presumes things such as giants and gryphons which are not possible within the framework of real-world physics, yet are still a natural part of the world.


Going into the topic of whether or not D&D heroes can be based on the likes of Hercules and other mythological demi-gods, it is worth pointing out that the monsters they fought (the Hydra, the Minotaur, Cerberus, the Chimera, etc.) were all demigods as well. And yet, all of these monsters are considered perfectly acceptable opponents for D&D heroes, if not downright plain or ordinary ones. Heck, Giants are based in part on the Giants and Titans of Greek and Norse myth, who were equals to the gods themselves, if not their direct relatives.

Given the opposition they go against, it is silly to say that a high-level D&D party are not themselves demigods, at least in terms of power.

And you've ignored the fact that non-superhuman, martial protagonists did exist in some of the literature D&D was based upon. I'm not arguing anything else, so I'm not sure what the rest of this post is addressing... because I never claimed it's sources had no mythic or supernatural martial protagonists just that it also had some that weren't.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Interesting - so the weapon's "extra" power comes from the wielder...who in turn gets this power...how?

Damn good question! In some cases, you could fluff it as the wielder being just that good (e.g., the vorpal effect). In others, it's because the wielder's broad experience with magic weapons has clued him into a few tricks ("Look - an icesword is just a firesword turned in on itself, right? So all you do is kinda convince the magic to ...").

The second maybe sounds more aritificiery than fightery, but given that the fighter's supposed to be maintaining his own gear, at least, I'm not averse to him picking up a few tricks.

 

[Imaro]

Damn good question! In some cases, you could fluff it as the wielder being just that good (e.g., the vorpal effect). In others, it's because the wielder's broad experience with magic weapons has clued him into a few tricks ("Look - an icesword is just a firesword turned in on itself, right? So all you do is kinda convince the magic to ...").

The second maybe sounds more aritificiery than fightery, but given that the fighter's supposed to be maintaining his own gear, at least, I'm not averse to him picking up a few tricks.

Another possibility that could explain the "multiple power" magic weapons is that perhaps the fighter learns esoteric fighting forms that allow him to unlock or achieve a sort of "perfect form" of the weapons he wields and armor he dons... so it's not so much that the fighter is altering the magic but only when wielded by someone as skilled as he is that the weapons and armor are able to reach their full magical potential.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Yet another one is the Tomas one, only more repeatable. Great warriors of old have imbued their spirt into their weapons--sometimes consciously at death because of great magic (presumably performed by some Merlin-type character), in other cases due to accident, long-life with the weapon, ambient magic, a god's connection, etc.

So then when our present day fighter picks up that quasi-artifact flamebrand of Geoff the Mad, it is merely a flamebrand at first, albeit one with a latent intelligence and will. Use it awhile, this starts to affect the fighter. Instead of the typical early D&D struggle with intelligent swords, this is more benign as far as "controlling" the fighter directly, but more pervasive and lasting, too. After awhile, our fighter starts to absorb some of the personality of Geoff, along with his abilities. Let it go on long enough, and both "stick" even with the sword gone. (This would be a narrow but noticable change in personality, not a complete rewrite. Most of the original is still there, only changed by long association with the spirit.)

You'd have to give the fighter choice in the matter (great roleplaying fodder), but if it wants to hold Geoff at arms length, he's still got a flamebrand in the meantime!

Mechanically, every powerful weapon with a long history has a "spirit" capable of entering a wielder and slowly changing them, both in skill and personality, if the wielder allows. But it's always take both changes or neither. This also gives an even greater reason why a party will want to destroy some weapons. That dagger over there turns haflings into streakers, thanks to Wally "More Than Just My Feet Are Bare" Williams, the rather infamous hobbit thief. Some things can't be unseen.

 

[Underman]

You miss my point. Aragorn doesn't cast spells, but he is definitively super-human. He lives for like 200 years and can heal people with a touch (at least, the "hands of a king" are ascribed particularly potent healing properties). Yet, none of these qualities are segregated out from the norm as "magical". They are just a natural part of the world he lives in. Likewise, he lives in a world where birds can talk, but this isn't considered weird or magical, only natural and normal.

The idea that "magic" is something that only comes from "spells" which are used by "spell-casters", while things that are not touched by this "magic" are "mundane" and thus bound by real-world physics, is a paradigm that is practically a complete invention by D&D. It isn't even totally true within D&D. D&D still presumes things such as giants and gryphons which are not possible within the framework of real-world physics, yet are still a natural part of the world.

I think there is a good reason to differentiate "supernatural" from "magic".

Being supernatural informs other aspects of your nature and behavior. If you can smash an ogre dead with a thrown hammer, you're presumably exceptionally strong at arm wrestling too. If you strike your foes unerringly with supernatural agility and accuracy, you could easily toss pizzas and juggle tomatoes to amaze your friends during your dayjob. It doesn't matter whether it's strictly supernatural, like Samson's supernatural gift of strength from God, or mundanely extraordinary; it's innate for most intents and purposes.

Whereas magic is just a shortcut. For a shining moment, you obliterate a mob with a fireball and then you're just ordinary Joe Shmoe. (Gandalf is definitely both supernatural and magic).

This is why wuxia's tree running kinda nags me as more mythic/magical, because you don't see those same wuxia warriors being consistently acrobatic in other contexts like some sort of Spiderman. It's almost as if denying gravity is only "turned on" during combat, which seems more like magic in the moment than innately supernatural.