The Magic Items that WotC cannot publish

[Jhaelen]

If 6th-level Raistlin is using the Staff of Magius, does it make him equivalent to a 7th-level threat? 8th? More? Is the Staff of Magius better or worse than the Sword of Kith-Kanan that I gave to Tanis, and if so, by how much?

Threat levels? Are you talking about npcs, here? If so, npc's typically can use their equipment in ways that pcs cannot. Ergo, there's no need for guidelines.

If you're somehow talking about pcs that for some unfathomable reason are named after protagonists from DL novels, I'd like to note that 4e doesn't figure artifacts into the pcs power level. E.g. in the 'Ashen Crown' adventure, at some point every pc will have an artifact. Apparently, the author didn't think any adjustments were necessary. Neither do I.

Now, if every pc had ten artifact level magic items, some adjustments might be in order. But I _really_ don't think that would be a good idea.

 

[Scribble]

I suppose one could do those things, but I can see a number of problems with each of those implementations, and... what for? Just so I can say, "The Staff of Magius now fits into an artifact template?" That was my point above - yeah, you can cram square magic items into round artifacts if you really want to, but it's a bad fit and a lot of trouble and it's never going to work quite right.

What sorts of problems? I didn't really change anything in the artifact rules, just in how the end up presenting themselves in the game.

No, not to cram anything into anything else. It's you have the basics for something that's built with the idea of balance, but you want to modify to fit your vision.

Doing it this way allows you to put the coolness on as you see fit without screwing up the numbers in unforeseen ways.

As an individual DM, if I want the Staff of Magius in my game, I'll stat it up as a high-powered homebrew magic item, like the ones Peter S. describes in his article. But it would be nice to have a framework for such items, and some guidelines on power levels, and some examples, so I have an idea of what the impact will be. If 6th-level Raistlin is using the Staff of Magius, does it make him equivalent to a 7th-level threat? 8th? More? Is the Staff of Magius better or worse than the Sword of Kith-Kanan that I gave to Tanis, and if so, by how much?

But the point is once they DO stat up that stuff like that as a new class of item, it falls into the category of "Items people now expect WoTC to find the magical balance for" and "items players expect to see at some point because they're in a published book," instead of just being a cool new unique thing the DM threw into his campaign.

I just don't personally see the need for a new rule when I already have what WoTC considers to be the optimally balanced idea for magic items. I can adjust from there as I see fit. I don't need a new rebalanced rule for every variation someone can think of.

The unique ones are the memorable ones..

 

[Dausuul]

What sorts of problems? I didn't really change anything in the artifact rules, just in how the end up presenting themselves in the game.

Well, your first solution - the regular magic staff that blossoms into an artifact near the end of the game - is balanced but pointless. The whole idea is to have the Staff of Magius be Raistlin's signature item. If it spends the first 5/6 of the game being just another boring magic staff, Raistlin has no motivation to stick with it. Even if he knows it's going to turn into an artifact, he'll just shove it in his bag of holding till late epic tier rolls around (if it ever does), and use the latest magic staff he found on an adventure in the meantime.

Your second solution - the artifact that "rolls over" and is replaced immediately by another artifact when it moves on - is CRAZY broken. The single balancing factor on artifacts is that they do move on. You don't get to have them for more than a couple levels, so they don't have a long-term impact. If the artifact is instantly replaced by another artifact every time, then that one balancing factor is removed and the Staff of Magius becomes ludicrously powerful.

No, not to cram anything into anything else. It's you have the basics for something that's built with the idea of balance, but you want to modify to fit your vision.

But the thing that's built with the idea of balance (artifacts) is wildly different from my vision. Modifying it to fit my vision requires so many changes that by the time I'm done, I can't count on that built-in balance working any more, so why bother?

But the point is once they DO stat up that stuff like that as a new class of item, it falls into the category of "Items people now expect WoTC to find the magical balance for" and "items players expect to see at some point because they're in a published book," instead of just being a cool new unique thing the DM threw into his campaign.

Pfft. When WotC released the Tome of Magic in 3.5E, did everyone suddenly expect to see incarnum users in everything? This would be a non-core supplement (the horror!), and traditionally stuff from non-core supplements doesn't show up in other published material, because you don't want to limit the audience for your latest adventure to folks who have the Minor Artifacts Handbook.

I suppose such a book would conflict with WotC's "everything is core" approach, but frankly I think that approach is silly and potentially destructive to the diversity of the game. There's room out there for more than one playstyle.

(Of course, those playstyles could be supported by 3PPs, but WotC more or less killed 3PP support for 4E with the GSL fiasco, so... yeah.)

I just don't personally see the need for a new rule when I already have what WoTC considers to be the optimally balanced idea for magic items. I can adjust from there as I see fit. I don't need a new rebalanced rule for every variation someone can think of.

WotC has rules for low-powered items and rules for artifacts. Neither does what I need done. That being the case, I homebrew, but I'd certainly like rules support from the pros and I'd be willing to shell out some money for it. Other people here seem to feel the same way. If enough people feel that way, we've got ourselves an untapped market.

If WotC doesn't feel that market is big enough to make a Minor Artifacts Handbook profitable, so be it; but their stated reasons for "why we can't publish this type of item" are silly. If you don't want the MAH, nobody's going to make you buy it.

 

[Tallifer]

You want something like a Staff of the Magius for one of your players. You want it to be more powerful than regular magic items. You want it to be his signature item from heroic tier through epic tier.

But if it was called an artifact which rolled over, that would be crazily broken?

 

[nightwyrm]

For signature items, you can always upgrade the item as the char levels. Instead of getting a new item of a higher level, the char's old item "evolves" or "gets reforged due to plot coupon". For a 3ed flavour, the new item can gain new properties/powers but doesn't lose the old one. Yes, the item would be a bit more powerful this way, but since what new properties the item gets is under the DM's control, you probably won't get anything game breaking.

 

[Dausuul]

You want something like a Staff of the Magius for one of your players. You want it to be more powerful than regular magic items. You want it to be his signature item from heroic tier through epic tier.

But if it was called an artifact which rolled over, that would be crazily broken?

See, here's the thing. Someone proposes working this item as a "rolling-over" artifact. I ask why. They say it's balanced that way. I reply that in order to make the concept work, they have stripped out the single balancing factor of artifacts.

So, I come back to asking... why? Why jump through all these hoops to pretend this is an artifact, when it's clearly not?

This is its own category of item. You can't just slot it into the "artifact" section of the D&D rules. It doesn't fit. It has to be balanced in a different way. That could mean giving the wielder a "level adjustment," or requiring the wielder to give up feats and powers, or simply making sure everyone in the party has one... there are a lot of possible solutions. But "call it an artifact" isn't one of them.

"I want a sailboat to go sailing."
"Here's a car."
"Why would I want a car?"
"It's less work to make it go."
"But a car would sink and wouldn't sail."
"Not if you waterproofed it, and attached a mast to the roof, and welded a keel to the underside."
"But making that go would require a huge amount of work."
"If you don't want to work to make it go, why do you want a sailboat?"

 

[keterys]

Out of curiosity... what did the staff of magius actually do in the books other than light and feather fall? I mean, if you make the assumption that the book characters use the inherent bonuses rules and suddenly Raistlin and the Staff of the Magius are all set, and furthermore Tanis can use Kith Kanan's sword forever, ditto Sturm the brightblade, anyone a dragonlance, etc cause the important part is that it's dragonbane or whatever, not that it's +1 and has to get to +5. Staff of the Magius can do light and feather fall, for the entire campaign, etc.

 

[Dausuul]

Out of curiosity... what did the staff of magius actually do in the books other than light and feather fall? I mean, if you make the assumption that the book characters use the inherent bonuses rules and suddenly Raistlin and the Staff of the Magius are all set, and furthermore Tanis can use Kith Kanan's sword forever, ditto Sturm the brightblade, anyone a dragonlance, etc cause the important part is that it's dragonbane or whatever, not that it's +1 and has to get to +5. Staff of the Magius can do light and feather fall, for the entire campaign, etc.

The scene at the end of "War of the Twins" implies that the Staff of Magius is what enables Raistlin to make it through the Portal, where Fistandantilus lost control of the magic and got blown to smithereens. Later, Caramon - who isn't even a wizard - uses the Staff, with Raistlin's help, to close the Portal.

So, if nothing else, it provides major bonuses to plane-traveling ritual magic.

It also has the indestructibility-except-by-dragonfire thing going on, which Raistlin uses to good effect a couple of times... though that's more a flavor element than anything else.

 

[keterys]

The scene at the end of "War of the Twins" implies that the Staff of Magius is what enables Raistlin to make it through the Portal, where Fistandantilus lost control of the magic and got blown to smithereens. Later, Caramon - who isn't even a wizard - uses the Staff, with Raistlin's help, to close the Portal.

Some of that could even just be cause it's Raistlin's implement, but sure.

It also has the indestructibility-except-by-dragonfire thing going on, which Raistlin uses to good effect a couple of times... though that's more a flavor element than anything else.

Fwiw, the DLC1 has it as a +3 ring of protection, +2 staff, 1/day feather fall, 1/day continual light, in a 6th+ mage it doubled durations of spells involving light, air, or mind, maintained concentration on spells for 1 round, and added +2 points of damage per die of spell damage.

Which is not that atypical for some of the older treasure, oddly, that tended to do lots of stuff. Like Wyrmslayer was a +1 weapon... that did double damage to dragons and draconians, was immune to baaz, gave +3 to breath weapon saves vs dragons, and made a buzzing noise. and Tika's ring was a +2 ring of prot and fire resistance.

So in terms of what it _actually_ did, I think the list might be pretty low.

 

[samursus]

Here's an idea that just popped in my head:

What if we use the Monster Builder to create these "in-between" Magic Items???

For example: Staff of Magius has been bandied about--- create a monster named as such, and choose powers (or create them, which is fairly easy) that the Staff has, and use the Recharge mechanic or at-wills or dailies etc. This hopefully would also give us an idea of how much of a difference the item will make re: Encounter Level... depending of the level of the "monster" created.

As an alternative how about using the Companion rules in DMG2 to create these items. The Dm would know roughly how much assistance the item will provide... and possibly may even warrant a cut of the XP, so players would have to choose between power/abilities on the item vs. their own level advancement...

PEACH