Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dausuul" data-source="post: 5025389" data-attributes="member: 58197">Same reason I don't want to use a chainsaw to mow the lawn. It's overkill and not the best tool for the job.Artifacts are designed to make an appearance for a couple levels, then disappear again. Furthermore, they require a lot of DM involvement to track how happy the artifact is with its PC wielder. They're as much NPCs as magic items.I'd like a book of items that can become PCs' signature items. Think Raistlin with the Staff of Magius, or Aragorn with Anduril. (I was going to say Elric with Stormbringer, but with its sentient and semi-independent nature, Stormbringer might be better modeled as a full-scale artifact.) Such things would need to be more powerful and versatile than the standard run of magic items. At the same time, I don't want something that I as DM must constantly monitor - I want to be able to hand the item to the player, then let the player worry about the mechanics.In AD&D, such things were simply regular items at the top end of the power scale, like the staff of the magi and the +5 holy avenger. AD&D could take that approach because it was assumed that players couldn't simply go out and buy any item they had the cash for, and the item creation rules were 90% DM fiat.3E set out to codify item creation and wealth by level, as well as providing support for magic items as fungible commodities. However, that model left no room for the unique big-ticket "signature item." If you gave a mid-level 3E fighter a +5 vorpal sword, the response was seldom, "Wow, this sword is awesome! I'm going to use it forever!" Much more likely, you'd see, "Wow, this sword is worth a freakin' fortune! I sell it for 100,000 gold, then buy myself a +4 sword, +4 full plate, a +4 periapt of health, and a +6 belt of giant strength!"So 3E introduced minor artifacts, in between normal magic items and full-bore artifacts like the Hand of Vecna. Minor artifacts existed outside the regular continuum of magic items - you couldn't craft them and they had no listed gold piece value - but they didn't carry the plot baggage that major artifacts did. It wasn't a perfect solution, mostly because it didn't address how such items would affect PC power level and it punted on the question of what happens when the PC wants to sell one. But it did provide a way to keep such specialty items in the game.4E currently lacks such a category, which I think is unfortunate. I remember when they released Raistlin's stats for the Character Builder, I looked at 4E's version of the Staff of Magius and thought, "What the heck? That's the most pathetic Staff of Magius I've ever seen." But they didn't have much choice; either they gave Raistlin an outright artifact, which would disappear a few levels later instead of staying with him throughout his career, or they gave him a crappy regular low-level magic staff.</blockquote>

Verification