1. Magic items don't provide a bonus on attack rolls or saving throws. Instead, magic items do interesting things. A fiery sword, for instance, does fire damage and can light things aflame. It doesn't need a +3 to be awesome.
This is essentially how I want things. My old signature—Math
≠ Magic—stemmed from discussions of the idea back in the days between when we knew the new system was coming, but had yet to see any of the nuts and bolts.
I knew the +1 weapon was too sacred a cow to die, but to some degree I had hoped that it'd be the exception, rather than the rule: you can get a fiery sword
or a +1 sword (or more evocatively, a
sword of accuracy), and there's no such thing as a +2 or beyond.
No such luck.
(I do take consolation in the fact that, if they truly stick to their guns on not making the math bonuses expected, required, or essential in any way, that I can strip them out without consequence.)
… a magic weapon should make you better otherwise it isn't magic …
I firmly disagree. I'd say that a magic weapon should
be magical in some way, otherwise it isn't magic. A sword that makes your 16 strength character just as accurate and damaging as the next guy's 18 strength character using a non-magical sword is, from the perspective of characters in the universe, about as unmagical as it's possible to get. It's
invisible magic. Anyone not looking at your character sheet hasn't the slightest clue that your sword is more magical than his is.
A sword that's made of fire, or which glows when goblins are about, or speaks, or sings, or flies, or does your taxes is
clearly magical … and not one of those effects requires that it also makes your character marginally more likely to hit and grants a tiny extra bit of damage.