D&D General Weapons should break left and right

[Lanefan]

You really are missing the point, aren’t you. The reason there are a lot of magic swords in the DMG is that most of them are ripped off from literature.

Well, that and the game has always wanted to emulate either sword-and-sandal or knight in shining armour conceits, both of which have swords as their primary weapon.

But the only reason there are a lot of magic swords in your home game is that your DM has no creativity.

Ultimately true but not all DMs are willing to make that degree of change to the items list, even in spite of...

The DMG does not only allow DMs to create their own magic items, it actively encourages them to do so.

...this.

If you write an adventure yourself, you tailor it to suit the party. If you write an adventure for publication you tailor it to a generic party, with the expectation that the DM will adjust it to suit.

If I write an adventure myself I still tailor it to a generic party, and let the party that actually goes through it sort things out for themselves. And yes that means they might find a suit of +3 plate that only fits a Gnome regardless of whether they've any Gnomes in the party that can use such.

 

[GrimCo]

Important to remember that "your group" includes the GM. They have to have fun too.

3/5 of us rotate as DM. Things like that are decided unanimously at group level. If DM wants to do inventory resource management and players don't, then it's bad fit and difference in playstyle and game expectations.

I've played paintball a few times, and when I did, I paid FAR more attention to my environment in all direction than I normally do. When in "danger" humans are just plain more alert, and dungeons are a lot of danger from all directions.

And that's just paintball. I did tour in sandpit. Nothing fancy, regular infantry. But boy, any time we left base, everyone was hyper alert and scanning around. Even on base, alertness was way higher than back home. When you are in hostile environment, you tend to pay attention to things that could potentialy end you.

When it comes to swords, they are dominant cause they are perceived as heroes weapon. Also, might have to do with phallic shape, better ask old dr.Sigmund about that part. It's symbol of nobility and knighthood. Same thing with samurai and katanas. For both european knight and japanese samurai, sword was mark of status and backup weapon, but trough art, it became their trademark.

 

[James Gasik]

Wizard money making scheme #1

Step 1: be 7th level.

Step 2: acquire the spell fabricate.

Step 3: acquire (or conjure!) a large amount of raw materials.*

Step 4: cast fabricate to convert materials into saleable goods.**

Step 5: Profit!

*this was easier when you had access to wall of iron, but wall of stone can create stone from nowhere, so there are still possibilities.

**in 5e, you do need proficiency in the proper tools to do this. But you can gain this proficiency with downtime, so...

Most DM's will crack down on this trick- Pathfinder 1e infamously made wall of iron somehow worthless for anything other than being said wall, lol. But you could still easily turn raw ore or gems into valuable items with fabricate.

 

[Hussar]

Well, that and the game has always wanted to emulate either sword-and-sandal or knight in shining armour conceits, both of which have swords as their primary weapon.

Ultimately true but not all DMs are willing to make that degree of change to the items list, even in spite of...

...this.

If I write an adventure myself I still tailor it to a generic party, and let the party that actually goes through it sort things out for themselves. And yes that means they might find a suit of +3 plate that only fits a Gnome regardless of whether they've any Gnomes in the party that can use such.

I know right? It's almost like randomly generated treasure doesn't exist in the game...

"Swords are very dominant in D&D."

"Nuh uh. A DM can change any sword to any other weapon."

"But, that's the point. The initial default is going to be a sword very, very often."

"Doesn't matter. The DM can change it."

"Well, yes, that's true. But, if swords weren't the default then the DM wouldn't need to change it, right?"

"No, you just don't understand. The DM can change anything."

:wow:

I must admit though, I don't think I've ever seen such a perfect illustration of the Oberoni Fallacy.

 

[Hussar]

Just to give a little perspective here.

I dug out my Encylopedia Magica books - I have all 4. These are the pretty thorough listings of all magic items published up to 1994 (well, probably 1993). They're wonderful books and I love them to pieces.

Polearms - as a section- include AFAIK, every single polearm, trident, bident, whatnot, published for D&D to that date. 7 pages. 840-847 (and that includes one full page art spread). Spears cover a whopping 4 pages (pages 1128-1132) Swords start on page 1335 and run to page 1415. Eighty PAGES of nothing but magic swords.

IOW, there's probably more published magic swords in the Encyclopedia Magica than all other weapons combined.

Tell me again how swords aren't given the prime seat at the table.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

"Well, yes, that's true. But, if swords weren't the default then the DM wouldn't need to change it, right?"

You think that if Lucerne hammers were the default the DM wouldn't have to change it!?

You have to have a default in order to write adventures for an unknown band of adventurers. Sword is as good as anything else, since whatever it is, the DM will change it.

"Swords are very dominant in D&D."
"Nuh uh. A DM can change any sword to any other weapon."

Yeah, you are still missing the point here. Swords were dominant in the DMG because Gygax copy-pastaed the magic items list from fiction and mythology, not because he wanted them to be compulsory. But what what is dominant in D&D is whatever the DM happens to like. If the DM is lazy then it will be the placeholder default.