What's so great about Shuriken?

[CombatWombat51]

I've heavily modified monks IMC, and there's no such things at special monk weapons anymore. As I was busy getting rid of those wacky monk weapons like sianghams, I went over shuriken with the intention of just renaming them "throwing knives". I read the description again, and got to thinking, and I compared them to a dagger. The shuriken does 2 sizes smaller damage, doesn't crit as often, can't be used in melee, takes a feat to use, and grants Quick Draw for free with them.

Why on earth would a character not just take Quick Draw instead of EWP: Shuriken, and throw daggers? Those simple weapons seem vastly superior to the that exotic one. Besides, Quick Draw even has uses outside of throwing daggers, while EWP doesn't.

Unless I'm missing something huge, shuriken just suck. However, I'm still interested in salvaging the weapon, and this is where you guys come in. Say I change shuriken to 1d3 damage, make them crit on 19/x2, and maybe increase the range to 15 or 20 feet. And call it martial. Would that be worthwhile in a campaign that doesn't have monks? Any suggestions on those changes, or some different changes?

 

[Tsyr]

Well, some of those monk weapons aren't so wacky...

But I think if I remember right you can throw three shuiken at one time.

 

[Wormwood]

Since Monks get the profiiency for free, the fact that Shuriken are treated as ammunition (effective Quick draw among other benefits), they are quite useful.

But essentially you are correct, they are only useful for core Monks. Once you remove them from the Monk list, they stop being special.

 

[CombatWombat51]

But I think if I remember right you can throw three shuiken at one time.

You could throw three shuriken with one attack roll in 3.0, but not 3.5. I briefly considered going back to that, but I don't like it because of the whole book of rules it entails, and the idea is too Hollywood-ninja-mammal for my tastes.

 

[Tsyr]

Actually, since the usefulness of shurikens as a whole is mostly hollywood hype, I don't see how it makes a hell of a lot of difference.

For what it's worth, within the scope of how difficult it is to do anything with a shurikan, it's not that much harder to throw three than one.

 

[Wombat]

In the Real World (tm) shuriken are mainly an annoyance and a nuisance -- they force a lot of people to blink and/or flinch, maybe even duck back around some cover, but do very little damage (with the rare exception of poisoned ones, but in the Real World (tm) that is much more difficult than in games). Consider them to be more like flying caltrops than anything else.

Of course D&D has very, very little to do with the Real World (tm), ergo anything goes.

 

[Klaus]

The advantage of shuriken in 3.5 (to monks, at least) is that the monk can throw shuriken using flurry of blows, which means a Monk20 can throw 5 shuriken with a full-round action. And since shuriken are treated as ammunition in regards to enchantments, they can be made into +1 lawful shuriken 50-at-a-time, for instance.

In my upcoming game, I altered some monk weapons. All that is needed are 1d6 damage, 20/x2 critical weapons, at least one slashing, one piercing and one bludgeoning, so a monk can benefit of the special monk abilities with them. Turning a kama into a "martial scythe", a siangham into a "butterfly sword" and a sai into a "parrying katar" is just cosmetic, and helps divorce the class from its oriental roots.

 

[CombatWombat51]

In the Real World (tm) shuriken are mainly an annoyance and a nuisance -- they force a lot of people to blink and/or flinch, maybe even duck back around some cover...

I'm picturing a 3" blade (for Medium creatures), and, while I have no idea from experience or texts, I think I'd do more than flinch if one got stuck in me. Like whimper, cuss, and bleed

Nice name, BTW

Thanks for all the replies folks, but keep in mind that I am renaming them "throwing knives"... I'm not so much looking for Real World (TM) effectiveness of shuriken, as much as I'm looking for balance in transforming them into something useful in terms of the rules

 

[LGodamus]

well the word shuriken actually describes in real life any sort of thrown blade smaller than a short sword . So a throwing knife would be called a shuriken. most people only think of stars , but there were actually many types of shuriken most were 4 pointed diamond shaped discs but some were straight pointed metal spikes or sharp edged small knives and even the hokey flea market eight pointed ones.

 

[Ace]

The advantage of shuriken in 3.5 (to monks, at least) is that the monk can throw shuriken using flurry of blows, which means a Monk20 can throw 5 shuriken with a full-round action. And since shuriken are treated as ammunition in regards to enchantments, they can be made into +1 lawful shuriken 50-at-a-time, for instance.

In my upcoming game, I altered some monk weapons. All that is needed are 1d6 damage, 20/x2 critical weapons, at least one slashing, one piercing and one bludgeoning, so a monk can benefit of the special monk abilities with them. Turning a kama into a "martial scythe", a siangham into a "butterfly sword" and a sai into a "parrying katar" is just cosmetic, and helps divorce the class from its oriental roots.

Thats a good way to do that

I went a little further-- Monk weapons IMC are Dagger, Shortsword (slashing) and Stick/Club and oh yeah Staff and Shuriken

Gives monks kind of an Arnis de Mano feel which I like

Of course I went a little further and allowed monk weapons to do the same damage as Unarmed combat i.e. x/x2 crit.

This makes monks more likely to use weapons than fists but IMO will have no game balance effects since I allow hands to be enchanted (with a feat from AU) and the Unorthodox Flurry feat (from Dragon) as well

OK on topic -- Shuriken are generally useless in 3.5 except for Monks I woudn't change that, Shuriken are generally worthless in real life

I do give them as a bonus weapons to a couple of classes though mostly Elven Shadar (Assassins more or less) I am considering Rogues and Unfettered as well but am still on the fence about that