White Plume Mountain Revised is Up

[Dave Turner]

That's all well and good, Jester, but there still remains the silly "one step foward, two steps back" nature of the +5/-3 bonuses in the same item. Surely the great minds of game design at WotC could have come up with another balance mechanism that doesn't look so sloppy and clunky?

 

[MerricB]

That's all well and good, Jester, but there still remains the silly "one step foward, two steps back" nature of the +5/-3 bonuses in the same item. Surely the great minds of game design at WotC could have come up with another balance mechanism that doesn't look so sloppy and clunky?

It does have the advantage of being easy to apply.

Do you have any suggestions at to how a levelled weapon could be balanced?

Cheers!

 

[Crothian]

It does have the advantage of being easy to apply.

Do you have any suggestions at to how a levelled weapon could be balanced?

Cheers!

LEvel checks. Each power has a DC that the character has to make a level check to see if it can be used at that time.

 

[jester47]

The problem is that the WoL balancing mechanic (as well as the one put forth by the game mechanics) strives to put balance in an area that is up to the DM to balance. The only way to legitimately balance a leveled weapon is to not give out as much treasure. The only way to do this is for the DM to look at the party as a unit and determining that the party has the ammount of treasure for their level. An item like blackrazor should slow down the treasure aquisition because as the character advances and the weapon gets more powerful, the party's total wealth changes. WoL tries to regulate with a rule what the DM should simply be doing with common sense.

 

[jester47]

Slowed treasure aquisition actually makes sense as such a weapon as blackrazor would likely put the players on the move and attract all sorts of higher level attention! So the abiltity to hunt down and gain significant wealth would be hampered as the campaign becomes more of a "refugee" lifestyle.

 

[Bullgrit]

+3 sword, int 17, ego 16.
- on a killing stroke, Blackrazor adds the number of levels of the dead foe to the bearer's levels (in terms of fighting ability), and the bearer temporarily gains the full hp of the dead victim. These bonuses last a number of turns equal to the number of levels received.
- Speech and telepathy (common, and whatever tongues the bearer knows)
- Detects living creatures 60'r
- Haste spell (bearer only, 10 rounds), 1/day
- 100% magic resistance to charm and fear (modified by caster's level)
[edit: also CN alignment?]

Why can't designers just do a straight translation:
+3 sword, Int 17, Wis 10, Cha 17, Ego 16
- On a killing stroke (reducing the victim to -10 hit points or less), Blackrazor adds the victim's HD to its wielder's HD for determining BAB, and grants the wielder the victim's full hit points as temporary hit points. These effects lasts for 10 minutes per HD of the victim.
- Speech and telepathy (Common and whatever languages the bearer knows)
- Detects the presence of living creatures within 60' (use the detect undead spell for reference, but for living creatures rather than undead)
- Haste spell (bearer only, as 10th-level caster), 1/day
- Spell Resistance 32 against charm and fear spells and spell-like effects

This is one thing that has annoyed me about how the designers "translate" old stuff to the new system. Translations are really not that difficult, or require so much twisting to fit. My translation may be flawed in a couple places, but I only spent 10 minutes writing it up. A little more thought could clean it up.

I say translate the stuff straight as is; if it is unbalanced, let it stand. If Tomb of Horrors or White Plume Mountain is terribly unbalanced, translate it straight and let it stand.

Bullgrit

 

[JimAde]

Why can't designers just do a straight translation:
<snip>
- Haste spell (bearer only, as 10th-level caster), 1/day
<snip>

In this case, I think it really is different. I suspect the 10 rounds don't have to be consecutive.

 

[jester47]

I say translate the stuff straight as is; if it is unbalanced, let it stand. If Tomb of Horrors or White Plume Mountain is terribly unbalanced, translate it straight and let it stand.

Yeah, weren't these supposed to be tournament mods anyways? Wouln't that make them very difficult? I have the same peeve. Do it direct. Rules based balance only works for things like character abilities.

 

[francisca]

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20051207a

I'm downloading as I type this.
I've never read this one before, so it should be interesting.

Thanks for the link.

 

[HeapThaumaturgist]

Wow. I find that people are REALLY resistant to new ideas in RPGs.

I really like WoL, myself. My Bbn/Clr already makes a few attacks a day (buffed to the gills) at +11 or more at 5th level. -1 to attacks isn't a huge deal. I'd rather have that than have to dip into a PrC with 0.75BAB progression that smokes my Smite (+1 Dmg/Clr lvl) etc. By 20th level, -10hp is the same as having to dip into something that has a 1-step smaller die.

As for "the GM aught to balance it". Man, I'd hate to be customer service or anybody on a messageboard trying to help people after that. Alot of GMs, some not so new to the hobby, might not realize exactly how unbelievably overpowered they will make a single PC by handing him the sword "as-is". Even if the abilities pop up as time goes on, how does the party handle distribution of wealth?

"Bob has Blackrazor and although it's only a +2 Greatsword this level, Bob, you don't get any share of the loot because it's going to be really SWEET by level 20."

Or does Bob get a share and Blackrazor? Does every GM on the planet have to play the balancing game of making everybody feel special even when one character has effective loot twice that of everybody else in the party?

Alot of us like balance. Personally, if a GM forced me to bring in a 1st level PC in a 12th level game ... I'd quit. Sure I might level up quickly, but god, what fun is it playing out half a dozen sessions one hit from death while I scurry from hiding place to hiding place "XP Draining" the party while adding absolutely nothing of any utility? While that might work for one GM with one group, if that were the RAW nobody would want to play the game.

I also like balanced translations. I played a translated 1st ed module that didn't take any balance into consideration. It just about destroyed the group. My character picked up a really expensive item, nobody else had one, one immature player just couldn't handle the disparity, the GM tried to make things right by adding loot for other characters. It was really hellish and just spiraled out of control. It was a really great GM, and a pretty good group. One odd-man-out, who could have skated by as a mild distraction RAW, just brought everything to a screeching halt. I'd have much much rather picked up a much smaller piece of treasure instead of a true translation heeling to the Everything Goes encounter style of older editions. "If you have a player smart enough to figure this out, his character gets to be as a god among mortals." type action.

--fje