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Shadowknight12
2011-06-01, 02:13 PM
I am very prone to simply creating things from scratch when what I have is not exactly what I need, and I needed a way to make a permanent antimagic cell and neutralise spellcasters easily. The main special material I would like critique on is Cursed Lead. The Spellwarped materials are of less importance. For reference, I used Adamantium, Cold Iron, Alchemical Silver, Byeshk and Riedran Crysteel. All of these materials replace metal and cannot be used in place of wood.

Are the prices reasonable? Assume Aberrations are found in droves, throngs, armies and with more frequency than any other kind of possible enemy.


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{table=4,30]Material|Hardness|Hit Points|Cost
Spellwarped Steel|10|30/inch|
---Ammunition|||x2, +10%, +120GP
---Light Weapon|||x2, +10%, +2000GP
---One-Handed Weapon (or one head of a double weapon)|||x2, +10%, +4000GP
---Two-Handed Weapon (or two heads of a double weapon)|||x2, +10%, +8000GP
---Light Armour|||+3000GP
---Medium Armour|||+6000GP
---Heavy Armour|||+9000GP
---Shield|||+3000GP
Spellwarped Silver|8|10/inch|
---Ammunition|||+10GP
---Weapon|||+250GP
---Light Armour|||x2, +10%, +20000GP
---Medium Armour|||x2, +10%, +22500GP
---Heavy Armour|||x2, +10%, +25000GP
---Shield|||x2, +30000GP
Spellwarped Wood|9|5/inch|
---Item made mostly of wood|||+20GP/pound
Cursed Lead|15|30/inch|
---Ammunition|||x5, +200GP
---Light Weapon|||x5, +1000GP
---One-Handed Weapon (or one head of a double weapon)|||x5, +2000GP
---Two-Handed Weapon (or two heads of a double weapon)|||x5, +4000GP
---Light Armour|||x5, +3000GP
---Medium Armour|||x5, +6000GP
---Heavy Armour|||x5, +9000GP
---Shield|||x5, +3000GP[/table]

Spellwarped Steel

Found in areas affected by the Spellwarp (great concentrations of magic in a single location), as spellwarped iron, it can be forged like ordinary iron into steel. Apart from an iridescent glow that shifts hues and a tendency to produce strange supernatural effects at random intervals (odd sounds, minor elemental manifestations, temporary illusions, arcane whispers and the like), it is otherwise indistinguishable from ordinary steel.

Weapons fashioned from such a material automatically bypass the Damage Resistance and Regeneration of all aberrations and creatures with weakness to magic. They also deal 2d8 extra damage to such creatures.

Armour fashioned from such a material provides a DR of 2/- (for light armour), 4/- (for medium armour) or 6/- (for heavy armour) versus aberrations or creatures with weakness to magic.

Shields fashioned from such a material provide a +4 to saving throws versus effects whose source is an aberration or a creature with weakness to magic.

Spellwarped Silver

Found in areas affected by the Spellwarp, it can be refined through an alchemical process and made to coat weapons, armour and shields of ordinary steel to grant the metal potent powers. Apart from suffering from the same supernatural manifestations commonly found in Spellwarped Steel (see above), Spellwarped Silver does not shift hues, but it glows faintly in the dark with a soft light of its own (dim illumination in a 5-foot radius) that can be suppressed by covering it with heavy cloth or the like.

Weapons fashioned from such a material automatically bypass the Damage Resistance and Regeneration of all aberrations and creatures with weakness to magic, as well as those of creatures whose DR or Regeneration can be bypassed with silver. Weapons made of Spellwarped silver carry an innate -2 penalty to damage due to the material's natural dullness.

Armour and shields fashioned from such a material have their Arcane Spell Failure chance reduced by 20%, to a minimum of 0%.

Armour made of spellwarped silver provides a +1 to caster level and a -4 to saves against spells, spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities.

Shields made of spellwarped silver allow the wearer, once per day, to retain a memorised spell or used spell slot of 6th level or lower. This item works as a Pearl of Power in all other regards, except it also allows spontaneous casters to recall used spell slots. Furthermore, a shield fashioned of such a material also imposes a -4 to saves against spells, spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities.

The penalties to saves from spellwarped silver, being untyped, stack with themselves and any other type of penalty to saves.

Spellwarped Wood

Found in areas touched by the Spellwarp, this light wood is often used to make staves and bucklers. Apart from suffering from the same supernatural manifestations commonly found in Spellwarped Steel (see above), Spellwarped Wood shifts hues and thrums faintly at all times. It also changes textures several times a day.

Items made of Spellwarped Wood weigh only half as much as a normal wooden item of that type.

Weapons made of Spellwarped Wood automatically bypass the Damage Resistance and Regeneration of all aberrations and creatures with weakness to magic.

Cursed Lead

Uncommon, but never found in areas touched by the Spellwarp, this dullish gray metal seems to dampen light, sound, flavour, smells and colour around it. It is anathema to magic of all kinds, Items made of Cursed Lead weigh twice as much as their iron or steel counterparts. Creatures cannot use magic (spells, spell-like abilities or supernatural abilities) while touching an object or sheet of Cursed Lead with their naked flesh. They must clothe their limbs if they wish to handle the metal without temporarily losing their magical abilities. Cursed Lead counts as normal lead for the purposes of blocking divinations and other magical effects. Cursed Lead is extremely hard to work into proper equipment, and as such it is almost prohibitively expensive.

Cursed Lead cannot be affected by magic (it is considered to have an unbeatable Spell Resistance, it can make saving throws as though it was an attended magical item, and automatically succeeds on saving throws versus spells, spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities). This means that it cannot be enchanted or affected by spells such as Magic Weapon or similar. It can be created by instantaneous magical effects (such as Minor Creation, Major Creation and True Creation). If a location is completely enclosed by Cursed Lead of at least one inch of thickness, its interior is considered to be under the effects of a permanent Antimagic Field, but it cannot be dispelled by Disjunction or any other type of non-epic magic. Epic magic affects the Antimagic Field effect normally. A square foot of Cursed Lead (one inch thick) costs 10 GP. A 10-by-10-by-10 room would cost 6000 GP to cover with Cursed Lead. If a door or window is opened in the room, thereby breaking the continuity of the Cursed Lead, the Antimagic Field effect is suspended until the door, window or the like is closed again.

Weapons made of Cursed Lead deal an extra 1d12 damage to creatures with the ability to cast spells or use supernatural or spell-like abilities. They also bypass resistance and regeneration as though they were magic weapons. Creatures wounded by a Cursed Lead weapon (must have received at least 1 point of damage from a successful attack with such a weapon) cannot cast spells or use spell-like or supernatural abilities for 1 round if they fail a Fortitude save (DC 10 + half of the wielder's HD + wielder's choice of her Strength or Dexterity modifier). Weapons made of cursed lead can only receive the following enchantments: +1, +2, +3, +4, +5, +6, +7, +8, +9, +10, Keen, Impact, Wounding and Vorpal. Other exceptions at DM discretion.

The wielder of a weapon made of Cursed Lead ignores the following effects on her target when making an attack, as long as their nature is magical (caused by spells, mysteries, manoeuvres, supernatural abilities or spell-like abilities): Concealment, miss chance, bonuses to AC, damage resistance, temporary HP, immunity to a specific kind of damage, energy immunity, illusory doubles (such as those created by the Mirror Image spell), incorporeality and etherealness. Attacks made with a Cursed Lead weapon do not trigger magical effects (such as Contigency).

Armour made of Cursed Lead increases the wearer's Spell Resistance by 5 points. This can affect Spell Resistance from any origin (base race, template, spell, item or even the Spell Resistance enchantment placed on the very same armour), but it can only affect one at a time. The wearer may change what type of SR it affects as a free action. Armour made of cursed lead can only receive the following enchantments: +1, +2, +3, +4, +5, +6, +7, +8, +9, +10, Fortification and Spell Resistance (modified as it follows: Light Armour: 10 + wielder's HD. Medium Armour: 13 + wielder's HD. Heavy Armour: 16 + wielder's HD).

Shields made of Cursed Lead provide a +4 bonus to saving throws versus spells, spell-like abilities or supernatural abilities. Shields made of cursed lead can only receive the following enchantments: +1, +2, +3, +4, +5, +6, +7, +8, +9, +10 and Bashing.

Glimbur
2011-06-01, 07:14 PM
My inner metallurgist is upset, but let's stick to game mechanics.

Spellwarped steel is better for fighting aberrations than spellwarped crystal, because the +HDd4 damage is very helpful. The price should probably reflect that, a flat +2 damage is less good so I would make the crystal cheaper than the steel.

Spellwarped Silver is a little better than regular silver but the -2 to damage and loss of the HDd4 damage means that it will be used for a backup weapon, or regular silver could be used instead.

Cursed Lead is useful for manacles, bolas, and other things for inconveniencing spellcasters and such. 60,000 is a lot of money. How good does the seal on the room of Cursed Lead need to be to keep the AMF? Suffocating spellcasters is a valid way to kill them, but it seems overly expensive. Can items made out of Cursed Lead be enchanted? They shouldn't be able to be, by the fluff, but I didn't see a specific rule in the text. If they can be enchanted the no-save suppression of spells and SLA's makes this an excellent primary weapon. I might make that somehow resistable, possibly a caster level check versus the hit dice of the wielder +10.

Seerow
2011-06-01, 07:44 PM
One question: What reason is there for any caster ever to not want to wear Spellwarped Silver Armor? No ASF AND a +1 caster level for 5000-10,000 gp seems really cheap. I'd start picking up spellwarped silver armor even on mages who don't want or need armor, just for the casterlevel boost.

The spellwarped weapon benefits all seem pretty niche, but that's about standard for most special materials. I would look into the balance between them though, because spellwarped steel beats the others hands down. If that's the intention, why not just combine them into one material:

Spellwarped Metal
-When used in a weapon, bypass regeneration of aberations and deal xd4 damage
-When used in armor reduce ASF 10%, provides DR vs Aberrations, and can be used to boost caster level for x rounds per day
-When used in a shield, reduce ASF 10%, and can be used as a pearl of power of x level once per day.

ie, rather than having 3 different materials that are nearly identical but with each being better for one item type, merge them into one material that has different uses in different items.


Cursed Lead armor is either going to be extremely strong, when it first comes available, or exceedingly weak at higher levels. If you get a suit of heavy armor made out of cursed lead as soon as it's available, you're nearly invulnerable, but around level 13-17, the armor becomes useless and you may as well make it into something else.

I like the shielding a room option for it, but it is pretty expensive to do so. You could probably cut the price by 10 or 20 (ie down to 5-10gp per square foot) and still be fine, given the cubic nature of warding areas.

Also, Glimbur beat me to it, but can cursed lead be enchanted? If so, it's pretty decent for shields/weapons, even if the armor is kind of iffy, but if not, it's not anywhere near worth ever getting as more than a backup weapon.

Though, I imagine most people would have a backup cursed lead weapon just to **** with mages, who really should get some sort of save to keep their ability to cast.. in exchange you can make the weapon capable of bypassing spell defenses (ie won't set off contingencies, will go through mage armor, etc)

Kyrinthic
2011-06-02, 08:54 AM
These are all clearly better than any other material in any book, that said, Here are individual thoughts:

Spellwarped Steel:
+d4/hd is a lot of free damage from a material, Its more damage than any weapon mod of pretty much any value. Also I am assuming its by HD of the enemy not the wielder, but thats not entirely clear from the text.
Anyone not using this in their weapon is a sucker.

DR 10/- vs 90% of the enemys in the game by your description is pretty huge, again, any melee not using this is going to die, or the ones that are are going to be invincible.

Spellwarped Silver:
Weapons are good, but not nearly as good as spellwarped steel. Maybe someone will use them if they are handed to them with big magical bonuses, maybe.

Armor, any mage not using a chain shirt and buckler of this stuff is a sucker.

Spellwarped Crystal:
Better than silver, worse than steel, someone might use it in a pinch, but no-one will want it if they can get steel.

Shields are a good option from silver for mages, an extra spell slot is very nice, makes a hard trade for a +1 caster level.

Cursed Lead:
Weapon ability with no counter to stop enemys from casting is plain broken. Even unenchanted, the extra damage die makes up for weapon properties, and it breaks any spell resistance as long as the enemy is someone you want to use the sword on anyhow. If its enchantable, it gets even crazier.
Build a reach weapon with this property, get a good initiative mod, maybe grab mage slayer feats for added fun, and just about turn the tiers upside down.

Armor is not so good. And making the SR based on armor type means its more or less useful for them. By the time a character can come up with 3-4k for light armor, never mind enchanted armor (if thats possible), SR 15 wont do much for them. The heavier is slightly better, but overall pretty weak.

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So, suggestions to even them up:
D4 damage per HD has to go, its just not in the ballpark for a weapon property to add 20-30 damage to every swing at mid levels. Change it do maybe 2d6 max. Or make it 1 point of con damage or something if you want it to be very powerful still and scale with hd.

Silver needs some other weapon property, or it needs to be cheaper, or the other types need to be more expensive.

Lead weapons need an opposed roll for their effect, a character should not be able to suit up with steel armor and a lead weapon and deal with things twice their CR with no worries about spell like abilities.

Lead armor needs a boost, give it a +5 or 10 bonus to SR gained other ways maybe, or a flat %miss chance vs spells

Overall, if your goal was the ensure that players NEED special material weapons and armors to play on the same field as players with them, you have succeeded.

Shadowknight12
2011-06-02, 12:39 PM
My inner metallurgist is upset, but let's stick to game mechanics.

I find it hilariously ludicrous to make anything meant to be hit over and over out of crystal, but eh, I was running out ideas and there was Riedran Crysteel (or was it Deep Crystal?) right there.


Spellwarped steel is better for fighting aberrations than spellwarped crystal, because the +HDd4 damage is very helpful. The price should probably reflect that, a flat +2 damage is less good so I would make the crystal cheaper than the steel.

Spellwarped Silver is a little better than regular silver but the -2 to damage and loss of the HDd4 damage means that it will be used for a backup weapon, or regular silver could be used instead.

Lowered the prices of both sp. silver and sp. crystal. The idea is to make regular alchemical silver still appealing by virtue of being cheaper and offering less of a penalty to damage.


Cursed Lead is useful for manacles, bolas, and other things for inconveniencing spellcasters and such. 60,000 is a lot of money. How good does the seal on the room of Cursed Lead need to be to keep the AMF? Suffocating spellcasters is a valid way to kill them, but it seems overly expensive. Can items made out of Cursed Lead be enchanted? They shouldn't be able to be, by the fluff, but I didn't see a specific rule in the text. If they can be enchanted the no-save suppression of spells and SLA's makes this an excellent primary weapon. I might make that somehow resistable, possibly a caster level check versus the hit dice of the wielder +10.

Yes, manacles and the like are definitely what I had in mind for cursed lead. I was pondering on making chains and manacles available for purchase, but I couldn't figure out a way to price them. Any ideas on that regard?

Also, yes, 60K GP is, in fact, a lot of money. Antimagic cells aren't supposed to be cheap. A proper castle or palace would have, at most, three or four. Is that still beyond what a king or wealthy lord could afford? The 60K comes from basic calculation. 6 walls, times 10 ft times 10 ft, times 100GP. The seal need not be exceedingly good. All that matters is that the doors are lined with the lead as well, so that when they close, there is a continuity between the lead in the walls/floor and the one on the door (which means that slipping a sheet of paper or a bit of cloth between the door and the frame effectively prevents the AMF effect). Of course, the lead need not be visible. Once the structure is set, the lead can be covered in stone, wood or any other form of decoration.

I had actually not thought at all about enchanting cursed lead materials. Fluff-wise, I'd be tempted to say no, but that would relegate the use of cursed lead to arrows, thrown weapons and the occasional crazy build that doesn't need the weapon to be enchanted (going on a limb here and remembering Kensai from CW). And that would make cursed lead very situational, when my goal is to make it appealing. On the other hand, common sense. Cursed lead is basically antimagicium. It makes no sense to do magical things. I could stomach a basic +1, +2, etc enchantments, since I can just say that they're treated with special oils and sharpened with the best of the best materials, but I can't really explain any of the more overtly magical features. Hmmm. I'll have to give this greater thought.

The problem with making this possible to save against is that casters are good. Like, really really really good. Just hitting them with a weapon is going to be a true feat to accomplish (getting TO the caster, then bypassing cover, concealment, miss chances, mirror images, illusions, hilariously high ACs, etherealness, etc). Giving them a chance to resist this on top? Whether it's a save or a caster level check, odds are the caster is going to succeed it.


One question: What reason is there for any caster ever to not want to wear Spellwarped Silver Armor? No ASF AND a +1 caster level for 5000-10,000 gp seems really cheap. I'd start picking up spellwarped silver armor even on mages who don't want or need armor, just for the casterlevel boost.

That's actually what I'm going for. I want casters to feel very, very strongly tempted to pick up sp. silver armour. Instead of spending their gold in scrolls, wands, buying spells to add to their spellbooks and other items, I want them to sink gold into armour that they don't really need for a bonus that may or may not be worth the cost. And what's more, if they feel tempted to enchant it further, the costs begin to ramp up considerably.


The spellwarped weapon benefits all seem pretty niche, but that's about standard for most special materials. I would look into the balance between them though, because spellwarped steel beats the others hands down. If that's the intention, why not just combine them into one material:

Spellwarped Metal
-When used in a weapon, bypass regeneration of aberations and deal xd4 damage
-When used in armor reduce ASF 10%, provides DR vs Aberrations, and can be used to boost caster level for x rounds per day
-When used in a shield, reduce ASF 10%, and can be used as a pearl of power of x level once per day.

ie, rather than having 3 different materials that are nearly identical but with each being better for one item type, merge them into one material that has different uses in different items.

Hah, funny you should say that, but that's how spellwarped metal began, until I realised that it was just too good, and that it really needed to be more "niche" and specialised. Instead of having a catch-all material that is just all around good and has no drawbacks, I decided to make it several materials, each with their own kind of benefits and balanced by some drawbacks (mainly, cost, but also damage or brittleness).


Cursed Lead armor is either going to be extremely strong, when it first comes available, or exceedingly weak at higher levels. If you get a suit of heavy armor made out of cursed lead as soon as it's available, you're nearly invulnerable, but around level 13-17, the armor becomes useless and you may as well make it into something else.

Yes, that's what I was pondering earlier today. I like the idea of armour that gives SR, to give casters pause, but having static numbers causes the type of scenario you just outlined. And making it something like 16+HD (or even 21+HD, since casters can hit that number without much hassle) would favour high HD races, mainly, monsters (whether they're NPCs or PCs). Something vaguely humanoid with a slew of HD and some class levels would benefit immensely from such a type of armour. And conversely, it would hurt characters with LA.


I like the shielding a room option for it, but it is pretty expensive to do so. You could probably cut the price by 10 or 20 (ie down to 5-10gp per square foot) and still be fine, given the cubic nature of warding areas.

Hmmm, so a 10-by-10-by-10 antimagic cell would be worth 3000-6000GP? I have no idea how wealthy a kingdom or vassal lord is supposed to be, but I suppose that would make antimagic cells more commonplace, and that's a good thing. Price reduced.


Also, Glimbur beat me to it, but can cursed lead be enchanted? If so, it's pretty decent for shields/weapons, even if the armor is kind of iffy, but if not, it's not anywhere near worth ever getting as more than a backup weapon.

Since I've yet to have a player who doesn't play a caster, a rogue or something out of ToB, I'm curious as to why weapon enchantments (other than the +X type) matter that much. I am honestly on the fence on this subject. Is there anything that can be added to the weapon (or perhaps the price lowered?) that can make up for a lack of enchantments beyond the +X type?


Though, I imagine most people would have a backup cursed lead weapon just to **** with mages, who really should get some sort of save to keep their ability to cast.. in exchange you can make the weapon capable of bypassing spell defenses (ie won't set off contingencies, will go through mage armor, etc)

That's actually an excellent idea. I've added an addendum about bypassing magical protections. On the subject of saves: should they really? Even if the attacker can get to the mage and bypass all their protections, who's to say that they can't just buff themselves up so much that they auto-pass any save? And even if I state that the save does not gain the benefit of magical buffs, how would you set the DC? Static? That would cause a similar problem to the armour. A DC of 10+wielder's Str+half of the wielder's HD makes sense at first glance, but I'm not sure if it's all that balanced.


These are all clearly better than any other material in any book, that said, Here are individual thoughts:

Yes, and as a consequence, they're (as far as I know) more expensive than any other material I've encountered.


Spellwarped Steel:
+d4/hd is a lot of free damage from a material, Its more damage than any weapon mod of pretty much any value. Also I am assuming its by HD of the enemy not the wielder, but thats not entirely clear from the text.
Anyone not using this in their weapon is a sucker.

Enemy's HD, yes. Aberrations don't have a lot of HD, so the damage varies between 1d4 and 10d4. Also, their HD is a d8 and unlike undead and constructs, they benefit from a high constitution. Furthermore, they have qualities like DR, fast healing, regeneration and class levels, which makes the damage bonus less massive than it looks like at first glance. I've crunched a few numbers and it's not excessive, but it does tend to end the battle faster than it otherwise normally would.


DR 10/- vs 90% of the enemys in the game by your description is pretty huge, again, any melee not using this is going to die, or the ones that are are going to be invincible.

Yes, but then again, that's the point. Aberrations are everywhere and they have destroyed roughly 70% of the setting (population, lands, gods, everything). The point is that the survivors have found ways to stem the never-ending tides and are slowly taking back the wastelands that used to be their homes. I needed a way to explain why this was possible.


Spellwarped Silver:
Weapons are good, but not nearly as good as spellwarped steel. Maybe someone will use them if they are handed to them with big magical bonuses, maybe.

Armor, any mage not using a chain shirt and buckler of this stuff is a sucker.

Weapon: Hm, not even with the obvious price differences? I remind you that Spellwarped Steel is intended to be expensive.

Armour: That's precisely the idea. And also, it's meant to put a drain into the coffers of whatever mage goes for this. This should be outright impossible to get at low levels and very costly at mid to high levels.


Spellwarped Crystal:
Better than silver, worse than steel, someone might use it in a pinch, but no-one will want it if they can get steel.

Shields are a good option from silver for mages, an extra spell slot is very nice, makes a hard trade for a +1 caster level.

Hmmm. Again, cost doesn't even figure into it? Perhaps the bonuses are too appealing.

That's exactly the idea. A mage now is going to be lugging around a very expensive shield, and will be hard pressed to decide which to take. Or they might just buy both. Silver for battle, crystal for in-between battles to recover a spell slot. And this investment in expensive shields adds up.


Cursed Lead:
Weapon ability with no counter to stop enemys from casting is plain broken. Even unenchanted, the extra damage die makes up for weapon properties, and it breaks any spell resistance as long as the enemy is someone you want to use the sword on anyhow. If its enchantable, it gets even crazier.
Build a reach weapon with this property, get a good initiative mod, maybe grab mage slayer feats for added fun, and just about turn the tiers upside down.

It makes up for some weapon properties, such as Flaming and Shocking and the like. Other properties aren't about extra damage.

Yes, the idea is to give casters something to be afraid about, but again, the issue here is cost. This provides a gold sink for melee now, especially if they go with the ammunition/thrown weapon route, which ends up adding up to quite a bit over time.


Armor is not so good. And making the SR based on armor type means its more or less useful for them. By the time a character can come up with 3-4k for light armor, never mind enchanted armor (if thats possible), SR 15 wont do much for them. The heavier is slightly better, but overall pretty weak.

Yeah, I confess I was wondering the same when I was creating the properties. See my response to Seerow above for other ideas on what to replace the static SR with.


----------------------------------------------

So, suggestions to even them up:
D4 damage per HD has to go, its just not in the ballpark for a weapon property to add 20-30 damage to every swing at mid levels. Change it do maybe 2d6 max. Or make it 1 point of con damage or something if you want it to be very powerful still and scale with hd.

Hmmmm. Okay, see, Con damage is actually a very good idea. Isn't it easy to become immune to ability damage (without being undead, I mean), though? Spells, abilities, etc.? I suppose I could give it a thought. I'm sure there's something there that would "turn the tides of war" but wouldn't fall into "becomes absolutely necesary."


Silver needs some other weapon property, or it needs to be cheaper, or the other types need to be more expensive.

Reduced the price on silver as per a suggestion above. Does that become appealing again or would it need a little extra?


Lead weapons need an opposed roll for their effect, a character should not be able to suit up with steel armor and a lead weapon and deal with things twice their CR with no worries about spell like abilities.

And a caster should be able to suit up with a few items and deal with things twice their CR with no worries about anything they can throw at him?


Lead armor needs a boost, give it a +5 or 10 bonus to SR gained other ways maybe, or a flat %miss chance vs spells

Problem is that SR is hard to come by in other ways. Hence why the idea of an item giving SR was so appealing. I do like the idea of a flat chance of outright spell immunity, though. Which is oddly like SR, too, but perhaps better. I'll give it some thought, definitely.


Overall, if your goal was the ensure that players NEED special material weapons and armors to play on the same field as players with them, you have succeeded.

So you're seriously telling me that a mid-to-high level caster with sp. silver armour and a sp. silver shield is really on the same level as a mid-to-high level non-caster with a cursed lead weapon and cursed lead armour? Really? Huh. I must have overestimated the Tiers 1 and 2, then.

Kyrinthic
2011-06-02, 01:24 PM
So you're seriously telling me that a mid-to-high level caster with sp. silver armour and a sp. silver shield is really on the same level as a mid-to-high level non-caster with a cursed lead weapon and cursed lead armour? Really? Huh. I must have overestimated the Tiers 1 and 2, then.

Well that depends, are you looking at weapon properties to fix the tier system?
Thats a whole other ball of wax really. None of this stuff will fix the tiers, a wizard will still win if the wizard knows what they are doing, thats just what they do. My comment on tiers was mainly in jest :)

What I am saying is that a character of any level with this gear is better than the same character that spends the same gold on other gear. And is better by a level that will be very noticeable in game.

My responses were in the terms of 'vs monsters, mostly aberrations' aspect. And you know, a beholder is supposed to be scary, but it just isnt if you are toting around a cursed steel weapon and have a decent initiative. you may as well just say they won if any member of the party wins initiative in that case.

I'm not saying it has to be an easy opposed roll, make it a level+d20 vs enemys CR+10 or something, adjust the numbers a little if you want it to be easier or harder, but make it not a sure thing. Realize that even then, a guy dual wielding is pretty sure to do the job, just not 100% confident.

Prices are a lot more balanced between them now, I definitely see low level characters getting ahold of crystal weapons as early as they can get their hands on, and maybe silver if they are really tight on money, tho the difference between the two is low enough that I'd hold out for the +4 damage difference in the two myself.

That said, the prices of all these materials is such that players will probably need them, I mean the spellwarped steel armor is less than 2/3rds the price of adamantine, and more than 3 times as good.

On the other hand, it does open the door to very scary fights vs occasional non-aberrations :)

If you go the bonus to SR route for cursed steel armor, theres a few ways to get natural SR, and the Spell resistance effects in the book are the most obvious, if its enchantable. Or hey, just make those be the only enchantments the stuff can work with, due to its nature, and give them a boost. The reason most people look at that armor mod as crap is because the SR is too low to matter for the item levels you can generally get it.

At level 5 getting into +1 spell resistance armor gives you a useless 13 sr. An 18 wouldnt be useless, and a 23 would be godly, depending on where you want to balance it. As a +5 mod available at higher levels, 19 SR doesnt mean much, but again a 24 is noticeable, and a 29 is damn hard to reliably break before nearly epic levels.
Considering the prevalence of +1-2 CL from silver armor, I'd probably aim for the +10 in that example tho :)

Seerow
2011-06-02, 01:27 PM
First, no, the costs you put on the materials aren't enough to make up for the effects. Compare your spellwarped armor to a +1 caster level ioun stone. Your armor is 5000g compared to the 30,000 of the stone. And the stone doesn't negate ASF.

You are A) Seriously underestimating the value of bonus caster levels and B) Providing way too much ASF reduction. Most materials give like 5-10% reduction, there are entire classes built around removing more than that, and here for 5000 gold you can completely invalidate that. Not cool.

This is why I suggested dropping it to a 5-10% ASF reduction, and +1 caster level for a few rounds a day rather than a continuous effect. It's still good, and something most casters will want, but not overwhelmingly so.

Similarly, Spellwarped Steel weapon is 2000g (btw why does a double weapon cost 5000 when 2 one handers cost 4000? Why not just let the cost be 2000 per head?), and deals 1d4 damage per hit die of the target to a specific target

The closest comparisons I can think of are the bane property (a +1 enchantment, meaning a minimum 8000 gold, for +2 hit/damage and +2d6 damage to a specific creature), and Wounding (a +2 enchantment, minimum 18,000 gold to get, works only on creatures vulnerable to crits with a constitution score, deals 1 hp damage per hit die of the creature per 2 hits), both of which are pretty much completely outclassed by the spellwarped steel, but stacks.

Spellwarped Steel being treated as a Aberration Bane weapon without being enchanted would be more than enough to make it competitive and fit the flavor you've set forth just fine.

As for the spellwarped steel armor, I'd compare it to adamantine armor, which gets DR1/- per armor category. I'd take that, and double it across the board for working only against aberrations. So DR2/- on light armor, DR4/- on medium, and DR6/- on heavy, against aberrations.

A spellwarped crystal shield costs a mere 4000gp. Compare this to a pearl of power (which your spellwarped shield replicates). A level 2 pearl of power costs that much. However your spellwarped shield has no limit on the spell slot it can restore, meaning it can function as effectively a 9th level pearl of power, which costs 81,000 gp. Once again, way too strong for the cost, and a no brainer. It's okay to make it a bit cheaper than the equivalent since it takes up an item slot, but I'd limit it to no more than 3rd level spells that can be restored with the shield, and such a shield can only be used once per day (no carrying around a bag of holding full of spell warped shields to recharge your 3rd and lower spells constantly)





Since I've yet to have a player who doesn't play a caster, a rogue or something out of ToB, I'm curious as to why weapon enchantments (other than the +X type) matter that much. I am honestly on the fence on this subject. Is there anything that can be added to the weapon (or perhaps the price lowered?) that can make up for a lack of enchantments beyond the +X type?


It's typically things like speed and wounding that get a lot of mileage, then backup weapons with things like bane and Holy. You also have outside of core some pretty awesome weapon enchantments, like metalline (lets you treat your weapon as made out of any metal you choose), morphing (turn your weapon into another weapon of the same type), etc.

For armors, there's things like Fortification, Ghost Touch, and outside of core you have the enchant that is basically death ward (forget the name), among other things I'm probably forgetting.

There's a lot of nice things that you can do with enchants. They may not be 100% necessary, but they certainly do make a difference.



That's exactly the idea. A mage now is going to be lugging around a very expensive shield, and will be hard pressed to decide which to take. Or they might just buy both. Silver for battle, crystal for in-between battles to recover a spell slot. And this investment in expensive shields adds up.


The problem is, it's only expensive at low levels. Even the most expensive of your items is heavy armor (no mage would want), for the light armors, shields, and weapons, the most expensive of your materials are 5000gp or so. That's the cost of a low level magic item. By the time you hit level 10 or so, you carry around stuff like this in your back pocket, by the time you're around 15-20, you have as many of them as you want, and every one of your items that is being complained about scales up in those levels.


The problem with making this possible to save against is that casters are good. Like, really really really good. Just hitting them with a weapon is going to be a true feat to accomplish (getting TO the caster, then bypassing cover, concealment, miss chances, mirror images, illusions, hilariously high ACs, etherealness, etc). Giving them a chance to resist this on top? Whether it's a save or a caster level check, odds are the caster is going to succeed it.


If you're giving the weapons with the property the ability to bypass magical defenses, then the mage is in fact very likely to fail it. Especially if you make it something like a fort save with a DC equal to even something like 10+half the damage dealt, or your suggested 10+half hd+str.

Also consider you're likely getting multiple attacks, each one provoking a save, there's a good chance that you will negate the casting, but the caster should have some sort of chance.

As an aside, if the cursed lead bypasses magical protections, and can be worked to gain the +x bonuses, the other benefits it gives is probably worth not having any other enchantments on it. Make sure it can't benefit from the GMW spell though, so you have to actually pay the 50,000gp to get a +5 Cursed Lead weapon.


Hah, funny you should say that, but that's how spellwarped metal began, until I realised that it was just too good, and that it really needed to be more "niche" and specialised. Instead of having a catch-all material that is just all around good and has no drawbacks, I decided to make it several materials, each with their own kind of benefits and balanced by some drawbacks (mainly, cost, but also damage or brittleness).


But your idea of niche specialized metals is 3 different metals, each of which has one use that's awesome, and the other uses are meh. It seems to make more sense to me to have one metal that has 3 different good uses.

I'm not saying have spellwarped shields give +4 to saves, +1 caster level, and 10DR, I'm saying pick the one effect that is most iconic and have it give that effect on that item type.


Problem is that SR is hard to come by in other ways. Hence why the idea of an item giving SR was so appealing. I do like the idea of a flat chance of outright spell immunity, though. Which is oddly like SR, too, but perhaps better. I'll give it some thought, definitely.


Well for comparison's sake there are SR properties for armor in the DMG, they just suck so bad nobody wants them. (SR19 as a +5 enchantment. Hah!). Perhaps your solution could be found in fixing those?

Alternatively you could just jack up the SR as you suggested (though I'd say more like 12-14+HD, and no I don't particularly care about high LA characters, since LA is a terribly balanced section of the rules anyway. And I assume you will consider the balance ramifications before throwing a 50hd monster encased in cursed lead at the party), or for the extreme case make cursed lead effectively grant immunity to magic a la a golem. (I don't like that last case because it precludes a lot of buffing and other things that could potentially help the character, but it fits the flavor well, and that drawback could keep it from being totally unbalanced)

Shadowknight12
2011-06-02, 02:41 PM
First, no, the costs you put on the materials aren't enough to make up for the effects. Compare your spellwarped armor to a +1 caster level ioun stone. Your armor is 5000g compared to the 30,000 of the stone. And the stone doesn't negate ASF.

Hah, and my players found it horrendously expensive. Shows how much you can trust them! :smallamused:


You are A) Seriously underestimating the value of bonus caster levels and B) Providing way too much ASF reduction. Most materials give like 5-10% reduction, there are entire classes built around removing more than that, and here for 5000 gold you can completely invalidate that. Not cool.

Huh. Good points on that and the above. The intention WAS to offer more ASF reduction that most materials out there, but apparently I didn't price them high enough.


This is why I suggested dropping it to a 5-10% ASF reduction, and +1 caster level for a few rounds a day rather than a continuous effect. It's still good, and something most casters will want, but not overwhelmingly so.

Good idea. I'll make the necessary adjustments later today.


Similarly, Spellwarped Steel weapon is 2000g (btw why does a double weapon cost 5000 when 2 one handers cost 4000? Why not just let the cost be 2000 per head?), and deals 1d4 damage per hit die of the target to a specific target

I am taking this from the Alchemical Silver description found in the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialMaterials.htm). Actually, now I see what you say. I tweaked the prices and forgot to make them double each other. Fixed.


The closest comparisons I can think of are the bane property (a +1 enchantment, meaning a minimum 8000 gold, for +2 hit/damage and +2d6 damage to a specific creature), and Wounding (a +2 enchantment, minimum 18,000 gold to get, works only on creatures vulnerable to crits with a constitution score, deals 1 hp damage per hit die of the creature per 2 hits), both of which are pretty much completely outclassed by the spellwarped steel, but stacks.

The Bane property is terrible. Seriously, it's incredibly weak for its cost. I don't think it should be used as a measure of something designed to be truly anathema to a creature. Wounding is okay, true, but it applies to everything (which is why it's an enchantment, as it should be).


Spellwarped Steel being treated as a Aberration Bane weapon without being enchanted would be more than enough to make it competitive and fit the flavor you've set forth just fine.

Still, since you've all made such convincing arguments, I've replaced the Xd4 for a flat +2d8 to damage. Now I do believe the price is too high for what it does.


As for the spellwarped steel armor, I'd compare it to adamantine armor, which gets DR1/- per armor category. I'd take that, and double it across the board for working only against aberrations. So DR2/- on light armor, DR4/- on medium, and DR6/- on heavy, against aberrations.

I was actually basing it off Adamantine, and I figured that since it only applies to Aberrations (and not against plain humanoids, fey or monstrous humanoids, which the PCs might get into trouble with, I suppose) it ought to be a little better than that. What price would a 3/6/9 arrangement have?


A spellwarped crystal shield costs a mere 4000gp. Compare this to a pearl of power (which your spellwarped shield replicates). A level 2 pearl of power costs that much. However your spellwarped shield has no limit on the spell slot it can restore, meaning it can function as effectively a 9th level pearl of power, which costs 81,000 gp. Once again, way too strong for the cost, and a no brainer. It's okay to make it a bit cheaper than the equivalent since it takes up an item slot, but I'd limit it to no more than 3rd level spells that can be restored with the shield, and such a shield can only be used once per day (no carrying around a bag of holding full of spell warped shields to recharge your 3rd and lower spells constantly)

Good catch. And if I were to price them slightly lower than pearls of power but followed similar prices? And how would it reflect on the price if the shields did not have ASF reduction and the only way to regain a spell slot would be as the spell is being cast? (With the shield being worn, and still only once per day regardless of the amount of shields you own, of course)


It's typically things like speed and wounding that get a lot of mileage, then backup weapons with things like bane and Holy. You also have outside of core some pretty awesome weapon enchantments, like metalline (lets you treat your weapon as made out of any metal you choose), morphing (turn your weapon into another weapon of the same type), etc.

For armors, there's things like Fortification, Ghost Touch, and outside of core you have the enchant that is basically death ward (forget the name), among other things I'm probably forgetting.

There's a lot of nice things that you can do with enchants. They may not be 100% necessary, but they certainly do make a difference.

Ah. Still, I would be inclined to say no, except for the +X line of enchantments. Maybe make an explicit exception for Vorpal and/or Keen/Impact as well.


The problem is, it's only expensive at low levels. Even the most expensive of your items is heavy armor (no mage would want), for the light armors, shields, and weapons, the most expensive of your materials are 5000gp or so. That's the cost of a low level magic item. By the time you hit level 10 or so, you carry around stuff like this in your back pocket, by the time you're around 15-20, you have as many of them as you want, and every one of your items that is being complained about scales up in those levels.

That's precisely the kind of reply I was looking for. I would like to point out, though, that the spellwarped items can be enchanted and they double the cost (like Cold Iron), so I was using that as a way to keep up with the WBL.


If you're giving the weapons with the property the ability to bypass magical defenses, then the mage is in fact very likely to fail it. Especially if you make it something like a fort save with a DC equal to even something like 10+half the damage dealt, or your suggested 10+half hd+str.

Good point. I've added a save based on either Strength or Dexterity (wielder's choice).


Also consider you're likely getting multiple attacks, each one provoking a save, there's a good chance that you will negate the casting, but the caster should have some sort of chance.

Ah, true, good point with that.


As an aside, if the cursed lead bypasses magical protections, and can be worked to gain the +x bonuses, the other benefits it gives is probably worth not having any other enchantments on it. Make sure it can't benefit from the GMW spell though, so you have to actually pay the 50,000gp to get a +5 Cursed Lead weapon.

Good caveat. I'll add it.


But your idea of niche specialized metals is 3 different metals, each of which has one use that's awesome, and the other uses are meh. It seems to make more sense to me to have one metal that has 3 different good uses.

That's... something I hadn't considered. Perhaps I'm due for a complete revision of this.


I'm not saying have spellwarped shields give +4 to saves, +1 caster level, and 10DR, I'm saying pick the one effect that is most iconic and have it give that effect on that item type.

Yeah, I'll definitely think about that.


Well for comparison's sake there are SR properties for armor in the DMG, they just suck so bad nobody wants them. (SR19 as a +5 enchantment. Hah!). Perhaps your solution could be found in fixing those?

There are? I think I vaguely remember them, even! Well, I suppose, but they wouldn't stack with Cursed Lead, since Cursed Lead can't be enchanted.


Alternatively you could just jack up the SR as you suggested (though I'd say more like 12-14+HD, and no I don't particularly care about high LA characters, since LA is a terribly balanced section of the rules anyway. And I assume you will consider the balance ramifications before throwing a 50hd monster encased in cursed lead at the party), or for the extreme case make cursed lead effectively grant immunity to magic a la a golem. (I don't like that last case because it precludes a lot of buffing and other things that could potentially help the character, but it fits the flavor well, and that drawback could keep it from being totally unbalanced)

The idea of giving spell immunity in exchange for not being buffed is actually a very good one. I wonder, though, what would the implications be if this metal was actually nonexpensive and extremely common, especially for armies? How would that affect the power balance in a given world? I've toyed with the idea of giving everyone SR, but never implemented it. What implications would this have?

EDIT: Will get back to you later, Kyrinthic, I haven't missed your post. Tight on time right now.

Seerow
2011-06-02, 03:00 PM
The Bane property is terrible. Seriously, it's incredibly weak for its cost. I don't think it should be used as a measure of something designed to be truly anathema to a creature. Wounding is okay, true, but it applies to everything (which is why it's an enchantment, as it should be).


Don't underestimate Bane. For its cost it is the most efficient boost to damage against a specific creature type, and it is the only way to breach DR/Epic without paying the x10 cost for a epic weapon, which comes up as you get closer to level 20.

Yes, it's only useful if you are certain you are going to be fighting an enemy of that type. But at low levels, finding out you're going to be hunting aberrations, picking up an aberration bane weapon is the best investment you can make. At high levels, you can afford to carry around a +1 bane weapon for every type of creature, and use Greater Magic Weapon to bring its other bonuses up to appropriate level.


Still, since you've all made such convincing arguments, I've replaced the Xd4 for a flat +2d8 to damage. Now I do believe the price is too high for what it does.


No, 2000-4000gold for 2d8 damage that stacks with weapon enchantment properties is still pretty cheap. No need to lower it further. Compare to an Adamantine weapon that costs 3000 gold and is used just to bypass some DR.


I was actually basing it off Adamantine, and I figured that since it only applies to Aberrations (and not against plain humanoids, fey or monstrous humanoids, which the PCs might get into trouble with, I suppose) it ought to be a little better than that. What price would a 3/6/9 arrangement have?


Honestly, I wouldn't give DR that high from a special material.


The idea of giving spell immunity in exchange for not being buffed is actually a very good one. I wonder, though, what would the implications be if this metal was actually nonexpensive and extremely common, especially for armies? How would that affect the power balance in a given world? I've toyed with the idea of giving everyone SR, but never implemented it. What implications would this have?


It would cause most spells with SR to be rendered useless, so you'd see most mages specializing in conjuration, for the orb spells and summons, and utility. Group buffs would also be mostly out.

Kyrinthic
2011-06-02, 04:17 PM
Thats ok, I had a lot of similar thoughts as shadow, honestly :)
We were typing at the same time, and clearly thinking along similar lines in a lot of cases.

And I second the 'dont knock bane'. I played an artificer in a low level game, and it is the best +1 enchantment on a weapon if you know your enemy, by a wide mile.
If you are in a game where you can be sure of one type of enemy like aberration, its a clear winner on a weapon. Compare it to flaming for example, +1d6 damage that can be countered by elemental resists vs +2d6+2 damage and +2 attack that cant really be countered by anything, even if only half your enemys are aberrations, its a net win.

Tvtyrant
2011-06-02, 08:44 PM
1. A Net of Cursed Lead would be a devastating weapon in low-mid levels. I approve.

2. What does "with weakness to magic" mean? Anything that has DR x/magic?

Shadowknight12
2011-06-02, 09:01 PM
Well that depends, are you looking at weapon properties to fix the tier system?
Thats a whole other ball of wax really. None of this stuff will fix the tiers, a wizard will still win if the wizard knows what they are doing, thats just what they do. My comment on tiers was mainly in jest :)

What I am saying is that a character of any level with this gear is better than the same character that spends the same gold on other gear. And is better by a level that will be very noticeable in game.

And this can't be solved by upping the prices?


My responses were in the terms of 'vs monsters, mostly aberrations' aspect. And you know, a beholder is supposed to be scary, but it just isnt if you are toting around a cursed steel weapon and have a decent initiative. you may as well just say they won if any member of the party wins initiative in that case.

I'm not saying it has to be an easy opposed roll, make it a level+d20 vs enemys CR+10 or something, adjust the numbers a little if you want it to be easier or harder, but make it not a sure thing. Realize that even then, a guy dual wielding is pretty sure to do the job, just not 100% confident.

Yes, I do agree with that. I've made a few alterations before I typed my previous post to reflect that.


Prices are a lot more balanced between them now, I definitely see low level characters getting ahold of crystal weapons as early as they can get their hands on, and maybe silver if they are really tight on money, tho the difference between the two is low enough that I'd hold out for the +4 damage difference in the two myself.

That said, the prices of all these materials is such that players will probably need them, I mean the spellwarped steel armor is less than 2/3rds the price of adamantine, and more than 3 times as good.

On the other hand, it does open the door to very scary fights vs occasional non-aberrations :)

Hrm. Well, the idea is that there are still other enemies out there, most of which have class levels and might be able to summon things that are not, in fact, aberrations. Still, I suppose that you have a point in that it might be far too cheap.


If you go the bonus to SR route for cursed steel armor, theres a few ways to get natural SR, and the Spell resistance effects in the book are the most obvious, if its enchantable. Or hey, just make those be the only enchantments the stuff can work with, due to its nature, and give them a boost. The reason most people look at that armor mod as crap is because the SR is too low to matter for the item levels you can generally get it.

That's actually a great idea. I was considering giving cursed lead armour the benefit of the +X line of enchantments, and the SR exceptions are good too. Would basing it on HD be useful? Something like 10+HD for Light, 13+HD for Medium and 16+HD for Heavy?


At level 5 getting into +1 spell resistance armor gives you a useless 13 sr. An 18 wouldnt be useless, and a 23 would be godly, depending on where you want to balance it. As a +5 mod available at higher levels, 19 SR doesnt mean much, but again a 24 is noticeable, and a 29 is damn hard to reliably break before nearly epic levels.
Considering the prevalence of +1-2 CL from silver armor, I'd probably aim for the +10 in that example tho :)

Let's see what I proposed above with those examples. Level 5: 15 for light, 18 for medium and 21 for heavy. A 5th level caster with no CL bonuses would have a 50% of hitting a lightly armour target with a spell, a 35% of hitting a target with medium armour and a 20% of hitting a target with heavy armour. If we assume that the relations between the wielder's level and the opposing caster's level remain the same, then the chances of hitting the target with a spell would remain the same. It sounds roughly balanced to me, since it would encourage the use of heavy armour while not making it strictly mandatory.


Don't underestimate Bane. For its cost it is the most efficient boost to damage against a specific creature type, and it is the only way to breach DR/Epic without paying the x10 cost for a epic weapon, which comes up as you get closer to level 20.

Yes, it's only useful if you are certain you are going to be fighting an enemy of that type. But at low levels, finding out you're going to be hunting aberrations, picking up an aberration bane weapon is the best investment you can make. At high levels, you can afford to carry around a +1 bane weapon for every type of creature, and use Greater Magic Weapon to bring its other bonuses up to appropriate level.

Huh. Well, all right, I suppose it's better than I thought.


No, 2000-4000gold for 2d8 damage that stacks with weapon enchantment properties is still pretty cheap. No need to lower it further. Compare to an Adamantine weapon that costs 3000 gold and is used just to bypass some DR.

How about 4000-8000? Remember that it doubles the price first, like cold iron. A +1 Aberration Bane weapon would cost from 20000GP to 24000GP under this correction. Sounds a bit excessive.


Honestly, I wouldn't give DR that high from a special material.

All right, 2/4/6 it is. Changed.


It would cause most spells with SR to be rendered useless, so you'd see most mages specializing in conjuration, for the orb spells and summons, and utility. Group buffs would also be mostly out.

And if all spells with a creature as a target would have SR: Yes (including the orbs)? Assuming summoning and wildshaping/polymorphing are heavily restricted, would this make a difference against caster omnipotence? Or would it just mean that they have to rely more heavily than ever on battleground control (such as grease, web and the like)?


Thats ok, I had a lot of similar thoughts as shadow, honestly :)
We were typing at the same time, and clearly thinking along similar lines in a lot of cases.

And I second the 'dont knock bane'. I played an artificer in a low level game, and it is the best +1 enchantment on a weapon if you know your enemy, by a wide mile.
If you are in a game where you can be sure of one type of enemy like aberration, its a clear winner on a weapon. Compare it to flaming for example, +1d6 damage that can be countered by elemental resists vs +2d6+2 damage and +2 attack that cant really be countered by anything, even if only half your enemys are aberrations, its a net win.

That's true, I agree, but I was assuming Flaming and the like were simply bad enchantments. You could spring for something like Wounding instead.

Anyway, I have added the inability to enchant and the specific exceptions, and modified Cursed Lead armour to grant a flat +5 to the wearer's SR.


1. A Net of Cursed Lead would be a devastating weapon in low-mid levels. I approve.

2. What does "with weakness to magic" mean? Anything that has DR x/magic?

1: Yes, that was the idea. Also, bolas, thrown weapons and projectiles.

2: It's a setting thing. Mainly, it means "aberrations and anything the DM deems particularly vunerable to magic." I am honestly considering making this DR/Magic, as you suggested, but that leaves a host of creatures with DR/Magic that simply shouldn't have it because they aren't particularly weak to magic. And this would mean having to go over every published monster with DR/Magic (other than Aberrations) and determine whether they ought to have it or not, and if not, how to replace it with (though I am sorely tempted to make some sort of blanket statement like "Non-Aberrations with DR/Magic gain the following DR instead: Chaotic creatures gain DR/Cold Iron. Constructs and undead gain DR/Adamantine and everyone else gains DR/Silver."). But I digress. :smalltongue:



EDIT: I have decided to partially follow Seerow's advice and did away with Spellwarped Crystal. Furthermore, I increased costs all around and remade armour and shields made of spellwarped silver entirely. Hopefully the costs are more in line with the benefits (and penalties) as well.

Kyrinthic
2011-06-02, 09:35 PM
Casters are going to be better than melee, the best spells dont target SR. If the caster is doing damage, they are probably doing something wrong. incapacitate the monsters in large areas, let the melees play cleanup. Give out buffs / divinations to have the right things at the right time, thats how wizards win. The barbarian can dish out more damage than any orb spell, thats not why wizards are T1, and I dont see any easy way to change that other than pruning the spell lists liberally. But really thats a different (really really common and long) discussion.

I wasnt entirely sure what you meant with the first post, so I was looking at them as balanced with each other, not so much the normal book material. That said, as mentioned, the biggest problem with a lot of it is that it scales. Magic items dont scale, you need to upgrade / replace them. This is different than class features. Gloves of dex dont give you (level/3) dex for 4k gold, they give you +2 dex for 4k, if you want 4 dex, you need to come up with the 16k difference or get someone to upgrade them.

That said, changing the damage of the steel to a flat number is good, 2D8, plus overcoming DR and regen is strong, at least as strong as bane, which is a +1 mod. A non-magic sword costs 2k to put a plus one mod on it, vs 4k for this property. A +5 weapon costs 22k to add bane, vs 4k for this one. Material bonuses kinda scale in that the cost is static rather than dynamic, but its at least reasonable.

You mention about price doubling, usually in this context its the base weapon price (around 300g or so), if it doubles the cost of enchanting the weapon like your example implies, thats a whole different deal, making it a lot harder to get a powerfully enchanted weapon, and basically cancelling out the above paragraph about how material bonuses scale well. Possibly making it too expensive at higher levels (that +5 sword would now cost 54k for material vs 22 for bane).

But even so, if players are fighting aberrations, this will be the best material to get the job done. I would tone down the x2 part on enchanting. maybe x2 base price, and a 10% cost increase to enchant (the +5 example sword would then be 9k to put this on vs 22 for bane, but still enough more expensive than other options to consider the cost).

Now, without steel being d4xHD the other two seem a little cheap if anything. Especially how you are working the doubling, I would consider doubling both of them back to 500 / 1000 respectively, making them a bit of an investment, but not badly so. Maybe leave the silver cheap if you want people to be able to bypass DR early.

Armor is much more reasonable at 2/4/6, twice as good as adamantine, but only on some targets, the 10- seemed excessive, especially when it was available on light armor.

ok, now the cursed lead (sorry, I called it cursed steel most of last post cause I cant read :).

Dont scale it or base it on HD, scale it with cost, like most magic items, players want to upgrade / find new armor, not keep the same suite their whole life cause it just gets better. give it a bonus vs the value in the book, like +2/5/8 for light/medium/heavy to keep the same numbers you were looking at for the +1 version of spell resistance.

If they are level 10 and want to upgrade their SR, they can invest in say Spell resistance 17, and get a similar bonus, but they would need to upgrade the armor for it to remain effective.

Otherwise you get that 'stuff is expensive at low levels, and crazy cheap at high levels' feel you had to start with.

Final note, you might want make something along the lines of spellwarped wood for the poor bastards that want to play a character that doesnt use metal equipment :) It can be crappy, as long as it bypasses DR, or people will (rightly) feel like its a bad choice to go with a non-metal primary weapon.

ps: Flaming is a mediocre enhancement, those are ok at low levels when you cant make a good sword, but really lose steam when things like wounding and speed are available. But ask a level 5 fighter if he wants another D6 on his one attack per round and he will usually be pretty keen on the idea. It really depends a lot on what level of optimization the campaign tends towards really. I a low op game, the +1d6 damage mods are good for a long while.

Shadowknight12
2011-06-02, 10:13 PM
Casters are going to be better than melee, the best spells dont target SR. If the caster is doing damage, they are probably doing something wrong. incapacitate the monsters in large areas, let the melees play cleanup. Give out buffs / divinations to have the right things at the right time, thats how wizards win. The barbarian can dish out more damage than any orb spell, thats not why wizards are T1, and I dont see any easy way to change that other than pruning the spell lists liberally. But really thats a different (really really common and long) discussion.

Yes, I'm aware. Painfully aware. And it seems like trying to fix it is like getting a paper cut and then sticking your hand into a tangle of barbed wire for the bandaid.


I wasnt entirely sure what you meant with the first post, so I was looking at them as balanced with each other, not so much the normal book material. That said, as mentioned, the biggest problem with a lot of it is that it scales. Magic items dont scale, you need to upgrade / replace them. This is different than class features. Gloves of dex dont give you (level/3) dex for 4k gold, they give you +2 dex for 4k, if you want 4 dex, you need to come up with the 16k difference or get someone to upgrade them.

That said, changing the damage of the steel to a flat number is good, 2D8, plus overcoming DR and regen is strong, at least as strong as bane, which is a +1 mod. A non-magic sword costs 2k to put a plus one mod on it, vs 4k for this property. A +5 weapon costs 22k to add bane, vs 4k for this one. Material bonuses kinda scale in that the cost is static rather than dynamic, but its at least reasonable.

Yes, which is why I made it double the final cost. Doubling the base price is hilariously cheap, might as well not include it at all.


You mention about price doubling, usually in this context its the base weapon price (around 300g or so), if it doubles the cost of enchanting the weapon like your example implies, thats a whole different deal, making it a lot harder to get a powerfully enchanted weapon, and basically cancelling out the above paragraph about how material bonuses scale well. Possibly making it too expensive at higher levels (that +5 sword would now cost 54k for material vs 22 for bane).

Apparently I misread cold iron several times as I was designing this and had it in mind that it doubled the final cost of the weapon, base + masterwork + enchantments. And then it added an extra cost on top.


But even so, if players are fighting aberrations, this will be the best material to get the job done. I would tone down the x2 part on enchanting. maybe x2 base price, and a 10% cost increase to enchant (the +5 example sword would then be 9k to put this on vs 22 for bane, but still enough more expensive than other options to consider the cost).

Well, that really IS the idea, to have a material that is the go-to for fighting aberrations.

Hmmm. That sounds about right. Fixed.


Now, without steel being d4xHD the other two seem a little cheap if anything. Especially how you are working the doubling, I would consider doubling both of them back to 500 / 1000 respectively, making them a bit of an investment, but not badly so. Maybe leave the silver cheap if you want people to be able to bypass DR early.

Hah, I changed steel to a flat +2d8 and removed the crystal. Silver remains cheap because it's meant to be the low-level crappy option before steel becomes affordable.


Armor is much more reasonable at 2/4/6, twice as good as adamantine, but only on some targets, the 10- seemed excessive, especially when it was available on light armor.

Good!


ok, now the cursed lead (sorry, I called it cursed steel most of last post cause I cant read :).

Don't worry, my own gaffe with cold iron was far worse.


Dont scale it or base it on HD, scale it with cost, like most magic items, players want to upgrade / find new armor, not keep the same suite their whole life cause it just gets better. give it a bonus vs the value in the book, like +2/5/8 for light/medium/heavy to keep the same numbers you were looking at for the +1 version of spell resistance.

If they are level 10 and want to upgrade their SR, they can invest in say Spell resistance 17, and get a similar bonus, but they would need to upgrade the armor for it to remain effective.

The problem with that approach is that SR is very situational, though I agree it makes equipment trading rather difficult. Still, the problem with static SR is just how obsolete it becomes fairly soon. I don't really think that the "players will have a hard time getting rid of their armour" problem (which is something that can be fixed by them enchanting their current set of armour instead of getting a new one and selling the loot they find) is worth getting rid of dynamic SR.


Otherwise you get that 'stuff is expensive at low levels, and crazy cheap at high levels' feel you had to start with.

Wait, what? Why is this so?


Final note, you might want make something along the lines of spellwarped wood for the poor bastards that want to play a character that doesnt use metal equipment :) It can be crappy, as long as it bypasses DR, or people will (rightly) feel like its a bad choice to go with a non-metal primary weapon.

Wow, I can't believe I completely forgot about spellwarped wood. It didn't even register. I'm probably going to base it on Darkwood (for the similar weight reduction) and make it slightly more expensive.

Added. Twice as expensive as Darkwood, slightly less durable and doesn't count as masterwork or lessens a shield's ACP.


ps: Flaming is a mediocre enhancement, those are ok at low levels when you cant make a good sword, but really lose steam when things like wounding and speed are available. But ask a level 5 fighter if he wants another D6 on his one attack per round and he will usually be pretty keen on the idea. It really depends a lot on what level of optimization the campaign tends towards really. I a low op game, the +1d6 damage mods are good for a long while.

Hmmm, all right, I suppose that's true. Still, for something like Cursed Lead, it won't be much of a tradeoff.

Anyway, I've updated the OP with all the changes suggested thus far. I replaced crystal with wood, changed the prices a bit and remade the bonuses casters get from spellwarped silver so that they're more in line with ioun stones and pearls of power. I'm really keen on hearing the other downsides to SR that scales with HD, too.