Enchanting ammunition vs enchanting weapon

[Max Caysey]

Hi guys...


I am tinkering with a sniper build for a upcoming session, and I have some thoughts or questions that I want to ask.

I was wondering whether or not its possible to apply the enchantments for ranged weapons, such as distance or collision on ammunition? The thing is that the crossbow will be above +10 item if I add all the inchants I want... SO I was thinking of placing some on the ammunition. Can I do that?

Thanks

[sleepyphoenixx]

You can, with any weapon enhancement that isn't restricted to melee or ranged weapons. Distance for example can only be placed on a ranged weapon, not on ammunition.

[Bronk]

You can indeed! The better of the enhancement bonuses apply, and if any of the special properties like flaming are duplicated, you would take the better of the rolls instead of stacking.

[Max Caysey]

Cool...

Then I will place collision on the arrows, that makes room for the splitting enchant on the crossbow! :smallbiggrin:

[Âmesang]

Would it be permissible in the campaign to get yourself arrows individually enchanted with spells (which I believe have a similar cost to scrolls)? Outlaw Star made me love the idea of (potentially) rare, magical ammunition. +1 flaming arrows are cool; +1 implosion arrows would certainly leave their mark… well, figuratively speaking.

[Max Caysey]

Would it be permissible in the campaign to get yourself arrows individually enchanted with spells (which I believe have a similar cost to scrolls)? Outlaw Star made me love the idea of (potentially) rare, magical ammunition. +1 flaming arrows are cool; +1 implosion arrows would certainly leave their mark… well, figuratively speaking.

I think this is a very cool thought. I would surely fit the BBEG, to have such nasty arrows. Splitting dissintegration arrows seems like a nasty thing! :smallbiggrin:

[Jack_Simth]

Hi guys...


I am tinkering with a sniper build for a upcoming session, and I have some thoughts or questions that I want to ask.

I was wondering whether or not its possible to apply the enchantments for ranged weapons, such as distance or collision on ammunition? The thing is that the crossbow will be above +10 item if I add all the inchants I want... SO I was thinking of placing some on the ammunition. Can I do that?

Thanks

Short answer is "yes", long answer is "Yes, but you'll burn through wealth fairly quickly".

See, 50 enchanted arrows cost the same as one enchanted bow. So if you've got your +1 Splitting Speed Seeking Thundering Merciful bow (+10 equivalent) that you've slapped Greater Magic Weapon on for the enhancement bonus, then go on loading it with +1 Bane (Outsider(Evil)) Flaming Burst Icy Burst Holy Axiomatic (+10 equivalent) arrows... then 50 shots in (which, with ranged full attacks and the speed property, is just ten rounds, which is going to be only five or ten fights - a day or two of adventuring), you've expended the cost of your bow on arrows. If you've got any feats that let you fire your bow more often (such as, say, Rapid Shot), then you're going through arrows faster.

[Fitz10019]

I've always been interested in having a ranged character who has a couple of dozen bows, each with a different Bane enchantment. He'd wear plaid pants with a matching hat, and have a servant who tags along to carry the bow bag and who can make the right Knowledge rolls.

BowGuy: "What's that look like to you, Seamus?"
Seamus: "I believe it's an Evil Outsider, sir." [hands him the appropriate Bane bow] "And it's worth noting the wind's outta the southwest at 7 knots"

[Âmesang]

Please name him Shooter McGavin. Please?

[Rubik]

I had a character who tried enchanting a weapon once.

Unfortunately, it was immune to mind-affecting effects.

[Zancloufer]

If you want to fire what is effectively +15 arrows at a decent price you could always stack +10 worth of enchantments on your Bow/Crossbow/Trebuchet and get a CL 20 Greater Magic Weapon Wand to +5 50 units of Ammo for a day. Cost wise it's only about 900GP per 50 shots, or 18 GP an arrow/bolt/bolder. Would probably be the most cost effective way IMHO. With splitting your effectively spending 9GP for +5 to hit/damage per attack.

[Chronos]

Why cast Greater Magic Weapon on arrows at all? So far as I can tell, it's exactly the same effect as casting it on your bow, except that you might run out of the arrows before the spell ends, or want to switch arrows for some other reason.

One good thing you can do, incidentally, is to buff up your bow heavily, like any weapon-user, but then have different arrows of different special materials. Cold iron especially is essentially free, if you don't intend to make it magical, and silver and even adamantine are a lot cheaper than magic items.

[MisterKaws]

the most ridiculous and inexpensive way to do this is by creating a Soulknife, then branching into a Soulbow, and then dropping for a Kensai at the point you get the best possible combinations of special abilities from the Soulblade. As a Soulboul's bonuses go to the arrows, you use Kensai levels to enchant your mind itself, thus getting the "bow's" portion of enchantments, and leaving all your wealth to other items, because now you have unlimited arrows(just save a common bow and some common arrows for antimagic field). This is probably the only REAL reason someone would play as a soulbow.

[ericgrau]

Short answer is "yes", long answer is "Yes, but you'll burn through wealth fairly quickly".

See, 50 enchanted arrows cost the same as one enchanted bow. So if you've got your +1 Splitting Speed Seeking Thundering Merciful bow (+10 equivalent) that you've slapped Greater Magic Weapon on for the enhancement bonus, then go on loading it with +1 Bane (Outsider(Evil)) Flaming Burst Icy Burst Holy Axiomatic (+10 equivalent) arrows... then 50 shots in (which, with ranged full attacks and the speed property, is just ten rounds, which is going to be only five or ten fights - a day or two of adventuring), you've expended the cost of your bow on arrows. If you've got any feats that let you fire your bow more often (such as, say, Rapid Shot), then you're going through arrows faster.
It's not so bad if your arrows are much less enchanted than your bow. Say +5 equivalent for example. And way cheaper than getting an epic magic weapon even after burning through piles of arrows. Bane arrows, specialty utility arrows and so forth are really nice too, because you can swap to the ones you want.

Collision is a bit general purpose so I'd stick it on the bow. Distance would be nice on ammo because not everything is far away, but as pointed out it says "This property can only be placed on a ranged weapon." If that means to exclude projectiles and not only melee weapons then you're out of luck. Since projectile weapon properties tend to depend on the weapon rather than the projectile, I'm betting you are in fact out of luck. i.e., ammo doesn't have a range increment, bows do. But putting other situational properties on your ammo would be nice.

[Rubik]

The MIC's raptor arrow is still ammo, and thus it could be enhanced as such. It's auto-bane vs anything you attack with it, it's unbreakable, and it automatically returns to you after you fire it. Buy like 20 of them with all the stuff you want to have for specialty situations and (ab)use the hell out of them.

Also, aurorum arrows, for cheaper options that require a bit more work.