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View Full Version : And the truth shall set you free... [magic weapons, D&D]



Dhavaer
2007-09-02, 02:10 AM
The minds of the vashar are alien to mortal races. While they trade, eat, fight and love as all peoples do, they have an innate, overwhelming hatred for the outer planes and everything on them that is startling in its intensity. Since a time before elf saw tree or dwarf knew stone, they have stood as shadowy sentinels over the Prime Material, hunting down fiend and celestial alike.
With their uncommon mastery over shadowstuff the vashar have shaped and forged many powerful weapons to wield against their otherworldly foes, the greatest of which was the sword Truthteller.

The vashar concept of truth is famously (or notoriously) twisted; they have one word that refers to what is, and one to what should be. The phrase 'vashar's truth' in many human or halfling lands refers to an impossible, wishful dream. Truthteller was created to make that dream a reality; to slay every god and cut the outer planes from the multiverse.

Unfortunately, Truthteller's great powers were never successfully replicated, although many lesser versions were created. These lesser swords, each given to vashar champions, were named the Scions of Truth.

Truthteller was lost two thousand years ago; flung across the Prime after the death of Erythnul, god of slaughter, at the hands of the vashar champion Isshaethyr. The vashar have been searching for it ever since.

Truthteller

Truthteller strikes as a +10 shadowstriking outsiderbane thinaun bastard sword. Like a sun blade, however, its wielder may wield it as though it is a short sword, applying feats and abilities that apply to either type of weapon. Its bane ability applies to all outsiders.
More importantly, Truthteller renders its wielder and everything within 60ft. of it entirely immune to salient divine abilities. Any deity struck by Truthteller loses their divinity and all accompanying abilities as long as Truthteller remains attuned to them with its shadowstriking ability. Any deity slain by Truthteller is captured by its thinaun blade, and thus prevented from rejuvinating in its divine realm. Truthteller automatically destroys any deific essence it captures, granting its wielder the benefits of a heal and greater restoration spell, and also generally releasing an enormous blast of energy with uncertain but far reaching effects.
A non-vashar wielding Truthteller wields it as a -10 bastard sword until they fail a save against a dominate monster effect (DC 23) that commands them to return the sword to the vashar. They must make this save once a day.
As a major artifact, Truthteller cannot be destroyed by normal means. It loses its invulnerability when there are no longer gods in the multiverse.

Scion of Truth

This sword is the size of a bastard sword. However, a scion of truth is wielded as if it were a short sword with respect to weight and ease of use. (In other words, the weapon appears to all viewers to be a bastard sword, and deals bastard sword damage, but the wielder feels and reacts as if the weapon were a short sword.) Any individual able to use either a bastard sword or a short sword with proficiency is proficient in the use of a scion of truth. Likewise, Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization in short sword and bastard sword apply equally, but the benefits of those feats do not stack.

In combat, the dark blade of a scion of truth is equal to a +2 shadowstriking outsiderbane thinaun bastard sword. The bane property is normally applied to either good or evil outsiders.

A lesser scion of truth is equal to a +1 shadowstriking thinaun bastard sword. A greater scion of truth is equal to a +3 shadowstriking outsiderbane thinaun bastard sword. The outsiderbane property of a greater scion of truth is normally applied to good and evil outsiders, although some are attuned to lawful and chaotic. The wielder of a greater scion of truth is constantly under the effect of a protection from evil and protection from good (or law and chaos, if the scion of truth is attuned to those outsiders).

Any ideas on pricing?

Arakune
2007-09-02, 08:40 AM
minor artifacts.

Zeta Kai
2007-09-02, 08:59 AM
Um, are you refering to the Vashar from the Book of Vile Darkness? Because they are just an evil Human subrace, not a group of Guardians of the Material Plane.

Dhavaer
2007-09-02, 04:51 PM
Um, are you refering to the Vashar from the Book of Vile Darkness? Because they are just an evil Human subrace, not a group of Guardians of the Material Plane.

The name is the same, they still like deicide, but otherwise they're all different.

Again, any ideas on pricing?

Dhavaer
2007-09-04, 06:12 AM
Okay, the lesser scion is a +4 equivalent weapon, so that's 32,000gp, and it's made of thinaun, with is another 15,000gp (pricing as though it's a bastard sword) and then 310gp for the masterwork sword. The problem with the thing is that I can't work out the pricing for the sunblade ability; it's hard to reverse engineer because of the extra effect against evil creatures and undead and so on. Does anyone have any ideas? Any why is thinaun so bloody expensive?

olelia
2007-09-04, 04:01 PM
I might be rusty on my D&D artifact rules...which Truthteller definitely seems to be...but I thought artifacts don't have a price on them because there is only 1 of them in existence...its not like you could just vendor it...except to like some EPIC merchant...that just happens to be immune to dominate >.>

Dhavaer
2007-09-04, 05:51 PM
Truthteller is undoubtably a major artifact, as I mentioned in the item description, and major artifacts do not have prices. The Scions of Truth are just swords, though, and do have prices just like Nine Lives Stealers and Sunblades.

olelia
2007-09-04, 06:05 PM
Maybe subtract the masterwork, base cost and the enhancement bonus from the sunblade price and slap it onto the weapon as an added cost.

Dhavaer
2007-09-04, 06:08 PM
I would do that, but the enhancement bonus isn't set; they're normally +2, they count as +4 against evil, and do double damage against undead and negative energy plane creatures, which makes them very difficult to price.

olelia
2007-09-04, 07:37 PM
I would say +4 because bane is normally a +1 and that seems to be a more powerful version of it.

Dhavaer
2007-09-04, 08:28 PM
That's a very good comparison. Thanks.

Assuming then that sunblades should be priced as +4 weapons, that leaves 18,000 left over after enhancement and weapon costs. The daylight ability is like having daylight at will, but much weaker because it takes a while to get up to full strength and only has a 1 minute duration. Daylight at will would cost 27,000gp, so obviously the sunlight ability is worth considerably less.

The feycraft template from the DMG2 does something similar to the ability and costs 1,500, but is much weaker.

How does 12,000gp for the short/bastard sword ability sound? That would put the lesser scion at 59,315gp. A normal scion would cost 99,315gp. A greater scion would cost 165,315gp, plus the perma-protection spells. They'd normally cost 2,000 each, but they have quite a lot of overlap as to their effects (the most relevant ability being the prevention of possession and mind control, which isn't useful to have twice) so 3,000gp might be more reasonable, putting it at 168,315gp.

Comparatively, that puts it as more expensive than the Holy Avenger, which I'm a little iffy about, but then it has an extra +1 enhancement bonus over the Avenger, and is made of a more expensive material. So I suppose that's fair.

So the prices as they stand are:
Lesser Scion of Truth: 59,315gp
Scion of Truth: 99,315gp
Greater Scion of Truth: 168,315gp

Does that seem fair?

Jasdoif
2007-09-04, 11:52 PM
A sun blade is priced as a +5 weapon (50,335 gp. 335 accounts for it being a masterwork bastard sword, and 50,000 happens to be what a +5 equivalent costs).

The evil effect thing is a basically a variant of the Holy property (+2 to the enhancement bonus instead of +2d6, offset by double damage against particular creatures; also has the negative level clause). Holy is a +2 equivalent, so we'll assume the same here; and the sun blade has a natural +2 enhancement bonus...so that leaves +1 for the pseudosize thing. (The light thing appears to be largely fluff, I assume its "cost" is subsumed elsewhere)


As for the subject at hand, do the Vashar hate deities more then outsiders in general? Or do they not acknowledge the existence/possibility of non-outsider deities that are native to the (prime) Material Plane?

Dhavaer
2007-09-05, 06:10 AM
They acknowledge that it's possible for mortals to become gods (Vecna and St. Cuthbert both exist in the campaign setting) but as becoming a deity involves becoming an outsider (barring temporary deities like proxies) they don't actually care beyond frustration that there are two new gods and they've only killed one.

Dhavaer
2007-09-06, 08:43 AM
Hmm. If the pseudo-size is a straight +1 enhancement, that makes things a lot simpler.

Lesser Scion of Truth: 65,315gp
Scion of Truth: 105,315gp
Greater Scion of Truth: 180,315gp

Also more expensive.

Jasdoif
2007-09-06, 01:33 PM
Hmm. If the pseudo-size is a straight +1 enhancement, that makes things a lot simpler.

Lesser Scion of Truth: 65,315gp
Scion of Truth: 105,315gp
Greater Scion of Truth: 180,315gp

Also more expensive.I've noticed that weapons appear use +1 equivalents a lot more then static cost increases, at least in core. And simple is good, should anyone feel the need/capability to enhance one of these scions.


As for the double protection effect...well, you only get two of the three effects different. And you really only get a limited subset of them: The bonuses are typed so they don't stack, meaning you only get them against an extra two alignment types instead of the base three; and the summon protection only adds two alignment types instead of the base six. Combine in that with the usual discount for multiple similar abilities...and we'll err on the side of increasing the cost and assume that the second one's cost is 25% standard.

The closest item in the SRD to this is the horn of goodness/evil (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#hornofGoodnessEvil), which follows the item creation guidelines for a 1/day use-activated spell effect, at 90% cost (which would be for the alignment restriction on use). So we'll use the same guidelines....

1 (caster level) * 1 (spell level) * 2000 (continuous) * 2 (spell duration in minutes/level) * 1.25 (quick addin for the second protection) = 5000gp.

Now, the +1 that accounts for the pseudo-size appears to be worth 34,000 on its own (difference between +8 and +9 {I think the greater scion is +9? Can't check some of the enhancements} ). I'm not sure being able to use it like a short sword is worth that much...so since this is a specific weapon, I think it'd be OK to subsume the cost of the two protection spells into it.



They acknowledge that it's possible for mortals to become gods (Vecna and St. Cuthbert both exist in the campaign setting) but as becoming a deity involves becoming an outsider (barring temporary deities like proxies) they don't actually care beyond frustration that there are two new gods and they've only killed one.Interesting. How do they feel about native outsiders, who are basically part of the Material Plane? And how would they feel about a non-outsider deity, should one come to exist (let's say...a deity with the Plant type instead of Outsider)?

Dhavaer
2007-09-06, 06:13 PM
Interesting. How do they feel about native outsiders, who are basically part of the Material Plane? And how would they feel about a non-outsider deity, should one come to exist (let's say...a deity with the Plant type instead of Outsider)?

There aren't any native outsiders. Tieflings and Aasimar are humanoids. I'm going to rework genies somehow (I'm thinking of replacing outsiders and elementals with just outsiders and have subtypes (elemental) for genies and so on and (alignmental) for fiends and celestials and so on. The vashar hate the alignmentals, and don't mind elementals. I'd probably change the Bane to Good Alignmentalbane, or some such). If somehow a non-outsider deity came to exist... they'd be confused. Probably watch it for a while and see what it does. If it's just a really powerful plant, they'd leave it alone. If it's a deity in the form of a plant, they'd try to kill it, but if it was then it'd be an outsider.