Issues with changing magic weapons.

[krossbow]

In my next campaign i'm thinking of doing a houserule on Magic weapon enchants;

Namely, that instead of adding a bonus to hit/damage, a +1/+2/ect. enchant means the weapon's base damage is increased by one (as an example, a +1 greataxe would deal 2d12 damage instead, a +2 one would deal 3d12 damage, however a +1 dagger would deal 2d4, ect.)

This would have the effect of keeping the weapon rolls from going into the thog power attacks for 1d12+500 issue (Shock trooper is outlawed due to cheesiness), and curb ease of hitting opponents slightly, as well as keeping the base weapon fairly unique.


On the other hand, I realize this would make fiery/icey/ect. enchants look wonky, and power attack would be weaker by a good margin.




Any issues i seem to be missing that you guys can think of?

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

In my next campaign i'm thinking of doing a houserule on Magic weapon enchants;

Namely, that instead of adding a bonus to hit/damage, a +1/+2/ect. enchant means the weapon's base damage is increased by one (as an example, a +1 greataxe would deal 2d12 damage instead, a +2 one would deal 3d12 damage, however a +1 dagger would deal 2d4, ect.)

This would have the effect of keeping the weapon rolls from going into the thog power attacks for 1d12+500 issue (Shock trooper is outlawed due to cheesiness), and curb ease of hitting opponents slightly, as well as keeping the base weapon fairly unique.


On the other hand, I realize this would make fiery/icey/ect. enchants look wonky, and power attack would be weaker by a good margin.




Any issues i seem to be missing that you guys can think of?

Yeah, it makes Power Attacking more difficult. Most Power Attack builds rely on passive bonuses (Strength, Weapon Focus, and weapon to-hit bonuses) to hit reliably because they can't add their BAB. (Remember, the MM says that a monster's AC should be 13 + party level.)

However, increasing a weapon's damage dice so that the average damage increases by 1, and then keeping the +1 to attack as normal seems reasonable. It makes damage more random, which seems to be what you're shooting for.

[ericgrau]

There are already weapon enchantments that add 1d6 damage, or +3.5 on average. A +1 with power attack only adds 3 damage, although sometimes creatures are immune to certain d6 enchantments. At worst we could use collision as a baseline, at 5 damage for the cost of +2 instead of 6 damage. At the same time there are enchantments like wounding and spell storing that may often be better than 3.5 damage. That plus you can't have an enhancement bonus higher than 5, but the enhancement bonus plus special abilities combined may reach up to +10.