Magic Weapons and the Three Classes

[Anathemata]

Hi Everyone!

While pondering my upcoming OD&D game, I was struggling with the idea of d6 damage and weapon restrictions. We've all thought a lot about this before. So here is the houserule I've been pondering:

1) Weapons do d6+1 damage for Fighters, d6 damage for Clerics, d6-1 damage for Magic Users

2) All classes may use any weapon

3) Magic weapons are restricted as follows:
--Magic weapons come in two varieties, Sorcerous and Divine
--Fighters may use any and every magic weapon
--Clerics may only use those Divine magic weapons that are enchanted by their god (or church) or by a friendly god (or church)
--Magic Users must roll at a -1 (CHA bonus allowed) on the 2d6 morale table to use a sorcerous weapon, which afterwards behaves as a hireling and has the possibility of turning traitor

So this is meant to allow for a great deal of diversity in the types of magic users and clerics present. You can potentially have druid-type or paladin-type clerics, who are unable to use weapons enchanted by another sect. Sorcerous weapons innately distrust magic users, who might attempt to manipulate their internal magic energies or in some other way threaten their existence, and so will only follow a magic user begrudgingly. Think of Elric. While Stormbringer was loyal to Elric, it betrayed him and hurt those around him numerous times, and was as much of a curse as a blessing.

I also like this system because it allows for more differentiation in play between clerics, without having to create new clerical subclasses. Instead, you can create clerical churches with their own restrictions on weapons and armor, and divine magic items and weapons that fit in with their style.

Thoughts?

[scottenkainen]

Are all sorcerous weapons intelligent, then? Are magic weapons (swords) for fighters ever intelligent?

~Scott "-enkainen" Casper

[Anathemata]

The way I see it, all magical weapons have some degree of ego or intelligence, even if it is rudimentary or comparable to an animal. Divine Weapons can 'sense' your alignment and religion, and know whether or not you are a 'friendly'. Likewise, sorcerous weapons know whether or not you have magical ability, and decide (via the morale roll) if they want to trust you or not. This also holds true for fighters. I imagine that powerful magical weapons always have intents and purposes of their own, whether because of their innate magical nature or because they are the result of having a demon or something bound into it. All magical weapons are comfortable being used by Fighters, since there isn't an inherent magical 'personality clash'. Some extremely powerful weapons and items might even believe there is a better chance of 'using' a Fighter for their own ends, a la The One Ring.

[waysoftheearth]

It looks well thought out and perfectly reasonable Anathemata.

A couple of other things you may (or may not) want to consider too...

. Granting all magic weapons a degree of sentience takes a bit of the glamour away from magic-swords; a sword isn't quite so "special" if any magic weapon has what swords used to have. That's not necessarily a problem, just an observation. Should this principle also apply to magic items in general (not just weapons)?

. IMHO one of the most important distinctions between weapon types in OD&D is their relative frequencies on the magic item tables. The distribution of magic weapons is one of, or even THE, fighting-man's foremost advantage over the other classes.

By the book, 92% of all magical weaponry appearing on the treasure tables is usable by fighting-men only. 80% of these are swords, 8% arrows, 1% bows, 1% axes, and 2% spears. Only the 4% daggers, 2% maces and 2% hammers are usable by magic-users and clerics, and these are usable by fighters too!

So, if they want magic weapons, the clerics and magic-users would have to convince the group that they should get these weapons ahead of the fighters -- even though it would generally be a sub-optimal play strategy to give your best weapons to your second line.

Allowing all classes access to all weapons is a nice approach for sure, but one should be aware that this potentially dilutes the value/significance of the fighting-man. Perhaps, by way of balance/compensation, you might consider dropping the fighting man's XP requirement by a third? Or something similar...?

Just a few thoughts...

[inkmeister]

AGreed with Ways - seems fine. I'd play this system.

I like the idea of allowing everyone to use all the weapons. My answer is to let fighters get +1 to hit every level, +1 damage at level 4, +2 at level 8. Clerics get +1 to hit every other level (half fighter to hit), never get bonus damage. Wizards get half the cleric's to hit ability. Works fine for me.

[Deleted]

This is quite a clever idea.

[cooper]

The balance is to let fighters wield staves and wands. Giving a fighter a +1 to damage or whatever just highlights how people aren't properly assessing the power of magic swords. And by focusing on combat (like Gygax did sadly with exceptional strength and specialization) just makes the fighter boring in an actual game.

So take away a cool exploration power (detect gems/gold/evil) plus languages plus RP for some crappy damage bonus.

But now wizards can dual wield a staff of power and an intelligent vorpal sword that detects secret doors and speak 4 languages?

Magic swords = magic staves. This is known. This goes back to arneson's FFC and it's a much cooler ability than a dry + to the most boring part of the game (melee rolls)

At the very least give them barbarian/paladin/ranger/ or cavalier abilities if wizards and clerics get swords.

[Porphyre]

In Dave Arneson's FFC, magic Swords come in three varieties: heroic, holy(unholy) an magic. Picking up a sword not designed for your class gives you a commotion similar to picking a sword of another alignment.

The additionel powers of the sword depend of its type:
Fighter's Swords are very similar of the list of magic Swords of M&T; and the powers of the wizards' swords are suspiciously similar to those of the wands/staves from OD&D.

[llenlleawg]

Oct 31, 2013 20:33:47 GMT -6 cooper said:

The balance is to let fighters wield staves and wands. Giving a fighter a +1 to damage or whatever just highlights how people aren't properly assessing the power of magic swords. And by focusing on combat (like Gygax did sadly with exceptional strength and specialization) just makes the fighter boring in an actual game.

So take away a cool exploration power (detect gems/gold/evil) plus languages plus RP for some crappy damage bonus.

But now wizards can dual wield a staff of power and an intelligent vorpal sword that detects secret doors and speak 4 languages?

Magic swords = magic staves. This is known. This goes back to arneson's FFC and it's a much cooler ability than a dry + to the most boring part of the game (melee rolls)

At the very least give them barbarian/paladin/ranger/ or cavalier abilities if wizards and clerics get swords.

I think this is exactly right! If you want to allow MUs (especially) or Clerics to use magic weapons with, more or less, the same range as fighters, then fighters ought to have the ability to use wands, rods, and staffs. Apply similar limits, and that would be fine. On the other hand, I don't see any reason to give MUs (or clerics) access to the more interesting magic weapons.

[Anathemata]

@ waysoftheearth: I don't really mind swords not being THE magic weapon in ZeroDnD, since mythology is chock full of all kinds of magic weapons—an intelligent magic bow or dagger doesn't strike me as a bad idea. Besides, the same chart would apply for determining sentience of weapons, so many (if not most) magic weapons would still be unintelligent—they just have an instinctive aversion to wizards or clerics of the wrong sort.

Many magic swords refuse to be used by PCs of the wrong alignment anyway—which cuts the number of magic weapons usable down by two-thirds, if I understand correctly. This system mostly helps out the cleric, who can now use pretty much any weapon and gets access to a limited number of weapons blessed by his deity or his deity's buddy. So now my cleric gets to find the Mace of Ra or the Bow of Artemis—and is harmed by it if he happens to be a follower of Set or one of the Titans.

As for magic users, magic weapons are risky business. They prefer fighters, and can turn traitor on mages who dare to wield them with impunity.

I don't mind dropping the fighting man's XP requirement, or even switching his XP chart with that of the cleric. What I DON'T want to do is make the mechanics of the classes more complicated. I'd rather make the magic items they find into a puzzle of what fits who, and what dangers are worth what payoff?

As for other magic weapons, how about this: lesser and greater magical weapons, of the divine and sorcerous variety.

Lesser magical weapons (most rings, wands, staves, etc.) are distinguished by being unintelligent and carrying a number of charges of a single spell. They are either divine or sorcerous, and thus only fighters can wield all varieties. The save against such items corresponds to the 'Save vs. Wands' category.

Greater magical items are intelligent, and possess many powers and abilities. The save against such items corresponds to the 'Save vs. Spells or Magic Staves' category. The same rules apply, but with an interesting caveat: while great magical weapons prefer to be wielded by fighters, great magical items prefer to be used by wizards or clerics of the appropriate alignment. So a fighter must roll on the Morale chart to use these items, and wizards or clerics must be of a compatible alignment or religion, respectively.

Thoughts?

[waysoftheearth]

Nothing is a "bad idea" @anathemata, whatever works for you works for you and is therefore good.

FWIW -- by the book 58% of swords are intelligent and 42% are "ordinary" magic weapons. 65% are lawful, 25% are neutral, and 10% are chaotic (a compelling reason for a fighter to choose the lawful alignment if ever there was one!)

I agree that enchanted weapons (or any weapons for that matter) are a "risky business" for magic-users as these might encourage M-Us to enter combat. With their poor AC this would be an ill advised strategy indeed, not to mention they can't perform their main function (casting spells) in melee.

It sounds like you have some well formed ideas based on wide reading. There's no reason not to try it out and see how it works out. In any case, you can always change things up a bit if you don't like how it's going.

It also occurs to me that your cleric is something like a simplified paladin, so perhaps you could consider the paladin XP requirements in the AD&D PHB? On the other hand, swapping the cleric and fighter XP requirements in M&M could work perfectly fine too.

[aldarron]

Nov 1, 2013 6:59:06 GMT -6 Porphyre said:

In Dave Arneson's FFC, magic Swords come in three varieties: heroic, holy(unholy) an magic. Picking up a sword not designed for your class gives you a commotion similar to picking a sword of another alignment.

The additionel powers of the sword depend of its type:
Fighter's Swords are very similar of the list of magic Swords of M&T; and the powers of the wizards' swords are suspiciously similar to those of the wands/staves from OD&D.

Righto, and the non fighters swords remain less common with 1 in 8 chance (12.5%) for a clerics sword, and 2 in 8 for an MU's sword (25%).