Weapons and Armor overhaul

[theCountofMonteCristo]

Alright, so this suggestion is for a complete overhaul of how crafted weapons and armor works.

In short: I dislike the linear progression of bronze to iron to steel to damask, where each step the weapon is superior to the version before. I rather see each type of material be useful even in 'late game'.

Ideally each type of metal would have three stages of improving quality. I think the exception should be bronze as there should always be a 'plain' type of weapon (as spells like Greater Magic Weapon and Darkfire require it).

So I'll give a couple of examples of what I mean:

Steel Weapon:
+1 Attack
+2 Damage

Expert Steel Weapon:
+2 Attack
+4 Damage

Masterwork Steel Weapon:
+3 Attack
+6 Damage

As you can see, in the end the Masterwork Steel is equivalent to what Masterly Damask would be today. I think Steel ought to be the 'base' weapon and everything adjusted off of it. As for crafting materials I leave that up to you to balance out.

Let's look at what I think for Iron:

Iron Weapon:
+1 Attack
+4 Damage vs Fey

Expert Iron Weapon:
+2 Attack
+8 Damage vs Fey

Masterwork Iron Weapon
+3 Attack
+12 Damage vs Fey

The Iron weapon carries a bigger damage bonus, but is situational. Against Fey it is clearly the weapon of choice. (Problem to note: Are there many low level fey? The Spriggans near Guldorand, but what else? Should this see more added to make it useful?). Outside of a DM event, is an iron weapon really useful? I don’t know a whole lot about NWN’s item properties. What is or isn’t possible, but maybe a bit more should be added to these, to make them even more unique? This template is only the base, please build upon it!


A look at another sort, Greensteel:

Greensteel Weapon
+1 Attack
Keen

Expert Greensteel Weapon
+2 Attack
Keen

Masterly Greensteel Weapon
+3 Attack
Keen

This template can be used over and over again. Silver would be similar to Iron but vs Shapechanger instead of Fey. Another can be added for vs Outsider. Or Undead. You can make lots types of weapons.

Armor should follow the same template.

Iron Armor:
+1 AC
10% Slashing Resist

Expert Iron Armor:
+2 AC
10% Slashing Resist

Masterwork Iron Armor:
+3 AC
10% Slashing Resist

Using this template my ideas are:

Steel: Piercing Resist
Greensteel: Arcane Spell Failure reduction
Mithril: Weight reduction and Uni Save
Adamantine: DR 5/- or something.

Again, just a template where lots of ideas could be implemented. And again I don't really know a lot about NWN's abilities that can be applied to armor, so you could really add things to make each type 'cool' in its own way.

Also: I'm not 'sold' on "Expert Weapon" or "Expert Armor". Could be Journeyman, or any other descriptor for quality.

[garrbear758]

Denied as written, although I like the idea of having more situationally useful weapons.