Joyous Dance (Handaxe)

[Waldo52]

This is a new weapon, per the latest update. I just wanted to point out that this is the first "end game" or "tier one", or whatever you call it, handaxe. It's really, painfully underwhelming.

When you've got a special named weapon with +4 and you're not adding keen, there better be some really special benefits associated with it. We have the following:

1d4 massive criticals. Trivial damage for an end game weapon, and compounded by critting with the worst probability possible and not being keen.

Hideous laughter, which requires a will save at some low DC. Remember, this spell has a language component. So possibly -4.

SR 12. At this stage in the game, most players have real SR.

I am not one of those sour grapes posters who poops on all of the hard dev team work. My character will work fine with shortswords, or I might even take these new axes just for the +4 and the axe murderer look. However, I think this needs a good second opinion by the team.

[Twohand]

Have you tried enchanting keen on it

[Heroic Spirit]

This. The new weapons with Keen don't have a rune. Those without include one. So, you can just do it yourself 🥴

[msterswrdsmn]

To be fair, massive crits is a pretty underwhelming property, adding a very small bonus on a weapon that only has a 5% chance to crit to begin with (massive crit damage is NOT affected by weapon crit multipiers, it only gives the stated damage). Joyous Dance also has a SR 12 bonus which....honestly, why? Even a level 4 character has a moderate chance of bypassing that.

Tanshas hideous laughter is also a pretty bad choice for a spell-like property. If it was an on-hit property I can see it being feasible, as you're pretty much spamming attacks hoping for a 1. Most of Areliths end-game mobs are immune to mind affecting, and they'll get a +4 bonus against it if youre not the same race. Ignoring the fact the dc is going to be -very- low to begin with.

the only notable property on the weapon is the +4 attack bonus, which really isn't worth the damage loss from using a masterly damask weapon. I do believe there are lootable +4 handaxes with a ton of vs racial bonuses on it, which outperforms this by quite a bit if you want to use handaxes. Handaxes are unique in the fact they can be dual wielded and crit -really- hard, none of which is really being helped in a significant way with this weapon.

I like the -idea- of a "joyous" themed weapon, but something with a taunt/perform/sonic damage boost might thematically fit better (aids the user in their dancing movements and creates a faint, harmonious tone that changes to match the users movements and rythm. Tah-dah~)

[MRFTW]

I think they make a nice pair for a rogue, using the rune for uni saves, which will stack with the +1 vs mind, for an effective +4 will vs all of the stuff rogues are usually scared of. Not currently playing a rogue so can't comment on if that's actually a good idea or not, I always found crits on a dex rogue pretty useless.

I'd rather have that than keen on a rogue, whose selection of +4s is slim (24+ rogues can use +3 weapons to penetrate premonition but 19-23 rogues have to lean on +4s).

Much easier than 5%ing +4 daggers.

[msterswrdsmn]

Theres a decent selection of +4 weapons for rogues. Deadmans cross/the identical mace, elfsword, dalesword, and variable whip are all +4 and have better damage potential than the axe. Variable whip having a bonus for having the ability to change elements, allowing you to target a spawns weapon element (or unresisted element) with proper preparation. The downside being weaker physical base damage, which isn't a huge issue for sneak-heavy builds.

These only require 30 UMD, which is pretty easy to get. And the required base level to use.

[Waldo52]

Have you tried enchanting keen on it

My knowledge of the system in general isn't very good, but I'm assuming this would eat up a rune just to make this weapon almost as good as its competitors are WITHOUT the rune.

That aside, it's still looking really weak to me. And this is coming from a guy who tries to find a nice compromise between power and flavor. I always deviate from spreadsheet builds and use the weapons that look the coolest, but I'm still holding my nose with this one.

[Eyeliner]

Are the DC spells like dominate person, control undead, hideous laughter etc on crafted items really intended to be used or are they there just for flavor and/or to increase the item value to make them more difficult to enchant without actually increasing their combat power? I mean in almost all cases we're talking a very low DC on a very few uses a day item so there's no chance they'd be effective.

[God_In_Action]

Are the DC spells like dominate person, control undead, hideous laughter etc on crafted items really intended to be used or are they there just for flavor and/or to increase the item value to make them more difficult to enchant without actually increasing their combat power? I mean in almost all cases we're talking a very low DC on a very few uses a day item so there's no chance they'd be effective.

I always thought that use per day low DC items were intended for lower levels, but that doesn't square with an epic item. There's really no point to a spell that you need the enemy to roll a 1 to fail, and is only 3x/day (and the effect of which is only s very low number of rounds anyway).

If this weapon used an On Hit effect like the Sceptre of Tyranny it would be much more appealing.