D&D 3E/3.5 Ripping Hong Off (or, remake the Sure Striking enhancement for 3.5e)

[Jeph]

You know, that one from Sword and Fist? For a +1 enchantment, it can beat DR as if it were a +5 weapon. Now, in the 3.5e damage reduction system, this is...completely useless. As Hong mentioned in Some Other Thread, changing it so that it negates 5 points of DR, no matter what type, could be a useful substitute. But wait! That's scalable!

Sure Striking
Sure Striking weapons are enchanted to worm their way through a target's defenses, be they physical or magical. Hits with a Sure Striking ignore the first 5 (Minor), 15 (Average), or 25 (Major) points of a target's Damage Reduction.
Caster Level: 12th; Prerequisites: Greater Magic Weapon, True Strike; Market Price: +1 (Minor), +3 (Average), or +5 (major).

Thoughts?

 

[comrade raoul]

Sure Striking now like a terrific purchase, especially since, as written, it ignores DR n/-, up to the magnitude specified by the strength of the enchantment. The +2 version seems optimal, especially since I imagine that DR greater than 15 will be rare in 3.5e.

 

[Aelryinth]

Yeah, wouldn't a bow+5 and arrows of Sure Striking basically take care of any DR neutralizing you need to do? I personally don't see the need for Arrows +5 if you have a bow+5 anymore....just get the Sure Striking arrows for DR and you are set.

==Aelryinth

 

[Staffan]

It's a pretty nifty idea, but I'd probably make it 5/10/15 instead of 5/15/25. 5/10/15 seems to be the general progression of DR in 3.5e.

 

[Technik4]

I'll second 5/10/15, but I think the enhancement costs should be: +2/+4/+6. (you are trading +2 to hit and +2 damage for +5 damage against all enemies, a very nice ability).

Technik

Edited: "..for +5 damage against all enemies with DR. The hassle of not having to configure your weapon alone should be worth +1."

 

[Staffan]

+2/+4/+6 sounds a wee bit excessive. +2 to hit and +2 to damage could easily be turned into +4 damage with power attack, and I think the limitation "only against opponents with DR otherwise unaffected" should be worth more than a single point of damage. That's ignoring that if the weapon is two-handed, it would transfer into +6 points of damage - a net *loss*.

Maybe +1/+3/+5?

 

[Technik4]

Ok, look at it this way. Compile all of the common +1 weapon enhancements:

Elemental +1d6
Keen
Regular +1/+1
etc

Now, how do these enhancements do against DR? Elemental can't overcome it, it only applies to physical damage (and while the elemental damage may get through, there are elemental immunities to think about). Keen just got nerfed down so the baseline remains +1 to hit +1 damage.

Now, who is this new Sure-striking enhancement for? Well, as you pointed out, unless its cheaper than power attack's ratio (it shouldn't be, I'll try and explain why) it falls to people who can't do much damage (or overcome DR) easily. TWF rogues, sword and board fighters, etc. These are the same characters that can't benefit from the new power attack, so why use power attack's ratio to compare?

Lets use the power attack they will be using to compare:

+1 enhancement can provide:

+1 to hit/ +1 damage, assuming you have power attack you can turn this into a flat +2 damage.

Your proposed sure-striking gives a flat +5 damage against all DR.

Ahem. Needless to say, I don't think it can be +1. Lets look at what you can get for +2.

Bane
Holy
Lawful
Chaotic
Evil
Elemental Burst
+2/+2

Now these are some enhancements! Bane ups your weapon by +2/+2 AND gives you +2d6 extra (non-elemental) damage, but only against a subset of enemies. Holy/Evil/etc give a flat +2d6 damage against one type of alignment. 2d6 is on average 7 points of damage.

So if we had an anti-DR enhancement we could place it at +2d6 damage against...one type of DR? Well that seems weak, it might be better to just make your sword out of adamantine rather than enchant it to to more damage against adamantine DR. OR we could make it apply to everything with DR. In which case, lowering it to 5 damage (a consistent bonus) doesn't seem too out-of-hand.

Especially when we go back to our power attack example. Remember, we're talking sword and board or TWF here (the people that would benefit the MOST from an enhancement like this, 2-h fighters can just power attack/plow their way through DR) so power attack is a 1:1 ratio (again). So we turn that +2 to hit into +2 damage, add it to the regular +2 damage and we only get 4.

A +1 Sure-Striking weapon will strike at +1/+1 against DR of 5 (or less). A +3 weapon can be altered (via power attack) to strike at +1/+0 against DR of 5. Well, that comes up a little short for sure-striking. Perhaps if the enhancement gave something like bane, a +1/+1 vs DR creatures.

My analysis may be a little kooky, but I'm about to drift off and count sheep. My version follows:

Sure Striking
This weapon is borderline sentient. This enhancement allows it to pierce many strange hides, regardless of the weapon's original construction, the type of weapon, or the wielder's alignment (or even the weapon's alignment)!

A sure striking weapon excels at penetrating Damage Reduction. Against DR a sure striking weapon's effective enhancement is +1 (Minor), +2 (Medium), or +3 (Major) better than its normal enhancement. Further it allows the wielder to ignore the first 5 (Minor), 10 (Medium), or 15 (Major) points of a target's Damage Reduction.

Caster Level: 12th; Prerequisites: Greater Magic Weapon, True Strike; Market Price: +2 (Minor), +4 (Medium), or +6 (Major).


'Night All

Technik

 

[Spatzimaus]

I was thinking about this last night, too. The problem is, even scaling +1/+3/+5 for 5/10/15 won't work.

While a lot of things have DR 5/(something), not nearly as many have 10/* or 15/*. It's a diminishing-returns thing. Someone going up against that Pit Fiend (DR 15/Holy Silver) would prefer to take the +1 Sure Striking to knock it down to 10 and then use the remaining +4 for Enhancement Bonus. You'd have to change the price to +1/+2/+3 to be worthwhile.

Also, note that 3E Sure Striking doesn't penetrate Epic DR, "untyped" DR (the Barbarian's DR 1/-), object hardness, the Skeleton's ability to reduce slashing/piercing damage, and so on.

Here's the way I thought of doing it, using the new Ki Strike as a guideline:

Sure Striking: The weapon ignores all of the DR types listed:
Lesser (+1): Magic
Standard (+2): as Lesser, plus any material-based DR (Silver, Cold Iron, Adamantine)
Greater (+3): as Standard, plus any alignment-based DR (Lawful, Holy, Unholy, Chaotic) or damage-type DR (Piercing, Slashing, Blunt)
Epic (+4): as Greater, plus all others. This includes Epic, untyped, or object Hardness (and yes, it's an Epic weapon if you put this on)

If a DR requires more than one condition (DR 15/Holy Silver), the Sure Striking can satisfy one without the other. For example, someone with the standard Sure Striking (+2) can bypass the Pit Fiend's DR if his weapon is also Holy; the Sure Striking mimics the "Silver" part.

So for a +1 cost you can ignore DR */magic entirely. Against some creatures this could be worth 10 or 15 damage points, but against most it's worthless, so that balances.

Anyway, it'll need balance tweaking once we know what kinds of DR each creature has, but that's the basic idea.

 

[comrade raoul]

So for a +1 cost you can ignore DR */magic entirely. Against some creatures this could be worth 10 or 15 damage points, but against most it's worthless, so that balances.

Against any creature it's worthless, since, like any other weapon enhancement, sure striking can only be placed on weapons with an existing +1 enhancement bonus, which is already sufficient for overcoming any DR of the form n/magic.

Personally, I'd eliminate the Lesser version, price the Standard version at a +1 equivalence, the Greater version at +2, and leave the Epic version as-is.

 

[Technik4]

While a lot of things have DR 5/(something), not nearly as many have 10/* or 15/*. It's a diminishing-returns thing. Someone going up against that Pit Fiend (DR 15/Holy Silver) would prefer to take the +1 Sure Striking to knock it down to 10 and then use the remaining +4 for Enhancement Bonus. You'd have to change the price to +1/+2/+3 to be worthwhile.

This is a problem inherent to DR, perhaps there should only be 2 types, lesser and greater.

Sure Striking
This weapon is borderline sentient. This enhancement allows it to pierce many strange hides, regardless of the weapon's original construction, the type of weapon, or the wielder's alignment (or even the weapon's alignment)!

A sure striking weapon excels at penetrating Damage Reduction. Against DR a sure striking weapon's effective enhancement is +1 (Lesser) or +2 (Greater) better than its normal enhancement. Further it allows the wielder to ignore the first 5 (Lesser) or 15 (Greater) points of a target's Damage Reduction.

This enhancement can only penetrate DR with a listed source, for instance a barbarian's DR may not be penetrated by anything, and this weapon enhancement is not an exception.

Caster Level: 12th; Prerequisites: Greater Magic Weapon, True Strike; Market Price: +2 (Lesser), +4 (Greater).


Why am I so adamant (no pun) about not letting something like Sure-striking be available at +1 enhancement? Because it destroys the entire idea of the new DR. Now, you can say that you don't like the new DR, and thats fine, perhaps you should continue to use the old way, or invent a new system. However making an uber-enhancement for weapons that nearly negates it is not cool, imo.

Consider this agrument. The 3.5 design team restructured DR in such a way so that the only divisions would be 5/10/15, with possibly gods and epic monsters having 20. This was done to allow people to try and ignore DR, something that was foolhardy in 3e. It will reduce your effectiveness, but this does not mean it is futile. A weapon enhancement that is priced at +1 means every warrior will carry a backup weapon with that enhancement, just in case. Eventually, when he has enough money, he will buy a greater version (or what-have-you) again, just in case. The point being, once again DR will almost always be worked around, once again it will be a system that might-as-well-not-exist because of a mechanic.

I don't want that. That is why I was trying to give the mechanic more power against DR creatures, but also raising the cost. It is still possible that you will see many fighters with a backup lesser sure-striking weapon, but at that point, priced total as a +3 weapon, that is a chunk of change (and it only penetrates the first 5 points of DR). Most fighters will not consider it worth it.

However, it allows for a nice enhancement which could be said of some legendary swords. The ability to pierce anything. Fight a Pit Fiend then a Balor then a Slaad, all the while with the same weapon. In my version a +1 Greater Sure Striking weapon is priced the same as any other +5 weapon. Against a 15 DR a +5 weapon comes up at least 10 points short per hit (assuming its +4 with one more enhancement, keen or flaming perhaps). And the +1 G.S.S. becomes a +3 weapon and penetrates all 15.

To be honest, I'm not even sure +4 is enough of a cost for such an enhancement. Which makes me even more unsettled when I see versions which are priced lower than +4.

Technik