In the game I'm running, my characters just finished the Mead Must Flow adventure in chapter one. One of the treasures in that is a basket of otherworldly metal fragments th t the verbeeg recovered from the crashed mind flayer ship. One of my players commented about getting that forged into plate armor. If he did that, should I treat it as regular plate, or should I give it some special traits?
Idk about canon lore, but in my homebrew world, Mindflayer tech and construction is associated with Adamantine so maybe this "otherworldly metal" could be that?
Maybe call it too hard to forge into anything, or because it's otherworldly, maybe have the blacksmith refuse to work with it, if you don't want to deal with possible changes the metal would cause
The decision is entirely up to you :) ... what do you think would be more cool or fit into YOUR world better? Do you even want it to be possible?
1) Are there enough fragments to forge anything?
2) Can D&D metal smiths even get their forges hot enough to melt or work the substance?
For example, titanium carbide alloys melt around 3160C while a blacksmiths forge tops out at about 2000C using coal. A D&D blacksmith probably couldn't do anything at all with titanium carbide fragments for example. Tungsten melts at 3400C, tungsten carbide about 2870C (all numbers from Wikipedia or similar sources). So there are lots of advanced metals and alloys that would be completely unworkable without some sort of magic.
3) If you decide it can be forged through some extreme methods then look at its properties.
Is it harder than comparable materials? Give it a +1, +2 etc or allow it to cancel critical hits like adamantine or increase its base AC without making it magical
Is it lighter than comparable materials? Remove disadvantage to stealth checks, or remove strength requirement or both
Is it more flexible and lighter than comparable materials? Classify it as medium or light armor but give it a higher base AC.
Any other special properties are up to you ... those are only ideas.
However, if the metal has no special properties in relation to comparable materials used for making similar armor, and you allow it to be forged, then the armor produced shouldn't be any different from that made with contemporary materials except perhaps for looks.
In the game I'm running, my characters just finished the Mead Must Flow adventure in chapter one. One of the treasures in that is a basket of otherworldly metal fragments th t the verbeeg recovered from the crashed mind flayer ship. One of my players commented about getting that forged into plate armor. If he did that, should I treat it as regular plate, or should I give it some special traits?
Bear in mind that crafting a suit of plate armor takes 36 weeks of work unless someone casts Fabricate or there are other special conditions making it faster, so even if there are no special properties it likely won't be available until after the adventure is over. Otherwise than that, I'd be inclined to call it Mithral Armor on the theory that materials used to make a flying ship are probably lightweight.
2) Can D&D metal smiths even get their forges hot enough to melt or work the substance?
For example, titanium carbide alloys melt around 3160C while a blacksmiths forge tops out at about 2000C using coal. A D&D blacksmith probably couldn't do anything at all with titanium carbide fragments for example. Tungsten melts at 3400C, tungsten carbide about 2870C (all numbers from Wikipedia or similar sources). So there are lots of advanced metals and alloys that would be completely unworkable without some sort of magic.
You don't need to bring metal to melting temp in order to forge it. You only need to get it to about half way to make it move under a hammer.
Aside from that, you made some really good suggestions.
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"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
You don't need to bring metal to melting temp in order to forge it. You only need to get it to about half way to make it move under a hammer.
Temperature required depends heavily on the metal. There's no particular reason to thing the martensite-austenite phase change applies to exotic metals.
In the game I'm running, my characters just finished the Mead Must Flow adventure in chapter one. One of the treasures in that is a basket of otherworldly metal fragments th t the verbeeg recovered from the crashed mind flayer ship. One of my players commented about getting that forged into plate armor. If he did that, should I treat it as regular plate, or should I give it some special traits?
Idk about canon lore, but in my homebrew world, Mindflayer tech and construction is associated with Adamantine so maybe this "otherworldly metal" could be that?
Maybe call it too hard to forge into anything, or because it's otherworldly, maybe have the blacksmith refuse to work with it, if you don't want to deal with possible changes the metal would cause
Maybe you can work the metal fragments into very thin sheets and wear them as hats (i.e a tinfoil hat) to keep mind flayer thought probes out...
The decision is entirely up to you :) ... what do you think would be more cool or fit into YOUR world better? Do you even want it to be possible?
1) Are there enough fragments to forge anything?
2) Can D&D metal smiths even get their forges hot enough to melt or work the substance?
For example, titanium carbide alloys melt around 3160C while a blacksmiths forge tops out at about 2000C using coal. A D&D blacksmith probably couldn't do anything at all with titanium carbide fragments for example. Tungsten melts at 3400C, tungsten carbide about 2870C (all numbers from Wikipedia or similar sources). So there are lots of advanced metals and alloys that would be completely unworkable without some sort of magic.
3) If you decide it can be forged through some extreme methods then look at its properties.
Is it harder than comparable materials? Give it a +1, +2 etc or allow it to cancel critical hits like adamantine or increase its base AC without making it magical
Is it lighter than comparable materials? Remove disadvantage to stealth checks, or remove strength requirement or both
Is it more flexible and lighter than comparable materials? Classify it as medium or light armor but give it a higher base AC.
Any other special properties are up to you ... those are only ideas.
However, if the metal has no special properties in relation to comparable materials used for making similar armor, and you allow it to be forged, then the armor produced shouldn't be any different from that made with contemporary materials except perhaps for looks.
Bear in mind that crafting a suit of plate armor takes 36 weeks of work unless someone casts Fabricate or there are other special conditions making it faster, so even if there are no special properties it likely won't be available until after the adventure is over. Otherwise than that, I'd be inclined to call it Mithral Armor on the theory that materials used to make a flying ship are probably lightweight.
You don't need to bring metal to melting temp in order to forge it. You only need to get it to about half way to make it move under a hammer.
Aside from that, you made some really good suggestions.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
Temperature required depends heavily on the metal. There's no particular reason to thing the martensite-austenite phase change applies to exotic metals.
Since they worth 75 GP, I would say you can make anything worth 75 gp. Maybe add +1 psionic damage to item.
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