I was recently creating a L5 character for a high magic campaign and was reminded of one of my pet peeves with the way magic is classified. The DMG suggested that my character get 2 uncommon and 1 rare items but nothing from the common items listings. That reminded me that the entire listings don’t make sense to some extent. Granted almost any magic should be uncommon, some things like +1 weapons should be considerably more common than things like jugs of alchemy. The entire listings are actually sort of messed up. It was a bit better in earlier editions where things like cloaks and rings of protection came as +1, +2, & +3 versions of increasing rarity as they were (supposedly) requiring higher level casters to make. It strikes me that basic tools of offense and defense (+1 basic weapons ( no extras), armors (especially studded leather, half plate, plate and shields), bracers/rings/cloaks of defense/protection should all be uncommon as they would be the first things anyone who had the cash would make or commission the making of. Pretty much everything else would be rare or more simply because there were never enough folks with the cash and need/desire for them so they simply wouldn’t be created very often. Then there are essentially useless common items like the rod/staff of bird calls - WHY? Clothes of mending, cloak of many fashions, even the cloak of billowing, tankard of sobriety I can see as common magic items but most of the others are simply WHY did anyone spend the time, money and effort to make even one? To my mind the rarity rankings should be based on how useful the item is to adventurers/wealthy patrons, which/how many classes would “typically” be interested in them and then how difficult they are to create. Anyone else have any thoughts on the magic items rankings.
Magic items rarity provides a rough measure of an item’s power relative to other magic items and how rare they can be. Common magic items, such as a potion of healing, are the most plentiful, and less powerful in general but the system shows imperfection in close comparison.
Personally I'm fine with the setup as a whole, although you do get the occasional case like Ornithopter or Handy Haversack that is objectively outperformed by a lower rarity item. I think it's important to remember the tiers are broad categorizations not exact measurements, so comparisons within an tier won't be perfectly even and you'll be able to find some edge cases that could be argued to belong to a higher or lower tier. Regarding common magic items, I don't overthink the "why" much; they're primarily cosmetic items to allow for players to add a bit of flair to a character's design if they want.
I’ve worked with it for 40+ years so I can live with it but it’s still a pet peeve - to the extent that I took the time to redo the list how I think it should work and reassign items to what I considered the appropriate rarity levels. The other part is the non inclusion of common items when they list what magic a pc could have at various levels. I do realize that ma not really matter as there are only a few common items that have any real value to an adventurer.
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Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
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I was recently creating a L5 character for a high magic campaign and was reminded of one of my pet peeves with the way magic is classified. The DMG suggested that my character get 2 uncommon and 1 rare items but nothing from the common items listings. That reminded me that the entire listings don’t make sense to some extent. Granted almost any magic should be uncommon, some things like +1 weapons should be considerably more common than things like jugs of alchemy. The entire listings are actually sort of messed up. It was a bit better in earlier editions where things like cloaks and rings of protection came as +1, +2, & +3 versions of increasing rarity as they were (supposedly) requiring higher level casters to make. It strikes me that basic tools of offense and defense (+1 basic weapons ( no extras), armors (especially studded leather, half plate, plate and shields), bracers/rings/cloaks of defense/protection should all be uncommon as they would be the first things anyone who had the cash would make or commission the making of. Pretty much everything else would be rare or more simply because there were never enough folks with the cash and need/desire for them so they simply wouldn’t be created very often. Then there are essentially useless common items like the rod/staff of bird calls - WHY? Clothes of mending, cloak of many fashions, even the cloak of billowing, tankard of sobriety I can see as common magic items but most of the others are simply WHY did anyone spend the time, money and effort to make even one? To my mind the rarity rankings should be based on how useful the item is to adventurers/wealthy patrons, which/how many classes would “typically” be interested in them and then how difficult they are to create. Anyone else have any thoughts on the magic items rankings.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
The handy haversack being rarer than bag of holding is weird as far as how much it can carry.
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Magic items rarity provides a rough measure of an item’s power relative to other magic items and how rare they can be. Common magic items, such as a potion of healing, are the most plentiful, and less powerful in general but the system shows imperfection in close comparison.
Personally I'm fine with the setup as a whole, although you do get the occasional case like Ornithopter or Handy Haversack that is objectively outperformed by a lower rarity item. I think it's important to remember the tiers are broad categorizations not exact measurements, so comparisons within an tier won't be perfectly even and you'll be able to find some edge cases that could be argued to belong to a higher or lower tier. Regarding common magic items, I don't overthink the "why" much; they're primarily cosmetic items to allow for players to add a bit of flair to a character's design if they want.
I’ve worked with it for 40+ years so I can live with it but it’s still a pet peeve - to the extent that I took the time to redo the list how I think it should work and reassign items to what I considered the appropriate rarity levels. The other part is the non inclusion of common items when they list what magic a pc could have at various levels. I do realize that ma not really matter as there are only a few common items that have any real value to an adventurer.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.