Setting: World of magic in early age of gunpowder, just been discovered (20-50years).
- Automatic weapons are not relevant and the usage of muskets and pistols are usually for high end military personal or specialized mercenary groups.
- General libraries do not have open source for these guns (has history, but not schematics), I give the possibility of being mentored by a specialized blacksmith.
Question:
I am the GM and I have an Artificer (artillerist) , Hobgoblin Lvl3 with proficiencies in "Magical Tinkering, Carpenter's Tools, Leatherworker's Tools, Tinker's Tools, Woodcarver's Tools" . The character currently has a palm pistol and wants to invent more powerful firearms. I want to accommodate the player but also want to make sure the character is balanced. What systems have you done for a character researching a weapon and when should these things be available to my characters?
This really depends on what a firearm even means. For some people it can just be a reflavoured crossbow and be done with it. For others they need to have an intricate and unique system that requires different resources and the introduction of weapon properties unique to that style of weapon. Is the firearm for flavour or function, and what function does it serve?
My light domain clerics shield is a lantern, a rogue player of mine used batons instead of blades for their weapons, a co-player of mine has their warlock chain familiar be a flavoured as a less powerful shadowspawn. Do these changes actually change anything? Nope. So my advice is to play into the mechanics of the game and look at what is already on offer.
Turn the firearms they build to just be magic weapons with crossbow properties, but there are also plenty of magical weapons that let you cast an extra spell. Shotgun? Let it cast Burning Hands or imbue a target with Dragon's Breath once a day. Sniper? Give it Guiding Bolt and maybe some extra range. Other things you could do is have the weapon act as a pseudo-Superior Technique fighting style and let them have a single use of a battlemaster maneuver. This way you can keep it in line with other items already in the game, but the artificer gets to give it a lot more personality on how they go about crafting the item and what it does.
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Hello all,
Setting: World of magic in early age of gunpowder, just been discovered (20-50years).
- Automatic weapons are not relevant and the usage of muskets and pistols are usually for high end military personal or specialized mercenary groups.
- General libraries do not have open source for these guns (has history, but not schematics), I give the possibility of being mentored by a specialized blacksmith.
Question:
I am the GM and I have an Artificer (artillerist) , Hobgoblin Lvl3 with proficiencies in "Magical Tinkering, Carpenter's Tools, Leatherworker's Tools, Tinker's Tools, Woodcarver's Tools" . The character currently has a palm pistol and wants to invent more powerful firearms. I want to accommodate the player but also want to make sure the character is balanced. What systems have you done for a character researching a weapon and when should these things be available to my characters?
This really depends on what a firearm even means. For some people it can just be a reflavoured crossbow and be done with it. For others they need to have an intricate and unique system that requires different resources and the introduction of weapon properties unique to that style of weapon. Is the firearm for flavour or function, and what function does it serve?
My light domain clerics shield is a lantern, a rogue player of mine used batons instead of blades for their weapons, a co-player of mine has their warlock chain familiar be a flavoured as a less powerful shadowspawn. Do these changes actually change anything? Nope. So my advice is to play into the mechanics of the game and look at what is already on offer.
Turn the firearms they build to just be magic weapons with crossbow properties, but there are also plenty of magical weapons that let you cast an extra spell. Shotgun? Let it cast Burning Hands or imbue a target with Dragon's Breath once a day. Sniper? Give it Guiding Bolt and maybe some extra range. Other things you could do is have the weapon act as a pseudo-Superior Technique fighting style and let them have a single use of a battlemaster maneuver. This way you can keep it in line with other items already in the game, but the artificer gets to give it a lot more personality on how they go about crafting the item and what it does.