Sorry about posting here. I didn’t know where to post this. Since my player and myself are new. They’re asking me for new weapons. Well I’m always searching for weapon in the items from dnd website. For me it doesn’t seem like much, it doesn’t help that I’m new. I was wondering if I should home brew or rename weapons. Like a axe +1, then tell them it’s crafted in the shape of a dragon, but the axe blade are the dragons wings. . Wanting to make sure I don’t go over board with giving them strong weapons as well items. To add variety, to them instead of saying. Oh you find a axe +1 any tips ? My players characters are currently lvl 5 . If this helps in any way shape or form
Firstly, don’t let your players bully you into giving them too many magic items too quickly. The characters can end up overpowered, and DMing becomes a headache.
Otherwise, you’re really on the right track. Giving an item a cool description makes it more interesting and memorable, and the way it looks won’t impact game balance. So, yeah, if it’s a +1 axe, but looks like a dragon, that’s 100 times more interesting than a+1 axe. Generally, you can make cosmetic changes to anything, items, spell effects, etc. without worrying about game balance. The big things are don’t start changing numbers or damage types. But flavor changes, the sky’s the limit.
I think +1 weapons are entirely appropriate for level 5 characters and flavor is always free. Either you can make a homebrew of an existing +1 magic weapon to add your flavor or just use the default +1 and customize it on their character sheet. One method is more permanent but harder to change, the other is easier to set up on the fly but is temporary to that character sheet.
Sorry about posting here. I didn’t know where to post this. Since my player and myself are new. They’re asking me for new weapons. Well I’m always searching for weapon in the items from dnd website. For me it doesn’t seem like much, it doesn’t help that I’m new. I was wondering if I should home brew or rename weapons. Like a axe +1, then tell them it’s crafted in the shape of a dragon, but the axe blade are the dragons wings. . Wanting to make sure I don’t go over board with giving them strong weapons as well items. To add variety, to them instead of saying. Oh you find a axe +1 any tips ? My players characters are currently lvl 5 . If this helps in any way shape or form
First, let me welcome you to D&D, and D&D Beyond!
This is the perfect place to post this sort of question, either here or in the DMs’ forum. So you’re all good. No worries.
I agree with the others:
4th through 7th levels is around the perfect time to start dropping magic weapons into the game for your players. I don’t usually drop them all in at once, I usually start dropping them in one or two at a time here or there so it feels a bit more realistic for them. Maybe they stumble across a copse that has a +1 dagger to bump up the rogue who seems to need a little help in combat,* and then a little later, after defeating a cool enemy they find that axe you were talking about. Stuff like that.
*I try to determine who needs the boost in combat the most and drop in something that will appeal to that character/player. Then I drop in something for whoever needs the boost the most next and so on until everyone has something that will carry them on for a few levels before it starts to feel like they could use another boost and start over again.
A +1 battleaxe is a perfect starting magic weapon for a party, but they don’t all have to have +X bonuses to be appealing and appropriate. Any of the Uncommon (Green) or even some Rare (Blue) magic weapons could be appropriate depending on what level the party is. If they’re closer to 7th level than to 4th a Rare magic weapon would probably be more appropriate for them. I don’t know if you have purchased the DMG here on DDB or not, but that opens up the possibilities for you for stuff like a weapon of warning, which is another excellent magic weapon for a 2nd-Tier (5th—10th level) party.
Something else to consider is that some PCs need more help on defense than offense, or don’t usually use weapons & armor (like monks & spellcasters), so magic armor or other magic items might be more interesting for them. Stuff like a bag of holding, immovable rod, or other cool items are also great things to start dropping in around this level too.
Never be afraid to take a bog standard item and dress it up a bit for them. Your idea about that dragon shaped axe is a perfect example. A “+1 axe” is rather boring as a description, but your dragon axe sounds way cooler and more evocative. Doing stuff like special descriptions for otherwise straightforward magic items is never a bad thing.
Finally, there’s “homebrew” territory. That can be tricky for new DMs to do well since, when not done well it can really unbalance a game, and that kinda thing can be hard for newer DMs to gauge. If you decide to go that rout I would suggest starting small until you get a better feel for how the game is balanced. Perhaps that +1 dragon axe you mentioned might glow whenever there’s a dragon (any creature with the Dragon type) within 60 feet would be a bit cooler than an ordinary +1 axe (especially if you plan to put lower CR dragons into the game soon), and wouldn’t risk unbalancing the game. Or if your next adventure arc will involve the undead for example, maybe a +1 dagger that has a bone handle and is actually +2 against undead just to give it a little extra kick some of the time. In my experience players love that sort of thing.
I hope that was used information, and again, welcome to D&D!!
I find +1 weapon or armor so vanilla and boring, i prefer to give players more interesting items than one that give only a bonus, so magic weapons such as Lightbringer or Shatterspike are more attractive to me.
Thanks, for this advice and truly helpful. They aren’t being bulky, just every time they run into a vendor or killed an enemy. It gets boring just reading off. Hand axe, or just a dagger dropped. I want thing to be good and fun. As well when giving them a description as such. See if they use it in other ways. I did the dragon axe. It add more variety to their actions. One thought the dragons axe may need to be placed or given to someone. It’s much better than given a dagger and their play being stagnant. Past could have sesh , I’m try to intro Duce more actions to their fighting. Cause when we all started it was point at to point be. Then I watched videos of fight and other encounters. So I set up a scenario for them to have more of a different outcome than. Oh I shoot x enemy. Now their fights are getting more interesting.
This is great!! I’ve home brewed a couple of items. Though not for weapons or anything like that. They where a quest item, one of my player where gathering and building. I’m doing my best to balance things out as well. Just want weapons to be a bit more exciting at their level. Since they been super interested in getting items as well attempting to get out of the starter gear.
Do not feel to get creative. The shatterspike is a great example it is a +1 weapon with a special ability when attacking objects. You can make similar items appropriate for your campains. Goingup against Goblinoids? Perfect place to put a +1 Goblin Slayer weapon. Which I will make up here...
+1 weapon that vibrates when within 100' of any goblinoid, does +1d4 damage and heals you 1d4 when you slay a goblinoid.
Nice weapon that the players will love, but does not overpower the game.
Do not feel to get creative. The shatterspike is a great example it is a +1 weapon with a special ability when attacking objects. You can make similar items appropriate for your campains. Goingup against Goblinoids? Perfect place to put a +1 Goblin Slayer weapon. Which I will make up here...
+1 weapon that vibrates when within 100' of any goblinoid, does +1d4 damage and heals you 1d4 when you slay a goblinoid.
Nice weapon that the players will love, but does not overpower the game.
I like it. Although auto healing might be a bit much unless it’s a Rare or rarer item, I might go with it giving you 1d4 temporary HP instead, but that’s just me.
Here is something for inspiration Devotee's Censer not +1, but deals extra damage on a hit, can heal quite a bit once per day, is class restricted to 2 classes and requires attunement.
To a certain degree you might also want to talk with players to manage expectations; going all Bethesda loot mode in D&D just isn't practical as the DM either needs to work out a bunch of loot lists ahead of time or they have to stop and roll/ad-lib something on the spot. The basic cycle of D&D is "kill monsters-> find a couple magic items and a lot of treasure-> return to civilization and use the treasure to buy some more magic items-> repeat". It's simple to prep, easy to track, and gives the players some room to customize their builds.
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Sorry about posting here. I didn’t know where to post this. Since my player and myself are new. They’re asking me for new weapons. Well I’m always searching for weapon in the items from dnd website. For me it doesn’t seem like much, it doesn’t help that I’m new. I was wondering if I should home brew or rename weapons. Like a axe +1, then tell them it’s crafted in the shape of a dragon, but the axe blade are the dragons wings. . Wanting to make sure I don’t go over board with giving them strong weapons as well items. To add variety, to them instead of saying. Oh you find a axe +1 any tips ? My players characters are currently lvl 5 . If this helps in any way shape or form
Firstly, don’t let your players bully you into giving them too many magic items too quickly. The characters can end up overpowered, and DMing becomes a headache.
Otherwise, you’re really on the right track. Giving an item a cool description makes it more interesting and memorable, and the way it looks won’t impact game balance. So, yeah, if it’s a +1 axe, but looks like a dragon, that’s 100 times more interesting than a+1 axe. Generally, you can make cosmetic changes to anything, items, spell effects, etc. without worrying about game balance. The big things are don’t start changing numbers or damage types. But flavor changes, the sky’s the limit.
I think +1 weapons are entirely appropriate for level 5 characters and flavor is always free. Either you can make a homebrew of an existing +1 magic weapon to add your flavor or just use the default +1 and customize it on their character sheet. One method is more permanent but harder to change, the other is easier to set up on the fly but is temporary to that character sheet.
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First, let me welcome you to D&D, and D&D Beyond!
This is the perfect place to post this sort of question, either here or in the DMs’ forum. So you’re all good. No worries.
I agree with the others:
4th through 7th levels is around the perfect time to start dropping magic weapons into the game for your players. I don’t usually drop them all in at once, I usually start dropping them in one or two at a time here or there so it feels a bit more realistic for them. Maybe they stumble across a copse that has a +1 dagger to bump up the rogue who seems to need a little help in combat,* and then a little later, after defeating a cool enemy they find that axe you were talking about. Stuff like that.
*I try to determine who needs the boost in combat the most and drop in something that will appeal to that character/player. Then I drop in something for whoever needs the boost the most next and so on until everyone has something that will carry them on for a few levels before it starts to feel like they could use another boost and start over again.
A +1 battleaxe is a perfect starting magic weapon for a party, but they don’t all have to have +X bonuses to be appealing and appropriate. Any of the Uncommon (Green) or even some Rare (Blue) magic weapons could be appropriate depending on what level the party is. If they’re closer to 7th level than to 4th a Rare magic weapon would probably be more appropriate for them. I don’t know if you have purchased the DMG here on DDB or not, but that opens up the possibilities for you for stuff like a weapon of warning, which is another excellent magic weapon for a 2nd-Tier (5th—10th level) party.
Something else to consider is that some PCs need more help on defense than offense, or don’t usually use weapons & armor (like monks & spellcasters), so magic armor or other magic items might be more interesting for them. Stuff like a bag of holding, immovable rod, or other cool items are also great things to start dropping in around this level too.
Never be afraid to take a bog standard item and dress it up a bit for them. Your idea about that dragon shaped axe is a perfect example. A “+1 axe” is rather boring as a description, but your dragon axe sounds way cooler and more evocative. Doing stuff like special descriptions for otherwise straightforward magic items is never a bad thing.
Finally, there’s “homebrew” territory. That can be tricky for new DMs to do well since, when not done well it can really unbalance a game, and that kinda thing can be hard for newer DMs to gauge. If you decide to go that rout I would suggest starting small until you get a better feel for how the game is balanced. Perhaps that +1 dragon axe you mentioned might glow whenever there’s a dragon (any creature with the Dragon type) within 60 feet would be a bit cooler than an ordinary +1 axe (especially if you plan to put lower CR dragons into the game soon), and wouldn’t risk unbalancing the game. Or if your next adventure arc will involve the undead for example, maybe a +1 dagger that has a bone handle and is actually +2 against undead just to give it a little extra kick some of the time. In my experience players love that sort of thing.
I hope that was used information, and again, welcome to D&D!!
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
I find +1 weapon or armor so vanilla and boring, i prefer to give players more interesting items than one that give only a bonus, so magic weapons such as Lightbringer or Shatterspike are more attractive to me.
Thanks, for this advice and truly helpful. They aren’t being bulky, just every time they run into a vendor or killed an enemy. It gets boring just reading off. Hand axe, or just a dagger dropped. I want thing to be good and fun. As well when giving them a description as such. See if they use it in other ways. I did the dragon axe. It add more variety to their actions. One thought the dragons axe may need to be placed or given to someone. It’s much better than given a dagger and their play being stagnant. Past could have sesh , I’m try to intro Duce more actions to their fighting. Cause when we all started it was point at to point be. Then I watched videos of fight and other encounters. So I set up a scenario for them to have more of a different outcome than. Oh I shoot x enemy. Now their fights are getting more interesting.
This is great!! I’ve home brewed a couple of items. Though not for weapons or anything like that. They where a quest item, one of my player where gathering and building. I’m doing my best to balance things out as well. Just want weapons to be a bit more exciting at their level. Since they been super interested in getting items as well attempting to get out of the starter gear.
Do not feel to get creative. The shatterspike is a great example it is a +1 weapon with a special ability when attacking objects. You can make similar items appropriate for your campains. Goingup against Goblinoids? Perfect place to put a +1 Goblin Slayer weapon. Which I will make up here...
+1 weapon that vibrates when within 100' of any goblinoid, does +1d4 damage and heals you 1d4 when you slay a goblinoid.
Nice weapon that the players will love, but does not overpower the game.
I like it. Although auto healing might be a bit much unless it’s a Rare or rarer item, I might go with it giving you 1d4 temporary HP instead, but that’s just me.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Here is something for inspiration Devotee's Censer not +1, but deals extra damage on a hit, can heal quite a bit once per day, is class restricted to 2 classes and requires attunement.
CENSORSHIP IS THE TOOL OF COWARDS and WANNA BE TYRANTS.
To a certain degree you might also want to talk with players to manage expectations; going all Bethesda loot mode in D&D just isn't practical as the DM either needs to work out a bunch of loot lists ahead of time or they have to stop and roll/ad-lib something on the spot. The basic cycle of D&D is "kill monsters-> find a couple magic items and a lot of treasure-> return to civilization and use the treasure to buy some more magic items-> repeat". It's simple to prep, easy to track, and gives the players some room to customize their builds.