Author Topic: Monks and magical weapons  (Read 10466 times)

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Offline Arioch

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Monks and magical weapons
« on: August 06, 2007, 09:03:06 PM »
As a GM, do you let monks in the PCs' party find magical "weapons" like, for example,  +10 Gloves of Martial Arts or something similar? Or do they have to use weapon katas or develop a weapon if they want to be prepared in the case they encounter a "may only be hit by magical weapons" creature?
I suppose a magician might, he admitted, but a gentleman never could.

Offline markc

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #1 on: August 07, 2007, 02:45:39 AM »
In my game the creatures that need to be hit with magical weaon are few and far between. But if I did have a monk I would limit them to a magic weapon. No gloves that allow you to do magical MA attacks. But you would also have to rule on bladerunes and tatous, if they could enchant a fist ect.
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Offline yammahoper

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #2 on: August 07, 2007, 11:13:09 AM »
I never give out gloves or the like that are magic, or even superior.  If a monk wants a magic weapon, he will need a kata, or train a weapon like everyone else.

The non magical attack of martial arts IMO is one of its inherient weaknesses.  OTOH, with Chi powers like Elemental Fist, even a monk CAN generate a magical, unarmed attack.

lynn
« Last Edit: August 07, 2007, 06:25:51 PM by yammahoper »
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time... like tears in rain... Time to die.

Offline dreameling

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #3 on: August 07, 2007, 02:35:00 PM »
For our campaign, we created a restricted Special Attacks Chi Powers skill called Power Fist. The description reads:

Power Fist enables the martial artist to focus his inner energies into his unarmed attacks so as to charge them with temporary arcane potential analogous to the magical power of enchanted weapons. His next strike is treated as a +0 magical attack. In case of multiple attacks, only one attack is affected. Power Fist requires a 20% preparation action. {Em}

The skill is not as powerful as it may seem, yet it still allows monks and the like to damage creatures that can only be hit with magical weapons. I consider the skill a pretty fair one, particularly since it's my Changramai monk who's using it, and it kinda makes sense that Chi Powers would include something like this.

And you avoid giving monks enchanted items, if that's your thing. ;D

- Timo -

Offline Arioch

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #4 on: August 07, 2007, 09:41:50 PM »
The non magical attack of martial arts IMO is one of its inherient weaknesses. 

This is also what I think, too.  :) But recently I was discussing this topic with another GM, who was more for the "magical gloves" solution...

For our campaign, we created a restricted Special Attacks Chi Powers skill called Power Fist. The description reads:

Power Fist enables the martial artist to focus his inner energies into his unarmed attacks so as to charge them with temporary arcane potential analogous to the magical power of enchanted weapons. His next strike is treated as a +0 magical attack. In case of multiple attacks, only one attack is affected. Power Fist requires a 20% preparation action. {Em}


Great! I'll add it to our list of Chi powers  ;)
I suppose a magician might, he admitted, but a gentleman never could.

Offline Dax

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #5 on: August 08, 2007, 07:39:17 PM »
I'm not so experienced with RM Monks and the like
(don't know if there need to be some inherit weakness to them).
But in this case I made a decision long ago inspired by a very old nordic/Viking (?) tale -
the tale of the Wiederganger (wieder = again, ganger = walker  ::)).

After his natural death a Viking king came back and attack people.
He couldn't be stopped because normal weapons didn't "bite". So his son goes into
hand to hand combat and break the neck of his father.
The son believes in that moment that the father cursed him, but the father blessed him.
The king didn't want to die in his bed, he want to die in a battle, so he returned.

No normal weapon could hurt him, but bare hands could do the trick.

So I decided to let bare hands hurt any creature.
Imagine the fighter throw away his battleaxe to go hand to hand with the vampire  ;D

BTW in our game won't be any monks in the near future ...
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Offline Balhirath

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #6 on: August 09, 2007, 12:13:58 AM »
My players usually find magical things that fit the situation and not the group :) if they can use them, well good for them. If not, they'll have to trade it, sell it or learn how to use it.

If Monks want to do magical attacks, he can use a weapon. Either as a Kata or as a Weapon Bugei (From companion 4)
I'm new here, but have played RM2 on and off for 20 years. :)

Offline Dark Schneider

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #7 on: August 09, 2007, 08:43:37 AM »
Quote
+10 Gloves of Martial Arts

They really exist, not all gloves are equally good to strike (boxing punch, american punch, cestus...), and then magical gloves are obvious.
But as you can deduce, this is not possible for sweeps. For sweeps bonus, you need special clothes accesories, for example some hooks, but as the damage is made by the enviroment, usually the floor is not magical. 8)

And then, of course, you can use too the weapon katas and then you have all the weapon combat advantages, but remember with a -20 OB  :-\

Offline markc

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #8 on: August 09, 2007, 06:26:10 PM »
IMO +10 gloves do not say that they are magical, they to me that they increase your chance to hit by 10.
IMO you need to say hit as magic weapon ability.
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Offline dreameling

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #9 on: August 10, 2007, 01:00:14 AM »
IMO as well. +10 Gloves of Martial Arts give you a +10 skill bonus to your OB. They do not make your attacks magical as such. Or this is how we've always interpreted them at least.

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Offline Balhirath

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #10 on: August 10, 2007, 03:09:36 AM »
IMO as well. +10 Gloves of Martial Arts give you a +10 skill bonus to your OB. They do not make your attacks magical as such. Or this is how we've always interpreted them at least.

- Timo -

Hmm does that mean that a +10 mace gives you a +10 bonus to your Mace skill, but doesn't make the mace attack count as magical?

IMO + 10 Gloves of Martial Arts will make the attacks count as magical since you actually use that item to do the damage and it is designed for.

 
I'm new here, but have played RM2 on and off for 20 years. :)

Offline mocking bird

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #11 on: August 10, 2007, 10:31:18 AM »
Quote from: Dark Schneider
For sweeps bonus, you need special clothes accesories, for example some hooks, but as the damage is made by the enviroment, usually the floor is not magical.

This has always bothered me from my AD&D days.  This implies that a magic only creature could jump off a cliff and be undamaged as the ground would not be considered magical.  Likewise if you drop a 20 ton rock on such a creature it would not be squished.

I will agree that the sweeps example is a bit different but it could easily be explained via the 'magical aura' (a catch all theory) of the item much like a circlet protecting as a full helm or negating head crits.

IMO as well. +10 Gloves of Martial Arts give you a +10 skill bonus to your OB. They do not make your attacks magical as such. Or this is how we've always interpreted them at least.

- Timo -

Along the lines with Balhirath, the gloves in question (like weapons) could either be +10 quality or matierial bonus without being magical or could indeed be magical.
Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who has said it, not even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.    Buddha

Offline yammahoper

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #12 on: August 10, 2007, 11:21:40 AM »
Many supernatural creatures are immune to the natural enviroment, and can be slammed through walls, thrown off cliffs, cast into the deep ocean, all with little more than results that inconvienance the foe.  This is a staple of comics and movies.  Fire is often the sole exception, being able to hurt almost anything, with the exception of ethereal type monsters, such as ghost.

However, few creatures in RM require magic to damage.  Even the mightiest dragon can be killed by a mundane spear.  In comics, Superman has only one weakness besides kryptonite; magic.  Magic is assumed to be a universal energy that can affect just about anyone.

Sweeps will smash a skeleton and good, but are absolutely worthless against a Fog Beast or Demonic Protoplasm.  Even creatures that could be hurt, such as Gorgonar Demons, are best not grappled because of their ability to immolate.  Now, knocking such a fire spirit into a lake may result in damage, but these situations are best dealt with on a case by case situation.

lynn
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time... like tears in rain... Time to die.

Offline dreameling

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #13 on: August 10, 2007, 02:14:42 PM »
Hmm does that mean that a +10 mace gives you a +10 bonus to your Mace skill, but doesn't make the mace attack count as magical?

IMO + 10 Gloves of Martial Arts will make the attacks count as magical since you actually use that item to do the damage and it is designed for.

You certainly make a valid point there. Still, a glove is not a weapon, or at least not a weapon the way a mace is. You could argue the special material angle, as mocking bird does, but you'd still be left with, well, a glove. Upgrade that to a gauntlet, for example, and we're getting somewhere. But we're still left with a hand-worn apparel. Martial arts attacks include much more than just one's fists. Depending on the style, your whole body may well be the weapon: feet, knees, fists, elbows, shoulders, head, and all. How does the magical or material enhancement of a pair of gloves cover all these? Or is the bonus perhaps a weighted percentage of sorts? For example, the gloves are really +40 by themselves, but because it's just the fists, their effect averages out as +10? At least with a mace it's really just the mace (rule-wise anyways).

Of course, we are talking about magic so you can probably rationalize this satisfactorily one way or another. To me, however, the magical weapon angle is just not, well, intuitively right. (Make a convincing enough an argument and that may change. Maybe the gloves cast a funky magico-offensive skin-tight force field around your entire body that ...)

- Timo -

Offline mocking bird

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #14 on: August 10, 2007, 03:29:46 PM »
You could argue the special material angle, as mocking bird does, but you'd still be left with, well, a glove. Upgrade that to a gauntlet, for example, and we're getting somewhere. But we're still left with a hand-worn apparel.
.....
Of course, we are talking about magic so you can probably rationalize this satisfactorily one way or another. To me, however, the magical weapon angle is just not, well, intuitively right. (Make a convincing enough an argument and that may change. Maybe the gloves cast a funky magico-offensive skin-tight force field around your entire body that ...)

- Timo -

You can have a dagger that can use the 2-H sword chart, why not magical gloves that can use the magical crit chart?  A stick is not a weapon but it could be enchanted to use the quarterstaff chart.

For the strikes vs. what you are striking with argument, following that rationale it would be impossible to create gloves (or any apparel short of a jumpsuit) that would affect any MA skill since such mods could only apply to the hands - like boxing.  Likewise it would be impossible to enchant a belt to increase wrestling skill.  Or even increase a strength mod via an earring - unless you were picking up something up with your ears.  I therefore have to default to the magical aura model - similar to your 'funky magico-offensive skin-tight force field' which sounds much cooler.  This can also be applied to armor enchantments in that you are enchanting the entire suit rather than each individual piece.  If not, enchantments will have to be limited wrt only being able to be effective on what is directly being used.
Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who has said it, not even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.    Buddha

Offline Cory Magel

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #15 on: August 10, 2007, 11:32:39 PM »
It's not very often we get a player with a monk type character that doesn't use some kind of weapon kata. However, I would tailor my 'loot' slightly for someone that wanted to do so. After all, we play for fun and recreation and it IS generally a 'fantasy' setting... so while it's somewhat far-fetched I see nothing wrong with coming up with some kind of option for a purely hand-to-hand based character to have some kind of ability to fight creatures requiring magical attacks. Although I have to admit it would most likely be quite a ways into the campaign before such a need arose.
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Offline Arioch

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #16 on: August 11, 2007, 09:03:49 AM »
I agree that the "hit only by magical weapons" is a vague definition and that it would be better if each monster had a description of what can exactly harm it... For example it's easy to accept that incorporeal monster are unharmed by all physical attacks (including things like great falls or being smashed by big rocks), but for other monsters (like vampires or werewolves) is more difficult to accept. I usually have them regenerating damage from non magical source very quickly, so that a huge amount of damage (as throwing them off a cliff) can knock them out for a couple of rounds, but then they rise again completely regenerated.

For the magical glove: I agree that by the rules you could create a glove that let you strike bare-handed like a magical weapon, but I don't  really like the concept, seem too videogame-like to me...  :-\
Maybe something like a magical tatto would be better.
 
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Offline dreameling

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #17 on: August 12, 2007, 05:05:18 AM »
Quote
Maybe something like a magical tatto would be better.

Tattoos are wicked cool. A magical martial arts tattoo I could work with. Maybe something that artfully twines or coils around your entire body. Something that makes your body a magical weapon in effect. Cool, dude.

Existing spell lists probably do not allow for this kind of stuff ... or do they?

I seem to recall a series of fantasy novels by the default Dragonlance writers Hickman and Weiss that has a main character whose magic is based entirely on runes tattooed over his entire body. Not sure if this also extendes to his martial skills. Anyways, fantasy literature (and comics and computer games) are probably full of variations of the tattoo warrior.

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Offline Balhirath

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #18 on: August 12, 2007, 01:12:32 PM »
There's a whole list that deal with magical tatoos. I think that they originally was in Comp 5, but they certainly are in Alchemist Comp.
I have used them with good effect, but they do take a long time to make :)
I'm new here, but have played RM2 on and off for 20 years. :)

Offline markc

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Re: Monks and magical weapons
« Reply #19 on: August 12, 2007, 01:29:26 PM »
For magical tatoos, I often look at legend of the five rings: drangon clan.

I think the point I was trying to make was that you have to say wether a golve is just +10 to OB or able to hit magical creatures or both.
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