I think even the stingiest, most flint-hearted DM knows how important magic items are to the game of D&D and its players. Finding that perfect item for your character is a little like getting a Nintendo Entertainment System for Christmas, which is to say, AWESOME!
A little bit of background. Magic items have been in D&D since the beginning. The first edition I'm familiar with is 2nd, so we'll go from there. In that one, magic was rare treasure from bygone empires, but necessary to hurt higher level monsters. So you scrambled over it whenever you found it, and struggled to save it. Weapons and armor had bonuses, as did rings of protection, and those capped at +5.
Again in 3e, magic items were a bit rare but necessary to deal with higher level threats. In fact, it was assumed that the party would amass items and the associated bonuses at a certain rate to keep pace with the threats they encountered at higher level. Again, weapon items and protective items capped at +5 bonuses, but weapon and armor abilities were designed to be modular, so a particularly optimizing player could build his perfect weapon and suit of armor. But 3e introduced something new: a magic item economy. A character built a certain way could make magic items. But almost no one ever built a character like this-part of the cost of building an item was your character's precious, precious Xp. That could be a steep cost for disposable items like scrolls and potions! But it was assumed that NPCs could be built to make items, so players could buy and sell them. In fact, the setting that premiered in 3e, Eberron, assumed that this magic item crafting was common enough that it replaced technology.
And 4e took this to its logical conclusion-something many people (sticks in the mud, in my opinion)-took issue with. Magic items were part and parcel of the treasure PCs received (and I do mean parcel, that was 4e's term for a unit of treasure). Again, the pluses received from magic weapons and protection were built into the growth of threats the PCs faced. The caps this time, however, was +6. Also, you wouldn't have bonus armor, a ring with a plus, and a cloak with a plus, 4e featured a very detailed breakdown of what you could equip where and what kinds of benefits you could get. And it still had the magic item economy. Players could buy and sell items to their black-hearts' content, and even make them without too much effort-no Xp was required to be expended. While armor and weapons were no longer modular, generally a weapon or armor only had one ability, each ability was assumed to fit on a variety of different kinds of weapons or armor, anyway.
The new edition seems to be trying to find a balance between the older method and the newer. The baseline assumption is that magic items are still the relics of bygone empires, but there still seems to be an economy for minor consumable items-potions of healing are available in the PHB. And, as I've already mentioned, the DMG includes optional rule for players to use character downtime to make magic items of their own. They've added a rarity mechanic, so items are (like Magic cards!) common, uncommon, rare, very rare, or legendary. Legendary items cover what 3e would have called minor artifacts, really powerful stuff that is in somewhat limited supply. Abilities are no longer officially modular, but suggestions for customizing items later in the book suggests switching abilities to different items. This time the bonuses cap at +3 for weapons, armor, and even shields. The item slots are left up to the DM and common sense to govern, but 4e does have a limit: attunement.
Attunement was introduced in 4e, and it required the character to spend some time with an item before being able to get the benefit from it. In 5e, you spend a short rest with the item (an hour), and it is attuned. In 5e, you can have up to three items attuned. How does that work in play? Most of the basic items don't require attunement, so if you're lucky enough you could carry around however many +1 weapons you want and use them, but the nicer items, the ones that let you have a +1 sword that shoots fire and the armor that lets you turn invisible, require attunement. So more than likely, rather than being able to layer their ten cloaks, the character will really only be able to use one of them. And you might have to choose between attuning that shield that makes you immune to everything and that sword that lets you kill everything if you already have the armor that lets you turn invisible, those boots that let you fly, and that ring that summons fire elementals.
There's a lot more, but this is only a blog. When we return, we'll see how our heroes fare against the remaining inhabitants of that cave.
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