Equipment Progression

How do you feel about a setting with a video game-like equipment progression? For example, bronze being the most common and weakest material for crafting arms and armor, followed by progressively better real world materials up until high level elites are carrying items of fantastical materials like orichalcum. Then you'd have legendary equipment made of ridiculous things like crystalized angel tears or static space-time folded a million times into a fucking dimensional rainbow katana.

Basically something more interesting than 99.9% of equipment being made of steel or wood.

Honestly these days I prefer systems that move as far away as possible from vidya style progressive crunch. I don't even play DnD any more (for many reasons, this being one of them).

Just use a craftsmanship system
Inferior, Common, Better, Best.

Inferior inflicts penalties, Better has a small bonus, Best has a big bonus.
For armor, that's
>a movement penalty
>no effect
>weighs less
>weighs less and blocks a tad more damage

Why haven't you read your GURPS user?

Depends on what you are your players are looking for but that being said I'm pretty sure D&D already does exactly what you describe.

It makes sense within the realm of D&D but I hear yah, you gotta play to your tastes.

Now that I think about it even more I'm pretty sure that the reason that videogames do it is because that's what D&D did so that's what old school RPGs did since they were based off of D&D

I have no problem with this, as long as it makes sense. I don't mean it has to be realistic, just make sense within the setting.

That said, unless we're talking some 15th century and onward tech level, bronze shouldn't be worse than steel. If anything, bronze should be used for flashy, ceremonial (although still combat-ready) or magic equipment. For a long time steel replaced bronze only because iron is everywhere and once you know how, it's easier to work with than bronze.

That said, I like it when equipment is an expendable item, with weapons being lost, confiscated, returned after quest etc. So in my games there wouldn't be that much progression in the equipment itself, more likely in skills, contacts, etc. Things, that can provide you with the necessary equipment when you lose it.

>bronze
>most common and weakest
nah son, nah

I like equipment progression beyond +1, +2, etc. though. But use it to sell me the setting. Think more along the lines of Elder Scrolls than Runescape. Certain cultures use certain materials, and the availability and styling of said equipment can vary regionally.

Since I like my games to A) not have a constantly ramping powerlevel, and B) Make at least a small amount of sense, then no, of course not.

>bronze being the most common and weakest material

bronze were none of those things. If you're gonna have a bottom tier shit material at least make it copper or something.

> Make at least a small amount of sense
> It doesn't make sense that there are "tiers" of materials that make good armor
> It doesn't make sense that magical shit makes for the best stuff

Also you're sounding pretty douchy homie with the "no, of course not" you from /v/ or do you just hate it when people have fun?

Well I imagine that as people got to steel and chain link and stuff then bronze would be pretty shit tier, yeah?

Like copper might have already cycled out completely

If you have steel in, run Iron as bottom tier.

Bronze could still be around in isolated or otherwise "behind" areas.

Sorry, it was not my intention to shit on anyone elses fun, but no, I don't really think having a large amount of increasingly superpowered materials being sold like a jrpg makes sense from a worldbuilding perspective.
Or maybe I'm just missunderstanding OP, I assumed he meant something akin to a Final Fantasy game.

Yeah, as an equal-but-more expensive variant to iron. Or I guess a made-up fantasy metal that happens to share name with the real-life alloy bronze.

Wouldn't places that haven't got access to iron yet still use bronze? Or at that point would they still have copper?

it would make a lot of sense in an over-the-top setting. That might not be your bag but it's still a legit choice, but yeah OP is kinda vague on the "spread" he's looking at

Realistically?

That depends on how lucky they got in the geological lottery. Copper isn't common, tin is outright rare. They could easily be stuck in the stone age until they import ironworking technology. (Which isn't all that far behind a proper bronze age in many cases, due to the cost of bronze. You're not making everyday tools out of it.) And if they trade for their metals, like most had to do in the bronze age, then as soon as the iron age gets started amongst their neighbours iron metal and items will be much cheaper for them than bronze.

Bronze itself required contact and trade and involved several different nations usually. Most people didn't have access to easy tin and copper at the same time. Given that iron tech spread through the same trade/cultural ties, it simply became a lot more popular very quickly. Bronze was still used well into the classical age and perhaps further even (I think mostly for armor), but iron was just a lot more common.

You did have a time span in which basically only the Hittites knew how to work iron though.

So is iron just more common than copper/tin but for a while nobody knew how to use it?

Yes. Bronze weapons were made by directly casting them and it was generally a lot easier. Iron is more difficult because it has a much higher smelting temperature, so instead of casting it directly they had to figure out forging and how to make it efficient so that you produce weapons in great quantities.

I dig I'm just trying to figure out how "common" iron is in the world, like the ore or whatever.

I use an hybrid system (Progression and utility) for arrows

Stone/flint: For hunting unarmored big game. Unrecoverable, breaks into the wound causing internal bleeding.
Steel: If you can afford it, its the best all around material. Has the most variations avaible.
Glass cage: A steel/iron cage holding a small glass bubble, it is meant to break open against/inside the target. It can contain reactive chemicals to cause fire and small explosions for sieges, or a considerable amount of poison against large monsters
Obsidian: A direct upgrage stone, cuts flesh like butter, shatters against armor and bone, but maybe that is just what you need. Breaks into incredibly sharp particles. Overkill against humanoids, but it gets the point across
Beastbone: Made from ground bone held together by a mixture of soluble resin and a poisoning agent. Can pierce pretty much anything, provided the user is strong enough. Hard and dangerous to make, save for biggest, meanest monsters around.
Among others

Now equipment is not only to be choosen because of it material, but also because of its utility.
As armor it works like:

>Dragonscale: A perfect heat insulator. It is made from the scales of slain dragons embeded into a metallic base. Can be made into lamellar or scalemail only.
>Mithril: Completely unbreakabl under normal conditions. Due to its properties it is impossible to turn into plate or scales, to make it into armor it has to be converted into wire and then into maille. Can be used in combination with a lesser material to make scale mail
>Angel tears: A metal remebling quicksilver. When properly treated it can be made into excellent plate armor but it struggles to hold its shape as wire or lamellar. It is said to be the blood of the angels who fought in the very beginning

And stuff like that, now there is not a "superior" material in every situation and progression is not linear.