Magic Weapons

So I'm conflicted about magic weapons. My party has a tendency to find one type of weapon and stick with it. For example, we have a rapier user, scythe wielder and a guy who throws cards.

If the party finds any other magic weapons, that don't fall under these categories, they usually sell them. I'm conflicted because I want my dungeon and boss loot to be more than just shiny things to sell, but I also don't want to inexplicably have every item dropped be one of those weapons. Sometimes I just want to make a cool magic sword or hammer and not have the party immediately dismiss it. Should I just adapt to making the cooler weapons into rapiers and scythes? Or should I just say screw it and let them keep selling them?

I say, if you enjoy cool magic items, maybe introduce a NPC that's specifically interested in them and is willing to trade pieces from his collection for items of equal or greater value. That way you're guys get things they'll actually use while also making them care about what they find more.

Make magic weapons rarer maybe? Give out more amulets and shit instead. This has the added bonus of making magic weapons more special, especially if they just so happen to be a rapier or a scythe.

Well.

Maybe you can have a shop enchanter that specializes in moving enchantments from one item to another?

Name him Tim.

That way their normal weapons can be kept without sacrificing the cool weapon's magic.

Put thematic magic items other then weapons into your dungeons. Especially pointless things.

Some of them will get sold, but at least a few will catch your players eyes and get incorporated into their characters.

Dont bitch about it online and communicate to your players?

My character will only use flails and other bludgeoning weapons (but prefers flails). Since my character is a blacksmith, I've convinced my DM to allow me to reforge magic weapons I find into flails.

If your PCs are selling, there are people buying. Possibly other adventurers, arcane antiquarians or just a very well-paid mercenary wanting to treat himself with his latest payment.

Characterize the magic weapons that the PCs come across, nothing fancy, just details like the shape of the pommel or whatever magic writings might be inscribed into the blade. If that doesn't tickle the party's fancy enough for one of them to break habit and keep it, then have an NPC take interest in it and ask if the party would be interested in trading for it.

Scythe fella finds a magic bastard-sword that belonged to an old Paladin? His great great grandson, now a cleric, offers to trade a weapon of the scythe-user's choice from his church's armory. Rapier guy has a handful of obsolete +1 weapons? Some mercenary-captain is willing to pay in money and non-weapon magic items for those magic weapons to better arm his men.

give out non weapon items like amulets and boots and belts and stuff

other fun stuff could be wands and staffs like the wand of wonder. I guarantee your party wouldn't sell those.

My DM gave us the ability to transfer magical enchantments to new items as part of a ritual. Expensive at low levels, affordable at higher ones.

Another DM had the magic items turn into the favoured weapon of the wielder automatically upon binding with it. Sort of like magical armour fitting the wearer. Not all weapons can, but some do and they fetch a high price for their utility.

I had introduced a 'Bard' who collected weapons of legend. He would ooh and aah over the miscelaneous magical gear they found and whip out a long story about it, including who the last wielder was. Sometimes that was enough for the m to keep it. The paladin found out that the axe was binding an ancient and evil tiefling, and it could corrupt people. They lacked the means to destroy it, so he took it to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. If you've ever read a baldurs gate unique weapon blurb its basically like that, but with bardic identify. You learn about the weapons history, and that tells you about the ability of the weapon.

Nothing gets me exited like a pointless magic doodad that only exists to look cool in my study. I'll move Heaven and Earth to get my hands on that shit.

It's called "Gar-Malad" which means "Pay back for past grievances in Dwarvish.

It was forged specifically for the 'Grudge keeper' Furen-Mansfeld "The rememberer" as a way to both keep track of his job and exact revenge.

To the naked eye the flail may seem normal, but the weapon is highly enchanted with a very specific type of runic magic:
The flail's head contains a compartment for a magic scroll, the scroll is enchanted to keep the name of a being (living/undead/inanimate), and the grievance he made against the wielder of the mace and his clan (Under restrictions).

If the name was entered correctly and the grievance is valid (very liberal interpretation-we're talking Dwarves) , the flail will strike a target with a force proportional to the severity of the grievance written for said target.

...

There are two ways that I can see to make them diversify their equipment, the friendly and the unfriendly way. I'd prefer the unfriendly.

Friendly: Give the weapons unique and exciting powers that are worth carrying them around for even if you aren't proficient in their use and your main weapon is something else:
A sword that fights autonomously.
A dagger that phases through people and only kills evil or unhealthy influences affecting them.
A flying spear that can be ridden.
etc

Unfriendly: Give them enemies that are almost immune to piercing/slashing attacks. Force them to diversify their arsenal.

I think both ways are great

Are you playing a system with weapon proficiency? If so, drop them.

I like it. More of an NPC weapon, imo, but its sort of like a very, VERY selective bane.

Whats that you torched my clan and I'm hunting you down? 8d6+static and the flail becomes damaged, again and it becomes broken.

Flipped me the bird while crashing into nuns? 2d6 off the top.

One magic item just keeps showing back up no matter what they do. Even after selling it, burying it, it shows up in a random chest or as a reward for some NPC.

But why Tim, why not Jim?

...

Welcome to the difficulty of being a G/DM.

The story, world, and game you want to present is frequently not the one that the players want. You either be a "good" G/DM and give the players what they want, you be a good G/DM by talking to your players and come to a compromise, or you be That Guy and railroad them.

If you insist on not doing the above and doing your best to keep your players disinvolved, then put the components/forces/magic necessary to enchant any other kind of weapon with the effects of the particular weapon you want in the game. If that's not good enough and it HAS to be a specific kind of weapon, refer to the options I gave in the previous paragraph.

Repeat these processes until you don't want to be a G/DM anymore.

ew, generic magic weapons

Does he specialise in items that kill ravenous woodland critters, like... rabbits?

what system?

As a GM who has used DND and PF for fantasy games with magic weapons I used to find this to be an issue as well.

as such I reworked many of the feats that martial classes take so that they apply to whole weapon schools rather than just a single type of weapon

Fighter takes weapon focus Greatswords? that actually means he just gets weapon focus 2H weapons

this way I can have that "rapier" user but if I throw in a 1H shortsword their weapon finesse feats applies to it as well

now players don't feel like they are pigeon holed into using 1 weapon type

You can give enemies other weapons.

Just have segments where they're tracking down improvements of their own type.

Like 'legendary scythe guarded by club-wielding knight', and they're there because they were looking for that scythe.

Consider also ways to "convert" weapons. Perhaps there's an enchanter/blacksmith/etc. who specializes in reforging magic weapons while keeping their enchanted nature. The classic example would be something like a two-handed sword being reforged into a sword and dagger combo (or the reverse). The necromancer's cursed spellbook becomes a deck of playing cards imbued with dark power. Could lead to some dumb/fun stuff like slapping a magic blade onto your +1 quarterstaff to make a scythe, too.

Bonus points if said blacksmith requires the party to do it in exchange for favors, rather than just straight gold.

That tends to be a flaw of the system, though "flaw" may be overstating it. Weapon-based characters tend to need to spend into specializing in a single weapon type (eg feats like weapon focus or more general things like dual wield requiring a light weapon, to use dnd examples, other systems have their own specs). Once you've picked a spec it's usually very bad to switch weapons unless what you pick up is MASSIVELY better than what you are using.

is a pretty good idea. Alternatively instead of moving enchantments you could have some smith reforge magical weapons into different shapes.

If your players want to use throwing cards and fucking scythes in the first place, they're beyond saving.

Piecemeal magic weapons. Have your players find a hilt of a ancient sword or the blade of a scythe. Till they have all the parts, if they have craft wonderest weapon skill they don't have to hunt down a blacksmith that can.

>enchantments
enchantment?

...