Your +1 Flaming Longsword has served you well through all your battles. But through it all, have you ever thought “What does my flaming sword do when I’m not killing things?”
Does it burn while in your sheath? If so, is your sheath flame retardant? Can you start a fire in the woods with your flaming sword? How do you turn it on or off – and how much effort does that take?
Let’s check it out.
The Rules As Written
Magic weapon activation is another often overlooked mechanic that actually is spelled out in the DMG’s magic weapon section.
Activation
Usually a character benefits from a magic weapon in the same way a character benefits from a mundane weapon—by attacking with it. If a weapon has a special ability that the user needs to activate then the user usually needs to utter a command word (a standard action).
This means you run around with a +1 longsword normally, but when you want it to “flame on”, you have to activate it – and this takes a standard action. No wonder so many of us ignore that rule.
What About Heavily Magicked Weapons?
Say you have a +1 flaming, frost, shocking longsword – does that take 3 rounds to activate?
How about magical arrows? Do you need to effectively take 2 rounds for each shot and get limited to one magical arrow per round?
It could – but it doesn’t have to.
What’s The FAQ Say?
If you weren’t aware, Wizards has a FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) list for a number of books. Here’s one very long and rambly question the FAQ:
The new descriptions for the flaming, frost, and shock weapon special abilities say that these weapons’ energy effects work only on command. Why was this changed in the revision? Does that mean that their wielders must use a standard action to activate them for each attack? Or do the energy effects last awhile? If so, how long do they last? What’s the chance that you burn (or freeze or shock) yourself when holding onto an activated weapon? Can you put away an activated weapon without damaging the scabbard where you store it? What happens if you have ammunition with these effects? Do you have to activate each piece of ammunition separately? What happens if you have a flaming, frost, and shock weapon? Logically, such a weapon couldn’t exist, but what if it did? Would you have to activate each property separately? Finally, how does all this affect flaming burst, icy burst, and shocking burst weapons? Do these weapons’ flame, frost, and shock properties have to be activated for the burst powers to work?
A FAQ’s not a useful FAQ without the answers, so there’s a not-quite-so-rambly answer:
The flaming, frost, and shock weapon special abilities always have been command activated; the revision just clarified that.
Activating an energy power requires a standard action, but once you activate energy power, the power works until you use another action to deactivate it. You can activate or deactivate one of these powers on up to 50 pieces of ammunition at the same time, provided that all the ammunition is in your possession, all the ammunition is the same kind, and all the ammunition has the same power.
Any attack you make with an activated weapon deals energy damage to your foe if you hit—you don’t have to do anything special to deal energy damage with it.
A burst weapon’s burst power is use activated and it works even when the weapon’s energy power is not activated (see the last sentence in each power’s description).
The energy from a flaming, frost, shock, flaming burst, icy burst, or shocking burst weapon never harms you while you’re wielding or carrying the activated weapon (see the power descriptions), and it will not harm your equipment. If you lose or set down an activated weapon, the energy it produces will harm other objects it touches, so it is best to deactivate it first.
There’s nothing illogical about a flaming, frost, shock weapon (at least not within any framework that allows weapons to generate energy in the first place), and there’s no rule against such weapons (think of the weapon as having fiery, frosty, shocking flames). The character creating such a weapon decides how it can be activated. Most such weapons probably are made so that the wielders can activate all three powers simultaneously, or activate them one at a time, as desired.
Ok, it’s silly for me to assume you’ll actually read all that. So here’s a quick breakdown.
- You do need to use a command word to activate your weapon abilities (such as flaming), but only need to do so once until you turn it off.
- The energy doesn’t harm you or your stuff, but can harm anything else you hit or touch with it.
- You can give one command word to multiple abilities on one weapon – activating them all at the same time. Likewise, you can activate up to 50 pieces of ammo if they’re the same type of ammo with the same abilities.
That make things easier, doesn’t it. I guess I just wanted everyone to believe me when I gave the answers.
Ok, Fine – But It’s Still Dumb That It’s A Standard Action
Know what? I fully agree. I don’t think I’ve played in a game that requires that you use a standard action to activate your weapon abilities. Combat happens so fast as it is that even a single standard action wasted for a melee type can have severe consequences.
What I would like to see or do, is have someone with a flaming weapon get disarmed and subsequently catch the area around them on fire – say a big dry field. They don’t even need to take damage – just cause a massive blaze that ends up burning down all sorts of things.
Also, the language seems to imply that in order to activate and deactivate the weapon you need to be wielding it. So if they’re disarmed, picking up the weapon is a move action. If the weapon happened to catch stuff on fire (such as the surrounding grass), you’re now stuck in a fire and have used up your move action for that round. Sounds a bit odd to me.
This Is Getting Weird, What’s Your Point?
My point is that the rules about magic item activation and use is very clearly spelled out in the DMG. However, not every rule makes the most sense for every campaign. What’s important is that you’re consistent. If you don’t use command words for the PCs, then neither do the bad guys. At least that way, balance is preserved.
Combat usually takes up the longest amount of time for most games, so saving some extra rounds throughout encounters consistently can sure speed up things over the long run.
I’d much rather spend round one hacking at some evil guy than saying “Flame On” to get my sword wreathed in flame.