Weapons Usable for Bloodtheft

[LaeAndril Rayn]

In all the reading I've done on bloodtheft and how it is done, I need some clarification. None of the descriptions of the act of bloodtheft (at least, in the books I have) say what kind of weapons can or cannot be used to commit bloodtheft. Whether a character is using a tighmaevril weapon or a normal weapon, does it have to be a melee weapon? If so, are they limited to slashing and piercing weapons, or can bludgeoning weapons be used as well? If someone is using a normal weapon, logic would say "yes" because the rules indicate they must pierce their opponent through the heart on the killing blow. However, it says nothing about tighmaevril having to pierce through the heart; it doesn't say anything about tighmaevril having any limiting factors of this nature, other than the killing blow must be with the tighmaevril weapon. So, could a character have arrows or bolts made of bloodsilver and be able to commit bloodtheft with them? Could they use a mace or flail made of tighmaevril?

Thanks to all in advance who provide any answers.

Lae'Andril Rayn

[Fizz]

I would say it needs to be a melee weapon. The act of killing the scion through the heart is required to create a conduit from one character to another. It's a personal thing, stealing a bloodline.

But if there isn't a character on the other side of the weapon, as in the case of an arrow or bolt, where is all the divine energy going to go? It'll just dissipate into nothingness.

That's my view anyways, but it's not `official'. I don't know if there is an official ruling or not.


-Fizz

[Rhiannon Faramiriel]

My view is the same as Fizz. Bloodtheft is a very up close and personal thing.

I would say that it is anything that "pierces". It could even be a sharpened stake of wood. A blunt does not pierce, it crushes.

I don't know what the sactioned ruling is, but the house rule of my campaign is no distance weapons.

J

[Osprey]

I am also in agreement about the melee requirement, and the idea of the act of bloodtheft opening a conduit for the divine energies of the ruptured bloodline.

Also, all tighmaevriel weapons I have ever seen described are edged/pointed: swords, spears, daggers, etc. "Blood-shedding" seems to be a primary attribute of these weapons. Also, all of them are made by one elven smith...and I really have a hard time imagining any elven smith making a blunt, metal, melee weapon (mace, warhammer, morning star, or flail).

Osprey

[irdeggman]

In 2nd the combatants had to meet in battle. In general this was considered melee since ranged attacks could be done for ambushes and not in battle per se.


In the BRCS:


However, because the scions divine essence is contained in his blood, this usurpation can only occur if a scion dies in a violent manner and his blood is literally spilt. If a blooded character dies non-violently, by poison, or a spell that doesn’t result in the spilling of blood, then the divine essence of their bloodline passes with them, either to their heir or to into the land itself if they had not designated a heir. However, if a scion’s blood is spilt as a result of his death in hand-to-hand combat then the divine essence of his or her birthright is released in a burst of immediate power.





Bloodtheft

If a blooded character is slain as the result of being pierced through the heart (via a coup de grace), then the victim's divine essence passes in its entirety, to the slayer whether or not he is blooded. Specifically slaying a scion through a blow to the heart to claim their bloodline is commonly referred to as bloodtheft. Bloodtheft also occurs when a scion is slain by a weapon made of bloodsilver (Tighmaevril).

A scion that commits bloodtheft is not subject to any maximum limit for absorbing RP (normally twice the receiving scion's bloodline score). Furthermore, this regency is immediately used to raise the scion's bloodline score at the standard cost (one more than the current bloodline score).



Coup de Grace: As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target.

You can do a coup de grace witha bow or crossbow if you are adjacent to the target and it still takes a full round action to perform. IMO using ranged weapons in this manner is wrong, but the RAW allows it and it was decided to follow the core rules as closely as possible. So it would be up to the DM to modify this one.

[LeifVignirsson]

You know, in a magical world, there is nothing wrong with having a ranged weapon as bloodsilver and let me tell you why... You coup de gace someone from a distance of even 100 feet, that person is not going to be drained of blood by the time you reach them in... what... 2-3 rounds if it is all clear?

I look at it like this... Bloodtheft is something that is not honorable, it was developed by the Awnsheghlien to destroy each other, not the Anurieans to settle duels. So, yes... Crossbow or longbow to the back, through the heart and bathing in blood of your enemy... That sounds awnsheghlien to me.

I'd allow it in a heartbeat, ranged bloodtheft.

[RaspK_FOG]

You know, in a magical world, there is nothing wrong with having a ranged weapon as bloodsilver and let me tell you why... You coup de gace someone from a distance of even 100 feet, that person is not going to be drained of blood by the time you reach them in... what... 2-3 rounds if it is all clear?

I look at it like this... Bloodtheft is something that is not honorable, it was developed by the Awnsheghlien to destroy each other, not the Anurieans to settle duels. So, yes... Crossbow or longbow to the back, through the heart and bathing in blood of your enemy... That sounds awnsheghlien to me.

I'd allow it in a heartbeat, ranged bloodtheft.You can't perform a coup de grace on an opponent with a bow or crossbow unless you are next to him or her; hence the "adjacent" thing mentioned in an earlier quote.

[irdeggman]

In 2nd ed there also was no such thing as a coup de grace (3/3.5 terminology/mechanic). In Player's Option: Combat and Tactics they had tables for "critical" hits with locations, etc. That was how we used the kiling bow through the heart thing and also a "called shot" to the heart with a 4 penalty to hit.

[Doyle]

I feel that melee - 'up close and personal' is the way it should be - even for the Awnsheigh. The type of weapon can have a bit of variety though. The means of bloodtheft is peircing the heart - a spiked mace or flail will achieve that end with a strong enough blow - it's just a lot messier. I've allowed very strong monsters (vampires, trolls, ghouls) to use their hands / fists / claws to smash through the rib cage and bloodtheft by rending the heart. I'd say anything that could open up the heart at melee range is good.
Missile weapons should also be ok, but only at melee range ("Dodge this" - Trinity), although at that range there'd have to be a good reason why the character isn't using a melee weapon - cinematic roleplay counts as a good reason.

Back to those that hunt down scions for blood theft rather than it just 'happening in the heat of battle'. I can see a huge popularity in 'arrows / bolts of paralysation'. Snipe the victim until it stops moving (fails a save) and then rush down and then run it through.

...must remember to remove that sort of ammunition from the home campaign...

Doyle

[ausrick]

It seems that usurpation is less precise than bloodtheft, and thus nets less precise results, and that bloodsilver nets you the results of bloodtheft for the price of usurpation.

Since the requirements of usurpation are death through spilt blood, it would seem that bows, crossbows, throwing axes, firearms, etc. would meet this requirement from whatever range increment. Also, bludgeoning might if it was brutal enough to cause blood loss. It might be a bit of a crap-shoot. fist fight, possibly not, but baseball bat from the scene from the movie "The Untouchables" where Capone does batting practice at the dinner table, that is definitely spilt blood. Also, the Morning star, it is a Peircing and bludgeoning weapon, and though I would say it may be hard to hurt the heart with it, when it comes to spilling blood, they didn't nick name it the Holywater Sprinkler for nothing. I always kind of imagine usurpation as being messier, splattering the dead scion's divine essence all over the place.

Now to actually blood theft, coup de grace is required which puts you in melee range and you get to take your time about it. To meet the peircing of the heart I would outlaw bludgeoning unless you can somehow argue that the person would be able to generate enough force/cause enough damage to open the chest and open the heart. a club swung by a human, unlikely. super human monk with the kung-fu-action-movie-punch-through-torso-hole-action, +10 str Ogre with a club, or a semi truck could all be feasable at the DM's discretion. I don't know if it is written anywhere, but back in 2nd edition we had a rule that if someone went to -40 hp then their corpse was too dismembered/destroyed/gibbed-like-in-Quake to be raised and they needed a true ressurrection. For massive blunt trauma to cause enough damage to the chest cavity to substantiate blood theft you might use a rule where the blunt weapon coup de grace would have to be capable of at least 40 points of damage in order to bloodtheft with it.

The beauty of bloodsilver is that you "could" blood theft with a blunt or ranged attack ammunition made out of it. However since there was supposedly only one smith that knew how to make it, and he was elven I don't see this as being a cannonical possibility. Elves don't strike me as typically putting a lot of value on bludgeoning weapons. and the difficulty of working the bloodsilver would make arrow and bolt tips unlikely. anything made of bloodsilver would have been meant to be kept and charished, ammunition has a way of not sticking around.

However, it could be a fun plot hook to have rumor of a bloodsilver mace. The questions would immediately go to who made it, why, and where did it come from. It would be considereably more rare than the already legendarily rare bloodsilver weapons already in existance. and the possibility that somebody else (possibly from a race that prizes bludgeoning weapons more) had the ability to craft bloodsilver weaponry could be played up in a way that could be utterly terrifiying to cerillia. Again though, the existance of a bloodsilver mace is anything but BRCS cannon.

A fun house rule though, we've always played that bloodtheft could happen from a peirced heart OR a severed head. something about severing the head just seemed to fit with our campaign style. And it made vorpal weapons all the more prized/expensive/feared because on a good critical it skipped the need for a coup de grace even.

[LeifVignirsson]

Need I remind you that there was no such thing as Coup de Grace in the 2E? No? Other people have said it? Well then, let me be redundant...

You are confusing what is real world mechanics into a magical filled world. Let's examine. You have a magical bow and a magical blood theft arrow. You are 100 feet away from a dying prince/princess. You fire arrow and it hits a massive critical, ending their life.

Now, who is to say that the blood theft ability doesn't work? What if that "generic" magical bow instead had a tie to the arrow? What if the arrow wasn't "magical" at all but the bow was? What if the arrow transfered the blood draining ability to the bow and thus, through the weilder...?

Magical ties can be added to pretty much anything ranged and can have the affect above. That was the point of 3.0/3.x, to allow for things like this.

Everyone is looking at Birthright 3.5 through 2.0 glasses. You need to open it up a bit and see that 3.X has opened doors that restricted it in the TSR daze.

Now, I am not expecting it to be canon. Hell, I am not expecting ANYTHING to be official at this moment until something gets published, but as a rule I would allow ranged blood theft. Plain and simple because 3.X allows me to do it. You may not like it, but don't DISMISS it because "they never did it in the 2.0 days".

Make you sound like ol' coots!

[ausrick]

Bloodtheft



If a blooded character is slain as the result

of being pierced through the heart

(via a coup de grace), then the victim's

divine essence passes, in its entirety, to

the slayer (blooded or not). Specifically

slaying a scion through a blow to the

heart to claim their bloodline is commonly

referred to as bloodtheft. Bloodtheft

also occurs when a scion is slain by

a weapon made of bloodsilver

(Tighmaevril).











yes, in third edition bows confer their magical properties to the ammunition, usually. However that is speaking about things like "+2" or "Keen", a Mithril bow doesn't make its ammunition lighter and a bow constructed out of silver doesn't bypass lycanthrope's damage reduction. How do you make a bow entirely out of bloodsilver anyways. However, if a bow had the ability "heartseeker" I would imagine that its ammunition would seek the heart on a critical hit much as vorpal seeks the neck. Tighmaevril is a material, not an enchantment. I don't see it confering its inate properties to other objects.

Obviously, if you are using bloodsilver arrows/bolts, I would say that if you used them for the killing shot of the scion, it would count as bloodtheft. I thought that was what I said in my previous post Leif, maybe I didn't word it correctly. What I was saying about being "canon" was the "existance" of bloodsilver ammunition. What I was trying to say was that I doubted the elven smith who made all the bloodsilver weapons eons ago ever spent the time and energy on making bloodsilver ammunition. The flavor text, IIRC states that he didn't know of the ability the metal possessed to steal bloodlines when he made the weapons. He made the weapons as prized possessions. And I don't know of princes out there who say "Look at my esquisitely crafted arrows", It is usually the weapon and not the ammunition that gets the tender loving care of the artisans work, weapons are meant to be heirlooms while ammunition is meant to become broken and lost through use.

About plain old Usurpation:



However, because the scions divine essence is contained in

his blood, this usurpation can only occur if a scion dies in a

violent manner and his blood is literally spilt. If a blooded

character dies non-violently, by poison, or a spell that doesn’t

result in the spilling of blood, then the divine essence of their

bloodline passes with them, either to their heir or to into the

land itself if they had not designated a heir. However, if a

scion’s blood is spilt as a result of his death in hand-to-hand

combat then the divine essence of his or her birthright is released

in a burst of immediate power.


This all hinges on how you interpret "hand-to-hand", since the BRCS playtest mentions poison and spell that doesn't shed blood, this makes me think that for vanilla flavor Usurpation, spilling blood violently is the key, in which case fire your bow crafted from whatever materials from whatever range and just kill that scion. Only thing is that if you are far away you will be far away when it comes to determining who is closest for determining the burst of immediate power.

[LaeAndril Rayn]

Thanks to everyone for providing for some pretty good input, here. :) I have enough from all the various opinions and suggestions to make my own decision, now. Though, it looks like we're starting to debate and become rules lawyers. No matter. :rolleyes: However, there is one thing I would like to respond to:



Originally Posted by LeifVignirsson
Everyone is looking at Birthright 3.5 through 2.0 glasses. You need to open it up a bit and see that 3.X has opened doors that restricted it in the TSR daze.

I have played 3rd Ed/3.5 Ed enough to know that I do not like it. There are a few things that I like (a few character classes and things), but, for the most part, any "rules" that appear to open the doors actually either existed in 1st Ed, or simply took a little thought on the part of the DM to administer. Simply because there wasn't a table or graph to look up dice rolls didn't mean a certain "rule" couldn't exist. It only makes logical sense that a magical longbow +2 would confer that to-hit and damage bonus to the ammunition. It doesn't make sense that the only way that bonus comes into play is if the wielder runs up and smacks someone across the head with their longbow. This has been a guideline I've used for missile weapons for years, now.

Remember, they're called Player's Handbook and Dungeon Master Guide for a reason. If anyone believes their game was restricted because some table or graph of rolls didn't exist (or anything else), then it is your fault that your game was restricted. All it takes to "open doors" is your mind.

Also, I've had the opportunity to play with many, many players over the past 15 years. Of all of these, an overwhelming majority of the ones that play 3rd Ed never played 1st or 2nd. I wonder how true this is of other people? If it is, then the only ones looking at this through "2nd Ed glasses" are people like me. :cool: If this, and the fact that I stick to a blend of 1st and 2nd Ed, makes me a lesser player and fan, then I don't know what to say. What I do know is that I've been DM-ing for 13 years now, and I know the game better than I know the back of my hand.

I ought to stop now before I write a book..... ;)

No hard feelings.

Lae'Andril Rayn

[irdeggman]

Actually I started playing with 1st ed (just missed out on the the OD&D boxed set by about a year or so).

I find that 3.5 (much improved over 3.0 by the way) does so many things better than 2nd ed (and 1st ed) did that it really isn't a fair comparison.

Higher is better as the standard rule for dice rolling made things so much better.

One experience table instead of separate ones for each class is another one.

Skills and feats is another one. Skills started to emerge from proficiencies in Player's Option: Skills and Powers and helped to cement the system where you actually got better at doing things as you gained levels instead of just combat.

The entire team play concept is a vast improvement over 2nd ed's rewarding of individual actions that often pitted PC against PC and left players with a bad taste in their mouth when their fighter dished out 95% of the damage on a monster and someone else's managed to get in the killing blow and thus the experience award for the kill. (I saw this one happen far too often in our games).

The relative ease of multiclassing is a great thing overall. No more having to use house-rules (or optional ones) to get your dwarf cleric to go over 10th level.

Magic, well that is still a weakness in the whole thing - most likely it will be the thing that changes whenever 4th ed comes out.

[ausrick]

I started playing I believe when AD&D came out, the one with, IIRC, the people stealing the jewel out of the demon statue on the cover of the DMG and too much nudity in the monster manual if I remeber. (I didn't actually buy my own books until TSR re-did them all with the Players Option: line of books, just bummed them off of my friends).

Nothing against the older editions and those people who play them. When 3.0 was released I was very upset and skeptical. (Especially steamed that I couldn't use my Core Rules 2.0 CD anymore for character generation.) Even when I purchased the PHB I was let down. Coming off of using books like "Skills and Powers" it just seemed that the options were weak. It was only after I really dove into it and saw the other suppliment books that were produced that the value of it made any sense to me. They made the system more modular and more able to customize it from within its framework. Previously, if you wanted to add a house rule to handle something it was largely up to the DM's perception on chances, possible outcomes, etc. Depending on your DM's inate ability to do this. New books and editions "added" onto the rules, not integrated with them.

I had a blast in 2nd edition, I had some DM's that had made up a rule system to allow people to spot creatures that were hiding because they thought that a creature with good vision or reasonable skill at looking for things could see. However each individual DM had to make a ruleset like that, where a lot of those options were integrated in d20. However I also had DM's that lacked that ability to "ajudicate" what was possible. One DM wouldn't allow me to slit an incapacitated character's throat or stab them in the heart for instant death, no matter that they are bound, gagged, and unconscious, because a dagger only does 1d4 damage and the victim had 68 hit points left.

If I say specifically something like "third edition allows bows to confer their bonuses" I wasn't implying that 2nd or 1st did not. I just don't have any of the older rule books logged up in my noodle well enough still to be able to rip quotes from.

I often assume people who come here are using something other than AD&D 2nd edition only because that is what the original books were printed in. I often times forget that Cerillia was a world that still had many tales to tell but was cut short due to TSR ceasing to exist and that a lot of people that love the setting, even while playing with the rules it was originally written for, still have questions/wonderings/ponderings. I naturally assume we are talking about 3.0/3.5 because this site is the home of the d20 BRCS and Atlas projects. But it is also the ongoing home of Birthright, and I have met people that use all sorts of rulesets to play a birthright campaign. (Palladium, the White-Wolf D10 stuff, even a "Role-playing in Her Majesty's Secret Service" adaptation if you can imagine.) So I am sorry that I assumed everyone was wanting a 3.0/3.5 d20 rules answer to things.

To better answer the original question regardless of ruleset used. I would say, as a DM, if you or the majority of your players favor the gritty, hands-on, get your hands dirty feel of bloodtheft, then it would be in your interest to rule that it has to form a physical conduit for the divine energy to flow. (In which case you could even rule that if the person stabbed them through the heart but let go of the weapon before the bloodtheft finished that it would fail). If however, you like the idea of sneaky, underhanded villains who like to deal death cowardly and safely with minimal risk to themselves and want them to be able to bloodtheft, allow ranged. Also, if you have a player that has specialized their character to be some sort of ranged-weapon master and he has eschewed the skill and proficiency of melee combat to better focus in ranged weaponry, even to the point of where they have no penalties or provoke any sort of "attack of opportunity" from drawing, nocking, and firing at enemies who are close enough to grab/tackle/stab/bite. . . I would say you would want to consider allowing ranged bloodtheft, if only for the fact that the player would feel handicapped in your campaign if you did not. "Hows come the melee fighter has gotten to bloodtheft the last 3 awnshe we have fought, just because he's up close. Even on a Usurpation my character is too far away from the radius. I'm just as good as everyone else and help the team but now I have the lowest bloodline score" is potentially how that player might feel. I guess gameplay wise it could come down to what you choose to reward/punish, and how your players are going to handle it. I would recommend that you be consciencious of that. It is about having fun and challenging players in the end. (and some people would include "being fair")

I know I've rambled and wrote a book, sorry about that.

[LaeAndril Rayn]

I know, people have their reasons for liking one thing over another. I'm not here to try and convince people that 2nd Ed is better, or that 3rd Ed is better. ;) I simply have my reasons for liking 2nd Edition more than 3rd. I don't complain about not being able to find 2nd Ed stuff anymore; I simply get 3.0/3.5 material and convert it to 2nd. It's not that hard... :rolleyes:

To irdeggman: Thanks again for all the input. Also, thanks for tipping off Arjan (correct guy who runs this site?) of the trouble we were experiencing last week. Also, if you're interested, I have a large cache of 2nd Ed Birthright stuff (not for sale ;) ) that I may be able to use to help people here. If you are interested, I will compile a list of all the material and send it to you. I don't know, maybe it's not necessary?

Take it easy!

Lae'Andril Rayn

[Osprey]

To better answer the original question regardless of ruleset used. I would say, as a DM, if you or the majority of your players favor the gritty, hands-on, get your hands dirty feel of bloodtheft, then it would be in your interest to rule that it has to form a physical conduit for the divine energy to flow. (In which case you could even rule that if the person stabbed them through the heart but let go of the weapon before the bloodtheft finished that it would fail). If however, you like the idea of sneaky, underhanded villains who like to deal death cowardly and safely with minimal risk to themselves and want them to be able to bloodtheft, allow ranged. Also, if you have a player that has specialized their character to be some sort of ranged-weapon master and he has eschewed the skill and proficiency of melee combat to better focus in ranged weaponry, even to the point of where they have no penalties or provoke any sort of "attack of opportunity" from drawing, nocking, and firing at enemies who are close enough to grab/tackle/stab/bite. . . I would say you would want to consider allowing ranged bloodtheft, if only for the fact that the player would feel handicapped in your campaign if you did not. "Hows come the melee fighter has gotten to bloodtheft the last 3 awnshe we have fought, just because he's up close. Even on a Usurpation my character is too far away from the radius. I'm just as good as everyone else and help the team but now I have the lowest bloodline score" is potentially how that player might feel. I guess gameplay wise it could come down to what you choose to reward/punish, and how your players are going to handle it. I would recommend that you be consciencious of that. It is about having fun and challenging players in the end. (and some people would include "being fair")

For the most part I agree with you. However, I am of the school that "setting trumps core rules." That is, setting first, make the rules fit second. Bloodtheft via stabbing through the heart was a very distinct part of the Birthright setting. If new players aren't aware of this, it's one of the things I'd try to impress upon them when generating characters. Heroic melee fighters DO get the spotlight in Cerilia, and DO tend to have the strongest bloodlines. In Anuire, this has reinforced the idea of heroic hand-to-hand combat; for the Awnsheghlien, it has encouraged monstrous forms that also tend to brutalize enemies up close. For those would-be bloodthieves who don't want to be melee fighters, then they'll need to use a bit more cunning and care. Like specializing in disabling enemies from afar (Enchantment spellcasters are great at this) or sapping them from hiding, then running in to deliver a coup de grace through the heart.

"It's not fair" is only true if the players were ignorant of how the world works when they made their characters. If they know how bloodtheft works, but made their archer specialist anyways, they really have no grounds to complain about how the fighter is always getting all the best gains from bloodtheft. The fighter is also probably taking the most beatings (as tanks do), and is risking Usurpation every time a bloodline is stolen or "detonates" [BRCS]. "Them's the ropes" in Birthright.

Osprey

[ausrick]

Very Valid point, Opsrey, I didn't even think of it that way.