Bow of the Galadhrim and Kings Blade

[bluejay]

Don't forget that you have to consider every aspect with these Rewards. For instance not only is the Short Sword fairly weak for Injury rating but also Hobbits have a low Body meaning their extra damage is pretty weak. One other thing that no one seems to have mentioned is that Hobbits typically have the highest number of Hope points in the game plus they add more to the Fellowship Pool ... so while Hope expenditure is tough on any ability, they are best positioned to take advantage of it.

I had a Hobbit player use this throughout the entirety of a campaign (mostly with the old ruling) and yeah it can be pretty powerful, especially when combined with Fell. The character became known as "death from below" after a while.

[Rich H]

The character became known as "death from below" after a while.

Hahaha, very good!

[Yepesnopes]

First of all, I have to say that Short Swords (and Daggers) in my game are house-ruled so that their Called Shot is Piercing blow.

King's Blade works like this:
When the King's Blade forces a Protection test (because of Edge or Called Shot), spend 1 Hope point to add +4 or your Valour (whichever is higher) to the Injury rating of the weapon for that attack.

I like this approach very much. I will consider it as well for my games.

Don't forget that you have to consider every aspect with these Rewards. For instance not only is the Short Sword fairly weak for Injury rating but also Hobbits have a low Body meaning their extra damage is pretty weak. One other thing that no one seems to have mentioned is that Hobbits typically have the highest number of Hope points in the game plus they add more to the Fellowship Pool ... so while Hope expenditure is tough on any ability, they are best positioned to take advantage of it.

I had a Hobbit player use this throughout the entirety of a campaign (mostly with the old ruling) and yeah it can be pretty powerful, especially when combined with Fell. The character became known as "death from below" after a while.

Thanks bluejay, this is the sort of answers I was hoping for.

I have never played with the same group of characters long enough as to see powerful PCs. Nevertheless, as Rich said, once the hobbit is consistently rolling great successes and has a Fell King's Blade, I wonder what the Dwarf is doing with his Mattock, or an archer with his Fell Great Bow and called shots. So, while I see that a Fell King's Blade wielded by a hobbit with a score of 4 in short swords is a powerful thing, I am not sure how it compares to other PCs of the same experience level killing proficiency, that is what I fail to assess.

This Sunday we play again and I will go with the old version of the King's Blade and see if we play long enough for it to be an issue.

[bluejay]

I think the point is that King's Blade doesn't need to be a Called Shot. Even with 4 or 5 in a weapon skill, Called Shots can drop your hit rate noticeably. Plus if you miss and roll an EYE then you're at a serious disadvantage for a round. None of this applies to the King's Blade.

As for how tough this is compared to say a Fell, Keen Great Spear ... well yeah that's debatable but it was certainly effective.

[Glorelendil]

Now that we're talking about King's Blade, here's my thinking on the various options...

"Spend Hope to..."
I agree with Rich: rewards shouldn't require Hope expenditure. Unless, perhaps, it's a truly powerful effect. For example, I could see "Spend Hope to get a Pierce, and the target must roll two Feat dice on its Protection test and use the lower result."

"Automatic Pierce on Extraordinary Success"
As mentioned above, I don't like this for great bows because by the time you have a halfway decent chance of getting double Tengwars you'll be making Called Shots every round anyway.
On a Short Sword it's better, but even it doesn't really kick in until higher skill level, and then you're still looking at that low Injury rating.

"+4 to Injury"
TOR weapons are designed so that they all have strengths and weaknesses. I'm not sure I'm a fan of taking the weakness of Short Sword and turning it into a strength. The only weapon with higher Injury would be Great Axe.

"On Great or Extraordinary Success, forego bonus damage to get a Pierce"
I'm starting to like this, but (as noted) for many Hobbits that's not giving up very much, and at higher skill levels this would be proccing constantly. But maybe that's ok: by the time a hero has weapon skill of 4 or 5 I think it's ok to drop an AL 2-3 target with every hit.