Sword of Kas Downgrade

[Mr. Bambu]

Mentioned I'd do this some time ago, now seems as good a time as any. This should be a fairly harmless revision.

Sword of Kas is listed as 2-C for scaling to Vecna, since it can kill Vecna, and being comparable to the Wand of Orcus. Cool.

Couple things wrong with this. First of all, the sword shouldn't scale outright to Vecna. It quite literally has the sole purpose of destroying Vecna, the two are opposites and are built to destroy each other. This is less a case of Attack Potency as very specific durability negation.

With that said, not all Artifacts are of equal potency. Scaling them blindly between each other is bad. It's particularly foul to scale the Wand of Orcus of all things to the Sword, given that the Wand was used to amp something as strong as the Last Word.

Now, regarding the other stats of the weapon, its durability should actually be fine. Artifacts are famously hard to destroy, and in general they need a very specific means of destroying them, even when in the context of gods. I'd be open to revising it, but at the moment I don't have a better suggestion for default Artifact durability, so this is solely to fix AP.

As discussed below, I think it should be downgraded to High 6-A. The sword still beat the hell out of Vecna before he was a god, that should be enough to give the tier for now.

 

[Overlord775]

looks good

 

[Tllmbrg]

Seems good, for AP eh are there any notable none Artifact magical weapons the sword could scale from?

 

[Dragonstitch]

this makes sense. When it comes to 4e it's AP is higher than Icingdeath, and twinkle. if that is useful.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Seems good, for AP eh are there any notable none Artifact magical weapons the sword could scale from?

Honestly the sword could scale to pre-god Vecna, which would make it High 6-A. Like before it was an artifact it still absolutely ****** Vecna up.

 

[Tllmbrg]

Then put that High 6-A for now until we find a better option if any

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Aye, that's probably the placeholder/potential final resting place of the sword. I thought I had put that in the OP but I guess I forgot. Whoops lol.

 

[Qawsedf234]

Its time for a sudden left turn.

The Sword Scaling at all to Vecna's full strength is sketch

First off there's the sword harming Vecna. It happened but it happened with context

“Through the use of artifacts and rituals, his own terrible intellect, and the harvested lives of thousands of victims, Vecna had finally gathered enough power to perform a new rite that would transform him into a god. The Sword of Kas sensed this, and told Kas that now was the opportunity to strike. Kas would slay Vecna during the ritual, seize control of his empire, and ascend to godhood himself.“

While Vecna spoke the incantations under the stars, at the pinnacle of the Rotted Tower, Kas charged into the keep. Vecna’s guards might have proven a challenge for Kas at one point, but the vampire’s fury had been stoked to near-insanity by the sword’s whispers. The guards fell beneath his blade like wheat at the harvest. As they died, Vecna detected Kas’s presence. He saw the sword’s trickery and realized too late how his paladin’s loyalties had been twisted. He tried to suspend the ritual, but the godlike power he had unleashed would not be contained. Just as well, for at that moment Kas reached the top of the Rotted Tower, his blade and fangs dripping with blood. The lich would need all of that power for battle.

“And an epic battle it was! Cultists of Vecna will say that had the combat been on equal terms, Vecna would have quickly felled the vampire. Perhaps so. But whether due to the effect of interrupting the ritual, the sword’s ability to anticipate its creator’s attacks, or Kas’s great strength and stubborn refusal to die, the combat raged on.“

Kas backed Vecna into the center of the ritual circle, its chaotic, thunderous energy now lashing them both. Vecna staggered Kas with a bolt of lightning; but as the lich moved to finish him off, Kas lunged forward, slicing off Vecna’s left hand.

“The vampire, his body crumbling from Vecna’s spells, pressed the attack. ‘You shall not spy on me again!’ he shouted as he plunged his sword into Vecna’s left eye, gouging it out. Kas’s sword, sensing triumph, released a surge of radiant energy as bright as the sun into Vecna’s body.

“The effect of the sword’s act was like tossing a torch into a sea of oil. It set off an explosion so powerful that it destroyed the Rotted Tower, deafening creatures for miles around. Vecna and Kas, at the center of the arcane maelstrom, were sent hurtling through the abyss between worlds. Afterward the only objects that were found intact in the rubble of the tower were Vecna’s severed hand and eye,

Dragon #402

It seems the sole major interaction of the blade involved waiting for Vecna to preform his god ritual then attacking when he power was focused there. Despite that (and seemingly being amped) his entire body was still destroyed and if Vecna was at full strength he'd likely just crush Kas as the text (and the sword for waiting that long) implies.

The sword possess a critical weakness to Vecna

The Sword's powers and protections shut down when close to Vecna

Unfortunately for its possessor, the Sword cannot use any of its normal powers, constant or invoked, within 30 feet of Vecna or the Eye and Hand. Even though it has led many brave war- riors against the Whispered One (only to see each of them destroyed), the Sword does not realize that its powers cease to work. If its wielder tries to back out of the final confrontation with Vecna, the Sword attempts to dominate the wielder and force the final confrontation. The Sword has an Intelligence of 19 and an Ego of 18, but it does not reveal this to the wielder or attempt domination until a confrontation with Vecna is at hand; any other developments are too petty for it to consider.

Die Vecna Die! - page 160

The sword does have anti-Vecna powers, but only when the person holding it has Vecna's arm and/or eye attached to their body as well (though ngl later editions like 4e do retcon it).


So basically

• In older editions the sword basically switched off when near Vecna
• 2e changed it to where if you have parts of Vecna grafted the sword becomes an anti-Vecna weapon that nullifies a lot of powers
• 4e changed it to where the weapon does extreme bonus damage to Vecna and those associated with

At best the sword with a built in counter to Vecna barely defeated a nerfed pre-god version of the character and at worst gets negated without Vecna's body part being attached to the wielder.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Hm. We could leave it at Unknown, then, until we get some basis for baseline Artifact scaling.

 

[Qawsedf234]

Scaling it to a minor artifact would be fine. Or have the AP be something like "At least Low 7-B, likely much higher" or something, since its superior to Kas who's a level 17 dude.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Even Kas probably isn't Low 7-B, given he was almost out of the tier before he became a vampire, but still, yeah, that works.