Champion's Sword

A Champion's Sword is a highly magical weapon made for champions and heroes. Each one is a unique work of art, often made with a particular wielder in mind, sometimes commissioned by or for said wielder.   The legacy of Champion's Swords in the Fourth Age began when Valak first taught the secrets of Living Swords to the Dwarfs. While Living Swords are very powerful, they are also quite difficult and time consuming to make. So the Dwarfs worked on simpler process that still created a powerful weapon, but was not as difficult or time consuming as a Living Sword. They reduced the quality of the materials (although Champion's Swords can be made with higher quality materials), simplified the forging process so it doesn't need to be as precise, and dialed down the magic infusion, most especially the final infusion of some form of intelligence. This means they are still powerful and unique, but much less time and materials consuming, sacrificing some of the power of the Living Sword.   The simplified process of Champion's Swords provided three benefits. First, the dwarfs could create a greater number of powerful swords. Second, more heroes could have a unique and powerful sword. Finally, the techniques were such that the dwarfs had less compunction against teaching outsiders how to make them, reducing the amount of conflict such creators caused when the were frequently turned down for Living Weapon training.   Just because a Champion's Sword is less powerful than a Living Sword does not mean that it is not powerful. The effects the dwarfs are able to build into these swords can still be quite powerful. They just don't have an intelligence guiding their application.   One of the problems with Champion's Swords, from the Dwarfs' perspective, is that once others are taught the techniques, they don't have to follow the strict Dwarfish code for magical wepons and devices:

1. Never construct a weapon in exchange for cash. It sullies the heritage of the weapon.
2. Do not give a weapon to just anyone who wants one. The initial wielder should be deserving of the weapon.
3. Weapons have a heritage or pedigree. This acts as documentation of the process and materials that went into the sword, in a generic way but one that allows tracing the weapon's origins.
4. There should never be too many magical weapons in the world, especially very powerful ones.
5. Any magical construct should display a part of the creator's soul, as the care, love, sweat, and tears of the smith goes into the weapon, so the evidence of that effort should be visible.

This is a partial representation of the Dwarfish Code. It is much more extensive and specific. However, these four items show the gist of why it's bad for the code to be violated. Outsiders rarely learn the reasoning behind the code, and so don't learn or respect it. They start making wepons willy nilly, sending lower quality, mass produced junk into the world. This, of course, does not apply to all outsiders, as some are able to honor the Code.