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8/30/2014 9:34 pm  #1


Making Magic Items Weird

Hail Krimmr! Long time PDF-owner and lurker, I just got the box set in the mail yesterday (it's gorgeous! The people who get the next book edition are going to miss out!) so I thought I'd post. My first thought when digging into the rules more deeply is that I wanted to make magic items more magical or weird.

Firstly, I am considering taking a page from HackMaster 5th Edition and saying that +X doesn't necessarily mean magic. Thus, a +1 shield simply becomes a Kimmerian masterwork item crafted from the pure iron of the Spiral Mountain Array (a skill forgotten by all but a few), a +2 sword is simply an Atlantean cold-forged blade fashioned from a lost antediluvian art of underwater steel-working and a +3 chain shirt is of original Hyperborean-make.

These items would of course remain as rare as their magical counterparts were. A magically enchanted (cursed?) item could be one of these exceptional creations or could be something more mundane, but in any case magic would be something far stranger than a bonus or a buff for combat. But this is where I need help developing the idea.

I think AS&SH does a good job at the magic-weirdness in general (viz. Robe of Eyes etc.), but I want magic items to be rare and to be real game-changers—as in, they change the way the party responds to the world. Magic items in my mind should always come at a price, with positive and negative effects built into a single item. For instance, imagine a ruby amulet that (once worn) instantly sucks the wearer's soul into its gem. On the downside, your soul is no longer part of your body (which falls limp whenever you're not wearing the amulet). On the other hand, as long as your amulet is safe, bodily destruction won't be the end of you. Maybe you can even dominate and subdue other souls (and commandeer their bodies) by putting the amulet around their necks. In any case, the way that player plays the game is instantly changed. I want magic items that are powerful and ambiguous enough to give players serious pause when they encounter a new one. Is it loot or is it better to leave well enough alone and not touch the magic dagger on the altar?

What do you think? And what other strange effects can make magic items truly powerful and truly intimidating?

Last edited by Galadrin (8/30/2014 9:57 pm)

 

8/30/2014 11:38 pm  #2


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

If you don't already have it, I recommend searching around and picking up a copy of the 1st ed. AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide. The description of artifacts and relics in there should form a nice template for how to design unique magic items with great power as well as horrific side-effects.

Off hand, whatever effects you give your items, I'd say it's probably best to only sprinkle in the "true" artifacts very rarely; enough to keep player's on their toes, but not so much that they become passé or begin to seriously unbalance the game or make your players feel like you are out to get them.

 

8/31/2014 12:05 am  #3


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

I'm trying to remember what I've put in our AS&SH game . . . a set of Chewbacca thongs that respond to command words . . . a long sword +1/+3 vs. undead that turns you first CE and then into a wight . . . a +0 long sword that lets any class use it without penalty . . . a +1 scimitar that allows water breathing 1/day and has no penalties for underwater use . . . and then basically a wand of magic missiles but all dressed up in Hyperborean physics.

So, yes, I like them nonstandard, too. I'd say just put out there whatever feels fun. The AS&SH magic item tables are very simliar to the DMG tables, bit as NAJones says, checking out how AD&D handles artifacts and relics is a great stimulus for nonstandard (i.e., messing the hell out of the PCs) magic items.

Edit: Also, welcome to the boards!

Last edited by Handy Haversack (8/31/2014 12:07 am)

 

8/31/2014 8:09 am  #4


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

Galadrin wrote:

Hail Krimmr! Long time PDF-owner and lurker, I just got the box set in the mail yesterday (it's gorgeous! The people who get the next book edition are going to miss out!) so I thought I'd post.

Welcome aboard Galadrin.


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8/31/2014 8:09 pm  #5


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

Welcome Galadrin! 


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And sweat at the daily round,
While in my soul forever
The drums of Pictdom sound?” 
 

8/31/2014 9:41 pm  #6


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

Thanks all for the replies and welcome! The AD&D DMG is a good suggestion—I'll have to check it out. To clarify, of course, I'm not just looking for magic items that have negative side effects when used. I'm actually most interested in magic items that are so powerful that they change the way a player plays the game. This is a dumb example, but a magic item that slowly made a character become ethereal would change how one plays his or her character.

To be honest, I got the idea from flipping through an old-school gamebook (basically a choose-your-own-adventure book with dice rolls) and I noticed how the player character would always treat new magic items with caution, stuffing a ring in his pocket until he could get it identified. Of course, this has everything to do with the limitations and style of gamebooks—every new item would come up for use at some critical point later on in the story, when suddenly the true purpose of the ring is revealed... Oh, you don't have the ring? Go to page 86...

While I'm not interested in simulating the mechanics of gamebooks, so that magic items just become keys to unlock predetermined obstacles, I am interested in capturing that sense of hesitation and wonder gamebook characters have when they stumble across something new and unknown. In my experience of D&D, most players respond to new magic items by just "throwing it on the pile" with the rest. Magic items should be very rare (without precluding other ways of supplying characters with +1 swords) and very weird. I'm not sure I can come up with sufficiently weird effects that also do not break he campaign, however...

Last edited by Galadrin (8/31/2014 9:42 pm)

     Thread Starter
 

9/01/2014 1:07 am  #7


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

You can always change the way magic items are "identified" if you want to maintain a sense of mystery. Don't let all of the properties of an item be revealed with a spell, make some of the properties hidden that only emerge through use, etc.

 

9/01/2014 3:39 am  #8


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

There's a book from Goblinoid Games called 'Realms of Crawling Chaos' that has some great Weird Artifact generation tables in it. Fits right into Hyperborea.

 

9/01/2014 4:41 am  #9


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

NAJones wrote:

You can always change the way magic items are "identified" if you want to maintain a sense of mystery. Don't let all of the properties of an item be revealed with a spell, make some of the properties hidden that only emerge through use, etc.

 
Indeed.

A few weeks ago, my players got their hands on a set of 10 magical crossbow bolts.  Analysis determined that they would "burst into flame" on impact.  (I'm sure all the GMs out there already know where this is headed...)

The following week, they got into a tough fight with a couple of trolls, so the crossbow specialist figured, "fire works on trolls" and fired one of those bolts into the melee.  The resulting fireball incapacitated half of the henchmen and outright killed all 13 of the party's mercenary pikemen.

They haven't found any more magic items since then, but they certainly sound like they'll be a bit more careful when they do...

 

9/01/2014 5:08 am  #10


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

Reminds me of Numenera. Isn't that game all about weird items?


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9/01/2014 11:38 am  #11


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

Judge Khan wrote:

There's a book from Goblinoid Games called 'Realms of Crawling Chaos' that has some great Weird Artifact generation tables in it. Fits right into Hyperborea.

Gah, that's great advice, thanks. I have RoCC and I completely overlooked it. That does have some weird items in it, particularly in the d100 tables in the appendix. That might be all I need to keep players on their toes.

     Thread Starter
 

9/01/2014 1:16 pm  #12


Re: Making Magic Items Weird

Wlecome Galadrin!
I too often change existing magic items or create new ones. I agree that magic items should be rare, even unique in some cases and that they should change not only how the party responds to the world, as you say, but also how the world responds to the party. Powerful magic items should be highly sought after and powerful people will kill for them. So if a 4th-level party finds the Hand of Vecna and brings it into the nearest town, people will be talking about that and word will get around.

Generally, the advice here is what I would say, I will only add that I sometimes add a penalty/cost/curse to using the item. I think about what the item does and what the cost might be. For instance, a ring of poison resistance, might drain the wearer's Constitution by one point to power itself. Another point might be that many items are ancient and were created by ancient beings. If those creators are around, they might want it back. Basically, I like to give to most powerful items a history and a place in the wider world.

Last edited by joseph (9/02/2014 1:55 pm)


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