[3.5] How to make a good Inteligent Item?

[Arakune]

I know this is homebew, but how do you make a good inteligent item? For example, how to determine price, powers, which spells/effects are apropriate for it's dedicated purpose...

For this topic, don't care about books used or price of the item. The price of it is just to get a sketch of when the PCs are supposed to get them, or to confront the enemy with them.

[Anxe]

What do you mean by good? Do you want something fun? Or something balanced?

If you're the DM, then you really don't need to stat out the item before your players get it. You can give it any abilities you want when the time is right, and then the item can just reveal those abilities.

As for the personality of the item, my most successful intelligent item was a rock that talked like he was 50 Cent. Do something completely ridiculous and it should work.

[Dyllan]

An intelligent item is as much character as it is item. You can't really say what a "good" intelligent item is any easier than saying what a "good" character is. It depends entirely on what you want that item to accomplish in the campaign.

What role will it have? Support the PCs? Corrupt them? Entertain them?

I've only used one intelligent item in my campaigns. It started off as a dagger used by an entertaining group. It was given to the party to use to track down a dragon - it had the ability to point the direction to a dragon after coming in contact with something the dragon touched (in this case, the fighter's armor).

It also fed on dragon eggs. When the party killed the dragon, the dagger revealed a short range teleportation ability, and stabbed the egg... draining it and leaving a dessicated husk. After that, it's full power began to awaken. It had telepathic abilities, gained the dragonbane property, the returning property as well as the ability to teleport any distance back to its owner at will (its will). And it had a hatred of dragons - of any alignment.

The PC who had it managed to control it fairly well, however... and used it to kill the BBEG. Of course, he was a bit evil (as was the dagger). He gave it up when he found redemption.

Eventually it ended up in the hands of another PC in my next campaign. She also used it well... but by fighting its will constantly, not by compromising. Until eventually, it overpowered her and she went off and killed about half the dragons in the world (as an NPC) before finally regaining control.

It wasn't a highly talkative type of intelligent item. It just had a strong force of will and focused on only one desire - finding the most powerful owner possible and using them to kill every dragon in the world.

But that's just one example.

[JoshuaZ]

You may want to take a look also at Monte Cook's Book of Eldritch Might which has alternate rules and options for intelligent items that have much better flavor and crunch than the normal rules.

[Devils_Advocate]

I know this is homebew, but how do you make a good inteligent item? For example, how to determine price, powers, which spells/effects are apropriate for it's dedicated purpose...
The section on Intelligent Items (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/intelligentItems.htm) addresses a lot of this. A few example intelligent items are given in the DMG. Here's one of my own design, to further illustrate the sort of things you can do with intelligent items:

Justice-bringer, Blade of Righteousness(!!! :smalltongue:): holy avenger; AL LG; Int 10, Wis 16, Cha 16; Speech (Common; literate), 60 ft. darkvision and hearing; AC 4 (when unheld), hp 55, hardness 15; SV Fort +11, Ref +11, Will +14; Ego score 21.
xxxLesser powers: Item has 10 ranks in Knowledge (religion) (total modifier +10), Sense Movitve (total modifier +13), and Spot (total modifier +13).
xxxSpecial purpose: Defend innocents.
xxxDedicated power: Wielder gets +2 luck bonus on attacks, saves, and checks.
xxxPersonality: Honorable, dedicated, beleaguered, and occasionally sardonic.
xxxStrong abjuration; CL 18th; Craft Magic Arms and Armor, holy aura, creator must be good; Price 221,630 gp; Cost 111,130 gp + 8,840 XP.

I think that I got all the math right.

[Fallbot]

I agree with Dyllan. The most interesting aspect of an intelligent item is its character, and it can lead to some excellent opportunities for roleplay.

We've only used one intelligent item in our campaign so far, but it's been a huge amount of fun. It's a scarf, possessed by its dead owner, the party rogue, for reasons I wont go into. The fun comes from the fact that, before her death, the rogue was in love with her current owner, which has lead to a good deal of awkwardness for him - she is very jealous. He's also failed to tell the rest of the party about this, and no one else has caught on, despite him speaking of her in the present tense and occasionally using 'we' instead of 'I'.

I'm afraid the game is 4E, so the stats aren't really applicable, but it provides some boosts to rogue related skills and, at high levels of happiness, allows the wearer to deal sneak attack damage. The party were all level 4 when the scarf was created.

[ZeroGear]

I've been trying to make an intelligent shovel recently, but I can't understand why giving an item ranks in a skill costs so much (I wanted to give it Knowledge (Geography), but hate the 5000gp price tag on the ability). So fat, it kinda looks like this:

Goldseeker
+1 Shovel (Simple 2 handed weapon, 1d8 Bludgeoning or Slashing, x2).
AL CN
Int 14 Wis 14 Cha 10
Vision 120 ft, Speaks Common, Terran, and Gnome
Knowledge (Geography) +12; can glow at will
Personality: he is very greedy and loves being covered in valuable items and material, especially gold.
Cost: 11000gp (Somehow think the price should be 7000gp)

[Anxe]

I've been trying to make an intelligent shovel recently, but I can't understand why giving an item ranks in a skill costs so much (I wanted to give it Knowledge (Geography), but hate the 5000gp price tag on the ability). So fat, it kinda looks like this:

Goldseeker
+1 Shovel (Simple 2 handed weapon, 1d8 Bludgeoning or Slashing, x2).
AL CN
Int 14 Wis 14 Cha 10
Vision 120 ft, Speaks Common, Terran, and Gnome
Knowledge (Geography) +12; can glow at will
Personality: he is very greedy and loves being covered in valuable items and material, especially gold.
Cost: 11000gp (Somehow think the price should be 7000gp)

If you're the DM you can make the price whatever you please. Although the item may have cost 2,500GP (half the for sale price = cost to make) worth of magical components to construct, it doesn't mean that the average customer values a masterful knowledge of geography that much.

[Magesmiley]

I've used intelligent items off and on over the years, and I think that it is first and foremost the personality that the item has which makes it memorable for the players, not so much the abilities of the item.

For example, one of the players in my current game has an intelligent sword. For abilities, it speaks, has a low plus, flaming, and has bonuses to spot, listen, and one other minor ability I'm not recalling. It is also somewhat insulting to its owner, other members of the party and occasionally others in the surrounding area, particularly when it spots or hears something that others don't. Or when someone makes a particularly not-too-bright move. The players seem to greatly enjoy the snarky comments it makes, and the occasional humor that ensues with it (the most amusing probably being when there was another intelligent sword that showed up in the hands of an NPC, and the player's sword started hitting on it).

Do the players enojoy the sword for its statistics? Nope. Its the personality. Intelligent items are characters. Make them one. Decide on a personality, and then go with abilities that complements that.

[ZeroGear]

If you're the DM you can make the price whatever you please. Although the item may have cost 2,500GP (half the for sale price = cost to make) worth of magical components to construct, it doesn't mean that the average customer values a masterful knowledge of geography that much.

I'm building a character, I'm not the DM.
He is a CG Eldrich Deciple of Halal (Draconic jester goddess) with a very bad sense of direction. He has the shovel to keep it out of trouble (amusing background story), and argues with it every time he makes a donation to the church. (Nooo! Don't give away the gold! Have you any idea what you are doing? :smallfrown: )

[Beelzebub1111]

One of my players has a docent component. It is made for two tasks, translation, and battle coordination (it's abilities are deathwatch constantly, 10 ranks in Sense Motive, and 10 ranks in spellcraft and it has a 20 intelligence) it gets annoyed pretty quickly when its abilities are asked of when not in combat. It was made to say "Incoming Fireball" or "He's Feinting" or "Your allies are dying" or "Those troops are undead" or "He's telling his allies to circle around to flank"; not "I think this businessman is taking us for a ride" or "Ah, there seems to a sepia snake sigil on this tome"

If asked to do otherwise it will become very short very quickly. It will lie if insisted upon. If the warforged it's attached to does well in combat and listens to her advice, she will be more genial and more likely to offer advice in other situations. If she's treated badly enough, she will offer bad advice and if a stronger warforged is around (and coexistance isn't that great) she'll try to get "stolen" or offered as a barter.

[OverThoughtName]

Intelligent items, oh how fun they can be... Three of the most poignant things about them to me were traits of NPCs done right; helps out when it needs to, further hooks into the story, and has a personality that makes it remembered. In fact, the single favorite intelligent item I've ever encountered was a cart. It knew it's way around, knew the names of all the old ruins we eventually had to visit, and talked with a snarky British accent. We called him Sir Caravan the Awesome Talking Cart, but I digress.

When to introduce it is whenever it seems appropriate. Sir Caravan started out with us, part of a deal with Old Quest Giver A, and stayed useful during the whole campaign. Another device I've seen is to have it show up after all other leads seem to be exhausted, as a Deus Ex Machina (Or, well, "God out of the Loot Pile," but I'm not sure about the Latin for that last part.) to keep the campaign rolling. Just don't make the mistake of introducing something more powerful than a character of their level deserves.

As a final note, perhaps it's just me, but I've never seen an intelligent item that worked against the party that anyone liked. I've probably just never had it done right, but we usually just cast silence on it and sold it at the next town after the first of such an episode.