[Any] Acorns

[arguskos]

Gentlefolk of the Playground, I come before you, humble and contrite, with a challenge.

There is a famous acorn in D&D 3.5, the Acorn of Far Travels (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fw/20040710a), and I am curious, is this the most broken acorn in the history of table-top roleplaying games? It sure seems like it. Are there other acorns in other games with balances issues?

The only other gaming acorn I know of is the Acorn of Wo Mai in AD&D, which is far from broken.

tl;dr: See what Greenish said:

Indeed, I posit that it is the single most broken acorn of any published game.

[Greenish]

There is a famous acorn in D&D 3.5, the Acorn of Far Travels, and I am curious, is this the most broken acorn in the history of table-top roleplaying games?Given the shenanigans involved with the acorn in question, narrowing the search to only table-top roleplaying games seems overly specific.

Indeed, I posit that it is the single most broken acorn of any published game.

[The Rose Dragon]

I don't know what Acorn of Far Travels does, so I can't really comment on that. The acorns I know of (which are strangely all in Exalted) are far from broken, though.

[arguskos]

Given the shenanigans involved with the acorn in question, narrowing the search to only table-top roleplaying games seems overly specific.

Indeed, I posit that it is the single most broken acorn of any published game.
Well, you posed the question first, so we'll go with that. Any published game, it is.

EDIT: OP edited with Greenish's challenge, and a link to the Acorn of Far Travels, for details.

[FMArthur]

Are there any special acorns from general fantasy and mythological sources? I can imagine something like a world's whole origin story emerging from an acorn being pretty likely, such as the Yggsadril (AKA The World Tree) possibly coming from one. That's outside the bounds of the thread, but it's a good place to start if one of those made it into a roleplaying game.

[Greenish]

I don't know what Acorn of Far Travels does, so I can't really comment on that. The acorns I know of (which are strangely all in Exalted) are far from broken, though.It's here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fw/20040710a). Doesn't look much, eh?

[Mulletmanalive]

Well there's an acorn in Warhammer [a Wood Elf magic item] that creates a wood when thrown by the bearer.

It's useful, especially as it's able to serve as a source of plant manipulation spells [Warden of the Wood is pretty brutal, worse if you're in the wood itself] but not broken.

Can't think of any other specific acorns, though one of my GMs combined a Plant Growth and Liveoak spell into a potion type acorn, which was hillarious at the time, especially as a delaying tactic.

[Keld Denar]

The biggest Acorn of Far Travels abuse I know of involves Magic of the Land (buffs you cast in a forest grant temp HP) combined with Spellguard of Silverymoon + War Weaver, which basically makes EVERY spell EVER printed ANYWHERE weaveable with War Weaver.

Basically, War Weaver lets you cast spells on a large number of folks through their Eldritch Tapestry, which is good. The only restriction is that the spells have to be castable on others.

Spellguard steps in and says what's up. Spellguard has an ability that lets you cast ANY personal only spell on another person, so long as that spell either heals or grants temporary HP.

Magic of the Land makes ANY buff spell grant temp HP, which thus qualifies for Spellguard which thus qualifies for War Weaver.

As long as you have the Acorn of Far Travels, you can use Magic of the Land. As long as you can use MotL, the whole combo works nicely. With a bit of Uncanny Trickster and some Sanctum Spell shanananananananananananigans, you can literally Weave ANY spell, up to and including Shapechange. Yea, that Shapechange...


creates wood when thrown
Dirty out-of-context quote is dirrrrrrty!

[Greenish]

The biggest Acorn of Far Travels abuse I know of involves Magic of the Land (buffs you cast in a forest grant temp HP) combined with Spellguard of Silverymoon + War Weaver, which basically makes EVERY spell EVER printed ANYWHERE weaveable with War Weaver.There's also having the oak in a specific plane to have certain spells auto-maximized and enlarged. There was that one early entry/something trick that required you to specify an area…

Dungeon Master PrC from Dungeonscape gains some stuff while in it's dungeon…

[dextercorvia]

Relatively minor abuse...but You would always be in the shadow of the tree, so basically nothing can prevent your HiPS.

[Claudius Maximus]

Hathran can use Acorn of Far Travels to cast their whole spellbooks (or for clerics, their whole spell list) spontaneously wherever they go.

[arguskos]

Ok, yes, Acorn of Far Travels is broken as hell. Is there any acorn ANYWHERE in any game ever printed or published that compares?

[Coidzor]

I've never run into any acorn like it before, but I'm definitely going to file knowledge of it away in that dark place where lulzy things are kept.

[ericgrau]

What exactly do you do with the acorn of fall travels to break the game?

[Xefas]

Ok, yes, Acorn of Far Travels is broken as hell. Is there any acorn ANYWHERE in any game ever printed or published that compares?

The only other magic acorn of comparable power I can think of is Octavian's acorn from Exalted. It basically gives him the at-will ability to spend an action to summon seven of any animal that walks upon the earth or burrows beneath it. This includes all of Exalted's weird animals, like those T-rexes that urinate heroin.