Keep it Secret Keep it Safe

[Ranting Fool]

*Spoiler Warning* Mortuus, Wraith, Eisenford this thread will contain spoilers and reading anything beyond this point will result in books being thrown. You have been warned :smallbiggrin:

For the rest of you, thanks in advance. I need a bit of general advise on how to keep an Artifact "Safe". More Detail after the brake.


I need to give a bit of In Game advise to the players to help them protect the big shiny artifact they've just gotten and also need a bit of help some of the dangers that might crop up.

Oh and yes I'm aware that nothing can really be safe with Wishes and such but within reason.

What they have to work with.

The Players,
(Caster) level 12 Wizard. (big on crafting)
Level 13 Knight/Dragon rider
Level 12 Warlock (big on the bluffing/stealth)
Level 13 Duskblade (big on chopping things in half)
Level 11 Favored Soul (Cohort, Healbot)

Friends with level 12 Ranger and more importantly just saved the life of an Old Silver Dragon (Who is very much a pacifist)

The players are on a Large country sized demi plane which is grown from and controlled via a small little cube which the players have just gotten their hands on. What it all boils down to is this... how do you keep a Nuke safe and hidden? :smallbiggrin:

More Detail
It is in fact three very different demi planes all "orbiting" each other (You can see the other two in the sky) each is controlled by this keystone.

Important fact Number 1
These demi planes are not stable and will slowly shrink unless the Keystones are powered up Via
A) Big high level Arcane spells cast into them.
B) Sacrificing souls to some Devils,
C) Sacrificing your own soul
D) Unknown.
Now the players know that you can build up a reserve of power in these Keystones, which is good because every time one is used to change something about the world the reserve is used up and if there is no reserve left then the plane shrinks and last time they saw this happen hundreds of miles of the plane fell into the main plane it's connected too... which just happens to be the infinite layers of demon filled hell.

Important fact Number 2
The Keystone has been under the control of an little Halfling Necromancer and her growing army of worshipers, she announced to the worlds (Via one of the uses of the keystone) that she would "Save" everyone on this plane by destroying the other two planes making this one larger and stable (And proving that she is a God) the Players rush off to talk her out of this/kill her if they can but it seems that someone on one of the other planes took notice and did something like This (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eujwxh_r43E) but replace the White House with a Mountain Stronghold. There is now only a Crater left... which had the Keystone nice and safe within.

The Players are convinced that this epic level magic was done using one of the other keystones

Important fact Number 3
The players now have an item that can change the fabric of the world if you are willing to pay the cost, there is a chance a giant beam of death will come from another world and destroy everything around the item, it may be able to shoot off a giant beam of death itself.

Important fact Number 4
A number of people both Good and Bad won't want our heroes to have this power / risk leaving it in their Murderer Hobo hands

Important fact Number 5
No big outsiders can get into this plane. So no gating in a Solar or any such thing. Though lesser Demons keep going after the Keystone.


So how would GiTPG go about protecting/hiding this artifact? Suggestions, anecdotal experiences or just silly jokes are all welcome.

Also what sort of dangers would you throw at this party?

[BowStreetRunner]

Check out some of the advice from this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums//showthread.php?t=257761), which dealt with a similar topic.

[LemonFarmer]

Belt of hidden pouches. It extra dimensional space so no aura from the item and a magic aura spell on the belt so it has no aura. So basically undetectable.

[Phelix-Mu]

Belt of hidden pouches. It extra dimensional space so no aura from the item and a magic aura spell on the belt so it has no aura. So basically undetectable.

A good approach, but all of this relies on the only means used to detect it being normal level magic. It's entirely possible that the keystones might have some ability to detect each other, some kind of resonance perhaps, and the player characters wouldn't have a way to know until whatever cloaking scheme they devised failed (a la second giant beam of death, end of party).

More importantly, if I were one of the players, I would be very paranoid about moving the item that stabilizes the plane that I'm currently located on off of this plane, and I'm not sure that the grey space of extradimensional spaces is any safer. The results could be anywhere from amusing ("LOOK, THERE'S A NEW DEMIPLANE IN MY BELT OF HIDDEN POUCHES"), to end-of-campaign bad (isolation of keystone from current plane causes cataclysmic destabilization).

[Ranting Fool]

More importantly, if I were one of the players, I would be very paranoid about moving the item that stabilizes the plane that I'm currently located on off of this plane, and I'm not sure that the grey space of extradimensional spaces is any safer. The results could be anywhere from amusing ("LOOK, THERE'S A NEW DEMIPLANE IN MY BELT OF HIDDEN POUCHES"), to end-of-campaign bad (isolation of keystone from current plane causes cataclysmic destabilization).

Thank you :smallbiggrin:

That is what my players believe (And may well be true as they haven't yet studied it in detail I haven't had to give too many concrete answers)

But I have hinted (Via knowledge checks) that it is very unlikely that you could remove it from it's current plane (or if you could bad things would happen)

ALSO forgot to mention an important little effect. When Keystone was held and the Wizard also started casting spells (at the Demons trying to grab it) the keystone responded to each spell being cast by glowing a bit. Which worried them a lot :smallbiggrin: and even when held by a mundane who held it while they were teleported back to town the keystone reacted.

[GenericMook]

Just out of sheer curiosity, how would it react to an antimagic field?

I would go with a box made of Riverine (Stormwrack), sandwiched between Adamantium on the outside and a layer of lead on the inside. Toss a ton of locks on it, and hide it in a pile of similar Riverine/Adamantium/lead boxes.

Also, if they really want to keep it safe, they can just lure everyone that wants to kill them for the keystone into a trap, which turns out to be a really elaborate sacrifice ritual, and then BAM, sudden keystone power.

[Ranting Fool]

Just out of sheer curiosity, how would it react to an antimagic field?

I would go with a box made of Riverine (Stormwrack), sandwiched between Adamantium on the outside and a layer of lead on the inside. Toss a ton of locks on it, and hide it in a pile of similar Riverine/Adamantium/lead boxes.

Also, if they really want to keep it safe, they can just lure everyone that wants to kill them for the keystone into a trap, which turns out to be a really elaborate sacrifice ritual, and then BAM, sudden keystone power.

A good and valid question. I was under the impression (perhaps wrongly) that antimagic fields don't work on magic of Artifact level, or am I just miss remembering something. *Goes off to check*

Don't know about the Riverine and will have to look it up but they can get their hands on adamantine and lead easy enough. Any ideas what level of divination spells led stops?

As for killing evil to power the keystone, yep that works. Though not Undead/Outsiders/Constructs or anything else that lacks a soul. :smallbiggrin:

[Phelix-Mu]

A good and valid question. I was under the impression (perhaps wrongly) that antimagic fields don't work on magic of Artifact level, or am I just miss remembering something. *Goes off to check*

As for killing evil to power the keystone, yep that works. Though not Undead/Outsiders/Constructs or anything else that lacks a soul. :smallbiggrin:

As to the first point, I think you are entirely within rights to have the artifact function however you wish within antimagic zones. Artifacts are kind of a "normal rules don't always apply" area of the game, otherwise they would be much easier to create or destroy and wouldn't be half as fun from a plot perspective.

As to the second point, I should point out that even some good-aligned people might object to the capturing/destruction of someone's soul, even if said victim were evil. It can depend on the individual's take on the afterlife, but many gods want the normal movement of souls into the afterlife/final judgement to take place. This sounds like a pretty custom cosmology, though, so maybe nobody cares. Using somebody's soul for something is tantamount to a form of slavery (holding someone against their will and forcing them to do something, removing free will, etc), and destroying a soul entirely might be seen in an even dimmer light.

Just thought I'd give my take on alignment implications. If I were playing a character intent on using the sacrifice route, I'd go to some lengths to make sure that no one ever found out (abjurations and alter memory for everyone!). Don't want to get a bad name with the [equivalent of] Pelorites.

[GenericMook]

Here's what Riverine does (Stormwrack 128):


Riverine: This unusual material is made from water under extremely high pressure, usually obtained from the Elemental Plane of Water but sometimes from the blackwater trenches far below the ocean's surface. The water swirls and flows continuously, sandwiched between fields of magical force.

...

Riverine is sometimes also used to create walls and even containers. Being enclosed in magical force, it is immune to all damage and is unaffected by most spells. However, disintegrate immediately destroys an item made of riverine, as does a rod of cancellation, a sphere of annihilation, or a Mordenkainen's disjunction spell, causing the water to spill out in a sudden rush. Armor and shields made of riverine do not form a complete enclosure, so breath weapons and spells do still affect the wearer. howeer, walls of riverine block ethereal travel, breath weapons, and spell effects just as a wall of force does.

It's priced at 2,000 gp/lb. of it, which might be quite a bit, depending on how huge the keystone is.

Still, it's hilarious to have. As for the effects of lead, the big one I know that it affects is detect magic. Other than that, I'm not too clear on it.

[Phelix-Mu]

Maybe they talk about lead and divinations in the magic chapter before spell descriptions in PHB. They like to hide important stuff in there.

[TuggyNE]

Anti-magic field doesn't affect artifacts by RAW. No houseruling or fiat needed.

[Kobold Esq]

Lead does a lot of heavy lifting, frankly. It is mentioned under the [scrying] description. And remember the purpose of the anti-magic is not to stop the artifacts from working, but to stop everyone else's magic from locating said artifact.

Lead + antimagic + drop it in the ocean is usually good enough for me. If the anti-magic field is large enough, it'll be very difficult for anything that is not a native aquatic life form to get there, even if they did manage to figure out where it is.

The question I have is does the reserve deplenish over time if it is left alone? Will the demi-plane collapse eventually if no one actively restores the reserve? If so, then simply hiding the thing, and hiding it very well, doesn't help. In fact the better they do that job, the more likely they are dooming the demi-plane to hell.

[Ranting Fool]

The question I have is does the reserve deplenish over time if it is left alone? Will the demi-plane collapse eventually if no one actively restores the reserve? If so, then simply hiding the thing, and hiding it very well, doesn't help. In fact the better they do that job, the more likely they are dooming the demi-plane to hell.

Yes and Yes. Though rather slowly without someone trying to change reality. So the world (which is at least 1000miles square) would lose inches or feet each year (not sure which yet)

The world was being maintained by a bunch of rather angry druids who were cursing people to go on "Culls" which was feeding the Keystone up until our heroes (and everyone else from their world came exploring)

The PC's will only want to keep it safe enough while they go off trying to find a way to
A) Stabilize the plane.
B) Find a non-evil renewable power source.
C) evacuate all sentient life off the plane and allow it to collapse / stabilize the other 2 planes by sacrificing this one.
D) Same as C but do it to one of the other planes to keep this one stable.

[TuggyNE]

The question I have is does the reserve deplenish over time if it is left alone? Will the demi-plane collapse eventually if no one actively restores the reserve? If so, then simply hiding the thing, and hiding it very well, doesn't help. In fact the better they do that job, the more likely they are dooming the demi-plane to hell.

Cheesy solution: once they figure out how the artifact recharges, just set up a resetting spell trap and let it go! (Or a spell clock, or whatever.)

[Xervous]

1. Artifacts don't show up to any sort of magic detecting stuff.
2. This thing sounds simple and cube like
3. What would it be like if there were, say, thousands of these cubes in one room? (with one being the real one)

or thousands of those cubes in an ocean trench

[Alleran]

Items cease to exist when placed in an Earth Node, until they're retrieved. No, that isn't a play on words. They literally do not exist.

Get one of those in a private demiplane with planar traits set up so that nobody can get in, get out, or cast spells in or out, and make sure you get in and out by having a minion cast wish to transport you in, and then cast it again to transport you back out when you're done. Also, surround it with lead to block scrying.

For bonus points, put the item into a portable hole, then put it in the Earth Node.

[Slipperychicken]

Belt of hidden pouches. It extra dimensional space so no aura from the item and a magic aura spell on the belt so it has no aura. So basically undetectable.

Polymorph the Artifact into a sock (or something unpleasant you would expect in a Smuggler's boot), and Polymorph something else into a replica of the Artifact, cast Misdirection so it detects as a nonmagical item, and so the replica detects as the Artifact. Put these in a Bag of Holding in a lead-lined pouch (Complete Scoundrel, 10gp for the lead lining), in a Smuggler's Boot (A&EG, 10gp). Now it doesn't even detect as magic. Keep your personal Bag of Holding separate and on your person.

First you need get an ordinary-looking boot which doesn't detect as magical (and wrench it off the stinky feet of a PC, needing you to defeat him first), from a guy who is covered with unhidden magical auras, actively search through this boot and succeed a DC 30 Search check to find the hidden compartment, then rifle through a Bag of Holding, steal an ordinary smelly sock along with the "Artifact", and then overcome the Misdirection to determine the sock was really the Artifact.

[TuggyNE]

Polymorph the Artifact into a sock

Polymorph any object can't target magical objects.