Magical Weapons/Items and Artifacts You've Created or Encountered

[supersonic29]

What are your favorite or least favorite specialty weapons/items you've created, used, or are planning to create? Anything unpredictably broken or just really cool?

I want to design one in the near future that operates very similarly to the Monado from Xenoblade, but for it to not have a destined wielder so the repercussions of using it are very real for anyone who dares to do so in order to succeed.

[Alanto]

Ah, I was in a game a few years back that had a series of magical boxes, all made by an old and really quite powerful wizard who'd gone a little strange in his later years. They wren't a polt hing as such, though we met a baron who'd collected a good few of them.
They were all maybe eight inches across, wooden and pretty plain.

However...of the ones I saw:
- One contained a permanent explosion. Like Fireball, but it just kept going if you opened the box, until you shut it.
- One was overflowing with an apparently unending supply of blood
- One had a tornado in
- One was basically a Rod of Wonder, but only worked underwater
- One would snap shut and lock itself if allowed to (we damaged that one somewhat destroying what was inside, after it turned out to be a vampire's grave dirt and coffin fragment)
- One was a normal box, but treated gravity as though it was at ninety degrees to the norm (it was kept tied to a plinth)
- One made you dizzy and a bit sick on touch
- One gave you nightmares if left under your pillow at night

And last but by no means least, the so-called Box of Incriminating Evidence, which looked just like the rest, but occasionally valuable items would vanish from nearby and turn out to be in the box later on (examples include: The lost artifact crown of a nearby kingdom which had been missing for centuries, a holy relic amulet we had just witnessed being stolen from a cathedral, and a Small blue dragon we met a few hours before)

[supersonic29]

The last of those boxes sounds like a curse to have with you more than anything.

[AlanBruce]

My current campaign revolves around artifacts that have taken living form. They each embody an energy plane (six in total), and each has powers associated with each plane. The problem is that they're amnesiac. They have no idea why they have these powers and how they came to be.

Some of them are allies to the party, others are antagonists. The main plot is about discovering why they are who they are and what happened way back for them to be this way.

All the while thwarting an evil organization who wants them all for themselves.

[Jergmo]

I made the mistake of having my own Time of Troubles of sort in a homebrewed setting, during which an artifact of each deity wound up scattered across the world, the total enhancement being equal to the deity's divine rank. Each artifact was intelligent, having a spark of the deity's essence left over.

It was ridiculous, in hindsight. It was an E12 campaign and the party wound up with an artifact bow in their possession which allowed them to one-shot Vrocks.

There were a couple I enjoyed, though. I like generally impractical but "neat" magic items. One was a religious textbook that read itself aloud to the person holding it, because someone decided it would be easier to simply craft a Magic Mouth book than to educate the masses.

I also had an intelligent coin. It had no latent powers that they were ever aware of, but it led to a lot of interesting discussion about what the deal with it was. Was it simply an intelligent magic item? A soul trapped in an extradimensional space? If so, who was it? I didn't really give any hints.

[Iwasforger03]

My current game features a number of artifacts created by me for players to quest after (or sometimes get as random drops).

Examples include: Tonbogiri - +6 Spear (counts as all spears), it ignores ALL DR on crits, and once per day you may call a crit threat before rolling the atk. If the atk hits, it is automatically a confirmed critical. You could supplement this with points of mythic power. It later go upgraded with at will reach and vorpal and keen

Had a halberd that was a +4 Bane halberd vs orcs, goblinoids, giants, and dragons, Acid and Acidic burst, and had a +4 to sunder attempts. Very minor artifact. Oh, it could change forms to any of several "dwarvish" weapons.

Currently have a halberd that has +4, shocking burst, and the Many fang enchantment. That's fun.

+2 Holy Flaming Flaming burst Form changing intelligent weapon sound fun? ALL dmg is half fire, half divine.

Let's see, anything else actually interesting?

Modified the Shishi-o from weapons of legacy, gave it the ability to summon a pride of lions, and changed its form of the lion general to grant the werelion template instead.

Rainfall: +2 Rapier, can dispel necromancy once a day and can be called to its owner's hand at will.

[Vhaidara]

So, I'm in a campaign that I originally GMed. I stepped down after a communal agreement to find someone else. The someone else was apparently not informed that I was becoming a player, taking over the previous DMPC, a warlock. He wrote a huge campaign path the focused on fighting golems. You know, those things that are immune to magic? That warlocks can't affect until level 11. We were level 8.

So, at the end of the first dungeon, we found the Cloak of Immunity to Magic Immunity.

[supersonic29]

the Cloak of Immunity to Magic Immunity.

I enjoyed reading that way too much

[Vhaidara]

I enjoyed reading that way too much

We also have a guy with an agreed upon GM Fiat mega rage that is basically an apocalypse. All of his stats double, and he gets not only Magic Immunity, but Immunity to Magic Immunity Immunity.

[supersonic29]

If I were more serious I would really have to question this guy's definition of immunity.

[FidgetySquirrel]

The most interesting, and infuriating, magical artifacts I ever saw were my old DMs 'fatestones.' What some of them were doing in dungeons that could be delved by 5th level adventurers is beyond me, but that's not the point. These stones each had the power to control a particular aspect of the world. For the most part, the ones we collected went straight to the NPC who was coming along to catch 'em all.

After an incident with where we had to kind of floo powder our way to one, our party got split (stupid will saves). Somehow, I ended up with the only one I can remember off the top of my head, the fatestone of dragons. So here I am, traveling alone in the wilderness, trying to find my party, with a magic rock that makes dragons go bat guano crazy. That was... something.

Well, at least I didn't die! Considering how things usually went in that group, I thought I was done.

[Vogonjeltz]

Ah, I was in a game a few years back that had a series of magical boxes, all made by an old and really quite powerful wizard who'd gone a little strange in his later years. They wren't a polt hing as such, though we met a baron who'd collected a good few of them.
They were all maybe eight inches across, wooden and pretty plain.

However...of the ones I saw:
- One contained a permanent explosion. Like Fireball, but it just kept going if you opened the box, until you shut it.
- One was overflowing with an apparently unending supply of blood
- One had a tornado in
- One was basically a Rod of Wonder, but only worked underwater
- One would snap shut and lock itself if allowed to (we damaged that one somewhat destroying what was inside, after it turned out to be a vampire's grave dirt and coffin fragment)
- One was a normal box, but treated gravity as though it was at ninety degrees to the norm (it was kept tied to a plinth)
- One made you dizzy and a bit sick on touch
- One gave you nightmares if left under your pillow at night

And last but by no means least, the so-called Box of Incriminating Evidence, which looked just like the rest, but occasionally valuable items would vanish from nearby and turn out to be in the box later on (examples include: The lost artifact crown of a nearby kingdom which had been missing for centuries, a holy relic amulet we had just witnessed being stolen from a cathedral, and a Small blue dragon we met a few hours before)

Sounds like ter'angreal to me

[Buufreak]

A cursed jar, filled with dirt and a few gold coins. When you first try to inspect the inside of the jar, you are cursed with an obsession that whatever is in the bottom of it is without a doubt the most valuable thing in existence, and you must hoard it for yourself. It also would occasionally cause you to slip a few coins into it (thus the being filled with coins. The dirt could have come from nearly anywhere, I suppose). A few Pirates otC jokes later, we managed to get it stolen by a swashbuckler.

[Eaglejarl]

- A magic shield which, on command, would change to be 10' in diameter. 1x/week, while in its large form, it could cast a Temporal Stasis on whomever was under it. It was useful for things like: a juryrigged boat, a wall to block a corridor, a very low-ceilinged igloo for bad weather camping, etc.

- The Bandolier of Infinite Stilettos. Just what it says on the tin -- a bandolier containing stilettos, but no matter how many you pull out there are always more. When thrown, each one does something random...Chain Lightning, turns the target purple, Earthquake, etc. It was more of a joke thing than a really useful item.

- The Stone of Size and Weight. It's a small, round, gray stone. There are command words which cause it to change size to anything from "grain of sand" to "giant boulder", and to change its weight from "very large negative number (buoyant)" to "very large positive number". It seemed like a junk item, but it actually had surprising utility given creative players.

[Alanto]

The last of those boxes sounds like a curse to have with you more than anything.

It was a pain in the ass for *me*, since I was party Paladin, but the Rogue, who had the thing, didn't seem to mind too much at all (no surprises there)

[Dunsparce]

While I myself didn't make it, my Paladin smelted a bunch of magical items in an enchanted dwarven forge to create it:

Saddle of the Centaur. Basically allows any rider and his or her mount to become a single creature for a number of rounds equal to the total amount of HD between the two. Their combined creature type is Monstrous Humanoid.

You pick the best stats/BAB/AC bonus/Saves/HP of each, so for example I get the Natural Armor and Dex bonus of my mount and the Armor and deflection bonus of my Paladin and because each are higher in that catagory respectively. Magic items that raise stats, like Belt of Giant Strength, don't count towards which stat is higher, so you get the higher base stat of the two PLUS the bonuses from items.

Their minds don't meld, allowing them to make 2 will saves at once for will save effects, but only needed one to roll high enough for both to pass. Any natural attacks the mount has are secondary attacks for the fusion and can be used alongside weapon attacks during a full attack. For example a level 16 Fighter with a Heavy Warhorse using the saddle would get his four attacks from his BAB and 3 natural attacks from the Warhorse.

If the combined creature's HP hits 0, the saddle deactivates and splits the damage between the two. Not just HP damage, but stat damage as well. Activating and deactivating the saddle is a move action. Spells that have a target of "Your mount" have no effect on the combined creature and wear off during the fusion, but any other buff spells stay active.

This item allows my Paladin to keep up with the party's cleric/ordained champion damage-wise.

EDIT: I forgot some more features. The combined creature keeps all abilities of both the rider and the mount, like DR, Spell resistance, Class abilities, ect. Because my mount is Celestial and has a Smite, and I'm a Paladin, during the fusion the smite from my mount is added to my normal smite pool and acts as a Paladin's smite instead of the normal celestial template smite.