Alternatives to Magic Items

[b4ndito]

I've always brought literary influence into my campaigns, and as I am re-reading Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian for the dozenth time, a scene from that book brought an idea to my game. Essentially an Apache war party affixes mirror shards to their shields and blinds an American filibuster and promptly slaughters them.

And (sadly) I began thinking about rarity of magical items, and alternatives.

How hard would it be for a character to affix mirror shards to his or her shield and use it to blind or impose disadvantage on an opponent? Would it be an action, reaction, or a bonus action? Could a character do this from range against an enemy in melee combat with a touch attack?

Do mirrors exist as we know them now, or are they just highly reflective, polished steel? How many hits would the shield take before needing to be refinished?


Beyond just the rules lawyer-ing that this elicits, what other mundane or affordable items could be used to create a quasi-magical effect? Explosives come to mind, if my players research them, but that's a rabbit hole I'm afraid to go into.

[Kurt Kurageous]

How hard would it be for a character to affix mirror shards to his or her shield and use it to blind or impose disadvantage on an opponent? Would it be an action, reaction, or a bonus action? Could a character do this from range against an enemy in melee combat with a touch attack?

Start with an assumption, you have a light source bright enough to blind/annoy the target. Your reflection won't likely be brighter than that unless you happen to have a concave lens, and then that would only work at a fixed range.

There used to be silver mirrors in DnD, which would probably work as signals or nuisances given sunlight or another light source. Similar to casting Light on an opponent, thus a DX save? Perhaps.

[Daishain]

Most mirrors would be polished metal of some kind. Brass, steel, silver, whatever, depending on the wealth level of whoever's buying.

That stated, between magic and those tinkering gnomes, it should be quite possible for more advanced mirrors to be made. But they won't necessarily be common or cheap.


As per blinding someone with mirrors: If you have a light source capable of blinding someone, just point the light source at them, simply reflecting it will actually reduce the intensity.

If your light source isn't strong enough, and/or cant be easily directed, what you want is a focusing array. Either a bowl shaped mirror, or a collection of pieced together mirrors with an overall similar shape. It would take a fair bit of math, or a lot more trial and error, to get the angles right, but you can come up with a weird looking shield that would focus an intense beam of light at certain distances. (design the shield to adjust concavity, and you can adjust this distance) From there, in combat, it is just a matter of finding the right angle to hold the shield at.

[b4ndito]

I was thinking obviously that they would be redirecting sunlight, which lets be honest a dude can use his watch well enough in that regard to make you shade your eyes

[Safety Sword]

I was thinking obviously that they would be redirecting sunlight, which lets be honest a dude can use his watch well enough in that regard to make you shade your eyes

Only question is whether he can maintain the glare spot on my eyes as I rush him with a greatsword to cut his head off, I guess?

Edit: Other magic item alternatives: Magical tattoos, blessings from deities, magical locations.

[Slipperychicken]

Grapple-guns are pretty magical. Well, the mechanism to to carry the user upward is pretty much magic :smalltongue:

Night-vision and thermal are somewhat magic-y as well. Darkvision used to be thermal ("infravision"), back in the day.

And I'd be pretty skeptical about the mirror shards. You would think someone would have done that before. Besides, if the light was at the right angle to reflect it, then the shields' user would have it in his own eyes, only more intensely. In that vein, perhaps you could say that an alchemist created sunglasses? I know 3.5 had "sundark goggles" which are essentially sunglasses to let Drow be active in the daytime.

You can always cut the head off a Gorgon (i.e. "Medusa"), strap it to your shield, and put a cloth over it. When you need someone petrified, yank the cloth off so enemies are forced to look at it. Same goes for some other creatures with petrifying gazes, like basilisks or cockatrices.

[Daishain]

And I'd be pretty skeptical about the mirror shards. You would think someone would have done that before.They have, in some cases quite successfully. But in general it is awkward as all hell to use in combat, doesn't protect the user very well physically, and depends on light conditions being just right. Its a bit like standing on the battlefield with a laptop in hand. Sure, the laptop could be used to screw the enemy over in various ways (telemetry controller for an attack drone for instance), but if things go wrong, its just going to slow you down.

On the other hand, the inventor and all around thinking type Archimedes is said to have destroyed a fleet of ships attacking Syracuse. So far as we can tell, he used a simple array of mirrors to focus sunlight into a beam of light hot enough to ignite the ships. (humanity's very first death ray! and over two thousand years before the invention of lasers!)

So yeah, potentially devastating if you get it right, worse than worthless if you don't, and achieving the former isn't easy.

[tieren]

Beyond just the rules lawyer-ing that this elicits, what other mundane or affordable items could be used to create a quasi-magical effect? Explosives come to mind, if my players research them, but that's a rabbit hole I'm afraid to go into.

Many years ago I had a gnome character and I thought about trying to invent a mundane set of armor to protect the senses. Mirrored Louvers to look through so you were only looking at reflections. A crystal on the top of the helmet that would shatter with any damaging sound attack which was in turn attached to arms that would stuff wads of beeswax in your ears to try to protect your hearing (conversely you could tap the crystal yourself to plug ears if you wanted to be deafened for sirens or something).

I was thinking of a cloth soaking in wine in a compartment on the helmet you could pull out and breathe through for gas attacks. Maybe some kind of liquid cooling in a back pack you could pump with your arms to keep feet cool when walking over hot coals or through fire, etc...

[BoardPep]

Encouraging player creativity is always a good idea, as long as it's not granting them anything they normally couldn't do.

Someone gave the example once of using a goblin as a shield. Lots of people would chime in as to whether it would protect as well as a shield would? Perhaps after it takes 10 damage, it would become useless. Perhaps it would provide DR? All of those things are just realism the DM is trying to add to reduce the player's fun. And if your players are trying to get "extra" effects, then they are often just trying to manipulate the DM into giving them "free" ways to kills things. Explosives almost ALWAYS end that way. As I player, I've been guilty of misusing explosives given to me.

In reality, if a player wants to use something else that is reasonable (a dead goblin) as a cheap and easily available object, just let it happen. It's fun, it's thematic, and it's something they will talk about in the future.

Just be careful with stuff like the mirror abilities you mentioned. I recall seeing actual magic items that were less effective (extremely short ranges usually) than that. Letting players do stuff like that in perfect conditions (the sun is just right in the sky) is probably fine. But letting them use non-magical magic all the time might be going too far. I know it has worked in history, but it's more difficult than it sounds, take practice, etc.

I'm not sure if your campaign is anti-magic or not. If it's not, I do have a good suggestion! Have them find magic items that mirror the effects that you're looking for. So a shield that is highly polished and can be used to reflect sunlight. The magic of the shield is what helps you aim it, but it's essentially non-magical (no +1 or other abilities). The nice part about that is that players have an answer if they ask "wait, how is this working so well?". Really though, it's possible the players could find a mundane shield that is of exceptional quality, maybe crafted with gems in JUST the right areas to make it reflect light non-magically. I think that's the trick. Explaining it in a way that makes it seem like the players probably couldn't replicate it and abuse it, but it's still non-magical. If you're looking for advice on it, set the range to 60 feet and cause blindness for 1 round. Perhaps using your bonus action on a turn. If you want it to be more complicated, give it various effects at longer ranges. Blinding for 3 rounds within 15 feet and giving the enemy disadvantage on attack rolls if you do it at 120 feet.

There are a lot of alchemical things you can use for things too. A huge number of them can be pretty easily ported over from 3.5E. I like having my Rogue's using marbles, caltrops, bouncy balls, twine and bells, etc. Setting alarms, traps, and testing hallways all without the use of magic or danger of hurting yourself.

Weapons tend to be very easy to do this way. A particular weapon material could add +1 to damage. A weapon made of an easily sparkable metal that is coated in oil could perhaps do 1d4 fire damage. Though it takes the first hit to "light" the weapon. It could even be a type of metal that reacts to blood and sets it on fire. Blood Iron.

If you ever use explosives, make sure they scale dramatically backwards. Every time I see explosives abused, it's because they scale in a crazy way. So perhaps 1lb of explosives deals 1d6 damage and has to be detonated with fire. It detonates in a 5ft radius. In order to increase the damage and radius, you have to add 1 to the number of pounds it takes each time. So 2lb more would add 1d6 damage and 5ft to the radius. Adding 3lb more would add another 1d6 and 5ft to the radius. And so on. So the more they use, the less effective it's being used and the quicker they will burn through it. Perhaps make it's ingredients rare-ish as well.

No matter what, introduce mundane options as a limited stock at first (to test if it's fair). Maybe they find 6lb of the explosive at first and can't figure out a way to get more. Test to see how fair it is with a small amount, and if it seems fine, introduce more or have them figure out how to make it. My DM made the mistake of giving us 500lbs of an explosive all at once before. Which did 1d6 PER pound used and 5ft radius PER pound used. We used it to destroy an entire keep. No questions asked. Which wasn't his plan, considering they had a hostage we didn't know about. Whoops!

[b4ndito]

Encouraging player creativity is always a good idea, as long as it's not granting them anything they normally couldn't do.

Someone gave the example once of using a goblin as a shield. Lots of people would chime in as to whether it would protect as well as a shield would? Perhaps after it takes 10 damage, it would become useless. Perhaps it would provide DR? All of those things are just realism the DM is trying to add to reduce the player's fun. And if your players are trying to get "extra" effects, then they are often just trying to manipulate the DM into giving them "free" ways to kills things. Explosives almost ALWAYS end that way. As I player, I've been guilty of misusing explosives given to me.

In reality, if a player wants to use something else that is reasonable (a dead goblin) as a cheap and easily available object, just let it happen. It's fun, it's thematic, and it's something they will talk about in the future.

Just be careful with stuff like the mirror abilities you mentioned. I recall seeing actual magic items that were less effective (extremely short ranges usually) than that. Letting players do stuff like that in perfect conditions (the sun is just right in the sky) is probably fine. But letting them use non-magical magic all the time might be going too far. I know it has worked in history, but it's more difficult than it sounds, take practice, etc.

I'm not sure if your campaign is anti-magic or not. If it's not, I do have a good suggestion! Have them find magic items that mirror the effects that you're looking for. So a shield that is highly polished and can be used to reflect sunlight. The magic of the shield is what helps you aim it, but it's essentially non-magical (no +1 or other abilities). The nice part about that is that players have an answer if they ask "wait, how is this working so well?". Really though, it's possible the players could find a mundane shield that is of exceptional quality, maybe crafted with gems in JUST the right areas to make it reflect light non-magically. I think that's the trick. Explaining it in a way that makes it seem like the players probably couldn't replicate it and abuse it, but it's still non-magical. If you're looking for advice on it, set the range to 60 feet and cause blindness for 1 round. Perhaps using your bonus action on a turn. If you want it to be more complicated, give it various effects at longer ranges. Blinding for 3 rounds within 15 feet and giving the enemy disadvantage on attack rolls if you do it at 120 feet.

There are a lot of alchemical things you can use for things too. A huge number of them can be pretty easily ported over from 3.5E. I like having my Rogue's using marbles, caltrops, bouncy balls, twine and bells, etc. Setting alarms, traps, and testing hallways all without the use of magic or danger of hurting yourself.

Weapons tend to be very easy to do this way. A particular weapon material could add +1 to damage. A weapon made of an easily sparkable metal that is coated in oil could perhaps do 1d4 fire damage. Though it takes the first hit to "light" the weapon. It could even be a type of metal that reacts to blood and sets it on fire. Blood Iron.

If you ever use explosives, make sure they scale dramatically backwards. Every time I see explosives abused, it's because they scale in a crazy way. So perhaps 1lb of explosives deals 1d6 damage and has to be detonated with fire. It detonates in a 5ft radius. In order to increase the damage and radius, you have to add 1 to the number of pounds it takes each time. So 2lb more would add 1d6 damage and 5ft to the radius. Adding 3lb more would add another 1d6 and 5ft to the radius. And so on. So the more they use, the less effective it's being used and the quicker they will burn through it. Perhaps make it's ingredients rare-ish as well.

No matter what, introduce mundane options as a limited stock at first (to test if it's fair). Maybe they find 6lb of the explosive at first and can't figure out a way to get more. Test to see how fair it is with a small amount, and if it seems fine, introduce more or have them figure out how to make it. My DM made the mistake of giving us 500lbs of an explosive all at once before. Which did 1d6 PER pound used and 5ft radius PER pound used. We used it to destroy an entire keep. No questions asked. Which wasn't his plan, considering they had a hostage we didn't know about. Whoops!

That's a reasonable post. I want to offer limited bonuses that are circumstantial without giving too many magic items. I want to foster creativity, not number mashing.

Using the environment appropriately has been a problem for my group

[BoardPep]

That's a reasonable post. I want to offer limited bonuses that are circumstantial without giving too many magic items. I want to foster creativity, not number mashing.

Using the environment appropriately has been a problem for my group

If you require your players to identify their items by use/deduction, or they just like doing them that way anyway, I have a fun way for you to ensure the item does something creative.

Wait until the player tries to do something creative with it, and have the item do that.

"You find a pair of high quality boots that give off a little bit of a feeling of magic."
"I try to walk on water."
"Nope, that doesn't seem to work."
"I'm going to start a fire and see if I can walk on fire."
"You stand on top of the flames, as if they were solid."

That's a strange example, but players always seem to try the craziest thing. Wait until you find the one you like, and have the item do exactly that. :)

[KorvinStarmast]

Let's just say that Cormac McCarthy isn't/wasn't a physicist, but a writer of fiction. The difference between blinding and distracting isn't trivial, in terms of effects on the opponent, but the other issue is the matter of surprise.

If you are expecting X and you are confronted with Y, you will sometimes be either distracted enough, or ineffective enough to give your opponent an advantage. (See old street fighting techniques of throwing sand/salt/dirt into opponent's face, hoping to get it in his eyes).

To put it bluntly, you are overthinking this thing with the shield and mirrors. (For some more overthinking ... as soon as the shield in struck during combat, the highly polished metal, be it glass covered or not, bends, gets flawed, and is already a less effective mirror than you had designed). What's a shield for, eh?

As to other "low tech" ... the sky is the limit, but your best bet is to remain bound by the laws of physics as we know them. (Less trouble with suspension of disbelief in the story you are telling).

About thirty years ago, we were running an adventure party where the DM allowed some attempts at alchemy. One of the few successful attempts that our wizard made, and that didn't injure him in the process, was an analog of nitroglycerin: an explosive and volatile liquid. We put vials of it on crossbow bolts, and placed them in specially constructed bolt cases with only a few per case, packed in soft feathers and straw. At impact, they did some bonus damage when they hit something.

We stopped using them after my thief got grappled and landed with a thud at the bottom of a flight of stairs. The DM had the bolts make a save versus crushing blow, with modifiers for the padding, and we still missed. All four bolts I had blew up. They didn't bother scraping the bits of thief and hobgoblin off of the ceiling and walls, but just rolled up another character. (It was sorta hilarious in the telling as it was played, even for me the exploded thief).

Whatever tech you let characters invent, there needs to be the chance of failure or flaw until the design gets refined by finding out its drawbacks during use. There is some fun to be had there, for sure, and working the bugs out is great versimilitude.