Quest ideas for a magic item formula

[Dalebert]

I'm taking my turn running a home brew. The warlock wants a ring of spell Storing. I was thinking of his patron giving him a quest for either there ring or a formula to make one. I want to be sure the ingredients are tricky enough that he can't just start cranking them out.

He and his patron are quite despicably evil. I was thinking of difficult sacrifices, each of which would add one level of spells until it can hold five. But that's just my initial brainstorming.

Ideas?

[PhoenixPhyre]

I'm taking my turn running a home brew. The warlock wants a ring of spell Storing. I was thinking of his patron giving him a quest for either there ring or a formula to make one. I want to be sure the ingredients are tricky enough that he can't just start cranking them out.

He and his patron are quite despicably evil. I was thinking of difficult sacrifices, each of which would add one level of spells until it can hold five. But that's just my initial brainstorming.

Ideas?

A ring of spell storing is a Rare item, thus the formula will be Very Rare. It should thus (by Xanathar's guidance, page 129), involve an encounter of CR 13-18 to acquire. Plus making the item itself requires an encounter of CR 9-12, 2k gp, and 25 workweeks.

For a Ring of Spell Storing, I would say that you're looking at raiding a lich (or other similar spell-caster's) lair for the formula, and then something involving a place of major magic (possibly guarded by something arcane) for finishing up the forging.

[Vogie]

Some ideas:

Soul Power - you need to defeat and entrap a series of spellcasters to imbue the ring the ability to cast those spells. You have to use/create a device/ritual to store those spellcasters before putting them in the ring.
Storage Space - to create space inside the ring, you need to get the extradimensional space from somewhere. This could mean absorbing Bags of Holding, hoovering up magnificent mansions, or collapsing demiplanes, to do so.
Gotta Catch 'em - Instead of hunting spellcasters, you have to defeat and collect certain aberrations or monstrosities. Or maybe there are living spells, a la the denizens of Eberron's Mournland, that have to be tamed and contained into the ring.
Lightning Rod - Instead of entrapping spellcasters, you need to entrap spells as they're being cast. The player must create a lightning-rod-style object that gives spellcasters advantage on attacking them, but allows them to counter the spell to consume it into the rod if they don't have that level of spell stored. Once you've countered 5 levels of spells, you can transform the rod into the ring.

[Unoriginal]

Maybe storming the castle of a bookish Nycaloth?

[Dalebert]

A ring of spell storing is a Rare item, thus the formula will be Very Rare.

I Don't want to make him wait till tier 3. I may just have his patron send him on a quest to complete steps to make the ring. Less a formula than a reward for following his commands.

They just rescued some urchins that the rest of the party is feeling protective of. I may start him by sacrificing one in a cruel way, which will give him a ring that stores one spell level. Further steps will get progressively more difficult and each will add a spell level until it's complete.

[Wuzza]

I always felt a Dragons fart and a Skeletons tear were pretty good ingredients. :smallsmile:

[JackPhoenix]

I Don't want to make him wait till tier 3. I may just have his patron send him on a quest to complete steps to make the ring. Less a formula than a reward for following his commands.

There's no level requirement on magic item rarity. And the encounter doesn't need to involve combat.

[Zhorn]

A strategy I've been looking at for some of my players is to give them an "almost completed" magic item, that only requires a couple of small (but appropriately challenging) steps to complete.

The 'final step' to completing the item could be the reason the item was recovered in an incomplete state to begin with, either the event needed was too rare that the original creator didn't have access to it, OR it required something that they just couldn't bare to go through with.

One of my players has an item that right now isn't magical, but if they can fully submerge/engulf it in *redacted secret ingredient* then I have a handout all lined up for them. I actually have a few different ones depending on which trigger they manage to achieve, just in case they miss a few opportunities here or there.

For the ring of spell storing (being tied to a warlock patron) could have the final step being to "rest the ring of the heart of a virgin". It SOUNDS like it involves some kind of sacrifice to achieve (and will work if done in such a way), but it could be perfectly acceptable to just have the person hold the ring to their chest when lying down to satisfy the ritual requirements, and the original creator never thought of something so simple (the patron could be so wicked as to know that such a thing would work, but intentional be misleading to toy with those they hold a pact with... just to see how far they'd go)

[krugaan]

I always felt a Dragons fart and a Skeletons tear were pretty good ingredients. :smallsmile:

I just had the most hilarious vision of a whole adventure geared around finding a bronze dragon (the safest, because they enjoy pranks), finding out what it eats, figuring out what gives it intestinal discomfort, and then figuring out how to sneak up to it's butt and capture a fart.

That would be *epic*.

You could even throw some combat in there: it turns out that beholder eyestalks are a delicacy, but zombie beholder eyestalks give it the runs. So you'll need a bunch of fresh eyestalks and a way to disguise the rotten one.

And, naturally, the only way to get fresh beholder eyestalks is to harvest them from fresh beholders.

[Foxhound438]

step 1: rumors about old wizard at *location*.
step 2: easy to find, he's right there (though possibly an illusion or projection or etc), hears them out and agrees to help with basically no time spent deciding or bargaining the price
step 3: this old wizard now creates ways to convolute the process of getting it, though nothing unachievable.

Example of what I mean by convolute: "this one, right here? OOPS I dropped it into my portal to a maze of demiplanes that I made in my long years of boredom. I drop so many things in there, i'm such a clutz. Jeez, last week I dropped in my pet snake Chungus, I sent a couple of guys to go retrieve it because I kind of like him, but they got eaten by this mysterious, gigantic serpent that showed up in there! Anyways, if you guys want that blueprint, you can go ahead and jump in for it. You'll find your way back out, can't miss the exit."

[Dalebert]

I just had the most hilarious vision of a whole adventure geared around finding a bronze dragon (the safest, because they enjoy pranks), finding out what it eats, figuring out what gives it intestinal discomfort, and then figuring out how to sneak up to it's butt and capture a fart.

I love this! And it is kind of evil too.


I feel like the 5th and final quest that completes the ring would involve drafting someone else into the service of the pation, perhaps someone specific who's not "easy" because they're not already evil.

[Zhorn]

I feel like the 5th and final quest that completes the ring would involve drafting someone else into the service of the pation, perhaps someone specific who's not "easy" because they're not already evil.

Hah! I'm now picturing the patron running a recruitment seminar. All the followers had to bring a plus one to the event, and the whole thing is playing out like the scene in Yes Man.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3la7QyMBvu8

"We're going to make a covenant, Carl"

[darknite]

Doing three services for a Hag Coven is what I'd do. Nothing about hags is obvious and they twist plots within plots. The first service should sound impossible but actually be pretty simple if the party follows the Hags' cryptic advise literally. The second service should sound dangerous but be even more dangerous than that. The third service should sound benign but be very tricky or dangerous.