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View Full Version : my opinions on some custom magic items, am I wrong?



Lance Tankmen
2019-04-19, 06:21 PM
I normally DM but I had a chance to be a Player, The DM was new and honestly got a lot better as we kept playing, originally using a DM screen and gimping the rolls, hitting often but doing set damages like 2s and 3s.(not the average just a random number except on my character who had heavy armor master, he did 5 or 6.) then later getting rid of the screen, and ran monsters that we encountered later really really well. true challenges. That said he made three items that were custom meant as risk/reward items for the players. i only know the other two vaguely because they were only known to the holders but I held one.


1st)was some kind of Wand that could be used in place of spell slots but you took a d10 or flat 10 damage necrotic per spell slot, and if this damage brought you to 0 you died.
The main issue with it besides death was we generally did one or two fights,then got a long rest. The holder who was a high elf moon druid never ran out of spell slots, it remained unused until the campaign ended. Personally in a Gritty realism setting the wand may see some use but since we were always full it never saw light.


2nd) Was a sword, long sword i think? it may have been a +1 or +2 or just magic but it basically had the ability during combat to allow you to take damage and it'd gain that damage die. So if you take 6 damage you gain an extra D6, you take 12 damage you gain a D12, you get the point, which is cool but if you missed with the weapon you lost the bonus to its damage, as long as you keep hitting it does weapon damage + bonus. The holder was a drow Rogue thief. he had like 34 hp. He actually didnt get it to be honest he failed a heist to steal from a magic vault but he had the sun blade before... it seemed like a worse weapon in all regards.

3) the third was my item and the reason I'm very harsh on the other two.. my item was only reward. it was a Golden Hand of Pelor, as i was a Vhuman Cleric of life, it replaced my spiritual weapon with a golden hand, did an extra D6 per spell level past two, and could do a line damage sweep attack, also increased its movement by 10. Thats it. no risk, i honestly felt guilty i had such a cool Item and the other two didnt get to use or even get the items meant for them.

That said the other two were very new, the druid only started due to crit roll. They didnt seem to mind but my question to you guys is this, Are the items equal? would you use these as a player? as a DM? Great DM otherwise in many ways.

Frozenstep
2019-04-19, 07:01 PM
Does it really matter? Yeah, your item was probably the best, but if you guys had fun, there's no need for lingering doubts.

sithlordnergal
2019-04-19, 07:30 PM
To be honest...the wand is the better item. If you hand that over to a wizard things could get crazy. Now don't get me wrong, your item is pretty good. Its a nice upgrade to Spiritual Weapon, and it doesn't seem so bad. It does boost Spiritual Weapon a bit, but not to a broken level. The wand on the other hand...whoo boy. Depending on what level you guys got to, I can see the Druid not using it. Especially since you took too many long rests.

But I would kill to get a wand like that for my level 20 Moon Druid. Its essentially unlimited 9th level spell slots for an average of 50hp per cast...which doesn't matter since you can be in Wild Shape, cast, Bonus Action Wild Shape and be back at full HP. Even a Wizard with limited HP could make amazing use of such an item. And the damage actually scales decently with level after level 1, provided you have at least a 14 Con. A level 2 Wizard with 14 Con and taking the average HP would have 14 hp. Using a single 1st level slot could do, at most, 10 damage.

Even at 20th level, when such a wizard would have 122hp, using a 9th level slot from the wand would do an average of about 49 to 50 damage. That's basically one free 9th level slot every time you're at full hp, which its easy to get back to full hp after an encounter.

Lance Tankmen
2019-04-19, 11:34 PM
To be honest...the wand is the better item. If you hand that over to a wizard things could get crazy. Now don't get me wrong, your item is pretty good. Its a nice upgrade to Spiritual Weapon, and it doesn't seem so bad. It does boost Spiritual Weapon a bit, but not to a broken level. The wand on the other hand...whoo boy. Depending on what level you guys got to, I can see the Druid not using it. Especially since you took too many long rests.

But I would kill to get a wand like that for my level 20 Moon Druid. Its essentially unlimited 9th level spell slots for an average of 50hp per cast...which doesn't matter since you can be in Wild Shape, cast, Bonus Action Wild Shape and be back at full HP. Even a Wizard with limited HP could make amazing use of such an item. And the damage actually scales decently with level after level 1, provided you have at least a 14 Con. A level 2 Wizard with 14 Con and taking the average HP would have 14 hp. Using a single 1st level slot could do, at most, 10 damage.

Even at 20th level, when such a wizard would have 122hp, using a 9th level slot from the wand would do an average of about 49 to 50 damage. That's basically one free 9th level slot every time you're at full hp, which its easy to get back to full hp after an encounter.

thanks for the response, yeah i figure higher level, also not sure if it was a d10 or flat 10 HP. but yeah if he had drained our resources more the wand may have mattered more.

sithlordnergal
2019-04-20, 12:09 AM
thanks for the response, yeah i figure higher level, also not sure if it was a d10 or flat 10 HP. but yeah if he had drained our resources more the wand may have mattered more.

No problem. As for your last few questions: The items aren't equal at all. The longsword and the Golden Hand of Pelor are fine as is. I'd maybe make the Golden Hand a Very Rare magic item and require attunement from a Cleric of Pelor, while the sword seems like a Rare that leans towards Very Rare. I'd even use both of them as a player or DM, the sword is especially nice for Paladins that like to smite. Sort of a risk/reward sort of deal.

That wands though? while I would love to have it as a player, I would never put it in a game. Usually I'm fine with adding stuff and letting anything go...but again. That's basically giving your caster an extra spell slot of their highest level spell slots. And in the hands of a level 20 Moon Druid, it'd just be unlimited 9th level spells cause they don't have to care about the HP cost.