Is there a reason there's no Cha 19 item in 5e?

[Segev]

There's no Cloak of Charisma in this edition, and unlike the other Stats, there only seem to be items that give +2s to Charisma. Int, Con, Str, and Wis have items that set them to 19. I can't find any that do so for Dex or Cha. Is this for some deliberate purpose? Or likely just an oversight?

[Protolisk]

Is there a Wisdom item? The only ones I know about are the Str, Con, and Int items.

If I had to make a guess, it's because Dex is a very powerful stat, affecting initiative, AC, stealth/sleight of hand/acrobatics, a common damaging save, the damage and accuracy of many melee weapons and all non-thrown ranged weapons, and more. Strength is only really useful for melee weapons and athletics, Int for knowledge rolls (and Wizards) which aren't super useful (if the DM wanted you to know something, they shouldn't leave it up to complete chance, especially if it is plot relevant) but Investigation is pretty good, and Constitution is health and the common constitution and concentration save but no other skills.

Wisdom and Charisma are also fairly strong as far as stats go, being some of the most used spell-casting stats (ignoring basically just the Wizard and the two half casters, though Artificer will soon join them) and some of the most used skills such as Perception and Insight, along with the social Charisma skills Persuasion, Deception, and Intimidation.

But beyond that, all items in the DMG are just examples, some even incomplete examples (artifacts needing you to roll for minor/major bonuses and flaws even though its the Hand of Vecna we are talking about), so creating the Boots of Agility or the Tiara of Personality shouldn't be too off the mark for magic items a DM could homebrew.

[Vorpalchicken]

There is no 19 Wis item.

[Reevh]

Probably for the same reason that there's no 19 DEX item. Those two ability scores are too broadly useful in skill checks, and are generally of extremely high value. But that's just a guess.

[Pex]

There can't be one for DX because it already provides a better AC than bracers of defense before you factor in initiative and finesse weapons. There can't be one for the mental scores because of spellcasting.

[Grod_The_Giant]

There can't be one for DX because it already provides a better AC than bracers of defense before you factor in initiative and finesse weapons. There can't be one for the mental scores because of spellcasting.
Headband of Intellect.

I'm guessing they were cut because they weren't as iconic as, say, Gauntlets of Ogre Power, and the developers figured that it would be easy enough for a DM to add them on their own. I'm kinda dubious that they were considering subtle points of balance when writing magic item lists.

[Ganders]

I'd prefer to think there IS a Cha 19 item in 5e.

I believe the other three, such as Gauntlets of Ogre Power, are just representative samples. Look, there's only so much space to print everything; you don't want the DMG to be 1500 pages long. Besides, you want to save a few ideas for future splatbooks. So they didn't list every possible item. They figured DMs would be smart enough to figure out the other three stats on their own.

If you read the magic item list critically, I think you'll see that many of the categories are incomplete, not just that one. For instance, elven chain shirt but no elven chain mail. Especially for items that cast spells (potions, rings, wands, etc) they didn't bother to list one item for every possible spell... they just assume DMs can improvise.

[Vorpalchicken]

You've got to curb two level warlock dips somehow.

[Greywander]

I've never understood why these items boost your stat to 19. Why 19? Why not round it off to an even 18 or 20?

I can understand the logic of not wanting to be better than someone who actually bothered to put points into that stat, it just nags at me a bit. Like a picture frame that is almost but not quite straight.

As far as I can tell, there's no way to get a +1 bonus to that stat in such a way that it applies to the 19 granted by the item rather than applying it to your base stat, which then gets overwritten by the 19 from the item. Although now I'm curious what happens if you get ability damage while wearing one of these items. Like getting hit with Feeblemind while wearing the Headband of Intellect. Your INT might drop to 1, but the headband makes it 19. Likewise with the shadow's STR drain and the Gauntlets of Ogre Power or Belt of Giant Strength.

[DwarfDM]

Because str, con and int are minor saves so they have 19 items.

Dex, Wis and cha are major saves.

[Spacehamster]

Because str, con and int are minor saves so they have 19 items.

Dex, Wis and cha are major saves.

CON is a major save

[darknite]

CON is a major save

Agreed. Amulet of Health is one of the best magic items in the game.

[JackPhoenix]

CON is a major save

And Cha isn't, just for the completeness' sake.

[Chrizzt]

But there are many Charisma based caster. More than anything else, to be precise.

[GlenSmash!]

Perhaps because Str and Int are commonly seen as dump stats and Con is rarely raised above 14 by ASIs?

[Willie the Duck]

I've never understood why these items boost your stat to 19. Why 19? Why not round it off to an even 18 or 20?

I can understand the logic of not wanting to be better than someone who actually bothered to put points into that stat, it just nags at me a bit. Like a picture frame that is almost but not quite straight.

Psychologically, it is 'just shy of the best.' Mechanically, the strength one gives you and extra 15 lbs of max carry compared to 18, so why not?


I'm guessing they were cut because they weren't as iconic as, say, Gauntlets of Ogre Power, and the developers figured that it would be easy enough for a DM to add them on their own. I'm kinda dubious that they were considering subtle points of balance when writing magic item lists.

That is certainly reasonable. There is no requirement that magic items be balanced, since their entire point is to give the person getting them a leg up.
If I were to posit some possible balance reasons, it would be:

Strength and Intelligence are (predominantly) minor perks (saves and skill modifiers) to anyone who wasn't already dropping a decent stat into that score (maybe you have an Eldritch Knight who dumped Int, but they likely don't have a lot of 'save vs.' spells. And maybe you have a cleric who dumped Str who can wear plate mail with the gauntlets, but they probably had a 14 Dex for use with medium armor, and thus are only getting +1 AC). So most people either won't get too much use from them, or will go from 15+ in the stat to 19 (a controlled amount).
Constitution, likewise, well... you probably already had a 14+ in that. Going up to 19 is another controlled amount. Plus, it is roughly equally beneficial to everyone (everyone needs good hp and con saves).
Dex, Cha, and Wisdom items, OTOH, may well be semi-huge to certain character types (who might not already have a 14+ in those scores) in a non-homogenous way. The barbarian who went 15 15 15 8 8 8 in point buy would love to get a 19 wisdom item. Likewise a wizard who formerly was just going to hang in the back row and work hard never to be targeted ends up with a 19 Dex and suddenly can Mage Armor themselves up to AC 17. Charisma is a little harder to figure out, but perhaps the rogue who wanted Str, Int, and Wis for skills and was suffering through a dump-stat Cha suddenly finding themselves a deception master.

None of which is particularly convincing, but they probably didn't need too much justification either, as I suspect that they didn't want to include all 6, to reinforce the idea that there isn't universal symmetry across everything, and that the DM can make up new items as needed.

[Lille]

I've never understood why these items boost your stat to 19. Why 19? Why not round it off to an even 18 or 20?

I can understand the logic of not wanting to be better than someone who actually bothered to put points into that stat, it just nags at me a bit. Like a picture frame that is almost but not quite straight.

As far as I can tell, there's no way to get a +1 bonus to that stat in such a way that it applies to the 19 granted by the item rather than applying it to your base stat, which then gets overwritten by the 19 from the item. Although now I'm curious what happens if you get ability damage while wearing one of these items. Like getting hit with Feeblemind while wearing the Headband of Intellect. Your INT might drop to 1, but the headband makes it 19. Likewise with the shadow's STR drain and the Gauntlets of Ogre Power or Belt of Giant Strength.

I'd imagine that the Gauntlets of Ogre Power, at least, give 19 Strength because that's what an Ogre's Strength is. It would be kind of weird for them to not give the Strength of the creature they're named after.

Not sure about the other items, maybe it's just to match the Gauntlets?