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mostlyharmful
2007-10-24, 08:30 AM
My groups just got handed one of the spellbooks of one of my worlds greatest ever wizards, level 20 with centuries of magic in it. It was originally a Boccob's blessed before the Archmage tricked it out.

They got hold of it at the end of an adventure and all the parties divinations have been worn out so 've got until next week to work out the protections. The contents are easy, just lots of spells of every level, but the part i'm thinking about is the protections on the book.

The mage in question had the craft wondrous item, craft construct and craft magic arms and armour feats. I figure he'd have had around two hundred thousand GP to trick out the book with traps, alarms, protections and all sorts of nasty surprises for anyone but him that got hold of it. Given he's been dead for three hundred years some of them won't be useful anymore (teleport to me, geas them to find me and return the book, etc) what do the forum goers think in terms of magical protections and traps on a high level wizards stuff.

I'm aware this thread has been done, and one of my players is a wizard that has used the standerd symbols and firetraps and such. What I'm looking for is something to surprise them and put them off, perhaps the magic has corroded over the centuries, perhaps the great mage had a weird sense of humour, perhaps it sends them on unaplicable quests like return it to the tower that got blasted out of existance, etc....

Funny, not immieatly obvious and off putting is the name of the game.

The party consists of:
Sun elf wiz 13
wood elf ranger 14
gold dwarf barb 13
human bard 14

Kurald Galain
2007-10-24, 08:48 AM
Here's a nasty one: the spells in the book are subtly modified, to incorporate a subtle Geas on whomever they target. The first few times this is so subtle as to be ignorable. However, once a character has been targeted by something in the book as often as he has wisdom points, his will succumbs to the Geas.

Funkyodor
2007-10-24, 09:26 AM
Um, the book could be an Item Familiar in addition to a spellbook. Or just an intelligent talking book that wants to read the spells to you because the old wizards eye sight was failing (kinda like large print books for the elderly). It allows the DM to add a humorous powerfull item that speaks up at inopportune times to give biased advice based on the prejudices of the Worlds Greatest Wizard. Make it so the spells can't be transferred out because if they do it comes out in garbage scribbles and word smoothies that the scribe doesn't realize he is doing until finished. So to carry it around is to carry a magic mouth that you can't control and if you try via sound proof stuff or quieting magic it gets upset and wont 'talk' you through the spells or screws them up on purpose for you "Oh, Fire Ball! I thought you said Fire Shield!" *Supressed sound of laughter*

Attilargh
2007-10-24, 09:27 AM
When opened by a reader who does not know the password, the book snaps shut, teleports five feet to a random direction and is either displaced (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/displacement.htm) or turns invisible.

Runolfr
2007-10-24, 09:35 AM
You might look in Complete Arcane at the section on spellbooks for some ideas about protecting it from harsh environments, which may be relevant to your other protections.

Hmm... spells that could be worked into good spellbook protections.

Mage's Faithful Hound (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magesFaithfulHound.htm)
Constant attacks from a magical defender that can't be counter-attacked; only hope is to successfully dispel it (against your L20 caster).

Baleful Polymorph (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/balefulPolymorph.htm)
Turn the offender into a newt.

Blindness/Deafness (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/blindnessDeafness.htm)
Can't use it if you can't read it.

Plane Shift (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/planeShift.htm)
Send book and anyone holding it to another plane, where unpleasant things are likely to happen to them (the book should be appropriately protected from the environment, of course).

Sepia Snake Sigil (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/sepiaSnakeSigil.htm)
Obviously it was made for such uses.

Summon Monster IX (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/summonMonsterIX.htm)
Something very unpleasant appears and starts mauling the offender for up to 20 rounds.

Mass Suggestion (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/suggestionMass.htm)
The offender(s) really ought to put the book back where they found it.

Greater Teleport (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/teleportGreater.htm)
Teleports one of the wizard's golems to the book's location to retrieve it.

Mass Reduce Person (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/reducePersonMass.htm)
Shrink those annoying book thieves every time they try to open the book.

Mage's Disjunction (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magesDisjunction.htm)
They'll hate you forever, but it will certainly annoy them.

Modify Memory (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/modifyMemory.htm)
Combined with a geas, quest, or suggestion to return the book, prevents them from every trying to get it again by making them forget it exists.

Studoku
2007-10-24, 09:41 AM
Explosive runes could be used. While it doesn't deal much damage, it does destroy the book if it ever falls into the wrong hands.

Darrin
2007-10-24, 10:32 AM
I'm aware this thread has been done, and one of my players is a wizard that has used the standerd symbols and firetraps and such. What I'm looking for is something to surprise them and put them off, perhaps the magic has corroded over the centuries, perhaps the great mage had a weird sense of humour, perhaps it sends them on unaplicable quests like return it to the tower that got blasted out of existance, etc....


Make the book intelligent. Then make it snotty, pretentious, and uncooperative. If it deems the PC handling it is "unworthy of its greatness", then it blanks out its pages, scrambles the words, or replaces known spells with random/unexpected effects similar to a Rod of Wonder. When the PC tries to cast Bull's Strength on a companion, it turns out to be Hideous Laughter or another harmful/unpredictable spell (it's quite fond of Confusion, Feeblemind, and Prismatic Spray).

For the PCs to get the book to do what they want, they have to negotiate through a series of bizarre demands. The book could send them on wild goose quests to prove they are "worthy" or browbeat them into "finishing the Great Master's work", which may have been tracking down/completing a legendary artifact, or maybe something even more important like cataloguing all of the species of wasps on the Isle of Dread.

Pronounceable
2007-10-24, 10:32 AM
What you need to apply is imagination, not some cliched spell effects.


The book is actually a fine sized golem. It sprouts limbs from its cover, the pages open into a fanged maw and it attacks those it deems unappropriate. Some spells are damaged and or lost if the golem is dealt any damage.

The book is intelligent and it can cast spells in it as a nth level sorcerer. It is very unfriendly and may become hostile on short notice.

The book is blank. Writing appears only on an image (mirror, water surface). Certainly the writing is reverse and must be corrected with another mirror to read.

Each page is sentient with differing personalities. They must be individually persuaded to allow themselves to be read. All but cantrips require mutliple pages to be persuaded. Some pages also don't like others, and won't allow themselves to be read if other pages have been read.

Some pages are sentient and can cast spells. Such pages are hidden between a spell's pages, and they cast their spells only when someone is copying from the book.

The book can polymorph into another book when someone tries to read. Possibly into a children's tale or a picture book for adults. Or a combination of two...

The cover suddenly grows teeth at edges and snaps itself shut backward biting/severing the hands holding it.

Pages burst into fire when opened. They regenerate when the cover is closed.

Fishy
2007-10-24, 12:22 PM
It's not a book, it's a dungeon.

Reading any of the text triggers a small Vacuous Grimoure effect: enough to distract you while the portal to a Magnificent Mansion type effect opens under your feet. When you look up from the page, you're in the middle of the Archmage's personal library/plane, with dense shelves as far and high as the eye can see, filled with all manner of books in a thousand languages: Spellbooks mixed in with history mixed in with pulp, arranged in an order that may have made perfect sense to the Archmage millennia ago. Add monsters/traps to taste.

jameswilliamogle
2007-10-24, 12:30 PM
It's not a book, it's a dungeon.

Reading any of the text triggers a small Vacuous Grimoure effect: enough to distract you while the portal to a Magnificent Mansion type effect opens under your feet. When you look up from the page, you're in the middle of the Archmage's personal library/plane, with dense shelves as far and high as the eye can see, filled with all manner of books in a thousand languages: Spellbooks mixed in with history mixed in with pulp, arranged in an order that may have made perfect sense to the Archmage millennia ago. Add monsters/traps to taste.I like that one! Very nice. Cookie 4 u!

Animate Objects could be an initial trap. Was it an evil spellcaster? If not, then likely he would just punish those that are raiding his personal belongings with small things first, gradually working his way to more and more dangerous magics and more complex traps.

Yakk
2007-10-24, 01:37 PM
The dungeon idea is great.

Let's mix and match.

1> The book is an intelligent construct. It can cast some spells from within it, but which spells it can cast and how often they can be cast vary very randomly. It is also fortified to an extreme degree -- basically, artifact-level destruction to take it out. Hostile spells cast on it either do nothing, or hit the caster instead.

2> The book hates it's former owner, but is bound to serve it. The book is also senile (it has been a LONG time). So the book really really wants some things to be done that the master wanted done. It considers the PCs to be even bigger idiots than it's former master.

3> There are layers of defenses on the book. There are some outer ones (snake sigil, monster summoning, etc) that the players disarm.

4> Opening the book takes the character, everyone nearby, and the book into the mentioned dungeon. The spells are actually stored throughout the dungeon, which the book considers to be it's own "inside". (the book remains both inside and outside of the dungeon -- those outside who open the book also fall in). Inside, the book cannot be opened.

So to be able to free up a section of the book to be used, you have to adventure inside the dungeon. Various sections of the dungeon allow escape from it. The wizard himself, naturally, knew how to navigate the dungeon and avoid/control the traps and monsters.

There are two kinds of exits from the dungeon. The first drops you where the book is. The second drops you out (with the newly reunited book) at a fixed location.

Doing some things inside the book frees up more powers for the book. Other things open up new routes. Other things allow you to access spells from the book. Other things grant knowledge (there is more than just spells recorded in this book).

5> In order to convince the book to help you (and the book knows lots), the book will demand you do things.

6> The book sleeps a lot, and is cranky if you try to wake it. Given that it is basically indestructible, waking it up when it doesn't want to wake up is hard. (this means that for the most part, it will do nothing, and then randomly wake up and say something or do something when the DM scripts it to).

How is that?

mostlyharmful
2007-10-24, 01:46 PM
Horah! that's lots of inspiration to run a crusty fuddiduddy book with enormous power and no socail skills. Just the sort of stuff i was looking for. Thanks everyone.:smallsmile:

Lord Tataraus
2007-10-24, 03:47 PM
The book can polymorph into another book when someone tries to read. Possibly into a children's tale or a picture book for adults. Or a combination of two...

I have got to remember that one! Good ol' Monty Python (http://youtube.com/watch?v=YfDgajSoI3s).

Runolfr
2007-10-24, 04:57 PM
Given he's been dead for three hundred years some of them won't be useful anymore (teleport to me, geas them to find me and return the book, etc) ...

Actually, there's no reason those particular effects couldn't still cause problems for your adventurers.

Teleport to Owner
Well, the owner's dead, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything to the spell: it just teleports the book and anyone around it to the location of the deceased wizard's body. How unpleasant that place might be is up to you.

Geas to Return Book
If the adventurers messing with the book don't know he's dead, then they'll have to satisfy the geas by at least confirming that they can't return the book. This could force them to waste quite a bit of time following a trail of clues as to the wizard's whereabouts before they determine that he is, in fact, dead.

Mewtarthio
2007-10-24, 05:12 PM
The book has a few cursed two-page spreads scattered throughout. The archmage had memorized their locations and knew how to avoid them, but anyone else flipping through the book has a 10% chance to come across a strange, intricate design. Those who see this design must succeed at a Will save or be compelled to study it for the next ten minutes (treat as fascinated). At the end of this period, they affected by programmed amnesia, and all their memories are completely erased. They know nothing more than that they were just studying a very interesting design...

It might seem a little cruel, but it is avoidable. The rest of the party has ten minutes to end the fascination effect (it's no different from a Bard's music, minus the amnesia), and, in a worst-case scenario, programmed amnesia can be reversed with a wish, miracle, or similar effect.

Kurald Galain
2007-10-24, 05:18 PM
Reading any of the text triggers a small Vacuous Grimoure effect

Oooh, wasn't that the book that absorbed its readers? No? Yes? Well, anyway, the Discworld library also has books that devour you, quite literally. They are so captivating that you become totally absorbed in it, you disappear, the book is now a few pages thicker, and whatever you knew can now be read in there. Nasty for the unscrupulous knowledge-gathering archmage...