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  1. - Top - End - #1
    Halfling in the Playground
    Join Date
    Jan 2019

    Default Wonky magical innovations

    What kind of wonky magical innovations might you expect to find in a literal city made from emerald in the feywild? Think The Emerald City ala Wizard of Oz, except no technology.

  2. - Top - End - #2
    Firbolg in the Playground
    Join Date
    Oct 2011

    Default Re: Wonky magical innovations

    Huh. I guess I know what movie I’m watching tonight. I’ll let you know if I get any thematic inspiration. But, offhand, electrified flying monkey traps, complete with banana lure?

  3. - Top - End - #3
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
    GnomeWizardGuy

    Join Date
    Mar 2009
    Gender
    Male

    Default Re: Wonky magical innovations

    The thing about the emerald city (in the books) is that it wasn't actually emerald. The wizard just forced everyone to wear green glasses so they didn't know that it was just a regular city.

    So I guess at the gates I'd force the players to take on an item that hides a simple truth about the city from the residents.

    What is the purpose of the city in your world. What narrative beats do you want experienced in this feywild city?
    Last edited by Shinizak; 2022-09-29 at 01:47 PM. Reason: Typos

  4. - Top - End - #4
    Halfling in the Playground
    Join Date
    Jan 2019

    Default Re: Wonky magical innovations

    Quote Originally Posted by Shinizak View Post
    The thing about the emerald city (in the books) is that it wasn't actually emerald. The wizard just forced everyone to wear green glasses so they didn't know that it was just a regular city.

    So I guess at the gates I'd force the players to take on an item that hides a simple truth about the city from the residents.

    What is the purpose of the city in your world. What narrative beats do you want experienced in this feywild city?
    Yeah, i was thinking about having some emerald glasses that do... something. Maybe let you see a cool aurora in the sky? Glamors everyone you look at to be more beautiful and in better clothes, etc than they are?

    Almost no one actually lives there. The only actual being is an archfey - the Lady of Wonder. All the denizens are essentially extensions of herself. Sort of a shared consciousness through advanced illusions. Everything in the city - including visitors - is actually part of a vast play the archfey puts on for herself.

    There is a fountain of champagne. If drank from, that person will start seeing some crazy ****. Dancing fountains, actual word bubbles, crazy graffiti. Since of that graffiti is a particular flower, marked on stone cellar doors or the lintels of other doors. These mark places that messengers of the Prince of Frost use as meeting places.

    There's a crashed hot ait balloon.

    Maybe the person flying it just created it. She used a feywild flower - fire flowers - to be her "fire" to fill the balloon. Flowers like this keep their properties until they wilt, about five days. I don't know how it's controlled to cool off to control height.

    The players will witness a hot air balloon approaching the city. They'll watch as a localized storm springs up around it and tosses it to the ground. (The Feywild responds to big emotions and will charge to represent them.)

    If they decide to investigate, they'll find the pilot among the wreckage. A spring eladrin, perhaps? She'll tell them that she got a message from her father which made her very angry, causing the storm and her subsequent crash. The balloon and basket seem to be OK, and the apparatus holding the bunch of fire flowers only took a little damage. She can fix that, but she lost most of the fire flowers in the crash. Good news, though! She saw a field of them not far away. Will the players please go collect her some fire flowers while she fixes the apparatus?

    They'll say yes because they always do. But when they get to the field, they'll find a jaberwock is hanging out there. It'll attack because jaberwocks are the dumb.

    Ultimately the players are in the city to meet a contract who they were told can put them into contact with an archfey who can control the time dilation when they leave the feywild.

    I want there to be emerald glasses but i don't know what they'd do. Maybe allow you to see a crazy aurora in the sky?

    I'm also trying to figure out ways to clue the players in that this is effectively a shared consciousness and is also a "play".

    Maybe there's moments where they meet someone new and that person uses their names before they are introduced. Maybe all the food is fake. What else?

    And other wonky magical innovations.

  5. - Top - End - #5
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
    GnomeWizardGuy

    Join Date
    Mar 2009
    Gender
    Male

    Default Re: Wonky magical innovations

    If it's main connecting theme is "fey girl putting on largest play in existence" then you should have "innovations" (or items) that can serve that function. Maybe a bunch of props?

    Imagine a stick that can be turned into a sword, or a broom, or an oar, depending entirely or what you want it to look like BUT doesn't stop being a stick. Or a simple wool dress that can change to resemble any color or style of clothing you want (even armor) but doesn't stop being a wool dress. That sorta thing.

    Or maybe she's a bit more authentic and likes "real" and "authentic" stuff better. Maybe she's got a supernatural workshop somewhere on the side to build props and buildings and stuff. Maybe she makes mannequins (effectively level 0 constructs with 5 hp and zero modifiers) to control (thus enabling the hive mind extension aspect of the story) that can change their appearances.

    Maybe she skips directly to the point and makes you put on glasses that let you see what she wants you to see (but in reality it's a blank simulation room).

    Either way, whatever you make should have a connecting theme tied to the story concept.
    Last edited by Shinizak; 2022-10-05 at 01:37 AM.

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