Good Mundane Gear?

[Swooper]

I was fiddling around with the equipment list of a character (Psion//Warblade 1) I made for an upcoming game. Since I changed my weapon of choice from greatsword to glaive, I had some leftover cash. I went through the equipment list in the PHB, and still had some leftover. Out of curiousity, I paged through some other source books I thought might have some useful gear and managed to add at least some useful stuff to it. I then thought of asking you playgrounders, what are some of your favourite pieces of mundane gear? What should no adventurer leave home without? I'm particularly interested in stuff from outside the PHB, since there's a smattering of equipment in a lot of source books that's hard to keep your head around.

[Hunter Noventa]

I don't have anything specific to mention, but Dungeonscape, Complete Adventurer + Scoundrel and the old Arms and Equipment guide have some excellent random gear, from totally mundane and useless, to fun and don't forget alchemical items either.

[shaggz076]

I personally like the hamock. Enemies are always looking for tents and sleeping bags. Set it up high enough and they'd walk right past you. lol

[AKA_Bait]

Honestly, as lame as it sounds, 100 ft. of Silk Rope.

No joke. It can save your life.

[wormwood]

I really liked the springwall from Arms & Equipment (i think). Nifty little gadget. Also, you need a 10' pole.

[Telonius]

Rope is my first choice too. Oil, hooded lantern, chalk, caltrops, signal whistle, crowbar, and grappling hook follow quickly, and in that order. If you have a haversack or bag of holding, get all of that stuff as soon as possible. (I'm assuming you already have the ultra-basic stuff like bedroll, backpack, rations, tent, flint/steel). If you have the gold for it, get one of each for the rest of the mundane items. Every single thing on that list can be useful in the right circumstances. So get to it, MacGyver.

[TheElfLord]

I have to third the rope. As Sam said, you should never leave home without it.

[ealan]

Well after two or three levels, ussually with enough GP I buy a Harversak and 1+ of every piece of mundane equipment from scoundrel+PHB+Adventurer, and I guess there is a point I'll be adding the odd Arms and Equip book to that, but I like rogue trapsmiths, and having the random stuff for an ingenues trap is nice, and signal whistles have 4 of them, cause someone is going to fail their preform check to whistle or do their bird call when the trap should go off.

[Seffbasilisk]

Earthsilk Jersey.

Very good for anyone without DR.

Races of Stone. PG 160.

Costs 150gp though, so might be outta reach.

[Crimson Avenger]

You can never have enough rope.....or tangle foot bags. I've seen a sorcerer with Launch Item drop a dragon out of the sky because of a failed Reflex save. Yup, rope and tangle foot bags.

[JellyPooga]

A tent (Honey Leather, from RotW, for preference)...no amount of rope will keep the rain off whilst you're trying to sleep in bad weather.

Spare clothes (including bad weather gear) for when you want to make a better impression than every other smelly adventurer or want not to die from hypothermia in bad weather.

Cooking gear (including cutlery) so that you can have hot food...when it's freezing cold, there's nothing better than a hot meal instead of cold trail rations to make yourself more comfortable and warm yourself up.

A bottle of strong alcohol (whiskey or rum is my personal preference)...see above comments on being comfortable in cold weather...also good for buttering up chance encounters with suspicious travellers who may have knowledge of the local area/road ahead.

Boot polish...no-one likes having wet feet...actually, full kit/self maintenance gear (needle and thread to repair minor tears in clothes, oil, whetstone and abrasives to keep armour and weapons in good nick, hairbrush/comb, razor, mirror, shaving soap, towel/drying rag and anything else you can think of that is needed for personal hygeine or maintenance of your gear)

A Spade (not a shovel)...when setting up camp for the night, no-one wants to smell your...uh...leavings. Also useful for digging up treasure under big X's.

[Fridesgerte]

You can never have enough rope.....or tangle foot bags. I've seen a sorcerer with Launch Item drop a dragon out of the sky because of a failed Reflex save. Yup, rope and tangle foot bags.

I completely agree on the tanglefoot bags. We kept a dragon from casting its spells until we could cast ours when our paladin chucked three tanglefoot bags at it from much too close range in the dragon's lair. We killed it, too. Since then, my PC is never without them.

[TheThan]

This is the usual gear I take as a 1st level character.
Backpack
Bed roll
Winter blanket
Rations, trail x10
Water skin
Flint & steel
Rope-silk (50ft min)
Grappling hook
Weapons and armor (if applicable)

Gear I also will take if I have left over cash.
Tent
Caltrops
Tinder twigs
Oil/holy water
Lanern, hooded
Scroll case

This is just the equipment in the PHB though.

Things like the spade, the camping equipment and what not are nice, unfortunately there aren’t any rules for them, and most of them don’t need rules anyway, at least not for dnd. It does help Verisimilitude though.

[Fuzzy_Juan]

AH.....such noobs these people be...you got the obvious but must not be old school...

j/k...

A couple of items...an adventurer should never leave home without if they can help it.

A silvered dagger (arrows or silver swords are just too expensive, but a silver dagger is usually a good price and a worthwhile investment...those pesky lycanthropes...can't always rely on a magic weapon)

A handful of iron spikes - Cold iron spikes that is...never be too careful about fey. Cheap, and a nice way to be sure if you come across some fey that they won't be too much of a problem. Also useful as a fighter's 'hold portal' when combined with the business end of a small warhammer...or even as a 'ladder' in some circumstances.

extra oil - slightly mentioned above...while oil is standard for lanterns...rarely do people keep a good supply of extra oil for those times when pyromania is a valid defense. Oil is the poor man's grease spell combined with wall of fire.

Vial of acid - so many uses...just be sure that you store it in a spot where it won't break. Might be relegated to extradimensional storage only. Examples include a poor fighter's lockpick, time delay rope release, interrogation enhancer.

A sealed bottle with some water and a chunk of rotting meat - However disturbing this sounds, you may need to put someone out of comission without hurting them really...mix in some extra water with the foul water and then into a larger barrel of water to 'poison' your target, or into some wine/ale. Food poisoning will be full on in short order with the person decidedly out of action and in need of healers.

Healer's kit - bonus to heal checks...everyone should know first aid...extra bandages and wake up stuff, generic antivenom...great for when you are messed up at the end of a day and the cleric will be out of spells for a day...or there is not enough healing to get to everyone with just one day of rest/re-spell.

chalk - you need at least one.

Signet ring - they are cheap enough...a good discreet calling card that you will get some use out of. Great for leaving a stamp that you were there without eeryone always knowing it was you.

paper, pen, ink - aside from the obvious with writing notes, and maps...ink, while expensive, is a great way to blind people or to create some form of stain that will last. I mean...you want some tatts...right?

Others have covered most of the other normal items that one should have available when adventuring...between you and your party, there should be a stock of these items at hand.

[SilentNight]

The Thief's cap, I think from arms and equipment guide is a nice cheap +1 to listen checks. Also the adamantine tool kit from the last issue of Dragon magazine if you have it. It allows the user to remove the lock from any object with a hardness less than twenty. Effectively bypassing it.

[Human Paragon 3]

Skill kits. 50gp per kit gives you +2 on any skill you might want or need. Masterwork earplugs for those defensive castings and psychic focus Concenstration Checks, A masterwork field book for a +2 on knowledge checks or whatever it is that you need to be all you can be.

[Theli]

Note regarding the base +2 to skill item, a caveat was made:

Tool, Masterwork

This well-made item is the perfect tool for the job. It grants a +2 circumstance bonus on a related skill check (if any). Bonuses provided by multiple masterwork items used toward the same skill check do not stack.

Note the (if any) clause. A DM is free to limit the availability of any such item regarding any skill which doesn't already have such an item explicitly defined elsewhere.

You can come up with all sorts of things that could conceivable help any possible skill. But that doesn't mean that the DM must accept it.

[Lord Tataraus]

I'll second most stuff on this thread, but I'd like to add a few specifics:
from dungeonscape

• Rubber Ball
• Lard
• Flour Pouch
• Acid Neutralizer
• Finder's Chalk and Finder's Glass
• Adamantine (or iron) Drill
• Adamantine (or iron) hacksaw
• Mithral & silk grappling hook (or even better: Mithral & Silk grappling ladder)

From Complete Scoundrel

• Torch Bug Tube/Paste
• Rust Monster Wand (no more pick lock checks)
• Hidden Spaces and Blades*

* - while not technically items in their own right, these are amazing to have if you are afraid you'll get caught "without" your stuff or frisked.

[Grynning]

I also will bump the rope. Charlie Bronson's always got a rope!
Another excellent and often overlooked item is the steel mirror. Groom yourself, look around corners or obstacles while keeping your cover, use it to signal for help when there's sunlight, and maybe even bounce back a gaze attack.
Oh, and the crowbar! Very helpful if you need to open something and you have a party where almost everyone dumped strength (which happened to one of my groups once). Also useful as an improvised weapon.

[Newtkeeper]

Rope(elven is great, from Races of the Wild- like silk, only better), tent (honey-leather is great), cooking gear (seriously, far too many PCs forget that), warm cloak, shovel (collapsible, for preference), everburning torch (quite apart from lighting up surroundings, it makes fire-starting easy. For when you need dark, get a metal tin you can cover it with).

Food is always nice, as are waterskins. If you have a ranger or druid (or a wand of create food/water) these become less critical, but are still nice.

A hip-flask may give you no mechanical benefit, but makes for some great RP opportunities.

Oh, and a ten-foot pole. When your rogue is out cold, some method of springing traps is useful. Extra credit if you buy a 10-foot ladder (for less cost) and disassemble it for parts).

EDIT: Oh, and if you can carry the weight, bring a bag of flour. It can reveal invisible foes, create a smokescreen, and, when empty, make a decent hood.

[Arbitrarity]

Flour is hilarious in dark corridors, if you can convince your DM to allow some physics.

"I toss the flour in a cloud behind us, and run"
"O..k... the enemies, carrying torches, chase after you"
"With torches, you say?"
"Yes..."
""

[Chronos]

everburning torch (quite apart from lighting up surroundings, it makes fire-starting easy.

That one doesn't work. An everburning torch is just a stick that has Continual Flame cast on it, and Continual Flame produces no heat.

[John Campbell]

Also, you need a 10' pole.

No, he doesn't. He's got a glaive.

[FlyMolo]

I'll have to second the masterwork tools. You should buy one for every skill you put ranks in. They might be hard to find in a country bumpkin hamlet or village, but in a big city they'll be everywhere. Best of all, they make sense. Guitar picks, spatulas, good cooking pots, camo paint, etc etc etc. All really exist. War paint for intimidate, etc etc.

[TempusCCK]

I throw on a vote for rope, never leave home without it. Torches are a must, more versatile than a latern and cheaper.

I also throw a vote in for the crowbar. Pitons are ridiculously useful for all sorts of things, not excluding your pulled-it-out-of-my-rear rope bridge over that chasm for the losers who can't make the jump.

[AslanCross]

PHB 2 has a Standard Adventurer's kit that only costs 15 GP.
-Backpack
-Belt Pouch
-Bedroll
-Flint and Steel
-Hempen Rope (50 ft)
-Two Sunrods
-10 days' trail rations
-Waterskin

[sonofzeal]

Tower Shield. Even if you're not proficient, the ability to take Total Cover at a moment's notice is a good thing.

[Chronicled]

From the Arms and Equipment Guide, the Signal Torches (can be bought at any color desired, 1g/torch) and Instant Rope (pour out the vial to have rope in 2 rounds, 25g/vial) can be quite handy.

[Theli]

Instant...rope?

THE MIND BOGGLES!!!

[hylian chozo]

Smokesticks are amazingly useful and if you can get tindertwigs use those too. Caltrops are also great if you toss them into a narrow corridor (or smokescreen ). I think acid bypasses the hardness on objects so that can be useful. Alchemist fire is a must for large groups of enemies. Almost any alchemical item is great for non-casters.