Increasing INT in AD&D 1e

[Lord Torath]

Huh. My DMG lists the Gem of Brightness as 17,500.

Gem of Insight, not Gem of Brightness.

[LibraryOgre]

Gem of Insight, not Gem of Brightness.

I guess you didn't have will'o'the'wisp or boggart essence handy to uncover the REAL text of my Secret Page, where I wrote it correctly.

Rookie move, Torath.

EDIT:
Incidentally, I looked up the Gem of Insight, and it gets even better. The Gem itself is worth 5000gp. THE ITEM ACTUALLY BECOMES LESS VALUABLE IF MADE A GEM OF INSIGHT.

Beautiful. Just beautiful.

[Lord Torath]

I guess you didn't have will'o'the'wisp or boggart essence handy to uncover the REAL text of my Secret Page, where I wrote it correctly.

Rookie move, Torath.

Gah! Serves me right! <grumble gramble> Next time, Mark! Next time!

Jay R, is there a particular reason Ioun stones are not an option for increasing your intelligence?

[Jay R]

Huh. My DMG lists the Gem of Brightness as 17,500.

That said, a Pearl of Power is often a good investment. At 2000gp/spell level, you can get a few bonus castings of useful spell levels... get a 2nd level one and you can throw two Melfs per day, while only memorizing one (which is my usual use for a Pearl of Power... greater versatility in memorization, since I can memorize one offensive spell and, effectively, have it memorized twice).

Yup. He has a 3rd level one. [They didn't have a 2nd level.]

What sources can you use?

Any TSR 1e source. All I own to look up items in are the DMG and Unearthed Arcana, but I think any source is usable.

Jay R, is there a particular reason Ioun stones are not an option for increasing your intelligence?

Yes -- because my PC can't find any. He was told, "Not here. You might try the elves."

Incidentally, I looked up the Gem of Insight, and it gets even better. The Gem itself is worth 5000gp. THE ITEM ACTUALLY BECOMES LESS VALUABLE IF MADE A GEM OF INSIGHT.

Beautiful. Just beautiful.

Yup. I also just noticed that xp value is 3,000, and gp value is also 3,000. Since gp value is usually 10 times the xp value, that pretty much proves that it's a typo. 30,000 gp would still be low, compared to the Tomes that do the same thing, but it would be more likely.

Unfortunately, this means I have to go ahead and tell the DM that it shouldn't be possible. Sigh.

[Willie the Duck]

Which leads me to the next question: what other items are under-priced in 1e that I should look for? I'm primarily interested in items useful for a 5th level wizard, with a soft limit of 10,000 gp. But the party includes a fighter and a cleric, so other ideas could help too. [I will set up a new thread for that one.]

Question: Are you using training costs for level-up? With mostly gp=xp, spending much money on anything else before name level means delaying levelling, so I would be much more restrictive in what items I would suggest.

[Jay R]

Question: Are you using training costs for level-up? With mostly gp=xp, spending much money on anything else before name level means delaying levelling, so I would be much more restrictive in what items I would suggest.

Good question. No we aren't using training costs. Also, gold doesn't provide experience points. That makes it slow going. With the xps from our 15th session, I leveled up to 5th level, so we're averaging not quite four sessions per level.

[knag]

Which leads me to the next question: what other items are under-priced in 1e that I should look for? I'm primarily interested in items useful for a 5th level wizard, with a soft limit of 10,000 gp. But the party includes a fighter and a cleric, so other ideas could help too. [I will set up a new thread for that one.]

Just quickly giving glance at the DMG, these ones popped out at me:

Girdle of Giant Strength - 2,500 gp massively underpriced, for the party fighter. By the book, no price change for Storm Giant strength vs Hill Giant Strength
Cloak of Elvenkind - 6000 gp (90% undetectable)
Necklace of Missiles - 200 gp per hit die of fireballs
Basic Crystal Ball - 5000 gp

[Lord Torath]

Cloak of Elvenkind - 6000 gp (90% undetectable)

Ring of Invis is only 7,500 gp, and lighting and background conditions don't affect your visibility. Plus, 10% of them offer inaudibility as well (at no added cost, apparently). Boots of Elvenkind are another 5,000 gp.

Good call on the Girdle of Giant Strength, though.

[Jay R]

Some really good ideas here. Thanks. Keep 'em coming.

[Lord Torath]

Bag of Devouring: 1500 gp. Don't get it confused with your Bag of Holding!
Deck of Many Things: 10,000 gp Offer to let your enemies draw from it if they'll leave you alone/let you pass. Or just offer to let them draw once before combat. If they get something good, you can probably take it from them (Stat increases, followers, and castles are among the exceptions). If they get something bad, it's no skin off your nose.


After your fighter has purchased his Girdle of Storm Giant Strength, you may as well get some worthy weapons to go along with it. You, uh, will need to get the wizard to cast Enlarge on the Fighter before he can use them, because you need to be giant sized. How tall are hill giants? Nine-and-a-half feet? As long as your mage is level 6, you're set
Mattock of the Titans: 7,000 gp
Maul of the Titans: 12,000 gp

Mirror of Opposition: 2,000 gp. If you can't find a use for this, you need to turn in your RPG license!
Necklace of Strangulation: 1,000 gp. Same as above.
Helm of Opposite Alignment: 1,000 gp

Is there a halfling (or gnome) in your party? Dagger+2, Longtooth, 2,500 gp (S4 Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth). Counts as a dagger, but does damage as a shortsword, and max damage against wood or stone.

Anyone know if there's a version of Prayer Beads, Gloves of Missile Snaring, or a Ring of Truth in 1E AD&D? They are probably worth looking into if they exist.

[knag]

Anyone know if there's a version of Prayer Beads, Gloves of Missile Snaring, or a Ring of Truth in 1E AD&D? They are probably worth looking into if they exist.

Gloves of Missile Snaring are in OA, priced at 10,000 gp
Necklace of Prayer Beads is in the 1e DMG. 3,000 gp per special bead, so you could have three of the possible five special beads for 9,000 gp, which is pretty powerful in terms of adding healing and potential divine intervention into the mix.
Ring of Truth is in OA, priced at 5,000 gp.

[Lord Torath]

Necklace of Prayer Beads is in the 1e DMG. 3,000 gp per special bead, so you could have three of the possible five special beads for 9,000 gp, which is pretty powerful in terms of adding healing and potential divine intervention into the mix.

It would probably help if I looked for it under "Necklace" instead of "Prayer Beads" or "Beads, Prayer". Still, a pretty good deal for some really potent abilities. 2E has six special beads: Atonement, Bless, Curing, Karma, Summons, Windwalk.

I would say the Ring of Truth is a very good investment. If they lie, you hear their voice an octave higher than it normally is. If they have magic protecting them from lie detection and they lie, you can't hear what they say at all, so you still know they lied. You just need a friend who heard the lie to let you know what they said. You just have to always tell the truth yourself.

10,000 for the gloves is probably not a great deal, but they really can come in handy, especially for a squishy mage who frequently has a free hand available.

More items:
Rabbit Slayer, Dagger+4, returns within 1d20 hours if lost or stolen (you have to give it willingly before it accepts a new owner). 1500 gp from the 1E Dragonlance Adventures Book (Price from Encyclopedia Magic vol 1).
Dagger of Throwing+4, 2,750 gp (1E DMG according to the Encyclopedia Magica Volume 1): Range: 180', inflicts double dagger damage +4 when thrown. It doesn't say it returns when thrown, but neither does the Hammer of Thunderbolts, which implies it by saying you can only throw it once every other round, because throwing it is so exhausting, not because you need to go fetch it. So you can argue it returns after each throw, and so should other magic items of throwing.

[knag]

Dagger of Throwing+4, 2,750 gp (1E DMG according to the Encyclopedia Magica Volume 1)...

Interesting. It's not in my version of the 1E DMG. I wonder if that's an error in the EM.

[rredmond]

Yup, that's in the 2E DMG.

[rredmond]

Interesting. It's not in my version of the 1E DMG. I wonder if that's an error in the EM.

Polyhedron #47 also has a "Throwing Dagger of Returning" specifically magicked to return. Not really "official" but figured I'd share :)

[Lord Torath]

Dagger of Throwing+4, 2,750 gp (1E DMG according to the Encyclopedia Magica Volume 1)

Interesting. It's not in my version of the 1E DMG. I wonder if that's an error in the EM.

Yup, that's in the 2E DMG.

The gold cost is not from the 2E DMG, though. They decided to remove the gold value of magic items. Unless they put it back in the revised edition? <runs to check books> Nope, still just XP values, even in the Revised (black cover) printing.

[Jay R]

Interesting. It's not in my version of the 1E DMG. I wonder if that's an error in the EM.

The Dagger of Throwing is not in the DMG. It was introduced in Unearthed Arcana.