Post/Author/DateTime	Post
mrandrewv 02-17-08, 01:35 PM	Lo. I don't know about you guys but in my campaign the players are getting kinda bored of the magical items contained in the DMG. I mean as cool as they are it doesnt take too long for them to loose their originality. But then I had a cool idea. See I used to play Alternity. For those of you who don't know Alternity was WOTC's science fiction role playing game and it was used as a field test for the D20 system. It was RAMPANT with game bugs, but these were ironed out to make the D20 system that we all know and love. So we all owe Alternity a debt of gratitude. Anyway the "treasure" of Alternity came in the form of alien artifacts. These were created using much the same system as random magical items: complex tables where dice rolls resulted in random collections of...stuff. But the cool part, for our purposes, is that the conceptualisation of these artifacts is completely different from the magical items in D&D. For example if I roll 2D20 and get 15 and 16 that gives me an artifact defined as: Implant or Graft - full body, skeletal. Another 2D20 gives me 3 and 10: 'Control' and 'Transmutation' I roll again on the appropriate tables and get 'Probability Control' and 'Elemental Conversion' Now from that point on the Alternity GMG stops being useful, because the technical specs obviously don't work in D&D but a good DM shouldn't have too much trouble working out a way for this to fit into the game. For my money I made this: The Hands of change When picked up this item immediately burrows into the skin of the person who picked it up, wrapping itself around their bones and giving them the following, strange powers, as well as the knowledge of how to use them: 1)Probability Exchange Once per day, as a swift action the user can activate a 'probability exchange' power. This subtracts 10% (rounded down) from every attack roll made against the user and adds the average of this same amount to one attack roll of the users choice in the following round. The effect lasts 1D4+4 rounds. 2) Element Swap 3 times per day, as a swift action, the user can make a ranged touch attack against an elemental spell of their choice. The AC is 10+ the spell level. If the touch attack is successful then the user can elect to transform the elemental part of the spell into a different element of their choice (i.e. ice, fire, water, earth, sonic or acid). All other aspects of the spell (duration, damage, target, attack roll etc) remain the same. In other words the user of the Hands of Change can alter a fireball into a sonic ball, an acid arrow into a cold arrow and so on. Now these additional items don't have teh same variety as the standard magic items but the simple fact that they are different makes them worth using. There are also other reasons to use them. Firstly you can use them as a plot hook. After all: these items aren't magical, they are alien. Which means that magical protections don't work against them. Any evil organisation would kill to get these, and they may have to. I mean the item described above isn't an item at all. It's an alteration to one of the players' SKELETON'S! So to get it they are going to have to cut it off him.... Secondly the items all come with in built flaws. For this one the flaw is 8: "Infamous Device". This means that there are already powerful groups that know of the existence of the device, and want it to destroyed, at any cost. But there are lots of options here. I mean some of these items are chemical processes, some of them are areas, or installations. So my advice: dust off those old source books and see what you can find. They could be a storehouse of cool stuff. Opinions?
Shiftkitty 02-17-08, 06:46 PM	You know, I damn near gave my Alternity set away. I didn't care for it much, but I don't recall why. You just gave me a reason to keep it! I do like to create unique items for exceptional role-playing rewards. I sometimes get stuck trying to think of how to reward such excellence without tipping game balance. This may just be the ticket!