"Must be worn for 24 hrs" - Huh? [Archive] - Wizards Community

"Must be worn for 24 hrs" - Huh? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
exploding_brain
02-02-06, 08:42 PM If any of you have looked at the magic items listed in the Miniatures Handbook, you will probably have noticed that many of the wondrous items listed therein have an odd quality. They must be worn for 24 hours before the wearer can use them. If the wearer takes them off, they become inactive until they have been worn for another 24 hours.

I'll say right now that I don't play the D&D miniatures game, so maybe there's something in those rules that makes this make more sense. I only have the book because a friend gave me a used copy. Anyway, the "must be worn for 24 hours, becomes inoperative if taken off" rule is totally inappropriate for a role-playing game. It's just not heroic to sleep with your cloak, bracers, and boots on unless your camping in hostile territory. I also don't want characters refusing to remove their gear to bathe. It's exactly the sort of goofy rule that leads to stupid situations like this one.

http://www.giantitp.com/cgi-bin/GiantITP/ootscript?SK=25

Funny, but not what I want in my game.

I'm planning on implementing a house rule overcome this problem. Before I do so, I thought I'd try to get some advice about the game balance of these items. Is the "you can't take this stuff off, even for a moment" feature intended to contribute to the game balance of these items in a meaningful way? Should I institute a rule that makes these items vulnerable to interruption of function, or raise their prices? They mostly seem balanced for the price, but I haven't seen them in action, so maybe they are a little too much bang for the buck.

Thanks
smrtgmp
02-02-06, 09:13 PM It was probably an attempt to prevent quick item swapping or something, especially if the item in question has a limited number of uses per day for a given individual.
Tyler Do'Urden
02-02-06, 09:26 PM Think of it as a soulbind kinda thing. You have to bond with the item for a day before it'll function for you, like it has to be formatted or something. Look at it this way; a ring of sustenance has to be worn for an entire week before it functions properly.

If you want players to be able to swap back and forth between fifty different cheap items, then by all means remove that property.
Seeker95
02-02-06, 10:02 PM Repeat of what smrtgmp and Tyler said.

Further, it prevents a PC from ripping the item off the corpse of the newly vanquished foe and gaining the ability immediately. Lastly, it serves as a decent plot twist resource for making cursed items bind to someone without the owner immediately suspecting something.
Dragonteuthis
02-02-06, 10:32 PM Personally, I find the rule moronic, for the role-playing elements that the item's restriction ignores. If the character removes the item to sleep or bathe, he'll never benefit from it...what a pointless item.

I've never had a player request one of these items (and I'm lazy when it comes to inserting non-DMG treasure), but I'd either ignore that requirememnt or change it from "wearing" to "possessing." That'd basically mean you can't use it the first day you get it.
Suzaku455
02-03-06, 01:16 AM may I suggest you must item in your possession for one day and if it's swapped out for another magical item of the same slot then you have to recarchage it.
kraegor
02-03-06, 02:32 AM may I suggest you must item in your possession for one day and if it's swapped out for another magical item of the same slot then you have to recarchage it.

I agree, or something to the extent that after its bonded, you can safely be parted with it for only an hour before it looses your "bond".

It would suck having a huge, jewled necklace that gave you a +5 strenght, but you couldn't sneak into town" because its so noticable, and you could'nt take it off. But, i can see where the opportunity for roleplay would come in.
Ra-Tiel
02-03-06, 03:13 AM Hi.

===

If you are afraid of your players swapping magical items quickly (especially cheap ones to gain their benefit again and again and again...), why not simply reduce the "24h" to "1h"?

1h until the item works properly still prevents item swapping in the midst of combat, but it allows characters to sleep, bath, dance,... without having to worry about their items.

Another idea would be to leave the "24h" section, but additionally add the following paragraph?
After being worn for 24 hours the magical item becomes active. It remains active for at long as it is worn, and for as long as it is not removed from its wearer for more than 9 hours per 24 hour period. After being seperated for more than 9 hours, it must be worn again for a period of 24 hours to become active again.

Just a quick idea.

===

Greetings,
_Ra-Tiel.
Shatteredtower
02-03-06, 05:27 AM That latter suggestion is a pretty good one for those who have qualms about the current rules, Ra-Tiel.

As for the concerns about items you can't remove without being able to bathe, look, folks, I realize that in a magical world, the option to bathe every day can be a practical one, but so can the option to never again bathe in your life and still remain clean.

It's called prestidigitation. At 5 gp a casting, most adventurers can easily afford to have it cast daily (and get the entire group "dry-cleaned" for that one payment, I'll add), though they probably won't need to worry about it quite so frequently.

Totally inappropriate for role-playing purposes, though? I wouldn't think so. If anything, it can easily run in the opposite direction. Is the power of your magic boots so important to you than you'll never remove them or will you accept that some things are only worn on the adventure or campaign trail and accept the risk? I mean, if you're supposed to remove your footwear in the Temple of Ob, do you leave the magic footwear at home or do you try to duck the issue by tucking them away in the bag of holding you're always lugging around, so that you'll be able to retrieve them at a second's notice? If the boots can activate within seconds of donning them, you'd never think in terms of leaving them behind. It's never a meaningful choice, so what roleplaying is involved?
Ulorian
02-03-06, 05:42 AM Why not do this? Leave the 24 hour rule in place, but only make it necessary once. That is, when a character acquires an item, he must wear it for 24 hours before he can make use of it. Once it has become attuned to him, he can take it off and on at his whim without affecting his ability to use the item. For another character to use it, that character must wear the item for 24 hours, but the original character will then no longer be attuned to it; magic items can only be attuned to a single character at a time.
Dragonteuthis
02-03-06, 09:25 AM As for the concerns about items you can't remove without being able to bathe...

It's not only bathing it's sleeping, too. Though technically there are no rules enforcing characters to sleep, most DMs will. And I seriously doubt someone's going to want to go to sleep wearing a belt, bracers, cloak, gloves, helmet, and sandals (all examples from the miniatures handbook).
Keenath
02-03-06, 09:42 AM I think the intent is to avoid having players swapping items around constantly. I don't know why this might be more of an issue in Minis, but I also don't know the items you're talking about. Do they have a commonality -- for example, is it all items that have some spell 3/day, or is it items with certain types of continuous effects?

I suspect that rules is in place because Minis likes to use the idea that a creature has a list of abilities, rather than (as in normal D&D) items with powers. So rather than being a Circlet of Blasting that shoots rays, it's a circlet that gives the creature the ability to cast Searing Ray. It's a minor distinction as far as I care, but that's probably why the rule is there.

In any case, feel free to ignore the rule. I have never had a problem with players trading items around. If it becomes an issue for you, feel free to give them the DM-smack. "Quit doing that!"
Shatteredtower
02-03-06, 09:48 AM It's not only bathing it's sleeping, too. Though technically there are no rules enforcing characters to sleep, most DMs will.Most? Got the statistics to back that up? ;)

And I seriously doubt someone's going to want to go to sleep wearing a belt, bracers, cloak, gloves, helmet, and sandals (all examples from the miniatures handbook).Then you lack life experience. People have slept and will sleep in any of the items you mention, and sleep quite comfortably, especially if they're used to "roughing it" (if anyone with access to prestidigitation can be considered to be roughing it when full laundry and shower facilities, as well food exactly to their taste, are never that far away) for any length of time. This becomes all the more true when bathing and clothes cleaning is as easily accomplished as I just noted.

If they feel that the benefit is not worth some inconvenience to their character -- or it causes a problem with a bedmate -- then they'll remove the items and take the penalty. That 24 hour bonding penalty makes them consider the option carefully, making it a meaningful choice, rather than the equivalent of asking the caddy to reach into the bag of holding and pull out the five iron instead of the seven -- or rather, the boots of flying instead of the boots of haste.

Otherwise, the missus just has to get used to you sleeping with your boots on all the time, you know? ;)
exploding_brain
02-03-06, 10:41 AM Ah, it all makes sense now. Almost all the items in question are once per day items. When I hear the descriptions of item swapping munchkinism that y'all describe, it makes me very thankful to have the players that I do. I never considered that they would try something like that, and I'm pretty sure they'd never try it, even if they did think of it. The worst they'd subject me to would be an annoying running gag.

I think the easiest thing to do there would be to say that the item is capable of it's function once per day, rather than giving the character the ability once per day. The 24 hour attuning process is interesting. Maybe I'll keep it.

OK, so the game balance thing is not an issue for my game. Awesome.

As for the role-playing opportunities, that might be interesting if it were a curse or disadvantage on one or two really significant items. But that sort of tough choice is interesting occasionally, when the stakes are fairly high. When it applies to one, two, or three minor items for each party member, it just becomes an annoying obstacle that slows down game play and makes for really dumb situations.

By the way, did any of you check out the link in the first post? Please do.

Order of the Stick #25 (http://www.giantitp.com/cgi-bin/GiantITP/ootscript?SK=25)

:heehee:

I don't have any players who would get all obsessive, paranoid, or annoying about taking off their boots and bracers and such, but I have played with players like that, and it's just awful to have to constantly deal with their nit-picking nonsense. :yuck:
tarkin
02-03-06, 11:18 AM For a lot of items it is a balance issue.

I can't see reducing the time down to one hour - players could still abuse it.

I could see reducing the time down to 6 hours. That lets them take it off, then put it back on before they go to sleep and have full abilities.

But my favorite way to solve this issue is to replace the 24 hour rule with:

Must have had it on for 13 of the past 24 hours. This lets them take it off at will, but only one person at any time will be capable of using it.
Thelon Fairblade
02-03-06, 04:56 PM I'd just say that it takes 24 hours to bond with the item. Once bonded, you're good until someone else bonds with the item. To use it, of course, it must be worn, but after that first day, you can sleep, bathe, whatever without the item on. Might be a little uncomfortable that first day in the full plate, but it's worth it...
kraegor
02-05-06, 08:46 PM New Ruling:

Character must wear the item for 24 hours, after this duration the item works as intended. The character can take off the item at any time, leaving it anywhere, for as long as he wants. As long as the item is off, the character does not loose his attunement to it, but also does not benefit from the item.

At any time if the item is placed upon another person, the bond with the previous owner is broken.

Also if the owner of the bonded item uses another magical item in that slot that is attuned to the item, the attuned item is broken from the bond.

That should prevent any powergaming, metagaming or otherwise "swapping" of magical items, leaving characters free to leave thier magic necklaces at home, as long as they wear no other magical necklaces, it is still attuned to them.
Dragonteuthis
02-05-06, 10:58 PM It's not only bathing it's sleeping, too. Though technically there are no rules enforcing characters to sleep, most DMs will.Most? Got the statistics to back that up? ;)

Every DM I've ever met has slept at one point or another. Do you know any who haven't?

Then you lack life experience.

Not quite true. Though I am only level one, I have been steadily killing toads. Solo too, so I get all the experience. I figure I must have at least 630 experience by now, though one of the toads was sickly and I ambushed him, so I may have gotten reduced experience.

*In all actuality, I cannot bring myself to harm animals. The toad-killing story was a joke. Please don't baste me in thread-flames.
Wizards_White_Knight
02-06-06, 01:26 AM Actually, if you were australian, you'd be branded a hero. Apparently they are pests and none desrve to live.

That's why the national pastime is substituing toads for golf balls. Either that, or they do this. Toad + Deodorant spray + lighter = Hours of side splitting humor.

:weep: Makes me sad to be an aussie when I witness these things.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
exploding_brain 02-02-06, 08:42 PM	If any of you have looked at the magic items listed in the Miniatures Handbook, you will probably have noticed that many of the wondrous items listed therein have an odd quality. They must be worn for 24 hours before the wearer can use them. If the wearer takes them off, they become inactive until they have been worn for another 24 hours. I'll say right now that I don't play the D&D miniatures game, so maybe there's something in those rules that makes this make more sense. I only have the book because a friend gave me a used copy. Anyway, the "must be worn for 24 hours, becomes inoperative if taken off" rule is totally inappropriate for a role-playing game. It's just not heroic to sleep with your cloak, bracers, and boots on unless your camping in hostile territory. I also don't want characters refusing to remove their gear to bathe. It's exactly the sort of goofy rule that leads to stupid situations like this one. http://www.giantitp.com/cgi-bin/GiantITP/ootscript?SK=25 Funny, but not what I want in my game. I'm planning on implementing a house rule overcome this problem. Before I do so, I thought I'd try to get some advice about the game balance of these items. Is the "you can't take this stuff off, even for a moment" feature intended to contribute to the game balance of these items in a meaningful way? Should I institute a rule that makes these items vulnerable to interruption of function, or raise their prices? They mostly seem balanced for the price, but I haven't seen them in action, so maybe they are a little too much bang for the buck. Thanks
smrtgmp 02-02-06, 09:13 PM	It was probably an attempt to prevent quick item swapping or something, especially if the item in question has a limited number of uses per day for a given individual.
Tyler Do'Urden 02-02-06, 09:26 PM	Think of it as a soulbind kinda thing. You have to bond with the item for a day before it'll function for you, like it has to be formatted or something. Look at it this way; a ring of sustenance has to be worn for an entire week before it functions properly. If you want players to be able to swap back and forth between fifty different cheap items, then by all means remove that property.
Seeker95 02-02-06, 10:02 PM	Repeat of what smrtgmp and Tyler said. Further, it prevents a PC from ripping the item off the corpse of the newly vanquished foe and gaining the ability immediately. Lastly, it serves as a decent plot twist resource for making cursed items bind to someone without the owner immediately suspecting something.
Dragonteuthis 02-02-06, 10:32 PM	Personally, I find the rule moronic, for the role-playing elements that the item's restriction ignores. If the character removes the item to sleep or bathe, he'll never benefit from it...what a pointless item. I've never had a player request one of these items (and I'm lazy when it comes to inserting non-DMG treasure), but I'd either ignore that requirememnt or change it from "wearing" to "possessing." That'd basically mean you can't use it the first day you get it.
Suzaku455 02-03-06, 01:16 AM	may I suggest you must item in your possession for one day and if it's swapped out for another magical item of the same slot then you have to recarchage it.
kraegor 02-03-06, 02:32 AM	may I suggest you must item in your possession for one day and if it's swapped out for another magical item of the same slot then you have to recarchage it. I agree, or something to the extent that after its bonded, you can safely be parted with it for only an hour before it looses your "bond". It would suck having a huge, jewled necklace that gave you a +5 strenght, but you couldn't sneak into town" because its so noticable, and you could'nt take it off. But, i can see where the opportunity for roleplay would come in.
Ra-Tiel 02-03-06, 03:13 AM	Hi. === If you are afraid of your players swapping magical items quickly (especially cheap ones to gain their benefit again and again and again...), why not simply reduce the "24h" to "1h"? 1h until the item works properly still prevents item swapping in the midst of combat, but it allows characters to sleep, bath, dance,... without having to worry about their items. Another idea would be to leave the "24h" section, but additionally add the following paragraph? After being worn for 24 hours the magical item becomes active. It remains active for at long as it is worn, and for as long as it is not removed from its wearer for more than 9 hours per 24 hour period. After being seperated for more than 9 hours, it must be worn again for a period of 24 hours to become active again. Just a quick idea. === Greetings, _Ra-Tiel.
Shatteredtower 02-03-06, 05:27 AM	That latter suggestion is a pretty good one for those who have qualms about the current rules, Ra-Tiel. As for the concerns about items you can't remove without being able to bathe, look, folks, I realize that in a magical world, the option to bathe every day can be a practical one, but so can the option to never again bathe in your life and still remain clean. It's called prestidigitation. At 5 gp a casting, most adventurers can easily afford to have it cast daily (and get the entire group "dry-cleaned" for that one payment, I'll add), though they probably won't need to worry about it quite so frequently. Totally inappropriate for role-playing purposes, though? I wouldn't think so. If anything, it can easily run in the opposite direction. Is the power of your magic boots so important to you than you'll never remove them or will you accept that some things are only worn on the adventure or campaign trail and accept the risk? I mean, if you're supposed to remove your footwear in the Temple of Ob, do you leave the magic footwear at home or do you try to duck the issue by tucking them away in the bag of holding you're always lugging around, so that you'll be able to retrieve them at a second's notice? If the boots can activate within seconds of donning them, you'd never think in terms of leaving them behind. It's never a meaningful choice, so what roleplaying is involved?
Ulorian 02-03-06, 05:42 AM	Why not do this? Leave the 24 hour rule in place, but only make it necessary once. That is, when a character acquires an item, he must wear it for 24 hours before he can make use of it. Once it has become attuned to him, he can take it off and on at his whim without affecting his ability to use the item. For another character to use it, that character must wear the item for 24 hours, but the original character will then no longer be attuned to it; magic items can only be attuned to a single character at a time.
Dragonteuthis 02-03-06, 09:25 AM	As for the concerns about items you can't remove without being able to bathe... It's not only bathing it's sleeping, too. Though technically there are no rules enforcing characters to sleep, most DMs will. And I seriously doubt someone's going to want to go to sleep wearing a belt, bracers, cloak, gloves, helmet, and sandals (all examples from the miniatures handbook).
Keenath 02-03-06, 09:42 AM	I think the intent is to avoid having players swapping items around constantly. I don't know why this might be more of an issue in Minis, but I also don't know the items you're talking about. Do they have a commonality -- for example, is it all items that have some spell 3/day, or is it items with certain types of continuous effects? I suspect that rules is in place because Minis likes to use the idea that a creature has a list of abilities, rather than (as in normal D&D) items with powers. So rather than being a Circlet of Blasting that shoots rays, it's a circlet that gives the creature the ability to cast Searing Ray. It's a minor distinction as far as I care, but that's probably why the rule is there. In any case, feel free to ignore the rule. I have never had a problem with players trading items around. If it becomes an issue for you, feel free to give them the DM-smack. "Quit doing that!"
Shatteredtower 02-03-06, 09:48 AM	It's not only bathing it's sleeping, too. Though technically there are no rules enforcing characters to sleep, most DMs will.Most? Got the statistics to back that up? ;) And I seriously doubt someone's going to want to go to sleep wearing a belt, bracers, cloak, gloves, helmet, and sandals (all examples from the miniatures handbook).Then you lack life experience. People have slept and will sleep in any of the items you mention, and sleep quite comfortably, especially if they're used to "roughing it" (if anyone with access to prestidigitation can be considered to be roughing it when full laundry and shower facilities, as well food exactly to their taste, are never that far away) for any length of time. This becomes all the more true when bathing and clothes cleaning is as easily accomplished as I just noted. If they feel that the benefit is not worth some inconvenience to their character -- or it causes a problem with a bedmate -- then they'll remove the items and take the penalty. That 24 hour bonding penalty makes them consider the option carefully, making it a meaningful choice, rather than the equivalent of asking the caddy to reach into the bag of holding and pull out the five iron instead of the seven -- or rather, the boots of flying instead of the boots of haste. Otherwise, the missus just has to get used to you sleeping with your boots on all the time, you know? ;)
exploding_brain 02-03-06, 10:41 AM	Ah, it all makes sense now. Almost all the items in question are once per day items. When I hear the descriptions of item swapping munchkinism that y'all describe, it makes me very thankful to have the players that I do. I never considered that they would try something like that, and I'm pretty sure they'd never try it, even if they did think of it. The worst they'd subject me to would be an annoying running gag. I think the easiest thing to do there would be to say that the item is capable of it's function once per day, rather than giving the character the ability once per day. The 24 hour attuning process is interesting. Maybe I'll keep it. OK, so the game balance thing is not an issue for my game. Awesome. As for the role-playing opportunities, that might be interesting if it were a curse or disadvantage on one or two really significant items. But that sort of tough choice is interesting occasionally, when the stakes are fairly high. When it applies to one, two, or three minor items for each party member, it just becomes an annoying obstacle that slows down game play and makes for really dumb situations. By the way, did any of you check out the link in the first post? Please do. Order of the Stick #25 (http://www.giantitp.com/cgi-bin/GiantITP/ootscript?SK=25) :heehee: I don't have any players who would get all obsessive, paranoid, or annoying about taking off their boots and bracers and such, but I have played with players like that, and it's just awful to have to constantly deal with their nit-picking nonsense. :yuck:
tarkin 02-03-06, 11:18 AM	For a lot of items it is a balance issue. I can't see reducing the time down to one hour - players could still abuse it. I could see reducing the time down to 6 hours. That lets them take it off, then put it back on before they go to sleep and have full abilities. But my favorite way to solve this issue is to replace the 24 hour rule with: Must have had it on for 13 of the past 24 hours. This lets them take it off at will, but only one person at any time will be capable of using it.
Thelon Fairblade 02-03-06, 04:56 PM	I'd just say that it takes 24 hours to bond with the item. Once bonded, you're good until someone else bonds with the item. To use it, of course, it must be worn, but after that first day, you can sleep, bathe, whatever without the item on. Might be a little uncomfortable that first day in the full plate, but it's worth it...
kraegor 02-05-06, 08:46 PM	New Ruling: Character must wear the item for 24 hours, after this duration the item works as intended. The character can take off the item at any time, leaving it anywhere, for as long as he wants. As long as the item is off, the character does not loose his attunement to it, but also does not benefit from the item. At any time if the item is placed upon another person, the bond with the previous owner is broken. Also if the owner of the bonded item uses another magical item in that slot that is attuned to the item, the attuned item is broken from the bond. That should prevent any powergaming, metagaming or otherwise "swapping" of magical items, leaving characters free to leave thier magic necklaces at home, as long as they wear no other magical necklaces, it is still attuned to them.
Dragonteuthis 02-05-06, 10:58 PM	It's not only bathing it's sleeping, too. Though technically there are no rules enforcing characters to sleep, most DMs will.Most? Got the statistics to back that up? ;) Every DM I've ever met has slept at one point or another. Do you know any who haven't? Then you lack life experience. Not quite true. Though I am only level one, I have been steadily killing toads. Solo too, so I get all the experience. I figure I must have at least 630 experience by now, though one of the toads was sickly and I ambushed him, so I may have gotten reduced experience. *In all actuality, I cannot bring myself to harm animals. The toad-killing story was a joke. Please don't baste me in thread-flames.
Wizards_White_Knight 02-06-06, 01:26 AM	Actually, if you were australian, you'd be branded a hero. Apparently they are pests and none desrve to live. That's why the national pastime is substituing toads for golf balls. Either that, or they do this. Toad + Deodorant spray + lighter = Hours of side splitting humor. :weep: Makes me sad to be an aussie when I witness these things.