Category Archives: Magic Items

DCC Magic Items to playtest

March 28, 2016 7:03 pm / Leave a Comment / Chris

I don’t give out a lot of magic loot in my Dungeon Crawl Classics campaign and one of my players was just telling me she likes it that way. So of course now I have to hand out some magic loot!

The first is a way to get ley lines and places of power into the game by giving the players a diving rod. There’s several mentions of ley lines and places of power in the DCC core rulebook but not much about detecting them.

The second brings the consult spirit spell into the game, which the Judge’s section suggests as a way to drop clues and adventure hooks into the campaign. I’d rather not wait for our casters to get high enough in level to get that spell (which there’s no guarantee they would take anyway). I’ll report back after they’ve had some use. Feel free to post your experiences here or ways you have brought these elements into your game.

LEY DIVINING ROD
A forked stick that can be used to find ley lines or place of power. The user must be a wizard or elf and must concentrate. The longer the concentration period, the further away the user can find such a place. (see table below)
A place of power can only be found if the user knows a spell that would benefit (ex. fireball’s might be enhanced in a volcano). Using this drains 1d4 HP of damage for each 15 minutes (or fraction thereof) of use. Magical healing cannot be applied during this time, but any regeneration powers or spells in effect when the user begins is in effect. If the user dies while attempting to find a ley line, he or she must be buried in a ley line within a week or become a lich (NPC) or some other awful fate.

Each 15 minutes beyond what is required for the radius adds ‘+1 to the spell check for finding space.

Radius:
5 minutes = 20m
10 minutes = 50m
15 minutes = 100 meters
30 minutes = 250 meters
1 hour = 1km
1.5h = 2.5km
2h = 10km
3h = 50km
5h = 200km

There is a spell check involved:
1-10 Failure to detect presence/absence
12-13 Yes/No there is one in this general area
14-17 Yes/No presence, general direction
18-19 General Direction and Distance +/- 20 percent
20-23 Direction, Exact Distance
24-27 Location, Size and Shape of line/place of power
28-29 Location, Size, Shape and shortest route to line/place of power
30-31 As per 28-29, plus extra +2 on applicable spell checks when on the line, within the space
32+ As per 30-31, plus location of connected lines, connected places of power within 100 miles

SKULL TRUMPET
This item can be used to consult spirit (as per the spell) once per month. The user speaks into and listens to this conch-shaped bone horn that has been twisted from the skull of a powerful medium.

Posted in: Dungeon Crawl Classics, magic items, Uncategorized

Eight Steam-Powered Contraptions

March 27, 2012 5:35 pm / Leave a Comment / Chris

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Ravas S on said:

8 steam-powered clockwork monsters OR traps OR vehicles, all of which have some chance of failure/explosion…

Ravas: I am not assigning HD or damage levels to these so you can adapt them to the level of your party as you see fit.

Pile of Gears

Every lab has a pile of broken or miscast pieces waiting for meltdown. This pile is a cleverly disguised security mechanism powered by a small steam engine. It can assume a number of shapes and can disguise itself as part of any equipment or projects in the lab. It attacks with small steam blasts (which drain 10 percent of its HP for 1 hour), slashes with gears, choking tubes and various and sundry pointy bits (piercing attacks). Any natural 20 hit or piercing attack that does more than 10 HP damage has a chance of piercing its engine, which would then release a cloud of choking steam in the room (save vs. breath weapon or take some grievous burning damage).

Hydraulic Ballista

A ballista on a cart that is powered by adding coal or wood to its boiler and which can be moved or driven by a single person. There is metal shielding in front of the driver’s position with a slit for viewing forward. The ballista reloads itself (there is room for three bolts) and has twice the range of a normal ballista. At short range, it deals double damage. There is a remote firing mechanism connected to the ballista via a tether. There is a 15 percent chance per shot of a catastrophic explosion that should kill nearly any driver in the driver’s seat. There is a 2 percent chance per turn of driving of such an explosion.

Lava Suit

A bulky suit of armor with some soft material around it and a looking-glass helmet is tethered by a four-inch hose to a cart-sized box on wheels. When the boiler in the box is filled and the contraption activated, the box pumps various refrigerants through the hose and the suit. This allows the occupant to withstand conditions of extreme heat and in fact submerge in molten lava for up to ten minutes. Should the suit, hose or contraption be damaged, the heat in the suit would rise to the same as its environment in thirty seconds. There is a five percent this will happen in any minute of use.

Hydraulic Ram

This is a steam-powered siege engine for taking down doors and even walls during siege of a fortress. A long metal rod extends five feet out of the machine and four times the damage of a typical battering ram and ignores most enchantments and other means of reinforcing a wall. It must be recharged for two hours per use and when activated has a thirty percent chance of exploding, dealing d100x2 HP damage to anyone within 100 yards not behind a wall or other strong barrier.

Death’s Pinwheel

A disk on the end of an axle is attached to an engine. When activated, the disk spins and extends 20 cables. On the end of each cable is a spinning circular blade. Anyone passing through the radius of the trap must save or be cut to shreds. Those who save take 1d20 damage. To keep this from being a complete FU trap, there’s a 10 percent chance of malfunction after five minutes and a 10 percent chance of malfunction per victim damaged. This trap runs out of steam after three hours.

Pogocart

A three-seat cabin is perched over a large hydraulic leg. Steam and hydraulic power enable this vehicle to to leap 300 feet vertically and up to 200 feet horizontally every ten seconds. In the cabin is a set of horse reins attached to a contraption with many gears and three spinning gyroscopes. The contraption allows the user to control the speed, altitude and direction of each jump. The driver must make dexterity checks or lose control. The gyroscopes can correct this 75 percent of the time, in which case the cart travels in a random direction (roll d8 and use 8 points of compass). Otherwise, the whole thing crashes. Did the PC’s notice the seatbelts?

Magic Battery

Wands, rods, rings and other small, charged magic items are placed in a canister. There is a – and a + button on a control panel. When the either button is pushed, the canister begins to spin. Concentric rings are lowered from above until they surround the canister. After about five minutes, the rings are raised and the canister stops rotating. If the – button was pressed, the items are drained of magic charges. The charges are stored in a battery in the machine. If there are charges in the battery already, and the + button was pushed, the charges available were evenly distributed to the items in the canister. If there are no charges and the + button was pushed, nothing happens. If there are no items in the canister and either button was pushed, the contraption still cycles but nothing happens.

There is a 40 percent chance the canister spins two slow or too fast, as this machine has not been maintained well. If that happens, the wand, staff, rod or ring will malfunction, doing something suitably ridiculous such as turning the wielder’s arm into a large daffodil or summon five squirrels. A thief, gnome or specialist might be able to calibrate the canister if she checks the machine for problems. Roll an appropriate skill check. The machine is powered by a small coal-burning boiler.

Clockwork Dancing Troupe

This set of human-sized automatons are connected via pneumatic hoses to a central contraption with a steam engine and a difference engine and a panel with many switches. The switches choreograph the automatons, which will perform a dance that has been programmed into the difference engine. A small steam powered organ uses the exhaust steam from the steam engine to play music according to what is punched into a roll of paper that spins through gears inside the machine.

The automatons have a STR of 20 and conceal weapons inside their bodies, which would be difficult to detect. They can be programmed to kill at certain points in the song or when a certain number of people are in the room. There is a 20 percent chance each time the contraption is activated that it will develop its own intelligence, in which case it might follow programming instructions while it plans. Eventually it will attempt to kill or evade its ‘owner’ and escape. The difficult point is figuring out how to get away with the contraption.

Posted in: legacy D&D, magic items / Tagged: bring it, contraptions, steampunk, traps

Ten Cursed Coins

February 2, 2012 5:38 pm / 4 Comments / Chris

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John Johnson said:

Posted in: campaign window dressing, legacy D&D, magic items / Tagged: bring it, cursed items, curses, magic items, money

What Does That Weird Busted Goblin Machine Do?

January 5, 2012 11:56 pm / 1 Comment / Chris

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Ricardo Signes says:

“What Does That Weird Busted Goblin Machine Do?”

What Does That Weird Goblin Machine Do?
roll d20	What it does
1	dehydrates potions into pills.
2	turns any humanoid race into another humanoid race at random.
3	turns any humanoid race into a goblin.
4	creates harmless cattle of random flavor.
5	attacks as level 10 fighter. ten slicing blade attacks as +3 vorpal blades.
6	spits out a hundred pythons.
7	answers questions about the dungeon/region. just like goblins, they always say the opposite of the truth.
8	demon vending machine.
9	a mechanized exo-skeleton that doubles your strength and defenses, but uses you to its own ends (usually attacks the party). you are not being controlled mentally–just physically.
10	distracts you from a much simpler machine in the room–one that doesn’t even look like a machine, but allows time or planar travel.
11	save at -4 or be charmed into trying to fix it for 1d4 months, sparing no expense to get it home, buy parts, etc. it cannot be fixed.
12	processes corpses into meat products.
13	circumsizes titans.
14	lays large eggs. what hatches?
15	dispenses 10 x d100 killer bees.
16	tells bad jokes constantly.
17	teleconferences with similar machine on far-away planet. 1D4: 1-aliens 2-faeries 3- demons 4-mirror universe versions of yourselves.
18	teleports party to mirror universe where alignments are opposite (and the shaved have beards).
19	mends armor and weapons, then eats them all and melts them down into ingots.
20	best cook on this side of planet.

Make your request here.

Posted in: content, legacy D&D, magic items / Tagged: bring it, table

12 Things Found in a Six-Demon Bag

December 30, 2011 10:29 pm / 6 Comments / Chris

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Ogilvy requests:

12 things that happen when you pull something at random out of a six-demon bag.

by way of Egg Shen:

Jack Burton: Terrific, a six-demon bag. Sensational. What’s in it, Egg?
Egg Shen: Wind, fire, all that kind of thing!

The six demon bag is a mixed bag. It can hold up to six elemental demons, representing the five traditional Chinese elements plus wind, which is a western element. The holder of the bag reaches in and pulls out a demon, which appears as a glowing baseball-sized sphere. She then throws it. Then something happens. Roll dice to determine if it is major or minor.

If the demon is minor, it will be extremely helpful to whoever holds the bag. It will only effect the other side in a battle. If Wang Chi were to open the bag and throw out a demon, it would be minor. If it is a major demon, it will indiscriminately destroy as much as possible according to the table below. If Jack were to open the bag, the demon would of course be major.

How do you determine major or minor? Pick some odds beforehand and roll. Of course players might not know that there’s a good and bad side, so perhaps always make the first demon minor. Up to you, DM.

Six Demon Bag Contents

Roll	Demon	Minor	Major
1	Wood	Root Trap	Splintering Forest
2	Fire	Fireball	Firestorm
3	Earth	Fault Opens	Earthquake
4	Metal	Magnetic Storm	Lightning Storm
5	Water	Deluge	Storm or Tsunami
6	Wind	Gust of Wind	Tornado

Deluge

A tremendous flood comes from nowhere, pushing the enemy as if from a fire hose, washing them away (if there is somewhere to drain).

Earthquake

A nasty earthquake effects the region. The center is where the bag is. There should be lots of property damage and hit points lost.

Fault Opens

A fissure opens in the ground, leading to the depths of the planet. It should be about 50 feet long and about 10 feet wide (see Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade ending). It should be close to the enemy leader or the strongest enemy grouping.

Fireball

A fireball that damages only enemies. Roll damage as if cast by fifth level mage.

Firestorm

A giant firestorm hits, doing one die of damage to each creature in a one-mile radius according to the level/HD each creature has (much more damage to higher levels). All who survive have a sunburn that lasts 1d4 years.

Gust of Wind

Knocks down all enemies, disarming them and possibly doing damage or putting them in harm’s way.

Lightning Storm

All creatures within one mile are hit by lightning if they have any metal whatsoever on their person. No tesla cages allowed–these are demons, not science.

Magnetic Storm

All metal used or worn by anyone within 200 foot radius, even magical metals, fly off or away from their owner and form a large Katamari ball of scrap. This applies to magical and non-ferrous metal as well as steel.

Root Trap

Roots come from the ground and entangle all ‘enemy’ creatures.

Splintering Forest

A forest erupts from the ground/floor or ceiling. Branches and vines entangle and skewer every creature larger than a medium dog. Druids take 1/2 damage automatically and are not entangled. Tree-dwelling and sylvan creatures are not effected, nor are flying creatures. This works even in the desert or arctic, but the forest may die off if not in an appropriate climate.

Storm or Tsunami

A hurricane or tsunami occurs, centered on the bag holder.

Tornado

A tornado rips through the area, doing damage to random locations in the vicinity in addition to the immediate area of the bag holder.

Posted in: legacy D&D, magic items / Tagged: bring it, magic items, orient

Ten Potions

December 16, 2011 4:29 am / Leave a Comment / Chris

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jasonk says:

10 alchemist potions.

ten potions
1	fizzy bang	explosive gas. if lit, does 2d8 damage. can be shaken and thrown for half damage.
2	sticky syrup	sticky tar. -2 to initiative, move at 1/4 normal rate. Covers 10′ x 10′ square area.
3	earth shake	shake well then drink. causes minor earthquake.
4	hair tonic	hair growth. will double length of all your hair. doesn’t cure baldness. 2 x 0 = 0
5	charlie’s potion	boil 10 scrolls with herbs. reduce inky liquid. drink to be a supreme expert on one subject for one day (can be in another language). then know nothing of it at all ever again.
6	northern marmelade	eat this and you cannot get lost for 2 days. after, you will be directionless and disoriented for 6 hours.
7	cahetch hup	a few drops of this elixir makes any meal taste delicious. does not prevent poison, but does prevent disease from spoiled food.
8	ear honey	three drops of this in the ear and you’ll be hearing ‘voices’ all day. (crazy voices)
9	fake fever elixir	can be mixed with various berries and herbs to simulate almost any natural disease for up to a week. duration depends on how much you drink.
10	cetacean potion	potion of whale summoning calls d100 whales to the nearest saltwater location. you can communicate with them and ask for help (you are aquaman without the water breathing).

I hope at least a few of these haven’t been done before.

If you want to make a request, click here. I hope to answer these at least one every other day. I’ll also be picking a charity to donate $1 to for each request. If you can suggest a charity, I’d like to find something that helps sick or disadvantaged children.

Posted in: campaign window dressing, legacy D&D, magic items / Tagged: alchemy, bring it, potions

Belt of Fireball Skulls

January 6, 2011 4:53 pm / Leave a Comment / Chris

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First, an undamaged skull must be cleaned, inside and out. The jaws also need to be affixed to the skull with metal wire.

The skull is placed on a very hot fire. For three hours, the mage must chant to encourage the skull to take the fire in, then for another three she must convince it to shrink until it is the size of a pine cone. Both of these stages require a saving throw or intelligence attribute check to proceed. If they fail, the skull shatters.

At the conclusion of this chanting, the soul is pulled back to the skull, which then speaks with the mage, who has but a few minutes to strike a deal. In return for some favor, the soul will hold the fire in the skull. Common favors include acts of vengeance, contrition, the delivery of a message or just letting the skull see the sun set over its homeland one last time.

The favor must be accomplished within the year, but once it is, the skull becomes a fireball grenade. When the mage says hold the skull and reminds it of the favor done, the fireball automatically hits and does maximum damage at one level higher than the mage’s casting level. These can be given to others to use, but they must know the favor and speak it aloud to throw (this is the ‘pin’).

If the mage screws up the favor, or does not complete it within the year, or dies, the skull goes mad, flying around breathing fire (as a young dragon) for one turn, targeting the mage and then any random bystanders.

These are often worn as part of a necklace, belt, bone bikini or other ridiculous fantasy getup.

Note: This is a first level spell with a casting time as mentioned above. One need not know the fireball spell to make one.

Posted in: legacy D&D, magic items, spells / Tagged: magic items, magic-users, skulls, spells

Sword of Rusting

January 5, 2011 10:28 pm / 2 Comments / Chris

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This very jealous +n sword will begin to rust a player’s other ferrous metal weapons after 24 hours (including arrowtips if applicable). One item per day will rust to complete uselessness the moment it is drawn or hefted to strike a blow.

Posted in: legacy D&D, magic items / Tagged: cursed items, magic items, swords, weapons

Baubles of Doom 2 – The Drum of Judgement

October 4, 2010 3:35 am / Leave a Comment / Chris

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The drum may only be played by the righteous. This block of wood has wedges and faces carved into it, so that striking the top of the drum sounds one of four notes. Should the player have strayed from the moral code of the drum, one of the notes will fail. Should one of the notes fail, a consequence is determined by random roll. A failed note should be accompanied by descriptions of sudden silence, as if the world stood still and took notice. This should be ominous. The player of the note will immediately remember any and all offenses committed and understand that punishment is coming to the entire party. It’s probably best if the party does not know.

Should the player sound all notes correctly, the spirit of the drum will grant one great boon to the party. If the DM cannot think of a good boon (such as find our way home, the mountain pass melting early, the dragon lose their trail, etc.) then the voice of the drum will ask the party what their common desire is and it will be granted, at discretion fo the DM. The spirit does not seek to twist the words of a request, as would a devil, but it is rather unsophisticated and literal.

Note 1: AH – This measures the moral condition of the character in relation to the sky, particularly bird, bats and creatures that live in trees, such as monkeys. Should the character have committed any offenses against the sky, the note will fail and d100 giant bats will pursue the party any time they are above ground on within a cave.

Note 2: KU – This is the note of the ground. If the character has spilled the blood of any earth creatures smarter than, say, a mole, the party will be pursued by a 10HD earth elemental/doppleganger. This avenging spirit will follow the characters and catch them off guard when they are underground.

Note 3: MO – This is the note of the ocean. Should the player have offended the ocean or its spirits, all water in the party’s possession will violently sublimate into steam.

Note 4: SAH – This note represents the tribe, race or community who created this artifact (up to DM) so that any serious offenses to that group will cause the note to fail. The party will then be pursued by 2d6 x 10 agents or members of that group, who will arrive in 2d4 hours. The pursuers will not stop until the entire party is dead or the offense has been undone, the dept paid or the karma purified.

This item was inspired by an item I found just a few minutes ago looking over the Metropolitan Museum of art’s Heilbronn Timeline of Art History.

Posted in: magic items / Tagged: magic items, Metropolitan Museum

Stubborn Treasure Chest

September 27, 2010 12:23 pm / 3 Comments / Chris

Jewelry Casket, 1857. By Pietro Giusti. Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC

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The party finds a small box that will only open in one specific location in your campaign world. When the party tries to open it anywhere else, a ghostly face appears over the lid and tells the party that the chest may only be opened in a location x leagues, miles or feet away. It will then say a number before it disappears, which starts at 20 and counts down each time they attempt to open it.

Jewelry Casket, 1857. By Pietro Giusti. Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC

The players may attempt to open the chest only 20 times. On the 21st attempt, it will teleport back to where it was found (50% chance) or to the spot where it can be opened (50% chance). Attempting to open it with a wish spell will have the same effect. Lesser spells have no effect.

This was inspired by a real product, that uses a GPS-based lock that will only open in one location on earth. Be sure to read the article to see how the recipient managed to solve the puzzle. It shouldn’t take anywhere near 20 tries, unless you place the special spot underground.

Posted in: content, legacy D&D, magic items / Tagged: magic items

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