DM Magical Item Introduction

[Strolen]

Magic Items, the Holy Grail of roleplaying games (for me at least).

There are numerous ways to get your hands on them from killing to making, but the funnest are when you really have to work for them. As DMs, what kinds of ways did you make magical weapons available to your players that were out of the ordinary. And for players, did your DM ever surprise you or entertain you with an interesting way to earn the coveted magical weapons?


My first story:

Going to an ice cave to retrieve some of the required "stuff" for a campaign. Could be any cave for that matter and once through some mindless physical barriers and some dangerous environments that required some skill check, the players finally came to what appears to be a ring of icy towers about 6+ feet high with a base of about 4 feet. I matched the amount of ice towers to the players. Encased inside each mound of solid ice was a barely perceptible outline of a favored weapon.

Being who they are, they immediately started to make short work of the mounds of ice. I had it take a couple days I think. Duration doesn't matter, but they get the weapons. Yeah! They continue on their trek, reach their goal, solve a riddle or puzzle or whatever and find that the weapons they have are magic indeed, but nothing overly special. +1, maybe resistance to cold, small things.

They make their way back out. Problem is, that the entrance is now completely covered by the a wall of ice. Little did they know that each chip they took off the weapons was installed at this entrance.

Ok, no big deal, chip away. Hi Ho, Hi Ho, off to work we go. As they chip away they start to feel the weapons get heavier and heavier. Those that are sheathed, after a little bit the sheathe explodes to reveal their weapon slowly being covered with ice and continue to as long as the entrance is being chipped.

The ice returing is evenly distributed. Ok, a slight dilemna. The ice is thick enough that to get through it the weapons are going to be beyond manageable. So what happened was that they took the extra time to dig a whole straight through the ice and tried to match it to the growing ice around their weapons without chipping too much to make the weapons unmanageable. Finally they got the hole to match the new size of the ice weapons and they happily threw their weapons through the hold to the other side and chipped away at the ice at then entrance till they could all get out.

Then they started chipping away at the ice at their weapons to clean them. The ice did not reapper at the entrance.

Two options at that point. We never finished this one so didn't get to play them. 1) Ice chipped off the weapons anew magically deposited itself to somewhere incovenient that the players will eventually go to. Entrance to another dungeon, exit, whatever plays the best in the game and continues till they get rid of the weapons where they will create for themselves a similiar deal like where they were originally found.

2) The ice could continuously build itself onto the weapons over time so that they have to constantly be cleaned of the growing ice to be useable. Eventually the agony of doing it for so little gain will be too much and the players ditch them somewhere.

Mostly wanted to see how far they would go to keep a crappy magical weapon. I wanted them to be creative with the disposing of the weapons as well. Only logical that they would want to put the weapons somewhere like they found them to 'get' the next set of adventureres that stumbled upon them.

This one could probably go into the items part, and probably will. I have a couple more that wouldn't and why I started the thread. Will post as I have time.

[CaptainPenguin]

Here's one:

My PCs are walking through the Fortress atop the White Mountain of Kandoth Dalka. They come to a chamber with a huge pit that shimmers with heat and has magma at the bottom. The only way across the pit is a rope with weapons suspended from it by their respective handles. Obviously, the weapons are magical. So, Asherak the war-mage reaches for a shortsword that's close to the landing that he is standing on. He grabs it without incident. So they start climbing along the rope, with Asherak in front, gathering weapons for them. But  when they get to the other side of the rope, the find that the rope is frayed to the breaking point, and snaps beneath them. They all died. I am without mercy.

Each magic weapon they took from the rope frayed the rope just a little bit.

[sniperspy]

Ive never DM'd myself, but I hope to with a group Im putting together. My DM once, had us hear of a cave with the most fabulous magic item in the world. It was a sword that gave plus 20 to attack, and had perfect accuracy. However, when my partner foolishly rushed in to grab it, 10 million red goblins came, engulfed him, and destroyed him. I eventually got the weapon myself, but I had to climb the cave and lower myself on a rope to get it, I almost died myself as well.

[CaptainPenguin]

Well, I dunno about that one. It's kinda predictable.
Obviously, if an adventurer is stupid enough to expect to just run up and grab a sword that useful, they deserve to die.
Of course such a sword would have guardians!

[sniperspy]

ya, I expected guardians too. We used all sorts of detect magics and evil, but nothing showed up.
And 10,000,000! That was a little much, even for our DM. Besides, my friend is really dumb!

[MoonHunter]

My regular fantasy campaign is in a magik item poor low fantasy world. They work for them. They sweat for them.  When they finally get them, they are amazed that they even exist.

You would be amazed at the jubilation at achieving a +1 Sword when nobody has seen one for the length of the campaign.  Scarcity makes you appreciate the power of the magik item.

[Strolen]

Now to add another scenerio. (By the way 10 million is just plain stupid and he is stupid for even doing that. Is there any other way to describe that? You no more DM....you fired.)

Magic portal that sends the characters to a large calm meadow. A very small hill is in plain site 50 yards away. Whichever character sees it can see a small shadow in the shape of their choice weapon. They can only see the shadow for their weapon regardless of what the others see. When they approach it they see that it is a slight indention in the hillside that will fit their weapon perfectly.

If they put their weapon in it the hill engulfs it to be perfectly flush grass, a seamless hill. At any point until it is closed they are able to grab it and pull it out.

Items that are already magical...get eaten by the hill automatically and dissappear forever. Go ahead and dig, it is gone sorry.

Mundane items get a + to hit and damage. If they are brave, any weapon that was mundane can be put into it any number of times to get any number of + without being eaten by the hill.

From all outwards appearences the weapons are the same except with continually added bonuses.

Problem is, with each increase in a bonus, the weapon increasingly weakens. I don't have the chart I had but you can make it up to fit. I used percentages. Depending on the original weapon quality as well. So say a weapon in perfect condition would be at 100%. The first plus would bring it down to 90% or so. Still fine. Another plus, 75%, another plus, 55%.

The way I did it was any critical hit or max hit, they would roll a percentage. If they stayed under, no problem, if they go over, breakage. The lower the percentage the more deadly/brittle the break. A 55% blade would shatter shrapnel for damage in a radius where a 75% would probably have a random 4 pieces of shrapnel or something.

Can't find my notes and too lazy to find them at the moment but you get the picture. Once they visit the place it obviously won't be there anymore.

[sniperspy]

thats a good idea. It benefits the brave, but punishes the overly greedy!

[manfred]

That is actually cursing the weapon!

So if you have a +5 sword (for those REALLY greedy guys), it is basically a timebomb... waiting on your first critical hit! Then it expodes and kills you, and a few friends... nasty.

[sniperspy]

maybe just injuring the friends, they wernt as greedy!

[Strolen]

As a once great magician once said,

"Magic happens."