Unique Magic Items

Magic Items: Public Profile

Need just to remind again that potions are certainly not permanent magic items, and are quite often created. These are the magic items even the average population can get hands on (not too often), and the bestseller healing potions have no moral stigma around them, are useful and handy.

A wand of fireballs or a +X sword is something different, it is good if in hands of heroes, but dangerous in hands of villains.

And one more thing: if a lowly peasant finds a potion, he is very likely to earn a little fortune in gold. If he finds a permanent magic item (a powerful and rare thing indeed), he is in trouble, for there are few willing to pay the right price, but many willing to take it by force.

I would also make dispell magic not work on permanate items, but still have the ability to prematurely end temporary enchantments.

This idea could also me a way to set up the differences in spiritual and arcane magic. Since arcane magic was fashioned my the will of mortal hands, it would be restriced to only one form, by artifacts, or rather relics, formed by the gods could have multiple instances, but is only present by the god's will, and if anyone should try to missuse it's power they would face the wrath of that god and likely drive it to let the relic cease to exist.

Another possible way to explain the single form of magic would be to make the permancy spell consume the casters life/spirit/essence. Since there can only ever be one person's soul with that person's point of view and memories, even identical twins wouldn't be able to form the same item since they have led seperate lives. This would cut down on the number of adventurers wanting to tinker around with making thier own artifacts and drive the price of creating them sky high. They'd best just deal with what they can find. Some people (wizard orphans) might shun artifacts in general, as they know very well that that wand of magic missiles was someone's parent/lover/sibling.

Where do items with charges fall in all this? They can only be used a limited number of times, so they aren't neccessarily permanate, but they can be recharged, so in a way, they are. Would these be permanancy spells gone wrong, or some dark and forbidden form of permanancy that consumes the soul of someone besides the caster? Or just regular items? If they ARE artifacts, shouldn't they be changed to a limited number of time a day to use them rather than charges?

I suppose it all lies in your interpretation of the idea of charges and how much stress you'd lay on the importance of uniqueness.

For example, the Staff of Saoul, crafted by the eponymous wizard, draws on the powers of an ancient deity, trapped beneath the earth in a mighty cavern. The deity is too weak to grant its powers more than once every day and only then may they be used on a quest to free the deity. After the deity is sapped of its strength it can no longer grant powers to the staff, so the staff ceases to work as a conduit: in game terms it runs out of charges.

Each staff which is created is unique and individual, so though there may only ever be one 'staff of snakes' a future wizard can base his design on that of the now defunct (i.e. chargeless) staff. It will have approximately the same powers, but slightly different: e.g. it will transform into a cobra instead of a viper. When a staff runs out of charges (however that is to be interpreted) it cannot be recharged, but a new staff can be made which monopolises on the powers previously held by the dead staff.

Magic is strange, and it seems to be not willing to be bound in the same way twice. So there is only one +1 weapon ever, only one +1 weapon with resistance to fire, etc, etc, etc.

Once this is discovered there are always easy workarounds. I am not magic master but follow this logic.

Current systems allow for the enchantment of a plus sword against a certain species. That, I would think, would be a slightly complex enchantment. Has to take into consideration all the differences between each individual and be able to recognize that, right? But an enchantment against rocks would be just as difficult because of all the different compositions of rocks. Another complex enchantment I would think. But if you could bind a sword to a single rock that you already have available, I would imagine that to be much easier to do. You have the rock, able to mystically make the sword resistant to that rock or able to easily split that rock like it was butter, some sort of enchantment to make it unique. In that case, all you need is a handful of pebbles from a stream and you have the means to uniquely enchant +1 swords with immunity to a pebble.

Using the fire analogy, you could probably enchant a + sword with immunity to wood fires, candle fires, etc., because each burn would be chemically different then the other. You could make any number of concotions and/or mixtures of stuff to make a unique fire that the sword is immune to.

Just thoughts as I get ready to work.

I am pro magic, anti limiting it if you couldn't tell.

Somebody has got to defend that position.

A simple set of definitions and a list.

I guess I have gamed with too many people like Strolen (or who game as Strolen presented), as I had already throught of the process to make it 'player proof'.

All you need to do is define what is an acceptable 'field' or width for a modifier trait. Any new traits proposed must be of the same width as the existing traits and should not overlap an existing trait.

Example: You would have All Fire, Mundane Fire, Magikal Fire, and Dragon Fire as the four traits in the fire category. A player could propose a new fire trait. To be accepted it would have to be a type of fire not defined as above and be of the same width (atomic fire maybe?). So Candle Fire is a subgroup of Mundane fire, so it would be too narrow in definition. Chemical Fire has too much overlap with mundane fire. Pyros instead of fire would be disallowed because it is the overlap with all fire, being a synonym.

You would also have the category of weapon, sword, axe/mace, pole weapon, flexible weapon, and missle weapon. I would not do it that way. I would define it as Weapons, Earth Weapons (those of metal or stone), Wood Weapons (those of mostly wood). So three weapons of a given type would be possible that way. Note: You might have a Fire Weapon being invented when Black Powder weapons come of age. Water Weapons occuring in the age of blasters (fusion, don't you know).

Mixing and matching additional abilities would increase that 3, but it does put a dent in what is possible.

For ease of use you would create a list of common fields, which would help you define what is and is not generally possible. It would be used as an example for those that get 'creative' in their enchantment.

In fact, I am sure there is a near immortal member of the mages guild that is the keeper of the book, that which they list what is and is not available to be used. His would be a sad job as he would be cataloging the demise of magik. (As traits are bound, then the items lost no longer available to be used... that magik is lost forever).

Heck if Corvus was in this world, it would be impossible to make an orb, as he would of created an orb of every trait. In fact, certain types of items, some of them quite common, would be lost to modern time because of the lost enchantments of previous times.

The plan was to give something for both Strolen and MoonHunter

- if you want a permanent magical item, you cannot simply ask for a nice +1 sword, you must think carefully and choose smartly something that is not likely to made ever before. Smart thinking was therefore expected.

- of course, candle fire would not be accepted. Nice try, Strolen!

- if someone comes up with a new trait, or actually a new category, it will be a much discussed news between all magic-users. Why was it not tried before? If it was, why didn't it work then, but does now? Can new traits or entire categories come into existence? How is it possible?

- hmm... elemental kind of weapons... interesting. Rhymes with elemental categories, and makes the entire world more focused on elements, and/or other uebermensch categories. Interesting world specificator.

Re Agar:

I would also make dispell magic not work on permanate items, but still have the ability to prematurely end temporary enchantments.

Right.

Spiritual/Arcane magic are of course different and permanency may be much easier. But the thing is, gods would never make the same thing twice anyway... even if they could. And maybe they can, but that's not your problem, mortal!

Consuming life/spirit/essence... I have seen that somewhere. Let's say the first artifact costs 10hp, second 20hp, third 40hp, fourth 80hp... see where it is going? The loss is irreversible, and weakens for the same number of weeks - is it worth to recover for months?

Consuming the soul, or part of it, ohhh... not nice. I was thinking this world would be permanency-hostile enough!

Will think about charging items later.

The Book

Somewhere magic users are keeping track of what is possible in a book. There are many copies of said book, but the magic users might keep track of what is possible.

The mages might keep track of who has what, thus every weapon will have some history behind it.