How to Craft Emotional Items with DnD's 2024 DMG

Magic item with sentience dungeons and dragons It offers a unique way to add personality and depth to your campaigns. These items have unique intelligence, motivations, and goals, often creating interesting dynamics for the character who wields them.

Crafting a sentient item requires more than simply assigning magical properties to it. This includes providing a voice, purpose, and even a backstory that relates to the story of your campaign. From defining their abilities and personality to seamlessly integrating them into your adventure, here's how to design magic items that make sense.

How to create a sentient magic item

There are many ways to grant sentience to magic items, and in practice Some of them already are. Artifacts in Dungeons & Dragons tend to have some degree of sentience. Guides the player towards some type of goal. or Trying to corrupt their minds.

Items with a limited purpose, such as scrolls or potions, cannot become sentient.

reason for feelings

There are two main reasons why magic items are sentient. It got its features through magicor it holds The soul of a living creature. The biggest difference here is that items that have always been inanimate I have no complaints about realityHumanoids trapped in such items are Existence as pain.

If the item is magical enough to be alive, It gained this feature during creation. If you want to add flair to something already established in a campaign, it needs to be done while it's happening. some transformation processIt's like an alchemy experiment to make a weapon more powerful.

Spirits that possess or haunt items are often associated with: How did the object affect their lives?Or even to the moment of death. Item in question It doesn't have to be magicalIt possesses no special properties other than the spirit that resides within it.

ability score

Item with sense Requires Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma points.It's not just about interacting with the world, it's about having conflicts and conversations with the player. You can give any score you want, but There is only one score as high as 18If so.

If you want to let the dice decide, you can use the proven D6 method. Roll 4D6 for each score.Drop the lowest roll and add up the rest. This will help you earn points. 18 and belowBut it could also end up like this: Significantly low.

adjustment

Like all living things, Sentient items have alignmentmost driving force Conflict between the person who has the object and the object he or she is holding. You probably already know the arrangement of items you want to give flair to. The story around it will likely define it.

you can also Roll a D100 on the next table. Decide on your alignment if you haven't already. Please keep in mind High rarity items are not neutral.Due to the nature of the quests they engage in, there is much less neutrality.

communication

If the item has sentience, Must be able to communicate. The 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide provides three ways for items to communicate. emotional projection, telepathic connectionor Talk out loud.

The idea of ​​projecting emotions may seem cool in a visual medium, but not in a TTRPG. It gets a little complicated to convey. However, this method works perfectly in the following cases: Items with low intelligence scoreCommunicate with players in more ways than words.

An item that speaks of delicacy, Announce out loud what may be needed and quests that the player must complete. this is a good way Good item for communicationAfter all, it saves time for everyone listening because what they say tends to involve the entire party.

Telepathic links convey privacy and deeper connection, Ideal for evil items I want to persuade players to do less of the savory stuff. To keep secret what an item tells the player: Talk to them privately in several waysHide the fact that certain items are alive from the rest of the players.

sense

It may not take into account how the item perceives the world. It has little to do with how far an item can see. For your meeting. But the player Will be spending more time with these itemsIt can be helpful to know the feel of the item as it creates a bond or even a rivalry. Understand how it reacts.

A player might be momentarily offended by an item and throw it aside, but how far should the player go with that item? Do items get lost in tracking? How effective will the item be if the player wants to save it for night patrols? Keeping them safe?

Whatever you choose here is fine, but if the item is owned by a spirit, It must have the senses that the spirit has. For purely magical items, I recommend the following: Give them the ability to trembleBecause it suits their unique way of seeing the world.

special purpose

This is Quest or mission that the item must fulfill Above all. Although not all sensory items have a purpose. There's usually a reason why Carl can talk. Or why ghosts haunt the shield, beyond the twisted pleasures of powerful magic users.

ordinary ghost stories Revolving around unfinished businessPlayers can help the spirits inhabiting items with whatever they need. they could Helping the spirit for some kind of reward.Or I just want it Stop talking about items. And it remains inanimate.

Items created using the senses are often It's a lengthy quest that spans the entire campaign. Players can always argue about items, but failing to do the quest is the most direct way. Conflicts with magic items begin.

conflict

When the player and the sentient item do not make eye contact, Conflicts may arise. If the item is particularly upset for some reason, Experienced players can attempt to calm it down.making Charisma Saving Throw DC 12 plus the item's Charisma modifier.

When saving fails, Items begin to claim To change the situation to something more desired. Failure to comply at this point may result in the item being removed. take drastic measuresat refuse to coordinate try to Magically affects characters; Obviously, not all items will attempt this, only evil-aligned items will.

If an item attempts to control the player, it will not automatically succeed. The player makes another Charisma saving throw. (same DC) and when it fails They get a state of fascination For 1D12 hours.

This is not mind controlHowever, players should try their best to follow the item's commands. If it's an attractive character suffer damage in any form While the effect lasts Save and repeatAnd the item cannot attempt to charm the user in this way until dawn the next day.