I am homebrewing my own campaign, trying to weave all of the backstories of my players together.
One of them wants to hunt down a powerful artifact, another wants to investigate how an entire dwarven city was destroyed by an earthquake. So I was planning on combining these two stories by an artifact that could create earthquakes. Broken into three pieces, spread over the country is a violin that has an effect simmilar to the Earthquake spell.
However, I run into two problems here. First of all, the earthquake spell is an 8th level spell, and I am worried that the party get all the pieces way to early. (They are currently level 5 and Earthquake is something a wizard usually can use on level 15) Secondly, I don't want them to have the power to actually destroy cities. So... How do people usually handle these kind of artifacts?
You could treat it like a Vestige of Divergence artefact from the Explorer's Guide to Wildemount; these have a set of basic properties you can get simply by attuning to the item, then they get more powerful "awakened" bonuses when the DM tells you.
So you for example you might have your artefact do something like:
Dormant: Has three charges, can cast Earth Tremor for 1-3 charges to cast at 1st to 3rd level. Recovers d3 charges at dawn.
Awakened: Has six charges, can cast up to 5th level. Spell may now be targeted at a point within 60 feet and has a radius of 20 feet. Recovers d6 charges at dawn.
Exalted: Has twelve charges, can cast up to 8th level, doubling range and radius for Earth Tremor. Can also cast Earthquake for eight charges. Recovers d12 charges at dawn.
Just to give you an idea; I'm not sure how the Wildemount artefacts are implemented on D&D Beyond (haven't unlocked them), but if I were doing it I'd probably do three separate magic items and just inform the player with it when it becomes awakened or exalted and have them swap version.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
You could treat it like a Vestige of Divergence artefact from the Explorer's Guide to Wildemount; these have a set of basic properties you can get simply by attuning to the item, then they get more powerful "awakened" bonuses when the DM tells you.
So you for example you might have your artefact do something like:
Dormant: Has three charges, can cast Earth Tremor for 1-3 charges to cast at 1st to 3rd level. Recovers d3 charges at dawn.
Awakened: Has six charges, can cast up to 5th level. Spell may now be targeted at a point within 60 feet and has a radius of 20 feet. Recovers d6 charges at dawn.
Exalted: Has twelve charges, can cast up to 8th level, doubling range and radius for Earth Tremor. Can also cast Earthquake for eight charges. Recovers d12 charges at dawn.
Just to give you an idea; I'm not sure how the Wildemount artefacts are implemented on D&D Beyond (haven't unlocked them), but if I were doing it I'd probably do three separate magic items and just inform the player with it when it becomes awakened or exalted and have them swap version.
All wildmount vestiages are separate into 3 items, 1st the Dormant then Awakened then Exalted, to unlocked them your character have to do a great feat to unlocked them by defeating a dragon, killing their sworn enemy, saving citizens from a dangerous threat or whatever suits your campaign. just unlock them as your characters grows in level.
Also i would say added more earth related spells or increase the Spell DC of his spells and add some magical bonus to the magical violin.
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Hey all,
I am homebrewing my own campaign, trying to weave all of the backstories of my players together.
One of them wants to hunt down a powerful artifact, another wants to investigate how an entire dwarven city was destroyed by an earthquake. So I was planning on combining these two stories by an artifact that could create earthquakes. Broken into three pieces, spread over the country is a violin that has an effect simmilar to the Earthquake spell.
However, I run into two problems here. First of all, the earthquake spell is an 8th level spell, and I am worried that the party get all the pieces way to early. (They are currently level 5 and Earthquake is something a wizard usually can use on level 15) Secondly, I don't want them to have the power to actually destroy cities. So... How do people usually handle these kind of artifacts?
You could treat it like a Vestige of Divergence artefact from the Explorer's Guide to Wildemount; these have a set of basic properties you can get simply by attuning to the item, then they get more powerful "awakened" bonuses when the DM tells you.
So you for example you might have your artefact do something like:
Just to give you an idea; I'm not sure how the Wildemount artefacts are implemented on D&D Beyond (haven't unlocked them), but if I were doing it I'd probably do three separate magic items and just inform the player with it when it becomes awakened or exalted and have them swap version.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
All wildmount vestiages are separate into 3 items, 1st the Dormant then Awakened then Exalted, to unlocked them your character have to do a great feat to unlocked them by defeating a dragon, killing their sworn enemy, saving citizens from a dangerous threat or whatever suits your campaign. just unlock them as your characters grows in level.
Also i would say added more earth related spells or increase the Spell DC of his spells and add some magical bonus to the magical violin.