I read in the player's handbook about a character starting with a trinket and I was wondering if it is necessary to have. What's the significance of them?
Exactly. More than any other edition before this, 5th is very character-centric, encouraging players to flavor their characters to their own unique tastes. Trinkets are just another option to support that, but they are in no way necessary.
In one of my campaigns, I used the trinkets that the characters started with as a means to show the players how deeply their characters lives were being shaped toward a particular result.
They each had a trinket that had come into their possession years before the start of the campaign under circumstances that caused them no suspicion at all; a gift, something found when moving into a new house, that sort of thing. And then they arrived at a ruin that wasn't at all related to the diplomatic mission that brought the group of strangers together as a party, and suddenly found their trinkets to be directly related - one had a partial floorplan that turned out to be a map of the ruin; another had a glass eye that served as the key to open a secret door hidden with a statue missing an eye; another had an indecipherable map that murals beyond the secret door served as a decryption key for and lead them through labyrinthine passages; an alabaster mask one of them had was actually the face of a magical construct they found at the center of the labyrinth that would provide them information they needed; that information also told them the use of the glass orb filled with moving smoke that the last of them had.
I wouldn't do that kind of thing for every campaign for fear that it would grow old, but then, I also don't insist that players roll trinkets at the start of every campaign for the same reason. But there are definitely ways to make a trinket much more than just a unique item of questionable use or value.
Every character rolls a trinket in my campaigns. Some of them turn out to be stupidly mundane and of no major consequence. Others, however, become plot hooks/devices and have major implications on the story at some point.
Not everyone is good at, or interested in, developing a background story for their PC. Trinkets are a good way to jump start that process and give the DM a jumping-off point for his plot.
I actually made my trinket, and wore it to game night. The next game, the DM roleplayed an NPC was who walking down the street, and bumped into my character. He was wearing my trinket! Turns out I had left it at his house so he utilized that to introduce us to the NPCs.
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Admin on MeWe's Conservative D&D Players group, but I believe that no matter what our differences are, our love of D&D is something that should bring us together. So, if you don't start something I won't either. Fair enough?
Method Actor, Storyteller, Tactician type who plays peacemaker at the table. This fall will be my 39th year playing D&D, Gamma World, Car Wars, Talisman, Serenity and Traveller.
In an introductory adventure I ran for my wife and friends, a bulk of the "treasure" that could be found was made up of trinket items, some of which were later required to solve a puzzle at the end of the dungeon. It was fun to watch my players find fascination in the strange relics that were monetarily worthless, but something they could treasure from their first adventure forever.
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
Admin on MeWe's Conservative D&D Players group, but I believe that no matter what our differences are, our love of D&D is something that should bring us together. So, if you don't start something I won't either. Fair enough?
Method Actor, Storyteller, Tactician type who plays peacemaker at the table. This fall will be my 39th year playing D&D, Gamma World, Car Wars, Talisman, Serenity and Traveller.
Personally I see trinkets as both a fun thing for the character to have, and as a key to generating interesting details about a character that the player may not have thought of before. Why do I have a small glass feather? Why, exactly, can this slim black candle I'm carrying never be lit? Some of the most interesting roleplaying moments at my table have come from players coming up with explanations for, and interesting uses of, the trinkets that they've been carrying since first level.
I think there's also a possiblity for them to add extra levels of detail to the world that you as a DM build. If you pepper loot caches with unusual - but non-valuable and non-magical - trinkets, you not only get more interesting rewards for encounters than "You find x amount of gold and x potions, plus some magic weapons", but you also have the opportunity to tell your players things about both the location they're adventuring in and the world in general. Plus you provide possible hooks for future adventure. What if the gold coins that the party find are marked with faces of long-dead rulers nobody has ever heard of, along with a slim book containing legends from this long-dead culture? That book is nothing but a trinket, but combines with the strange currency it might prompt the players to go and investigate it, sending them off on an adventure that feels organic to them - that is, it feels like they're adventuring because they have a purpose that they decided on themselves, rather than because they're following a quest that you set them on.
If you couldn't guess by now, I really like trinkets (so much so that I actually wrote a table of 100 new trinkets to add to the list in the DMG).
Oh yeah? Where might we find this table? I love roll charts/tables. Especially homebrew ones :) The more the better is what I say lol
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"...Debts must always be paid, sometimes in more than blood and gold. But this is Ordo Ursa," Ren places his hand on Erakas's chest, right where the Dragonborn's heart is. "Right here. And it always has been and always will be. Don't ever forget that. Because I won't."
Serandis Mendaen (Aereni Elven Rogue/maybe one day Wizard)- Project Point Playtest
In one campaign that i was playing, the DM give us the trinket that came with an special ability/feat/power how ever you wanna call it. It was interesting by the way. of course, it cames also with restrictions, but i feel that wasn´t overpowered, just nice or cool.
I used trinkets as gifts given to the party. They saved a quaint town from bandits and the mayor "scrounged what they could to give as a gift to say thank you." While it didn't have real relevance towards the story, I loved the randomness it brought as each member of the party is scratching their head wondering what just happened. I handed more out as prizes for the carnival the townsfolk threw for "Freedom from the Bandits Day."
I often place trinkets on the corpses of the party’s enemies. Sometimes they turn out to be clues, sometimes junk, sometimes other stuff, but they never know unless they pursue them.
I know this is totally the wrong use for them, but I’ll use them as a way to make common magic items. An example: I was running Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, and one of my players wanted to buy the beholder plushie in Xeblob’s Shop, so I let him. Later in the story i saw that if he had a bit of higher passive perception, he could notice certain things so I made the trinket into a wondrous item that gave +2 to Perception. Now I didn’t just pull this out of thin air, Xanathar is my main villain for the game, and he is able to use the trinket to spy on the party. The feeling of being watched gives the PC who has it heightened senses, giving him +2 to Perception.
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I read in the player's handbook about a character starting with a trinket and I was wondering if it is necessary to have. What's the significance of them?
... Hello!
It's really just a flavor item to give your character some flair you can also build story hooks around it etc. if you like.
Exactly. More than any other edition before this, 5th is very character-centric, encouraging players to flavor their characters to their own unique tastes. Trinkets are just another option to support that, but they are in no way necessary.
They are for fun. Altough some DMs use trinkets for the plot or something.
Yeah, plot items or motivation (return this pendant to your childhood friend after his mother died sort of thing)
In one of my campaigns, I used the trinkets that the characters started with as a means to show the players how deeply their characters lives were being shaped toward a particular result.
They each had a trinket that had come into their possession years before the start of the campaign under circumstances that caused them no suspicion at all; a gift, something found when moving into a new house, that sort of thing. And then they arrived at a ruin that wasn't at all related to the diplomatic mission that brought the group of strangers together as a party, and suddenly found their trinkets to be directly related - one had a partial floorplan that turned out to be a map of the ruin; another had a glass eye that served as the key to open a secret door hidden with a statue missing an eye; another had an indecipherable map that murals beyond the secret door served as a decryption key for and lead them through labyrinthine passages; an alabaster mask one of them had was actually the face of a magical construct they found at the center of the labyrinth that would provide them information they needed; that information also told them the use of the glass orb filled with moving smoke that the last of them had.
I wouldn't do that kind of thing for every campaign for fear that it would grow old, but then, I also don't insist that players roll trinkets at the start of every campaign for the same reason. But there are definitely ways to make a trinket much more than just a unique item of questionable use or value.
Every character rolls a trinket in my campaigns. Some of them turn out to be stupidly mundane and of no major consequence. Others, however, become plot hooks/devices and have major implications on the story at some point.
Trinkets are great not only for backstory development by the player but they can also be tied into a future plot development by the DM.
My trinket always gets turned into a weapon at some point. I don't think I have ever had an adventure where I didn't end up throwing it at someone.
Not everyone is good at, or interested in, developing a background story for their PC. Trinkets are a good way to jump start that process and give the DM a jumping-off point for his plot.
I actually made my trinket, and wore it to game night. The next game, the DM roleplayed an NPC was who walking down the street, and bumped into my character. He was wearing my trinket! Turns out I had left it at his house so he utilized that to introduce us to the NPCs.
Admin on MeWe's Conservative D&D Players group, but I believe that no matter what our differences are, our love of D&D is something that should bring us together. So, if you don't start something I won't either. Fair enough?
Method Actor, Storyteller, Tactician type who plays peacemaker at the table. This fall will be my 39th year playing D&D, Gamma World, Car Wars, Talisman, Serenity and Traveller.
In an introductory adventure I ran for my wife and friends, a bulk of the "treasure" that could be found was made up of trinket items, some of which were later required to solve a puzzle at the end of the dungeon. It was fun to watch my players find fascination in the strange relics that were monetarily worthless, but something they could treasure from their first adventure forever.
I told my DM what mine was ASAP so he had time to work it into the plot.
Admin on MeWe's Conservative D&D Players group, but I believe that no matter what our differences are, our love of D&D is something that should bring us together. So, if you don't start something I won't either. Fair enough?
Method Actor, Storyteller, Tactician type who plays peacemaker at the table. This fall will be my 39th year playing D&D, Gamma World, Car Wars, Talisman, Serenity and Traveller.
"...Debts must always be paid, sometimes in more than blood and gold. But this is Ordo Ursa," Ren places his hand on Erakas's chest, right where the Dragonborn's heart is. "Right here. And it always has been and always will be. Don't ever forget that. Because I won't."
Serandis Mendaen (Aereni Elven Rogue/maybe one day Wizard)- Project Point Playtest
In one campaign that i was playing, the DM give us the trinket that came with an special ability/feat/power how ever you wanna call it. It was interesting by the way. of course, it cames also with restrictions, but i feel that wasn´t overpowered, just nice or cool.
I used trinkets as gifts given to the party. They saved a quaint town from bandits and the mayor "scrounged what they could to give as a gift to say thank you." While it didn't have real relevance towards the story, I loved the randomness it brought as each member of the party is scratching their head wondering what just happened. I handed more out as prizes for the carnival the townsfolk threw for "Freedom from the Bandits Day."
I often place trinkets on the corpses of the party’s enemies. Sometimes they turn out to be clues, sometimes junk, sometimes other stuff, but they never know unless they pursue them.
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My DM let me choose my trinket as a rogue. I rolled anyway and got the needle that doesn’t bend then i realized, infinite lock pick.
This is Zevulon the Great! He's teriyaki style.
I know this is totally the wrong use for them, but I’ll use them as a way to make common magic items. An example: I was running Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, and one of my players wanted to buy the beholder plushie in Xeblob’s Shop, so I let him. Later in the story i saw that if he had a bit of higher passive perception, he could notice certain things so I made the trinket into a wondrous item that gave +2 to Perception. Now I didn’t just pull this out of thin air, Xanathar is my main villain for the game, and he is able to use the trinket to spy on the party. The feeling of being watched gives the PC who has it heightened senses, giving him +2 to Perception.