Magic Rocks. The idea is that they hold the effects of the spell, not the spell itself.
For example, If you cast a spell like fireball into a magic rock, you now have a grenade. If you cast cure wounds, you now have a rock that can heal people (after you use it it would need to be recharged). The idea isn't that the rock holds the spell, just the effect. This would allow some interesting technology like, airships, guns and advanced healing.
The rock works very similarly to gems in Stormlight Archives by Brandon Sanderson. The more flawless the rock the more powerful spell it can hold and the longer it can hold it (meaning it doesn't leak out).
I'm trying to figure out if there are ways to exploit this and break the game. Could the wish spell be used somehow? What about any of the power word spells.
I just need ideas on where this could go and the possible hooks it could add to a campaign and advice on possible game breaking features and how to fix them.
Thank you in advance.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
The obvious fix for something like not wanting power word or wish is to cap the spell level. Think of the spell storing ring (? I know it's an item but can't remember exactly what). It's like up to 3 levels of spell so you could store one 3rd level spell or one 2nd level and one 1st level or three 1st level spells.
The other fix you could do if you don't want to cap it by spell level is to assign a specific type of rock or gem to each level of spell and the rarity goes up commensurate with the spell level. So a wish spell being 9th level would require something like a rock of pure unobtainium that weighs X grams/pounds. But a cantrip level rock would be like a bit of sea glass that's been polished up well. They could probably find the sea glass in any coastal town that gets a decent tourist trade. The unobtainium would be a tier 4 quest to the lair of a kraken in the elemental plane of water.
Great idea but as cosplaywrite said it needs to have a cap. Even though it would take a spell slot to cast in the first place to store, the party could end up with a very high level spell stored in their back pocket for free if they rested and got the spell slot back.
Perhaps add a chance that the spell could fail if the rock isn't perfect.
Well, spell scrolls can be 9th-level, so there doesn’t necessarily need to be a cap depending on how you handle it.
When the generates the effect of the spell, and then needs to be recharged, what exactly do you mean? Is the same spell locked into the rock and just needs another spell slot to juice it again, or could the bearer cast a different spell into it every time?
When you say “doesn’t leak,” what kinda timeframe are you talking about here: hours, days, months, decades?
Does it cost anything besides the casting? I’m assuming that would also require the M components, correct? If one “casts” revivify into a rock, it would require the Diamond worth 300gp still. Yes?
The reason why things don’t “leak” like that in D&D is because that’s more bookkeeping that will just get forgotten. As is spell slots, charges, uses, even money gets skipped sometimes. It happens, people get into the moment and forget to check a box. 🤷♂️ But something like this would get to be annoying depending on how many everyone has and how long each of them takes to “leak.”
However, the idea of a temporary, reusable “expendable” is kinda cool, but they have them. They just don’t treat it quite the same. Stuff like a ring of spell storing, spell gem and to a lesser extent a rod of absorption do. The Artificers’ Spell-Storing Item is pretty much that too.
A Spell Gem (Diamond) could do 9th level spells, but you can only cast it if it’s on your class spell list, or if you know it. If you want this to be useable by anyone, then look more towards the Ring of Spell Storing, or the Artificers’ Spell-Storing Item. Those have level limits, 5th and 2nd respectively.
So if each Stone was coded to a specific spell so the DM could control their content; and if you combined them and handled “leakage” with charges and kept it to maybe 5 uses for a single casting of a “common” spell (cantrips & 1st level), 3 castings of an “uncommon” spell (2nd & 3rd) and a single casting of a “rare” spell (4th & 5th) and maybe, just maybe a “very rare” (6th level spell) for your different rarity levels.
Or if they are meant to be whatever you cast into it is what it can do, then you could instead maybe do:
Uncommon: Cantrip, 1 day retention
Rare: 1st-level, 1 day retention; cantrip, 1 week retention (or a flat 1 day for both spell levels)
Very Rare: 1st-level, 2 days; or 2nd-level, 1 day (or a flat 2 days for all spell levels)
Legen-(wait for it)-dary: 1st for 3 days; 2nd for 2; or 3rd-level with 1 day retention (or a flat 3 days for all spell levels)
Or if they’re sposta be like the spell gems that everyone can use then use those, but ratchet up the rarity’s by 1 bracket and say nothing above Very Rare (or maybe Legendary 🤷♂️).
Those would be my thoughts. The rarity would be that high so that they would be rare enough that everyone only had at most 1 each to track. I don’t know you’re source inspiration, so I really don’t know how they’re sposta work, I’m just spitballing here.
So you learned how to create the beads for a necklace of fireballs and realized you could do it with most spells. You should add other input costs though.
I would recommend AOE only spells that don’t require concentration.
I'm think that the more powerful the spell, the more perfect the stone needs to be in order to hold the power and the more perfect the stone is, the longer it can hold the power, similarly to your rarity system.
If a powerful spell is cast into a imperfect stone, the power of the spell shatters the stone and the effect is released then and there. I'm thinking that the stones that are perfect enough to hold a high level spell, are only heard of in story's and that it might make a good quest to find one. The stones that can hold the low level spells, can be fairly common to the rich.
You would still need to cast the spell normally, M, S and V is all required. Non spell casters will be able to use them as well. However, a spell caster would need cast a spell into it first. After the effect is expended, a new spell (it doesn't have to be the same one) can be cast into the stone (with spells like fireball there wouldn't be much stone left but that's the idea).
A highly flawed stone could hold a low level spell for several hours, However a perfect stone can hold it indefinitely. I Haven't completely worked out this system, but it would work something like that.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
I see what you mean. By giving them the effect of a spell like glyph of warding, they can have that effect wherever they go, instead of one location. Is there a way I could fix that ?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
The main options are: (A) Attunement, (B) Concentration, (C) Availability, (D) Cost, (E) Action Economy
Attunement would be like a Pearl of Power. You've got the rock, but need to bond it to yourself to unlock it.
Concentration would make using the rock a deliberate choice that can only be done once at a time.
Availability can let the DM directly control the item. If they are inherently rare, then they become a finite resource. Sure, they might go nova with 6 in one fight, but that's all they get for the rest of the campaign.
Cost. If they can't afford them, then they can't abuse them. Basically the same as availability, but the players have a little more control.
Action Economy. Tie them to an action, or "casting time". Basically, how long does it take to "light the fuse"? Similar to concentration, it limits them to one per turn.
I like the idea of a rechargable version of this with a once per day limitation. The easy fixes for it are to make them worth considerably more rare (you can't spam them if you don't have them) and only allowing AOE spells to be put inside them (to remove the need for way too much explanation for the item). Other than that, golden!
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I've had an idea for my next campaign after lmop.
Magic Rocks. The idea is that they hold the effects of the spell, not the spell itself.
For example, If you cast a spell like fireball into a magic rock, you now have a grenade. If you cast cure wounds, you now have a rock that can heal people (after you use it it would need to be recharged). The idea isn't that the rock holds the spell, just the effect. This would allow some interesting technology like, airships, guns and advanced healing.
The rock works very similarly to gems in Stormlight Archives by Brandon Sanderson. The more flawless the rock the more powerful spell it can hold and the longer it can hold it (meaning it doesn't leak out).
I'm trying to figure out if there are ways to exploit this and break the game. Could the wish spell be used somehow? What about any of the power word spells.
I just need ideas on where this could go and the possible hooks it could add to a campaign and advice on possible game breaking features and how to fix them.
Thank you in advance.
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
The obvious fix for something like not wanting power word or wish is to cap the spell level. Think of the spell storing ring (? I know it's an item but can't remember exactly what). It's like up to 3 levels of spell so you could store one 3rd level spell or one 2nd level and one 1st level or three 1st level spells.
The other fix you could do if you don't want to cap it by spell level is to assign a specific type of rock or gem to each level of spell and the rarity goes up commensurate with the spell level. So a wish spell being 9th level would require something like a rock of pure unobtainium that weighs X grams/pounds. But a cantrip level rock would be like a bit of sea glass that's been polished up well. They could probably find the sea glass in any coastal town that gets a decent tourist trade. The unobtainium would be a tier 4 quest to the lair of a kraken in the elemental plane of water.
My Homebrew Backgrounds | Feats | Magic Items | Monsters | Races | Subclasses
Great idea but as cosplaywrite said it needs to have a cap. Even though it would take a spell slot to cast in the first place to store, the party could end up with a very high level spell stored in their back pocket for free if they rested and got the spell slot back.
Perhaps add a chance that the spell could fail if the rock isn't perfect.
Well, spell scrolls can be 9th-level, so there doesn’t necessarily need to be a cap depending on how you handle it.
The reason why things don’t “leak” like that in D&D is because that’s more bookkeeping that will just get forgotten. As is spell slots, charges, uses, even money gets skipped sometimes. It happens, people get into the moment and forget to check a box. 🤷♂️ But something like this would get to be annoying depending on how many everyone has and how long each of them takes to “leak.”
However, the idea of a temporary, reusable “expendable” is kinda cool, but they have them. They just don’t treat it quite the same. Stuff like a ring of spell storing, spell gem and to a lesser extent a rod of absorption do. The Artificers’ Spell-Storing Item is pretty much that too.
A Spell Gem (Diamond) could do 9th level spells, but you can only cast it if it’s on your class spell list, or if you know it. If you want this to be useable by anyone, then look more towards the Ring of Spell Storing, or the Artificers’ Spell-Storing Item. Those have level limits, 5th and 2nd respectively.
So if each Stone was coded to a specific spell so the DM could control their content; and if you combined them and handled “leakage” with charges and kept it to maybe 5 uses for a single casting of a “common” spell (cantrips & 1st level), 3 castings of an “uncommon” spell (2nd & 3rd) and a single casting of a “rare” spell (4th & 5th) and maybe, just maybe a “very rare” (6th level spell) for your different rarity levels.
Or if they are meant to be whatever you cast into it is what it can do, then you could instead maybe do:
Or if they’re sposta be like the spell gems that everyone can use then use those, but ratchet up the rarity’s by 1 bracket and say nothing above Very Rare (or maybe Legendary 🤷♂️).
Those would be my thoughts. The rarity would be that high so that they would be rare enough that everyone only had at most 1 each to track. I don’t know you’re source inspiration, so I really don’t know how they’re sposta work, I’m just spitballing here.
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Epic Boons on DDB
So you learned how to create the beads for a necklace of fireballs and realized you could do it with most spells. You should add other input costs though.
I would recommend AOE only spells that don’t require concentration.
Guide to the Five Factions (PWYW)
A rather comprehensive list of free WotC D&D resources
Deck of Decks
The biggest risk is spammability. Even cantrip level effects become obscene, if you can just drop 40 of them from a Bag of Holding.
Spells like Glyph of Warding are immobile for a reason.
I'm think that the more powerful the spell, the more perfect the stone needs to be in order to hold the power and the more perfect the stone is, the longer it can hold the power, similarly to your rarity system.
If a powerful spell is cast into a imperfect stone, the power of the spell shatters the stone and the effect is released then and there. I'm thinking that the stones that are perfect enough to hold a high level spell, are only heard of in story's and that it might make a good quest to find one. The stones that can hold the low level spells, can be fairly common to the rich.
You would still need to cast the spell normally, M, S and V is all required. Non spell casters will be able to use them as well. However, a spell caster would need cast a spell into it first. After the effect is expended, a new spell (it doesn't have to be the same one) can be cast into the stone (with spells like fireball there wouldn't be much stone left but that's the idea).
A highly flawed stone could hold a low level spell for several hours, However a perfect stone can hold it indefinitely. I Haven't completely worked out this system, but it would work something like that.
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
I see what you mean. By giving them the effect of a spell like glyph of warding, they can have that effect wherever they go, instead of one location. Is there a way I could fix that ?
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
The main options are: (A) Attunement, (B) Concentration, (C) Availability, (D) Cost, (E) Action Economy
Attunement would be like a Pearl of Power. You've got the rock, but need to bond it to yourself to unlock it.
Concentration would make using the rock a deliberate choice that can only be done once at a time.
Availability can let the DM directly control the item. If they are inherently rare, then they become a finite resource. Sure, they might go nova with 6 in one fight, but that's all they get for the rest of the campaign.
Cost. If they can't afford them, then they can't abuse them. Basically the same as availability, but the players have a little more control.
Action Economy. Tie them to an action, or "casting time". Basically, how long does it take to "light the fuse"? Similar to concentration, it limits them to one per turn.
How is this functionally different from a scroll? A potion?
I don't understand this distinction you're making:
The effect is the spell, the spell is the effect. What's the difference here?
I got quotes!
I like the idea of a rechargable version of this with a once per day limitation. The easy fixes for it are to make them worth considerably more rare (you can't spam them if you don't have them) and only allowing AOE spells to be put inside them (to remove the need for way too much explanation for the item). Other than that, golden!