Source
r/RPGdesign•
NarrativeCrit

Living Enchanted Items with motivations

Game Play

The question, "What if xyz was alive?" is low hanging fruit for TTRPG hijinks. Its up there with, "What if xyz was magical?" and, "What if xyz was large and dangerous?"

Recently I decided enchanted items would have consciousness and motive in my lore. In fact, items grow stronger as the owner builds loyalty by aligning motives and actions with the item.

A misused or long-abandoned enchanted item may grow hateful (the opposite of loyal) and maybe even compel the owner the way The One Ring does in LOTR. Do as the item wishes to decrease its hatred, which decreases its power and its hold over you in equal measure. Or you can pass it off to someone else whom it will accept.

That's it. Items now give PCs and NPCs motivations and missions. Instant hit at my table. Easy leverage for moral themes and drama.

Example: My player was first wronged and maimed by someone trying to appease a guilt-punishing dagger. The man then gave it to him. The Player punished (killed) some sinful people he didn't have to, morally corrupting himself but reducing the item's hatred. Now he has an item with no hatred at all but his own character has been warped and he realizes it's himself that deserves punishment. This is not even the main conflict, but it is for his character.

Ever tried living items? What did you do? What ideas do you have?

Posted Mar 17, 2022, 2:42 AM UTC

2010
dndencounters•

There's a pretty cool game about this concept from the perspective of the enchanted item: Wield by John Wick

5
cf_skeeve•

I haven't seen this revisited well since games started to use soft compels (that can be ignored with metacurrencies like willpower) instead of hard compels (your character must do this, because rules). I think this leads to a more tense mechanic, especially if those metacurrencies are useful for other powerful abilities.

2
NarrativeCritOP•

Yeah, I like soft compels and my players often ask for them in the stories we play. Madnesses especially.

2
Phlogistonedeaf•

I've read Elric of course, and have seen clunky addon rules for, in particular, demon swords, in Sinkadus and Fenix (Swedish gaming magazines) I believe, but never tried the rules -- because I thought they were clunky.

"Instant hit at my table" -- What system does your table use? How do the mechanics mesh? Please tell us more.

2
NarrativeCritOP•

In brief, these items are treated like followers.

My system is OSR-adjacent with story game elements. Stats are just die sizes that step up and down, so Loyalty and Hate are die sizes for the weapon. D20 > d12 > 10 etc. The bigger the die, the more effective.

Reputation is a stat as well, and the total Loyalty of all your followers (items included) cannot exceed your Reputation size. Reputation is the only die where I can forsee needing to stack multiple dice as it grows, though playing with it for a year nobody has grown Reputation to even a d20. You can lose Reputation for doing dishonorable things after all.

The edge case here is that an item's hatred can grow and exceed your Reputation limits with other followers. If that happens, it's other followers' Loyalty that takes a hit.

2
ShyBaldur•

In my system I have soft magic (ancient, before scientific method came about, more to do with feeling and emotion) and hard magic (recent, developed due to scientific method, rote, easily replicable, exact same result)

The new magic has no feeling to it, use up mana, same result occurs, but sometimes people find the soft magic ancient items, and they have a personality.

You have to figure out what an old artifact wants in order to bond to it, once you do it will do as you ask most of the time, sometimes it won't, sometimes it'll do something for you without being asked.

Some artifacts are cursed and subtly affect you or others close to you.

The powerful artifacts can speak to you in your mind, or take your mind places to show you things or introduce themselves.

But you have to be careful, bonds can be broken, or you have to give the artifact away to a new owner.

A lot of the times the low level artifacts represent an emotion that went into an object. The scarf of warmth always protects the owner from any cold, but it only works when you put it on someone else, like a mother covering up their child.

The higher level artifacts are the items other powerful people used to wear, and a part of them still inhabits the item and retains all of their memories like an echo of the past. Some of those people were good, some weren't.

2
NarrativeCritOP•

Very cool thanks for sharing! What's one of fhe best items you've brought to the game, and what is the one that works led worst?

2
ShyBaldur•

Dunno! my players havent gotten far enough to get any artifacts quite yet.

I can tell you that theyve found great uses for ice wall, and have learned how to abuse a number of spells.

2
klok_kaosLead Designer: Project Chimera•

I mean I don't really consider this a new concept... I think the first time I saw and used it was probably in my early days of playing 3 decades ago.

I think the approach has merit, but it can be easily overdone like any trope, and I'd be willing to be this has some cleverly named TVtropes page somewhere.

That said, it can be fun, like any other concept if well managed at the table.

I don't see it as new or groundbreaking as a concept, but it doesn't have to be, I'm just mentioning because I feel like the idea is new to you (hence the excitement) but it's not gonna be to most folks.

personality weapons have been around if I think back the first time I saw them was either ADnD either first or second ed? So like 80s or 90s... and even then you can make an argument for consequences with animated magic items acting of their own accord going back to fantasia in 1940 before even chainmail was made and before most anyone here was likely born, and there's probably other examples, but it's hard to say Disney isn't at least a cultural icon, as with mickey mouse. Plus you mentioned LoTR, which goes back to 1955 I think?

Regardless it's been around. I've done it. It can be fun, like any plot point.

-1
NarrativeCritOP•

There's the sword in the stone for that matter haha. My premise was that it's low hanging fruit (accessible, obvious stuff to go for), but the way I implemented it has been juicy and I want to know how others have done it

Living magical items seem like folk tale fodder, and to my thinking folk tales are a good genre for TTRPGs.

0