Tag: 5e-D&D

I recently read Healing Potions Are Dumb (and how I fix them), and enjoyed both its analysis and proposed solution. Then an old thought came back to me.

I never played the 4th edition of Dungeons & Dragons, but one concept from it always impressed me: Healing Surges. Specifically, that a Healing Surge restores one-quarter of a character’s maximum Hit Points. No more risk of bad dice rolls on healing spells.

That fixed proportion can easily be ported to apply to Potions of Healing in D&D 5e—in any edition, really, but especially in 5e where combat damage frequently outpaces healing abilities. This is a middle ground between the current rule and Nerdwerd’s maximalist option.

Backlinks

• Healing Potions – Ruprechts RPG Blog

Advanced Dungeons & Dragon’s Unearthed Arcana has an interesting magical item that I have never seen used: the Anything Sword.

As with several other things in Unearthed Arcana, this power comes with restrictions that make it almost not worth having. Ahem. 😀

This item has great potential for roleplay. So I am going to update it for use with D&D 5e. The biggest change I am making is removing the impermanence.

Anything Sword

Weapon (any sword), Legendary

This sword has a base type (e.g. short sword, longsword, et. al.) and a base +1 magical bonus. While drawn and held, you can use an action to have it transform into another magic sword. This is limited by the rarity of the new form:

• A Uncommon sword, any number of times per day
• A Rare sword, once per day (resetting at dawn)
• A Very Rare or Legendary sword, once per day (resetting at dawn)

It may stay in its new form indefinitely. If still in a Rare, Very Rare, or Legendary form at dawn, it remains in that form but it also expends the appropriate usage for the new day. Note that the sword type counts as part of its form. For example, it cannot change from a Vorpal longsword to a Vorpal greatsword as the latter would be a second Legendary form.

This can be taken further.

Anything Item

Wondrous Item, Legendary

This item has the base form of any Uncommon magical item. While held, you can use an action to have it transform into another magical item. This is limited by the rarity of the new form:

• A Uncommon item, any number of times per day
• A Rare item, once per day (resetting at dawn)
• A Very Rare or Legendary item, once per day (resetting at dawn)

It may stay in its new form indefinitely. If still in a Rare, Very Rare, or Legendary form at dawn, it remains in that form but it also expends the appropriate usage for the new day. Note that the item type/size counts as part of its form just like the Anything Sword.

So it can be all magical items but only one at a time, and only two big ones a day. Very powerful but I do not believe abusively so. Properly legendary.

FYI, the Elemental Blade of Fire is an Anything Item. Its base form is a Ring of Warmth. 😀

I have lately been pondering cavalry lances in D&D. I never see them used. (I never see mounted combat, either, but nevermind that now.) With a charge attack scoring double damage, a lance is the most powerful melee weapon. Yet no one uses them.

Although there has never been a rule for it, one reason I never used a lance was because they usually break—are supposed to break. A Player Character needs to carry more than one. (Missed opportunity to have a person-of-hench as a squire.)

A magical lance that does not break is a danger to its wielder. It should be impermanent in the same way magical arrows are. (You should find 1d4 lances +1 in a treasure trove. 😁)

My pondering led me to the conclusion that the best application of magic here is overcoming the need for spare lances; all my Player Character truly wants is another, unbroken lance. A lance that magically reassembles after breaking is too fanciful for my tastes. Conjuring a new lance is the simplest solution. Since the lances are not the permanent magical item, something else needs to perform the conjuring.

And so I give you: the Gauntlet of Lances!

Gauntlet of Lances

Wondrous Item, Rare

A gauntlet for the right hand that creates in its grip a nonmagical wooden lance (of appropriate size).

Letting go of the (presumed broken) lance causes all pieces of it to disappear.

Game Master’s discretion as to what level of action is required for a wearer to conjure a new lance.