Invisibility magic items seem overvalued

Khisanth the Ancient · May 22, 2019

Why is a potion of invisibility "very rare" and a ring of invisibility "legendary"? Invisibility is only a 2nd level spell. Other potions that mimic low-level spells are much more common.

Also, given that invisibility is such a low-level spell, people will know that it exists in the world, and the defenders of anything really important will have considered it (with the exception of a world where even low-level spellcasters are super rare, but that's not the default).

Invisibility is mostly really powerful in fiction because it's rare or new, and people don't expect it or take precautions against it.

Radaceus · May 22, 2019

The Potion of Invisibility being very rare, perhaps has to do with the ingredients needed to make it.

However, regarding the Ring of Invisibility being legendary, this is due to it allowing its wearer to cast Invisibility repeatedly, as an action.

furthering on the above, invisible as a condition is a huge tactical advantage in 5E game mechanics, therefore it belies the need for it to be harder to come by.

Fanaelialae · May 22, 2019

Also keep in mind that, whereas the spell requires concentration, the potion and ring do not.

Khisanth the Ancient · May 26, 2019

Radaceus said:
However, regarding the Ring of Invisibility being legendary, this is due to it allowing its wearer to cast Invisibility repeatedly, as an action.

Well, sure, but it's still only a 2nd level utility spell, and you still become visible when you attack... and then it takes another action before you're invisible again...

It just doesn't really seem to compare with other legendary items on either the cool factor or the power factor.

furthering on the above, invisible as a condition is a huge tactical advantage in 5E game mechanics, therefore it belies the need for it to be harder to come by.

But it isn't really hard to come by, since it's a 2nd level spell.

Radaceus · May 26, 2019

Khisanth the Ancient said:
Radaceus said:

However, regarding the Ring of Invisibility being legendary, this is due to it allowing its wearer to cast Invisibility repeatedly, as an action.

Click to expand...

Well, sure, but it's still only a 2nd level utility spell, and you still become visible when you attack... and then it takes another action before you're invisible again...

It just doesn't really seem to compare with other legendary items on either the cool factor or the power factor.

furthering on the above, invisible as a condition is a huge tactical advantage in 5E game mechanics, therefore it belies the need for it to be harder to come by.

Click to expand...

But it isn't really hard to come by, since it's a 2nd level spell.

the Ring of Invisibility allows its wearer* to become invisible, not cast the 2nd level spell. And it allows you to do this all day long, as an action, without concentrating, similar to any creature that has the at will ability to turn invisible (i.e. some Yugoloths, Pixies, etc). That is far superior to any spellcaster burning up his spell slots, and maintianing concentration on the '2nd level utility spell.'

*any class, or being with an appendage for rings, can wear a Ring of Invisibility, no need to be able to cast the spell.

Sure, let's make a Ring of Invisibility an 'easier to come by' item, and while we are at it, lets give a similar accessibility for all the non spell casters to also acquire a Rings of Spell Storing. Spellcasters can retire on the income from recharging said rings, while the martial classes to all the heavy lifting...

DEFCON 1 · May 26, 2019

Another thing to note is that the rarity of items are not necessarily based on how easy or hard the spells are to get normally... they are based upon what the designers decided were genuinely how rare they thing the items should be in a default campaign.

A Ring of Invisibility is such an iconic magic item (in literature if not D&D) that I suspect they didn't want to make them commonplace in your average D&D campaign. They wanted it to maintain its legendary status, a la the 'One Ring'. It's as much story as it is mechanics, which is why many rarities are given as they are.

Now granted when you couple it with the magic item prices in the DMG it does make for some illogical situations (where a Potion of Invisibility could "cost more" than many much more useful continuous magic items per their chart)... but that's where you as a DM have to decide whether your campaign is defaulting to the default or if you are going to make your own choices. So if you think a Ring of Invisibility shouldn't be that big a deal, then you can easily ignore or change its rarity to fit your campaign.

Radaceus · May 26, 2019

Or, one could simply make a variant version of a magic item ( similar to the Variant option for wands on DMG pg 141), in this case a Ring of (limited) Invisibilty which bestows the same ability as the legendary counterpart but has a limited number of uses. Or even make something like a Wand of Invisibility ( with 7 charges/ 3 uses per day/etc) which allows its wielder to cast the 2nd level spell.

Fenris-77 · May 27, 2019

If it has the potential to break a game then it needs to be legendary. If you don't think a ring of invisibility has that potential then you haven't seen a creative player with unfettered access to invisibility in action. At higher levels it's less of an issue because more options will exist to deal with it (bulk true seeing etc) but at lower and medium levels it's really powerful.

Even something seemingly much less powerful, like cast at will Disguise Self, can be immensely powerful in the hands of a creative player. In both cases it's much like the school of illusion - the impact on the game comes far more from the player than it does from the mechanics of the magic in question.