D&D 5E Dissapointed with Attunement

[Jeff Carlsen]

When I read about attunement in Legends & Lore, it sounded awesome. Some magic items would have secret abilities, and the right person, who performed the right ritual or sacrifice, could bond with that magical item and unlock it's mysteries.

Instead, it's just a ten minute period of concentration to prevent swapping items. This is a seriously missed opportunity.

Each of these items should have an attunement section that describes the specific method of attuning that item to you and the benefits it grants. Some items might have multiple levels of attunement, requiring greater and more dramatic sacrifices.

 

[FireLance]

While I found the ten-minute attunement process to be acceptable, this is a far more interesting way to do it. While having a specific attunement process, action or deed for every single attunable magic item may be overdoing it a little, I can see this being the standard approach for Legendary and Artifact-level magic items.

 

[AeroDm]

Instead of every weapon having an attunement section, I'd prefer a sidebar giving ideas for how to vary it up and a list of 20-50 ideas to get you started. That way if a group decides to hand waive and just go with the 10 minute rule they don't lose pages from every book.

Also, I'm not a fan of the choice of 10 minutes. Ten minutes is one of those time frames that don't allow for interesting things to happen. If it was one minute, then you could have the sequence where the players have to fight through the minions to get to the evil Wizard before he attunes with the artifact. If it was a series of skill checks people could conceivably do it during combat albeit with some risk. At 10 minutes, you're basically saying, attunement is no big deal, just do it out of combat. That isn't the most fun default I can imagine; it might be the least fun default.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I like the atunement idea. It prevents character from using too many too powerful items without assigning slots. It also prevents characters from swapping.

On the other hand, your idea of accepting greater sacrifices for enhanced atunement seems great: Hand and eye of vecna have just a harsher requirement for the attunement. Your hand and your eye. Seems ok.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

Instead of every weapon having an attunement section, I'd prefer a sidebar giving ideas for how to vary it up and a list of 20-50 ideas to get you started. That way if a group decides to hand waive and just go with the 10 minute rule they don't lose pages from every book.

While I think it's important for individual magic items to have their own attunement rules, the idea of a chart for attunement options that goes along with the other charts in the document is a great idea.

 

[GreyICE]

I like the atunement idea. It prevents character from using too many too powerful items without assigning slots. It also prevents characters from swapping.

On the other hand, your idea of accepting greater sacrifices for enhanced atunement seems great: Hand and eye of vecna have just a harsher requirement for the attunement. Your hand and your eye. Seems ok.

The Head of Vecna, on the other hand...

 

[Yora]

I looked over attunement rules and pretty much immediately decided that I won't be using them. There doesn't seem to be any point to them except for keeping PCs from using a lot of powerful magic items at the same time. But then you don't need to give them to the PCs in the first place.

 

[Zaukrie]

I have not read the rules yet, but if all they are is "wait 10 minutes", that is awful. Give me items that unlock in various ways, give me charts of ways various items can be attuned.

 

[nightwalker450]

I think for the most part, I'll be overlooking the number of items you can attune to. If I feel it's an issue, I'll just throw in a Possessive item, that will be jealous of your other attuned items.

Items should also be limited to only allowing one person to attune with them at a time, so it isn't so much 10 minutes to remove attunement, as it will take someone else to possess the item... Which leads to another minor option - "Freely Given" attunement, item attunes instantly with someone but only if freely given by the previous owner, otherwise attunement takes ridiculously long time...

Overall though I really love attunement, mainly because it's prompted me to think how a character will bond with each item I provide. Right now I'm plotting a necklace that strangles you for 3.5 minutes if you survive you attune, if not wight in 1d4 days. Just need to figure out how to portray the item as meant for someone with a decent constitution, in case finding it on a fairly fragile looking wight isn't enough to get the point across.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Yeah, those two ways are the ways it mostly falls down for me.

If you want it to limit simultaneous magic items, I don't know why you're not just telling the DM not to give the party that many items. Occam's Razor that noise, kids.

If you want it to be an awesome story moment, ten minutes of french kissing your vorpal sword isn't going to do that. Unique quests and awesome uses and unusual storyline moments will, but that's not how the mechanics work at the moment...and you probably don't even NEED mechanics for that. "This power only works when you are a dwarf, this power only works when you fight a giant, this power only works when you've killed the Frost Giant Jarl," whatever. You don't need a fancypants label-and-rule for it, do you?

And before anyone says that french kissing a vorpal sword is absurd, I'd ask if you accurately remember some of your past relationships.