Cursed Items

[TwinBahamut]

Stormbringer is Elric's sword... *snip*

Ah, thanks. That particular story is pretty much from before my time, so I didn't recognize it.

Technically, it wasn't cursed, as Elric could rid himself of it, but he was practically helpless without it, as he was extraordinarily physically decrepit and illness-ridden without its strength. I won't give away any further spoilers for the books...

It is only not cursed if you use the definition that cursed items can't be thrown away. I don't think that is a valid definition of a curse, so I am perfectly happy to say that Stormbringer is a good cursed item.

Now to bring out an example that will certainly get me accused of being a blashphemer again.

In the mange/anime Naruto (I can hear the howls of pain already...) one of the characters is affected by a "curse mark", a powerful curse on his body that manifests itself as a tatoo on his neck. When activated, it increases all of his abilities and gives him a lot of power, but turns him into a sadistic, heartless monster. As long at it is active, it eats away at his body, and if it remains active long enough, it will just kill him.

A thing like that probably fits better under the idea of a deal with the devil rather than a cursed item, but the two are pretty much the same thing, so I think it counts.

 

[VirgilCaine]

This.

And remove "Remove Curse" from the game. Make it an explicit part of the rules that cursed items can only be removed / given up under story-appropriate circumstances. Freedom from them must be earned (even at 20th level).

You can do that already--you just have to be...hmmm.

What's the best word?

Railroading power-tripping DM?

Yeah, that's a lot more polite than what I first thought.

If I'm not going to have many magic items in the first place, I'd rather ditch items I don't want at all.

Err, what is Stormbringer?

Blackrazor (from White Plume Mountain) is D&D's version of Stormbringer.

It's the "top item" from WPM, an intelligent CN bastard sword with the special purpose of sucking souls.

Unfortunately, it requires you to kill something of every few days or it starts getting antsy and trying to dominate you, and will find someone of your own race and kill them.

If you do kill something with Blackrazor, you gain it's HP for a while, IIRC hours to days, and gain it's levels as bonus hit dice.

If you hit an undead with it, BR drains some of/all of YOUR levels into the undead.

It also has some other nifty powers, but giving you gobs of HP and bonus hit dice is the important one.

In my campaign, a True Neutral Locathah Lich tortured Blackrazor for information on the interior of the Ghost Tower of Inverness.

White Plume Mountain isn't a bad module, but the three magic weapons are really, really bad treasure items--Wave requires conversion to a new deity, Whelm requires a dwarf to go and fight goblins and giants. Blackrazor, well...he doesn't play well with others.

 

[Lord Zardoz]

Cursed items should be rare, interesting, and plot/story driven.

Many people say the exact same thing about regular magic items.

I mostly agree with most of that statement, but with one caveat. Cursed items should only be as rare, in the greater scheme of things, as the more interesting magic items. Not as common as say, a +1 sword, but they should show up as often as say, a Sword +2 Bane sword, or a Bag of Holding or Boots of Striding and Springing. Please note that I am still looking at a curse as a way for someone to keep an item from falling into the wrong hands as much as anything else. If your going to create a kick ass item, why not throw a some safeguards to keep unwanted people from using it?

I do not think that cursed items should all be plot driven. The examples of Wave, Whelm, and Blackrazor, are great examples of what a plot driven item of any sort ought to be.

But as an alternative to a player who is decked out like a Christmas tree all the time, I think a cursed item is like those old decorations that used lit candles. They look just as nice on that tree initially, but if your not careful. the tree tends to catch fire.

If I were to hand out a cursed item, I would expect that the players would mostly not use it, but would also want to keep the thing handy. Most of the time they may run around with their normal Ring of Protection +2. But when the crap hits the fan and it is time to pull out all the stops, I want them to have to take a moment and consider taking the Cursed Ring of Protection +3 that also grants Damage Reduction at the risk of always having an enemies critical hits confirmed. Enemies do not crit that often, but an ill timed crit threat could end them.

Items of that sort may not be essential to the plot of the adventure, but they do provide interesting opportunities for character development.

END COMMUNICATION