brehobit
Explorer
Well, more in the house rules side but...
I've always played inteligent magic items a bit differently than most. First of all, it depends upon where the inteligence came from. I've seen three basic sources:
For the first, the item would have the skills, feats, class abilities and personallity of the NPC, at least as much as possible. For the 2nd and 3rd, the peronallity is usually fairly blank, but in the 2nd case it has some of the old personallity (and that "old" personallity will continue to show up more and more over time, tempered with a new personallity formed as time passes.
If you treat the new item (in the 2nd or 3rd case) like a person, it will tend to become a person. I've got 1 NPC who basically is taking a few years off to "raise" her Axe.
For vision and stuff I've always let the item use its wielder's senses. Without a wielder most items IMC can't see, but a few have a crystal designed to act as an eye.
For sleep, I've always had these items rest. They don't usually sleep per se (although those of the 1st type might I suppose) but they do have down time when they just sort of zone out.
One staff (an Elven mystic thurge who got taken as a "maiden sacrifice" by an Evil NPC and ended up in a magic staff.... long story) is actually a fairly powerful noble in one of my games, a rank she gained after the whole "stuck in a staff" thing. She has a "staff" (old joke real fast) who carry her around and act as her eyes, ears, companions and aids.... In combat, she is huge and really hard to hurt as long as her wielder stays up....
Just some different thought on this.
Mark
I've always played inteligent magic items a bit differently than most. First of all, it depends upon where the inteligence came from. I've seen three basic sources:
- A once living NPC (perhaps psuedo-lichdom, perhaps a human sacrifice, perhaps a magical mistake by a wizard)
- An other-planer intelligence sucked into the weapon
- An artifical intelligence.
For the first, the item would have the skills, feats, class abilities and personallity of the NPC, at least as much as possible. For the 2nd and 3rd, the peronallity is usually fairly blank, but in the 2nd case it has some of the old personallity (and that "old" personallity will continue to show up more and more over time, tempered with a new personallity formed as time passes.
If you treat the new item (in the 2nd or 3rd case) like a person, it will tend to become a person. I've got 1 NPC who basically is taking a few years off to "raise" her Axe.
For vision and stuff I've always let the item use its wielder's senses. Without a wielder most items IMC can't see, but a few have a crystal designed to act as an eye.
For sleep, I've always had these items rest. They don't usually sleep per se (although those of the 1st type might I suppose) but they do have down time when they just sort of zone out.
One staff (an Elven mystic thurge who got taken as a "maiden sacrifice" by an Evil NPC and ended up in a magic staff.... long story) is actually a fairly powerful noble in one of my games, a rank she gained after the whole "stuck in a staff" thing. She has a "staff" (old joke real fast) who carry her around and act as her eyes, ears, companions and aids.... In combat, she is huge and really hard to hurt as long as her wielder stays up....
Just some different thought on this.
Mark
