D&D 5E Monsters w/ Magic Items?

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Where are you getting any of that? From the DMG

Wearing and Wielding Items
Using a magic item’s properties might mean wearing or wielding it. A magic item meant to be worn must be donned in the intended fashion: boots go on the feet, gloves on the hands, hats and helmets on the head, and rings on the finger. Magic armor must be donned, a shield strapped to the arm, a cloak fastened about the shoulders. A weapon must be held in hand.

In most cases, a magic item that’s meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build.​

It goes on from there to talk about wearing rings on tentacles, etc. You wear a ring. Therefore it can fit a creature regardless of size or build. If I'm missing something let me know, it wouldn't be the first time.

Well, guess what? I asked Crawford and he gave a great non-answer. He quote this line from DMG p140-141:

"When a nonhumanoid tries to wear an item, use your discretion as to whether the item functions as intended."

So if you as a DM say yes it can resize, or if I say no it cannot resize to just anything, then it is DM discretion and not house ruling it, because the rules do not specifically say yes or no.

 

[Oofta]

Well, guess what? I asked Crawford and he gave a great non-answer. He quote this line from DMG p140-141:

"When a nonhumanoid tries to wear an item, use your discretion as to whether the item functions as intended."

So if you as a DM say yes it can resize, or if I say no it cannot resize to just anything, then it is DM discretion and not house ruling it, because the rules do not specifically say yes or no.

DM always has the last say, and there are "Rare exceptions". Their specific example is "A ring placed on a tentacle might work, but a yuan-ti with a snakelike tail instead of legs has no way to wear magic boots."

This has nothing to do with your very specific restrictions which are not mentioned anywhere in the book. You can always run things the way you want of course, but as a general rule items resize.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

DM always has the last say, and there are "Rare exceptions". Their specific example is "A ring placed on a tentacle might work, but a yuan-ti with a snakelike tail instead of legs has no way to wear magic boots."

This has nothing to do with your very specific restrictions which are not mentioned anywhere in the book. You can always run things the way you want of course, but as a general rule items resize.

Then I guess you need to go to the Monster Manual to further clarify this for yourself and others. A head, a torso, two legs, and two arms does not automatically make something a Humanoid. It may be human-shaped, but not Humanoid. So any creature in the MM that does not have the mechanical descriptor Humanoid in the stat block is a non-Humanoid for determining if it can wear a magic item. And that is pure DM discretion. Sprites are not Humanoid. Giants are not Humanoid. So armor or a ring sizing to fit them is purely DM discretion, not something automatically allowed by a rule in the DMG.

 

[Maxperson]

Where are you getting any of that? From the DMG

Wearing and Wielding Items
Using a magic item’s properties might mean wearing or wielding it. A magic item meant to be worn must be donned in the intended fashion: boots go on the feet, gloves on the hands, hats and helmets on the head, and rings on the finger. Magic armor must be donned, a shield strapped to the arm, a cloak fastened about the shoulders. A weapon must be held in hand.

In most cases, a magic item that’s meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build.​

It goes on from there to talk about wearing rings on tentacles, etc. You wear a ring. Therefore it can fit a creature regardless of size or build. If I'm missing something let me know, it wouldn't be the first time.

No, you got it right.

 

[Maxperson]

Well, guess what? I asked Crawford and he gave a great non-answer. He quote this line from DMG p140-141:

"When a nonhumanoid tries to wear an item, use your discretion as to whether the item functions as intended."

So if you as a DM say yes it can resize, or if I say no it cannot resize to just anything, then it is DM discretion and not house ruling it, because the rules do not specifically say yes or no.

Actually, what the rules say is yes unless the DM decides otherwise, that's what, "In most cases, a magic item that's meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build." means. It then goes on to give an example of what MIGHT make the DM decide otherwise. that is very different from "not saying yes or no."

 

[Maxperson]

Then I guess you need to go to the Monster Manual to further clarify this for yourself and others.

Why would we need to go to another book when the DMG clearly says what happens. The magic item resizes unless the DM decides otherwise. That's crystal clear from the DMG. The only reason you would need to go to the MM would be if you were looking for a reason to deny the resizing.

 

[Oofta]

Then I guess you need to go to the Monster Manual to further clarify this for yourself and others. A head, a torso, two legs, and two arms does not automatically make something a Humanoid. It may be human-shaped, but not Humanoid. So any creature in the MM that does not have the mechanical descriptor Humanoid in the stat block is a non-Humanoid for determining if it can wear a magic item. And that is pure DM discretion. Sprites are not Humanoid. Giants are not Humanoid. So armor or a ring sizing to fit them is purely DM discretion, not something automatically allowed by a rule in the DMG.

I just quoted specific rules from the DMG. A tentacle might be able to wear a ring, a creature without feet couldn't wear boots (big shock there). There's no mention of being classified as humanoid.

Of course as a DM if you want to say that magical armor made for giants only works for giants that's fine, just like drow armor may only work for elves. But at that point you're making a specific rule that overrides the general rule and default assumption.

As a DM if you want to give the bad guys an item you don't want the PCs to have there are many ways of doing it. I don't allow evil PCs so sometimes I have magic items only usable by evil characters. In previous editions drow items decayed in sunlight and so on.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

I just quoted specific rules from the DMG. A tentacle might be able to wear a ring, a creature without feet couldn't wear boots (big shock there). There's no mention of being classified as humanoid.

This is not a rule, it is a suggestion.

Of course as a DM if you want to say that magical armor made for giants only works for giants that's fine, just like drow armor may only work for elves. But at that point you're making a specific rule that overrides the general rule and default assumption.

The dwarf and Drow examples in the DMG are there to show how one might restrict something from all humanoids to specific humanoids. That does nothing for humanoid versus non-humanoid. The DMG says the wearing of a magic item by a non-humanoid is purely DM discretion and I use the obvious method to determine that, whether a creature is listed as a humanoid in the MM or not. All PC races, for now, are automatically humanoid, and do not need any DM discretion in general. Giants are not classified as Humanoid, either in the MM or in the Ranger class for it's chosen enemies, so your use of Giant as an example is not valid.

So that is the rule in the book. Any non-humanoid creature is DM discretion whether a worn magic item works as intended or not. The rule does not say I have to let them work.

 

[Oofta]

This is not a rule, it is a suggestion.



The dwarf and Drow examples in the DMG are there to show how one might restrict something from all humanoids to specific humanoids. That does nothing for humanoid versus non-humanoid. The DMG says the wearing of a magic item by a non-humanoid is purely DM discretion and I use the obvious method to determine that, whether a creature is listed as a humanoid in the MM or not. All PC races, for now, are automatically humanoid, and do not need any DM discretion in general. Giants are not classified as Humanoid, either in the MM or in the Ranger class for it's chosen enemies, so your use of Giant as an example is not valid.

So that is the rule in the book. Any non-humanoid creature is DM discretion whether a worn magic item works as intended or not. The rule does not say I have to let them work.

The DMG is clear

Unless a ring’s description says otherwise, a ring must be worn on a finger, or a similar digit
...
In most cases, a magic item that’s meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build.
...
Rare exceptions exist.​

There is no mention of "humanoid" anywhere. You're making what they call a rare exception the rule.

That's your prerogative, I'm not going to argue with you about this any more.

 

[GreenTengu]

Where are you getting any of that? From the DMG

Wearing and Wielding Items
Using a magic item’s properties might mean wearing or wielding it. A magic item meant to be worn must be donned in the intended fashion: boots go on the feet, gloves on the hands, hats and helmets on the head, and rings on the finger. Magic armor must be donned, a shield strapped to the arm, a cloak fastened about the shoulders. A weapon must be held in hand.

In most cases, a magic item that’s meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build.​

It goes on from there to talk about wearing rings on tentacles, etc. You wear a ring. Therefore it can fit a creature regardless of size or build. If I'm missing something let me know, it wouldn't be the first time.

You aren't missing anything, but do understand that rules are meant to be a guideline and the ultimate Rule 0 is that the DM has the final word.

The intention of this rule is no doubt that because PCs can come in a variety of shapes and sizes, generally one wants to avoid the situation where each armor piece needs to be given a particular size. If you are someone who has ever gained or lost a lot of weight or even just grown during childhood, I think we can all understand that it can be so very easy for a piece of clothing to simply no longer fit us adequately. It would be quite odd for a Dwarf to wear armor fitted to an Elf body and even more so for a Bugbear to put on the clothing that once belonged to a Gnome.

So if the DM goes and gives a particular size for each size of armor found, they would be offering the part a lot of stuff that they presumably could simply not use. By being vague about it to a point, it side-steps that issue.


Granted, the issue here is that what is stated in the DM's guide does allow for the wonky situation... According to the rules you cite there, it is correct to say that a huge size blue dragon can put on a helm or a breastplate (although how natural armor works in 5E, I think this would not increase the armor class any as it would not stack with the natural armor and the natural armor would be equal or better) and then if dealt with, a Gnome can swipe the helmet and breastplate and put it on.

But I have to think that the majority of DMs would agree that such a thing would be completely immersion breaking and would rule that such a thing is not possible. If they understand that the helm and breastplate are meant to be rewards for the PCs for defeating the dragon, they would just say that they are an unspecified PC size and certainly not dragon size, they would just be in the Dragon's hoarded pile of shinies... If they somehow decided to rule that the dragon was going to use these (despite the fact the dragons are not generally known for wearing armor or helmets unless placed upon them by a human) then they would be dragon size and thus simply not usable by a PC.

So while the DMG does technically in black and white present the implication that universally all magical items are able to resize and reshape themselves to fit any body without limit... I just don't think that DMs would generally rule that this would be the case in practice, nor would PCs generally expect such a thing to be possible.

The entire DMG is completely optional rules and hardly any DMs use much at all out of it.