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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ruin Explorer" data-source="post: 6320512" data-attributes="member: 18">Er... er... Henry... you've described an entirely relative item (even it's name calls it's relative nature out!) which obviously more useful to stronger people (vastly so) as being similar to absolute items which are expressly less useful to stronger people.Bad example, maybe? Because it really seems like Thor is rolling more 3E-style than 2E-style there. Even if someone like Loki stole Thor's belt, it seems unlikely that he'd be as strong as un-belted Thor, because strength-doubling and all that (pretty sure Loki is less than half Thor's strength naked).For me, I like the absolute items because, as a DM, you know what you're giving them, no more, no less, and because they were fun in 2E. So I don't really disagree with liking them. I just think that's a really odd example.Elsewhere people mentioned that items boosting stuff other than strength were "just symmetry", and not found in myths/legends, and I don't think that's actually true. It's just that D&D's conception of strength matches up very well with the mythical conception, and the way the word is used, whereas all it's other stats don't really match up so precisely - agility and dexterity tend to be separate concepts (speed is often separate from both, too). You see plenty of mythical stuff that made people tougher, or prettier, or more attractive/beguiling (often this is treated in a negative way and associated with women, I think it's safe to say there's a strong element of a very gendered, very patriarchal society behind a lot of that), or even more wise. It's not always an item, of course (Odin gained wisdom from his quasi-crucifixion), but it easily could be. I do think D&D is kind of "missing a trick" by not having more rewards like Odin's crucifixion - you could have a sort of "one-use item" in the form of a magic tree or whatever (obviously, I wouldn't go that literal, but still). Early editions had the books of stat increasing, but they were a little dull. You could also make them raise a stat to a fixed point - maybe the Odintree grants you a fixed 18 WIS or whatever.</blockquote>

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