What have been the most fun/impactful magic items you've found/made for your players?

[SkidAce]

Since all HP come back on a long rest, did you mean this works on a short rest? Not sure what this is supposed to do.

You healed to full overnight.

You had some battles this morning, expect some more, and are low on hit points.

Use the half heal spell to regain hp. You can only do this once.

Really handy if you don't have a cleric.

 

[Sunseeker]

Sadly, as much as I enjoy creating magic items, they see little use. Oh well, here's a few of my favorites:

The Forge Hammer: a Large size Maul, considered an "epic" weapon for purposes of damage reduction. For every full 24 hours you spend hammering raw materials with it, you can create a +1 (or increase the +X) item. Constitution check required for living (and certain undead) creatures not to pass out for every 24 hours after the first, exhaustion rules apply as normal. No crafting check required to produce the item. For anything that is "special" ie: does something new or unique with no clear +X rating, the DM gets to determine how long you need to craft for. Specific raw materials were unnecessary, the Hammer would "make it work" with whatever you made it out of, but you needed roughly-equal mass of material. The Hammer was semi-intelligent and had a dislike for evil-aligned, who would need to make a Will save every 24 hours to craft anything.
----Sadly, my players never did anything exciting with this, and never really put together that if you were some kind of undead or immortal that did not need to eat or drink or sleep you could craft absurdly powerful items.

Armor of the Eternal Soldier: Cursed armor broken down into 6 parts: Left & Right Arm, Left & Right Leg, Torso, Helm. Each piece of the armor appears as a hollowed-out replica of the respective body part (though the helm has no face), which when held will immediately adjust to the size of the holder. When worn the wearer first needs to make a Will save to beat the curse. If the save is beat, nothing happens. If the save is failed the appropriate body part then fuses with the wearer, draining the life out of the respective limb (but leaving the bones), leaving you with a Winter Soldier-style limb. Each limb has the following effects:
Arm, left or right: +2 Str, -1 Dex, +1 Con, +1 to AC, +1 DR/-, can morph into a shield, any non-reach melee weapon or can fire an energy burst (2d6 per armor piece worn) from the hand (more T-X than Iron Man), grants advantage on all Strength checks (or +5 in non-5E).
Leg, left or right: +2 Str, -1 Dex, +1 Con, +1 to AC, +1 DR/-, increases speed by +5, grants advantage (or +5 in non-5E) on all Endurance checks.
Torso: +4 Str, +4 Con, -2 Dex +2 to AC, +2 DR/-, wearer no longer requires food or drink or to breath and stops aging, cannot be worn before both arms and legs, you can be affected by spells that affect constructs.
Helm: +2 Con, -1 Dex, +2 to AC, +2 DR/-, wearer is immune to gaze, petrification and polymorph effects and no longer needs to sleep. Cannot be worn until all the other pieces are worn.
Though separated the pieces of the armor call to each other, once a day the wearer must make a will save to not start wandering in the direction of one the nearest piece. Wearer takes a -2 penalty to this check per piece of the Armor worn. The wearer cannot voluntarily remove any piece of the Armor and if the Torso or Helm are removed the wearer immediately dies. The wearer gains no benefit of wearing any armor once the Torso piece has been donned. The armor cannot be destroyed and only removed via Wish or Miracle, which must be used on each piece individually, if this happens the removed piece teleports to a random location in the planes.
-----Sadly, my players only ever found one arm. Then they died horribly and we started a new game.

The Gold Blade: a +2 golden gem-encrusted rapier. Whenever you scored a crit on something, if you confirmed the crit that object immediately turned to solid gold (similar to Flesh to Stone). Gold Dragons were immune. Non-Gold Dragons were turned into Gold Dragons (but weren't turned into solid gold).
----One of my few items to actually see use! Ironically, my pirate-themed player used it against an Lava Elemental resulting in the rather hilarious Molten Gold Elemental, which proceeded to attempt to murder the party. It failed, but it was funny!

 

[seebs]

Artifact Shopping List.

Write a thing on the list.

If you are within ten feet of the thing, it glows. If you touch the thing, then stop touching it, the entry is crossed out and disappears.

But it's an artifact. "The person who killed Bob." "An item significant to our quest." Sure, no problem. It can check for those.

 

[Toledo]

Since all HP come back on a long rest, did you mean this works on a short rest? Not sure what this is supposed to do.

You healed to full overnight.
You had some battles this morning, expect some more, and are low on hit points.
Use the half heal spell to regain hp. You can only do this once.
Really handy if you don't have a cleric.

We play that you only get 1 hit dice plus your constitution modifier back on a long rest - we believe that is more "realistic" to what a human body can do.

Therefore it becomes a very big deal.

 

[toucanbuzz]

For our Strahd campaign, I converted the magic items into Legacy items, inspired by 3rd edition. The party has rituals (quests) it must do to gradually unlock the item's full powers. I like the idea of players getting magic items that they can build upon, such as a Flame Tongue. Totally winging it:

Flame Tongue (basic, attunement). Upon command, 40' torchlight via harmless flames. The sword imparts knowledge of a ritual required to further unlock its powers. The sword must be immersed into lava/magma for a full day and the player must spend at least 8 hours of that day uttering the words for fire in at least 40 different languages. Once complete, the sword becomes a magical weapon.

To unlock further powers, the sword must strike into the body of an elemental creature of fire of at least 6 Hit Dice. The sword must then be left in a flame sufficient to melt ordinary steel for 8 hours and the words for fire once again uttered during this time. Once done, the sword's fire now deals +1d6 fire damage.

To unlock the final power, the sword must strike into the body of an elemental creature of fire of at least 10 Hit Dice. The sword must be then consecrated on the altar of a deity connected to light, heat, or flame in an 8-hour ritual costing 1,000gp in rare unguents and gems, which are consumed. Once done, the sword's fire now deals its full +2d6 damage.

You get the idea. You can do this with any special item, introducing it earlier than you normally might, and leading to any quests that seem appropriate to your campaign.

 

[Istbor]

My most memorable item received was honestly the +1 dynamic weapon during 4e.

It could shape into any weapon of the martial category. It was like my Swiss army knife. So handy. Even at higher levels.

 

[tglassy]

I did something like that. Gave a character an old, worn out Staff of the Magi, which could only cast a few cantrips. As she loved up, the plan was her wizards power would slowly unlock the staffs power.

 

[the Jester]

One of the most fun items I've given out in years is, actually, fairly useless: the cloak of fame. While you wear it, anyone who sees you recognizes you, knows your name, and knows your greatest accomplishments.

Another favorite is the sword Orphan's Revenge. This is a magical short sword, requiring attunement, that... well:

This short sword is always covered by an illusion that makes it appear to be a plain, unadorned, low-quality short sword. However, a creature that holds it by the hilt or is struck by it can see its true appearance. Orphan's Revenge is a short sword with a hilt of bronze wrapped in rat skin. The pommel is a silver rat's head wth tiny rubies for eyes. The blade itself is a dark gray-blue color, and has rats engraved on the blade all the way to the tip.

Orphan's Revenge gives you a +1 bonus to hit and damage. However, if you attack a creature that has dealt damage to you within the last minute, its bonus instead rises to +3, and it gains a bonus of +1d10 to critical severity against such a creature. In addition, while you bear Orphan's Revenge on your person, it grants you the following abilities and effects.

Orphan's Stomach: You are immune to diseases and the poisoned condition.

Filth Dweller: You ignore difficult terrain composed of garbage, detritus, or trash. However, you are constantly dirty, and if you become magically clean, you become dirty again in 1 minute.

Orphan's Revenge also bears a curse, which is only revealed by an identify spell cast using a 5th or higher level slot (thus, not a ritual). This curse strikes once a creature is attuned to the sword, and compels the creature to eat garbage, preferably discarded and rotten food and food scraps, to survive.

 

[Toledo]

Shield of the Deepwatch Guard (dwarven guards) - 35 lbs, 4'x2.5' shape, 14 strength minimum. All attacks by enemies from the front which need to roll (bows, firebolts, melee, etc.) are at disadvantage. Attacks from above (huge or gargantuan sized creatures), from the sides or rear aren't affected. Bearer is at -5' speed in combat and is -3 to attack.

For bearers larger than dwarf sized, treat as +3 shield, with -5' combat speed and -2 to attack. Intent is for dwarves to use.


Hawkwing Bow - Longbow +1, with a small 6" carving of a hawk in flight above the central handgrip. The following properties can be used as a bonus action, three times total combined per long rest:

The last two items were made for specific characters without saying as much. The dwarf player is not a good tactical player at all, so I made him something very nice. For example, he fell into the same 15' pit trap twice in one combat - not the player being funny, but literally being a dumb player. Sad thing is that he has a PHD in multiple forms of biology and genetic engineering.

Fate of the Shield of the Deepwatch Guard:

Melted by an Ancient Blue Dragon Wyrm when the guy at our table got too mouthy (in character) to the Blue Wyrm, who then collected the slag as a trophy!

In another campaign, this same person fell into another pit trap! DM whispered to me "He just killed the entire party" because of the bad tactical situation we were put in. DM fudged some situations so that our entire party wouldn't get wiped out because of the actions of our worst player.

Oh, in rewards time, that player was granted a "rope of climbing".

 

[Toledo]

For my last session, I created the Maul of Pain:

2D6 damage for the maul, +1 weapon (hit/damage). Has the special property (if you use it!) where it taps into your life force and does an extra 4D6 damage to both your opponent AND yourself! It also does 3 points of damage to good using wielders when they hit something, even if the property isn't used (since it is primarily the weapon of an evil creature).

I gave it to the evil reckless and raging barbarian bad guy who dropped both the party bard and sorcerer on the same turn (included an extra attack from great weapon mastery). The party was suitably impressed!

After attuning it, the party cleric didn't like the side effects! He tried it out after hearing the activation word, but didn't have another source to determine its effects. The party barbarian wants to keep it, but the cleric doesn't want to be the barbarian's personal heal-bot.