D&D 5E (2014) What to do with ball bearings?

[Derren]

Has anyone found any other uses for ball bearings than just for tripping people? Especially as 1000 ball bearings seem a bit excessive to cover such a small area. How big are those balls anyway?

Edit: I should read D&Ds definition of the word "ball bearing" first instead of assuming they mean the modern one.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

The problem goes back to squares. If you're using 5' x 5' squares, then that's 25 square feet to cover. Even pouring out 1000 of them over that area, they're still a couple of inches apart, so there's a good chance that someone could run through the area and not even notice them.

 

[Voort]

Other uses for ball bearings:

-Makeshift sling ammo
-Rust monster bait
-Noise maker / distraction

 

[aramis erak]

Has anyone found any other uses for ball bearings than just for tripping people? Especially as 1000 ball bearings seem a bit excessive to cover such a small area. How big are those balls anyway?

Edit: I should read D&Ds definition of the word "ball bearing" first instead of assuming they mean the modern one.

They double as sling bullets.
You can drop a handful behind you on the way out to force pursuing foes to make a dex save or fall down.
You can use them to muck up the gears in certain mechanical traps.
You can use them to help move that heavy furniture.

They're not as useful as a 10' pole, but they are useful.

 

[Sir Brennen]

The session I just ran this weekend saw excellent "standard" use of ball bearings. The players surprised a couple of minotaurs, and the monk dropped a bag of ball bearings. This not only complicated their dangerous charge attack (one went down), but also a couple of rounds later, the fighter pushed one back through the ball bearings. It fell down, and the party dog-piled on to attack with advantage. It definitely added some interest to the combat. Ball bearings have become "monk weapons" in the campaign.

Non-standard use was the monk rolling a ball bearing around to distract a wizard's cat familiar that had been following the party.

Really, though, the bounded accuracy of 5e makes little tricks like ball bearings, caltrops and hunter's traps still effective for almost any level, which I think is cool.

 

[rjfTrebor]

i'd let someone with a sling use them like buckshot pellets to make area attacks. dex save vs 1d4 damage (slings are 1d6 in my games)

 

[TheMadGent]

Another big one is helping to move that gilded 500-pound statue of Nergal out of the temple.

 

[MarkB]

• Place one on a smooth floor in order to determine a subtle gradient.
• Paint numbers on them and stage an impromptu lottery.
• Paint numbers and colours on them, and create hobbit-scale pool tables.
• Load them into a cannon as grapeshot.
• Attach wires and poles to them, and sell them as office toys.
• Magnetise one and paint a pointer on it so that it becomes an improvised compass. That way, if you get lost and need to check your course, you can get your bearings.

 

[Henrix]

They double as sling bullets.

They weigh 0.002 lbs each. (That is 0.032 ounces, or 0.9 gram.)
Far too small and light to be usable as sling shot - not even as buckshot. They'd go all over the place and have no kinetic force.*

And besides, there is this.





* If you could even launch them. Put small stuff in a sling and swing it - they would not be held down by their mass enough to stay in the pouch**.
And putting 1000 of them in a sling? However would you do that? And 2 lbs is too heavy for a sling - about 1/2 pound is about as much as a bullet can weigh.

** Which isn't a pouch as such - the stone/bullet would get caught in it and not fly well, if at all.)

 

[Hussar]

That way, if you get lost and need to check your course, you can get your bearings.

That is a horrible pun. You sir are unbearable.