Useless magic items

Cafe Society
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The first issue of Fantasy Gamer magazine contained a rather nice list of (ahem) “magic” items whose powers were next to useless. A few of these items were:[ul][li]A rod of rulership that only works when submerged in the blood of Cthulu.[/li][li]An arrow of location: When suspended on a string, the arrow will always point to the person holding the string.[/li][li]A ring of invisibility: When placed on a finger, the ring turns invisible. Its wearer stays visible, however.[/li][li]A mace of sharpness.[/li][li]A coin with the word “Yes” printed on one side and “No” printed on the other. When flipped and asked a yes-or-no question, it always lands on edge.[/li][li]A scabbard of sword resistance: No sword can be sheathed in it.[/li][li]The Lance of Quixote: +10 vs. windmills, -2 against any other target when a windmill is within 400 yards.[/li][li]A ring of invulnerability: The ring can never be damaged. (Its wearer is just as vulnerable as ever, though).[/ul][/li]There were other, less interesting “outre” magic items on this list, but you know what? I don’t think their list was nearly long enough. We need to add more!

I’ll start with a few of my own ideas:

[ul][li]plate mail of etherealness: When the wearer utters a command word, this suit of plate mail becomes completely intangible. The wearer remains solid, though.[/li][li]A ring of reverse x-ray vision: This ring enables its wearer to see through solid lead, but nothing else.[/li][li]Flame-retardant matches. A dweomer on these otherwise-ordinary wooden matches prevents them from burning. You no longer have to worry about your matches getting destroyed in a fire.[/li][li]statue of swimming: You can swim at twice your normal speed so long as you carry this 900-pound statue with you.[/li][li]Orcusbane: When attacking the demon prince of the undead, this tiny dagger is +1 to hit and does one extra damage point.[/li][li]potion of air breathing.[/li][li]wand of air detection: Very useful when you’ve imbibed a potion of air breathing.[/li][li]cloak of the fungusman: This cloak gives its wearer the proportionate strength and speed of a mushroom.[/li][li]scarab of combination fire resistance: When exposed to fire, electricity, poison gas, acid, and vacuum all at the same time, this broach will make you immune to the fire part.[/li][/ul]
Any others?

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Gauntlets of Dead Ogre Strength - Crafted from the bones of a mighty ogre, these gauntlets give their wearer the strength of the ogre from which they were crafted. The present strength of the ogre from which they were crafted.

Monomorph potion - This potion magically transforms the person who drinks it the exact appearance of the person who drinks it.

Parachute of Speed - When used (you know, as a parachute), it increases the speed of its user by a factor of a hundred.

3

In the old days of Dragon Magazine, the April issue would have Outrages from the Mages, chock-full of this kind of stuff, like the rug of mothering, which would nag you constantly, as well as spells of this ilk, like speak with normal mud. It doesn’t give the mud any intelligence or memory; it just allows you to communicate with it. :slight_smile:

Damn, I wish I had those somewhere… g

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Add the word ‘cloud’ to the end of that and you get a slight* change in the strength and speed.

[sub]*Slight - in the same way that the sun is slightly hot[/sub]

5

True Universal Solvent: a fluid which, at the end of the (long, complicated and highly expensive) process to create it is capable of dissolving any matter or force field.

This means, of course, that it disappears into the earth never to be seen again, no matter what you had it in the moment before you added the final ingredient.

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Lobsang: Yeah, but it’d definitely be a single-use item.

One of my favorites from Dragon was the +3 Hammer of Dwarf Throwing. When a dwarf utters the command word and tries to throw it at an enemies, it instead flips over and hurls the dwarf as a large missile.

Incidentally, wasn’t Cloak of the Fungusman a Cat Stevens song?

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Spectacles of Perseus’s Brother: These magic glasses cause any monster with a petrification ability to run away in fear when you glare at them.
Mining Powder: Tossing this powder into the air has the same effect as an Earthquake spell. It will only function when you are more than 300 feet underground.
Boomerang Arrows+3: You will never run out of these magic arrows. You will never be able to run away from them, either.
Plate Mail + 30: This armor is specially constructed of 15-foot thick granite plates.
Potion of Extra Healing: Whenever the protagonist of your story chugs one of these down, a meaningless henchmen will be resurrected and ready to fight again!
Monkey’s Pen: When placed on a blank scroll, this magical quill will tell you just what’s going through the mind of a random monkey on the planet.

Maybe some spells, too.
Improved find familiar: This high-level form of clairvoyance can tell you everything you want to know about things you are already highly familiar with.
Burning Hips: This variant of Burning Hands requires a mage well-trained in the Hokey Pokey.
Weather-Divination: This spell allows you to determine what the weather will be in the future. It will not specify a time, but you can be sure that the predicted weather will occur, somewhere, sometime in the future.

And don’t forget the lonely mage’s favorite:
Charm ugly person of the opposite sex

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Ring of Spell Reversal - When you use it, it spells the word “reversal” for you.

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From random DnD sites:

Unusual spells

  • Safefall: Upon casting, turns caster into a safe.
  • Bigbi’s Groping Hand: 'Nuff said.
  • Powerword - Smirk
  • Locate self
  • Orgasmic polymorphing: A special curse for all the sicko DMs out there.

Also, off the top of my head:

  • Wand of Brownian Motion: Summons strong cup of tea.
  • Boulder of Smiting: A 500lb granite boulder that, when thrown, hits someone exactly like a 500lb granite boulder.
  • Volpal Trout of Slaying: Victim must save verses death upon a successful piecing attack.
  • Fruggle’s Mighty Toothpick: All food stuck in teeth must save verses picking or be dislodged
  • Wand of Squirrel Summoning: Summons a squirrels. Not magic, talking, elemental or undead - just a single red squirrel. Successful luck roll also summons an acorn. Nothing else. Move along now.
  • Wand of anti-negative-un-negation
  • Bush’s Warhat: Cursed item. Reduces intelligence to 4 and wisdom to 2. Causes user to attack random provience.
  • Bow of Crotchshot: Bonus to hit groin. All males in viewing distance must make a willpower save or spend one turn cringing in sympathy.
  • Axe of the Woodsman Bonus +5 to hit trees.
  • Scroll of Icarus Causes user to fly 100mph upwards for 10 seconds (obligatory Morrowind reference) .
  • The pen: Bonus +10 to damageThe Sword.
  • Cloak of Arrows Attracts arrows in a 5 mile radius. Has many holes in it.
  • Ring of Shininess: Places semi-permanent binding spell on two people when worn. Typically used in conjunction with Scroll of Prenuptual Agreement
  • Mace of mace: Upon striking, 50% chance of releasing a 2’ acid cloud.
  • Perpetual Bag of Holding: Holds objects inside for a really long time. Until you take it back out. Reusuable.
    gasp…weeze…

Right, I’ve thrown down the gauntlet. Any takers :stuck_out_tongue:

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• The scent of unlife talisman, which allows it’s bearer to detect zombies by smell. Granted, that’s not too hard to do in the first place…
•A silver bullet, garunteed to kill any werewolf. Of course, you need to invent the gun and blackpowder before you can actually use it. And even then you might miss what you’re shooting at.
•The Wand of Deimos, which induces, in anyone, homicidal rage and determination against the wand bearer.
•The Coffeehouse Philosopher’s Stone Turns Lead into Bismuth, but the pure of heart can use it to remove rust from Gold.
•The Safety Saber, which is unable to cut living matter, or even formerly living matter.
•The Boots of Oppenheimer, which allow the user to walk on heavy water. But ONLY heavy water, not regular water.

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A Robe of Useless Items. It is covered in patches which, when torn off and following the speaking of the command word, turn into such things as the ashes of a campfire, an empty money pouch, the well-picked over remains of a meal, or a 1 foot pole.

Is anybody else having that thing where you look at the “useless” items and start finding situations they’d actually be quite handy in?

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Some IFGS items:

Ring of Insomnia–Autoactivate Awaken, triggered by the onset of natural sleep. Unlimited uses.

Ring of the Puzzlemaster (actual item from a game)–
-30 points of Life Support (heals you up to 30 points upon being reduced to 0 life points)
-Immunity to Hold spels
-Reduced knockdown/stun time
-+5 armor (most massive bonus possible in IFGS)
-Enables wearer to construct indestructible doors at will
-Drains all spell points from the wearer and any spell crystals, batteries, generators, and allies he may have, if he is a 10th level mage (max level in IFGS, very rare)
-Geases the wearer to find chokepoints in adventurers’ paths and block them with obnoxious puzzles
-Acquires the approximate weight of a lead rhinocerous when not worn by a 10th level mage.

Devious PCs can use some of the damnedest items, if you give them enough time to think. Both of the above examples were used–the first was given to a sentry, and the second was removed from the dead Puzzlemaster’s hand directly over an enemy’s head.

Uses for some of tracer’s items:
A ring of invisibility: When placed on a finger, the ring turns invisible. Its wearer stays visible, however.
–Use a variant of Mage Script or Magic Mouth to load the ring with a spy report. You can then smuggle the info through a checkpoint easily.

A coin with the word “Yes” printed on one side and “No” printed on the other. When flipped and asked a yes-or-no question, it always lands on edge.
–Handy for rigged wagers.

A scabbard of sword resistance: No sword can be sheathed in it.
–If it’s flexible enough, make a gorget out of it. It might make you vorpal-proof.

The Lance of Quixote: +10 vs. windmills, -2 against any other target when a windmill is within 400 yards.
We actually had a windmill attack once. A major elemental was conjured in the stone of the walls. If you have a Quixote-esque character, such events are near-inevitable.

plate mail of etherealness: When the wearer utters a command word, this suit of plate mail becomes completely intangible. The wearer remains solid, though.
–Ethereal objects are not affected by gravity, so they stay where they are until you move them. With well-timed command words, you could use the plate to provide protection from ethereal creatures. In 3rd Ed, ghost touch armor (which extends into the Border Ethereal) is quite valuable.

Flame-retardant matches. A dweomer on these otherwise-ordinary wooden matches prevents them from burning. You no longer have to worry about your matches getting destroyed in a fire.
–Collect the whole set and build a dragon-resistant hut (or at least a shield).

potion of air breathing.
–Potentially handy if you need to transport a sea creature overland. There are plenty of water-breathing sentients who could use it.

wand of air detection: Very useful when you’ve imbibed a potion of air breathing.
–Depending on what blocks it, this could be used to determine which wall to throw that Passwall or Stone Shape on to make a precipitous exit.

scarab of combination fire resistance: When exposed to fire, electricity, poison gas, acid, and vacuum all at the same time, this broach will make you immune to the fire part.
–While not spectacularly helpful, this would reduce damage taken while otherwise unprotected in the plane of Limbo. This would be best in a Planescape setting; combined with some planars innate immunities and spells, it could make them completely immune to the effects of the plane.

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Yup. I’ve been a DM for too long :smiley:

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That’d actually be pretty convenient. Taking off plate armor is a pain in the ass. Plate Mail of etherealness can be taken off in a flash. Could save your life if you fall off a boat.

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Well, there’s the Head of Vecna…

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This one isn’t mine, but is my favorite original AD&D cartoon:

<image of wizard holding a wand with a hand on it>
It’s either a wand for Bigby’s Hand spells or a +3 backscratcher…

More useless items:
Staff of seven parts: A wooden quarterstaff that breaks down into seven pieces which can never be put back together. Nope, no magic powers either.

Orb of Doggy control: Limited to command words “sit”, “stay”, “shake”, and “play dead”. Doggy can make a will save to disobey command.

Dagger of Virus Slaying: Will immediately destroy any single target virus when a successful attack is made. Of course, the virus’s AC bonus due to size difference is pretty formidable…

Glasses of reading: Allows the wearer to read any language they are literate in (useful for older characters, though…)

Shirt of Trap/Ambush detection: The wearer doesn’t so much detect the trap/ambush, as trigger it with him/her as the target. It’s red, of course.

Oh, and another fun one I remembered: The Head of Vecna

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You know, I really thought the board re-loaded the message list when you previewed…

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Once, I had my players find 1,000,000 GP worth of silver.

Cast into a single cube.

10 levels underground.

:smiley:

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Socks of Infinite Dampness
Underwear of Binding

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The Laundry Machine, this handy dandy portable device teleports left socks to unknown dimensions when put inside. It also generally cleans clothes when put inside and soap is added. The Laundry Machine will cease functioning if clothes aren’t distributed in an even manner around the inside.

In my playing days, I was often partial to the ring of contrariness. No you weren’t.