Loot is a major source of excitement for many players. For some, it’s the best part of the game. The heroes have beaten the bad guys, solved the puzzle, or made it to the end of the dungeon. Expectations and tradition call for a reward. Magical gear are top of the wanted list. Here though, many adventures make a mistake: they undercook the magic items. It’s a missed opportunity.
What’s The Point of Magic Items?
Loot has been part of the bedrock of tabletop roleplaying since the beginning. Players didn’t need to separately track experience points because one gold piece was one XP. Many OSR games like Ben Milton’s Knave have returned to these roots. However, as lovely as gold is, magic items are what really excites most players.
I’m saying magic items, but most of this article is really about any kind of gear; it doesn’t matter if it’s magical or mundane, fantastical, historical, modern, or futuristic/sci-fi.
There’s a deep rabbit hole here. GMs have scope to do this for every piece of equipment in the game. Cyberpunk 2020 is an example of this approach, and it’s brilliant for deep immersion. However, it was also one of the things that disappeared in the Cyberpunk Red update; everything became generic gear without any branding, probably to avoid overwhelming players with lore.
Although 2020 is extreme, I would argue for many groups to go as far as they can. There’s so much potential for worldbuilding and story making. At the very least, it’s something to consider with major pieces of equipment. The goal for all types of gear is to give players fun decisions to make; if they can make the characters feel cool too, that’s a lovely bonus.
It All Starts with a Name
Getting a +1 longsword tells me nothing about the world beyond someone, somewhere, at some point, could do enchantments. Buying a corvette class spaceship with two weapon mounts is similarly uninformative. These items, their histories and their makers, are a mystery. And not the fun kind.
Instead, consider the names Orcrist and Glamdring from The Hobbit. There’s an instant suggestion these are special swords, probably not made by a human. They aren’t just exotic; they are unique.
Similarly, the spaceship Serenity in the show Firefly isn’t just a ship, it’s a class three mid-bulk transport ship. Our main characters aren’t flying around in a battleship; it’s a transport. This isn’t a particularly exciting detail by itself, but it does help build a picture.
The ship’s owner, Mal, named her after Serenity Valley. This was the location for the final battle of a great war. A battle in which Mal commanded 2,000 troops, and lost. This great commander, reduced to transporting goods, flies in a ship so named to never forget that defeat. Serenity, ironically, is a constant reminder of the character’s internal conflict. Not every piece of gear needs this level of depth, but what a fantastic platform to build stories on.
Magic Items Earning their Names
Extra names can come later. Additionally, different names can come from different people. The goblins in The Hobbit know Orcrist and Glamdring as Beater and Biter, but only after the Goblin Wars. They hate and fear these swords because of their kill counts; they weren’t anything special to the goblins before, though.
Similarly, Bilbo names his sword—well, dagger—some time after he’d found it. Bilbo didn’t know Elvish, so he cannot copy the style of Orcrist or Glamdring. With some irony, it’s the Goblin names Beater and Biter that work as a reference he can follow. Accordingly, he chooses the name Sting.
In a nice touch, Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings builds on this, adding Elvish onto Bilbo’s sword. Sting gets translated into Maegnas; the whole phrase roughly reads: Maegnas is my name, I am the Spider’s Bane. Jackson’s addition builds on the sword’s story. He implies a moment when the Elves must have honoured Bilbo, celebrating his fight against the great spiders of Mirkwood.
Of course, it also foreshadows the future battle against Shelob. (And yes, for Tolkien purists, I know Tolkien never calls Shelob an actual spider, only a spirit in spider form). Nobody acknowledges Sting’s modification in the films, but it really is an example of great environmental worldbuilding.
The Path Most Travelled: Adding Crunch
Players love their numbers going up. However, I’d argue this is actually the least interesting way to level up an item. With weapons and armour especially, this may seem the obvious boost. Recall the trusty +1 longsword. Useful? Absolutely. Uninspiring? Quite possibly.
Compare this with Hew, an axe available in the D&D adventure The Lost Mine of Phandelver. Yes, it’s a +1 axe, but it also does maximum damage to plants; additionally, and even more creatively, it makes anyone carrying it nervous while travelling through wooded areas. Because of the flat maths in systems like D&D, GMs may be nervous of frequently adding modifiers.
One alternative is to have the modifier affect only certain enemies. Or, similarly, giving the item a +d4 or +d6 versus one type of monster. Hew’s maximum damage to plants is a variant on this.
Issues with Conditional Bonuses on Magic Items
However, a drawback to this approach is players forget conditional bonuses much more easily than universal ones. Tension can also come from giving an item targeting one type of monster, but then rarely facing that enemy type.
Counters to these concerns mostly come from the thinking characters should have more than one tool in their toolbox; players shouldn’t have the expectation one item will fit every occasion. And, in maximum tough love mode, adventures focus on the party, not a single character’s loadout; plus, sometimes, it’s hard to justify why an enemy type is in an area they wouldn’t normally be.
This is very much a situation where GMs will know what works at their table; if the group aren’t sure, some experimentation will be necessary. There isn’t one approach that works for everyone. Some groups will prefer the ease of universal modifiers; others will always be switched on over what gear they have at their disposal. Some tables will think it’s more immersive to need different equipment loadouts; they’ll enjoy the challenge of choosing the most appropriate one, and then making what they have work. Others will find that overly complicated; or, it may break their uniquely greatsword-swinging fantasy.
Adding Softer Boosts to Magic Items
Another alternative are boosts without numbers. Hew making the carrier nervous in woodlands is a great example of this. Orcrist, Glamdring, and Sting’s ability to glow blue when evil is near is another.
This style of making equipment feel special comes in a few categories:
First, they influence the carrier. These items might encourage a feeling of paranoia or alertness to a certain type of danger; they may offer a feeling of tranquillity or justification doing a certain action.
Here, I stress the word influence, not making the character do or feel something. Some players will be okay with a heavier-handed approach; however, there’s a risk some players will feel this is taking too much agency away. Instead, the item inspires a feeling, but the character doesn’t have to obey. Essentially, it’s there for the player to act on if they want, but it does no real harm if ignored.
It’s Not You, It’s the NPCs
Second, the item influences the people around the carrier. There’s more freedom here for the GM to go harder with the effects because the focus will be on NPCs. However, even here some care is necessary.
The effects should never feel like a gotcha. Especially negative results should get telegraphed or demonstrated two or three times before the party has an important encounter. When Frodo first puts on the One Ring, it’s not on Weathertop, facing the Ringwraiths. Tolkien has him in the Prancing Pony, far from immediate danger. None of the Nine are in town yet, so he can safely learn the true power of the Ring. When he does face them on Weathertop, the horror of their true nature is the narrative reveal; it isn’t them being drawn to the Ring. Frodo and the audience already know.
If foreshadowing isn’t possible, it may be best for GMs to directly tell the players. Something like “hey, this paranoid-causing ring near the king will make life hard” avoids the feeling of a gotcha trap. It’s always worth remembering players have a much less complete view of the world than the GM.
Tapping into the Senses
A third way magic items can feel more special is to use the fives senses. For instance, Sting glows blue when danger is near. Colour, shape, feel, smell, sound, and taste can all come into play. Many GMs neglect touch, taste, and even sound while describing the world. Offer a ring that makes gold smell like chocolate; or, find a sword that makes meat taste like rotting flesh. Special gear can pull more senses into the game, building immersion.
One more way to make items stand out is by making them intelligent. This runs the spectrum from subtle or occasional nudges, all the way to full companion NPCs. As with any NPC, it’s important to make sure they never become the star of the show. They should also never become a direct line to GM knowledge.
So, consider what their trigger effects are, and how they respond. How much power do they actually have? Give them personalities, even emotions like fear, joy, or compassion. But, even ancient intelligent artifacts won’t know everything. Wrong or out-of-date information seems only natural, especially if it’s been lost for many years. Perspectives can be limited or obviously biased. They may be well-meaning, but make mistakes.
Of course, intelligent items are an opportunity for GMs to give information. However, they never lose their ultimate purpose: giving players fun decisions to make.
Cursed Magic Items & Other Drawbacks
With that in mind, we turn to penalties and cursed items. The desire to really mess with players can be a hard one to resist. However, if an item’s drawback is too powerful, the players will never use it. Such items lose any point of being in the game at all.
I’d argue against giving almost all low-level gear a disadvantage. Opening up options and narrative pivots are the point of items; using them as gotchas is bad GMing. Therefore, I rarely see value in making basic equipment have any downside beyond breaking from overuse. And this only has value if there’s a focus on economy and getting better materials that the group enjoys.
High-powered items are another matter. Consider a scroll that can kill every nearby enemy, but pushes the character into a state of Dying; now the player has a potentially hard choice to make. Some GMs are very nervous about handing out high-powered gear. However, here I really recommend playing a few games of The Cypher System. The rules themselves are so smooth to run, even if the maths gets a bit weird. However, the key benefit I got from the experience is realising how wonderful single-use items are.
High-powered items only become a major stress if they unbalance every encounter. Side note: I strongly believe in giving unbalanced encounters, sometimes heavily in favour of the NPCs. Furthermore, I also think there’s a very simple fix to make any combat encounter challenging: add more monsters.
High-Powered Problems
That said, the problems with a super-powerful item that’s always available are easy to see. Making them single-use solves nearly all of them. It doesn’t matter if the character wipes out a villain; there can always be another one waiting in the shadows. It doesn’t even really matter if the characters hoard them; all the encounters they are choosing not to use them will be more difficult. And, ultimately, feeling badass, wiping out the boss with careful preparations, will live long in the memory of many players.
Introducing single-use items is also a great form of testing. GMs can discover if something works particularly well, or if it needs powering up or down. Single-use lets GMs trial items, seeing if making them more available would remove interesting player-decisions.
Accordingly, give scrolls and potions before wands and spellbooks. Offer grenades and blades that shatter before missile launchers and ancient swords of doom. Test a few times, then make a decision on what would make the game more fun.
Magic Items On-Brand
Earlier, I mentioned Cyberpunk 2020’s approach to gear. It’s a brilliant way to get players engaging with the lore. As another example of this, I’m going to use the video game Borderlands 2.
For the uninitiated, Borderlands is a looter-shooter series (except for the Telltale Games narrative-heavy spin-off; many of the same people went on to make Dispatch, which is a game I focus on here). Every time the player kills someone, they drop loot. The more powerful the enemy, the higher level the gear.
To give the insane amount of gear available some variety—and personality—the Borderlands team used brands. After a while, players will begin to notice key differences between these makers. For instance, Bandit guns hold the most bullets, but have the worst accuracy; Hyperion weapons increase their accuracy the longer the player holds the trigger; Maliwan guns deal extra elemental damage—like lightning, acid, or fire; when the player reloads a Tediore gun, they toss it like a grenade; the more bullets remaining, the higher the damage; Torgue weapons have slow moving shots, but they do explosive damage. And the list goes on.
Tolkien Did Branding Too
The Hobbit does this as well. Orcrist, Glamdring, and Sting all glow blue because they came from the Elven city of Gondolin. This isn’t a feature all Elven weapons have; it’s unique to the city. And, with its destruction and loss of its people, the weapons will always be a rare reminder of their skill. It’s another brilliant detail and show of environmental storybuilding.
Using brands and signature features based on location or maker gives GMs massive potential. Much like Gondolin, these companies can have real footprints in the world. They will need headquarters or bases, leaders, craftspeople, and supply lines—perhaps to unique materials. Area factions may want to protect or destroy them. There’s so much depth here, it could easily become the focus of an entire epic adventure.
The best use of brands marries mechanics with lore. Plenty of GMs have complained over the years players don’t engage with their world. Giving items brands that affect quality and encounter options will make almost anyone care.
Magic Items Mean Different Things To Different Classes
Another quick way to draw in more players is to weaponise their character class or skill choices. By this, I mean the information a wizard receives investigating an old sword should be different to a knight. The wizard may learn the power of its runes and ancient prophesy; however, the knight recalls important battles it featured as well as the names of previous owners still searching for it.
Classless systems, like Call of Cthulhu, work the same way; however, here the key difference is the characters’ professions and active skills. Information should differ—and even contradict—depending on whether it’s a professor or a socialite investigating the item. A character using Psychology and one using Occult should be getting very different answers.
All of this has the great reward for players making different choices—be that in class, skill, or approach. It’s also a really quick and easy way to add depth to the world and large narrative potential.
Evolving Magic Items
The final way to make gear special in this article. Third edition introduced the idea of evolving magic items to D&D. Initial rules let them level with the player, keeping an early item relevant late into an adventure. Then, in 2005, the Weapons of Legacy supplement went further. Now, players had rules to level up an item through sacrifice. The greater the sacrifice, the more power the item unlocked. Fast-forward to 2015, and Matt Mercer’s vestiges popularised magic items unlocking at narratively key moments.
All three of these approaches work to reward players for keeping an item for a long time. Players can form a strong affection for particular items, and this works to prevent punishing that. As with any other equipment, this levelling up—or indeed awakening—should give players new ways to approach problems. It might give the character new movement options, ways of dealing with multiple targets, or resist certain types of damage.
Giving players interesting decisions to make, new options, and hopefully the chance to do something cool, is the goal. In a sense, evolving items are the very peak of everything in the article mentioned so far. They offer the chance to combine narrative and mechanics on a whole new level. I’ve never seen a player able to resist the excitement in the moment an item powers up. In short, they’re awesome.
Equipment Can Do It All
Equipment is the chance for characters to do more than their basic skills. They should be opening up options, giving players interesting choices to make; those could be narrative or mechanical, but really good magic items accomplish both. Not every item of gear needs a deep dive. However, it’s well worth the time for a table to do whenever they can. Done well, they’re a wonderful package of mechanics, narrative platform, and storybuilding, all in one.
Have a lovely day!
