| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Power fantasy is probably a core aspect of a lot of games. You play a singular badass taking down armies of people. Sometimes, you're just a born-and-bred master of destruction. Sometimes, though, the power comes from a singular object.
Of course we know about artifacts in tabletops of all kinds, and while they are always powerful (even minor artifacts), we sometimes wonder "how much more powerful can we make them?" They could be the focus of an entire campaign, after all.
So just for fun, I want to see everyone's idea for super-powerful artifacts. Add as much detail as you want, as many complications as you desire, a backstory and a means of destruction... world's your oyster.
I'll start it off. Gonna go on the record to say that I'm already using this artifact for my players and, although it is weakened, they are bit-by-bit discovering and unlocking more of its power. It's a focus of the campaign, after all, though they don't know it yet.
Cosmos, Greatsword of the Master
This imposing +5 greatsword was created by Master Amadeus Kharam using the raw quintessence of creation. Yet, in base form, it is useless, as it has no blade whatsoever. Whenever the sword is anointed with one of 7 special quintessences (coined the Cosmospectra due to their unique hue and planar origin), it gains a blade of the appropriate color and bonus abilities based on that color. This effect remains until a new color anoints it or the current blade is destroyed (hardness 20, 60 hp). Anointing the blade requires a standard action and consumes a dose of the corresponding color. Master Kharam can anoint the blade as a swift action and does not require a material component to do so. The colors and their corresponding bonus abilities are:
Drimic: ghost touch exhausting phase locking
Inviolant: axiomatic unholy frost
Lavigo: deceptive unseen greater distracting
Memocyan: transformative called spell storing
Neregin: greater vampiric umbral
Phant: disjoining anarchic wounding
Solagone: holy flaming lifesurge
In addition, once per day per color, the user may activate a special ability or attack when a color is active by expending a point of mythic power and consuming a dose of the corresponding color (which may have additional effects). User must wait 1d4 rounds before they can use any other color ability. Kharam is able to use these abilities any number of days without consuming a color, though he must still expend mythic power. All saves are equal to 10 + mythic tier + user's charisma score.
Abandon Reality [Drimic]: Cast deep slumber and nightmare simultaneously (nightmare is treated as having a casting time of instant). Expend one additional mythic power to cast mythic versions of deep slumber.
Consuming drimic
Undeniable Truth [Inviolant]: Caster gains true sight for 3 rounds.
Be Forgotten [Lavigo]: Become invisible as per greater invisibility for a number of rounds equal to your mythic tier.
Remembrance of Might [Memocyan]: Recall Cosmos at any time from any distance, even across planes. Doing so causes a 10 foot burst of psychic energy that dazes enemies for 1 round and deals 5d6 points of damage (Fortitude halves and negates dazed condition). Creatures immune to mind-affecting abilities are immune to this effect.
Inevitable Oblivion [Neregin]: Slash the sword downward, causing any creature in a 120ft line to be affected by enervation (Fort halves). Spend 2 additional points of mythic power to make this energy drain instead.
Unmake [Phant]: The next creature or object struck by the weapon is also affected by a disintegrate spell equal to the user's character level as caster level.
All-Consuming Hope [Solagone] : Sweep the sword forward, causing any character in a 60ft cone to take 1d6 fire damage per the user's character level (Reflex halves). Half of this damage is sacred damage that bypasses fire resistance and does not affect good creatures. Expending an additional point of mythic power makes this 1d8 per character level instead.
===============
Destruction: To truly destroy Cosmos and its hilt, Amadeus Kharam must be killed with it. Doing so causes Kharam's soul to be released of its deity-borne curse of endless, conscientious, damned reincarnation and to pass on to the afterlife.
THE COSMOSPECTRA
NOTE: All +1 to DC/CL are granted to scrolls written with the ink. Only one dose is needed regardless of the spell's level.
Memocyan: Silver blue. The color of memory. +1 DC/CL to divination spells. Anything written in it that is seen is impossible to remove via memory altering spells, though lavigo consumption or wish/miracle can. Consuming it casts ancestral memory on the drinker, but with only a 50% chance of success. Tastes like something you ate but whose taste you forgot. Taste lasts for 24 hours.
Price: 1,500gp per dose
Solagone: Bright, burning, amber-gold. Tied closely to planes of fire, good, and positive energy. +1 DC and CL to fire, healing, and good spells. 1d6 fire damage if used as a splash weapon, half of which is non-resistible divine. 3d6 vs evil creatures, 2d6 vs neutral. Does not, oddly enough, cause things to catch on fire. Tastes like burning gold and joy.
Price: 2,500gp per dose
Phant: Seemingly translucent, but with streaks of pale ashen gray misting through it now and then. Tied to the Maelstrom and the Boneyard. +1 DC/CL to spells with the chaos or death descriptor. Phant-colored weapons inflict devastating wounds that will not heal naturally, and require a DC15 heal check to treat, and a DC15 CL check to heal with magic. Drinking one dose grants death ward for 10 minutes. Consuming more than one dose instead causes the subject to suffer every blow as if it had phant applied to it for 10 minutes for every dose consumed. Tastes like nothing.
Cost: 2,500gp per dose
Lavigo: An electric violet. Tied strongly to the Astral Plane, specifically the Akashic Record. +1 DC and CL to illusion and mind-affecting effects. Dangerous if smelled or touched. Smelling causes the target's memory to lapse 1 round (DC12 Will negates). Direct contact causes the target to lose 1 random memory as if by modify memory (DC15 negates). Consumption causes the target to gain the amnesia greater madness. No one knows what it tastes like, because they immediately forget.
Cost: 2,500gp per dose
Neregin: The deepest, darkest black, it doesn't even reflect light. Tied strongly to the Shadow and Negative Energy Planes. +1 DC/CL to shadow and negative energy spells. Applied to an undead, grants them the effect of an unhallow spell for 1 hour. Applied to the living, causes 2d6 negative energy damage. If drank, inflicts 1 temporary negative energy level and 2d6 damage for every dose consumed (DC15 Fort negates). Tastes like your own rotting tongue.
Cost: 2,500gp per dose
Inviolant: The deepest red, both bright and dark at the same time. Tied closely to Hell. +1 DC and CL to law and evil spells. Completely indelible, and ignores invisibility. Can only be removed with phant, destroying the object it is on, or with the 'erase' spell (DC 20 caster level check, as if against spell resistance). Tastes like burnt blood.
Cost: 2,500gp per dose
Drimic: Strange, translucent green color. Tied closely to the Ethereal Plane and the Dimension of Dreams. +1 DC and CL to sleep based magic. Applied to up to 1x1 sq ft of surface of an object, causes that object to become incorporeal for 2 rounds before becoming material again, shunting anything shoved inside to the nearest square. If consumed, 1 dose causes a creature to enter a deep sleep (DC15 Will to resist), though they can still be awakened. 10 doses at once causes a permanent coma that can only be removed with break enchantment, greater restoration, psychic surgery, wish, or miracle. This coma also causes the drinker's soul to enter the Dimension of Dreams. Tastes like the sum of everything you have experienced since your last sleep cycle.
Cost: 1,500gp per dose