Ring of Truth - Most overpowered cursed item ever?

[dave.gillam]

magnuskn wrote:

3.) The players begin to use the ring as a tool to get 100% sure confessions out of opponents, be it for a murder mystery or for getting vital information out of henchmen. They may even use it on a captured villain to get his masterplan from him.

4.) The GM loses several avenues of storytelling. No more secret hide-outs, no more hidden treasure-chambers, no more villains hiding as honest businessmen.

Charm, False/implanted memories, hypnotism, contingency, the old cliche "poison pill tooth", magic portals

gee, I can think of hundreds of ways that that ring only causes problems if you if you are deliberately gimping yourself for the sake of your players.

[Kevin Andrew Murphy]

dave.gillam wrote:

magnuskn wrote:

3.) The players begin to use the ring as a tool to get 100% sure confessions out of opponents, be it for a murder mystery or for getting vital information out of henchmen. They may even use it on a captured villain to get his masterplan from him.

4.) The GM loses several avenues of storytelling. No more secret hide-outs, no more hidden treasure-chambers, no more villains hiding as honest businessmen.

Charm, False/implanted memories, hypnotism, contingency, the old cliche "poison pill tooth", magic portals

gee, I can think of hundreds of ways that that ring only causes problems if you if you are deliberately gimping yourself for the sake of your players.

Agreed.

You're also forgetting the power of NPCs. After you use the ring to foil all sorts of villain's plans, there should always be one or two who get away and plot revenge on the party, and moreover, aren't idiots who plan a frontal assault.

Let's say some villain who was not the BBEG but someone in their organization, or their girlfriend, or their uncle, finds out about this and moreover finds out about the ring. This villain contacts a wise old witch to help come up with some cunning revenge, and the witch suggests that the best course of mischief would be to contract with some jinkin gremlins to have them curse the ring.

But it's already a cursed ring. Yes, their usual curse involves either intermittent functioning or a requirement, but since the enchantment were broken on this ring to begin with to make it a Ring of Truth, there's nothing wrong with a Rule 0 moment where the combination of witchcraft, unseelie fey mischief, and fun plotting can't make it so that the extra curse is that 30% of the time the ring will function as the old fashioned Ring of Truthlessness.

What this means is that somewhere down the road the party will find some innocent person--we'll call her Patsy--in some incriminating position, pop the ring on her for a quick confession, and rather than claiming honestly that she was framed by this week's villain, Patsy will confess to the crime she was framed for and what's more going into a fit of confession for every other possible crime she can imagine. You know the Lindberg baby? She ate him. With fava beans and a nice chianti. She ate all the children of Hamlin too--that business with the piper was just a lie!--and....

At some point in the horrific confession, someone--probably the paladin--will decide that summary justice is called for and will execute Patsy. Poor sweet innocent Patsy, forced by a cursed ring to confess to crimes she didn't commit. And what's worse, the party will tell the villagers that she was the author of all of their horrors so they'll burn her body to ashes, spit on the spot where she was killed, and basically make a perfect recipe for Patsy's poor soul to be utterly unable to rest, making a perfect recipe for a poltergeist.

Wonderful thing about poltergeists--they can be destroyed, but they keep coming back until the soul gets what it needs so it can rest properly. What does Patsy want? For her name to be exonerated and for all those who took part in her awful fate to be punished accordingly. And no, a little bit of blubbering and self-flagellation by the paladin is not going to cut it, nor is even a dignified death death by sepukku. If he was stripped naked, dragged through the streets, pelted with rotten vegetables, mocked by children and finally thrown to an otyugh? That would be more like it. And the same goes for the rest of the party, the BBEG, the witch, the gremlins, the previous BBEG's wicked uncle, the villagers who believed the unbelievable lies told about her, and even the incompetent wizard who made the cursed ring in the first place.

Also, even a True Resurrection won't cut it. Patsy wants justice and her good name restored, not a return to a world where incompetent adventurers can cruelly murder you at a whim.

[Cartigan]

My Friday game led me to notice that I don't think this item is in 3.X

[Zakur Opzan]

LazarX wrote:

Zakur Opzan wrote:

Ooh...some fun new tactics to try....as a witch, use Evil eye hex...misfortune hex...cast beguiling gift. Try this wonderful ring on!

But anyways, I have had campains where I had given a magic item and the way I thought it would be used the players completely overlooked and sold them, and little items i thought had little game price tags became completely overpowered in the hands of the right character.

Think about this: A paladin who is so devout that he chooses to wear the ring so he can never tell a lie. His Deity is so impressed/pleased with the paladin that he is granted an extra lay on hands per day.

Why should the god be impressed? The Paladin is relying on cheap arcane cheat to avoid having to bear the responsibility of honoring his code by his own true effort. The diety would be far more impressed by the Paladin next to him, who's doing the job without a crutch.

Because the paladin gave up the ability to use another ring to make sure he is always telling the truth. Because the ring is a cursed family ring that is passed from family member to family member as a reminder of a previous paladin family member who told a lie that had disastrous concequences for people of that deity.

Motive:

What it all comes down to is motive. Is the pally doing it with the right heart as in not wanting to hurt others with lies or as you said just taking the easy way out? Their deity would know the difference.

[erik542]

Cartigan wrote:

I still think it's absurd to assert a Ring of Truth is the more overpowered cursed item ever.

While it isn't a cursed item, there is the amazing mirror of opposition. Instant summons it to simply beat any BBEG.