Has any had experience of running - or even encountered - an intelligent item/weapon as a villain?
This is an idea I'm toying with, possibly even making it a recurring villain.
It could doubltess overwhelm a owner/wielder in order to further pursue its own schemes and exploit their powers and abilities too.
Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated.
I had a GM do that a while ago. The weapon was a behind the scenes bad guy though. It took over a cleric, and had him raise an undead army.
Well Chomper is interesting, but doesn't strike me as a real villain. I'm looking for a more sophisticated/sinister feel.
Taking over a cleric and raising undead is a very nice idea!
I already have used this idea in a campaign, it was the BBEG side-kick. The faces of my players were awesome when it teleported from the wizard hand in the BBEG's.
The blackblade from a magus can make a good one I think, it can even be a group of items or an unique being behind all of them.
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I am writing a campaign to take place in Minata where the main adversary role will be filled by a league of Rakshasa, led by Ravana. I'm considering binding Ravana's soul into a dagger to act like one of those dagger/snake Rakshasa and giving it to the party wizard as an improved familiar (free feat!) at level 2 or 3. Won't they be surprised when they've been carrying around the central villain the whole time!
The dagger and armour ideas are both good ones - one thing I am mulling over is if an item is the bad guy, how can it get away a few times before the final showdown?
You can also add a LoTR-feel with something like the One Ring, slowly building tension and paranoïa between the players.
If the players don't know it's the bad guy (make it uses some anti-divination spells so its alignment is not revealed). They will loot it, sell/keep it and life goes on, if you don't want it in players's hand just steal it.
Teleportation is the simplest option. You can use some transmurtation too, like animate object, polymorph any object, etc.
Have it teleport. Especially if it's the "number 2" guy. It can be wielded by a few different sub-bosses but disappear once the baddy is beaten. The PCs won't know that the boss they beat is really the REAL boss until the item doesn't disappear with the fall of whoever's got it. Then, in a last ditch effort, the item tries to take over one or more PCs before they figure out how to destroy it.
Hmm, now how about a collective of magic items? Maybe possesed of the souls/spirits of an evil cadre working their evil in many places. The actions of the PCs could start bringing some of the items closer together to make a BBEG even more powerful.
That's truly mean I like it!
You could make it a set of items (like in MMO or a piecemeal armor as in UC) or a collection of the same items (only armors/morningstars/jewelry/…).
in Imagine Magazine #29, in 1985 by Wizards of the Coast, Inc., there was a construct called the Taumet, which was a dragon-like golem that was formed by having a host of 5 malevolent magic items reading a codex that would transform it into the Taumet.
There is a 3.5 conversion here, which you could convert to Pathfinder.
In short, the items are a lance, a shield, a helmet, a pair of gauntlets and a cloak, all intelligent and that could act as one when controlling a host.
Just with that prionciple, you could expand it further, by adding a pair of googles, an amulet, a pair of boots, a robe, 2 rings, a belt, a suit of armor, an ectoplasmic skin, ioun stones, Thassilonian runes and so on. You could also design a weapon with gem sockets, with each gem being an evil entity.
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I saw a GM use an intelligent phylacteries once. It had alot of charms and such on it (one of them made it so that it read as the same alignment as the wearer). He made it as a powerful drop and had the party paladin carry it around all campaign long. It took the party forever to figure out why the final bad guy kept coming back and seemed unkillable. When they figured out that it was a litch, they could not find the phylacteries for the life of them. Made for an epic campaign, tho alas I never heard the end of it, so make your own end for it! I figure thats a good way to keep your phylacteries safe, just make it a heirloom to a paladins order. Have the good guys make sure your unkillable and vola!
Depending on how tough you want to make it, you could use artifact-level items. The Hand and Eye of Vecna come right to my mind - relics of the arch-lich Vecna, left behind when he became even more powerful.
The One Ring is another idea, as is Stormbringer.
Most probably, these kind of items have a strong connection to their maker, who might or might not have given up possession of these items voluntarily - if so, what plans and plots are behind this, if not, who or what was powerful enough to separate the creator from his creation?
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Has any had experience of running - or even encountered - an intelligent item/weapon as a villain?
This is an idea I'm toying with, possibly even making it a recurring villain.
It could doubltess overwhelm a owner/wielder in order to further pursue its own schemes and exploit their powers and abilities too.
Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated.
I'm trying something similar too in my game. One of my players, my brother, is playing an Machiavellian Magus, whose Black Blade is slowly driving him towards taking over the world. I've discussed it with the player, and he plans to slowly transition from LN to LE, eventually turning on the party as he ascends to BBEG status and the blade gains more and more control.
You mean like Chomper?
Made my day lol
I've used this idear before and it works well if the party are unaware of what the item is
In my game I used a broach that had belonged to an evil mage who became a lich
The lich's body had trapped by an order of clerics but they need the broach so they could destroy the lich totally
So you had the clerics looking for the broach and the broach looking for the clerics. The broach could teleport so waas always abel to move around only it had no control of where it landed
I just had it turn up from time to time on random npc's it drove the players nuts aas they would meet a bad guy for the firsat time but he would know stuff about them as the npc waas basicly a meat puppet for the broach
If you have seen (or will see) the old animated film "Heavy Metal" -- the evil artifact "Locknar" (it's an orb) is a great and sinister artifact villain, check it out. Media for it isn't broadly available on youtube, but you may have better luck than I or if you bite the bullet and get it on netflix or whatever you won't regret it.
But you could have it as an orb that changes size. So basically it reappears over and over again because one time it's a little round gem in a gauntlet or loose that the party sells for a little gold, or an orb another time that teleports away, or a scepter that conveniently falls out of a villains hand into a deep crevasse, or a gem in a ring another time... it always just teleports away or falls into possession of the players and is privy to anything about them or what they talk about during that time. When it wants to be acquired it could use an employer or trusted benefactor of the party to send it to be acquired. Perhaps a plot hook could be to attain sentience it corrupted and drained some of the intellect of various creatures in it's quest to become aware and think and plan like mortals, but parts of it's essence were traded to these creatures in the process... so the item is sending the party to kill all these undead anti-heroes, or ageless monsters (which seems like a good thing to do and a just cause) but every time they do they are restoring more and more of the item's power, and once it is totally aware AND totally empowered people better watch the hell out. The day the party finally sets out to fight the ultimate villain and they realize it's that friggin' orb they've seen so many times (in a kaiser soze moment) -- they'd know it's the grand finale.
...image-wise "cinematogographically" -- it could use a suit of armor to move around in the end game, but the orb would alternate from being the head/helmet of the suit, the tip of it's own staff, the tiny gem on it's ring and all the other incarnations the party may have seen it in... perhaps with different powers depending on what it chooses to be, or needs to be defeated in each form attached to it's armor. Just the image of a suit of armor with a green glowing orb for a head seems like a cool villain, at the moment.
Thanks for the additional thoughts and suggestions.
Vicon - not seen Heavy Metal so I will make sure to follow up on Locknar.
Seems like an item that the PCs acquire/carry/etc. often is a popular idea, and teleporting certainly looks to be the way to go for villainous item to make its escape.
The most diabolical magical item I can think of, makes a 1HD Simulacrum once per day, in whatever shape or form the owner wishes. But always a new one, every day.
Because that doesn't look so bad at all. Hey, it's free help! Except... you need to feed and shelter them too, these people. And they just keep coming. So the party gets callous about them. Starts treating the Simulacra as expendable. "Hey, they're not real anyway. And completely obedient. Besides: there'll be a new one tomorrow, and we can't keep them alive anyway."
And all the while, the intelligent item subtly suggests new, and ever more evil things to do with these people - if the PCs don't start sliding down that slope by themselves. First they're slaves. Then cannon fodder. Then experimental subjects. And ever worse...
Dungeon Magazine 31 had a darklord of Ravenloft named Ebonbane which was an intelligent and animated rapier. I don't remember the details of the adventure much though I think I might still have that old magazine around somewhere.
Blackrazor is definitely fun too though in most games it just tempts its wielder into greater and greater acts of slaughter rather than trying to execute some sort of evil master plan. It or another intelligent magic item could spread rumors in an effort to get adventurers to come claim it as treasure and thereby free it from some sort of imprisonment.
Another idea which just occurred to me is an evil mirror (possibly of the old "glassteel" material) which uses various illusions and mind control magics and might be able to create "mirror man" simulacra of creatures which have been reflected in it. It might also be able to create portals between planes and potentially even Gate in creatures from "the other side".
Whether this mirror hangs on an evil queen's wall, sits at the center of a twisted magical funhouse, or travels the land with a gypsy caravan/carnival might affect how the PCs interact with and hunt it down. it might not be able to "get away" very well, but perhaps it could suck the PCs through its image into other worlds where they have to complete various quests to get back to their home.
I thought of a certain something from the second book in the Mistborn series.
Perhaps because I just finished it today.
I started something that could have led to such an item but it never got to that stage. Basically in a module the party got a battle axe named man killer and to be different I made it a not very intelligent intelligent magic item that hated humans.
It was mostly used for comic relief like when they first defeated it the party were doing their thing and someone noticed the axe was not where it had fallen but closer to one the only human in the party. He would sometimes wake up in the morning and find the axe laying next to him.
However the party paldin decided to use it as his backup weapon. This is where the future bad guy item comes in. Mostly it just sent out feelings of anger twoards humans and the paladin didn't feel anything evil from it. But he wasn't bright if and never braught any of this up to the PC's who could figure it out.
Base calmly I had decided the axe had potential but needed some in specified event to happen. Such as a paladin failing his will save because he was standing next to an incapacitated human party member.
But its ego was so low the paladin needed to roll a one and most of the time he did stuff the axe liked so the " an atrocious act like murdering ones friend or an innocent" event never happened before the campaign ended.
I might plan something like this out better in the future.
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Has any had experience of running - or even encountered - an intelligent item/weapon as a villain?
This is an idea I'm toying with, possibly even making it a recurring villain.
It could doubltess overwhelm a owner/wielder in order to further pursue its own schemes and exploit their powers and abilities too.
Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated.
I am running Chellan as a bad guy in a campaign after one character snatched her up at the end of RothRL. It's pretty fun. a lot.
I've played an interesting one. A set of intelligent armor in several parts (breastplate, gauntlets, helmet, legs, etc.) each worn by a minor villain over the course of the campaign. The armor was clearly very useful, and well-worth wearing it over selling it.
It also spoke to its wearer, explaining that the whole set was far more powerful than simply a combination of the pieces themselves. A whole campaign was built upon hunting down the individual pieces, some were controlled by their wearers, some had effectively possessed them, but when they got into the hands of the PCs, the PC wearing them was in control.
It became clear after a while that the armor was evil, but it was deliberately failing possession attempts to give the impression that it wasn't strong enough to dominate the PC wearing it. At the same time it was secretly building a magical compulsion in that PC to continue wearing the armor, convincing the PC to make excuses to the others as to why it was okay (this was set up behind-the-scenes between the GM and that player, and the others didn't know it was happening until the campaign was done).
Eventually when the full set was collected (the final piece of course being the helmet to be dramatically lowered onto the PC's head) the PC that was wearing it was overwhelmed. He gained some cool new powers (I think via a sudden applied template) and demonic minions that spilled forth from the void to serve him. The player of that PC, alongside demonic minions controlled by the GM, faced down his ex party members as the surprise BBEG of the campaign!
The rest of us were stunned, but we managed to pull through in the end. It was a fantastic campaign.