From: cm601@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Bradley Alexander Derrick)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.dnd
Subject: Re: Artifact designing
Date: 12 Nov 1992 23:46:14 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Reply-To: cm601@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Bradley Alexander Derrick)
NNTP-Posting-Host: slc10.ins.cwru.edu



>Hello everyone out there!  I was just wondering, does anyone have any cool
>artifacts that they've designed, along with a bit of an outline as to how
>the PCs get the artifact?  For that matter, and cool new magic items?
>
>Thanx, later

	On Urath(c) there all artifacts being dug up by charaters _ALL_ of
the time.  Several of my friends who are designing the world along with me
all play with seperate playing groups.  But before we give the go ahead on
an artifact consider these KEY points

	o  Will the artifact make the players TO powerful?

	o  Does the artifact have some side effect or somethin' generaly
	   not good about it?  I belive that all magicall items when 
	   created have somethinng wrong with them.  Maybe the spell caster
	   forgot to add a pinch of dragon dust.. or something on those
	   lines.  Also magical items should have something extrodinary
	   about them.  Maybe they glow faintly when near a trap or evil.

	o  Design a history for the artifact that is magically passed into 
	   the character once he touches the artifact.  Or someone might
	   be framiliar with the artifact.

			   *  *  *  *  *
Example.. (I'm creating this one of the top of my head.. so bear with me) 

	Cy'Moril's Abmoninable Beast - All Urathians demi-humans are framiliar
	with Cy'Moril The Great Inventor.  In his last years of life he was
	busily slaving over a new invention.  Cy'Moril kept his invention a
	secret, and nobody could find the invention until his jounral was
	found 30 years after his death.  High Lord Raurin(my old PC) found
	the jounral and set out to find the now forgoten invention.  The 
	Half-Ogre searched Tragella(c) high and low.  He was contemplating
	giving up when his son Akmontu (a Kelvin half bread), deciphered
	some of Cy'Moril's runes.  The two crossed the plains again and
	after 3 months found the invisble invention in the Forests of Shae'
	Monhi.  Akmontu guarded the now coined "invisible box", while his
	father went and fetched a mage.  When the Mage returned he told his
	Akmontu that Raurin had fallen ill and wanted him to return to
	their keep.  Akmontu waited while the Mage cast his spells and 
	reverted the box into a visible state.  The box was actually not a
	box but a living beast that looks similar to a mainframe with fur.
	Akmontu returned home to find that his father had been poinsoned by
	the mage.  Akmontu healed his father and they returned back to the 
	Forest.  They believed the mage had stolen the beast, for it was no
	were to be found.. they tracked the mage back to his labratory
	were they confrented him.  The mage was easily slain by Raurin's 
	sword(Keener - another artifact).  Akmontu examined the labratory,
	found the mages notes.  Apparently the beast was an organing
	machine that had knowledge of 1st - 5th level mage spells, and 
	kept all of Cy'Moril's lost invention sketches.  Raurin decided 
	it was best to share the machine with the public.  So they led 
	the machine back to Tragella(tm).  Here it was again stole and it
	has not been recovered since.


	Feel free to use Cy'Moril's Beast if you want as an example, but I
will probably wind up including it my Newsletter.  If you would like
further info on the newsletter.. E-Mail me..

- Alex