Magic Items

Magic items in Tavern Tales are highly versatile and customizable. Rather than explicitly telling you what a magic item does, each entry asks several questions about the magic item and provides possible answers. As the GM, you can choose any answer you want, or even invent new answers. This approach allows you to scale magic items to match the adventurers' power. For example, you can select weak answers for upstart adventurers, or strong answers for true veterans. You might also leave some questions unanswered to control a magic item's power, or to let the players unlock additional powers at a later time.

## Getting Players Involved

Consider letting your players answer magic item questions. Giving your players a chance to determine a magic item's effects will make them feel more invested in the game. Several options are listed below.

### Let them choose

Ask a question and give a range of answers. It may be necessary to tweak some of the answers so that they are all approximately equal in power.

### Ask them an open-ended question

Ask an open-ended question and let your player figure out the details. They might come up with creative options that you never considered

### Unlock its true power

Since magic items are variable, you could say that magic items start off weak. Players could unlock a magic item's true potential through in-game feats (uncover the item's history, bond with it, pour magical energy into it, etc).

### Reward and punishment

You may want to alter a magic item's power based on player actions. For example, suppose a magic item is locked away in a chest. If a player makes an incredible roll to pick the chest's lock, you might pick a stronger answer. If the player made a a terrible roll, you might say that the magic item is cursed. Basically, the player's roll determines how strong the magic item is when the chest is unlocked.

### Discover its history

Every magic item has a story. Rather than immediately telling the players what a magic item does, you could tie a magic item to its legend. Before players can use a magic item, they must first investigate its history. The more they reveal, the more powerful the magic item becomes

> **GM:** You discover a sword among the ruins. There are runes on its surface -- it's obviously magical.
> **Player:** Cool, what's it do?
> **GM:** Who knows?
> **Player:** Heh, fine. I'll go to the temple, then. Maybe the priest who hired us knows something about it.
> **[Later] GM:** Alright, you're back at the temple.
> **Player:** I approach the priest and show him the sword. "Do you recognize this? We found it in the ruins."
> **GM:** He scrunches up his nose and looks it over. "Hmm... I've never seen it before, but I saw one of these runes in a holy text. It's the sigil of an angel called Dariel, I think."
> **Player:** That's a great lead! If the priest is fine with it, I'll research the rune int he temple library. I'm looking for everything I can find about angels.
> **GM:** Sounds like a Mind roll.
> **Player:** I was thinking the same thing. Ha! I rolled 21! I find an entry about how Archangel Dariel forged Flamedrinker to slay a demon named Agkor. As soon as the knowledge enters your mind, the runes on the sword emit golden light. How about this? The sword tells me the location of the closest demon.
> **GM:** 21 is a great roll. You can be more ambitious.
> **Player:** Archangel Dariel speaks to me through the blade. He's an expert on all things demonic.
>
>

## Magic Items

### Adorinel, the Legacy Circlet

***The wearer has access to the minds stored within it***

**Questions**

**What minds are stored within it?**

* Everyone who previously wore the circlet
* Members of a lost community
* Important members of a certain group (wizards, generals, angels, etc)

**What expertise do they offer?**

* General knowledge from a wide range of categories. Each person has a lifetime of experience to share
* The inhabitants are all experts on one specific topic. Together, they hold more knowledge about that topic than every library combined
* Sage wisdom. They seem to know the answers to profound cosmic questions, but they protect those secrets with cryptic half-answers

**How does the wearer communicate with them?**

* You go into a trance, and your mind enters a dreamlike realm where the inhabitants await you
* When you call upon an inhabitant, they appear before you (and only you) like a ghost
* You can telepathically communicate with one inhabitant randomly chosen each evening

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* When a psychic plague began driving the people of her village insane, a young psion created this circlet to preserve the wisdom of her people
* When heroes die, they go to the hallowed Vault of Heroes, where they counsel deities and other cosmic entities. This circlet is effectively an invitation to attend the Vault of Heroes at will
* The circle forms permanent psychic connections with others, like the center of a vast,
 unbreakable web. Their minds are linked across time and space, life and death

### Akik's Eye

***This crystal orb shows distant events and locations***

**Questions**

**How do you use it?**

* Just look into it
* Put it into your empty eye socket
* Light candles, burn incense, and chant

**What does it show?**

* The past or the future; never the present
* Anywhere, so long as the eye has been there before
* What it wants to show. It always shows you something important, though it's not always clear why it's important

**Do others know they're being viewed?**

* No, it's completely stealthy
* Creatures under the gaze of the Eye have a disturbing, creepy feeling that they're being watched. The feeling is so unsettling that it typically wakes people up
* A giant glowing orb appears at the viewing location

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* An adventurer visited Akik, a seer who was rumored to know the future. When Akik tried to read the adventurer's fortune, she saw her own gruesome death. Terrified, she refused to finish the reading. The outraged adventurer then slaughtered the seer and plucked out her eye
* The wizard Akik was the world's greatest diviner, capable of spying on anything and anyone the world over. His favored crystal ball absorbed a fraction of his powers over the years
* This orb contains an imprisoned shaft of sunlight. When released, the it flies off to the desired destination and then returns to provide a vision of a far-off place

### Bunsen's Burner

***This device shoots the backpack's contents. The nozzle has dials and levers on it***

**Questions**

**What's in the backpack?**

* Four canisters that can be loaded with potions
* Acid, fire, or poison
* Lava

**How does it recharge?**

* Pour raw chemical reagents into the backpack
* The backpack naturally replenishes itself
* The backpack replenishes its contents so quickly that the pressure must be relieved at regular intervals. Otherwise, it may explode catastrophically

**What happens if the backpack is damaged?**

* It breaks
* Chemicals spill across the ground, or the pressurized contents launch the wearer in a random direction
* Kaboom!

**What do the dials and levers do?**

* Reveal how much fuel remains
* Switch between different chemical contents
* Initiate a powerful chemical reaction that will eventually cause a massive explosion, destroying the item

**According to Legend...**

* An alchemist attached this device to the gullet of a mechanical dragon for Prince Bunsen's lavish coronation ceremony
* Originally built to distribute healing potions to troops, the military transformed this device into a flamethrower
* The backpack is the containment cell for the everburning heart of the fire sorcerer Bunsen

### Cuervo, the Hunter's Companion

***The wielder can cummon Cuervo, a loyal raven***

**Questions**

**What is Cuervo?**

* A normal raven with above-average intelligence. He can carry small objects, though he's ideally suited for scouting. He caws when he sees danger
* A giant raven big enough for a person to ride on his back
* A spirit raven that can find literally anything. Simply name it, and Cuervo flies off toward it

**How do you summon Cuervo?**

* Say its name
* luck one of the bow's feathers and cast it into the air
* Fire an arrow skyward. The arrow turns into Cuervo

**What happens if Cuervo dies?**

* He can't be re-summoned for awhile (GM's discretion)
* One of the raven feathers on the bow blows away (it starts with 1d6). The bow loses its magic when all of the feathers are gone
* The bow splinters into a hundred ravens, which fly off

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* Cuervo was a raven that followed a hunter throughout the wilderness, faithfully scouting ahead and helping the hunter track prey. Eventually, the bird died and the hunter kept some of his feathers as an adornment on the bow. Until the end of his days the hunter could always rely on his friend's spirit to guide the way
* When the Raven God clashed with a chaos titan, some of its feathers fell to earth. A fletcher named Cuervo gathered the feathers and crafted this bow
* After accidentally slaying his friend with a misfired arrow, an archer vowed to never shoot a bow again. He stripped the feathers from his arrows and tied them to his bow

### Emperor Yang's Teapot

***A group of people believe that the last person to drink tea brewed from this teapot is their rightful rule***

**Questions**

**Who believes this?**

* A small group of traditionalist knights
* An entire religion
* A nation

**Are they compelled to believe this?**

* Yes, they have no choice. The magic is binding
* Yes, but it's far from mind control. They deeply respect and love their ruler and happily obey, almost like a close parent-child relationship
* No, it's just a cultural belief. In fact, the teapot holds no magic at all. Its only power is the power that people choose to give it

**What happens if the teapot is destroyed?**

* The people will rise up to obliterate their former ruler
* The people revile their former ruler
* The custom ends; they'll need a new way to select their ruler

**How's the tea?**

* Delicious
* Bitter
* Glows like molten gold

**According to Legend...**

* Royalty of the Yang Dynasty must complete the sacred tea ritual before rightfully taking the throne. This teapot is the focal point of the ceremony
* A goddess disguised herself and visited an old tea farmer. Pleased by his gracious hospitality, the goddess enchanted his teapot so that he would have the authority to rule the land
* Emperor Yang sired no children, so he decreed that his legacy would live on in his favorite teapot

### Eye of the Night

***The possessor can behold darkness***

**Questions**

**What darkness can you see?**

* Light and darkness are inverted for you. Dark areas are as clear as a well-lit day, and bright areas are gloomy
* You can see the darkness of a person's soul, which hangs about them like a dark storm cloud
* Whenever you close your eyes, you witness dark and terrible events that have not yet unfolded

**How do you use it?**

* Keep it on your person
* Grasp it tightly and it vanishes, fusing with your soul
* Press it into your forehead, where it physically fuses with your skull. It becomes a third eye as black as midnight itself

**What does the Eye do at midnight?**

* You take on the visage of the Eye of Night's true form until sunrise
* It shows you what you want to see
* It takes control of you for a few minutes

**What is the cost?**

* It bonds with you. You're stuck with it until you die
* Sunrise makes you physically ill
* You are incapable of sleeping at night

**According to Legend...**

* In much the same way that a person can become sick, a ray of sunlight can become infected by darkness. This stone contains a beam of corrupted light
* This is the disembodied eye of a night drake, who are said to be able to see rays of shadow the way humans see rays of sunlight
* Only one explorer has ever found the edge of the world. He reached down and picked up a pebble from the horizon where night meets day

### Hourglass of Yesterday

***This hourglass manipulates time***

**Questions**

**What happens when you flip it over?**

* Time freezes for everything except you
* Time rewinds for exactly 1 day
* Time accelerates for you, allowing you to move much more quickly for a shirt time

**What toll does it take?**

* You age rapidly
* Temporal guardians cast their baleful eyes on you for violating cosmic laws
* It takes a very long amount of time for the sand to run through so it can be used again

**What happens if you break the glass?**

* You're thrown through time
* You age a thousand years in a few seconds
* Sand gets everywhere

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* The universe began when the Hourglass of Eternity was turned over. Someone managed to remove some of the sand and used it to create the Hourglass of Yesterday, thus shortening the universe's lifespan
* After his family was tragically slain by a tidal wave, the deranged wizard Xon devoted his life to draining enough energy to turn back the clocks. He succeeded and crafted this magic item, but was crushed to discover that his life's work only amounted to 24 hours of time travel
* Technically, the hourglass doesn't exist yet. Someone will create it tomorrow

### Gladius

***The wielder gains some of the martial prowess of the last wielder***

**Questions**

**What power do you channel?**

* Gain 1 of their combat traits as a temporary trait
* Learn everything they knew about combat
* Replace all of your combat traits with theirs

**How do you connect with the last wielder?**

* When you sleep, you dream of their battles
* Gain some of the last wielder's personality traits, as determined by the GM
* In the heat of battle, you may become possessed by the last wielder

**What happens if you lose the sword?**

* The sword pulls at you. Retrieving it becomes your foremost goal in life
* The sword forsakes you. You may never wield it again
* You permanently lose a fraction of your combat prowess (a combat trait, knowledge, stats, etc), locked away forever inside the sword

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* A soldier too this sword to war and used it to kill his enemies. That soldier died, so the sword found itself in the hands of another warrior. So it went, battle after battle. This sword has been wielded by hundreds of soldiers, and has slain untold thousands
* The legendary gladiator Tetraites used this blade in a 99-match victory streak before dying in his 100th match -- just one victory away from winning freedom
* This was the only weapon recovered from the great Battle of Cavorus. Some say that if you put your ear against the blade, you can hear the distant sounds of that bloody battle.

### Gourd of Morning Dew

***This container magically replenishes liquid placed in it***

**Questions**

**When does it replenish its contents?**

* Constantly -- one drop every second
* Every day at sunrise
* As soon as its empty

**When can you replace the liquid?**

* When the gourd is coated with morning dew
* After it's been upturned and empty for a full day
* Whenever you want. Just dump out the old liquid

**Does it have any restrictions?**

* No potions. The magic of the potion interferes with the magic of the gourd
* It can only hold liquids that a gourd could normally hold, so no acid or lava
* Only the person who put the liquid into the gourd can use its replenished liquid. To everyone else, the gourd pours plain water

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* A wine-loving adventurer found the world's best wine in a bottle of 412 Greyvine. He hired an alchemist to find a way to preserve the vintage indefinitely. It was a terrible mistake; with an infinite supply of the world's most delicious wine, he drank himself to an early grave
* A pious alchemist sought to distill sunlight itself. She never succeeded, but the developed a potion container that draws from the sun's replenishing energy
* For centuries, shamans would use this gourd to collect morning dew, which they used in their vision quests. This gourd gradually absorbed the shamans' magic and now continues to perform their morning ritual

### Key to Nowhere

***Any door unlocked with this key temporarily becomes a portal to Nowhere***

**Questions**

**What is Nowhere?**

* An extradimensional space the size of a house
* An empty, endless void
* Another universe

**How long does the portal last?**

* Just a few minutes
* Until the door closes
* Until the key relocks the door, returning the door to normal

**Does it work on any door?**

* Yes, even doors without keyholes. A keyhole magically appears when the key comes close
* The door has to have a keyhole
* The key only works on doors that go nowhere important, like doors to storage rooms

**What happens on the other side of the door?**

* They see the portal to Nowhere, too
* The portal closes if someone opens the other side of the door
* The other side of the door won't open, n matter what

**According to Legend...**

* This key spontaneously came into existence when someone finished crafting Nowhere. But that leaves another question: Who built Nowhere?
* Nowhere was originally the home of the first wizard, who created the universe because he got tired of his cramped living quarters
* Nowhere is the true universe. The universe we know is basically just Nowhere's backyard

### Many-Sided Coin

***This coin shows a beast on each side***

**Questions**

**What happens with the face-up beast?**

* The GM gives you a temporary trait that represents that beast. You have it until the coin is flipped again
* The beast appears next to the coin, loyal to whomever flipped it. It disappears when the coin is flipped again
* You transform into that beast for about 1 hour

**What happens after you flip it?**

* Both coin faces change to a new beast
* The face-up side changes to a new beast
* The face-down side changes to a new beast

**What sort of beasts does it show?**

* Mundane beasts (cat, bird, fish, etc)
* Magical beasts (unicorn, dragon, manticore, etc)
* Similar creatures (mammals, reptiles, birds, etc)

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* The knights of an ancient order each carried each carried a magic coin bearing a beast. A warlord defeated them all and smelted the coins to combine them into a single all-powerful coin
* When a group of powerful adventurers visited the gods, the rogue challenged the Goddess of Luck to a coin toss. He lost, but he never expected to win. He watched where she stowed the coin and later pickpocketed it
* Aso and Osa are twin spirits that collectively form Asoosa, the God-Goddess of Nature. They represent nature's dual components: predator and prey, growth and decay, sun and moon, male and female. Each summer solstice, they flip this coin to determine who will control which domains for the year. When they're done, one becomes predator and the other becomes prey so they can begin their year-long hunt

### Orgada's Fang

***This dagger drips venom from its hollow tip***

**Questions**

**What does the venom do?**

* Inflict a wound every couple of seconds
* Make victims physically weak
* Cause extreme hallucinations and eventually insanity

**How can the poison be cured?**

* A general antidote will do the trick
* There is only one known antidote, which requires special materials
* Complete a vision quest

**Can its venom be harvested?**

* No, the poison deteriorates within minutes of leaving the dagger
* You can extract 1 dose of poison every day or so
* It constantly produces harvestable venom, which degrades after about an hour

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* Orgada, the Queen of Serpents, was a deadly basilisk whose very touch was death. Adventurers slew the beast and transformed her tooth into a potent weapon
* Before embarking on a vision quest, would-be chieftains of the Emerald Snake Clan would prick their fingers on their holy clan artifact. Those who completed their quest in time would receive the antidote and gain the right to rule the clan. The antidote recipe is a closely-guarded secret, or perhaps lost to the ages
* A skilled rogue used this dagger to pierce the poison heart of a corrupted dryad. The dagger absorbed a fraction of the dying fey's poisonous blood

### Talia's Eternal Blade

***This weapon exists outside of the spacetime continuum***

**Questions**

**What does it cut?**

* Anything. No material is too strong
* Magic. It slices through spells and enchantments
* Reality. It cuts open portals to other dimensions

**How can it be destroyed?**

* This sword is utterly and completely indestructible. Not even the GM can destroy this weapon. When the universe ends, this sword will remain
* A powerful dispelling or magic-draining effect will shatter it like glass
* It will vanish if it ever crosses the border between dimensions

**How does it warp reality?**

* Struck creatures teleport to a random nearby location
* Once every so often (the GM decides when), the wielder can teleport as per Blink from the Arcane theme
* Creatures slain by this blade are erased from existence

**?**

**According to Legend...**

* During her fruitless search for eternal youth, Talia the chronomancer discovered a material that exists outside of the spacetime continuum. She crafted a sword out of the material to fund her research
* Talia, an apprentice swordmage, botched a dangerous teleportation spell. Talia vanished from existence, but her sword appeared at her teleportation destination
* Talia was a cosmic entity charged with dividing reality into its component pieces. She used this blade to slice apart the various universes

### Well-Wishing Whiskey

***Luck befalls those who make a toast with this whiskey***

**Questions**

**What happens when you drink a toast?**

* Toasters increase all rolls they make to fulfill that toast for the next day or so
* The toast becomes true, like a wish has been granted
* Drinks form deep, life-long bonds with each other. They henceforth regard each other as their most valued friends

**What happens with the leftover bottle?**

* Whoever breaks it loses their closest friend
* Nothing. It's just a bottle
* It smells of whiskey forever more. The scent invokes powerful feelings of fond nostalgia and camaraderie

**How's the hangover?**

* Blissfully absent
* Like a dragon is trying to break out of your skull
* It wipes everyone's memory of the toast. Drinkers privately write a toast on a piece of paper and give them to the GM, who secretly chooses one. That's the toast everyone made last night

**How's it taste?**

* Dry and sweet, with a smooth finish
* Rich and complex. Packs a punch
* The way friendship would taste, if you could drink it

**According to Legend...**

* The distillation process uses wishing well water
* The God of Booze and Valor created this drink for special occasions
* For decades, an explorer visited every site where something truly great happened. She searched the hallowed ground and gathered a few handfuls of grain. She used these to create a grain mash to distill the whiskey

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