The main reason i like the Eberron setting is because it encourages thinking like this, sure for day to day use a potion of healing is too much and possibly even too expensive for a commoner as a one time use thing, however if theyre able to be diluted into a flask or soaked into bandages/rags, it becomes something that most people have a small flask that they take a swig from or dab a bit into a rag or hankerchief whenever they get an injury, so 1 50gp healing potion may last an entire year in a chefs kitchen taking care of any small cuts or burns that may happen that dont quite equate to 1pt of damage.
Incomes are weird in D&D. A peasant is listed as making just a silver piece a day, but a mug if beer is 2 coppers. That’s 20% of the average income on a single beer. Meanwhile, rolling a 10 on a skill check, even one you aren’t proficient in, nets a gold per day instead. So we’re to assume that common folk are entirely unskilled, have no attributes above a 10, don’t even TRY to make more than that AND are happy to spent more than half their income every meal. Which is insane. A gold per day is a an actually reasonable income based on the rules. It’s high enough to be realistic for the bottom rungs to be able to survive, low enough to make something like adventuring still seem like a lucrative career choice. That’s 365-ish gold per year, making a potion a worthwhile investment for emergencies. I do like your idea of diluting potions or using them on bandages to speed natural healing, though.
@@VisonsofFalseTruthsi dunno, the hole idea of a salary is probably not very useful to gage wealth in a feudal society. Like a peasant don't have money for beer at the bar, but they probably make their own ale at home.
@@VisonsofFalseTruths if it's anything like medieval Europe, the main meal of the day will be provided by the employer, and children start working rather early, so it's not quite as crazy as it might seem plus most people would have a small vegetable garden and some chickens at home on the other hand medieval peasants typically worked only 8 months a year 5 or 6 days a week and still managed to save for food for the weekend and winter so 1 silver a day seems reasonableish if it's a yearly average, less so if it only counts workdays
The moon touched blade makes any weapon magical for the purpose of overcoming resistances to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage. This is useful against incorporeal and extraplanar creatures, as well as lycanthropes.
Sure, but fighting a werewolf up close is not in any way advisable. Use a sling filled with silver coins and/ or run as fast as you can! For the average person, this gets 1 swing in, so only useful for trained warriors. And trained warriors have better options from the uncommon list, or could just use a silver sword.
@Grungeon_Master still worth a few hundred gold to properly outfit a town guard at the gates and walls to prevent entry. Just because an item is common doesn't imply that it is exclusively useful to commoners. Also, the silver won't deter a ghost.
Absolutely! But with the drastic power scaling of Dnd, unfortunately your best bet is still investing those gold pieces in training a few magic initiates, or equipping your best fighter with the best weapon money can buy, imo. Perhaps I still underrated this, but there's my logic, at least.
@@corymorse4271 That's nice to have in some situations, but as Grungeon Master explains there are more useful items that would take priority for the value they yield. Unexpected attackers would be a more urgent threat (barring a specific entity threatening a town), so cast-off armor would be more important for guards being able to rapidly respond than giving them a sword that is more likely to provide no benefit. The Moon Touched Sword also has to compete with things that increase the quality of life for all townsfolk like the Cleansing Stone or one of the many industrial investment that would generate commerce to afford more magic items.
@@fnrope I'm by no means arguing that it should be treated a 10, just that it has value outside of being a sword that gives away your position in the dark.
I want you to know that these videos have been an invaluable trove of ideas for world building. I strongly believe that any one who wants to create a highly logical world or cool unique locations should watch these
The thing with the Ruby of the War Mage is that it works for every single class of spellcaster. Druids, Wizards, Clerics, Paladins, Warlocks, etc... Looking at it from a police or military perspective, having standardized equipment that can be issued to every soldier or police officer regardless of class would be ideal. Also, looking at it from that standpoint then things like the Moon-Touched Sword might not be a bad idea, especially when you can issue them in bulk to your soldiers for very little money. Thus giving them the ability to fight creatures that have immunity to non magical weapons on a budget... It might not be the best equipment, but for a standard military issue weapon it`s almost perfect.
I think that you are underselling Common spell scrolls. To be sure, saved-up extra daily castings of most first-level spells are not worth the cost of production, but I think most armies would want an emergency stock of scrolls of Goodberry, allowing the limited number of military druids or nature clerics to feed and heal the entire regiment, its horses, and its elephants when needed (if fantastic megafauna have not been hunted to extinction, it can be taken as a given that the elephants formerly found throughout the real world will be present in most fantasy lands, and that most armies will include these ravenous devastators).
Awakened Shrub Pot is VASTLY underrated. Because of false appearance, it is a better spy than the Scry spell in most circumstances, able to infiltrate and report the goings-on of many outdoor locations over extended periods. You can even command a shrub to take notes on the goings-on when no one is present so you arent relying on its memory.
This iw basically the only way to have a minion, my party scuffs at me for getting one because there are no immediet combat effect. It can be used with Artificers infusions
I've had a campaign where I used shiftweave as a spy character. My guy would prepare his shiftweave to have multiple uniforms for the place he needed to sneak into so he could change his role as necessary while still looking the part.
While I do agree that the Moon-Touched Sword is near useless, the reason so many people are responding saying it should be higher rated (I believe a 3 is fair, considering all of the cosmetics are a 2) is because it is the only Common magic item that is a weapon (aside from the Armblade which is Warforged only, and the magical Staffs). Silvered weapons are the weapon’s base cost + 100gp, and a Moon-Touched Sword is 100gp flat and is magic, therefore bypassing all resistances and immunities to non-magical Slashing damage (which I know everyone has mentioned to you without going further than that). -Bypassing this resistance allows fighting lower cr fiends and elementals (such as imps, quasits, and fire snakes), as well as low level incorporeal undead (such as Shadows and Specters). Yes, ranged combat will always be better than melee for basic commoners or even guards, you are very correct about that. It is however, useful to have a decent melee option if you are surprised, surrounded, or otherwise forced into melee combat. -Magical items are resistant to all damage (as you usually mention), but also are not subject to deterioration including from low cr monsters such as Grey Ooze or Rust Monsters (Rust monster Antennae specify Ferrous, it’s Rust Metal ability doesn’t when struck). Magical weapons are easier to maintain, and you wouldn’t have to worry about ever having to re-silver your weapon in similar situations. -Range is superior and preferred, but you will be constantly replacing ammunition. Ammunition gets lost, destroyed, or damaged, and D&D simulates this by making it so that you have to spend time scouring the battlefield after a fight to recover half of your spent ammunition, the other half being lost, magical or not. Some DMs allow the “Unbreakable Arrow” to always be recovered, but is a house rule (and every unbreakable arrow is 100gp). This doesn’t mean that magical ammunition isn’t worth it, but magical ammunition is rather expensive, though you would only really need to use it when dealing with monsters that you need to bypass non-magical resistances on (which as you mentioned in the video would be far more accessible using the Mind Crystal as a monster encyclopedia). -Some people defend it’s light ability, I don’t and completely agree that it is not worth it for the light alone and if anything in the wrong situation could put you in a worse situation. As you pointed out in the video, your sword (the thing you would be looking past towards your opponent) isn’t exactly something you want to have giving off “bright” light when trying to fight someone/something. Plus, with it being closer to you it would be brighter for the one wielding it and possibly harder to see past. It gives 15ft bright light and 15ft dim, making it weaker than a torch or even a lamp. However what others fail to mention when debating in favor of it is that it only emits light when in Darkness. This means on a particularly bright night (such as a full moon ironically) you would be in Dim Light instead of darkness, and your sword wouldn’t even glow to help you. Obviously this is ridiculous, but it is functionally how it works as written. So it’s only useful for light if you: a) Don’t have a lantern/torch b) It’s a dark night Or c) You’re underground without a lantern/torch (Additionally, the existence of the Light cantrip makes the lighting function of this sword useless/outclassed). TLDR: I both agree and disagree. I disagree in that this sword is slightly more useful than a silvered sword at nearly the same price, due to the benefits of being a relatively cheap magic item. But I do agree that it is in no way the best option, nor is actually good at the function that it sets out to do. Overall, I believe it is a 3/10 given that it: -Can be used against creatures that mundane weapons either aren’t as effective against or cannot effect at all. -Is of relatively similar cost to Silvering a weapon, with more benefits than silvering. -Lasts way longer than a mundane weapon with significantly less upkeep to maintain it. Thank you if you actually read my block of text lol. Sorry if I formatted it weird or poorly (mobile commenting). Wonderful video as always, can’t wait for you to cover the rest :)
I feel like the potion of climbing might be good for rescue situations Like little timmy fell down the fell, now he could climb out by himself or if you're adventuring alone, in a situation where you fall and theres no garmente someone is going to save you. a 2/10 seems incredibly low for something that could be useful in these situations.
Is it just my imagination, or is potion of watchfull rest literally magic redbull? If it didnt cost so much, I would imagine this being a similar culteral phenominon to our energy drinks.
@@thekaxmax Arcane Propulsion Arm and Artificers with Arcane Armor covers the limbs. Granted the only other eye I can think of off the top of my head is an artifact (that you really don't want it has baggage lol) but still. 3.5 had tons of grafting rules, like at least two different core grafting systems that technically didn't even compete with each other but RAI weren't intended to be combined plus several other similar options like symbionts and a few related prestige classes, it got really complicated (there's a dnd 3.5 grafting handbook on GiantITP called Fleshwarping covering all the various options albeit some might not consider some of what they said to count), but afaik they aren't in 5e.
Regarding shiftweave and other "universal" clothing, don't forget the power of snobbery. Truly wealthy people will wear handmade clothes requiring unique skills, rare materials, and special care that cost far more than a mere magic item. Anyone caught wearing shiftweave will be shunned as declasse. Our own society is replete with such attitudes regarding clothing, food, and other goodls
You know I just now realized that your name is probably a portmanteau of Dungeon and Grung, as in the frog race. Up until this point I thought it was Dungeon and Grunge, as in the music genre or “dirty”.
I so often listen to these videos when driving to work and just today actually sat down to watch one, and noticing that little frog man is exactly what made me go. “Wait a second….”
With the Rope of Mending, the question is whether it is worth paying for the equivalent of 25-50 times that length of normal rope to get a fully reusable one, and whether it will pay for itself fast enough to be a worthwhile purchase. Personally, I think that the biggest feature is that this rope can be joined together at the ends to form a closed loop after tying a knot, making it impossible for the knot to be untied or to come undone. There is a lot of use in that. I look forward to your Rope Trick video!
From a lifesaving standpoint, the potion of healing is kind of surpassed by the healer's kit because you can get more of them for cheaper and it takes the same action cost and requires being just as adjacent to another creature to use it as the potion does. Plus, Variant Humans can have the Healer Feat and give any commoner a significant portion (or all) of their hp back by stabilizing them and raising them to 1 hp and then following it up with the 1d6+X usage.
Prosthetic limbs depending on the material might be much more durable than regular limbs. If they not conducting burning sensation they might be useful for handling hot objects, acids, very cold objects, etc...
About the mystery keys: A king locks something stupidly valuable in a chest with no key that can open it, then confiscates all the mystery keys in the region. The only way a thief could gaurantee they can open the chest is to steal like 30+ of these mystery keys that have been entrusted to different lords and generals, as well as the chest itself
Given your take on pipe of smoke monsters, I kinda want a video about what the existence of gnomes ought to do to a medieval world. Specifically Forrest Gnomes, which all get minor illusion for free, as well as nerfed but permanent speak with animals.
Shiftweave is so fun. I loved having a couple of disguises on demand. Being able to turn into a member of the city watch got the party out of and in to so much trouble!
19:32 Dmg page 116 has rules for Water pressure, though they're rather simple. Expanding further, Ghosts of saltmarsh has an optional rule for damage to objects and equipment at depth on page 204. Hope this helps someone!
11/10 for the pot of awakening! This item is, in my opinion, the strongest for it's rarity in the whole game. If you consider high level characters, they often have thousands of gold spare. That could be hundreads of awakend shrubs! A walking forest more reliable than any person and that will work or fight for you for free? Slave traders would go out of business before it even becomes a debate. You might say they are weak to fire, so red dragons would be a concern. Counterpoint, they were already a concern to peasents, but the shrubs are more easily replaced. The shrubs can easily replace most hard labour, possibly including (with proper direction) the crafting of the pots themselves! I cannot imagine a more useful item.
The big problem with this: Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 6, knows a language. It's a sapient, enslaved creature. Granted, there is nothing indicating it's capable of resenting it's creator and master or is suffering an "I have no mouth but I must scream" hell, but I could see treants and even many druids for a start taking offense at them.
@@Avigorus I'm non certain they have a will of their own, but thankfully, there are ways to talk to plants, so you can ask what it feels about working for you. I'd bet though that they welcome the chance to move and pollinate in a larger region.
All these magic clothes just makes me think of the monster "Ragamuffin" or the Grim Hollow version of the same monster. A sentient clothes monster epidemic occuring to due to a magic clothes fad would be both funny and terrifying.
A couple of low-level uses for the subtle mind Crystal. 1: Cast friends on someone. If it's someone volatile, they might even attack you when the spell runs out. You can use this to convince people that the target hates you "for no reason". 2: Phantasmal force. Even the victim might believe they are going crazy. I guess these are both the same use: gaslighting.
Moon sword is a magic weapon that bypasses silver resistance stuff and costs the same as silver ing a weapon and also might be used on low magic regions to allow melee combatants to strike magical creatures immune or resistant to Normal damage
Smoldering armor can be wood elves' standard armor, allowing them to hide in their own smoke. Also, sentinel shields could be used to send messages on a battlefield without a need to carry flags or horns in your hands, eliminating the exclusively communication designated soldier
the shield of expression can be used for signaling and for secret messages, you can change the expression however you want, which in turn means the expression can be made really complex. in addition you can fully change it once per bonusaction.
Orb of Direction can be used to search for metal ores and other things influencing magnetic fields. Just watch for changes in reading beetween compas and orb.
Moon touched sword is actually good. Eternal light source is good thing by itself, compared to torches . It can be used even as automatic street lights. You can also use it in flammable envoirments. This is good communication tool. You can give commands to fighting army, or ship's crew. Sentinels can use it to warn their allyes of enemy attack.
The everbright lantern from part one blows it out the water, in that regard. It's such a small light radius compared to its counterparts. Strange how this is the item seems to be generating the most ardent defense in the comments, though...
@Grungeon_Master it's biggest pro in my opinion us as a light source on a weapon that doesn't use up a hand for guardsman at night. Kind of like how we mount flashlights to firearms in the real world. A floodlight would be better as a light source, but this is better then nothing in the dark. If your whole city guard was outfitted with these it would also make it easier to identify friendlies.
the moon touched sword is a magical weapon, able to overcome almost every immunity and resistance, and it's only a common magic weapon. definitely better than a 2/10
Hmm I'm unsure. Best policy for most people is not to go toe-to-toe with creatures far beyond your means to fight. If you do have to fight, I think ranged magical ammunition is strictly better
Keep in mind this is a list based on societal benefit, nit adventuring benefit. Why unless thise creatures are common enough to expect an average guard to need to fight them, this enchantment isn't thar useful.
They honestly are just shitty lanterns masquerading as swords, with the only benefit being that they don't require fuel. They cast less light then a regular lamp and way less then a lantern. A moon touched dagger makes more sense, so many more people have a reason to carry a dagger around then swords, if your everyday tool that is easy to carry could also provide light, then that could be quite useful, however it really sucks that these blades don't seem to have an on/off function.
Haven't watched all the video yet, but I really love the concept of viewing magic items from the perspective of commoners in a dnd world. One request would be if you could somehow boost the treble in your audio? im a bit hard of hearing on the low ends so I find myself blasting the treble eq for these videos. Just one tiny nitpick at an otherwise fantastic channel~
Have a wealthy aristocrat playing off the "autistic old rich guy with a business" trope but instead of being obsessed with trains or an animal, it's magic items. He's a genuinely good guy and tries to use those magic items to improve people's lives
You think that clothing that is (for all standard intents and purposes) indestructible would not have a massive use and impact on a fantasy society? Most of the cosmetic magic items should be at least a 5 since they basically never need to be maintained because magic items are near impossible to destroy without employing magic to do so. A shield of expression would be incredibly useful to armies since they wouldn't have to continually repair and resupply their men with shields.
Moon touched sword, staff of bird calls, and staff of adornment are all Magic Items that are Weapons (all staves double as quarterstaffs unless specified according to DMG), which apparently makes them count as +0 Magic Weapons according to Sage Advice.
Moon touched blade frees up a human's hand from a torch, allowing both a sword and shield. I don't know what other options there are for non casters who don't have darkvision since i havent really played 5e. But even dim lighting is better than no lighting, since it requires total darkness for you to have disadvantage. Most tank roles in military, police, guards etc would need the extra hand and can provide light to allow ranged allies to attack without shooting in the dark. Mining, fishing, diving, towns would find value in heatless light sources that can't be put out and uses no fuel. These are all occupations with the occasional monster hazard where a little less light is better than only 1 point of fire damage.
That bit about the “Orb of Time” actually reminds me of something from the Dragonriders of Pern (yes, my usernamesake); they measure time in “candle marks”!
The scribes are part of the Central Bureaucracy with close ties to both the Modrons and Asmodeus. Every so often, a some well-meaning fool tries to clean it up (with the most successful to date being a Githzerai by the name of Conrad), but for most the pure legalese is too dense to think straight if they go too deep into their machinations. (reminder for those who aren't catching the intentional pun, Githzerai are from Limbo... and the Modrons do indeed have shiny metal bottom plates if that helps you catch the reference)
@@johannesstephanusroos4969 I mean trying to streamline and get stuff processed correctly and efficiently. Also the entire above is a (admittedly tortured) Futurama reference joke if you didn't get it (Hermes Conrad the Limbo champion and bureaucrat had an episode where he had to go the Central Bureaucracy and had a sequence where he sorted a massive stack of unsorted mail)
Notes on possible misses (I'll skip the glowy sword as another already touched that): Orb of Time does have one niche I can think of: fully subterranean races who want to know what time it is up top before they set out to approach the surface (to help time their approach). This would make it a good convenience for say drow slavers or certain dwarves who want to keep good relations by not accidentally waking up their trading partners (this of course presumes any such peoples normally live deep enough that they don't have an easier means of tracking time of day). Pipe of Remembrance as a Speak With Dead Lite depends on DM being open to the idea... but yeah that potential cultural impact of abusing them as Zone of Truth Lite is definitely something to think about. Potential for Pole of Collapsing depending on DM ruling on the question of: when expanded, how much weight can it support? It does say, RAW, that it only expands as far as the space allows so no applying significant pressure when it comes out, but hypothetically I could see it being potentially useful in a pinch to hold up a ceiling after it's expanded (even if only for a few seconds so someone who was holding the ceiling up with a plank of wood the pole is now braced against can GTFO before the ceiling collapses). Pot of Awakening has a potentially major ethical/moral issue: they're supposedly sapient, yet they RAW only act to follow instructions. This has horrifying implications if you think about it too much as you're creating sapient life that is essentially enslaved to you and incapable of ever going beyond your instructions. Granted, it's still hella useful, but I could see some freaking out about it (especially Druids and treants lol) Potion of Climbing: certain forms of hunting just got a huge boost if the hunt was truly valuable enough (similar can apply to some wartime tactics), criminals just got a huge boost at sneaking in, and now properly savvy security features will be including defenses against random wall-crawlers. I'd say 4/10 myself, just because of the impact on the arms race between criminals and security. I'm guessing Potion of Comprehension was skipped cause it's basically a Spellwrought Tattoo of Comprehend Languages that you carry around and drink instead of put on your skin and activate later, and you clearly opted to stop before getting to the world-altering power of anyone with the gold can sheath themselves in countless spells (RAW only gives a guideline of how big the tattoos are, it doesn't say they can't overlap, and a Crawford tweet says they can even if that's not official)?
I'd say more like reading tablets given how you can't really transmit with them. Now if someone could work out a way to network them with an interlinked network of Sending Stones that only need an address instead of a matched pair...
Very clever. I did not consider this. Although unfortunately the armour does not produce smoke with any odour, which is the main thing that affects bees about real smoke. Such a cool idea that I'd probably allow it, though.
Depending on how you rule resting, a potion of watchful rest is either incredibly useful or incredibly useful. 8 hours of garunteed relaxation time, because you can't do anything intensive, allowing you to stay sane while pulling 16 hour days. (Assuming your time is worth that much.) 8 hours of being able to command and coordinate in a emergency, because it's not being physically active.
It'd be easier to hide/smuggle books to save them as crystals, and harder to accidentally destroy a library of crystals with fire. I imagine much greater preservation of knowledge.
Really good ideas of the pipe of remembrance. I love the idea of using it at funerals. For myself, I keep magic items much rarer and I want magic to feel magical not be a stand in for technology. Most permanent magical items in my worlds are unique, so people can't use multiples of them but local areas can incorporate them into personal rituals. I also had been using the 5e prohibition of buying and selling magic items since before 3e. I do have a few exceptions, but they are all extremely regional. Expanding on your thoughts on healing potions, the catch with potions of healing, especially the weakest ones, have a weird property that they are too weak during combat and too strong after combat. In combat 4-10 HP average of 7just isn't enough even at low levels when enemies are often dealing an average of 7 hp but with a max higher than 10. Outside of combat, they have no limit to use, so instead of using the greater/superior/supreme potions, just drink an equal gold value worth of the cheapest potions and go back to full hp after every battle. The greater potion at a cost 10 times the standard only heals twice as much, so instead drink two weak ones and keep the extra 8 for later. Means stocking shops with higher quality potions is, from a certain perspective, punishing your players... very weird.
The pot breaking automatically could lead a particular line of character to form a number of creatures via grafting or otherwise intertwining the multiple into a singular form. Alternatively, some species of shrub can spend years getting to full prominence, animation doesn't automatically deny growth per se. So you could have a baby Groot that will be as big if not bigger than adult Groot eventually. Just needs more time than the month. I'll admit I'm amused picturing animated tomato plants that irregularly toss their bounty at scavengers.
The problem with the Prosthetic Limb is that, given the prevalence of magical healing of all forms, it would be very rare to actually need one. The spell Regenerate also exists, so even if you do lose a limb there are magical options to replace it with your own flesh instead of a prosthetic. If you evaluate the limb in a vacuum I can see where it gets a relatively high score, but in the setting it's basically a novelty at best, or a slightly cheaper option at worst. This is kind of the problem in general when looking at how magic and other DnD things affect world building. Individually they would have the potential to be massive. All together at once and it's hard to even begin to guess what the world would look like and what features would actually end up important in the end.
Why do they care what the surface world says the time is? Every culture will have some method of timekeeping, even underground - a water clock perhaps? Their own time systems will likely be completely independent of the surface, except in rare cases where 'dawn' or 'per day' matters for magic items
Shiftweave is WAY more valuable for the everyday man you buy just one set and now you have, Sunday best, cold weather woolen stuff, everyday work, rainy day, and Spiffed up very formal gear. Or you could just do what my grandfather did, buy three outfits and wear them until Grandma through them out because of the holes and wear. Then grandpa would go and by the same three outfits. Just have all Shiftweave the same out fit now it last 5 times as long. At the start of your day you just put on one set clothes and head out. Is the weather going to change to cold and wet? No problem you now have a fur lined cloak to stay warm and dry.
First vid had a set of clothes that didn't wear out, the shiftweave would only really help with rapidly changing clothes not with making them last longer RAW.
Something that I've always wondered about, heroes get wildly powerful and have insane constitution, do commoners get the benefit of long rests? Always made me wonder if even melee people aren't super buffed by mana to heal in a single day
Having potions of healing on hand at every worksite in a setting sounds practical especially given that they're common in rarity, but OH MY GOD would this be abused. Especially in the feudal systems most settings would used, this would enable governments to justify the laxest workplace health and safety regulations possible. Why have guardrails? Why have Hi-Vis? Why incorporate any safety precautions into your bureaucracy when your first-aid kits are catch-all, immediate, and 100% effective. If every foreman had to carry healing potions at work, especially in authoritarian kingdoms I don't think there would be any worker protection laws.
I recently got some warhammer fantasy orks from the 90s I’ve added to my dnd mini collection. One of them has a red shield with a face on it. It is now the shield of expression. (Also the shark statue was so fucked that I had to re listen to that part multiple times cus it was so baffling.)
Even before i watch the video, i posit that no magical item is truly useless, because some of the weaker or sillier magic items might be results of experimentation or practice on a crafter's part, that may not have produced a useful item, but produced a useful piece of research. Also, a useless magical item, might be tinkered with, and augmented into something dastardly.
You missed the entire point of the moontouched sword; its value isn't because you've got a light source, it's because you now have a magic weapon. This is the only common-rank magic weapon (not counting ammunition) in the game, and thus the only one that can be mass produced in most campaign settings. Town guards defending the city walls against an invading force of golems or some other type of monster that's resistant or immune to nonmagical weapons can use moontouched swords to deal with enemies they would ordinarily be powerless to stop. IMO, this benefit alone means it's not a 2 out of 10. Sure, it's not a flame tongue or sunblade or whatever, but among the common items I'd say it's at least a 4 out of 10.
I think Potion of Watchful Rest is underrated, it's coffee on steroids. Even if you can only do light activity, for someone like a human scholar who can study 8 hours more without needing to sleep, that's a 50% increase to a human's usable hours, if you were wealthy enough to drink one every day you'd have a 50% effectively higher lifespan than normal humans.
No, it explicitly states it cannot expand further than the available space. However, I could see it having function as an emergency propping tool if a ceiling was about to collapse and maybe buy people a few seconds to run.
All these are candidates for Artificer's Artificer Infusion's Replicate Magic Item. And that makes me happy. Each one can used by an Artificer as a Spellcasting Focus. There are a lot more themes for Artificer Spellcasting. Perfume of Bewitching + Tasha's Caustic Brew or Grease? Yup, they just poured it out. Fireball? Yup, came right out of that bottle, let loose with a trail of smoke that no longer bears bewitching effects, just cinder. Also, Mind Crystal (Subtle) can be created over and over again to generate gold out of nothing.
Um, actually, if we're being pedantic, the Prosthetic Limb wouldn't be able to help people with physical deformities, as the prosthetic functions "identically to the part it replaces". Taken literally, this means that if you use it to replace a deformed limb, it functions as the deformed limb did. Hells, even replacing injured limbs is borderline.
You mean spell scrolls are useless, except for a clerics and bards, who can carry a pile of extra lives in their pocket. Healing word is all the benefits of a potion, except a 30-foot range and bonus action to use.
Sorry, hard disagree on the orb of gonging, you missed that with a resonant cavity and the fact that it's loud meaning it emits a lot of sound energy, you can use this to generate heat, and if you can do that.... Perpetual Motion Machines! 10/10 Rewrites the world.
That's extrapolating far beyond the text of the item, I feel. It doesn't say it produces heat, and this is magic, so we can't just assume it follows the same rules as real-life physics. It's magic, after all. Unless the item alludes to operating 'like a normal candle', we can't assume that creating light also creates heat, for example, either.
"The moon touch sword is really quite usless..." heavily disagree. Means you don't have to carry a torch that can set thing on fire, be blown out and takes up a hand. It will not run out of fuel no matter how long you are away from supplies, and for a creature without dark-vision, it might be their only method of sight in dark climates, and it works underwater, in area with flammable gas without igniting them, and in a pinch, a stealthy creatye that stalks the party can be marked by driving the weapon into it, essentially marking it with a beacon. Also, since underbarreled gun lights are rather useful in real life, you always want to have a light source and a free hand. When equipped on town guards it acts as an immediate signal that something is wrong and a weapon is drawn. I think your ratting it so low, is due to never experiencing the condition it would be a life saver. Then there is the fact that you can use a glowing weapon to bluff a foe into thinking your weapon has some other powerful enchant on it.
Not a DnD player so... what? Scrolls require you to be a mage? Yeah, that kinda makes them useless. I was going to say that any magic item that allows a commoner to cast fireball or any other attacking spell that is stronger than crossbow bolt is basically a gun. And I'm not even starting about utility spells with which it can replace most items in this list. Would be a 20/10.
Stats nerd here. Advantage is ONLY an effective +5 on rolls you're already overwhelmingly favoured to succeed at, and even then, not really. If you only succeed on a 20, advantage gives you 2 shots at it, sure, BUT it's actually WORSE than a flat +1. You have a 5% chance of success to start with, then with a +1 you succeed on 19 or 20, bringing you to a 10% success rate. Advantage will only bring you to a 9.75% success rate, which while a small difference, is *still* worse than a +1 On the inverse, if you only fail on a 1, so a success rate of 95%, a +1 brings you to 100%. Advantage doesn't eliminate the chance both dice will say 1 and 1, which means your success rate has only gone up by 4.75% to 99.75% - you're still maintaining a 0.25% failure chance. Again, it's small, but that doesn't feel like a +25% to me. But the above is for the extremes. Let's look at DC11, or an even stevens 50/50 shot at success, or a coin flip. Advantage gives you a 75% success rate, which is an increase of 25%. NOW it's a +5. Or if you're slightly favoured at a DC10, where you would only fail 45% of the time, for a 55% success rate; advantage brings you to 79.75, which is an increase of only 24.75%, so only a +5 due to rounding. Assuming you [1] don't know the DC and [2] the DC is something you can actually achieve with the roll (so 1 to 20), if you average it out for ALL DCs, advantage is actually an effective +3.3, which is NOTABLY NOT PLUS FIVE.
the potion of watchful rest would be useful in military campaigns against species that do not need to sleep for species that do. it takes away the opportunity of taking the encampment of a travelling army by surprise. it could lead to officers on the campaign using it to prevent assassinations while not losing any rest. in addition it would allow for longer work days as workers would still have leisure time for their private lifes, it could prove vital to something like urgent investigations in the books of some domain, urgent research into the wekness of an enemy likely to attack in at best a few days or critical negotiations where the ones that are more exhausted after possibly days of negotiating will have had the worse position. sure most good uses would be niche cases but there are possibly many and those can have deciding impacts. sure it's somewhat expensive, but especially the thwarting of assassination attempts in ones sleep and about doubling the work one can do in a day, while not having to sacrifice leisure time, could be worth the cost to a tyrant, or any absolutistic ruler. thus i'd argue 3 might be too low.
It might not be suited for your videos, but you should look at how ridiculously dumb the hammer of thunderbolts is. The more you understand it, the dumber it gets.
The main reason i like the Eberron setting is because it encourages thinking like this, sure for day to day use a potion of healing is too much and possibly even too expensive for a commoner as a one time use thing, however if theyre able to be diluted into a flask or soaked into bandages/rags, it becomes something that most people have a small flask that they take a swig from or dab a bit into a rag or hankerchief whenever they get an injury, so 1 50gp healing potion may last an entire year in a chefs kitchen taking care of any small cuts or burns that may happen that dont quite equate to 1pt of damage.
Incomes are weird in D&D. A peasant is listed as making just a silver piece a day, but a mug if beer is 2 coppers. That’s 20% of the average income on a single beer. Meanwhile, rolling a 10 on a skill check, even one you aren’t proficient in, nets a gold per day instead. So we’re to assume that common folk are entirely unskilled, have no attributes above a 10, don’t even TRY to make more than that AND are happy to spent more than half their income every meal. Which is insane.
A gold per day is a an actually reasonable income based on the rules. It’s high enough to be realistic for the bottom rungs to be able to survive, low enough to make something like adventuring still seem like a lucrative career choice. That’s 365-ish gold per year, making a potion a worthwhile investment for emergencies.
I do like your idea of diluting potions or using them on bandages to speed natural healing, though.
@@VisonsofFalseTruthsi dunno, the hole idea of a salary is probably not very useful to gage wealth in a feudal society. Like a peasant don't have money for beer at the bar, but they probably make their own ale at home.
@@VisonsofFalseTruths if it's anything like medieval Europe, the main meal of the day will be provided by the employer, and children start working rather early, so it's not quite as crazy as it might seem
plus most people would have a small vegetable garden and some chickens at home
on the other hand medieval peasants typically worked only 8 months a year 5 or 6 days a week and still managed to save for food for the weekend and winter
so 1 silver a day seems reasonableish if it's a yearly average, less so if it only counts workdays
The moon touched blade makes any weapon magical for the purpose of overcoming resistances to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage. This is useful against incorporeal and extraplanar creatures, as well as lycanthropes.
Sure, but fighting a werewolf up close is not in any way advisable. Use a sling filled with silver coins and/ or run as fast as you can!
For the average person, this gets 1 swing in, so only useful for trained warriors. And trained warriors have better options from the uncommon list, or could just use a silver sword.
@Grungeon_Master still worth a few hundred gold to properly outfit a town guard at the gates and walls to prevent entry. Just because an item is common doesn't imply that it is exclusively useful to commoners.
Also, the silver won't deter a ghost.
Absolutely!
But with the drastic power scaling of Dnd, unfortunately your best bet is still investing those gold pieces in training a few magic initiates, or equipping your best fighter with the best weapon money can buy, imo.
Perhaps I still underrated this, but there's my logic, at least.
@@corymorse4271 That's nice to have in some situations, but as Grungeon Master explains there are more useful items that would take priority for the value they yield. Unexpected attackers would be a more urgent threat (barring a specific entity threatening a town), so cast-off armor would be more important for guards being able to rapidly respond than giving them a sword that is more likely to provide no benefit. The Moon Touched Sword also has to compete with things that increase the quality of life for all townsfolk like the Cleansing Stone or one of the many industrial investment that would generate commerce to afford more magic items.
@@fnrope I'm by no means arguing that it should be treated a 10, just that it has value outside of being a sword that gives away your position in the dark.
I want you to know that these videos have been an invaluable trove of ideas for world building. I strongly believe that any one who wants to create a highly logical world or cool unique locations should watch these
The thing with the Ruby of the War Mage is that it works for every single class of spellcaster. Druids, Wizards, Clerics, Paladins, Warlocks, etc...
Looking at it from a police or military perspective, having standardized equipment that can be issued to every soldier or police officer regardless of class would be ideal.
Also, looking at it from that standpoint then things like the Moon-Touched Sword might not be a bad idea, especially when you can issue them in bulk to your soldiers for very little money. Thus giving them the ability to fight creatures that have immunity to non magical weapons on a budget... It might not be the best equipment, but for a standard military issue weapon it`s almost perfect.
I think that you are underselling Common spell scrolls. To be sure, saved-up extra daily castings of most first-level spells are not worth the cost of production, but I think most armies would want an emergency stock of scrolls of Goodberry, allowing the limited number of military druids or nature clerics to feed and heal the entire regiment, its horses, and its elephants when needed (if fantastic megafauna have not been hunted to extinction, it can be taken as a given that the elephants formerly found throughout the real world will be present in most fantasy lands, and that most armies will include these ravenous devastators).
Awakened Shrub Pot is VASTLY underrated. Because of false appearance, it is a better spy than the Scry spell in most circumstances, able to infiltrate and report the goings-on of many outdoor locations over extended periods. You can even command a shrub to take notes on the goings-on when no one is present so you arent relying on its memory.
This iw basically the only way to have a minion, my party scuffs at me for getting one because there are no immediet combat effect.
It can be used with Artificers infusions
I've had a campaign where I used shiftweave as a spy character. My guy would prepare his shiftweave to have multiple uniforms for the place he needed to sneak into so he could change his role as necessary while still looking the part.
finally, agent 47
Good work, 47. Now look for an exit.
While I do agree that the Moon-Touched Sword is near useless, the reason so many people are responding saying it should be higher rated (I believe a 3 is fair, considering all of the cosmetics are a 2) is because it is the only Common magic item that is a weapon (aside from the Armblade which is Warforged only, and the magical Staffs).
Silvered weapons are the weapon’s base cost + 100gp, and a Moon-Touched Sword is 100gp flat and is magic, therefore bypassing all resistances and immunities to non-magical Slashing damage (which I know everyone has mentioned to you without going further than that).
-Bypassing this resistance allows fighting lower cr fiends and elementals (such as imps, quasits, and fire snakes), as well as low level incorporeal undead (such as Shadows and Specters). Yes, ranged combat will always be better than melee for basic commoners or even guards, you are very correct about that. It is however, useful to have a decent melee option if you are surprised, surrounded, or otherwise forced into melee combat.
-Magical items are resistant to all damage (as you usually mention), but also are not subject to deterioration including from low cr monsters such as Grey Ooze or Rust Monsters (Rust monster Antennae specify Ferrous, it’s Rust Metal ability doesn’t when struck). Magical weapons are easier to maintain, and you wouldn’t have to worry about ever having to re-silver your weapon in similar situations.
-Range is superior and preferred, but you will be constantly replacing ammunition. Ammunition gets lost, destroyed, or damaged, and D&D simulates this by making it so that you have to spend time scouring the battlefield after a fight to recover half of your spent ammunition, the other half being lost, magical or not. Some DMs allow the “Unbreakable Arrow” to always be recovered, but is a house rule (and every unbreakable arrow is 100gp). This doesn’t mean that magical ammunition isn’t worth it, but magical ammunition is rather expensive, though you would only really need to use it when dealing with monsters that you need to bypass non-magical resistances on (which as you mentioned in the video would be far more accessible using the Mind Crystal as a monster encyclopedia).
-Some people defend it’s light ability, I don’t and completely agree that it is not worth it for the light alone and if anything in the wrong situation could put you in a worse situation. As you pointed out in the video, your sword (the thing you would be looking past towards your opponent) isn’t exactly something you want to have giving off “bright” light when trying to fight someone/something. Plus, with it being closer to you it would be brighter for the one wielding it and possibly harder to see past. It gives 15ft bright light and 15ft dim, making it weaker than a torch or even a lamp.
However what others fail to mention when debating in favor of it is that it only emits light when in Darkness. This means on a particularly bright night (such as a full moon ironically) you would be in Dim Light instead of darkness, and your sword wouldn’t even glow to help you. Obviously this is ridiculous, but it is functionally how it works as written. So it’s only useful for light if you:
a) Don’t have a lantern/torch
b) It’s a dark night
Or c) You’re underground without a lantern/torch
(Additionally, the existence of the Light cantrip makes the lighting function of this sword useless/outclassed).
TLDR: I both agree and disagree. I disagree in that this sword is slightly more useful than a silvered sword at nearly the same price, due to the benefits of being a relatively cheap magic item. But I do agree that it is in no way the best option, nor is actually good at the function that it sets out to do.
Overall, I believe it is a 3/10 given that it:
-Can be used against creatures that mundane weapons either aren’t as effective against or cannot effect at all.
-Is of relatively similar cost to Silvering a weapon, with more benefits than silvering.
-Lasts way longer than a mundane weapon with significantly less upkeep to maintain it.
Thank you if you actually read my block of text lol. Sorry if I formatted it weird or poorly (mobile commenting). Wonderful video as always, can’t wait for you to cover the rest :)
I feel like the potion of climbing might be good for rescue situations
Like little timmy fell down the fell, now he could climb out by himself
or if you're adventuring alone, in a situation where you fall and theres no garmente someone is going to save you.
a 2/10 seems incredibly low for something that could be useful in these situations.
Is it just my imagination, or is potion of watchfull rest literally magic redbull? If it didnt cost so much, I would imagine this being a similar culteral phenominon to our energy drinks.
The ersatz eye and prosthetic limbs essentially prove that any dnd world that have them would essentially be fantasy cyberpunk.
would need improved versions as well.
Specially for the army, it might even be expected from higher ranks
Are the prosthetic limbs using modern tech or is item closer to an animated suit of armor?
@@pheralanpathfinder4897 Read the book that includes them. Dunno, myself.
@@thekaxmax Arcane Propulsion Arm and Artificers with Arcane Armor covers the limbs. Granted the only other eye I can think of off the top of my head is an artifact (that you really don't want it has baggage lol) but still. 3.5 had tons of grafting rules, like at least two different core grafting systems that technically didn't even compete with each other but RAI weren't intended to be combined plus several other similar options like symbionts and a few related prestige classes, it got really complicated (there's a dnd 3.5 grafting handbook on GiantITP called Fleshwarping covering all the various options albeit some might not consider some of what they said to count), but afaik they aren't in 5e.
Regarding shiftweave and other "universal" clothing, don't forget the power of snobbery. Truly wealthy people will wear handmade clothes requiring unique skills, rare materials, and special care that cost far more than a mere magic item. Anyone caught wearing shiftweave will be shunned as declasse. Our own society is replete with such attitudes regarding clothing, food, and other goodls
You know I just now realized that your name is probably a portmanteau of Dungeon and Grung, as in the frog race. Up until this point I thought it was Dungeon and Grunge, as in the music genre or “dirty”.
there is a grung / frog on the channel icon ^u^
I so often listen to these videos when driving to work and just today actually sat down to watch one, and noticing that little frog man is exactly what made me go. “Wait a second….”
Tom the Grungeon Master once again thinking about the common man!
With the Rope of Mending, the question is whether it is worth paying for the equivalent of 25-50 times that length of normal rope to get a fully reusable one, and whether it will pay for itself fast enough to be a worthwhile purchase. Personally, I think that the biggest feature is that this rope can be joined together at the ends to form a closed loop after tying a knot, making it impossible for the knot to be untied or to come undone. There is a lot of use in that.
I look forward to your Rope Trick video!
From a lifesaving standpoint, the potion of healing is kind of surpassed by the healer's kit because you can get more of them for cheaper and it takes the same action cost and requires being just as adjacent to another creature to use it as the potion does.
Plus, Variant Humans can have the Healer Feat and give any commoner a significant portion (or all) of their hp back by stabilizing them and raising them to 1 hp and then following it up with the 1d6+X usage.
Prosthetic limbs depending on the material might be much more durable than regular limbs. If they not conducting burning sensation they might be useful for handling hot objects, acids, very cold objects, etc...
Aren't magic items nearly indestructible? That would make it very useful.
Yeah, very much a *oh drat, I got my arm cut off, guess I'll just trade it in for an upgrade* situation in many cases.
About the mystery keys:
A king locks something stupidly valuable in a chest with no key that can open it, then confiscates all the mystery keys in the region. The only way a thief could gaurantee they can open the chest is to steal like 30+ of these mystery keys that have been entrusted to different lords and generals, as well as the chest itself
Given your take on pipe of smoke monsters, I kinda want a video about what the existence of gnomes ought to do to a medieval world. Specifically Forrest Gnomes, which all get minor illusion for free, as well as nerfed but permanent speak with animals.
"This is good for society"
**A giant smoking pipe to boof tobaco with**
"Pot of Awakening" sounds quite interesting xD
Tom out here making a series that embodies his channel's whole thing into like 3 episodes.
It's very nice.
Pair the shiftweave with a changeling go assassin. Oh yea. Then actor and spy feats. You got yourself a master asssaassin
Shiftweave is so fun. I loved having a couple of disguises on demand. Being able to turn into a member of the city watch got the party out of and in to so much trouble!
19:32 Dmg page 116 has rules for Water pressure, though they're rather simple. Expanding further, Ghosts of saltmarsh has an optional rule for damage to objects and equipment at depth on page 204. Hope this helps someone!
11/10 for the pot of awakening! This item is, in my opinion, the strongest for it's rarity in the whole game. If you consider high level characters, they often have thousands of gold spare. That could be hundreads of awakend shrubs! A walking forest more reliable than any person and that will work or fight for you for free? Slave traders would go out of business before it even becomes a debate. You might say they are weak to fire, so red dragons would be a concern. Counterpoint, they were already a concern to peasents, but the shrubs are more easily replaced. The shrubs can easily replace most hard labour, possibly including (with proper direction) the crafting of the pots themselves! I cannot imagine a more useful item.
The big problem with this: Int 10, Wis 10, Cha 6, knows a language. It's a sapient, enslaved creature. Granted, there is nothing indicating it's capable of resenting it's creator and master or is suffering an "I have no mouth but I must scream" hell, but I could see treants and even many druids for a start taking offense at them.
@@Avigorus I'm non certain they have a will of their own, but thankfully, there are ways to talk to plants, so you can ask what it feels about working for you. I'd bet though that they welcome the chance to move and pollinate in a larger region.
When you talked about pressure capsules an ad using Queen's "Under Pressure" interrupted the video. Truly a sign from the deep ones.
My man looks at a magical common sword and goes "nah, this is garbage". But when he sees a magical compass...
All these magic clothes just makes me think of the monster "Ragamuffin" or the Grim Hollow version of the same monster.
A sentient clothes monster epidemic occuring to due to a magic clothes fad would be both funny and terrifying.
A couple of low-level uses for the subtle mind Crystal.
1: Cast friends on someone. If it's someone volatile, they might even attack you when the spell runs out. You can use this to convince people that the target hates you "for no reason".
2: Phantasmal force. Even the victim might believe they are going crazy.
I guess these are both the same use: gaslighting.
Can’t wait for bro to explain how chilling with a pipe is the key to world peace
Moon sword is a magic weapon that bypasses silver resistance stuff and costs the same as silver ing a weapon and also might be used on low magic regions to allow melee combatants to strike magical creatures immune or resistant to Normal damage
Idk if you saw but someone else said that and he responded saying that you wouldn't want to get close and a sling with silver coins is a better bet
Smoldering armor can be wood elves' standard armor, allowing them to hide in their own smoke. Also, sentinel shields could be used to send messages on a battlefield without a need to carry flags or horns in your hands, eliminating the exclusively communication designated soldier
Pole of Collapsing and Pole of Angling would have a really cute baby
the shield of expression can be used for signaling and for secret messages, you can change the expression however you want, which in turn means the expression can be made really complex.
in addition you can fully change it once per bonusaction.
Yep agree on this, as well as a shield is larger than a face and could be used for distance signaling. It has uses in tactics in warfare.
The hat of vermin is great for magic shows
Orb of Direction can be used to search for metal ores and other things influencing magnetic fields. Just watch for changes in reading beetween compas and orb.
Moon touched sword is actually good. Eternal light source is good thing by itself, compared to torches . It can be used even as automatic street lights. You can also use it in flammable envoirments. This is good communication tool. You can give commands to fighting army, or ship's crew. Sentinels can use it to warn their allyes of enemy attack.
The everbright lantern from part one blows it out the water, in that regard. It's such a small light radius compared to its counterparts. Strange how this is the item seems to be generating the most ardent defense in the comments, though...
@Grungeon_Master it's biggest pro in my opinion us as a light source on a weapon that doesn't use up a hand for guardsman at night.
Kind of like how we mount flashlights to firearms in the real world. A floodlight would be better as a light source, but this is better then nothing in the dark. If your whole city guard was outfitted with these it would also make it easier to identify friendlies.
I thought I was the only one thinking about how these kind of things would actually effect the game world's. These are great.
the moon touched sword is a magical weapon, able to overcome almost every immunity and resistance, and it's only a common magic weapon. definitely better than a 2/10
Hmm I'm unsure. Best policy for most people is not to go toe-to-toe with creatures far beyond your means to fight. If you do have to fight, I think ranged magical ammunition is strictly better
Keep in mind this is a list based on societal benefit, nit adventuring benefit. Why unless thise creatures are common enough to expect an average guard to need to fight them, this enchantment isn't thar useful.
@@Grungeon_Masterso… turn the sword into magicka bullets?
@@Aaa-vp6ug i'm not sure if it would keep its magical features if it is in any way tampered with or destroyed
They honestly are just shitty lanterns masquerading as swords, with the only benefit being that they don't require fuel. They cast less light then a regular lamp and way less then a lantern. A moon touched dagger makes more sense, so many more people have a reason to carry a dagger around then swords, if your everyday tool that is easy to carry could also provide light, then that could be quite useful, however it really sucks that these blades don't seem to have an on/off function.
Idk if you’ve read the Mistborn books, but the spellshard really works well as a parallel to the copperminds in that world.
19:10 could be useful for guards that don't work in shifts or elite guards you don't want falling asleep on the job
Heck yeah part 2!
I 100% approved, I'm just being a long form series especially if you add some Homebrew.
19:05 elves can still be put to sleep with poison
Haven't watched all the video yet, but I really love the concept of viewing magic items from the perspective of commoners in a dnd world. One request would be if you could somehow boost the treble in your audio? im a bit hard of hearing on the low ends so I find myself blasting the treble eq for these videos. Just one tiny nitpick at an otherwise fantastic channel~
Have a wealthy aristocrat playing off the "autistic old rich guy with a business" trope but instead of being obsessed with trains or an animal, it's magic items. He's a genuinely good guy and tries to use those magic items to improve people's lives
You think that clothing that is (for all standard intents and purposes) indestructible would not have a massive use and impact on a fantasy society? Most of the cosmetic magic items should be at least a 5 since they basically never need to be maintained because magic items are near impossible to destroy without employing magic to do so. A shield of expression would be incredibly useful to armies since they wouldn't have to continually repair and resupply their men with shields.
good voice balance, not shouting in my ears like them other youtubers, rather soothing
Moon touched sword, staff of bird calls, and staff of adornment are all Magic Items that are Weapons (all staves double as quarterstaffs unless specified according to DMG), which apparently makes them count as +0 Magic Weapons according to Sage Advice.
Moon touched blade frees up a human's hand from a torch, allowing both a sword and shield. I don't know what other options there are for non casters who don't have darkvision since i havent really played 5e. But even dim lighting is better than no lighting, since it requires total darkness for you to have disadvantage.
Most tank roles in military, police, guards etc would need the extra hand and can provide light to allow ranged allies to attack without shooting in the dark.
Mining, fishing, diving, towns would find value in heatless light sources that can't be put out and uses no fuel.
These are all occupations with the occasional monster hazard where a little less light is better than only 1 point of fire damage.
That bit about the “Orb of Time” actually reminds me of something from the Dragonriders of Pern (yes, my usernamesake); they measure time in “candle marks”!
The scribes are part of the Central Bureaucracy with close ties to both the Modrons and Asmodeus. Every so often, a some well-meaning fool tries to clean it up (with the most successful to date being a Githzerai by the name of Conrad), but for most the pure legalese is too dense to think straight if they go too deep into their machinations.
(reminder for those who aren't catching the intentional pun, Githzerai are from Limbo... and the Modrons do indeed have shiny metal bottom plates if that helps you catch the reference)
...What? Tries to clean what up?
@@johannesstephanusroos4969 I mean trying to streamline and get stuff processed correctly and efficiently.
Also the entire above is a (admittedly tortured) Futurama reference joke if you didn't get it (Hermes Conrad the Limbo champion and bureaucrat had an episode where he had to go the Central Bureaucracy and had a sequence where he sorted a massive stack of unsorted mail)
Notes on possible misses (I'll skip the glowy sword as another already touched that):
Orb of Time does have one niche I can think of: fully subterranean races who want to know what time it is up top before they set out to approach the surface (to help time their approach). This would make it a good convenience for say drow slavers or certain dwarves who want to keep good relations by not accidentally waking up their trading partners (this of course presumes any such peoples normally live deep enough that they don't have an easier means of tracking time of day).
Pipe of Remembrance as a Speak With Dead Lite depends on DM being open to the idea... but yeah that potential cultural impact of abusing them as Zone of Truth Lite is definitely something to think about.
Potential for Pole of Collapsing depending on DM ruling on the question of: when expanded, how much weight can it support? It does say, RAW, that it only expands as far as the space allows so no applying significant pressure when it comes out, but hypothetically I could see it being potentially useful in a pinch to hold up a ceiling after it's expanded (even if only for a few seconds so someone who was holding the ceiling up with a plank of wood the pole is now braced against can GTFO before the ceiling collapses).
Pot of Awakening has a potentially major ethical/moral issue: they're supposedly sapient, yet they RAW only act to follow instructions. This has horrifying implications if you think about it too much as you're creating sapient life that is essentially enslaved to you and incapable of ever going beyond your instructions. Granted, it's still hella useful, but I could see some freaking out about it (especially Druids and treants lol)
Potion of Climbing: certain forms of hunting just got a huge boost if the hunt was truly valuable enough (similar can apply to some wartime tactics), criminals just got a huge boost at sneaking in, and now properly savvy security features will be including defenses against random wall-crawlers. I'd say 4/10 myself, just because of the impact on the arms race between criminals and security.
I'm guessing Potion of Comprehension was skipped cause it's basically a Spellwrought Tattoo of Comprehend Languages that you carry around and drink instead of put on your skin and activate later, and you clearly opted to stop before getting to the world-altering power of anyone with the gold can sheath themselves in countless spells (RAW only gives a guideline of how big the tattoos are, it doesn't say they can't overlap, and a Crawford tweet says they can even if that's not official)?
Spellshard dnd's version of the Internet
I'd say more like reading tablets given how you can't really transmit with them. Now if someone could work out a way to network them with an interlinked network of Sending Stones that only need an address instead of a matched pair...
Good thing the Pot of Awakening only works on common shrubs. Imagine putting Kudzu vine in it.
Moodmark paint is also ideal for interrogation and testification in courts of law.
Smoldering Armor is clearly useful for beekeepers. Make them docile/sleepy.
Very clever. I did not consider this. Although unfortunately the armour does not produce smoke with any odour, which is the main thing that affects bees about real smoke. Such a cool idea that I'd probably allow it, though.
16:37 useful for a merchant or traveler in the mountains who needs to escape trouble
Depending on how you rule resting, a potion of watchful rest is either incredibly useful or incredibly useful.
8 hours of garunteed relaxation time, because you can't do anything intensive, allowing you to stay sane while pulling 16 hour days. (Assuming your time is worth that much.)
8 hours of being able to command and coordinate in a emergency, because it's not being physically active.
It'd be easier to hide/smuggle books to save them as crystals, and harder to accidentally destroy a library of crystals with fire. I imagine much greater preservation of knowledge.
Really good ideas of the pipe of remembrance. I love the idea of using it at funerals. For myself, I keep magic items much rarer and I want magic to feel magical not be a stand in for technology. Most permanent magical items in my worlds are unique, so people can't use multiples of them but local areas can incorporate them into personal rituals. I also had been using the 5e prohibition of buying and selling magic items since before 3e. I do have a few exceptions, but they are all extremely regional.
Expanding on your thoughts on healing potions, the catch with potions of healing, especially the weakest ones, have a weird property that they are too weak during combat and too strong after combat. In combat 4-10 HP average of 7just isn't enough even at low levels when enemies are often dealing an average of 7 hp but with a max higher than 10. Outside of combat, they have no limit to use, so instead of using the greater/superior/supreme potions, just drink an equal gold value worth of the cheapest potions and go back to full hp after every battle. The greater potion at a cost 10 times the standard only heals twice as much, so instead drink two weak ones and keep the extra 8 for later. Means stocking shops with higher quality potions is, from a certain perspective, punishing your players... very weird.
Do growth spells and potions work on your animated shrub? Surely there are ways to make them bigger and more effective individually.
The pot breaking automatically could lead a particular line of character to form a number of creatures via grafting or otherwise intertwining the multiple into a singular form.
Alternatively, some species of shrub can spend years getting to full prominence, animation doesn't automatically deny growth per se. So you could have a baby Groot that will be as big if not bigger than adult Groot eventually. Just needs more time than the month.
I'll admit I'm amused picturing animated tomato plants that irregularly toss their bounty at scavengers.
The problem with the Prosthetic Limb is that, given the prevalence of magical healing of all forms, it would be very rare to actually need one. The spell Regenerate also exists, so even if you do lose a limb there are magical options to replace it with your own flesh instead of a prosthetic. If you evaluate the limb in a vacuum I can see where it gets a relatively high score, but in the setting it's basically a novelty at best, or a slightly cheaper option at worst.
This is kind of the problem in general when looking at how magic and other DnD things affect world building. Individually they would have the potential to be massive. All together at once and it's hard to even begin to guess what the world would look like and what features would actually end up important in the end.
8:55 what about an underground society Grungeon master?
Why do they care what the surface world says the time is? Every culture will have some method of timekeeping, even underground - a water clock perhaps? Their own time systems will likely be completely independent of the surface, except in rare cases where 'dawn' or 'per day' matters for magic items
@Grungeon_Master so you know when the surface races are awake so you can trade or alternatively raid them
Shiftweave is WAY more valuable for the everyday man you buy just one set and now you have, Sunday best, cold weather woolen stuff, everyday work, rainy day, and Spiffed up very formal gear. Or you could just do what my grandfather did, buy three outfits and wear them until Grandma through them out because of the holes and wear. Then grandpa would go and by the same three outfits. Just have all Shiftweave the same out fit now it last 5 times as long.
At the start of your day you just put on one set clothes and head out. Is the weather going to change to cold and wet? No problem you now have a fur lined cloak to stay warm and dry.
First vid had a set of clothes that didn't wear out, the shiftweave would only really help with rapidly changing clothes not with making them last longer RAW.
Something that I've always wondered about, heroes get wildly powerful and have insane constitution, do commoners get the benefit of long rests?
Always made me wonder if even melee people aren't super buffed by mana to heal in a single day
Having potions of healing on hand at every worksite in a setting sounds practical especially given that they're common in rarity, but OH MY GOD would this be abused. Especially in the feudal systems most settings would used, this would enable governments to justify the laxest workplace health and safety regulations possible. Why have guardrails? Why have Hi-Vis? Why incorporate any safety precautions into your bureaucracy when your first-aid kits are catch-all, immediate, and 100% effective. If every foreman had to carry healing potions at work, especially in authoritarian kingdoms I don't think there would be any worker protection laws.
6:43 you could also probably set up a mundane trap to trigger one of these
3:21 imagine someone using this at a trial in court
I recently got some warhammer fantasy orks from the 90s I’ve added to my dnd mini collection. One of them has a red shield with a face on it. It is now the shield of expression. (Also the shark statue was so fucked that I had to re listen to that part multiple times cus it was so baffling.)
the smoldering armor is less useful than most aesthetical items, as the smoke can't be formed, or even only turned off.
Even before i watch the video, i posit that no magical item is truly useless, because some of the weaker or sillier magic items might be results of experimentation or practice on a crafter's part, that may not have produced a useful item, but produced a useful piece of research. Also, a useless magical item, might be tinkered with, and augmented into something dastardly.
11:56 don't forget use in entertainment
You missed the entire point of the moontouched sword; its value isn't because you've got a light source, it's because you now have a magic weapon. This is the only common-rank magic weapon (not counting ammunition) in the game, and thus the only one that can be mass produced in most campaign settings. Town guards defending the city walls against an invading force of golems or some other type of monster that's resistant or immune to nonmagical weapons can use moontouched swords to deal with enemies they would ordinarily be powerless to stop. IMO, this benefit alone means it's not a 2 out of 10. Sure, it's not a flame tongue or sunblade or whatever, but among the common items I'd say it's at least a 4 out of 10.
I think Potion of Watchful Rest is underrated, it's coffee on steroids. Even if you can only do light activity, for someone like a human scholar who can study 8 hours more without needing to sleep, that's a 50% increase to a human's usable hours, if you were wealthy enough to drink one every day you'd have a 50% effectively higher lifespan than normal humans.
giving plantation slavery a much more literal meaning
Could the pole of collapsing be used as a piston to do work? Industrial revolution if so
No, it explicitly states it cannot expand further than the available space. However, I could see it having function as an emergency propping tool if a ceiling was about to collapse and maybe buy people a few seconds to run.
All these are candidates for Artificer's Artificer Infusion's Replicate Magic Item. And that makes me happy.
Each one can used by an Artificer as a Spellcasting Focus. There are a lot more themes for Artificer Spellcasting. Perfume of Bewitching + Tasha's Caustic Brew or Grease? Yup, they just poured it out. Fireball? Yup, came right out of that bottle, let loose with a trail of smoke that no longer bears bewitching effects, just cinder.
Also, Mind Crystal (Subtle) can be created over and over again to generate gold out of nothing.
*each one except for Potions & Spell Scrolls can be an Artificer Infusion
Um, actually, if we're being pedantic, the Prosthetic Limb wouldn't be able to help people with physical deformities, as the prosthetic functions "identically to the part it replaces". Taken literally, this means that if you use it to replace a deformed limb, it functions as the deformed limb did. Hells, even replacing injured limbs is borderline.
Ahaha very good point
this is the perfect video
You mean spell scrolls are useless, except for a clerics and bards, who can carry a pile of extra lives in their pocket. Healing word is all the benefits of a potion, except a 30-foot range and bonus action to use.
Sorry, hard disagree on the orb of gonging, you missed that with a resonant cavity and the fact that it's loud meaning it emits a lot of sound energy, you can use this to generate heat, and if you can do that.... Perpetual Motion Machines! 10/10 Rewrites the world.
That's extrapolating far beyond the text of the item, I feel. It doesn't say it produces heat, and this is magic, so we can't just assume it follows the same rules as real-life physics. It's magic, after all. Unless the item alludes to operating 'like a normal candle', we can't assume that creating light also creates heat, for example, either.
"The moon touch sword is really quite usless..." heavily disagree. Means you don't have to carry a torch that can set thing on fire, be blown out and takes up a hand. It will not run out of fuel no matter how long you are away from supplies, and for a creature without dark-vision, it might be their only method of sight in dark climates, and it works underwater, in area with flammable gas without igniting them, and in a pinch, a stealthy creatye that stalks the party can be marked by driving the weapon into it, essentially marking it with a beacon.
Also, since underbarreled gun lights are rather useful in real life, you always want to have a light source and a free hand. When equipped on town guards it acts as an immediate signal that something is wrong and a weapon is drawn. I think your ratting it so low, is due to never experiencing the condition it would be a life saver.
Then there is the fact that you can use a glowing weapon to bluff a foe into thinking your weapon has some other powerful enchant on it.
Not a DnD player so... what? Scrolls require you to be a mage? Yeah, that kinda makes them useless.
I was going to say that any magic item that allows a commoner to cast fireball or any other attacking spell that is stronger than crossbow bolt is basically a gun. And I'm not even starting about utility spells with which it can replace most items in this list. Would be a 20/10.
When you gave the first 2 out of 10 I wondered what a one would be, then you got to that dumb little statue and ... Oh
Stats nerd here. Advantage is ONLY an effective +5 on rolls you're already overwhelmingly favoured to succeed at, and even then, not really. If you only succeed on a 20, advantage gives you 2 shots at it, sure, BUT it's actually WORSE than a flat +1. You have a 5% chance of success to start with, then with a +1 you succeed on 19 or 20, bringing you to a 10% success rate. Advantage will only bring you to a 9.75% success rate, which while a small difference, is *still* worse than a +1
On the inverse, if you only fail on a 1, so a success rate of 95%, a +1 brings you to 100%. Advantage doesn't eliminate the chance both dice will say 1 and 1, which means your success rate has only gone up by 4.75% to 99.75% - you're still maintaining a 0.25% failure chance. Again, it's small, but that doesn't feel like a +25% to me.
But the above is for the extremes. Let's look at DC11, or an even stevens 50/50 shot at success, or a coin flip. Advantage gives you a 75% success rate, which is an increase of 25%. NOW it's a +5. Or if you're slightly favoured at a DC10, where you would only fail 45% of the time, for a 55% success rate; advantage brings you to 79.75, which is an increase of only 24.75%, so only a +5 due to rounding.
Assuming you [1] don't know the DC and [2] the DC is something you can actually achieve with the roll (so 1 to 20), if you average it out for ALL DCs, advantage is actually an effective +3.3, which is NOTABLY NOT PLUS FIVE.
Try to interrogate someone good cop bad cop style but the cup of coffee was laced with mood Mark paint or die. Smile!
the potion of watchful rest would be useful in military campaigns against species that do not need to sleep for species that do. it takes away the opportunity of taking the encampment of a travelling army by surprise. it could lead to officers on the campaign using it to prevent assassinations while not losing any rest. in addition it would allow for longer work days as workers would still have leisure time for their private lifes, it could prove vital to something like urgent investigations in the books of some domain, urgent research into the wekness of an enemy likely to attack in at best a few days or critical negotiations where the ones that are more exhausted after possibly days of negotiating will have had the worse position. sure most good uses would be niche cases but there are possibly many and those can have deciding impacts.
sure it's somewhat expensive, but especially the thwarting of assassination attempts in ones sleep and about doubling the work one can do in a day, while not having to sacrifice leisure time, could be worth the cost to a tyrant, or any absolutistic ruler.
thus i'd argue 3 might be too low.
27:12 religious sculptures are rarely created for any practical purpose
Don't have the time code at hand, but you have three editing mistakes in this video where you repeated the same sentence twice in a row.
That's annoying. These bigger ones do tend to have some mistakes slip through, but it's still irritating. Thanks for letting me know
It might not be suited for your videos, but you should look at how ridiculously dumb the hammer of thunderbolts is. The more you understand it, the dumber it gets.
*S M O K E*
WOKE SHRUB?!
"This might turn smoking into a matter of national defence" then I'd be a five-star general XD