D&D v. Technology

If you would be willing to indulge me, I would like to begin this article with a little trip down memory lane. I began playing D&D in the fall of 1995 with 2^nd Edition. At that time, we didn't have cell phones, tablets, projectors, fancy computers, or even the internet! (I personally didn't get connected to the internet until mid-1996. Wow, I feel old now!) So we played with paper (both lined and graphed), pencils, dice, magazines (like Dragon or Dungeon) and piles upon piles of books. In fact, I believe the most sophisticated bit of gadgetry we had in our gaming room was a CD player usually pumping out Queen, Guns and Roses, Alanis Morissette (long story), or Metallica. Yet despite our lack of technology, we had an absolute blast.

Fast forward fifteen years to 2010. At this time, during an average session of 4^th Edition, I would be using a laptop connected to a flat-screen television to run the MapTool program for miniatures; a smart phone connected to my wifi to look up quick references; all of my books on PDF; and the Lord of the Rings Soundtrack pumping out of Winamp. Not to mention all of my players using their smart phones to send each other messages and even a few using tablets to run their character sheets and Player’s Handbooks. With all of this powerful technology at our fingertips we were still having fun but, to me personally anyway, it felt a bit off. You may call it nostalgia or maybe I’m just old-fashioned but I found something missing when we used all of that technology.

Fast forward another four years to present and I am currently playing D&D Next. I have a tablet which keeps my maps and PDFs running but other than that I use no technology. I’m back to paper, dice, and pencils. I no longer use miniatures of any kind as I much prefer the “theatre of the mind” system and I have deliberately cut out the use of anything I can do without. I find, as a DM, this makes me happier and more focused on what really matters: the players and the story. But this brings about a very interesting question: what place does technology have in a D&D game? In my opinion, it’s whatever makes the story better but that answer may not be as straightforward as it seems.

Originally, I thought that projecting miniatures and well-drawn 3D maps onto a flat-screen television would “up” my game; and while I’m sure that some of my players loved it, I hated it. It was a constant distraction for me during a session (making sure everything looked/worked right) and took up 2-3 hours of preparation time per session outside of the game. Additionally, I found that it also took away from the game on the player level. My players were so focused on the maps and miniatures up on the screen that they would go into what I like to call “head-space mode”. They would stare at the screen and plan their next round more akin to a game of Warhammer or Risk than D&D. I also found that inter-group interaction waned and improvisation in combat was almost non-existent. The players began to forget that D&D was a dynamic roleplaying game and began to treat it as a miniature/strategy game instead. In essence, the technology changed the nature of the game. The words of Marshall McLuhan (see here) began to ring loud and clear in my mind.

Now I realize that part of the problem was the 4^th Edition system itself, which was a very miniature based game; however, I have no illusions that any edition using too much technology could easily fall prey to “head-space mode”. So, when the D&D Next playtest jumped onto the scene in May 2012, I decided to do a full 180 and go back to basics. I stopped using miniatures, 3D maps, my laptop, and flat-screen televisions. I went back to paper, a DM screen, and printed booklets. My conclusion: I was a lot happier.

At present, not much has changed. I have deliberately limited myself to one-piece of technology at the gaming table. It used to be my smartphone for looking up things on the web and at wizards.com but now it’s my tablet for doing the same and having a few reference maps/PDFs close at hand. I've limited myself like this because I’d like to think I've learned a valuable lesson: D&D is sociable and technology is not. When I DM there are three critical things I feel I must keep an eye on: 1) What is happening with the story; 2) What is happening with the characters; and 3) Am I maintaining my players interest/involvement with the game? However, when I throw a lot of technology into the mix, I suddenly have to start splitting my attention into four parts (looking after the technology itself) instead of three and the difference is huge. Now some people may point out that good technology will make things easier/faster than pencil and paper and this will free up the DM’s time to concentrate on the other areas. I suppose that may be true but, from my own experiences, the trade-off is unnoticeable.

To clarify, I’m not giving all technology in D&D the thumbs down. What I’m saying is: all things in moderation and in harmony. Don’t immerse yourself in the “bells and whistles” of programs, apps, videos, and animations at the cost of losing the foundation of the game. D&D is a game about people and stories so keep the people and the stories the main attractions. I’m currently having more fun now than I have been since the beginning. I’d like to think that part of that turnaround is due to finding the right level of technology, i.e. the sweet spot where it helps but doesn't distract. Thankfully, D&D Next seems to be geared toward this kind of outlook and that makes me very excited!

Do you have a D&D/Technology story? Please share it below. 

D&D Campfire Stories: Darts! So many Darts!

(Image: http://darksun.wikia.com/)

Here’s another story from my personal collection. Enjoy!

My friends and I were in the character creation phase of a 2^nd edition Dark Sun campaign and my friend had decided that he was going to play a Thri kreen warrior. For those who don’t know, Dark Sun is an exotic desert world with a few races that don’t appear very often in the other settings. One of these races is the Thri kreen who look like the picture to the right, basically a humanoid Mantis.

Two of their more impressive traits are four arms that can all work independently and exceptional strength in the range of 19 or 20 without any bonuses. With this knowledge in mind, my friend asked our DM if he could specialize in a very odd weapon: the dart.

Darts are usually reserved for rogues or wizards or other classes who can’t handle the larger more “damage dealing” weapons, but my friend was adamant. Darts he wanted and the DM shrugged and said, “sure”. It was 

one of the worst mistakes he ever made. Using the 2^nd edition rules to their ultimate min-maxing glory, my friend began to construct one of the most deadly horrors I have ever witnessed.

Under these rules, he was able to roll his stats so that he his character had 20 strength and this gave him +8 to all of his damage rolls. Also, under normal circumstances, darts can be thrown at a rate of three per round. However, as a warrior, and starting at 3^rd level, he was able to take dart as a proficiency as well as a specialty. This increased his rate of fire to four darts per round and also increased his damage by +1. But then, he also spent three proficiency slots to make himself ambidextrous in all four of his arms. This then increased his rate of fire from four to sixteen! If you then do the math, he was doing 1d4+9 damage per dart x 16 throws per round. That means that should he hit with all sixteen shots he would do a minimum damage of 160 points and a maximum of 208, per round! Even if you average it out, only hitting with eight out of the sixteen shots and only rolling 2s on the d4s, that’s still a whopping 88 damage each round. Imagine if he ever got his hands on a potion of speed! 

During the first battle of the campaign, my friend unveiled this devious masterpiece of min-maxing like Grand Moff Tarkin revealing the Death Star. All of us players and our DM sat in fascinated horror as he decimated our foes in less than two rounds almost single-handedly (he did over 200 points of damage I believe). It didn’t seem possible but there it was in black and white, all of it perfectly legal under the rules. After the fact, we must have debated, laughed, researched, and argued about it for an hour or more.

Long story short, our DM eventually put a ban on my friend’s character and made him roll a new (and more sensible) one. But still to this day when I hear players bragging about the amount of damage they are doing with critical hits and/or magical weapons, I think on my friend's four-armed dart machine gun of a Thri kreen in Dark Sun and politely inform them that they don’t know sh*t.

5 Fantasy Series You Should Read If You Play D&D

Movies, television, and theatre are wonderful places to get ideas, concepts, and even plot-lines for great D&D campaigns. However, for true inspiration and a real feel for how adventures/characters should play out, nothing beats a good series of novels. When you have several volumes to work with and each one is hundreds of pages long, authors can really immerse you into their character’s world. This is exactly what DMs should do with their players and a really good fantasy series can show you how.

So, with that being said, I’d like to offer up five fantasy series that I highly recommend anyone with a strong passion for D&D should read. Each of these series has amazing characters, a gripping plot, and the kind of sweeping grandness that I strive for in every one of my campaigns. I know that there are dozens more that I am neglecting, or simply haven’t discovered yet, but these feature most prominently in my mind and I’ll give you the reasons why:    

(In order of release date)

1.       The Land of Oz Series, by L. Frank Baum (1900-1920)

I think it’s a tossup between this series of books or The Legend of Zelda for NES as my earliest exposure to fantasy. What I loved about these books as a child was their unending creativity in a world that was both alien and familiar at the same time. As an adult, I love them for their whimsical nature and the evolution of characters that continually show that they have more intelligence, courage, and heart than many of us. What I feel this series most has to offer a DM: how to be creative.   

2.       The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, by J.R.R. Tolkien (1954-1955)

It may be cliché but this is really the series that ushered in the modern-day fantasy era and I have my doubts that D&D would have ever become as popular as it did without these books. The reasons why are as long as my arm and although it can be criticized for being long-winded; Tolkien’s masterpiece trilogy is sublimely rich in its texture, complex and dynamic in its characters, and almost overwhelming in the depth of its world. It spawned entire languages, introduced races and fantasy concepts that are now foundations in the genre, and most importantly it told a damn good story. It is currently the high-water line to which almost all fantasy is compared and what many DMs try to emulate in their adventures to many varying degrees of success. What I feel this series most has to offer a DM: how to be epic.     

3.       The Legend of Drizzt Series, by R.A. Salvatore (1988-Present)

Bob Salvatore is a living legend in the fantasy world and his characters, especially a certain Drow Ranger, have been selling like hot-cakes for close to thirty years. At the time I first read the Icewind Dale Trilogy (circa 1996), Salvatore was already nine books into the series and the quality, in my opinion, only gets better. They are fun and easy reading books with a lot of D&D references. Also, you can’t help but pick up on that “this guy loves his work” feeling. Salvatore is also famous for his fight scenes and the ones between Drizzt and Artemis are mesmerizing. To this day I still challenge myself to make all of my in-game battles as dynamic and thrilling as those. What I feel this series most has to offer a DM: how to run an amazing battle. 

4.       The Wheel of Time Series, by Robert Jordan and Branden Sanderson (1990-2013)

Most people either love this series or hate it. Those that hate it have issues with the meandering plot that doesn’t seem to go anywhere for chapters at a stretch or with the daunting length of the series at nearly 12,000 pages over 14 books. However, for those of us who love these books, we know the value of a long set-up for a huge pay off at the end. We fell in love with characters who seem almost real and who are forced to make difficult decisions in hard times; we learned about the history, present, and possible future of a world almost as intricate as Middle Earth; and we witnessed the rise and fall of the Dragon Reborn. What I feel this series most has to offer a DM: how to pace/build your story for the long haul.    

5.       A Song of Ice and Fire Series, by George R.R. Martin (1996-Present)

These books are a perfect example of a terrific fantasy series becoming quickly overshadowed by its media version (Lord of the Rings is the other good example). But compared to the groundbreaking television incarnation, these books are even better. Until Martin came onto the scene eighteen years ago, no one before him had so expertly mixed a fantasy story with dark, gritty, backstabbing politics. Further, he stepped into a realm that very few before him dared to venture: he was willing to kill any character, even loved ones, at any time! Not sure if you could classify this series as “edge of your chair reading” but it certainly feels like it at times. The constant fear that “your” character might be the next on the chopping block makes you fall in love with them even more. What I feel this series most has to offer a DM: how to create/manage intrigue.

Honorable mention goes to the following:

-          The Discworld Series, by Terry Pratchett (1983-Present). Read this one if you want to know more about fantasy mixed with comedy.

-          The Dragonlance Chronicles Trilogy, by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman (1984-1985). Read this one if you crave more D&D references in a beautiful story about the Heroes of the Lance.

-          The Serpentwar Saga, by Raymond E. Feist (1994-1998). Read this one if you like your fantasy light on magic but high on combat.     

-          The Old Kingdom Trilogy, by Garth Nix (1995-2003). Read this one if you’re interested in undead and how to walk the fine-line between good and evil.

Do you have a fantasy series that you think D&D players need to read? Post it below!

The Ill-Fated Rescue Attempt

Our party was made up of a group of old friends with a new friend to keep things fresh.  So for us, even when we were playing a more evil alignment campaign, we (almost) always tried to save our party members. Often it worked, this time it really didn't.

Our party was fighter heavy with three melee types (two fighters and a rogue), a bard, and a wizard.  No cleric and thus no healing.  We were making our way room-to-room through a very frustrating dungeon with lots of dead ends and nasty traps. We had just picked up again after having to take a few weeks off so we were all raring to go, which is why events may have happened as they did.  We rushed into the next room which was square and had a stone path down the middle with 10’ deep pits of fire to either side. At the far end of the stone path was a large urn. We had encountered a similar room earlier in the dungeon and we knew that if we opened the urn it would release a wraith. However, we needed to defeat that wraith to obtain a piece of the key for the door out of the dungeon. So, we jumped into the battle with the wraith first and took the time to actually look at our character sheets second.  That’s when we realized that all of us, with the exception of the rogue, only had 10-20 hit points left from the previous battle. Also, the wizard had no leveled spells left so he was fighting with cantrips and staying out of the way. Mistake number 1. 

The Dwarf and Half-Elf fighters along with the melee rogue engaged the wraith, while the bard and wizard held back.  During the second round, the wraith accessed a hidden compartment to reveal a lever in the wall. We knew from the previous encounter that wraiths pulling levers would release unknown terrors but despite our best efforts he managed to pull the lever. Mistake number 2.

Suddenly, the floor broke into 5’ squares and started to shift/shuffle around the room, mixing with the fire pits like a carnival ride. All of us had to make Dexterity checks to keep our footing and we all passed with the exception of the Halfling bard.  He stumbled and fell into a pit of fire taking enough damage to knock him unconscious while still burning. Mistake number 3.

The wizard rushed over to help while the other PCs continued to fight.  He could not jump down into the pit directly as he didn't have enough hit points to survive; however, he used his mage hand to try and tie a rope around the Halfling and pull him out.  All he needed to succeed was for the rope to pass its saving throw vs. the fire. It didn’t.  Mistake number  4.

The Drow rogue, forcing interest at this point, took out his Wand of Wonder that had been found earlier and pointed it at the Halfling and said ‘Wuba-Wuba’.  The wand transformed into a Lyre of Building and when played would allow the player to do the work of 100 men.  The Drow, not trained in musical instruments at all, took a breath and began to play. He rolled a 1 which caused a string to break and caused the lyre to lose all of its magical properties. Mistake number  5.

Meanwhile down in the pit, the Halfling had failed the first of his death saving throws. The Dwarf then heroically raced across the room and leaped into the pit with the intention of throwing the Halfling out to safety.  For his gallantry he rolled a 1.  The Halfling was scooped up, lifted, and hurled…straight into the wall which he bounced off of and landed back into the fire.  Mistake number  6.

After that, the Halfling failed the second death saving throw. Then the wizard finally figured out something helpful and used Ray of Frost to put out the fire in the pit. This allowed the Dwarf and wizard to tie a rope on the poor Halfling and get him out of the pit with no more damage.  In the next round, the fighters managed to kill the wraith just after the Halfling failed his third death saving throw. 

Despite all of our efforts, the Halfling was dead…and crispy.

Girls in Gaming

I've been told that roleplaying and especially dungeon mastering are male dominated worlds. Personally, male DMs are all I've ever played under and when I was younger female players were uncommon. However, over the past eighteen years, I think a shift has begun towards more equal ground. I know that I am in the minority but I currently have two weekly groups where the female players outnumber the males! So, I wanted to delve a bit deeper into this issue and I thought the best way to do this would be to interview two female dungeon masters that I have met over the years and respect. I have renamed them for their privacy.

1. When, where, and how did you start roleplaying?

Mara: I was new to *city*, and knew very few people in the city, especially not anyone who 

           was particularly geeky. I met my first gaming group through some modelling I did                      around town. They were commenting on how few girl gamers they had in their group                and asked me to come along and see if I liked it. I started within a week of that                            conversation and have been gaming ever since, that was almost 10 years ago! What's 

           crazy is because of gaming, and me gaining some confidence through it, I was bold 

           enough to join another group through which my husband and I met!

Nara: I started roleplaying when I was 17 years old in my boyfriend’s basement which I had

planned on doing for a few months at that point. After watching him play and reading the books, I finally decided to join in.

2. What made you want to get into roleplaying?

Mara: It was a way to use my imagination, get creative, and enjoy throwing some dice around!

Nara: I had been interested in roleplaying since I had read the Hobbit as a young child;  

           however, growing up in a small French community and later in a small French school, I 

           didn't know anyone who I could approach to play role playing games.

3. Did you have a girl roleplaying role-model in the beginning? Do you have one now?    

     Explain.

Mara: My only "girl roleplaying" model that I had when I begun was another female gamer in 

           the group, who happened to be a writer and poet. She naturally played a bard, and 

           helped me really feel at ease pretending. I don't know that I have a particular role 

           model now when it comes to gaming in terms of roleplaying, but two people pop to 

           mind - Felicia Day, who I admire particularly in her roles in TableTop because she's 

           exceptionally badass and confidently makes her moves; and Kelley Armstrong - a 

           Canadian author who portrays women as strong kick-butt types that I can relate to.

Nara: I didn’t really have any role playing role models when I was younger. I was more of a 

          graphic novel and fantasy book fan then a gamer. Currently, I don’t really have any role 

          models as a gamer but I am a fan of women like Anita Sarkisian, strong female nerds 

          who are pushing for a more equalized approach to women in our culture.

4. What challenges did you face as a girl gamer?

Mara: I think the one thing that has been frustrating at different times is that there's always

            someone who thinks because you're a woman in the group, they can try their 

            seduction skills on you, in character. I don't game to attempt fake seductions, so it 

            really doesn't fly with me, and it bugs me that they think they can try.

Nara: As a girl gamer I have thankfully faced fewer challenges than most partially thanks to 

          the fact I’m outspoken and unafraid to voice my opinions of things that I feel are unfair 

          or biased. I am also blessed with a wonderful RP group who really don’t see me any 

          different than they are. However, in the ‘virtual’ gaming world I have faced more 

          challenging situations that have turned me away from most MMORPGS and Online FPS. 

          I’m not a fan of being a target because of my gender so I would rather just avoid those 

          situations all together.

5. Was there ever a time that you felt real sexism? Explain.

Mara: Nope!

Nara: Oh real sexism, yes there have been many times. I’ve had to deal with it, in the context of

           gaming less so then in the other sectors of my life; however, even while running female

           gaming events at Con I have run across sexism, such as male gamers expressing their    

           dislike of the fact that we had female only events. With comments like: “Why do girls 

           need their own events? Do their thumbs work differently or something?” I even had 

           someone who was so displeased that he wrote a letter about how unhappy he was 

           about our female only events. 

6. What advice would you or do you give to new girl gamers?

Mara: Forget all of society's rules about what you're allowed to do. Remember when your 

           parents said, "You can be anything you want when you grow up"? You can do anything 

           you want, as whoever you want, in D&D. It's extremely empowering.

Nara: The advice I usually give to new female gamers is, do it! Game! If you are interested in 

          gaming then dive in head first and let yourself fall in love with the awesomeness that is 

          the world of RP. If you come up against challenges, then reach out to other female 

          gamers in our community or just meet them head on. If you have to deal with sexism, 

          then voice your disapproval and let them know you aren't going anywhere because you 

          have the right to be there and enjoy your hobby just like anyone else.

7. What moment are you most proud of as a girl gamer?

Mara: Any moment where I get to try something ridiculous, and it goes well, or the nights of

            awesome role-playing are really good for me.

Nara: I am proud of a lot of my gaming accomplishments, however there are 2 moments that 

          are tied in my mind. The first being when we had our first very successful girl gaming 

          event at Con which was the second girl gaming event, we had excellent participation. 

          The second was the first time my daughter told me she wanted to make her own 

          character and learn to RP at just 2 years old.

D&D Campfire Stories: The Weirdest.

Here’s one of the strangest stories I have in my collection:

So I announce to my group that we are going to be starting a Waterdeep campaign and one of my players comes to me with a request: He wants to know if he can be a rogue/assassin Minotaur. My first instinct is: “There’s no way that’s going to work out!”, but I keep an open mind and tell him that I’ll give him a chance.

He rolls it up and gives it decent Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution, but very poor Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. Pretty standard for a Minotaur and not bad for an assassin, but then he adds in some very interesting and ingenious add-ons. First, he invests some starting money in padded hoof-covers so his feet are silent; next he goes and buys some weapon-black (this is a kind of dark oil that players can coat their weapons in so they don’t shine/glint) and uses it on his horns so they don’t stand out when he is hiding in shadows; and finally he puts in a request for a magical item, a Wand of Shrinking (this was not unusual at the time, as it was common practice for me to give every PC an item to start with).

“Why a Wand of Shrinking?” I asked him. “You’ll see,” he replied with a mischievous grin. Me, being young and foolish, gave him the wand.

As the campaign got started he mentioned that he wanted to work for someone with “more than a few enemies” so he would have lots of work. I obliged him and paired him with a tavern owner attempting to kill his way up the ladder and one day become a Lord of Waterdeep. He was thrilled with this and his first target was assigned to him within a few minutes of playing.

After making some inquiries and paying off a few beggars, he managed to track down his target. “What now?” I asked expecting him to charge in and attack. “I’m going to shrink him,” he said confidently. Suddenly, it dawned on me what his plan was and I obliged. He walked up to his target and used his impressive Charisma to get in close and then the wand came out! As soon as this happened, the target shrunk down to roughly the size of a one year old. According to the effects of the wand, the spell would last for 1 hour and I figured my player would use the size advantage to squash the target like a bug. But then he did something I didn't expect, he ATE him! He picked up this shrunken man and gobbled him down like Hannibal Lector. “What was that for!?” I exclaimed. “No body, no evidence,” he answered. I was both horrified and impressed.

Now, I had to work out in my mind the physics of it all. A Minotaur’s stomach can easily handle a shrunken man, but what about when the spell wears off? Well your average cow’s stomach can hold 50 gallons worth of material and that translates into roughly 400 pounds of weight. So, giving my Minotaur friend the favorable end of the calculation, even when the spell wears off he could digest two fully grown human men at a time. Amazing and disgusting, no?

Anyway, the shrinking of targets and chowing down went on for a few sessions until one faithful night my Minotaur friend ran into two targets, a Wizard and his apprentice. To his doom, the Minotaur went after the apprentice first. As the Wizard watched his young elf ward nommed down like a Big Mac, I had an idea. I had a wonderful, awful idea. It was the kind of idea that puts a smile on a DM’s face. Just before the Minotaur could take his final swallow of his late-night elf, the Wizard casts disenchant on the elf, bringing him back to normal size, and then pulls out a Wand of Enlargement, causing the elf to grow four times his normal size. Do the math: A 150 pound elf x 4 = 600 pounds inside a container that can only hold 400 pounds. The end result was a Minotaur going boom from the internal pressures.

My friend wasn't very happy with the result but, in the end, he realized that his character had become a bit too gruesome. I can easily (and thankfully) say that this was the weirdest PC I've encountered to date. 

3 Magical Items That Can Ruin Your Game

Oh it’s happened to me and I’ll bet it’s happened to many of you out there as well. The DM gives out a magical item and one way or another it completely railroads the whole adventure. It might unexpectedly render a character useless at the most horrible moment, or it might make a character so powerful they are no longer controllable, or it might be so fascinating that all other concerns for the party and the adventure are lost. No matter how it happens, the DM immediately wishes they could take it back and the player(s) are lost in its powers.

So rather than me lecturing all of you on how to avoid disaster, I’d prefer to give you three strong examples of what I mean so you can see for yourselves. For most of these, I’m talking from personal experience; however, I have no doubts that there are a dozen or more items out there that could make an equally nasty mess of things.

So, without further ado, here are three culprits that have kept many a DM up at night:

1.       The Deck of Many Things

Am I right? As a DM, when you hand one of these suckers over to the PCs, you may as well be asking for your campaign to be hijacked. And, for those of you who don’t know what this Pandora-like deck of magical cards is capable of doing, please allow me to enlighten you with the 3^rd Edition effects:

• Balance - Changes the character to a radically different alignment.
• Comet - If character single-handedly prevails in the next hostile encounter, the character attains the next experience level.
• Donjon - Character is imprisoned and loses all gear and spells are stripped from the victim in any case.
• Euryale - Causes a permanent penalty on all saving throws.
• Fates - Changes reality to allow the character to avoid even an instantaneous occurrence if so desired.
• Flames - Causes an enmity between the character and an outsider.
• Fool - Character loses experience points and is forced to draw another card from the deck.
• Gem - The character gains significant wealth.
• Idiot - The character's Intelligence score is permanently lowered.
• Jester - The character can gain experience points or two more draws from the deck.
• Key - A major magic weapon appears out of nowhere in the character's hand.
• Knight - A fighter appears from out of nowhere and serves the character loyally until death.
• Moon - The character gains a number of magical wishes which come true.
• Rogue - This card causes one of the character’s NPC friends to turn against him.
• Ruin - The character immediately loses all of his wealth and non-magical possessions.
• Skull - The character must defeat a powerful undead creature alone.
• Star - One of the character's ability scores increases.
• Sun - The character gains a beneficial magic item.
• Talons - Every magic item the character owns or possesses disappears permanently.
• Throne - The character becomes more charismatic and gains a small castle.
• Vizier - The character gains an answer to solve any single problem or answer fully any question upon request.
• The Void - This card sends a character's soul to some other desolate location, leaving his body in a catatonic state, requiring the adventuring party to find a way to rescue the soul.

(Wikipedia)

After an inspection of those cards, it’s easy to see how they can unbalance everything. Even if you limit the pulls each character is allowed to just one, the chaos caused by this item can easily be a game changer. Sure, it seems like a fun way to shake up a dull story; but my question would then be: If the story needs this magic to shake it up, why not just start a more interesting one?

2.       Wish Spells/Items

Hey, this worked for Aladdin so it should work for my adventure, right? Wrong!

When it comes to wishing for things, players instantly turn from timid and innocent little bunny rabbits into greedy and diabolical storm giants! I don’t know what it is but instantaneous infinite power seems to breed temporary insanity (no wonder Wall Street has so many issues!). As a DM, that thing that you were hoping the players would use it for will usually be ignored, or at the very least included with something else.

On the few occasions that I have used them, they were reserved for the end of huge adventures where their powers were desperately needed to undo terrible wrongs. And even then, I’m sure I spotted that little twinkle of chaos in my player’s eyes. I’ve seen witty DMs turn a greedy wish against the players, twisting their words for an undesired outcome; but in my opinion, a smart DM will avoid wish spells altogether.

3.       Time Travel Spells/Items

Okay, let’s get one thing straight, this is D&D not Dr. Who!  There are loads of other RPGs out there (including Dr. Who) that will allow you to go zooming through the ages, witness the end of time, or go back to try to hook up your mother and father so your existence is assured. With respect, if you want to play that kind of a game, go fill your boots! But, in my opinion, that should not be a central mechanic for a D&D campaign and I’ll tell you why: Firstly, as a mortal DM, it is almost impossible to imagine what effects the choices your players make in the past/future will have on the timeline. You are going to be quickly overwhelmed when your players make decisions that change everything and usually in very bad ways. Secondly, there are so many unknown factors to resolve where time travel is involved that you’d better have a quantum physics degree. If someone kills you as a child, do you disappear immediately or slowly? If a previously fought war is now avoided, does your character from the future suddenly forget about it? I think I feel a headache coming on.    

Honorable mention goes to cursed items with very difficult cures. These can turn characters to stone, feeblemind, permanently polymorph, change alignment, or even kill. While they can make for interesting plot twists, be sure that if you use them you always have the remedy available where the players can find it. Honorable mention also goes to intelligent weapons. My experience with intelligent weapons has been mixed at best. Depending on how you want to play these NPC-ish items, I find that characters usually go to one of two extremes. Either they fall in love with the weapon and become the weapon’s henchman/woman rather than the other way around, or they ignore/dislike the personality of the weapon and it becomes a kind of comic relief. Why not just have actual henchmen and let weapons be weapons? I have used them in past, but usually for some plot purpose and not as a reward.

At any rate, I’m certain that there are reasonable ways and situations where every single magical item in existence can be used with moderation and grace. I just haven’t encountered it yet (lol). The fact is, introducing any random or unforeseeable variable into a roleplaying equation can be fun but also distracting. My advice to the players and DMs that use these unpredictable items: be prepared for anything!