D&D: Five Items For When You Want to Get “Creative” With the Rules as Written
Adventurer’s equipment is potentially one of the most underrated things on your character sheet. Especially these five.
5E is a game that’s absolutely full of little idiosyncrasies. From rules that let you throw a halfling with enough force to potentially break atmosphere, to rules that let you definitely break the sound barrier, there’s a lot of places where the rules as written kind of go wonky.
And if you’re at a table that insists on wielding the “rules as written” as a cudgel, here are five items that will make for some interesting moments around the table.
Bag of 1,000 Ball Bearings
Ball bearings have been an item in D&D since day one. Mind you, so have lasers, but that’s a whole other kettle of fish. Ball bearings might seem like a potentially useless item on their own. But when you spill a bag of them from their pouch into an area of around 10 feet square, you start creating all sorts of havoc.
Any creature that crosses the covered area has got to either slow down to half speed or make a saving throw to avoid falling prone. And while it’s only DC 10, that’s a saving throw that many things, from humble ogres to the mighty tarrasque are likely to fail at least 50% of the time.
Not bad for only two gold pieces.
Black Sap
Here at BoLS, we think drugs are cool and that winners do them. This is the primary reason we recommend including Black Sap in your adventuring gear. Introduced in Explorer’s Guide to Wildemount, this tarry substance is harvested from a death’s head willow, and it will dissociate you like you can finally stop trying to hold off the edible you accidentally had 8 hours into a 12-hour shift.
It also is a totally mundane item that can’t be negated by magical means. And when you smoke it, you become immune to the Charmed and Frightened condition for 1d6 hours. This means you can’t really be mind controlled or sent running in terror. Get some friends, get wasted, hunt Mind Flayers. What else do you need?
Caltrops
One of the funny little idiosyncrasies of D&D is that creatures that have resistance or immunity to “normal damage” typically have resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage from nonmagical weapons. You’ll note, falling damage, or damage from the spikes in a spiked pit trap or the single hit point dealt by a caltrop, completely bypasses.
Entering an area covered with caltrops prompts a DC 15 Dexterity save, which makes it even more potent than a Ball Bearing. And creatures that fail not only take 1 piercing damage, but they also lose 10 feet of walking speed. No matter who you are, from a mighty ancient red dragon to a lowly gray ooze. Each of these creatures, regardless of substance or armor class, will be potentially impeded if they graze the all-piercing caltrop.
Hunting Traps
Similarly, hunting traps are one of those weird little items that get lost in the equipment table because it doesn’t appear in any of the starting equipment packages. But. A hunting trap can be indispensable.
Set yourself a trap and any creature that steps on the plate (and remember, you have plenty of ways to push people around, and once One D&D comes out, most characters with access to weapon mastery will be able to do this), has to make a saving throw or take 1d4 points of piercing damage (again, not from a weapon) and immediately stop moving. And once ensnared thusly, the creature cannot move past the length of the attached chain, “typically 3 feet long.”
Of course, it can break free with an action and a DC 13 strength check, but you can forestall something like a Frost Giant, for a single round if you manage to get them caught in your hunting trap.
Blasting Powder
Finally, we return once more to Wildemount for this last item. Blasting powder should be an addition to any character’s panoply if you can get hold of some. This powder explodes when ignited by an open flame or fuse. Any creature nearby takes 3d6 bludgeoning damage (save for half), but that’s just the start.
You can bind multiple pouches of blasting powder together, like Black Cats firecrackers during an illicit 4th of July party, creating an even bigger blast, up to a maximum of 10d6. Now, of course, the only limit to the number of 10d6 bundles of blasting powder you can put together is your DM. But, if you want your campaign to go out with a bang, consider it!
What are your favorite items when you want to show just how ridiculous the rules can be?
