Pendant of Ashaba

This information is intended for use with the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.


At a Glance

The Pendant of Ashaba is a minor magic item created by Ashaba to identify the legitimate ruler of Shadowdale.


Sources

Passing Mention
Other Resources

Disclaimer

Wizards of the Coast, Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Forgotten Realms, and their logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the United States and other countries. This blog is not affiliated with, endorsed, sponsored, or specifically approved by Wizards of the Coast LLC.

Dhauzimmer the Bright Blade

This information is intended for use with the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.


At a Glance

Dhauzimmer the Bright Blade is a sword sacred to the church of Lathander.


Sources

Passing Mention
Other Resources

Disclaimer

Wizards of the Coast, Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Forgotten Realms, and their logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the United States and other countries. This blog is not affiliated with, endorsed, sponsored, or specifically approved by Wizards of the Coast LLC.

Human-Bane Arrow

This information is intended for use with the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.


At a Glance

A human-bane arrow is a magical item. A ritual aimed at making these arrows is found in Tar’Ael Veluuthra.


Sources

Passing Mention
Other Resources

Disclaimer

Wizards of the Coast, Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Forgotten Realms, and their logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the United States and other countries. This blog is not affiliated with, endorsed, sponsored, or specifically approved by Wizards of the Coast LLC.

Camellia of the Black Lady

This information is intended for use with the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.


At a Glance

Camellia of the Black Lady is a magic item named for the Black Lady.


Sources

Primary Sources
Other Resources

Disclaimer

Wizards of the Coast, Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Forgotten Realms, and their logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the United States and other countries. This blog is not affiliated with, endorsed, sponsored, or specifically approved by Wizards of the Coast LLC.

Random Anything Tables

FWIW… One method of making random generation tables for whatever you want.

There is a school of thought which says using random generation tables is lazy. Real DMs choose treasure and opponents for their players, leaving only ability scores and skill checks and hit/damage rolls to chance, or somesuch.

Another school says that’s hogwash, and while choosing is good it’s not always necessary or fun. We have thousands of monsters and items to choose from these days, and nobody wants to rely solely on the DM’s memory. Also: fate is capricious, and that’s best represented by a roll of the dice.

I would add that dice are highly overrated when it comes to wading through tables of monsters and treasure. Excel can be bent to the task, and the result is much speedier and causes less risk of carpal tunnel.

Finally, the same empowerment which enables a DM to pick certain monsters and treasure also says that if you don’t like Excel’s suggestions you can roll again or pick the ones you like.

Why is Excel necessary or advisable? Because, using treasure as an example, the tables in the DMG are terrible. In fact, the tables in every published source are crap. They’re crap by necessity, because (1) they generally include only the items which are described in that particular source; (2) the tables are designed to be used with dice, which means that regardless of whether there are 5 items or 50 items on the table everything has to fit in the same 1-100 or (occasionally in 2e) 1-1000 range; and (3) the author didn’t waste a lot of time on making sure that the tables were logical. As a result of #2 and #3 we get tables that give equal probability for a ring of minor energy resistance (12,000 gp) and a ring of wizardry IV (100,000 gp). I’ll admit that the 3e DMG tables are better than most, generally giving higher probabilities to the items which appear higher on the list, but the assumption/requirement that dice are going to be involved yields unhelpful tables.

So, Excel.

I’m going to outline a simple table to randomly generate rings. Okay, as randomly as Excel can manage. I’m not going to just upload the spreadsheet somewhere, because that’s more work than it needs to be, and because the whole point of this is that you can edit the table to add rings from other sources… and in order to edit the table you should understand how it’s put together.

Planning: Factors

You need to decide what makes some things more common than others. I start with GP value for magic items, because it’s quick and logical. If you’re making a table for monsters, let’s say a wandering monster table for CR 7 monsters in a forest, you might want to decide how you’re going to differentiate them from each other. It can be arbitrary… that’s fine. You should have something, though, to make it more interesting than 1 point for each monster and a simple 1-17 roll, or whatever it turns out to be.

Creating the Table

Here’s a step-by-step process for making this type of table. First is obviously opening Excel.

This example is a table of minor magical rings, based on Table 7-18 on page 231 of the 3.5e DMG.

I’ll put in some headers first… they’re not necessary, but I sometimes go months without looking at a table and then have to puzzle through what I was thinking when I made it. Headers go on row 4 because there are going to be values in B2 and C2 so I’m leaving space for those.

In cell B4, I enter %low. C4: Item. D4: GP. E4: Factor. F4: Freq. G4: %hi.

Next is the items and gp values. C5: protection +1. D5: 2000. C6: feather falling. D6: 2200. I proceed down the list to water walking in C19 and 15000 in D19.

I enter =1/d5 in E5, and copy that down to E19. The values range from .0005 to 6.67E-05.

Now the real guts of the table. I skip over to I5 and enter this formula: =max(d5:d19). Right below that in I6: =min(stdev.p(d5:d19),min(d5:d19)*0.5). I7: =1/(i5-i6). I8: =1/i5.

Here’s the magic of the table, for me. In J5: =max(1/(i7-i8),1/i8). J5 now contains the value 210000.

Back over to F5: =roundup(e5*j$5,0). Copy this down to F19.

G5: =sum(f$5:f5). Copy this down to G19. The values in this column will increase from 42 at the top to 307 at the bottom.

Now up to B2: =roundup(rand()*g19,0).

C2: =concatenate(“Ring of “,vlookup(b2,b$5:c$19,2)).

Using It

Hit F9 a few times. If everything is entered properly (and if I typed everything right) you should see C2 printing randomly generated rings.

Similar tables can be made for “medium” and “major” rings, and the resulting revamp of Table 7-18 can be seen here.

If that seems like a lot of work for an underwhelming result, bear in mind that there’s no limit to the number of items you can put in the table. 5,000 different rings? No problem; they can all be given a logical frequency and random generation still takes only an instant.

And adding items is easier than making scrambled eggs. Just insert a row (ctrl+shift+insert) and type in the name and value, then copy down the formulas from the row above. Make sure column B is copied down to the row beneath the one you just inserted, or else it will get weird.

For those who care, the reason I think J5 is so cool is that it ensures that as long as you have at least two different gp values on the table, you’ll get a range of probabilities. Even if Excel has to multiply by really big numbers to do it. This is cool because part of the problem with restricting your magic item generation to a d100 table is that rounding and the limitations of the available range cause broad swaths of items to have the same probability even though they shouldn’t. Excel solves that problem neatly, and also rolls up as many values as you want very quickly. Copy cells B2 and C2 to 10 or 20 other cells, and you have 10 or 20 random rings. B2 and C2 can also be combined into one cell: =concatenate(“Ring of “,vlookup(roundup(rand()*g19,0),b$5:c$19,2))

You may decide that GP value is not the way you want to differentiate probabilities in your game. Cool; pick something else and plug those values into column D. Fiddle with the formula in column E if you want to. J5 helps keep things orderly.

Table 7-18: Rings (3.5e)

This is a modification of Table 7-18 on page 231 of the 3.5e DMG using an Excel worksheet which I outline here. The point here was to assign probabilities based on the GP value of the item, resulting in a more logical table than the too-constrained 1d100 table in the DMG.

Minor Medium Major Ring Market Price
1-105 protection 2000
106-201 feather falling 2200
202-285 climbing 2500
286-369 jumping 2500
370-453 sustenance 2500
454-537 swimming 2500
538-590 1-85 counterspells 4000
591-617 86-128 mind shielding 8000
129-171 protection 8000
618-642 172-211 force shield 8500
643-667 212-251 the ram 8600
252-285 climbing 10000
286-319 jumping 10000
320-353 swimming 10000
668-687 354-385 animal friendship 10800
688-705 386-414 1-539 energy resistance 12000
706-722 415-441 chameleon power 12700
723-736 442-464 water walking 15000
540-899 protection 18000
465-483 900-1259 spell storing 18000
484-500 1260-1583 invisibility 20000
501-517 1584-1907 wizardry 20000
518-531 1908-2166 evasion 25000
532-545 2167-2425 x-ray vision 25000
546-558 2426-2665 blinking 27000
2666-2864 wishes 32650
2865-3026 freedom of movement 40000
3027-3156 friend shield 50000
3157-3286 shooting stars 50000
3287-3373 telekinesis 75000
3374-3445 regeneration 90000
3446-3511 spell turning 98280
3512-3563 djinni calling 125000
3564-3596 elemental command 200000