The Gaming Den

Has anyone ever used this item in their campaign?

virgil wrote:Has anyone ever used this item in their campaign?

In 2e. It's fukkin' great. Bolt on some wand turrets, some wings of flight, a few decanters of endless water with the same command word, a few portable holes inside, and a some flasks of air. Think D&D 'Pimp my Ride'.

My friend loves these things, uses one for his character based on the gun nut from Tremors.

I had one when I played a goblin Artificer, added a button that cast Demon Wings (BoVD) on it.

In 2e it had a raw percentage chance to hit, completely bypassing the AC and THAC0 mechanics, making it theoretically great against high AC opponents.

I the PCs in one of my 3e games found one after an underwater lair raid - they sold it the first chance they got, since its listed GP value, even with college-textbook buyback ripoff pricing is still much greater than it actual utility.

Seriously, with the 45000 sale price for one of those and a looming underwater or at-sea adventure, Core sez you could afford:

• Three Pearls of the Sirines or
• A wand of Freedom of Movement and a Wand of Water Breathing or
• 6 cloaks of the Manta Ray or
• Just short of a second Helm of Underwater action or
• 180 Elixirs of Swimming or
• 100 Swan Boat tokens or
• Just short of a third Horn of the Tritions or
• Five necklaces of Adaptation or
• Six folding boats
• Two fourth level and one third level Peal of power to give your cleric extra daily castings of Water Breathing and Freedom of Movement or
• Just short of a second Plate Armor of the deep or
• 18 Rings of Swimming or
• Four and a half Rings of Swimming, Improved or
• Three rings of Water Walking or
• Four Bottles of Air or
• 7 gloves of Swimming and Climbing or
• Two and a half of the Ioun Stones that sustain the owner without air
• A ring of Freedom of Movement and some potions of Water Breathing

And that's without getting into polymorph nor metamagic type cheese or non-core more efficient options

And while 200 HP seems like a lot and Hardness 15 is crazy good, an AC of 20 is only good below level 3, a swim speed of 20' is massively slower than everything that you'll meet underwater, and 2 melee attacks at +12 for 2d8+0 is like bringing an 8th level core fighter along to take the underwater penalties, yet the WBL guidelines say that only a 16th level character can afford an apparatus.

Take a zero off the end of the price and you have a useful underwater tank that level-appropriate enemies will have trouble damaging, but can trap or easily can run away from.