Unlike people, your audience doesn't usually care about whether or not an item is believable. They want something memorable. Like people, however, the qualities that make an item memorable are its non-physical qualities. Whether that is an item's magical powers, the beliefs about that item, or the memories that are associated with an item - these are traits that make an item unique. An item can be rather plain and yet have a non-physical quality that makes it memorable. The One Ring is just a plain gold ring but it is precious because it is what binds Sauron's spirit to the world and grants its bearer power even if at a terrible cost.
How do you create interesting, believable characters to build your story around? How do we as GMs do this when the main characters are ultimately not of our design? Let's take a look at how to use the world around you as inspiration for the denizens of your game worlds, whether they are NPCs, creatures, and yes, even the player characters!
If you've not listened to The Maniculum Podcast, I highly recommend it. Zoe Franznick and Mac Boyle do an excellent job of bringing those cultures and time periods (specifically medieval in their case) into the spotlight and helping their listeners find those useful touchstones in medieval literature and events that we can bring into our modern RPG storytelling.
From all of these discussions, Zoe and Mac have pulled together 50 magic items that are based around real-life items that can be found in museums or medieval manuscripts. These magic items can be found in Marginal Worlds, their first TTRPG supplement that is now live on Kickstarter. Marginal Worlds is a deck of cards with these magic items detailed and illustrated for use in any TTRPG campaign.
Planescape was weird, vast, and groundbreaking. It has endured as card games and video games and has been kept alive by those that love it and even revisited occasionally in subsequent editions of D&D. Now, with Adventures in the Multiverse, 5th Edition finally returns to the planes and brings the setting back to life with modern updates, beautiful artwork, and a clever adventure campaign that pays homage to the past.
How do we make our towns and villages more interesting?
Watch the full playthrough of The Solo Adventurer - Dragonbane
