They work really well in Uber-high-magic setting, or in gritty low-magic setting. In 'standard' magic level the players just kind of call you a dick.

The Nethack way is the right way. Identify everything or suffer.

>>15134748
They're pretty cool, but only is used sparingly.
Heh, Cursed Arrows. Players will hate you for it.

Well, I tend to want to put in like, a cursed item that is suitably ironic or something, but the fact of the matter is, most cursed items are created accidentally.

And given that they are created accidentally, they tend to just be useless rather than interesting.

>>15134767
My friend and fellow DM has told me of his experiences with them. As a PC in one campaign, his DM was handing them out like candy, so much so that in any game with him as DM he would just craft his magical items himself. As DM, he gave the party just one and from then on after they wouldn't touch anything be it crown or key, just prod at it with sticks if they had to move it etc.

Another buddy of mine has been severely turned off of picking up anything as well, his party was given 3 in a row, so he's gotten fed up with them. I'm going to be DMing a campaign with both those people in it, wanting to throw in odd cursed stuff (once in a blue moon that is), but after hearing of their tales I'm now feeling quite put off. But they're part of the game right? And they can add risk and mystery and fun sooo, yeah.

>>15134765
>Identify everything or suffer.

>>15134849

Depends on your setting and the severity of the curse.
If the curse is something like "You can't get it off your person and it's always taking up those 2 pounds of carrying capacity until decursed" it's no big deal.

If it's "You lose 4 effective Constitution AND can't get rid of it AND it weighs in at 45 pounds AND suffer three negative levels until the item is decursed."
then you're being a dick.

I'm honestly not sure what a good middle ground is.

>>15134849
Yes, but again, only if used wisely. You know, for the same reason the encounters aren't really equal to the party, so that it doesn't end in a 50/50 chance of wipe.
But for a villains second in command or otherwise notable character[who is evil] planting items for the PCs or the above mentioned Cursed arrows can be really effective.

I prefer interesting curses and cursed items that have some uses rather than boring stat loss crap.
I remember one character that had five throwing knives that he was cursed to never lose. If he threw and hit, they'd show back up in his bag. If he threw and missed, they came back slightly faster directly at his face. Had to get a means to catch them.

Gave my players a magic hat. Every time they reached into it, they seemingly pulled out another random hat.

Little did they know that those hats belonged to people. It just allowed the players to steal hats from people within their plane at random.

So as the players were trying to put a hat that could produce a seemingly infinite amount of other hats to good use. Such as building a dam out of hats, giving hats to the poor, selling some of the finer quality ones.

Things turned sour, after they pulled a crown out from it.

Word reached the players of a missing crown belonging to King in a nearby city. People everywhere then caused an uproar due to all their hats going missing.

Now they're too scared to go to any city and they are roaming around in a desert wasteland.

Not sure if this counts as a "cursed item". But it was funny at the time.

>>15134880
I like the middle ground (especially for accidental items) that every time the intended functionality of the item is invoked, it has a chance to malfunction. You can easily tune the severity of the curse (3% vs 75%) even if you're not sure how tough to make the backfire.

>>15134901
That's fucking awesome.

Fucking cursed spear. Worked fine for several combats, then, right in the middle of a fight, it curved up over my head and stabbed me right in the fucking back.

>>15134901

>>15134891
I gave one of my players 3 cursed arrows that had some bonuses to them (dont remember what it was at this moment). When he fired them they dissapeared and appeared behind him heading for his back. He eventually came up with the idea when a rogue was behind him he now uses the arrows to kill anything behind him

I played a 2nd ed game and the DM gave me a sword that was perfectly normal until I finally crit with it.

It exploded like a bomb throwing all the shards of metal back at me.

In a 3rd ed game one of the players got a cursed immovable rod. It always came back and would randomly turn on. (DM rolled a d100 periodically and on a 95-100 it turned on) other then that it was a normal immovable rod.

I love cursed items

Our party was stealing a holy relic from the local church. It was a goblet that the tree of life was watered from. We were offered a mighty sum from our Red dragon clan lord. However we weren't told that the monks took periodic turns to guard the goblet. All well and fine you would think.
However the goblet absorbs the face of those who touch it until another does, so cue the party freaking out when we're trying to escape with a faceless rogue and a screaming goblet.
Was fun though. Cursed items are often rather hilarious... and never really go to plan.

for fun and at low levels i always put in some cursed items that where mostly inconvinent or items that didn't work completely right. a few examples

scimitar +4 vs plants, no damage to anything else
rubber dagger, +3 vs constrcts that allow sneak attack
a dwarf throwing hammer +2 that threw the dwarf instead of the hammer
a rug of mothering, would nag you about packing an extra sweater
a ring that when worn, anytime a succesful cut or pierce was made opened a hole to the demi-plane of blood... fire hose style
a clostrophobic light gem you couldn't turn off and would magicly fall out of your pocket/bag

Cursed items are either a minor annoyance that can probably get rid of easily, or a major hindrance which takes a long and epic quest to remove and destroy.

In an Underdark setting my drow players found a cursed mask made of red feathers. They were hesitant but eventually the rogue put it on - she promptly flew to the ceiling. Gravity was reversed on her and all her possessions... convenient at times, especially as she could sneak attack practically anything, but she couldn't enter big caverns until she got it removed (imagine emerging from a tunnel faced with a huge drop before your feet). At least they were underground.

I love my DM.

My DM always, always, ALWAYS has a recurring Djinn in his campaigns, and for all of us older players, we knew when it was him. Very fun when messing with the new players.

>DM: "The monster seems to have dropped a bronze piccolo, laden with several immaculate gems. The end of it seems to be giving off incense, and there is a symbol of Olidammara on it."

>Me: ohherewegoagain.gif

>OldCleric: GODFUCKINGDAMNIT

>NewDruid: Oh hey, this looks cool! I pick it up.

>Both me and Cleric: YOU FUCKING RETARD!

>DM: "The Piccolo begins to play a whimsical tune, as the incense pours out of it, its fumes swirling like a maelstorm before you hear a mighty voice: "GUUUESS WHOOOOOOOO'S BAAAAAAAACK, MORTALS OF [insert campaign setting]!" You suddenly see a terrifying Djinn, in the guise of an arabian man wearing a turban with two gazelle antlers coming out of it. He is riding a giant tortoise wearing gold armor.

>Me: ;C

>OldCleric: *Currently glaring daggers at DM*

>NewDruid: Oh... Ummm... I roll for Sense Motive? *Druid rolls an 1d20, lands an 11.*

>DM: The Djinn seems to be highly enthusiastic, much like a bartering salesman. "I AM THE GREAT MAKA-THAKA-HII, AND I AM HERE TO GRANT YOU A SINGLE ITEM OF YOUR CHOICE! BUT BEHOLD, IT WILL BEAR THE MARK OF MAKA-THAKA-HII! DO YOU STILL ACCEPT?"

>Me: Don't do it. Please don't do it.
>Cleric: Seriously, don't. I beg of you.
>Druid: ... I decline.

>MAKA-THAKA-HII: ARE YOU QUITE SURE, MY FORTUNATE FRIEND? I CAN GIVE YOU ANY ITEM IN THE WORLD! I CAN GIVE YOU A STAFF TO BEND THE WORLDS TREES TO YOUR WILL! I CAN GIVE YOU A RING TO WOO ANY WOMAN, I CAN GIVE YOU ANYTHING YOU WISH!

... And then the druid does something none of us expected.

>Druid: I want your turtle.

>Me: ...
>Cleric: o_o
>Dm: :|... Ummm... Right... Uhhh...

I shall continue.

>>15135186

>MAKA-THAKA-HII: My... Turtle? Are you sure, Mortal? I can give you anything you want, and all you request is for my tortoise?

>Druid: I do not trust beings not of this realm, so I will politefully accept your request and accept the gift of what you have offered: Which was anything I wanted. And I want your tortoise.

>MAKA-THAKA-HII: ... Very well, Mortal. You shall have my noble steed, and may he carry you into many victorious battles. But be warned! He is immortal, and upon your death, he shall ascend the Stairs of Light and come back to me. Do you accept?

>Druid: I do. What is your steeds name?

>MAKA-THAKA-HII: His name is La-Porcel. Take him now, for I must be leaving this plane!

Druid accepts the turtle. Entire party is wary, but the Tortoise is actually quite normal, except it can run as fast as a horse. The DM gave it a Siege Breaker attribute to make it unique, as well as Immortality.

I shall tell you what happened in 'The Battle of Shura City'.

>>15135193
The Battle of Shura City: A Desert Princes kingdom has come under siege by a slew of demons, who have effectively turned the entire city into a Hellhole consisted of grotesque rape, torture, pillaging, and dismemberment.

The Shuraian Citadel was the fortress of the city, and the King was executed, only to be replaced by his possessed son, who is now so far gone the only thing left to do is slaughter him.

Our characters were around level ten, so it was a rather difficult campaign to find out all the information about the city, as well as explain why the druid is riding a Holy Tortoise.

Then the GM does the most dastardly thing ever.

The Tortoise's eyes begin to glow with a golden light, and a holy, zealous aura begins to affect the entire party. The druid, holding on for his life, is being charged towards the front gate of the Citadel, with the entire party in tow while chasing this fucking tortoise.

The tortoise does not show any signs of stopping, and its ignoring all attempts for the druid to talk to it. A Sense Motive check shows that the Tortoise 'Knows what Needs To Be Done'. The druid clamps down onto the turtle, as it retracts its head and full on charges the Citadels gates, it somehow deflecting all the arrows and magic spells being chucked at it. Druid wasn't so luck. Six arrows in the shoulder, and a Scorch on his back.

cont.

>>15135253
The gate shatters into a million pieces, shrapnelling every soldier behind it. This tortoise is flying through the entire castle, before appearing in the throne room, only being stopped by three Lesser Demon fights.

... The Prince was possessed by a Demonic Rabbit.

If you want me to continue the grand finale, say so.

>>15135279

Oh yeah

>>15135186

>I want your turtle

>>15135279
Hell yeah, keep going. This is great!

>>15135279
Incoming tortoise and the hare reference.

>>15135279
The Demonic-Jack Rabbit-Persian Prince who shall hereby be known by the name "Karjai of the Rapid Sword".

Our party prepares for battle, with the Holy Tortoise boosting our parties stats, as well as giving us 'Purity of the Divine Shell', which prevents any chance of the demon using influential abilities in combat.

The Battle starts. The druid begins casting Wild Shape, taking the form of a Raven, which he then flies to the top of the room in order to prepare for more spell-casting.

I was a Rogue, and I couldn't do much except prepare some poisons and what-not until the Warrior and Cleric could draw its attention away.

Warrior bum-rushed, and got his ass-handed to him with a mighty back-hand into a pillar. 1d20 damage, took him almost completely out of the fight.

Cleric uses Holy Word, which blinds and deafens Karjai, and which I finally use a combat initiative to sneak up on him to attempt to just repeatedly stab him in the back for as many crits as I could. Got tail-clubbed.

Karjai is completely ignoring the party, only focusing on this turtle.

>KARJAI: "YOU! Why have you returned, you foul monstrosity! You have lost that challenge from so long ago, so why have you come back! Begone, foul beast of the Djinn, for this realm is under MY control!"

>Holy Tortoise stands there resolutely (pic related) just staring at Karjai with dissaproving, beady black eyes. A leaf of lettuce is sticking out of its mouth, which it casually chews.

>Entire Party is still battering on this demon, which it only pays mild attention to us, focusing on only badgering this poor Turtle.

>Karjai brings his scimitar down onto the Turtle, which simply rolls off its shell and cleaves into the ground.

>Holy Tortoises eyes light up, as the entire Turtle begins to glow with a holy, white, pulsating light.

>>15135279
Don't leave us hanging.

Friend DM put out a cursed sword. Someone picked it up and it stuck to his hand, he couldn't remove it or drop it. They couldn't just get it decursed either because they were on the bad side of the church/law for killing an unarmed cleric for no good reason. Having it ready at all times saved his life from a surprise attack at night one time but was his ultimate downfall as well. He fell backward off a cliff but failed his rolls to catch the edge or any out-cropping because of the sword.

>>15135493

My god this is glorious. I wish my gaming group was half as awesome as this.

>>15135505

My DM had one interesting take on this. In an epic quest to recover a powerful artefact blade, the shrine was surrounded by an army. We had been told, under no circumstances, to draw it.

Because we were doomed, anyway, I didn't listen, and wrenched it out of the scabbard.

The DM says:

"You kill everyone."

"The army, or my party members?"

"Everyone."

We were resurrected later, from Clones that had been fortuitously prepared. The area was later known as the Valley of Death, and my old body, now a unique Death Knight, would ride out to cover the lands of Middle-Earth in darkness.

Sometimes, cursed blades need a wielder, but not a master.

>>15135540

Why were you doomed anyways?

I think cursed items only really work if they change the way the game is played for a period of time. If it's some minor random nerf, it's just boring and tiresome.

Therefore, if it DOES change the way you play the game, it will come out on it's own, organically. No need to tip the players off. And as for scaring players away? I wouldn't say that's a terrible thing. That's just plain roleplaying. Though to be clear, I don't think a large number of cursed items is a good idea: the number should be well below 10%, simply because no matter what the magic level of your setting is, if 30% of magic items were horribly horribly cursed, only the insane would ever use them.

Speaking of which, Insane people are a good source of cursed items. The mad warlock becomes a lot more three dimensional and interesting as a character if after you kill him, you realize "wow, I just murdered fucking gollum there."

Good effects for cursed items to have: something that imposes status conditions if you don't act in a certain way, something that works well most of the time but can fail you in a signficant way, or something similar, like "glows in the presence of orcs.... really brightly. Shame you were trying to sneak up on them, eh?"

Basically, it feels more organic if the item communicates not by some telepathic dialog with funny voices, but through actions that manifest in the game world. And it gets a person more nervous to be dealing with a powerful force they don't fully understand, instead of just taking orders from a force who has explicitly stated his intentions and goals.

>>15135558

Enemy army around the shrine. We fucked up real good, at that point. We'd retreated to the altar, where the artifact was still clutched in the hands of the previous owner.

Also, we were a primarily non-magical party. Drawing the weapon has a Symbol of Insanity effect, which turns the affected into mindless berserkers lead by the wielder.

WE ALL FAILED. We remembered, vaguely, charging out- Terrible carnage- limbs flying everywhere, as the contagious madness spread...

So yeah.

>>15135493

>Karjai seems to panic, and slams the scimitar more and more into the turtle. A chip forms in its armor.

>Party Status: Warrior recovering, druid clawing at Karjais face, cleric healing warrior, me actually on its back, stabbing at its neck, dealing a bit more damage than normal. Still not enough, as it brushes me off with a sweep of its hand.

>Holy Tortoise casts Time Stop.

>Holy Tortoise suddenly appears over Karjai, dispels Time Stop, and slams onto his head. Karjai retaliates with a rudimentary swipe at the turtles head. Turtle is as turtle does, retracts head, and is sent ricocheting all over the room, until it slams once more into Karjais stomach.

Karjai is sent reeling backwards, slamming into the wall as the ceiling starts dropping rocks down onto all of us. We roll for a dodge save.
...
Druid fails. With a 1d20 roll of 2.

Druid is impaled by a falling rock.

>Holy Tortoise emanates power before the entire room explodes, sending the room into a different plane of nothing but rainbow colored lights.

>Karjai, Party, dying Druid goes "WTF?"

>Turtle seems to walk away, before MAKA-THAKA-HII appears, holding a massive golden spear. M.T.H. mounts the turtle, and lances Karjai with the spear, directly in the middle of the chest.

>Maka-Thaka-Hii: AND THUS THE TURTLE WON THE GAME. AS USUAL. CAN YOU PLEASE STOP MESSING WITH MORTAL LIVES KARJAI? THIS IS THE SIXTH TIME THIS MILLENIA WE HAVE SLAIN YOU.

>Karjai dies in a massive firey explosion, sending everyone flying out of the city, somehow surviving the brutal landing. Impaled druid spears next to us.

>Maka-Thaka-Hii: AS I HAVE SAID, MY STEED SHALL RETURN UPON YOUR DEATH. MAY YOU HAVE A WONDERFUL AFTERLIFE, DRUID, FOR YOU HAVE SAVED THE CITY WITH YOUR FOOLISH WISH.

Druid stays dead. Turned out the DM and him got into a fight a few weeks ago and the DM never got rid of the grudge.

Not really a cursed item so much as a dick DM story.

>>15135594
That is the best, most fun dick DM story I've ever seen. I'd high five him for that shit.

>>15135594
The druid died fair and square, from my chair. DM could easily have pincushioned him far worse all through the charge, and the ceiling wasn't aimed at the druid - he just got killed dead.

>>15135594
I love recurring NPC stories.

My group had one as well. He came to be referred to as "the world's best NPC". Somehow he managed to show up everywhere. The party would wreck wherever he was working or kill his boss or force him to flee the country because of one reason or another but somehow or another he managed to survive any combat he was ever in by running, hiding, and getting very very lucky.

His only real useful attribute was Charisma but he had enough of it to make friends pretty much anywhere and the man could talk his way out of a paper bag (something that's actually surprisingly hard to do).

>>15135700
Now that I think about it we did use him to test items for a while. Never actually got any cursed items but we did have some fun times with some shit we built. like when he rolled really really bad on testing out our homemade "Necklace of fireballs bomb." Which was basically a flask of alchemist's fire with a necklace of fireballs wrapped around it.

>>15135805

Why didn't he see your party and then run a mile?

>>15134901
I'm using this in my campaign tonight. A bunch of merchants are going to hire the party to kill a monster for a huge cash reward and once they complete the task they'll say "Thank you for doing the deed. As a reward you may have these two thousand gold coins, or you can have what's in.... The Mystery Box." I've been looking for a good item to put in The Mystery Box and that hat is perfect.

We had a real dick of a GM. We didn't realise it for a while but the majority of loot we got was cursed. I'll give you a list of things
-Ring of swimming. Everytime you go swimming it gives you a 50% of +10 to swim or -10 to swim
-Gloves that give you +1 to hit. However when you roll a crit you lose half hp
-A book of spells and every time a character opens a door a random spell is cast. Killed a character that way. Scariest thing was trying to figure out what set it off
- The biggest dick move was him giving a party member a +3 AC amulet but that was also a liches phylatory.

>Shrink Person
>Put in Bag of Devouring
>XP farm on my belt.

Also
>mfw I want your turtle.

This needs to be archived just for the story about the turtle. Has someone archived this yet?

Non-magical, but I always enjoyed giving out poorly-counterfeited gold pieces when we played D&D. Since counterfeit is opposed by counterfeit nobody in the party would figure it out until they tried to change money or buy something big. Very amusing, but not world ending.

I have a question...

Say you have a cursed item that you can't get rid of.

Can't someone just sunder it from you?

>>15136605
Just have the item have hardness 50 or something.
You're the DM, if you dont want it destroyed from sundering it wont be destroyed.

>>15136605
If I recall correctly, magic items (and therefore cursed items) can't be sundered. I know their immune to the Shatter spell, but i'm not 100% sure about them being immune to mundane destruction.

My fighter had a vorpal sword(kills any thing that needs is head attached to its body to live on a roll of 20), that would do the same to him on a roll of 1. He didn't live long, especially since the sword can't be released once you grip it. We were only level 5 so a vorpal weapon was pretty awesome, killed a boss with it, later decapitated myself while striking a kobold. Hilarious.

>>15136691
>Hilarious
>Dying on every attack roll at a 5% chance

My friend's stepdad and his stoner chums used to play D&D, and I remember him telling me about how his Drow wizard tried on a cursed hat that turned him into some kind of idiot savant. And then they couldn't take it off.

I'd probably think that pretty par for the course now, but when I was eight it was the coolest thing I had ever heard. Pretty much sold me on D&D forever I think.

Cursed stone. Weighs one pound. Every day, its weight doubles.

>>15136725
Meh it was sorta clear it was cursed since we found it with its old owner, I didn't really mind but every attack roll was scary as fuck.

>>15136605
>>15136622
>>15136623

magic items can be sundered just like any other
magic item, they just have higher hp and toughness
i believe its 2 hardness and 10 hp per + on it
so it will take a while to do it, just remember cursed items
can still be sold

>>15136999
Wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that given that a cursed item is working against the holder, that it would be also allowed its own saves rather than the holder's?

>>15137044
striking with a weapon just goes against ac not a save,
also magic item saves are overall terrible

>>15137123
I just meant for the possibility of someone trying to magic it off with damage rather than sunder.

As for them being terrible, well, hey, likely better than the character forgoing the save.

My players can normally count that every single magical item I give them will be cursed or have some sort of drawback.

Even if it is something obvious, like identifying a red magic sword: I say it catches everything it touches on fire once it is activated. They activate it while holding it, they catch on fire.

If you think about it, there would be a lot more novice wizards that suck at magic than there would be great wizards that make properly legendary artefacts.

>>15137141
Who leaves their crap in treasure piles along with gold, priceless paintings and other stuff?

Rather than say, destroying them?

>>15134880
Best middle ground is a cursed item that ramps up in effects. Start it as the weighs 2 pounds, and can't be removed, then after a week, make it start eating players' CON scores.

It won't be bad until they've had plenty of time to find a decursive.

>>15137141
>lies in a self-satisfied tone
it's weird that you're so utterly shitty that you'd do that. what's wrong with you?

The best cursed items are neither magical not cursed, just malicious in design.

>>15137155
Magic sucks, why wouldn't you think about the actual effects of each item?

Cursed items can still be useful if there is one creative person in the party.

I have a lot of malicious items. The best is, if you put them into someones pocket or have them 'find' it and watch them die on it.

>>15137161
Hm, does that mean you could use it like a choke wire?

>>15136503
Aside from laughing at pickpockets, you could also just use a permanent enlarge on it so that you could toss it on people. Somewhat easier than casting shrink person each time, somewhat more dangerous as you can more easily have it turned on you.

>>15137161

That item's pretty bullshitty, though. The only way you'd possibly sever your fingers is if you tried a full draw first thing; anything lighter (such as, say, experimentally giving a light tug to see how elastic the bow is, which MOST archers would do) and you'll be able to tell that it's not safe to use.

>>15137161
This items inspires me to make a trap based off it. A target or something in a seemingly unreachable area with the obvious [and incorrect] solution being to shoot an arrow from that bow. (magically attuned arrows for only that bow or something of the like being reason for no other bow to be able to be used on it or some bullshit).