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Need Help with Loot - Massive Hidden Library (ttrpg.network)

submitted 1 year ago by maxim38@ttrpg.network to c/askgamemasters@ttrpg.network

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Hello All!

First time using the new platform - F*ck Spez

I am building an utterly MASSIVE dungeon that is based on the idea of a hidden library. Its ancient, full of lost secrets and treasure. It shifts and moves and its easy to get lost.

I'm trying to populate sections with relevant loot for my party. I have RNG tables, but I prefer not to use them, as I like having narrative reasons for why something is there. (For instance, you find a dead adventurer, and in their pack is healing potions and a magic item).

There is a section of the library that is completely underwater. Its for housing the literature of underwater civilizations - "books" that would dry out and be lost if they ever left the water.

What sort of magic items would be found in this section? Bonus points if its book-themed. (I've already got the obvious ones that give you water breathing or swim speed, help me be more creative)

THANKS!

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[–] InEnduringGrowStrong@ttrpg.network 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Libraries are mainly places of knowledge.
They could also include second that aren't just books: a museum or natural museum, an art gallery, a meeting space for academic conferences, etc.
Was that part of the library used by an underwater civilization? Or was it about one?

If it's the former, even our idea of a book or scroll might be wildly different from them.
If they lived underwater, instead of using ink on paper/vellum, maybe they carved on things, or arranged shells or sand, tied knots in strands of rope like material, or tapestries, or influenced the growth of corals in ways to display their ideas, etc. If they used ink, maybe it was more like a 3d holographic representation but with pigments suspended in water.
Turbulence, moving through might simply make it ineligible (or maybe it can be reversed, see below)

1 minute science video about fluids

Did they even have light?
Bioluminescence might be something cool here, where the "books" themselves might literally be live bio things that are alive.
Or maybe just the ambient light can be provided by bioluminescent plankton as you move around.
Maybe their way of displaying an idea was recreating specific movement in the water so the plankton is simulated in a specific pattern to display.

You can probably also steal and reskin some of the stuff in the candlekeep adventure if you need side content. Won't be a drop-in replacement but the general vibe is there.