abyssalbrews

Umbrala

Added 2023-08-24 15:00:05 +0000 UTC

Greetings adventurers!

It was a particularly sunny day this late summer when I decided to treat myself to a walk. Things get a bit stuffy in the workshop on these muggier days. During the walk, I came across an individual wearing all black sitting under a tree with an umbrella. Their skin was pale as the moon and they didn’t seem to be one for conversation. Those are precisely the type of folks I like to make chatter with. As I plopped down next to them on a bench, I remarked on the oddity of carrying an umbrella on a cloudless day. They said they would gladly give me the umbrella if I just went away. I know a veiled threat when I hear one so I kindly took my leave, and the umbrella of course.

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Design notes from Matthew:

This is one of those items that started with an idea from Fernando actually. It wasn’t anything more than “We should make an umbrella” and that was enough to get me started. I had always considered it an interesting idea to make an umbrella that something falls from as it’s usually used to block something falling on you. I guess I just like subverting the standard uses of things. The thought of an umbrella that provides shade was an early part of the vision and when the term “umbral” hit my mind, well it was safe to say I had found the right theme.

For the 5E version, there’s some fiddly nature in how you define darkness. The split between magical darkness and regular darkness isn’t as clean, so I had to spend a good bit of time defining it. I spent some time researching some of the problems with Darkness as a spell and one of the biggest issues is that you just can’t see through it. Sometimes that’s useful, but if you’re using it for defense, that’s never going to work. That was the reason for the modification to see through.

For the PF2E version, there’s a better definition of what darkness does vs. magical darkness. I had to push this item to be a bit higher than I wanted level wise to include the heightened cast of Darkness. It’s a sacrifice that had to be made though considering Darkvision would have negated this item quite easily otherwise.

Starting with a simple idea for an item, even something as mundane as an umbrella is a really fun design challenge. I love trying to figure out what you could use a rather normal piece of every day kit for if you give it some magic as well. I think that there’s a lot of joy to be found in turning the mundane into magical within these fantasy worlds we run.

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