Shattered Mirror of the Insect Queen

[Joseph Kellogg]

Shattered Mirror of the Insect Queen
Aura faint conjuration and transmutation; CL 5th
Slot none; Price 10,800 gp; Weight 1 lb.
Description
This hand mirror is inscribed with hundreds of images of tiny insects, and the glass is broken into dozens of shards. Three times per day, the wielder can point the mirror at himself or another creature as a standard action. This is a gaze attack (range 30 feet, Fortitude DC 19 negates). If it fails the save, the targeted creature disintegrates into a swarm of hundreds of Tiny copies of itself. Any worn clothing, armor, or magic items shrink and split with the creature, but weapons and carried gear are left behind.

The affected creature becomes a swarm with a hive mind, gaining all swarm traits, the distraction special attack, and a swarm attack dealing damage equal to 1d6 plus 1d6 per 5 Hit Dice, plus the creature’s Strength bonus, if any. The affected creature gains a –4 size penalty to Strength, a +4 size bonus to Dexterity, and loses any natural armor bonus. Its speed is reduced by 10 feet (minimum 5 feet), and it is treated as a Tiny creature (for the purpose of size and armor bonuses to AC, etc.). It can still use spells or other abilities as normal.

The affected creature coalesces into its normal form after five minutes, or when it would be dispersed, such as from damage. It can be reduced to negative hit points as normal. If reduced to 0 hit points or dispersed by other means, the affected creature returns to its normal form, prone, unconscious, and stable at 0 hit points.
Construction
Requirements Craft Wondrous Item, reduce person, summon swarm; Cost 5,400 gp

[Clark Peterson]

Funky, I'll say that. I guess I see PCs using this to reduce themselves for exploration purposes more than to reduce enemies. But maybe I'm off on that. I think this is creative enough, and well thought out enough, to make the top, but in my view this is one of the weaker top items. Just don't get near that swarm slurper!

[Sean K Reynolds]

This is weird, but I like it. The author did a pretty good job of thinking out all the repercussions of turning an existing, intelligent creature into a swarm.

[Wolfgang Baur]

Every year we have a weird item that makes us say, "Well, maybe this writer is just gonzo and will wipe out in the next round, but...."

And this one shows more than just gonzo-ness. The mechanical elements are not bad, and the item design is pretty coherent, if complex.

I'm willing to take a chance on this one. Keep.

[Steve Miller]

Very, very interesting. Also gutsy for going this far into new territory. I do have a problem with the Strength modifier to damage. Are there any other swarms that have a static modifier to damage?
Explain the "reduced to negative hit points as normal" versus "if reduced to 0 hit points" sentences, please.

[Mike Welham]

Welcome to the Top 32, RainyDayNinja!

Congratulations on creating an item that has dual utility—the obvious "turn your enemy into a swarm, making this an easier fight" (even spellcasters who retain their spellcasting abilities are hampered with the potential loss of material components) and the slightly less obvious "turn myself into a swarm to get into places I couldn't otherwise." I think you've worked things out to their logical conclusion as far as how the target of the mirror re-coalesces, and I appreciate that you've covered all the bases.

Best of luck to you in future rounds!

[Tom Phillips]

First of all, congratulations on making the Top 32! That in itself is a major accomplishment and it’s something you should take great pride in. You rock!

This item is certainly a little gonzo, and that's not a bad thing. I think it's needlessly complicated though. Why not just reduce a target to a swarm that is equivalent to a spider swarm or rat swarm? The target could still keep their mental stats and spells, but the rest of the math is easier (and faster) to work out. Part of me also wants to make this item a little more powerful and add a baleful polymorph option so you can turn enemies into a swarm of bugs permanently. Still, I love the cool imagery and the clever powers. Despite my suggestions, this item is in my Top 5. Nicely done!

[James Olchak]

I'm not sure how I feel about this one. I like the broken mirror/tiny duplicates theme, but I'm not quite sure what it's for. Exploring is pretty limited if you leave your backpack behind, combat could be useful. I suspect it'll mostly find use as a way for a spellcaster to gain half-damage versus slashing and piercing attacks, while casting spells with relative impunity. Which is kinda boring.

I'm not sure the gaze mechanics are necessary. It seems like you're limited to a single target anyway, you could just point it at a single target and have it work as a targeted effect.

This one doesn't move me.

[Jacob W. Michaels]

I think this is the second one in a row that I disagree with James on (sorry, James).

IIRC, this was one of the first items I listed in my personal "keeper" file. I'm a fan of swarms and this seemed like fun. I like that it's one of those items that people can find different ways they'd use it; I think that's a sign of good design.

[Chris Mortika]

Congratulations, Joseph! This is a great item with a clunky name.

As a GM, I'd have a headache with this -- potions get retained by the swarmster (so it could drink a potion of enlarge person?) but alchemical items are left behind. A magic bow would contineue on with the character, but not her mundane arrows.

But as people said: gonzo! Good job on ceating an evocative image!

[Kiel Howell]

Congrats!

Chris Mortika hit exactly what I felt when I saw this item. Why are alchemical items left behind? Why is anything left behind?

This was not a keeper for me personally because of some of the oddities. How does the glass stay in the frame?

But, theme was kept together fairly well.

Congrats again!

[GreggKY]

This is just freakin' cool. Good stuff.

[Jeff Lee]

Joseph,

When I first saw your item, I was suffering from swarm item overdose, so I don't believe I gave it as much attention as I should. On future views though, it grew on me. I thought back to that scene in Army of Darkness when Ash shatters the mirror and all the little Ashes pop out and start terrorizing him. The possibilities here are fun, even if the mechanics are a bit wonky. It was solidly in my keep folder. Congratulations and good luck!

[Jacob Kellogg]

Congrats, Joseph! I knew you'd make it in!

[Thomas LeBlanc]

I really liked the idea behind this item, but I wasn't fond of the mechanics. The wording of the damage, size change, ability modifiers, and the dispensation of the items carried by the target.

[Richard Moore]

This is an item that I upvoted every time I saw it. It is something that everyone at a gaming table will want to use. I can even see my players passing it around from time to time so that everyone can have a turn trying it out.

There a lot of swarm items in my selection of pairings - one or two of which, besides yours, were also strong contenders in my mind - but this one captured my imagination and had mechanics that were logical and easy enough to grasp.

I do think that this is the sort of design a developer might look at and ask you to simplify prior to publication. But the core idea and the initial execution are good enough for someone to sit up and say, "WOW" on the first read-through, and that counts for a lot.

[Nicholas Herold]

Another item I admire for its sheer delightful weirdness.

Congratulations on making the Top 32, and I'll see you in the archetype round!

[James Conder]

I came across this one several times during voting and was always a fan. Pleased to see it in the top 32.

[agirlnamedbob]

This was one of my favorite, if not my favorite, mirror items this year. It made sense to be a mirror, yet, I didn't groan and feel like it was overly sterotypical. It managed to break my expectations...it also being a swarm related item that was, again, not what I would have expected. I think you played smartly with a lot of complex ideas and managed to not drop the ball, which in and of itself is impressive. I think that's what makes this Superstar.

Congrats and I can't wait to see what you come up with for the next round!

[R D Ramsey]

I voted against this one pretty consistently. I liked the idea of a cracked mirror creating a swarm, that made perfect sense. But it felt like something that would be highly exploitable when used on party members instead of opponents.

[Garrett Guillotte]

This falls on the great end of my gonzo spectrum and reminds me of James's Rajah's Silhouette from last year (even if he isn't very enthusiastic). The description is fun, but this is an item that would come more alive at the table than on paper (if it didn't immediately morph into an Army of Darkness homage).

[Guy Russell]

Congratulations fellow swarmer! For some reason I wish the mirror reflected a creature and made them into a swarm of tiny versions of themselves. Your choice was probably more wise than that.

[Andrew Marlowe]

Congratulations for making the top 32! This was one of those entries from the moment I first read it I figured would be in the top 32. Nicely done.
Good luck with round 2.

[frank gori]

The Good: Original, fun idea, very decent prose, and you thought out the consequences.

The Bad: Somewhat clunky name (where's the queen?}, pricing feels off to me.

The Ugly: For public voting this might have lost votes for being a little too weird. As a DM I'd be reluctant to allow this in the hands of my players for fear of the clever ways I know they'd come up with to abuse this.

That said: you definately deserve the top 32 congrats.

[RonarsCorruption]

Congratulations on making the top 32! You've given us a very, very intesting item with lots of potential uses, and while it was borderline weird, I think it stays safely away from the too weird side.

Also...

Guy Russell wrote:

I wish the mirror reflected a creature and made them into a swarm of tiny versions of themselves. Your choice was probably more wise than that.

item text wrote:

the targeted creature disintegrates into a swarm of hundreds of Tiny copies of itself

Just saying. ;)

[Andrew Marlowe]

GM_Solspiral wrote:

As a DM I'd be reluctant to allow this in the hands of my players for fear of the clever ways I know they'd come up with to abuse this.

I don't know that could be a lot of fun...In fact I may not only ad this some treasure pile in Pathfinder I may try to find a way to adapt it to another game system I'm running as a "useful hazard" and see what my player's do with it.

[Matt Blackie]

First of all, congratulations on making Top 32! Good luck in round two.

I can only assume that it's my own personal biases, but I loved this item and voted it up every time I saw it, even though I know it has some questionable mechanical aspects. Frankly, I think the idea of turning yourself into a swarm (which was the first image I had upon reading this, notwithstanding that it can be used on other creatures as well) was unique and compelling, and I'd be enthusiastic to see what a creative player could do with such an item.

But with great creativity comes great responsibility, so there are some unanswered questions that would probably require quite a bit of FAQing to completely unravel. Why are nonmagical clothes (possibly made of leather) shrunk, but nonmagical backpacks (possibly made of leather) left behind? What if you have a magical backpack? What if your mundane gear is inside your magic items? When shrunk, are the individual copies able to use their items individually, and if so, to what effect? If one of my minis zaps a wand, even if it does nothing numerically, does it use up a charge? What if 49% of them zap the same wand? 50%? 51%?

It's the sort of thing that makes a GM have to sit down and think through, or just rule by fiat. That's excusable when the item is as fun and interesting as this, but it's also going to lead to some degree of contention at the table when different people have different interpretations of what should happen. The item would have been much stronger with more clarity, but I confess that it would be difficult to consider every possibility in an elegant way and remain within the word count.

That said, this was very appealing item and I'm glad to see it made the cut.

[Joseph Kellogg]

Thanks for the comments everybody; I'm glad most of you liked it!

[Raphael]

When I saw this I thought Army of Darkness too. Which is cool.

[Joseph Kellogg]

Yeah, Army of Darkness was definitely my inspiration for this item. Although I'll be quite impressed if anyone can pick out the book/character that inspired my archetype...

[Joel Flank]

I'm not sure what to make of this item. Yes, it's creative, but I'm not sure when you'd use it. Sure you can use it to stop an enemy, but for a single effect that can take someone out of the fight, I'm not sure why you'd leave them the ability to do multiple d6s of swarm damage and still cast spells, etc. I similarly priced item that charmed, dominated, put to sleep, blasted for hp damage would simply take them down.

It can be used for exploration, but so could gasseous form and lots of other methods. This just seems like an overly complicated item for what it does.

Also, as a nitpick, disintegrate has a pretty specific in game meaning, and when you say "disintegrates into a swarm of hundreds of Tiny copies of itself" you're not refering to the standard meaning. I'd use a different word, since you're not actually vaporizing your target.

[Giorgios Abate]

This reminds me a lot of Slayers (The anime) which is cool since that is one of my favorite animes, and I love Lina Inverse!

Congratulations Joseph!, good luck with your archetype!

[Curaigh]

Congratulations Joseph,

This was a keeper for me, just based on its sheer fun. Since its held it will drop to the floor when you use it on yourself and depending on who is present/not present, might make this a one shot item. I think other things needed to work out mechanically speaking, but dinnae bother because of the fun.

Suggestion for R2 (& I realize this is coming too late): keep flavor tightly reined with balance. This could easily have gone too far.

Nice job and good luck!

[Jon Haire]

I didn't see this item very much but I do remember voting for it a few times. I do enjoy any item that reminds me of Army of Darkness... Turning yourself or an enemy into a swarm is cool. That's thinking outside the box and is also what gives it mojo.

For the record, we are not nemeses(I had to look it up). One character could use your mirror to transform the enemy into a swarm and the other character could use the slurper. Not a bad combo. If the enemy only has 40 hit points, then his entire body gets sucked in. I'm not sure what happens after 5 minutes when he reforms. At the 10 minute mark, the slurper is going to try to expel him/her out. I didn't really plan for that....

When I was voting, your entry did make me want to include a different command word to release the swarm. If the enemy had over 40 hit points and heard the command word, he/she could just say the original command word and be released. Grrrrr....

[Template Fu]

As prior entries will tell you, Template Fu is one mean point eating machine, but will also praise where praise is due.

These reviews being this in depth usually take me a while to do and they get fitted in around other demands on my time, so please bear with me if I haven’t gotten to your item yet. I will get there in the end.

Review Caveat: I try to keep things totally dispassionate and all comments herein are my own. Having not made the illustrious levels that you have achieved this year, I can only caveat that anything I propose in feedback may not be totally in line with what Paizo thinks or needs of its freelance game designers, so do consider carefully any and all feedback I make under this light.

I start your review with…

Congratulations on being selected by the public at large and then the stalwart judges!

Review Breakdown:

Template: 5/5
Hungry! Yes, perfection – including the easy trip up – you didn’t span the italics over the commas in your requirements spell list – very well done indeed - Template Fu stomps off in a huffy!

(Yes, I have worked out how to check page mark up on my iPad, so formatting issues cannot hide now)

I also will point out here the use of “feet” instead of “-ft” in the description – this shows real care and attention to detail – and I privately hope some of it comes from the Round 1 Template Explained thread I compiled last year – hey, one can hope 

Spelling: 5/5
This bit IS boilerplate to avoid confusion. Everyone should know to use US English, so you just know that I am going to eat points for stray ‘u’ letters and similar.

Template Fu’s huffing and muttering becomes the gentle(?) sound of dragon-kin deep slumber. Please tip-toe on and let him sleep…

Readability: 4/5
These are readings you can get from most spelling and grammar check options in word processors, for this, I am pasting everyone’s description into Word for consistency. My grading’s are purely my own personal feelings for target scores but it should be noted these are very helpful during development to spot problems in your writing, especially passivity.

Passive Sentences 41% (-1 pt)
There are whole threads on this and it is possible to get 0%, which is wicked, but I would expect scores of less than 20% to be around the ideal mark for item descriptions (sometimes, you need the passive, but only rarely).

Flesch Reading Ease 60.5 (in the expected range)
(0-30 best understood by university graduates, 60-70 easily understood by 13-15 year olds, 90-100 easily understood by 11 year olds)

Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level 10.0 (could be lower, but is okay)
(This equates to the grades found in the US schooling system, e,g. 8.2 means it should be understandable by the average 8th grade student)

Me as a Designer Review: 5/5
Starting at the top, it was okay when you mention the hand mirror is broken – when that happens for real, the pieces tend to fall out and not stay in the hand mirror, so I think I might have gone from some sort of surface is marred by multiple fractures. Not a major thing, just a passing comment.

Standard action is the default action when activating items, so you probably didn’t need to mention that in the way this item is written, because you say immediately after it is a gaze attack. Attacks are standard actions, so yeah, you didn’t need it at all.

I do worry about turning oozes, slimes and jellies to millions of them, that just seems like a really bad thing to do, but I think the being a swarm can be used to circumnavigate that one – it is something to be wary of, your affects on creature types with different attacks ( touch me you get acid burns, touch me you get poisoned, etc., the contact attack type worried me).

It’s a very complex item, but you managed to get it into the word count. That’s impressive but also something to consider when you hit the word walls going forwards – the more things in an item, the more work there is in keeping game play smooth when using it.

I found the ending paragraph a little awkward, like you were searching for how to close the zero hit points issues. I think you would have cleared this with maybe one more review.

I like the item, it’s a bit wordy and needs careful planning to include in the game by the GM to be sure they are fully understanding it, so I think I am going to give the full 5/5 for you here. Well earnt.

Overall Impression: 5/5
It was a very cool core idea, I think you probably would have found most of my comment yourself on a couple more re-visits, so do review a few extra times. The template execution was totally professionally done, I really applaud you here for that.

I do hold out great hopes for creativity in your archetype though following on from this item. That’s one of the fun things about this competition – success means more pressure to bring it again!

Final Score: 24/25
I won’t give a final score comment as I haven’t for anyone else as I work through the items.

If this interests for personal reasons, please feel free to check out everyone else’s scores and at the same time check out your competition and their feedback too!

Closing, as I started…

Congratulations on being selected!

[james knowles]

Jeff Lee wrote:

Joseph,

When I first saw your item, I was suffering from swarm item overdose, so I don't believe I gave it as much attention as I should. On future views though, it grew on me. I thought back to that scene in Army of Darkness when Ash shatters the mirror and all the little Ashes pop out and start terrorizing him. The possibilities here are fun, even if the mechanics are a bit wonky. It was solidly in my keep folder. Congratulations and good luck!

That's exactly what i thought upon seeing this. I don't like the item itself, but I'm interested in seeing what kinds of other strangeness this guy creates.

[Sam Harris]

Congrats on making the Top 32! I'm a fan of swarms, and this deals with the concept really well, from the imagery and feel to the effects. I'm looking forward to seeing your archetype, and good luck in Round 2!

[Daniel Rust]

Congratulations Joseph on making the Top 32!

I'll agree with the consensus that this is weird but cool. The fractured mirror creating 100s of reflections that come to life is a really creepy idea. It's comical yet horrific which is always a great combination.

The uses for the mirror are myriad (appropriately) and I can see players having great fun if they got their hands on one of these. That's the most important thing. I'm sure it would work at the table too. It may seem complicated (and I think you've made it sound complicated) but at heart it's a straightforward mechanic.

There are a number of technical things which don't quite add up (magic items shrink but weapons don't. What about magic weapons? If you're at 0 hit points you would be stable anyway) but you can be forgiven for that.

It's gonzo but very cool - great job!