Coldfire Anvil
Wondrous item, rare
This cold, iron anvil weighs 50 pounds and is 1 and a half feet long. It has three magic runes on its side from the Everglacier that magically enchant any item sharpened, forged, or otherwise smithed using this anvil. Over the course of a full workday, or half as long if you're proficient with smith's tools, you can use the anvil to turn a nonmagical metal weapon into a coldfire one. A coldfire weapon is magical and deals an extra 1d6 cold damage to any target it hits, but is made fragile like ice. When you make an attack roll using a coldfire weapon and roll a 1, roll a d20. On a 9 or lower, the weapon shatters and destroys the weapon, releasing a biting burst of cold that deals 2d6 cold damage to all creatures within 10 feet of the weapon. After 7 days, a coldfire weapon loses the enchantment and becomes nonmagical again.
Once the anvil has been used to enchant a weapon in this way, it can't do so again for 1d6 + 1 days.
Born from metal and fire, but at home in the ice and cold. Some chills burn worse than fire.
Comments (8)
Just discovered this item. So rad, Griff. Gonna be stealing it for my campaign at some point.
Very powerful. Seeing as powerful magic weapons have +1, +2 or +3 damage, this adds an average of 3.5 to every hit of a weapon. Still really neat.
A +2 weapon is rare, the same as this item, and has an average DPS of +4 damage (because it's hitting more often with a flat +2 bonus) and doesn't have the risk of shattering. This should be appropriate for its rarity, considering that, for the most part, you'll only ever have 1 (or *maybe* 2) items with this bonus at any one time given the anvil's cooldown timer.
I love this item. Anything that incentivizes crafting is a win for me!
Is this only for melle weapons? As could you not theoretically sharpen spears on it and just let loose, if it fails it does bonus aoe dmg, if it doesn’t fail you get to keep your spear? Just checking how it works.
It's any metal weapon, so it would work with daggers and some spears! Thrown weapons like that tend to have lower damage dice, anyway, and once you throw them you gotta go pick 'em up again anyway, so it should be balanced appropriately! Remember that once the anvil has been used, it can't be used again for 2–7 days, and any coldfire weapon loses the enchantment after 7 days (if it survives that long).
Shatter rules confusing. Is it a 1 or a 9 or lower?
When you roll a 1, roll another d20. On a 9 or lower on that second d20, the weapon shatters!