In an earlier post I talked about the use of a D20 while writing. But let’s talk about DND in general. Think of me pulling up a chair, turning it around and sitting on it. Let’s rap, kids.

What is the Deck of Many Things? It’s a rare magical item in DND that allows the user to pull a number of cards that they announce to the table. These cards have a wide variety of uses such as giving you a rare magical item, summoning an avatar of death to kill your character or just making them disappear completely to giving them the ability to cast the wish spell. Each card can be a campaign changer. But hey, so can every roll.

And that’s why I think you should give it to them early. Usually, I’ve seen people give the deck when their players are about to hit double digit levels. Mostly, I think to make sure that they can defeat the avatar of death if they pull that card. I think that’s cowardice. I think that you should hand it to them early and see what they do with it.

I gave it to my players in the current campaign at level 6 or so. The person who has it, is known for big moves. She’s pulled three cards. One got her a fighter that is having an existential crisis over being born and having no past. The other did summon the avatar of death, which she one shotted with a very lucky roll. She pulled the void card, which saw her soul ripped from her body and we had a lot of fun with that too. The final was the gem card, which saw money become irrelevant to their game.

I think that it was a net success. Sure, the gem card offset the economy for my game but how much was it really going to change? Why would I want my players to be poor forever? It just gives them different strategies to use.

The fight with the avatar of death was just funny in universe because she summoned this monster and killed it in the middle of a marketplace.

Giving them this deck early gives them the chance to screw themselves over in so many ways. It opens up interesting paths and that’s the important thing. So, hand them that or the wonderful bag of magic beans and have some fun.

Hell, why not both?