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The Magic of Krynn Leeching Magic Items

In the early decades of the Fifth Age, Wizards found themselves powerless, as the three moons of magic had disappeared and been replaced by a single pale moon. Desperate to regain a measure of their former power, these former wizards discovered that magic items retained their magical power. A rush was made to hoard as many of these magic items as possible.

The Shadow Sorcerer (actually Takhisis in disguise) discovered that it was possible to actually leech the magical power from magic items and temporarily allow wizards to cast their spells once more, despite the absence of the moons of magic. An even greater rush for magic items soon ensued. What follows are variant rules for leeching magic items.

Variant Magic

Leeching

As a bonus action, any sorcerer or wizard can leech

magic from any magic item she is touching. The wizard

gains a number of spell slot levels from the magic item

leeched, which can be used as normal. The amount of

spell slot levels gained varies by magic item rarity. The

wizard determines how many spell slot levels to leech at

the time of leeching.

Consumable magic items, such as potions and scrolls are

immediately destroyed when leeched and only impart one

spell slot level, regardless of what spells are currently

stored within. Any amount of leeching from a magic item

will cause that magic item to become dormant, and until it

recovers all its spell slot levels, it is for all intents and

purposes a mundane item. If all the spell slot levels are

leeched from a magic item it is destroyed, as though it

were a consumable magic item.

The DM determines how many spell slot levels can be

leeched from an artifact. Artifacts retain their magical

power unless they have been completely drained of spell

slot levels.

Leeched magic items recover one spell slot level per day.

Cantrips are treated as ½ a spell slot level.

Magic Item Leeching

Rarity Spell Slot Levels

Common 2

Uncommon 4

Rare 8

Very Rare 16

Legendary 32

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e.g. Dalamar, a level 13 high elf wizard, normally has the following spell slots per day:

-Spell Slots per Spell Level-

1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th

4 3 3 3 2 1 1 - -

Since the campaign takes place in the first few godless decades of the Age of Mortals, Dalamar is powerless. Using a medallion of faith (an uncommon magic item), Dalamar can drain anywhere from 1 to 4 spell slot levels. Since Dalamar is currently being accosted by a band of goblins, as a bonus action Dalamar drains 3 spell slot levels from the medallion of faith, and with his action casts a fireball (level 3 slot). The medallion of

faith is now powerless and will take 3 days before it becomes functional once more.