Making magical bling

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 3:26 am

I've been looking at a bunch of different game systems lately, and I started wondering what would be a good way to handle magic item creation. Here are several item crafting systems I've seen or thought of.

Money Equals Power. This is the D&D 3.x system. I dislike it for all sorts of reasons.

Luck of the Draw. Basic D&D ("When Elves were a class") uses this. You add up your modifiers and make your roll with a minimal chance of success. There's no penalty for failure and no real cash/XP cost, but this is "balanced" by the fact that you have a very low chance to successfully make a level-appropriate item. In practice, it means that items are limited because it takes forever to try again and again until you get it right...except for the few times you get lucky immediately.

"Three phoenix feathers..." Magic items require rare and exotic materials, such as pit fiend snot and basilisk tears. This has the advantage that making a magic item has a built-in adventure hook. It has the downsides that magical beasties will immediately be hacked up and sold (bringing us back to Money Equals Power), and it makes the low-level potion-crafting alchemist or witch-woman either impossible (if the components are rare and mythic) or unreasonably powerful (if the components are common and easy to find).

Selling Your Soul. Magic items consume a fraction of your life-force. Combined with Money Equals Power, this is D&D 3.x. It has the advantage that life-force can't really be bought or sold (readily, any way) and allows for the ever-popular Huge Evil Sacrifice with an actual purpose. The downside is that the item-crafter will either (1) slip farther and farther behind the rest of the party, or (2) slip just barely behind, then catch up at an alarming rate, for a net loss of nothing (D&D 3.x).

And Ten Ounces of Arbitrarium. The GM simply sets a hard limit on how many items a crafter can make, whether 1/level or 3/Int point or whatever. This keeps a PC crafter from outfitting everyone and their henchmen with magical gear, but it effectively kills the NPC potion-maker. It also makes no sense from an in-game perspective.

NPCs Are Speshul. Only NPCs can craft magic items. This effectively kills the problem entirely - PCs can't make magic shit, but the ever-popular Potione Shoppe or Scrolls-R-Us can exist just fine. I've always hated the NPC-only tag, though - if an NPC can do it (and he's not an extraplanar monster) a PC should, with sufficient effort, be able to do it as well. I don't care if it's hard or has a terrible cost, as long as it's possible.

None of these are perfect, and some of them downright suck. Nor have I seen a combination of the above that (1) makes sense, and (2) works mechanically.

So, any thoughts, opinions, or ideas from the Denizens?

zeruslord · Post by **zeruslord** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 3:42 am

I'm not sure there is a good game mechanic for making magic items fair, balanced, mythologically/setting accurate and cool at the same time time. Three Phoenix Feathers works for low fantasy, epic fantasy, and mythology, but it does lead to problems when you start distributing consequences and assuming optimization. If you go to the epic fantasy extreme where all magical items are special or even priceless, then it works wonderfully. Healing potions don't necessarily count as real magic items, and witches probably have some other limiting factors and a recharge schedule.

Voss · Post by **Voss** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 3:46 am

'3 phoenix feathers' with the caveat that shitty things (like potions of whatever the fuck) don't require real components.

So basically you've got:

artifacts, god level stuff, mortals need not bother to try to make this shit

Major magic items, the shit you actually care about

Minor magic items, hedge wizard crap equivalent to 1st and maybe 2nd level spells.

For major shit, components can get even more rare. instead of a scale of young blue dragon for a +1 shock longsword, for a +5 sword of lightning doom, you need the blood and scales of Bludsnazzierbom, Ancient Blue dragon who lives in the Mountains of Crazygenericness, and it must be forged and combined with your own blood upon the altar of the God of the Forge in the lost city of Mezzerschmidt.

Oh, and needless to say, you don't make Craft Major Items a feat.

Personally, I'd drop the pluses and do other random and crazy shit. The Sword of Kings can cleave any armor, but can only be wielded by an heir of the proper bloodline. Instead of trucking around with a load of crap, cap it off with 2-3 significant items per character, and yeah, you work with the group to make both appropriate to the character and not screw people over.

Also... maybe, for some of it, have quests for upgrading items rather than juggling the fucking golfbag of trophies. Sometimes its more appropriate to go the ancestral blade route rather than 'I loot the new bling'

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 3:53 am

Just Do It is the Nike style of time as a crafting resource, Where you just wander out into the hills, find red stones, melt 'em down while singing a hymn to Moradin, and forge it into a magic hammer of bad-assery. Y'all out there in the audience might remember that this method is also presented in the Book of Gears.

For me and my houserules: 1 hour/spell level for a single use magical item duplicating a spell (such as a scroll or potion) and a single casting of that spell, or you must pay for the casting if you don't have the spell. 1 week for a minor magic item with a permanent bonus, 2 weeks for a lesser, 4 for a moderate, and 8 for a greater. Double ammount of time if you don't spend 1,000gp per day to have others provide the magical regents for you to create the item (pheonix feathers, basilisk tears, the soul of an unborn child murdered during the blood moon, your mom, whatever).

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 4:16 am

Voss wrote:Personally, I'd drop the pluses and do other random and crazy shit. The Sword of Kings can cleave any armor, but can only be wielded by an heir of the proper bloodline.

Abso-fucking-lutely.
Note that I hardly ever use "fucking." That shows you how seriously I feel about killing those damn plusses.

Hicks wrote:For me and my houserules: 1 hour/spell level for a single use magical item duplicating a spell (such as a scroll or potion) and a single casting of that spell, or you must pay for the casting if you don't have the spell.

I like that...my only caveat is, what's to keep the party form accumulating a horde of them?

Maybe just a gentlemans's agreement?

IGTN · Post by **IGTN** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 4:20 am

Talisman wrote: I like that...my only caveat is, what's to keep the party form accumulating a horde of them?

Maybe just a gentlemans's agreement?

Use costs: in-combat, they take actions to use and you can't make your cool level-appropriate stuff into items, just the stuff you stopped caring about last level; out of combat, it's easier to just cast the spell than make a pile of items and then cast the spell from the items.

Then you don't care about their hoard. They might occasionally pull a situationally-appropriate spell out if it, but that's all.

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 5:17 am

I think none of your strategies thrill me.

Magic items should be less special.

"Sword Guy" and "Magic Sword Guy" should be of equal value, if not identical.

At best "Magic Sword Guy" perhaps should be allowed to do slightly different (but not better) things, because he is extra shiny with sparkles on.

The whole choice between "Sword Guy" and "Sword Guy +1" is dumb and frankly as much as "Sword Guy +On Fire" is cooler it is also dumb in much the same way. Bring on the world where the choice is "Sword Guy +whatever sparkly magic" and "Sword Guy +whatever non magic alternative"

The bit where a weapon selection makes your warrior flat outright inferior should be over sometime early in your very first adventure or early in any "escape from prison adventure" type equipment scenarios.

Once you get over the whole warrior+1 bullshit the concept of how available magic sparkly option is isn't so important any more.

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 5:22 am

The problem is that the entire reason in any of the source material to make, look for, or otherwise obtain magic weapons is that a magic weapon is an advantage.

Some options are just plain better. Some have advantages and disadvantages that unevenly balance out.

Ideally, magic swords should never be necessary just to be level fitting. But having magic items be that rare is a great change to D&D.

Of course, you could always have magic be something that characters are afraid of using because of the risks (for instance, sure, you could have a flaming sword, but it would corrupt your mind), but that's not "both options are about equal".

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 6:40 am

Talisman wrote:I like that...my only caveat is, what's to keep the party form accumulating a horde of them?

Abso-Fucking-lutely nothing, if you discount the influence of the adventure. The real deal is that these one shots still burn an action to use in combat, and (I should have posted this above) are made worthless by a sucessful dispel magic; constantly active magic swag gets shut down for 1d4 rounds, but your bandoleer of ni-infinite scrolls becomes worthless. You just gotta accept that there comes a level of play where the spell casters have ni-infinite scrolls of magical power stuffed in their handy "handy haversack" (hell! it even takes up one of their 8 magic swag slots!) about 6 seconds after you win The Wheel of Genie, which has a good chance of happening at level five.

Time is a resource not only spent by the players at a game night, but also their characters, and the threat of apocalyptic ending has the often hilarious motovating effect on said players as they choose to advance the plot over making yet another belt of magnificence.

But of course, your milage may vary. I'm the kind of DM to hand out a command word amulet of cure mionor wounds instead of 900gp of treasure, I hand out color coded potions like candy, and encourage PCs to actually bring their [leadership] army out to play at every available oppertunity.

And why not have unlimited healing? The Tome Barbarian and a Dread Necromancer with Tomb Tainted Soul have it; why can't the whole party start each encounter at full HP? What is so scary about a pile of scrolls or a rack of potions? Would it destroy the sacred "4 encoiunters per day" paradigm?

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 10:04 am

Elennsar wrote:The problem is that the entire reason in any of the source material to make, look for, or otherwise obtain magic weapons is that a magic weapon is an advantage.

There are like I don't know, a hundred, things wrong with that statement.

Lets try a few.

1) This isn't a book its a game. Magic item as deus ex machina is almost utterly invalid. And even if it WERE valid seriously it isn't "Sword Guy +1" or even "Sword Guy +5 and On Fire" it is "Sword Guy +Fucking Deus Ex Machina" and that is frankly not even remotely the same.

2) Being different is still plenty of advantage. It's all relative to what it is an advantage to. Players will love a magic sword for the pretty sparklies and the new flavoured options, they don't need it to be flat out better let alone mandatory.

3) The source material where a magic sword is more important than the magic swordsman is pretty much juvenile shit. Heck even juvenile shit source material more often as not makes an admirable big deal about the power item holder needing to develop their skills or their true emotions or pokemon empathy or whatever. It is clear that a levelling or other CHARACTER advancement system is a good fit there while items as power isn't.

And the thing is magic items as an alternate flavoured option is a very easy way of answering what to do about magic item availability. Because the answer suddenly becomes "Whatever you like!" And that is a very good answer.

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 10:16 am

People get magic weapons because having a normal weapon is an inferior option. Sometimes that's in a way that may or may not come up in a game. (A sword that never needs sharpening is generally going to be seen as awesome)

Making it so that so that magic items have no advantage over nonmagical items requiring coming up with some reason for how the nonmagical version can't be given the magical properties -and- keep the nonmagical properties.

"Only a sword not imbued with the powers of magic may slay the dragon." is the most absurd thing since people started treating the katana as a lightsaber and the arming sword as a club.

In brief: Deus ex machina and "magic sword is more important than the swordsman" have nothing to do with it. A highly skilled swordsman will benefit more from a weapon of high quality than an amateur even if the sword provides the same benefits. The master knows what to do with the sword. The amateur doesn't.

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 10:23 am

Elennsar wrote:"Only a sword not imbued with the powers of magic may slay the dragon." is the most absurd thing... blah blah

Actually if you want to talk source material that old chestnut gets trotted out like all the damn time.

People get magic weapons because having a normal weapon is an inferior option.

Actually in that situation EVERYONE gets magic weapons for that reason. And that sucks and plops you in the middle of the magic item availability dilemma and the much hated mandatory christmas tree business.

And that is all some bad shit.

Making it so that so that magic items have no advantage over nonmagical items requiring coming up with some reason for how the nonmagical version can't be given the magical properties -and- keep the nonmagical properties.

No, really, it doesn't. The nature of abstracted game mechanics has things like this all the time. You can't hit things with a sword in one hand and cast magic missiles from the other as an action in D&D 3.x, just because that's how the rules work.

The properties and fighting options associated with magic swords can just be plain old different. The old F&K tome armor material is a good example in a lot of ways and even comes with a brief explanation before hand that covers this "explanation issue" more than it even begins to deserve.

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 10:36 am

A nonmagical sword? No. A particular sword? Not infrequently at all. But "a sword without any magical properties"? You mind refering to any examples stating that?

Actually in that situation EVERYONE gets magic weapons for that reason. And that sucks and plops you in the middle of the magic item availability dilemma and the much hated mandatory christmas tree business.

And that is all some bad shit.

Not if magic items are so rare that you don't expect to have them and things aren't set up so that Standard Encounters require them. Note, I said standard, not normal difficulty. I don't like the Christmas tree effect, but that's a problem with characters needing the bonuses of magic items (and having them freely available), not with them being superior.

No, really, it doesn't. The nature of abstracted game mechanics has things like this all the time. You can't hit things with a sword in one hand and cast magic missiles from the other as an action in D&D 3.x, just because that's how the rules work.

Yes, really, it does. How the feth does having my staff do something cool (let's say I can use it as a dousing rod) harm my ability to defend myself more easily than normal?

The fact that you can't hit things with a sword in one hand and cast magic missiles from the other as an action is that both take an action on their own. Nothing about my dousing rod staff would require either ability being limited at all by the other's presence.

And which are you arguing for? Magic swords "Can do things mundane swords can't", in which case unless somehow they lose the properties of mundane swords (which is bullshit) they're the "better sword" option, or "magical" as just fluff, in which case it is meaningless whether you call it a magical sword or not, because I can get all the cool sparkles I want without it being something 'magical".

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 11:10 am

The last fifty years of fiction, the original post in this thread and the F&K material I referred to just slipped right over your head without you even noticing didn't it?

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 11:26 am

The part where it says "you MUST use a nonmagical sword" isn't showing.

Not "can do so"...unable to hurt the dragon (or whatever) with a magical weapon, since somehow the magic erodes the steel or something.

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 8:06 pm

Hicks wrote:
Talisman wrote:I like that...my only caveat is, what's to keep the party form accumulating a horde of them?
Abso-Fucking-lutely nothing, if you discount the influence of the adventure.

The abso-fucking-lutely part refered to killing off the sacred cow that is weapon/armor plusses (with extreme prejudice. And pointy sticks. And fire).

The real deal is that these one shots still burn an action to use in combat, and (I should have posted this above) are made worthless by a sucessful dispel magic; constantly active magic swag gets shut down for 1d4 rounds, but your bandoleer of ni-infinite scrolls becomes worthless.

Dispel magic kills one-shot items?

[checks PHB]

No it doesn't.

And why not have unlimited healing? The Tome Barbarian and a Dread Necromancer with Tomb Tainted Soul have it; why can't the whole party start each encounter at full HP? What is so scary about a pile of scrolls or a rack of potions? Would it destroy the sacred "4 encoiunters per day" paradigm?

My game crew tends to go with the "1 or 2 mega-encounters per day" paradigm.

I'm not worried about a lot of healing, but it's been my experience that, if you give the party access to anything with the tag "infinite" or "absolute," they will find creative ways to destroy your game with it. I'd rather deal with it in the planning stage rather than retcon it afterwards.

Also, I should mention that this isn't necessarily for D&D. It may be, but I'm looking at various other systems as well.

PhoneLobster wrote:1) This isn't a book its a game. Magic item as deus ex machina is almost utterly invalid. And even if it WERE valid seriously it isn't "Sword Guy +1" or even "Sword Guy +5 and On Fire" it is "Sword Guy +Fucking Deus Ex Machina" and that is frankly not even remotely the same.

You're talking about standard D&D 3.x, where the Sword Guy has to become Magic Sword Guy by level 3 or 4 just to keep from being a hindrance. That's crap, and I hate it. It has nothing to do with this particular topic.

2) Being different is still plenty of advantage. It's all relative to what it is an advantage to. Players will love a magic sword for the pretty sparklies and the new flavoured options, they don't need it to be flat out better let alone mandatory.

Wow, your players are a lot easier to please than mine. Magic needs to feel special, and if the only difference is that your sword is blue while mine is plain ol' silver, it becomes utterly pointless. Why the hell would you climb the Mountains of Nevermore, fight the Gargoyle King, seduce the Muse of the Twelve Winds and steal the Claw of the Silver King to forge a damn sword that's objectively no better than the one you can buy for ten gold from Honest Bob's Sword-Mart?

Magic has to give you more options or more power; otherwise, why learn it? Magic items have to be better than their mundane counterparts in some way. I'm not saying a to-hit bonus - that's part of the probelm. But a longsword that you can hurl like a boomerang and that always returns to your hand is cool and useful. An axe made of ice that deals cold damage is interesting. A quarterstaff that can be shrunk to toothpick-size or expanded to 20' long is unusual. It's not overpowered, but it's things mundane weapons can't do.

Consider a fight between two equally-skilled swordsmen. One has a +1 bonus from magic; the other does not. This looks like a pretty even match, but the magical swordsman has a slight edge - not enough for a sure win, but over the course of 260 individual encounters, enough to notice. Importantly, though, the nonmagical swordsman is still useful and valuable; he doesn't have to buy up his gear just to stay competitive. Sure, a magic sword is great - it gives him more options and slightly more power - but he's not Joe the Lead Weight without it.

That's the level I'm looking for.

3) The source material where a magic sword is more important than the magic swordsman is pretty much juvenile shit. Heck even juvenile shit source material more often as not makes an admirable big deal about the power item holder needing to develop their skills or their true emotions or pokemon empathy or whatever. It is clear that a levelling or other CHARACTER advancement system is a good fit there while items as power isn't.

True enough. The item that's more powerful than the wielder is useful as a plot device, and that's about it.

And the thing is magic items as an alternate flavoured option is a very easy way of answering what to do about magic item availability. Because the answer suddenly becomes "Whatever you like!" And that is a very good answer.

Except that it trivializes magic. Seriously, if both options are totally equal, I'm going with the easier one every single time.

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 8:40 pm

What I would propose then is that magic items of any real consequence (what that means being up to you, I'd say all magic weapons and such qualify by definition) requires Something Special in crafting.

For instance, a really good smith and really good ore and the right circumstances and a ritual.

As for effects, I'd go for the following (not necessarily all on one sword):

Minor bonus to hit or to damage, maybe both. Something you'd only really notice in a close encounter.

"Never needs sharpening".

"Unbreakable (or very hard to break"

Bane of _____.

Harder to disarm.

Wielder is immune/resistant to ____ (Fear, say).

Extra parries in a system with limited parries.

Special damage.

Able to ignore (some or all of) armor/DR.

Able to hurt foes that can laugh at ordinary steel (but otherwise about as good as).

Etc.

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:26 pm

PhoneLobster wrote:The whole choice between "Sword Guy" and "Sword Guy +1" is dumb and frankly as much as "Sword Guy +On Fire" is cooler it is also dumb in much the same way. Bring on the world where the choice is "Sword Guy +whatever sparkly magic" and "Sword Guy +whatever non magic alternative"

I guess that's the important part. Sure, I agree every time someone says "magic shouldn't rule everything". But in most settings, high-end equipment is magical indeed. Sure, in some settings there are alternatives, but it seems some people don't even like those. Anyway, for any kind of high-end equipment, magical or not, we'd have to figure a crafting method out, so we're back at the start.

Talisman wrote:My game crew tends to go with the "1 or 2 mega-encounters per day" paradigm.

Your material doesn't tend to show that. What's keeping the instant-kill rains from showing up in your games, BTW?

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:26 pm

Talisman wrote:
Dispel magic kills one-shot items?

[checks PHB]

No it doesn't.

I apologize for being unclear; dispel magic kills one-shot items in my house rules, making extradimensional sotrage very desirable as your months sunk into item creafting do not go up in flames, but are mearly denyed access to for 1d4 rounds.

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:37 pm

Talisman wrote:You're talking about standard D&D 3.x, where the Sword Guy has to become Magic Sword Guy by level 3 or 4 just to keep from being a hindrance. That's crap, and I hate it. It has nothing to do with this particular topic...

...Magic has to give you more options or more power; otherwise, why learn it? Magic items have to be better than their mundane counterparts in some way...

...That's the level I'm looking for.

OK So you declare both additional bonuses and additional special abilities to have nothing to do with what you want.

Then you declare that magic items HAVE to have something additional (and talk about literally, additional special abilities and then additional bonuses including literal +1s).

Then you declare that to be what you want.

Well I'm gonna pull Frank's recent favourite trick and declare you to be in conflict with yourself and unable to be helped until you can figure your own goals out.

Except that it trivializes magic. Seriously, if both options are totally equal, I'm going with the easier one every single time.

You "trivialise" magic in the way I described, you just give it to every damn fool, or you end up with the same damn wizard better than fighter disaster we all know and hate.

Those are your options. Enjoy.

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:41 pm

Bullshit. Just because a wizard is able to do some things a fighter flat out can't doesn't mean that the class overall is superior.

After all, being able to call up a light breeze when your ship is trapped in the duldrums is certainly "something".

Its even a useful something. But it doesn't make you overall better than the ship's marines.

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:45 pm

But in most settings, high-end equipment is magical indeed.

Well that's an option, that magic is simply the only option in equipment at some level. But then it really is the only option and you either have it or you have a very good very temporary reason why you don't (like having all your stuff lost when breaking out of a prison).

Anyway, for any kind of high-end equipment, magical or not, we'd have to figure a crafting method out, so we're back at the start.

Not really. If you MUST fill all your equipment slots with magic equipment then crafting goals are clearly different. You aren't about limiting availability (which most of the examples in the original are) You are about making damn sure everyone fills all their slots almost all the time.

You can only play around with different levels of magic item availability if there are viable alternatives. If everyone MUST have magic items, then everyone MUST have magic items and that's that.

PhoneLobster · Post by **PhoneLobster** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:47 pm

Elennsar wrote:Bullshit. Just because a wizard is able to do some things a fighter flat out can't doesn't mean that the class overall is superior.

Are you new to gaming forums in general?

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:49 pm

Are you new to the idea that being able to do something that no one else can do does not automatically translate into "able to beat things no one else can beat"?

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Fri Nov 28, 2008 9:58 pm

PhoneLobster wrote:
Talisman wrote:You're talking about standard D&D 3.x, where the Sword Guy has to become Magic Sword Guy by level 3 or 4 just to keep from being a hindrance. That's crap, and I hate it. It has nothing to do with this particular topic...

...Magic has to give you more options or more power; otherwise, why learn it? Magic items have to be better than their mundane counterparts in some way...

...That's the level I'm looking for.
OK So you declare both additional bonuses and additional special abilities to have nothing to do with what you want.

Then you declare that magic items HAVE to have something additional (and talk about literally, additional special abilities and then additional bonuses including literal +1s).

Then you declare that to be what you want.

Well I'm gonna pull Frank's recent favourite trick and declare you to be in conflict with yourself and unable to be helped until you can figure your own goals out.

Perhaps I'm being unclear, or perhaps you're misreading me. let me clarify:

I DO NOT LIKE +1 WEAPONS
I DO NOT LIKE +1 ARMOR
I DO NOT LIKE +1 SHIELDS

Magic items/weapons/armor/cockrings should grant a benefit which a nonmagical item does not. I never said, hinted, or indicated that that benefit had to be a plus to hit or damage.

I never stated that "additional special benefits (had) nothing to do with what (I) want." I stated that I did not want D&D's "you are your gear" paradigm, where a magical swordsman AUTOMATICALLY beats a nonmagical swordsman. I also stated that I did not like or what flat plusses to attack and damage (i.e., +1 weapons).

My use of the Mudane Swordsman vs the +1 Swordsman was a logical device known as an example. I did not mean a literal +1 bonus, but I didn't feel like typing out "a minor but significant benefit, such as an unbreakable sword or a sword that's on fire, that can only be achieved through magic." Silly me.

And just to reiterate - balancing magic vs mundane is not my intent with this thread, My intent is to figure out the basics of an item-crafting system that is neither too generous nor too stingy, that allows PCs to make items without giving them the figurative key to the kingdom.