A player in my home 3.5 game came to me asking for a custom item. It sounded really cool, so we came up with the Scourge of Darkness, which his character will craft next session. You will notice it uses my house rules to weapons of legacy, which are simply to ignore the penalties and instead give more bonuses.
Scourge of Darkness: Legacy Rod
This unholy perversion of the, already profane, Drow Scourge of Fangs was crafted by the necromancer Belvin from the skeletons of several cursed pit vipers and imbued with dark energy. The rod begins with three skeletal snakes and grows more as one unlocks additional power. The wielder of this rod gains 3 natural bite attacks each round as the snakes lash out under the necromancers mental control.
Each snake head must be controlled as though it were a 1HD skeleton, or else they act as uncontrolled undead, most likely biting the wielder with a +0BAB, +2 size bonus, and +2 dex bonus to hit, and dealing 1d4 piercing damage. Each snake acts independently, and makes one bite attack as a standard action.
Any creature slain by one of the skeletal snakes is instantly brought to life as a skeleton under the rod’s wielders control. If the wielder cannot control undead, it is animated and uncontrolled. If the wielder can control undead, but is past their normal limits, follow the normal rules to determine which undead are released. If the rod slays its wielder, they are returned as an uncontrolled skeleton. Creatures ineligible for animation as a skeleton cannot be brought back using this ability.
Level 1 – The bite attacks deal 1d4 piercing damage and crit on x2.
Level 3 – The bite attacks instead deal 1d4+1 negative energy damage and crit on x2.
Level 5 – The Rod gains an additional two heads, which can be used to make additonal secondary attacks for a total of 5 heads.
Level 7 – The wielder gains immunity to injury based poisons.
Level 9 – The bite attacks critically hit on a 19-20
Level 11 – Creatures struck by a snake bite must make a fort save (DC 10+1/2 HD+#of heads) or take a negative level.
Level 13 – the wielder gains immunity to poison.
Level 15 – The Rod gains an additional two heads, which can be used to make additonal secondary attacks for a total of 7 heads.
Level 17 – The bite attacks critically hit on 17-20
Level 19 – Creatures struck by a snake bite must make a fort save (DC 10+1/2 HD+#of heads) or are instantly slain (this is a death effect).
The TTRPG Factory 