1001 Uses for an Immovable Rod

[Engilbrand]

I have a character with 3. Young DM. When a pit started filling up with water and there was a lid on top, I used it as a ladder to get to the top. Once there, I put one behind my back, one under my butt and one by my feet. This character could breathe under water, so that wasn't a threat. I pulled out my morningstar and started hitting the lid casually. It was fun.
A little bit later, he came to an area with lava. There was a rickety rope bridge to the thing in the center with what I wanted. I told the DM that I would use them like monkey bars while walking on the bridge. When the bridge dropped out, I kept monkey barring my way across to what I need. I then held one rod while I grabbed the thing I need. When the ground dropped away, I was held in the air. Thing went into pocket, I pulled out the other rod and monkey barred back to my group. Good times.

 

[MarkB]

Well, if it's not immovable with respect to the plane, then how does it function in the astral plane?

That makes it very hard to adjudicate and I quite honestly don't have a good answer. I generally like to use a local frame of reference, perhaps as designated by the user. Thus, the rods in the chest from the example above would not perform the function as intended. The chest would be movable. Likewise, you could use the rods to climb up the side of a ship (you 'attach' the rods to the frame of reference of the ship, whereas others from above could not do that).

Well, user-designated definitely doesn't work, for the same reason it doesn't work for teleport. Otherwise you can strap an immovable rod into the traces of a carriage and designate its frame of reference as "relative to my faithful animal companion Hector the badger over there", and Hector can now "draw" a carriage weighing up to 8,000 lbs with no extra effort.

Or attach two immovable rods to opposite sides of a reinforced castle door, assigning them the frame of reference of two of your friends who are walking in opposite directions, then step back and watch as the door is ripped apart.

 

[Infiniti2000]

Well, user-designated within reasonableness. Inside a ship = ship, not planet. Outside a ship, but close to a ship=either ship or planet. Near a planet would probably have to be the planet. That is, you could not attach it to the planar reference and suddenly have the rod move 1000 miles per hour due to the world's rotation.

Like I said, though, it's nontrivial. And having it always use a planet reference makes it unusable in some other planes, including the astral where there are no planets (presumably).

 

[Plane Sailing]

Where could we find this PrC?

It was in the 2nd world publications book called 'Master of Arms'

Buy it here
http://shop.enworld.org/index.php?productsid=1607&source=Spotlight&internal=1

It has been consistently well reviewed throughout, and it is a lot of fun.

Better yet, you don't even have to use the prestige classes, as it has been arranged so that you could use it as a series of feats related to the immovable rod.

(There are also prc/feats for rod of lordly might master and blink master a well as a whole bunch of more traditional weapons)

 

[werk]

Instant gallows.

 

[Storyteller01]

If your clever, a means of winning a tug of war match. Against a giant...

 

[Velmont]

One of my character have a immovable rod since two years now in LEW (a PbP world on ths forum, in case you didn't knew) and here what I have done with it until now:

- Attach a rope to it to when no place to attach it can be found.
- Block a door so it doesn't close and block the way out
- Create a step, to climb low wall easily. Might need two to create a ladder to climb a high wall easily.

I have it for 4 adventures, I used it at least once in three of them, the forth I couldn't use it, I was strip of all my equipement for almost all the adventure. Between a +2 wepaon and a rod of immovability, i woudl take the weapon, but having a rod of immovability around might always be usefull, and I don't plan to sell it for now, even if it could give some good money.

 

[Storyteller01]

If you have levitate or fly, a means of hanging your food and equipment where animals can't get to it. Don't knock it until your character wakes up to see a brown bear going through their things.

 

[BlueBlackRed]

An anchor while climbing mountains or you have the potential of being blown into acid or lava.

 

[Machiavelli]

You could say "relative to the gravitational center of the locally most influential gravity well." If you get flung into a plane with no real reference points and no obvious gravity, suddenly you become the reference until something more massive than you comes along to drag away your Immovable Rod. If you're on a plane where gravity doesn't work at all, then NOTHING there will make any sense anyway, because you've just unglued one of the fundamental building blocks of absolutely everything, making that plane have absolutely no connection to concepts like a body, a character, or even a rod. Assuming a character could get to such a plane without simply ceasing to exist, the magic of the Immovable Rod just wouldn't work there.

Otherwise, on a planet in the material world, the rod would work the way you expect it to, because even the rotation of the planet drags space-time with it, influencing the rod to orbit the center of gravity at a constant distance. It's not exactly "real" physics, but it offers some clues for ruling in wierd instances.