Using adventuring gear… In an adventure!
The much overlooked adventuring gear section of the Player’s Handbook can be easy to skip when there are much more exciting things to take a look at. Those glossy magic item pages in the dungeon master’s guide often look that much more worn.
But adventuring gear can be a treasure trove of usefulness. And unlike magic items, you’re not reliant on your DM to get them. They can easily be bought or crafted.
The problem is that most players are not quite sure how to use them. Fortunately, with the 2024 Player’s Handbook, Wizards of the Coast have made it much clearer how these items can be used and what checks are associated with them.
In this guide, I’ve put together a load of interesting and unique ways you can use adventuring gear based on the updated rules in the 2024 Player’s Handbook.
Restrain enemies with chains
A chain will set you back 5gp and can be used to wrap someone up that’s grappled, restrained or incapacitated. If you pass a DC 13 athletics check (which is fairly easy, especially for the party barbarian), then your target is restrained.
Escaping is tricky too requiring an 18 or 20 DC check. Obviously you can do this to restrain an enemy that’s already been beaten, but where it gets really interesting is in restraining a healthy opponent that’s been grappled.
If you play a monk, barbarian or a few other classes, it’s easy to build a grappler. Just grapple your opponent, then next turn, wrap them in a chain and restrain them and move onto your next opponent.
Knock enemies prone with ball bearings
Spreading ball bearings on the ground will require those passing over them to take a DC10 dexterity saving throw or be knocked prone. It’s not devastating, but for 1gp, does a decent job at slowing enemies down, especially if you’re in a narrow corridor and forcing your opponent to come at you.
Books will help you with knowledge skills
Reading a book on a topic will give you a bonus +5 to skill checks related to knowledge about that topic. These can be arcana, history, nature or religion checks. If you know you’re going to be heading to the Nine Hells, why not pop to your local bookstore for a book about devils. Maybe you know you’re heading to an ancient temple to the dead god Bhaal, grab one of his religious texts and you’ve got a boost for relevant knowledge skills.
Use caltrops to stop enemies in their tracks
They don’t spread as far as ball bearings, but caltrops are great in a narrow corridor. A failed DC15 dexterity saving throw will stop your opponent in their tracks and deal 1 piercing damage. Great if you want to force enemies to come at you.
Crowbars for opening doors without a lock pick
Its always a pain if you don’t have a rogue. Getting through doors with brute force is much harder. A crowbar can help here though, by giving you advantage on strength checks like forcing a door open.
Grappling hook for scaling walls
need to climb 50ft but got nothing to grab onto? Just chuck a grappling hook up and latch onto a railing or a ledge. It only requires a DC13 acrobatics check.
Hunting traps for limiting movement
While they’re not too difficult to avoid, if an enemy does get caught by a hunting trap, it’ll take at least one action to get free or they’ll be stuck in the same area. A great way to frustrate melee opponents.
Manacles for even tougher restraints
If you want something even tougher than a chain to escape from, then you can attach manacles to your victim. As usual, they’ll need to already be grappled, restrained or incapacitated. They’ll prevent actions but not necessarily movement. Unless you manacle them to a fixed chain as well.
Nets for 1 turn of restraint
Nets aren’t hard to escape, but they are hard to avoid (if you have a decent dexterity). And because they need a turn to escape from, you’re essentially disabling an enemy for a turn at the cost of a single attack. Great for multi-attack warriors that don’t have something like a monk’s stunning strike.
Perfume to enhance persuasion checks
If you’re the party face, then you might want to have incredible persuasion. Apparently when you wear perfume, you’re more persuasive as you get advantage on persuasion checks as long as the target is indifferent towards you.
A portable ram for breaking down doors
A portable ram will add +4 to strength checks to knock down a door. Getting a friend to help will give you advantage too.
That’s all the most interesting things you can do with adventuring gear in the 2024 Player’s Handbook. Got any tips or great uses for adventuring gear? Share them in the comments below.
Spotlight on D&D 2024
All the latest updates on what’s changing with the 2024 rules revision.
