Cloak, Grounding

Ultimate Equipment Guide II

Author Greg Lynch, J. C. Alvarez
Publisher Mongoose Publishing
Publish date 2005

This simple but extremely effective invention has actually caused a number of area wizards and sorcerers to reduce, if not curtail entirely, the use of attack spells based on electrical damage.

The grounding cloak looks, for the most part, like a normal cloak, save that it has a long tail descending from the middle of the bottom hem that drags along the ground behind the wearer. Despite appearances, however, the grounding cloak requires an entirely different construction than does a normal cloak. Interspersed among the threads of fine wool are literally hundreds of fine copper filaments, woven into the fabric of the cloak and gathered together along the bottom hem, running in a stiff trunk down the cloak’s ‘tail’.

The copper fibres of the cloak serve to partially ground out any incoming electrical damage, providing the grounding cloak’s wearer with some degree of protection against lightning bolt and similar spells. One hit point from each die of electrical damage (with a minimum of one point of damage per die) is directed through the cloak’s tail and into the ground. Therefore, a lightning bolt spell that would normally deal 5d6 points of electrical damage instead deals 5d6-5 points of damage to the wearer of a grounding cloak. For each die of damage reduced in this manner, there is a 5% chance that the cloak’s delicate mesh of copper fibre will become fused and useless, effectively ending the cloak’s ability to reduce incoming electrical damage.

Cloak, Grounding: 300 gp; 8 lb.