I've made some posts about the Glory system previously, but its been in practice in the Catamaran campaign and seems to be working out pretty well. We're on session... ten?
Player characters can earn glory through deeds of great importance and heroism, allowing them to empower items, abilities, or other aspects of their identity through the might of their legend. Players earn Glory points when indicated by the DM and they can be spend in the following ways, but only if the bonus gained ties into the heroic deed that earned the character the Glory. If you received a Glory for fighting a dragon in a volcano, investing that Glory in making your weapon more effective against dragons or your armor fire resistant is totally valid, but making your weapon more effective against goblins is not.
In Catamaran none of the magic items found by the players have been bonus items with the exception of a ring of protection +1 (which I should not of given them but I had a brain fart) and the mechanical bonus from items made of unusual materials (i.e. metal, the party paladin got an iron shield and longsword that he carries around and are effectively +1 items, but everyone looks at him sort of weird for it). Instead their items have primarily been items they activate that give them a short term ability, such as a broach that can be used as a reaction to give resistance to one damage type until the end of the player’s next turn. All bonus items have come from investing Glory, and that is the rule going forward as well. The goal of this rule is to make the campaign about getting power and items by being awesome, not looting the dead or spending lots of time in research to manufacture magic items. The game is pretty epic in feel and scope with the deaths of gods being a major element from first level, so players getting magic weapons off dead foes seems or long abandoned tombs seems… off. It’s a very non-loot focused game; they don’t really get much in the way of money or stuff. Their goals are much more story oriented (heal my people’s god, find the wizards who killed my family, serve the Bone Witch, etc).
Thus far the players have gotten a Glory point approximately every two levels. I’m not sure if this is too fast, but I think it may be. We’ll see how they invest them. So far the group has done the following:
- Hanu the Monk Scalefolk: In the group boat, giving him advantage on proficiency (water vehicle) checks when using it
- Mokoa the Human Barbarian: Making Witchsplitter, his great sword, a +1 weapon
- Akara the Dragonborn Bard: Yukele, giving her +1 when attacking with spells or +1 to her spell save DC when other people make saves against her spells
- Pele the Earth Geasi Rogue: Gun, allowing him to reroll 1s on damage and get +1 to attacks (since he actually makes attacks now)
- Kel the Human Paladin: Making his armor +1
- Argus the Barbarian/Wizard: Spelljamming helm, either advantage on proficiency (spelljamming helm) checks, get an increase to movement when flying, or an increase to AC/Dex saves while
- Krah the Human Cleric of the Bone Witch, God of Death: Bone knife, which she uses as a holy symbol. It gives her +1 to attack with spells and +1 to saving throw DCs.
- Add an enhancement bonus to a weapon or suit of armor. Adding a +1 bonus requires 1 Glory point, a +2 bonus requires 2 Glory points, and adding a +3 bonus requires 3 Glory points.
- Bonuses on weapons against specific types of foes (so one point of Glory gets you a +2 bonus against the specified creature), such as fiends or sahaugin, get double the normal bonus for the Glory invested and grant a +1d6 damage against attacks made against those creatures.
- Armor can be made to grant resistance to a damage type for 1 Glory.
- Armor can grant advantage on saving throws against one condition, school of magic, or energy type.
- Choose a damage type or a spell school: when using abilities that use that damage or that spell school you gain +1 to attack rolls, +1 to your Spell save DCs, and get to reroll 1s on damage rolls. You can increase this bonus to +2 by spending two additional Glory, and to +3 by spending three additional Glory.
- Choose an item used in casting spells, such as a holy symbol. When you have it you gain a +1 bonus on attack rolls and +1 on your spell save DCs when casting spells through that item. You can increase this bonus to +2 by spending two additional Glory, and to +3 by spending three additional Glory.
- Choose a spell of 3rd level or lower. You can cast that spell once per long rest as a bonus action as if you were using a 3rd level slot. You can select your spell save DC ability score.
- Gain a feat appropriate to your Glory deed. The first feat costs 1 Glory, the second costs 2 Glory, etc.
- Bind and NPC to your fate. They begin gaining levels on their own and will have a more prominent role in the story going forward.
- Invest in a vehicle, selecting three of the following:
- +1 Dex save and AC
- +10% hit points and +1 Con save
- +10 ft. per round
- +1 cargo unit
