Visions from Within
A simple tiara with a white gem embedded in a silver moon. Pendants resembling lost holy symbols hang from the crown, their movement causes a wary tingling.
Dream Sharing: When you sleep wearing this crown, sleeping creatures around you share your dreams and are independent actors in them. Creatures around you are also able to see mental images, visions and memories that appear in your mind.
Unconscious Visions: The Crown makes you aware of your subconscious and how it speaks to you in symbols. It can also store either a Vision or a Nightmare. Each time you complete a Long Rest, in which you slept, roll a d12.
On a 12 you have a meaningful Vision, which is stored in the Crown. The DM can describe details of it and communicate events of the past, present or future. Roll a d20 and record the number rolled. You can spend the stored vision to substitute the rolled number to any d20 roll.
On a 1 you have a Nightmare, which is stored in the Crown. You determine the details of it. As a Bonus Action you can spend the stored Nightmare to make a creature relive it. A creature you can see within 30ft of you must WIS15, taking 3d6 psychic damage on a failure.
The Crown of Dreams can either contain one Vision or one Nightmare, if you have a new Vision or Nightmare, it removes the one currently stored.
Journey into the Dreamverse
The Crown of Dreams is an item full of narrative potential. Sharing dreams is a common fantasy most of us have thought of in our life. I mean, DND is some sort of ‘sharing a dream’, we are already trying to achieve this by playing! If your players enjoy the idea of the game itself, they are going to enjoy this item.
This Crown gives the wearer’s player the potential to open little windows into their character’s psyche. For this, the item will naturally gravitate towards the more expressive player, or often change hands if it becomes a way for the entire party to roleplay more. Let them have fun with it, but keep an eye on the clock if these dream adventures become bigger than the actual adventure.
That does not mean you as a DM shouldn’t indulge in using the Crown to convey visions, prophecies or sneak-peaks. Use it as you please to reinforce the theme of your current adventure and throw the personal character’s conflict into the narrative. Who knows what we could find in the Edgy Rogue’s dreams? What about the Silent Sorcerer?
Here on Skull Azure, I don’t believe in purely wondrous items. The capability of storing, and most importantly using, Visions and Nightmares is an actionable gameplay feature that not only reminds the party of the item, but makes it part of the character’s kit. This way even a combat focussed player has a hook to be more creative and start thinking about their character’s story and personality.
Hooks
The Crown of Dreams could be an essential piece in an adventure based on secret knowledge or future omens; or it could just be a neat addition to a loot pile. Here are some ideas:
| d6 | Hook |
| 1 | Elven Scribes use the Crown to inspire each other to write poetry and paint. But one of them has recently used it to torment a specific person with terrible visions. |
| 2 | The Crown is an ancient artifact attributed to the Asarii, ancient folks that practiced Dream Magic. They were unable to stop whatever caused their own ruin. |
| 3 | The Crown is found in a ruined room in the dungeon. At closer inspection the party realizes these were the sleeping chambers of the creator of the place. |
| 4 | The Characters find themself in a strange, dirty dungeon, weird things start to happen only for them to realize it’s a shared dream. The dungeon-dream keeps showing up every night and can be explored to better understand it. Turns out a Curious Goblin, wearing the crown, was following the party in their travels. |
| 5 | The Queen keeps having the same terrible, omen-filled nightmare. The Royal Wizard has brought the crown to the party to explore the dream and understand it. |
| 6 | A prophecy of the soon-to-come Doom is shown to one of the characters in a dream. Finding the crown could be the only way to store the vision and make the Captain of the Guard believe the party. |
Variations
The Crown of Dreams is a pretty thematic item, but we can easily tweak the mechanics of its Vision and Nightmare Uses.
| d4 | Spend the Vision to… | Spend the Nightmare to… |
| 1 | Bonus Action: heal 3d6 hp. | Bonus Action: gain 3d6 temporary hit points |
| 2 | Action: Remove a Curse or ongoing magical effect on yourself. | Action: a creature within 30ft must CON15 or become Poisoned. Save End. |
| 3 | Bonus Action: Gain advantage on an INT or WIS check. | Reaction: Give Disadvantage to an attack roll you can see. |
| 4 | Reaction: Gain +5 AC until the end of your next turn. | Action: create 3 Arcane Missiles. They automatically hit creatures within 30ft and deal 1d4+1 damage each. |
