Top 10 5E D&D Homebrew Magic Items by a Factor of Three — Rods

D&D Beyond includes tens of thousands of entries of homebrew content for fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons. Going over all the schools of magic, subclasses for each class individually, feats, monsters, races and a variety of other categorizations of 5E D&D content has become something of a tradition around here. Most recently I’ve been looking at magic items and already explored the homebrew armor, potions and rings. Alphabetical order dictates it’s now time for a look at rods. These scepter-like magic items often feel overlooked but such is not the case over at DDB where you’ll find over 1,690 homebrew magic rods. Let’s get into it.

Magic items (rods) at D&D Beyond

Before getting started it’s important to note you can create homebrew content for private use and share your homebrew content publicly at DDB at no cost — there’s no subscription required to access these services. However if you want to add any of the homebrew magic items like the rings mentioned below or any other homebrew content you come across to your 5E D&D collection you must subscribe at the Hero Tier or above. There’s a lot you can do at DDB for free. Check out what you can do here.

The DDB homebrew collection uses several statistics to track entries. Views shows how many eyeballs any particular homebrew creation received, Adds shows the number of times a creation was added to someone’s collection and Rating is an upvote/downvote system. Since there are over 1,690 rods in the collection I’m going to share the top 10 highest rated, most viewed and most added selections and to see what’s out there along with any crossover between these three lists.

Top 10 highest rating rods

1. Rod of Mercurial Form. We’ve got a weird one to start things off. The effects of this rod are kinda cool but at the same time I can’t help but feel like by the time characters start discovering very rare magic items something like this wouldn’t be very exciting. On the other hand the power to create objects beyond weapons and armor as indicated in the description hold up a sign reading ABUSE ME!
2. Bookworm’s Nightlight. I wondered why a magical glowstick was rare and the additional benefits explain why. All around a solid 5E D&D magic item with a bit of risk vs. reward thrown in for good measure.
3. Etheric Revitalizer Rods Of Resuscitation. Essentially a fantasy defibrillator I’m most impressed by how this is simple, clean and easy to understand. Even though it does save a party a bit of wealth when it comes to reviving downed creatures and it’s only uncommon I feel like a tad more cost reduction would make it better.
4. Camper’s Respite. Pure utility is the order of the day for this one, which demonstrates the creator’s sensible design language and provides a pretty nifty party item I’d be more than happy to incorporate into my games.
5. Heartwood Rod. People really seem to enjoy recreating existing 5E D&D magic items and here’s an example of one but with a different name. There is one difference though since this one indicates it can also be used as a melee weapon…but since it gives no other info about this trait it’s moot because it would function like an improvised weapon same as the original.
6. Rod of the Pact Keeper (+1). I have to assume the creator of this item doesn’t own the DMG through DDB so they recreated the existing magic item found therein from memory, which accounts for the extra word count and disconnect between attunement requirements and what the rod actually does.
7. The Black Rod of Nessus. Evocative name! Does it live up to the hype? Nope. Like the previous item on this list it replicates an existing item and tacks on some fluff features along with sentience but without much bite.
8. Adaligogh’s Rod of the Blessed Healer. I appreciate how incredibly useful this rod would be just about any time in any adventurer’s life from 1st to 20th level, which is what bothers me. My instincts tell me it’s way too easy to generate very, very powerful spell effects consistently without any drawbacks. But for a campaign with tons of high precision combat it would be terrific as a means to keep things moving along and an exciting pace.
9. Moonrod. It’s common so I wasn’t expecting much but with a name evoking the night sky paired with an effect explicitly evoking a public restroom I can’t honestly figure out why the creator even put this one together let alone shared with the public.
10. Rod of Seven Parts. Saved at the zero hour! Magic rods for D&D don’t get any more classic than this OG one, which first appeared in 1976’s Eldritch Wizardry supplement. This iteration does a terrific job combining lore, flavor and fluff with intriguing mechanics.

Top 10 most viewed rods

1. Rod of Mercurial Form
2. Heartwood Rod
3. rod of seven parts. Not to be confused with the capitalized version from the previous list this iteration of the classic D&D rod is a hot mess to look at and incorporates equally messy mechanical language. This entry does provide more details related to the lore surrounding the rod though.
4. Bookworm’s Nightlight
5. Damaged Rod of Resurrection. For straight up simplicity’s sake I appreciate this rod. It’s got appropriate rarity for the powerful effects it can generate although using one of the two possible powers makes me wonder if it’s a design flaw better suited as a spell scroll. Maybe this represents the damaged part.
6. Scourge of Fangs. Aside from descriptive flavor and the damage type this is identical to a tentacle rod. The attunement requirement suggests it was created for an NPC, in which case I question why it was created at all.
7. Aganhim’s Scepter. Wow. The primary function of this artifact rod makes it arguably the most powerful D&D magic item ever created or at least that I’ve ever seen. The secondary effect also has the potential to make this claim too but since it’s intentionally vague mechanically who can say for certain?
8. Etheric Revitalizer Rods Of Resuscitation
9. Dowsing Rod. At this point I’ll admit I’ve grown a bit jaded with the homebrew content I find at DDB. To illustrate the point this rather simple and straightforward rod is one of the better things I’ve come across.
10. Fool’s Scepter. Other than having too many charges to use for any of the three spells it allows a character to cast in addition to the extremely powerful co-opting of The Archfey warlock’s Beguiling Defenses feature this is a nifty magic rod.

Top 10 most added rods

1. Rod of Mercurial Form
2. Heartwood Rod
3. Bookworm’s Nightlight
4. Camper’s Respite
5. Rod of Tentacles. Cliff Notes version of what’s in the DMG presumably as a workaround for the creator’s lack of unlocked content at DDB. Next!
6. Rod of the Pact Keeper (+1)
7. The Black Rod of Nessus
8. Acid Arrow. There’s an interesting magic weapon hiding in this non-rod magic rod. A mashup of effects like those of black puddings and rust monsters in weapon form could be pretty cool but this ain’t it. Incidentally it creates some bookkeeping work, which is something we try to avoid in our own 5E D&D creations.
9. Etheric Revitalizer Rods Of Resuscitation
10. Gentleman’s Cane. A subjective attunement requirement, a poorly implemented new weapon and an overly powerful benefit for an uncommon magic item add up to a fizzle to finish out these lists.

Rods rising to the top

There’s never been a huge number of rods in any edition of D&D compared to other sorts of magic items. In all of the official 5E D&D material there’s only a dozen! The 19 rods above — at least the ones that aren’t duplicating existing ones — illustrate how this category of magic items can be awkward, wonky or otherwise outliers.

“A scepter or just a heavy cylinder, a magic rod is typically made of metal, wood, or bone. It’s about 2 or 3 feet long, 1 inch thick, and 2 to 5 pounds.” — from the 5E D&D DMG

Rods have always come across a little strange. Most of them traditionally represent powerful items with some sort of authority baked into them. Even with all the content we’ve created over the years there’s not a single rod to be found. More often than not rods are simply forgotten and overlooked in lieu of things like wands and staves or wondrous items.

These homebrew rods are all over the place and while going through them caused some frustration I can understand why any designer might run into some challenges because the official material does a pretty poor job distinguishing them too. In this sense I applaud the folks who share the magic rods they’ve created. Among the ones here I like the Camper’s Respite the most because it’s not high on the rarity scale and it would make a wonderful party item for a campaign featuring lots of travel and exploration (my favorite). I like the Dowsing Rod for similar reasons. I’ve also got to hand it to the creator of the Rod of Seven Parts — not to be confused with the rod of seven parts — for presenting a classic item in a great way.

5E D&D rods resources

I mention our own forays into homebrew content creation for 5E D&D several times to plant the seed in your mind. Now you’re wondering, “What kind of homebrew content do you create, Nerdarchy? I’m extremely interested!” In addition to the monthly rewards our Patreon supporters receive we’ve presented tons of material in our videos and right here at Nerdarchy the Website ready to drop right into your games too. Another place we frequently create new content for Dungeon Masters and players to drop right into games is Nerdarchy the Newsletter and you’ll also get several gifts including $9.99 in store credit so you can add whatever you like there to your own collection when you sign up. Here’s a selection of content focused on or including rods in a significant way:

• • • D&D Ideas — Rods, Staves and Wands
    • Best in Show 5E D&D Magic Items for a Bard
    • We’ve got to up our rod game huh? We’ve got a few more in the vault for an upcoming project…

*Featured image — In the Simpsons episode Deep Space Homer, Homer Simpson believes he will win the Worker of the Week award because it is a union requirement that every employee gets the prize and Homer is the only plant employee who has never won. Instead, Mr. Burns, Homer’s boss, gives the award to an inanimate carbon rod. [Image courtesy Fox Broadcasting Company]

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