Stone of the Mountain Troll Sage
‘Is there a safe path out of here? What dangers are ahead? Go on, ask your little stone,’ Captain Varrax said. The mountains were dangerous enough with landslides, surely there were monsters ahead.
Lamplighter frowned and whispered into the blue gem. A baleful eye looked at him from the smooth facet of the stone, and then an ear. Finally a mouth murmured back to the lackey.
‘There are orc and hobgoblin bandits in the vicinity. They might attack at night,’ Lamplighter replied.
Varrax grimaced and pondered on how to prepare for the attack in this dangerous territory.
‘Does that rock every give you good news?’ he snarled.
Lamplighter looked into the gem and there was a muted reply. The lackey laughed.
‘What was that?’ Varrax asked.
‘Nothing, sir, long day on the road is all. We’d better prepare for these bandits,’ the lackey suggested.
Momentarily distracted from his anger Varrax called for the cartogapher to see what a map of the area looked like so that he could strategize against the marauders.
Not so much a stone as a large uncut blue gem with one smooth side that is smooth and clear. Can be easily held in one hand by a human, elf or dwarf.
In the game: through a magical mishap an overly mountain troll was trapped within this enchanted gem and instead of just going insane the troll has decided that helping others with knowledge may be his path to escape. In practice the troll sage place an eye, ear or his mouth next to the clear side of the gem to either observe, listen or speak through the gem relaying information based on the troll’s observations. Any questions about the area are answered truthfully as far as the questioner can tell and the troll, believing that honesty is the way to freedom, will be truthful unless the asnwers would lead to the destruction of the area or a massive loss of life. When the bearer of this enchanted item leaves the area, even momentarily the gem will teleport away to a random location with the mountain range.
Ancient Vaults & Eldritch Secrets-An oldschool gaming blog.... 
This is good. Idk if I will have a chance to use it but I like it.
The Owlbear cloak went into my treasure tables.
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Thank you very much for the comment and I am glad that you have the Owlbear Cloak available as treasure.
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Huh. Feel kind of bad for the poor guy, troll or not.
If you ever saw the 4e book “Monsters of Nentir Vale” having one of the Hurly & Burly brothers trapped inside this thing could be an interesting touch. They’re two troll siblings who hate each others’ guts, with a magical blessing(?) that makes them effectively unkillable unless they’re within 25′ of one another. Usually they avoid each other like the plague, so they’ve become a bit of a local legend. The assumption is the PCs will eventually deal with them by luring one to the other (which starts them fighting – they aren’t to bright and really hate each other) and then finishing the winner with acid or fire. But having the escape clause for the stone be proximity to whichever brother is free could be interesting too, and maybe have them both turn on the party instead of fighting each other right away.
One of the more unique things to come out of 4e. Whether you like the mechanics and play style of the edition or not, there were some clever monsters scattered throughout it – a tradition 13th Age has continued with many of the same writers.
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That is a neat idea and with a cleverly worded blessing or curse the trolls could be compelled to fight UNTIL first blood is drawn, then they turn on any onlookers.
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