5e’s d100 starting trinkets are all very well, but after a few campaigns, you’re guaranteed to roll repeats. I don’t want too many characters starting with a “small, weightless stone block” or whatever.
It would be great to have a backup list of mysterious trinkets, so you could Cross Out and Write In as you used ’em. I’ll start; leave more in the comments.
A tattoo that specifies the time and place of an unknown future appointment.
A padlock that can be opened by all keys except the one it comes with.
An architectural schematic of a vast baby.
A botany book filled with dangerous misinformation.
An order for your own execution.
A wooden coin on which is written a curse.
A membership card to an exclusive club.
A list of six names, including yours, with three crossed out.
An obsidian figure of a panther; it has absolutely no magic powers.
A map with several strange inaccuracies.
A badge from a forbidden order of fallen paladins.
A doll-sized sword of masterwork quality, useful as a razorblade.
A tiny scroll bearing nine unusual names.
The deed to a house in an underwater city.
The recipe for a Potion of Deafness.
A dragonchess piece with a hidden compartment: inside is a human fingerbone.
A flute; its out-of-tune notes can play no known song.
A moss-covered book written in Druidic characters.
A green copper tool with no obvious function.
A piece of amber containing an insect; the insect wears a tiny saddle and halter.
a feather from an unknown type of bird
a coin of purple metal, etched in strange runes
a quill pen that only marks on living flesh, no ink needed, marks fade in a week
a crystal prism that refracts shadow instead of light
a book of flumph grammar
pair of castinets that make noise exactly one second after they have been used
a 7 sided die
a pastry that has been shellacked
I got started thinking of the listing objects from “Roadside Picnic” by the Strugatsky brothers, the novel on which the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. video games are based. In summary, there has been a visitation, the aliens have left behind their detritus but there are no simple answers for humanity because the technology is like giving a computer to a fish.
The mix of “high tech meets fantasy” setting has been around since “Expedition to the Barrier Peaks”, (for example see the new Iron Gods series from Paizo). Most however have the protagonists able to eventually understand and manipulate the tech, not it being so far beyond them and completely inimical (unintentionally) to them.
Just some random thoughts…
Three locks of hair, from three different people, braided together
A five-pronged dinner fork made of an unknown metal
A shopping list of common groceries and several items you’ve never heard of
A single shoe of a peculiar foreign fashion
A clear glass dish with four round notches around the outside edge
A wooden paddle with a rubber ball attached to the center by a string
A small hand-sized box covered with numbered buttons
A paper box containing twenty small wooden sticks
An oil lamp that only functions indoors.
A chair
That’s all I need.
What would be an uncommonly convincing glass eye if it wasn’t unusable due to being fully spherical.
A polished wooden box labelled “butter”. Any butter kept in it goes rancid twice as quickly as you’d expect.
An oval-shaped soapstone tablet inscribed with a short list of religious prohibitions.
A pepper grinder. Contains an unlimited supply of pepper unless opened, at which point it becomes half empty.
A small rock, hollow but otherwise ordinary.
A vial seemingly filled entirely with wax.
Two perfectly identical pine cones.
A bestiary containing only several dozen different entries on one common animal, some of them offering mutually contradictory information. (Give that one to the same person as the botany book, I guess.)
A bag of very large hazelnuts.
An ornate pewter tankard made without a bottom.
A pair of fancy silk gloves with eight fingers each.
The skull of a small rodent with someone’s name carved into it in tiny runes.
A smokeless and odorless candle.
A brass bracelet stolen from a very minor deity.
The name of the spambot above might actually provide an idea for a trinket, albeit one which few would be pleased to have in their inventory.
Someone was recommending Roadside Picnic to me. I guess I’d better read it.
Read the SCP website and pick any number of minor SCPs. Downgrade their effects and you are set to go.
A hunk of metal which appears to be several gears jammed together at unnatural and impossible angles. Attempting to turn it causes it to emit a horrible shrieking sound.
An empty whiskey tumbler that causes any liquid poured into it to become bourbon.
A shadowbox which contains a large, perfect, glowing specimen of moth. The specimen goes through its entire lifecycle as long as the box is closed. When it is opened, the specimen is found freshly preserved in whatever state of life it was at the time. When it grows old and would die, the old specimen is apparently removed, and a new egg appears in the box to live out its life.
A toy sword that whistles a song as you swing it.
This is my new favorite thing to occupy my mind while waiting.
A ring carved with the unfinished insignia to a defunct secret organization
A wax hand shaped to hold a large cup
A puzzle box holding 10 fingernail clippings
A used sky lantern
A seashell that is silent when held up to your ear
One piece of unknown paper currency with no obvious denomination
A tiny bubble level that is calibrated incorrectly
A letter of complaint to a toy shop owner
A penny whistle that plays the same note no matter which holes are covered
A small glass vial holding three eyelashes
A leather shoe made for a dog
A preserved piece of toast with a faint image of Leira burned into it
A doll head with no hair and poorly applied makeup
A pencil that writes with the eraser end and erases with the lead end
A non-magical wand with the name “Mitzi” carved into it
Page 11 from a book of lewd limericks titled “There Once Was A Dwarf From Semphar…”
A tome of letters written over a 30 year period containing an argument between your grandfather and his brother about what a phylactery is.
A highly polished dung ball
Illustrated instructions on how to make a paper hat
A wire circlet that bestows upon its wearer perfect posture
An intricate knot that nobody seems to know how to tie or untie – sailors believe it to be bad luck.
Pages ripped out of an accounting journal of a local merchant.
A ring with a poison reservoir for slipping into drinks and a tiny razor edge for cutting purse-strings.
A glass globe of swirling green goop, no openings.
A bundle of ragged “treasure maps” drawn by inventive local children.
A sliver from a spear said to have pierced the armpit of a saint.
A necklace woven entirely from the hair of one of your former lovers.
A tiny glass vial with silver end-caps and a chain for wearing as an amulet. Every full moon a message printed on a slip of rolled paper appears inside.
Shiny, hard mud-ball 3 inches diameter.
The piano-wire you used to murder your uncle as he slept in your sister’s bed.
A portfolio of pressed flowers.
Small handbook of foreign coins, for travelers to identify denominations.
Slightly out of date guidebook to foreign inns, taverns, and transportation.
Bifocal monocle.
Small box of awards you earned as a child in the expensive school you attended.
Pectoral hanging made of birds’ bones and blue beads.
Collection of 2d6 miniature dioramas inside hinged walnut shells.
Useless wooden tokens previously issued by a traitor-prince as currency.
False fingernails painted with mysterious symbols.
Set of cosmetic tools for cleaning the ears.
Harmless stage dagger with retracting blade and blood-compartment.
Wig made of human hair, reversible for blonde-to-black disguise change, inversible for use as a large pouch.
Magic tooth that will anchor in place where a lost tooth should go, thereupon becoming nonmagical.
Bottle of mead your mom sent you off with when you left to adventure.
Bottle-in-a-ship: a ship constructed around a wine bottle so that you can see the bottle is still in there.
A preserved plover’s egg the size of a ruby.
A book of stimulating images illustrating a story titled “the lusty dragonborn maid”.
A bag of holding which causes all items placed in it to fall out of the sky five feet from the user.
A silver goblet that turns any liquid placed in it to turn to the blood of a drow(great for vampires…)
Shackles that come undone when placed on an innocent person.
A suit of +3 plate armor made for a squirrel.
A letter sent to you by your obsessive ex-girlfriend.
A bottle that refills with the liquid it was most recently filled with every 24 hours.
A letter from your father, promising to let you decide which of the rich suitors you will be forced to marry if you return home.
A twisted spoon with interesting patterns on it.
A book with drawings from when you were a kid.
A ceramic bird-shaped money box.
A dragon figurine that can me made to walk around stiffly.
A puppet of…unusual…shape.
Crow-skeleton jewelry.
A cow vertebra. It doesn’t do anything except be a cow vertebra.
A small collection of fowl feathers.
A small wooden sculpture of a sleeping cat that purrs when you pet it.
A letter-opener that glows.