The Brass Spyglass is a nonmarketable magical instrument in Betrayal at Krondor. It can be used to detect caches in the bearer's local area and first appears in Chapter 3, The Spyglass and the Spider.
Overview
The spyglass was originally owned by a regal-looking man seen in a Prank's Stone tavern by Mitchel Waylander, who, short of funds at the time, tricked him into approaching the town's eponymous Prank's Stone so the spyglass would disappear from his possession. Like other items "pranked" away from visitors, the spyglass reappeared in a location known to Waylander, who collected it for his business partner to sell in Silden.
When the spyglass's fate became known to the Nighthawks, they targeted Waylander for assassination, and at some point the spyglass fell back into their hands.
Chapter 3
The party finds finds the spyglass, along with the Silver Spider, in the Black Sheep Tavern, and identifies it as an out-of-place object which can be taken as a clue in the assassination of the King's soldiers stationed in Romney. They follow the trail of its provenance from Waylander to Joftaz, who trades in such sailors' trinkets from time to time but does not remember whether it passed through his hands.
They can also learn of a magical brass spyglass inscribed with a star which was kept for generations as an heirloom in the Corvalis household, preserved in a glass case in the entryway of the family's original Keep. According to family legend, those who knew "the right things to think" could use it to spy on others' thoughts. Neville Corvalis used to tease his sister that he knew how to use it, but it disappeared around the time of his death, and his father accused the workmen of stealing it.
| Warning! This article contains plot or ending spoilers. |
If they confront Navon du Sandau with the Abbot's Journal, they can learn that he had the spyglass after Neville's "death" and used it to convince the Nighthawks that he possessed arcane mental powers, assisting in his rise to leadership.
Properties
The Brass Spyglass occupies 1 Inventory space and has an unlimited number of uses. It achieves the same effect as the Eyes of Ishap spell without the cost in Health/Stamina.
The Spyglass can be used normally in underground spaces, but cannot be used in buildings; if tried, the user decides not to risk revealing the device to onlookers.
Description
A relatively simple device, the spyglass was a cylinder of brass fitted with a large glass lens on one end and another, smaller lens on the opposite end. While spyglasses were used to spot distant objects, [character] suspected this one had been rendered useless by the cracks in the larger lens.
Trivia
- The game implies that the "regal man" from whom the spyglass was originally stolen was the Nighthawk leader directly involved in the Black Sheep massacre, requiring him to have traced it to Joftaz, regained it, and lost it once again at the murder scene.
- The Spyglass can also be used to locate some objects which are not caches, such as Nalar's Rib.