Wishes. Why do DMs fear them so much and who came up with this insane tradition of messing up wishes? Yeah, yeah, I know. Wishes can be "unbalancing". Well, if you suck as a DM that is!
I don't fear wishes. Nor do I feel the need (or even understand the desire) to screw with players' use of wishes. There was a group in my old neighborhood that had a DM who twisted every wish to the best of his ability. The players would actually adjourn the game and spend hours, sometimes days writing what amounted to a contract spelling out the terms of the wish. One they wrote (that I actually read) was 3 pages long! Come on!
What nonsense. Why do DMs feel the need to screw wishes? First of all, if the PCs find a wish, it's because the DM allowed them to find a wish. Period. The PCs can't just say ""Oh look I found a ring and it's a ring of multiple wishes!". The DM decides whether it's a ring of contrariness or a ring of wishes. Even randomly rolled, the DM can overrule it or just say it's cursed or doesn't work.
So PCs can only get wishes if and when the DM allows. Same for wizards. If they don't have access to a written wish spell to learn, then it doesn't matter if they have a 25 INT and are 50th level. They have to get access to a wish spell (written on a scroll, in a book, whatever) to learn it in the first place.
So the DM controls access to wishes. If the DM thinks a wish is unbalancing or isn't confident in his ability to adjudicate it, then simply don't let one creep into the campaign. But don't allow wishes into the campaign and then whine about how "unbalancing" they are and then pervert it so that the players wish they never found the damned thing in the first place! To me that is the sign of a weak DM with an utter lack of confidence.
It's so easy to control players' wishes.
"I wish for a million gold pieces!"
Ok, they have it. But how do they transport it? It's pathetic for the DM to make the pile of gold land on (and thus kill) the character. At 10 coins per pound, it would weigh 100,000 pounds. Good luck moving it!
And if they wish for a 1 million gp gem, who can afford to buy it?
Wishes inherently cause problems. The DM does not need too warp a wish to make it a challenge for the players.
And let's say that the players carefully word their wish.
"I wish to have a million gold pieces deposited in my over-sized treasure room in the basement of my castle".
Ok, fine. The DM doesn't need to fuse them into a solid mass or other silly things. Let the players have a million gold pieces. Is that really gonna disturb your "game balance"?
Taxes, unforseen costs (a tornado or earthquake blows parts of the castle away, etc), theft (did they really screen all their followers?), and just the basic costs of things they want to buy. Let them buy a galleon for 50,000 gp or whatever it costs. Let them buy a fleet of galleons! Is that really gonna unbalance your game? Not if you're a DM worthy of the title.
Where will they get the men to sail it? That costs money. Docking fees, upkeep, repairs, etc. All cost money. Oh how I love sea monsters! Krakens, linnorms, etc. A good battle with a ghost ship or ship of sea zombies led by a mad necromancer is fun too!
The point I'm making is that every wish has inherent problems associated with it, and challenges for those who attain those wishes. No need to do silly things to warp it. Sure, if you get a player who tries being abusive, let the gods punish them. I had a real dickhead of a player once who wished to be invulnerable to all weapons of any type. He had done crazy wish after crazy wish (it was a high powered campaign and they had found a ring of multiple wishes, plus a genie who could grant wishes, etc). The other players were responsible. This jerk tried to mess with me. So the gods tired of his nonsense. He wished to be invulnerable, so he was. He was encased in a solid suit of adamantine, pure adamant to be precise. Enchanted to +5. No joints, so he couldn't move. No way to get it off. Couldn't really use the bathroom now could he?
Eventually, after several weeks of stewing in his own waste material, and after describing the burning, itching pain of the rashes and infections he developed, he used his final wish to wish away his original wish.
So sure, punish when punishment is warranted by poor play. But don't screw up wishes simply because "that's supposed to happen". It isn't. The very purpose of the wish spell is to allow PCs to do the impossible. Don't grant that boon, then warp it into something bad.
Rant over.
