We've all heard of the Seven Wonders of the World (the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the Colossus of Rhodes, and the Lighthouse of Alexandria).  However, in a fantasy, D&D-type world, where people can cast spells like Wish and Resurrect, the requirements for being a 'wonder' would probably involve magical effects that can't be easily duplicated by 'standard' magic, or something that functions in violation of the 'known laws' of that universe.  

Sometimes it's a good thing for PCs to encounter something that isn't easily explainable in game terms, and having a few 'wonders' in a fantasy world can help to make a campaign setting a little more unique.  This thread is for knocking around ideas for such Wonders.  Let's see if we can come up with at least seven of them...

1) There is a fountain in the small town of Ruelhoak that the desperate sometime pilgrimage to... it is said that drinking from this fountain can cure any ailment, physical, mental, or magical.  However, it only does so for those whose faith in their god or gods (no matter whichever gods they might worship, good or evil) are strong and true; those who 'aren't right with the gods' who drink from the fountain instead die as a result.  You can only drink from the fountain once in your lifetime, no matter how strong your faith - those who drink a second time suffer the same fate as the weak of faith.  Those who are healed are sometimes changed people as a result (perhaps from having their self-illusions stripped away), while others find themselves compelled to follow some quest that the gods bestow upon them...

I think the key to the wonders of the ancient world were their size and complexity of construction (for the times).  I think in a fantasy world, it would still have to be the same (freaking huge astounding constructions, whether magical or not); a fountain, no matter what it did, just wouldn't cut it.

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2) The Giants' Horn

High atop the Crystal Mountain, but still visible to human eyes, lies this relic of an ancient war. A massive horn sculpted in rock, it was used by Frost Giants sentries to warn against incoming Dragon attacks. Wind currents create strange, haunting melodies when passing through it.

The giants are long gone, but it is said that whoever is able to use the Horn will summon their might as a reward from the Giant Gods.

Yeah, something more like that.

RPGPundit

The '7 wonders' analogy was probably a bad move on my part.  Still, I'm not certain that size is the key.  It's been my experience that describing something as 'the largest library in the world' will get a resounding 'that's nice' from the players.  At most, they might try to roleplay their characters as being impressed, but the players themselves aren't going to be that jazzed over it.

Unexplainable magic > 'normal' magic > size.  At least in my experience, yours may obviously differ.

That said, the Giant's Horn is a damned cool idea, one I will freely swipe for my next campaign.

I don't know; if you do the description justice, they can be impressed.

Shit, my WFRP players were relatively impressed; in-character at least, with the temple of Ulric in Middenheim.

And my Rome players were impressed period with the massive stone bridge Trajan constructed to cross the Danube when he marched on Dacia; the one that was constructed so that it made it look like his massive army of a hundred thousand men plus fixings were walking on water.

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