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 Windriders Of The Jagged Cliffs Part 8: Yet More Living Stuff Rhulhisti Artifacts The Rhulhisti is the term for the "original" lifeshapers back in the Blue Age (the Rhul-Thaun being their descendants). These artifacts are life-shaped creations that are still around but no one knows how to make any more of them. You'd think they'd be placed in their own section, but instead they're crammed in here between Guardian creatures and industrial-grade life shaping. So this section is kind of a grab bag of weapons and other items. All of these items are of exceptional ability compared to standard life-shaped items, because when you're descendants of an ancient civilization you only forget how to make the best stuff. Darkcloak: More cloaks! Unlike the rest of the 'cloak series, this one is not self-explanatory. Neither is it actually a rhulhisti artifact. Darkcloaks are actually an accident where a living cloak has gained psionic abilities which it uses to defend its wearer, giving them a mental AC of 5. It apparently also grants a physical AC of 5...but whether this functions like armor, more like Bracers of Protection or what exactly is unclear. It's not entirely clear on whether or not the improved protection is a psionic effect or simply a result of the cloak being very tough. Eyehand: Eyeballs that can be grafted onto your hands. You can only see through one set of your eyes at a time, making it mainly useful for things like peeking around corners. It features its own thick eyelid that'll protect it while you hold or carry things (because even the halflings are smarter than the 10-Eyed Man). Eyestalk This performs more or less the same function as the Eyehand, just more disturbingly and you can do it while holding things. Downside, it needs to replace one of your eyes. Fitting in the eyeball the eyestalk passes inspection as a normal eye 75% of the time but comes with an extendable, prehensile 1' long stalk.  Yep, I'm sure no one will notice Life Leech Sword: This is a functional short sword, on top of the normal short sword damage it also functions the same as the life-leech mentioned in the weapons section: +1d12 damage on the first hit as it rapidly absorbs water and nutrients, then +1d6 on each hit afterwards because of a sedative. Why would your weapon inject your opponent with a sedative whose only function appears to be making your attacks less effective? I could kind of buy it with the life leech because that never seemed like it was intended as a weapon in the first place but this one clearly is. Oh well, either way its pretty impressive for a life-shaped weapon since that bonus damage is added on top of the regular short sword damage.  Lightning Generator This large pod builds up a store of static electricity within specialized organs and can release it as a 6d6 Lightning Bolt equivalent. The bolt is shot from a wand connected by an organic cord to the main body of the creature. The generator produces a new "charge" every 15 minutes but can only charge up if left still: transporting it ruins the recharge. Hung from a soar whale it can be moved, but even then has a 25% chance to ruin a given recharging period. Mimicskin Like sheath armor this is a paste that must be spread upon the wearer. Once applied it responds to mental commands, reshaping the wearer's outward appearance just like the alter self spell. It can make you appear larger by inflating itself but can't (obviously) make you any smaller. Overmind: No, its not a supervillian. This is a giant artificial brain. A life shaped computer. It's an 8 foot diameter tissue wad with a single ear and a halfling sized mouth (apparently no one thought it would ever be useful to show it anything). The Overmind is not sentient in the standard sense: it has no free will or desires and exists only to be provided information then asked for a solution or make a decision. Because of its extensive store of knowledge and massive braininess it can come to a "correct" decision 75% of the time. Only one Overmind is known to still exist (presumably it is in thamasku although this is never stated). Recorder: Another life-shaped artifact with only one remaining copy (known as the Dal-erat, the word of the people). The recorder is a cube capable of recording and replaying sound, with each face of the cube capable of storing 10 minutes of audio. The current recording contains a message from an ancient and unknown High Lord regarding the value of life, and has never been recorded over. Senselink: An organic cord about 3 feet long that can connect two living beings by their brains. While connected the senselink allows the sharing of sense memories (so you can't "talk" back and forth, just share things like sights and sounds). Its not clear if this only works on willing creatures. The Womb: This is the most ancient, mysterious and important of the rhulhisti artifacts. The Womb is a creature whose body fills a 100 foot chamber in the Thamasku sanctuary. It is used as part of the initiation for new Life Shapers who are dropped into the womb and moved throughout its inner organs. Those who are accepted by the womb come out conscious (but with all memory missing of the experience) those who are not are spit out unconscious or dead. The unconscious ones are nursed back to health and rejected from the life shapers. The shapers see the womb as a way of testing whether the "forces of life" accept a new shaper...of course they have no actual idea what the function of the Womb is at all, it could be a faulty industrial plumbing device for all they know. Engines These are large life-shaped creatures intended to perform "industrial" scale work. They don't appear to be rhulhisti artifacts so presumably they can still be constructed. Air Pump: Basically some lungs and some tubes. Air Pumps are normally used in underwater structures like the Thamasku Sanctuary or clearing the air in large structures that would otherwise get filled without foul odors or smoke. Furnace: A round globe-shaped creature about 3 feet across which has an unusually high body heat (equivalent to several large roaring campfires) to provide warmth. Motive Engine: A big lump of muscle with 1-4 arms that are pre-programed to engage in certain movements: used to run mills, pull pulleys or elevators or open big doors. Water Pump : Like the air pump, but for water. Has several "trunks" that can be used to direct the flow of water (and which can also be attached to tubing to move it farther). Grafts A few grafts have already showed up among the rhulhisti artifacts, but these are the regular ones that can still be made. Grafts are life-shaped symbiotes designed to physically meld with other creatures supplementing or replacing their body parts. Since they can feed off nutrients from the host directly they don't need the same level of care as other life-shaped items (but do increase food and water intake by 10% per graft). Grafts can be removed, leaving only a slight rash that fades after 24 hours. Cosmetic: These skin grafts are the rhul-thaun equivalent of piercings or tattoos. They don't impose any kind of burden on the host's system (no increase in food and water) and are mainly used for things like showing clan affiliation or membership in a guild or organization. Glider Grafts: Snap-on wings that let you glide (not fly), traveling 100 feet for every 10 feet of height (requiring a minimum height of 30 feet to work at all).  Glow Grafts: Bioluminescent patches which shed light like a torch. The raver cousins to cosmetic skin grafts. Lens Graft: Little scraps of tissues that attach directly to your eyes (remember that removing a graft leaves a rash? my eyes are watering just thinking about it). A pair of lenses grants you the ability to see twice as far while still being able to see close up equally well. Lightvisor: Basically an organic graft that resembles Jordi's visor from star trek. This is basically a set of low-light goggles, allowing you to see in very dim lighting (but not complete darkness). Swim Fins: Exactly what you're thinking of. A pair of webbed extensions that graft themselves to your feet and hands, increasing your water speed and endurance by 50%. Touch Bad Grafts: set of pads that go on the fingertips and palm, increasing your sensitivity to touch, allowing you to do things like search for traps or pick locks with a +10% bonus. Producers For those who don't recall Producers is a term for life-shaped creatures who are engineered to produce organic, but non-living, products that are used by the halflings. They are the most important life-shaped creations as they produce the essentials for day-to-day life among the halflings. Two broad sets are presented: Food Producers: There's plenty more but some examples are turtle-like egg-layers called baredum, Don-egoth which are small trees that produce sweet red fruits, Chuhn-egil which produce milk and vash-erat which sprout "grains" from their body which can be sheared and ground into flour. Textile Producers: Another staple category. The drun-sahn are snakes which shed leather, fis-evar are herdbeasts grow long wool that can be spun into fabric. The ghov-erad secret a thin film that hardens and is used to make drycloaks (it seems like a type of plastic sheet essentially). Medicine: Although life-shaping, in general, isn't that amazing compared to what's possible with normal materials one area they excel at is medicine. They're still not as great as a templar, cleric or druid but the medical knowledge of the rhul-thaun is much broader and more easily applied to day-to-day life (for instance, they understand germ theory and sterilization). They also have a few medically specific life-shaped creations. Bloodclot: A sort of living bandage. Its a 3 inch patch of flesh that when placed on a wound will meld with surrounding skin and flesh, sealing the wound and restoring 1 hp. Now, here's where it gets unclear "after 1d10 minutes the wound heals completely, leaving the bloodclot enmeshed in the patient's own flesh". Does that mean that a bloodclot can heal all the damage from a wound, or is that just flavor text. I guess we'll never know. Detoxifiers: Miscroscopic life-shaped organisms suspended in a liquid medium. When drunk they'll search out toxins and neutralize them within 2d4 rounds. After finishing their task they're flushed from the system and die. Healing Patch: Bloodclots of extra healing. These resemble bloodclots and function much the same, but they heal 1d8 damage rather than 1 (implying that the ambiguous text in bloodclots is just poorly worded fluff). Joiner: A graft that'll actually reattach severed limbs. The joiner is a thin layer of tissue that should be placed over the open stump of the missing limb and then the limb stuck on over it. The joiner holds them in place and facilitates the passage of nutrients back and forth and the rejoining of nerves and tissue. This isn't simple though, for 2d6 days the patient absolutely cannot move or their arm will fall back off. The joiner has a 75% success rate (dropping to 50% if the attached limb did not belong to the original patient). Preservation Fluid:: An organic soup that prevents tissues from decaying. Mainly used to hold severed limbs for the joiner but could also be used to store damaged life-shaped creations or corpses for funerals. Care and Maintenance of Life Shaped Creations: Here we get a bit of info on the care of life-shaped creatures. First, we're told that they don't eat or drink normally. All living life-shaped objects subsist on cam-rahn, a nutrient solution which provides them food and water in one, and all require one "dose" of cam-rahn per HD per day (no guidelines are given on how much a "dose" actually is). Grafts are an exception, unless they are unattached. They are capable of breathing on their own. A life-shaped creature will die in 2-5 days if not fed its daily broth, and a tissue will die in 2-3 days. We're also told that life-shaped creatures need rest as well, resting at least as much time as they spend working and no single creature can work for more than 24 hours straight. So an engine that spends 8 hours grinding, pumping or pushing needs at least 8 hours of rest. If this is violated then they lose 1d4 hit points every 4 hours of additional work. Life-shaped tissues also must be submerged in a organic solution called lor-rahn (at least 30 minutes every 24 hours) and if they are not then there is a 20% cumulative chance that it will wither and die. Life shaped (except the rhulhisti artifacts) have a limited lifespan, dying in 3d4 years for creatures, 1d2 years for tissues. So, let's just summarize what a pain a life-shaped item can be. Let's take a fun item like the Warstaff. The warstaff is a 4 HD tissue. Here's a rundown on what you need to keep in mind with it:
Boy, life-shaping really seems worth it. Now, imagine doing that for half of your inventory. Magic and the Life Shaped Next we've got guidelines for how magic interacts with life-shaped creatures. The obvious is of course that, as living creatures, life-shaped creatures or tissues can take damage from harmful spells, be healed by healing spells, etc. The main purpose of the list is to provide guidelines on weirder spells. Any spell that affects plants or animals has a 50/50 chance of affecting a life-shaped being, as they are composites of both.
Other Races A bit of general info that got skipped along the way. Although the halflings have minimal contact with anyone else there are a few other sentient species they've interacted with, including some that live only in the Jagged Cliffs region. Pterrans: Dino-men who also dwell in some parts of the jagged cliffs who ride domesticated pterraxs (pterodactyls). They're not evil, but they are territorial and don't have much in common with the halflings culturally. There's been blood shed between them and the halflings and it doesn't look like they're going to sit down and chill together any time soon. One big bone of contention is that the Pterrans like stealing life-shaped creations and using them...but since they don't have the knowledge or supplies to feed and maintain them the creatures or objects will die quickly. This pisses the rhul-thaun off to no end and there have been suggestions as to the possibility of going to all out war with the pterrans. Pyreen: The Pyreen of the Jagged Cliffs region are almost as blindly traditionlistic as the halflings. You see the Pyreen know the history of the rhul-thaun and see them as the last remnants of Athas' history, and thus they seek to preserve them. On the one hand they're the reasons the halflings haven't faced raiders, nomads or outsiders from the East and they've often served as invisible protectors of the halfling way of life. On the other hand they're also just letting the halflings squat above the poison swamp as the skills and abilities essential to their survival fade from memory and more and more ancient techniques are lost every generation. Given that the pyreen are, effectively, immortal and much, much smarter than the halflings they could certainly make themselves useful by helping to preserve their life-shaping skills, teaching the halflings to master psionics and even helping to spread the knowledge and techniques of life-shaping to other parts of Athas where such skills would be vital for restoring the world's shattered ecosystem. But no, they'll just stay on top of the cliffs, keeping anyone from reaching the halflings from that side while the rhul-thaun are slowly killed by mutations from below and thri-kreen from the west. Thri-Kreen: Thri-kreen are the halfling's greatest enemies. Not the nomadic, hunting obsessed thri-kreen of the Tyr region...the thri-kreen to the west of the Jagged Cliffs are an expansionist empire whose desire for conquest is stymied only by the barrier of the Jagged Cliffs. As far as the halflings are concerned the Thri-kreen are not a part of nature and should be exterminated for the sake of all other living things...of course they don't have anything like the resources needed to challenge the thri-kreen empire and can only hold their own, aided by the natural barrier of the cliffs. Better hope no PCs from the east come with a Kreen in the party. To make matters worse the Thri-kreen have their own version of life shaping, its just instead of breeding other creatures and objects, they alter their own biology: adapting their soldiers to the conditions of the swamp, to make them tougher, stronger, better climbers, etc. Each new generation of thri-kreen is harder to fight off than the old one. And unlike halflings, the thri-kreen are making new techniques while the life-shapers lose them. Reggelids: This is a species that lives only in the swamps at the base of the Jagged Cliffs. They resemble ugly, elongated elves with an extra finger on each hand. No one knows their origin, even they don't know because they simply seem to have no desire to pass down or preserve their own history. The only thing that they care about is arcane magic, which they are very good at. All reggelids are wizards or fighter/wizards, born with magical abilities from the effects of the swamp and increasing in power as they get older. They have an innate talent with magic items, having a 75% chance to increase the effect of any magic item they use by 25% (rounded up). They live in simple huts, not because they lack the ability to make better conditions, but because they simply don't care to bother. Magical lore is inscribed on stone tablets and is the only thing that reggelids care about. They have little in the way of culture but never come into conflict with each other: they instantly defer to whoever is more magically adept or skilled (even marginally) and never fight and always seek to share knowledge among themselves. They also have an odd hatred of halflings in general and life-shaped objects in particular. They've even developed a spell (Organic Disruption) specifically to kill the life-shaped. It's a 10 ft radius AoE which is a save-or-die to all life-shaped as well as any non-living organic matter. Non-life-shaped creatures take 2d6 damage (save for half).  Bvanen: Despite their appearance, Bvanen are good aligned swamp-monsters. They're amphibious and live in the swamps at the base of the cliffs. Despite being good aligned they are a bit distrustful and this often leads to otherwise avoidable conflicts, especially since they look like monsters. They secrete an ooze from their skin which hardens into a protective shell and can be splashed with a claw attack to cover an opponent's limbs in hardened resin, rendering them useless. It also seals the bvanen's wounds immediately, making them immune to bleeding and just plain reduces all damage by 1. About 1-in-6 Bvanen are decent psionicists.  Next update should be the last, with the intro adventure " Into The Swamp "
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Apr 1, 2016 05:26
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Nessus posted:This life shaping thing sounds like a poo poo show, unless the idea is "for all of its bullshit and hassle, this stuff is as good as that metal weaponry that essentially no longer exists, and is more valuable as scrap metal if you find it. Also, they're still making more life-shaped poo poo." Life-shaping is one of those things that is immensely powerful and valuable...for poo poo the PCs will absolutely not care about. Even if they were rhul-thaun. The things life-shaping does great at is providing a good average standard of living, top class medical treatment (at a healer, not in the field) and providing amenities and luxuries no one else on the planet has. The average rhul-thaun lives like a king as far as the rest of the world is concerned, even better than hidden paradises like Saragar. Their homes are sturdy and clean, water and food are plentiful. They likely have access to the equivalent of indoor plumbing. If they get sick they can go to see a healer who actually knows how to treat them. Goods can be moved between settlements with speed and safety (relatively speaking). But who cares if halflings don't have to poo poo in a corner, because who delves into that in their games anyway? But the actual stuff that adventurers care about (weapons, armor, utility grafts, etc) are largely not worth the trouble. Life-shaped weapons like Warstaffs and Hurling Titan are deadlier than average halfling sized weapons but the average increase of 1 point of damage isn't worth the extra trouble. Your armor reduces your damage a lot but it'll probably die after your first fight or two. There's a few neat items (the air burster, spore pods, etc) which are useful tools but even then you've got to go through a lot of trouble keeping them alive and its practically impossible to travel with them. As far as metal-equivalent weaponry that's actually not addressed very well. The implication is that the halfling's organic weapons are the equivalent of metal...but its never actually stated. It's quite possible that their standard equipment is only as good as bone or wood (after all it is organic). The actual living weapons like the armblade and such are presumably at no penalty...but again this is never stated and even if they were then the hassle of dealing with them isn't worth it. And of course, the whole thing only works because of just how isolated the rhul-thaun are. They don't have any magical items or much in the way of magic to speak of. Even in Athas magical equipment is relatively common (not as much as forgotten realms, but your average mid-level adventurer will be toting around magic gear for sure) and the feats of a good priest, wizard or psionicist put the powers of life-shaped items to shame. And of course the rhul-thaun could do so much more with their life-shaping abilities if they just moved on with the times and didn't insist on living in horrible cliff villages. One of the main reasons that the thri-kreen empire is actually beating the life-shaping masters at the art of life-shaping is because they didn't dismiss psychic powers as somehow "beneath them". Just imagine what the rhul-thaun could do if they were willing to harness psionics. oriongates fucked around with this message at 08:48 on Apr 1, 2016 |
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Apr 1, 2016 08:46
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Windriders Of The Jagged Cliffs Part 9: Into The Swamp Included in the book is an intro adventure: Into The Swamp, for characters of 4-6th level. It claims that it can be used for rhul-thaun characters or for general Dark Sun PCs. Background: The intro to the adventure is centered around Sahl-oren. Sahl is an explorer who has traveled up and down the cliffs, into the swamp and even beyond into the thri-kreen empire and back. He's so badass you guys. Rumors have been passing around that he's recently discovered a super-awesome-special-total-super-ultra secret. It's so amazing you guys. Some possible rumors are the discovery of the High Lord's mummified remains, a super powerful life-shaped artifact, the source of Rajaat's Curse or the plans for a huge invasion by the thri-kreen. What he has actually discovered is a magical item: one designed specifically to destroy the life-shaped. He found it in the swamp along with several of his companions, who all died. The slaughter prevented him and his companions from actually recovering the item. The item is an ancient creation by Rajaat himself who, realizing that he might have uncomfortable encounters with the halflings, created the item (called little death) in order to defeat them by stripping them of their life-shaped items without killing them directly. Apparently Sahl learned about little death while exploring Rajaat's ancient sanctuary in the swamp but was never able to reach it because of the traps and magical protections...of course if he never reached it how the hell is he supposed to know what it does or that it exists at all? Did Rajaat leave notices written in ancient halfling posted on the walls of his sanctuary detailing the function of one of his personal magic items? Well, anyway Sahl apparently let this secret slip (despite the fact that none of the rumors are close to accurate) and got himself snatched up by the Chahn who want to force him to reveal the location of the item in order to use it in their war against the status quo. Rhul-thaun are assumed to be interested in searching for Sahl to find his secrets, either for their own purposes or because they've been hired by a sponsor interested in his secret. Outsiders are more complicated. Basically because they need to be safely introduced into rhul-thaun society, probably including learning their language, culture and even a basic understanding of what is going on. Then somehow they've got to get interested in Sahl and his secret. After this section the possibility of the PCs being non-rhul-thaun is completely ignored and everyone is assumed to be a halfling. The Set Up The adventure opens in Thamasku and assumes that the PCs have been hired by Cohg-agon, a merchant and information broker, who wants to know what Sahl does. She meets the PCs in a fancy safehome (halfling inn) called the Mirrored Host where she fills the PCs in and asks them to find Sahl, or his secret. She'll pay 500 ge per character and if they agree to an exclusivity agreement on the information she'll give them a 20% cut of any profits made by selling the information. If the PCs agree then she'll inform them that Sahl was last seen in Glerran and disappeared 3 days ago. She'll supply transportation to Glerran as well as the names of some contacts who migh know what's happening: a tender in the village, a painter and the barkeeper at a local safehome. One thing the PCs don't know is that Cohg-agon is deep in the pockets of the lifeshapers of Thamasku and they're the ones after Sahl's secret. On The Trail Traveling by Soar Whale to Glerran the PCs are guided by a windrider named Trav-osald. They leave from Thamasku and make a short supply stop in Sol-fehn to pick up supplies. The PCs are given an hour to wander the little village. After 10 minutes of doing whatever the GM is supposed to give them an Int check at -3. Anyone who succeeds will notice that they're being watched from a tower nearby. If the PCs attempt to approach the observer he'll try and flee (or if that fails) use his clerical abilities (he's a 7th level water cleric). The guy is a secret member of the Chahn and is very ugly (just so you know he's a bad guy). The Chahn have learned that the life-shapers are sending investigators and know that the PCs have been hired by them. He doesn't have much spine though, if threatened or trapped he'll confess he's a Chahn member and was told to watch for the PCs although he apparently doesn't know anything about Sahl in particular. If no one makes any of their intelligence rolls then everyone just wanders around town for an hour I guess. Glerran The flight down to Glerran is quick enough since it's just a matter of flying straight down, taking only an hour. The PCs are then expected to hit up their contacts. *The Tender: this is an old man who tends a flock of slugs who ooze anti-biotics. He also does a bit of healing on the side as well and is an old friend of Cogh-agon, having worked for her father in the past. He knows that the Chahn kidnapped Sahl, but has no details beyond that. *The painter: She's "very observant" and is willing to sell some info for 5 ge. Her information is pretty much useless though: she knows that Sahl had been on a trip to the swamps after some kind of relic related to Rajaat's curse (so apparently someone knew about the item already? How?). She can also show them sketches of the explorers as they left the city. This is in no way useful. *The bartender: This is the "Mos Eisley Cantina" scene, a bar full of criminals and ruffians. He's already been threatened by the Chahn and is unwilling to share information. Before the interaction can go on too long the PCs will be attacked by 4 Chahn agents: 4th level fighters, one armed with a grappler and another with a sleep pod...which they waste by using it on the bystanders to put them out of commission. After beating the Chahn and saving the bar and its patrons the bartender will spill everything: the chahn captured Sahl after he shared that he found a secret citadel in the swamp. The main bit of info he can provide is the general route that his expedition took to reach the citadel. He thinks that the Chahn probably already left for the swamp with Sahl as an unwilling guide. The bartender is right and since its apparently absolute impossible (as the adventure says) for the PCs to locate any other Chahn or their base in town so they have no choice but to follow. Down The Cliff There are two ways down: *The first is climbing. It's easy to find the path the bartender described and pretty much requires a professional climber and probably requires all of the PCs to at least have the mountaineering skill. It takes 2 days to climb down (a day and a half if everyone is a climber). *The second is flying, via windriding. This is obvious a lot faster (about an hour) and of course requires the funds to pay a windrider. Even if they can track down the windrider who found the citadel in the swamp originally and get directions none of them will be willing to actually land in the swamp...only set them down on the ridges at its edge. Despite the fact that travel times vary between 1 hour and 40 hour this has absolutely no effect on any of the encounters in the swamp. Near the bottom of the cliff is a climbing camp (along the trail). It has no real information or useful items other than perhaps as a general clue that the Chahn (or perhaps anyone else) has been walking along. Unfortunately there is a nest of cliff-kanks nearby who'll attack in groups of 3d6 (which is not a small challenge since kanks have a paralytic bite). Even worse they'll continue to attack in waves until the characters flee or all 500 kanks in the nest are gone. It's not clear how the people who camped here originally avoided being bug-murdered.  Scrotum warrior fights testicle monster. Scene not actually appearing in this adventure The Swamp Visibility is better in the swamp as the mists shoot up from steam pools and gather above the trees, allowing you to see a whole 2d10+10 feet. The water level is about waist-high on a halfling and includes sinkholes and quicksand. Of course, what would a 2nd edition adventure be without a random encounter table! 1-20 Quicksand: Getting caught in quicksand sinks you in 1d4+1 rounds. Attempting to escape requires assistance or a rope or branch to pull on and a strength check. Each failed attempt to pull yourself counts as an extra round. 21-30 Steam Burst: A blast of hot steam catches 1d4 characters and take 3d6 damage (save for half). 31-38 A giant crocodile 39-45: Giant frogs 46-50: Poisonous frogs 51-55 Strangling vines 56-60 Bog Wader 61-65 Hydra (I'm sure a group of 4th level characters will be totally fine) 66-70 Shambling Mound (another group murder) 71-75 Behir (and yet another) 76-80 Giant Leech 81-85 Bvanen 86-88 Will o Wisp 89-93 Reggelid 94-97 Monstrosity: a heavily mutated creature. The table for generating a monstrosity is actually larger than the original encounter table itself. 98-00 Rajaat's Curse: A random magic effect that ranges from enchanting PC equipment to forcing PCs to make a save or turn into a monster. No guidelines are provided for this. You're meant to roll a 1-in-6 chance for an encounter every 4 hours...but we are never actually told how far the PCs have to travel from the cliffs to the citadel in the swamp. I mean, we get this map:  which has several unhelpful notations for places miles away from where the PCs will actually travel and it does have a distance scale...but good luck getting an accurate measurement from that to the winding trail, or any information on travel times through the swamp. Then we get this map:  With no context beyond a section labeled "Mapped Dangers and Obstacles" telling us the streams are "only" 1-3 feet deep (telling me that the authors forgot that the PCs are probably all halflings). The paragraph also says that there are steaming pools (which do not appear on the map) which can inflict steam damage and produce mudmen. Next we have a paragraph on following the trail (automatic success for those with Tracking, otherwise an Int-1 check). It still tells us nothing about how far this trail actually is. It also tells us that PCs make an Int check to notice they're being watched and a second Int-5 check to actually spot 1d6 Bvanen at the edge of their vision (which means...20 feet away?) The Bvanen will follow the PCs to and back from the pyramid and even have a 30% chance to help the PCs if they're in trouble but may react with hostility if the PCs are aggressive. The Inverted Pyramid The trail will lead the PCs to the Confluence (the map that showed up a few pages ago). The pool in the center is unusually deep (50 feet) and the situation will be very different depending on whether the PCs arrive in daytime or nighttime (in which case it would be important to know how long it took to get here). If the PCs arrive during the day the trail just leads to the edge of the pool, which is too murky to see into. If the PCs swim to the bottom they'll find a rusty iron door...250 feet by 500 feet. The door is far, far too heavy to be moved, but a knock spell will open it...a spell that no halfling character would have access to and probably couldn't cast at the bottom of a pond even if they did. If opened magically the doors will slide open and the bottom of the pond begins to rise, revealing an inverted floating pyramid.  Hopefully whoever opened that door didn't cling to the pyramid as it rose into the air because they are now 600 feet above the ground with no way down. The "door" only leads to a shaft filled with water and nothing else, to a depth of 500 feet. The actual entrance is at the bottom of the pyramid...which is also floating 100 feet above the ground. Of course if the PCs come to the place at night the pyramid is already floating there. It apparently does so every night, rising up on its own and floating above the swamp. Let's just think for a moment how dumb this stronghold is. The whole "knock spell to lift up the pyramid" thing is really weird and inconvenient but its at least decent security...except the entire pyramid floats up all on its own every single night. And again things get a little bit out of order: First we're told that the Reggelid are watching the PCs from the swamp (apparently along with the bvanen...which means two groups spying on PCs a mere 20-30 feet away given the visibility here. The Reggelid wait to see how the PCs get in and follow them. The group consists of 5 standard reggelids who seem to be 3rd level wizards and their leader who appears to be a 7th level spellcaster. The stat-blocks here claim that reggelids are vulnerable to life-shaped objects, taking 1d6 damage when touched by them. This is not something that shows up in their full monster description at the end of the book, so clearly there's been some editing issues. Also, despite apparently living in the swamp and actively searching for the pyramid (which they know is a storehouse of magic) they've never notice the 500 foot tall pyramid that floats above the swamp every night. Then we're told that the Chahn and Sahl have already arrived at the pyramid and many of them have been killed in the swamp already. There are six remaining 4th level fighters and its leader a 7th level fighter/thief as well as Sahl himself (6th level fighter/thief). Sahl has told them everything he knows and they don't know what to do next. Despite this they apparently did manage to get inside and are going to be encountered somewhere in the pyramid (GM's choice). Next we're actually told how players are supposed to actually enter the pyramid. The entrance is at the bottom and the only way to get in is to move directly below the entrance which will cause it to suck up the person in a golden tractor beam from the pond. Of course, this shows the writers didn't really think very much about what this 50 foot deep pond is going to look like when the 500 foot tall, 500 foot wide pyramid leaves it.  Despite the massive size of the pyramid the interior map is quite small. Area 1: This room is round and only 15 feet wide. There is a silver hatch set in the ceiling with no apparent means of getting to it. around the walls are 5 shallow alcoves holding blue gems (2" wide). Beneath one alcove is a blackened halfling corpse, one of Sahl's original companions. All her life-shaped equipment is fried as well. Each gem is protected with a spell that inflicts 6d6 electrical damage on anyone that touches them. The only way to successfully activate the gems is to pass your hand over them without touching them. There is no indication of how to find this out, the gems don't glow, hum or otherwise give any signal when activate them correctly. They just shock you when you touch them. Leaving the pyramid is done in the same way, you just have to desire to leave the pyramid. Area 2: Each area beyond the first is themed based on a school of magic. This one is themed on divination. Of course, this would be a more meaningful gimmick in an adventure where the assumption is that the characters not only aren't wizards (since halfling wizards don't exist back in 2e), but are also completely ignorant of the existence of wizardly magic at all. The characters are deposited on a silver "landing platform" next to another blue gem (pass your hand over it and you're teleported back to Area 1). Above the gem is written runes in a unique language invented by Rajaat which (if read with a comprehend language or read magic spell) reads simply "divination". Why Rajaat would feel the need to label this chamber intended only for himself...who knows. The room is a catalog of the magic items that Rajaat has gained over the years. On the eastern wall is a stone bookcase filled with ancient scrolls and tomes, all of which crumble to bits when touched. There's also a silver plaque with words in ancient rhulisti listing the items kept here (for some reason). In addition touching the writing will mentally transmit the information about the function of the item to the person touching it. Just think...what reason would Rajaat have for creating this item. Keep in mind the amount of time and effort that goes into making your average magic item, especially back in second edition. Why would this super-smart archmage bother with this? Maybe if there were hundreds of entries that needed organizing...but nope there's 6. 6 items: *A Sword of Sharpness *Staff of Power *Rod of Rulership *Ring of Gray (a unique item intended to open a portal to the Gray and summon a spirit) *Circlet of Life (Allows you to magically warp and manipulate living beings) *Little Death (the plot item). Each of these items are kept in their own separate vaults for some reason and all but little Death are already gone. You may notice from the map that there's a secret door here. If you follow the stairs it basically leads to a separate section of each level (hidden by a secret door as well), the main door leads to Area 3. Also recall the Regellid are apparently supposed to show up here and attack the PCs, presumably having figured out the gem puzzle without problem. Area 3 This is the area accessible by the main door from Area 2 and is where Sahl's original group was driven back. It contains two mind-controlled and altered Thri-kreen. There's another magic label on the wall labeled "Enchantment/Charm". The corpses of Sahl's original team is here, with a selection of still-living (but near starved) life-shaped items. The first Thri-kreen has a permanent Stoneskin enchantment, ignoring the first attack every round. The other has a magical Strength of 20 and crystal forearms. By the way, if you recall the Chahn and Sahl have already infiltrated the pyramid you may be wondering when they'll make an appearance. Well the adventure suggests that they show up in Area 2, 4, 8 and 10. Keep in mind that if they show up in Area 2 that's two big fights in rapid succession (the chahn and then the regellid) which is probably going to be a complete TPK for a mid-level party that this adventure is designed for. If they don't show up in area 2 then...well how do they possibly show up in any of the other areas without dealing with these encounters already? Area 4: Accessible from Area 3 by stairs, this is an empty chamber where some of Rajaat's charmed halfling servants lived back when this place was being used. It contains only rotting furnishings and the door leading to Area 5 and a secret Door leading to area 6. Area 5: This door is locked with a conventional key lock (its unclear how a halfling thief would know how to pick such a lock). If the door is opened it reveals a gothed out room: rotting black tapestries a stained bone-white rug and black candles in silver candelabras. Unsurprisingly this is the Necromancy chamber. The halfling servants have been reanimated here as wights. So...halflings basically have no magic items as far as I can tell. Nor do they engage in any kind of mining. Keep in mind that 2e wights are straight out immune to non-magical or non-silver weapons...so these guys are going to gently caress up a team of halfling only PCs. The only ones who can hope to hold their own against them are elemental clerics who could hit them with magical damage or possibly turn them. But given the expected level of characters and the fact that most clerics are probably leaning heavily on healing and support spells and that wights drain levels with every hit...I think the party is likely screwed barring some exceptionally clever tricks or unusual supplies. Area 6: This area is only accessible via secret door. The secret door in area 2 leads to a set of stairs that will take you here, likewise a secret door in Area 4 will take you here as well. For some reason all these secret doors are used to guard Rajaat's trash pit. Sure its a magic trash pit, containing the remnants of damaged, drained or useless magic items, but still not clear why this area demands higher security than the rest of the stronghold. Regular searching is useless but detect magic (assuming you've got a party cleric and they decided to memorize that) will find two remaining magic items: a necklace of missiles (still with two 3d6 and one 5d6 missile) and a damaged ring of free action which now works as a ring of clumsiness. Area 7: The alteration room. This room contains a trap to prevent further entry. The room appears empty with colored floor tiles (evil wizards love floor tile puzzles!!) The left third is blue, the middle third is red, and the right third is green. Anyone touching the green zone will be affected by a Slow spell when they walk on the tiles. Anyone who enters the area of the red tiles (not simply walking on the tiles, merely being in the area targets you) are targeted by polymorphing beams. If you're already slowed your saves are at -4. Those who fail are transformed into small animals such as rats or lizards. Touching the blue area will transform you back to your original form. However, its impossible to get to either exit without passing over the red zone again (barring a teleportation wild talent). Wasn't it nice of Rajaat to include that blue zone for no apparent reason. Oh, and remember: fun fact, the life-shaped count as individual creatures meaning the average halfling adventurer is going to transform into a small swarm of little creatures...several of which are half-mindless and will probably just scurry in random directions. Area 8 After getting past Area 7 there's a hallway leading to Area 8. The end of the hallway has a pair of closets containing statues (one ebony and one ivory) in the form of snarling watchdogs (again...are there dogs in Athas?) upon approaching the door to Area 8 the closet doors slide open, revealing the statues which function with the Repulsion spell, forcing everyone to make a save or be pushed back into Area 7 (right back into the red zone) and then back down the stairs into area 5 (so even if the PCs avoid transforming when they hit the red zone they'll have to go back through again). The doors then close and the spell ends, but they'll reopen if anyone approaches again. The only way past is to somehow seal the doors, make your save against the repulsion effect or find the secret doors in Areas 2 or 4 which will bypass this area entirely. The only contents of the room itself are statues of various humaniods mimicking spellcasting gestures. There is no magic or anything else. Area 9 This is the "invocation" room and is only accessible via secret doors (from below via the rubbish room and above via area 12). No reason why this one is hidden away from the others is given. There is a brass sphere hanging by chains from the ceiling which randomly targets anyone who enters with an evocation spell: If you're lucky it'll be a forcecage or web spell that lasts about 15 minutes (why?) or a couple of magic missiles (also why??). If you're unlucky it'll be a lightning bolt or cone of cold. Keep in mind that AoE spells will utterly demolish any life-shaped creations you're equipped with. Area 10: After area 9, this is the "minor vault" of lesser magic items. It's been mostly emptied but there are a few magic items here: potions of levitation, health and treasure finding, a metal long-sword +1. a rod of security with 5 remaining charges. and a ring of protection +1. Disturbing anything sounds an alarm spell, but none of the guardians left behind are programmed to react to it. Area 11 Back to the "main" section that isn't hidden behind secret doors. this is the highest part of the pyramid and this area is themed for summoning and conjuration. It has a large well in the center and the walls are carved with bas reliefs of different creatures, most warped or mutated. Upon entering the room a creature is summoned from the well. A Feylaar (30%) or two Bhrog (70%) (both unique athasian monsters). better hope its the bhrog because the feylaar is baad news for a mid level party. Even more fun...every five rounds a new creature (roll again to see what) is summoned! the party is so hosed. There's also a little room to the south which is where Rajaat teleported in and out of the pyramid (so...why have the elaborate entrance in the first place?) Area 12 The illusion chamber. This room is the top of the 'secret door" section of the pyramid. The middle of the room is split by an illusionary wall of fire. Or at least it claims its an illusion. The wall inflicts normal damage from both sides and there's no "save to disbelieve" mentioned or anything of the sort, the damage doesn't disappear or anything like that...its just a wall of fire that is supposedly an illusion. There's a secret door to the south that leads to Area 13. Area 13 The final chamber. Area 13 is the vaults where Rajaat stored his major magic items. Only little death is still around, but the place is still guarded. The chamber is really big and contains a constantly flowing magical fountain, all carved with images of magical creatures. The vaults are along the north wall and all but the last is standing open. The last vault is locked and touching the door summons its guardian: Tethire, an athasian wraith. Tethire is basically a hopeless fight: not only is it difficult to fight him at all since he can possess and animate your weapons and even when you fight him he can only be hurt by +2 or better weapons (which the party won't have) and has the ability to possess living beings too. He's far too tough to be turned by a cleric of the adventure's level and there's no way the party's minimal spellcasting abilities would include enough damaging spells to eat through Tethire's 51 HP. He is at least somewhat merciful, if the characters surrender he'll allow them to leave. If the PCs somehow manage to defeat Tethire they can unlock the vaults and get the little death: a wand which can (for 1 charge) shoot a beam that slays any single life-shaped being or (for 3 charges) shoot a 50 foot cone that does the same. There's also the possibility of a plot hook for future adventures. the fountain contains an inscription that gives directions to another citadel (why? I don't know, apparently Rajaat is just absent-minded and needs to leave elaborate notes for himself). This would be a much bigger and more powerful place full of demons, super-monsters, etc. Ending The Adventure If PCs get little death and make it back they'll presumably turn it into Cohg-agon, who'll turn it over to the life-shapers (assuming they don't roll an encounter with a hydra on the way back and get their face's murdered). If Sahl is rescued he'll try and stop the PCs from bringing little death back to Cohg-agon, claiming its his by right with all his friends dying (and his kidnapping) and may attempt to steal it back. If the PCs decide to keep it they'll probably be hounded by life-shaper assassins. And with that we have finished Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs! It was way worse than I remembered! Well, I showed you guys that so we could kick it up a notch with the next book: Psionic Artifacts of Athas.
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Apr 4, 2016 04:20
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Bieeardo posted:Wow. That adventure was almost as lovely as the one for Mind Lords of the Last Sea. Yeah, I had only ever skimmed it before, so I never realized just how little sense it made and how freaking deadly it was for halfling PCs who'd lack the support of characters like psionicists or wizards or magical items.
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Apr 4, 2016 04:42
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Wizard shotgun comic in 3...2...1....
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Apr 4, 2016 07:32
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Covok posted:What would a nuclear winter actually be like? Less dramatic than it sounds. Basically the theory is that large-scale nuclear war (nuclear winter isn't something that's going to happen on a small scale) will throw enough dust, soot and particles into the atmosphere to dim light from the sun, resulting in global cooling as light gets blocked off. The effect is similar to what happens when a powerful volcano erupts, or a large meteor hits the earth. The effect would, presumably, be a drop of a few degrees average temperature. If it happened in the modern day it might actually largely cancel out global warming, leading to the same average temperatures we saw about 100-200 years ago. However, if the effect is more extreme then it leads to colder and longer winters and cooler springs and summers. In general this means less food (especially smaller harvests) and possible mass-extinctions of some species of animals in plants that aren't adapted to the climate change in areas where the climate is on enough of a tipping point for the change to be dramatic. It would be catastrophic for human society because it would cripple large scale agriculture but its not going to be a literal ice-age or anything.
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Apr 4, 2016 20:50
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Psionic Artifacts of Athas So, I mainly reviewed Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs as a prelude to this book. You'll see why once we get to the latter half. For those who don't know, back in 2e there was a product called the Book of Artifacts, basically a big collection of the most high-powered magic items around, the kind you build campaigns around. The Book of Artifacts was, from what I recall, not too bad other than a tendency to copy-paste artifacts directly from existing campaign settings with absolutely no explanation or preparation, such as a cutlass from Spelljammer or the psychometrion, an item from Dark Sun, and an odd decision that pretty much every Artifact should have some powers that are rolled randomly. Because what's a TSR era book without some random tables? It also had a cover featuring an excellent example of the very fine line between "awe" and "duuuurr"  But anyway....Psionic Artifacts of Athas is basically a version of the Book of Artifacts designed exclusively for the Dark Sun setting. It's not quite clear why they felt that Dark Sun needed its own...I love the setting but the place isn't exactly overflowing with magic items. In fact a good chunk of the items are taken from the Prism Pentad novels, and most are not actually psionic. Perhaps realizing that they didn't have enough material to turn this into a full book they introduced something even weirder: life-shaped artifacts! What are those? You'll see. Before getting into the actual contents lets take a look at this cover too and all remember the good old days when Brom did the cover art for Dark Sun. Those covers may not have always made sense, but they were cool.  So, lets take a look at the guy on the center. After reading the book you'll realize he's actually sporting a couple of artifacts from inside...at least theoretically because its also clear the artist didn't get a great description. The flaming sword is the Schorcher (sister sword to the Silencer from the book of artifacts) and that weird looking arm is probably the Arm of Radu, Dark Sun's answer to the hand of vecna. By the way, if you're wondering what the hell is wrong with his forehead...I'm not sure either. It might be some kind of life-shaped graft, but it certainly doesn't look anything like the grafts described in the book. The fellow on the right side is being loomed over by something that is probably the Centennial Brain and flashing us his sexy calves. If you're wondering why the guy on the left looks so much more badass and better drawn than the other two, its because he's actually been copy-pasted from a Brom piece, the back cover for the Cerulean Storm novel.  There he is, looking like the drummer in a rock band that plays weapons instead of instruments So, lets check out the contents: First we get an intro that tells us what artifacts are, how awesome and powerful they are, etc. It also mentions the artifacts that showed up in the Book of Artifacts: The Obsidian Man of Urik, The Silencer of Bodach, the Rod of Teeth and the Psychometrion of Nerid. It says that these artifacts were intentionally left out of this book to leave "more room" for new material. Normally this would be acceptable but actually reading the book makes it clear that its desperately hurting for actual page-count. It's only a 128 page paperback and only about 40 of those pages are dedicated to actual artifacts. It really sucks because the items in the Book of Artifacts were all very cool and flavorful and the book is desperately missing that. The Silencer in particular shares a close relationship with two of the other artifacts in the book, making its absence particularly notable. And with that we jump into the artifacts.  The Belt of Kings This is basically the artifact-level version of the magic item "the Belt of Dwarvenkind". It is a big leather belt decorated with gold and silver with a scary demon-face belt-buckle. It fits anyone between a Dwarf up to a Mul and is an ancient symbol of dwarfishness in Athas, from back when Dwarves actually had their own culture and kingdoms before the Sorcerer-Kings destroyed them in the Cleansing Wars. It was created by dwarven clerics and (despite the name) commonly worn by Dwarven generals and heroes. The final rightful wearer of the belt was Rkard, the last Dwarven King who fought and was slain by, one of the Champions of Rajaat: Borys of Ebe. The belt is from one of the Prism Pentad books where it was given to one of the main characters for a special mission and then it was returned to the Dwarves of Kled where it is guarded by the spirits of past wearers. The belt gives any dwarf wearing it a Charisma of 18 (non-dwarves get +4 to reaction bonuses towards Dwarves...unless they stole the belt, all dwarves know instantly if the belt is stolen on sight). All non-magical missiles are drawn to its invincible belt-buckle and inflict no damage to the wearer and the wearer gets the benefits of a ring of free action. The biggest bonus is that the wearer can draw on the battle-knowledge that has accumulated in the belt. Warriors fight as though they were 4 levels higher and non-warriors fight as though they were warriors of equal level. The wearer also gains proficiency in any weapon they wish. The belt's curse is that if the wearer ever unjustly takes the life of a dwarf the belt will immediately constrict to a diameter of 4 inches...crushing the wearer to death. Should the wearer survive or be Raised then anyone else wearing the belt will feel a compulsion to find and kill them. To destroy the belt it must be submerged in the blood of 100 murdered dwarves. The Dark Lens  The Prism Pentad books made the Dark Lens (along with the Pristine Tower) more or less the number one most powerful artifact of Athas. The Lens is the masterpiece of Rajaat, big ugly-pants father of magic himself. The lens is a polished egg-shaped orb of obsidian described as being "about the size of a small kank". That has to be one of the least helpful descriptions ever, considering a normal-sized kank is the size of a large horse or cow. The lens apparently weighs about 170 pounds so...maybe about the size of a person? Who here knows the density of obsidian? The raw power of the lens can be felt through intense heat that radiates from its surface. It was meant to serve as an amplifier for Rajaats massive magical and psionic powers and it was used in the creation of other powerful artifacts, namely the three swords: the Silencer, The Scourge and the Scorcher. After Rajaat's champions turned on him they used the Lens to imprison Rajaat in a pocket dimension called The Hollow. Then apparently they put it down someplace else and had a nap because the ultimate magical artifact to end all magical artifacts was then stolen by two dwarves. Wha-wha-whaaaaa. These two dwarves somehow stole the lens out from under the nose of the most powerful beings on the planet then took it and hid it in a "crystal pit" that they created...somehow and for some reason none of the sorcerer kings felt the need to look for it. After the two dwarves died attempting to protect the lens from a tribe of giants they rose as banshees and continue to guard it after death. Then a couple more tribes of giants showed up and the dwarven banshees apparently decided that they'd trick these giants into worshipping the Lens, ensuring they would guard it. The giants called it the Oracle and protected it until it was taken by two protagonists from the novels. Man, the Prism Pentad was pretty loving stupid. The Dark Lens is one of those artifacts that is just plain too powerful. I mean, that's kind of the point of artifacts but normally they're not so overwhelmingly powerful that a team of plucky heroes couldn't manage to overcome them. But the Lens is one of those that, in the hands of your enemies, means that anyone who tries to fight is doomed and in the hands of the PCs it turns everything into a cakewalk (not to mention getting the party wizard or psionicist to actually give up the thing later on). The artifact is only usuable by psionicists (although its meant to be used by multi-classed psionicist/wizards like the Sorcerer Kings and Rajaat himself). First you have to use the psionic power contact to link with the Lens (-4 penalty) while touching the lens. Every round the user fails to make contact they suffer 1d10 damage from the heat of the lens but once contact is made the damage stops. The Lens contains 500 Psionic Power Points that can be tapped to fuel the Lens' powers and these points get restored every 24 hours. The user can also use their own PSPs to activate it should they exhaust the Lens. The Lens acts as a Rod of Absorption and converts all magic it absorbs into PSPs (5 PSPs per level of the spell) and it lets the user use any psionic science or discipline that they know, have studied or seen used. It can also amplify magical power multiplying all elements of any spell cast through the Lens by 10. For perspective this means a 5th level wizard's fireball would inflict 50d6 damage, fill an area of 400 feet in diameter and having a range of 600 yards. Even a single Magic Missile from a first level wizard would inflict an unavoidable 10d4+10 damage. Oh, and saves against these spells are at -3. Those with the Lens can use its powers to simply create creatures, manifesting them as an act of will. The creatures cannot have more HD than the user and have only mundane abilities: no magic or psionic powers. This can be done 3 times per day and lasts for an hour. Four times per day the user can alter their form as per Polymorph...this is indefinite unless the effect is dispelled, the user wills it to end or their psychic contact with the Lens is severed. The Lens also has some random powers: while traveling across the silt sea the user will never be attacked by monsters, the user will not be attacked by undead and is always protected by a Mind Blank spell. Plus some actually random powers, rolled on the Immunities, Protection and Fate & Fortune. The curse of the dark lens is a 1% per use (cumulative) that they develop meglomania, believing the lens makes them invincible (they aren't far off frankly), complete unwillingness to be separated from the lens and a possible lust for world domination. There is no suggested means of destruction so long as the sorcerer-kings and Rajaat himself exist in any form. Heart(s) of the Drake     Just think, someone got paid for drawing these. Finally, an artifact (or set in this case) that isn't somehow tied into the horrible metaplot from the Prism Pentad. The Heart of the Drake (which really should be called Hearts of the Drakes I suppose) are a set of four artifacts which are the petrified hearts of elemental drakes imbued with incredible elemental powers. Well, moderate elemental powers, they're among the least impressive artifacts. The hearts were created by a druid about 1,000 years ago to try and defeat the sorcerer-kings. Believing that the drake's hearts contained the creature's connection to the elemental plane and the source of their power the druid spent decades hunting one of each drake species and performing a lengthy magical project to turn them into artifacts by gathering items of power and ancient pieces of elemental magic. Then he died of a heart attack at the age of 78 right when he finished. Wha-Wha-Whaaaaaah. No one even knew about this druid's goals or his creations until a wandering elf stumbled upon the cave where he lived and pilfered everything that looked valuable (assuming the hearts to be some kind of carving). Since then the hearts have passed through the hands of nobles and collectors until a few years ago when the Fire Drake heart came into the hands of a Dwarven fire-cleric who discovered its power. She then went on a quest for the other hearts after learning of their existence. However she mysteriously disappeared shortly thereafter, along with the Fire heart. On top of the druid's ignomious death the Hearts are not nearly strong enough to serve his purpose: they're powerful but not "topple a sorcerer-king" powerful. This isn't from the novels so it isn't allowed to kill sorcerer-kings like they were chumps. Each heart must be activated by anointing them in a piece of their element: sprinkling the earth heart with dirt, pouring water on the water heart, putting the fire heart in a campfire, and holding the air heart aloft under the open sky. This must be done once per day to keep their powers going. All the hearts share a power in common: while holding the heart you are invisible to elemental drakes of the heart's type so long as you do not do something to harm the drake. For some reason (probably bad editing) the Earth and Water drake hearts say the hearts make you immune to the earth and water based attacks of the corresponding drake, but the Air and Fire hearts don't have such a statement. However all other powers of the heart fail against Drakes of the heart's type. The Heart also grants +4 to saves from spells of the elemental sphere associated with the heart and allows the bearer to ignore 1s and 2s rolled from damaging spells from the sphere. *The Air Heart grants the ability to Fly (as the spell) at will and can also go without breathing for up to 12 hours per day and once per week they can remove all air from a 10-yard radius. The vacuum lasts 10 rounds and will kill creatures inside within 1d4 rounds unless they leave. The air heart can conjure a lesser air elemental once per week, create a gust of wind 5/day and cast cloudkill 1/day. Plus three random abilities rolled on the Elemental Air chart. The curse of the Air heart is a 1% cumulative chance per use that the user will suffer extreme pain on contact with the ground and suffering 1d10 damage per round of contact. (using the Flying ability constantly to avoid it, even while asleep) *The Earth Heart has probably the most powerful constant ability: it can prevent wizards from drawing power from the earth within 100 yards, stopping all wizardly magic (defiler and preserver), however this requires holding the heart in your hands and concentrating on it. Spells that wizards attempt to cast are used but have no effect. It also allows the bearer to continue breathing even when buried under the ground. The Heart can be used to gate in earth, filling a 50 foot cube around the user. Anyone trapped within the cube who fails their saves is caught and is slowly crushed to death (1d12 damage a round). It's unclear how the earth-heart user is meant to cope with this. They can meld with stone 3/day, animate rock 1/day, conjure a lesser earth elemental 1/week, and transmute rock to mud 1/day. Plus 3 random powers from the Elemental Earth table. The curse of the Earth heart is the inverse of the Air heart, 1d10 damage per round they are not in contact with the ground. This includes climbing trees and presumably being inside buildings without earthen floors. Like the Air heart there is a 1% cumulative chance per use of the heart that it starts. *The Fire Heart acts as a ring of fire resistance and cannot be harmed by the poisonous gasses, ash or proximity heat of volcanoes. They can also create non-magical fires (size of a campfire or smaller) at will. Once per day they can gate in fire from the plane of Fire as a 7th level fire cleric. If the user is already a fire cleric their power is doubled. Once per month the heart can be used to spontaneously combust a single humaniod of half-giant size or smaller. The fire does 1d10 damage per round until the target is dead and the flames will not go out until the magic is dispelled, the heart-bearer wills it or it is doused by a spell from the water heart. This also prevents raising from the dead with anything less than a Wish. The fire heart also lets you cast Delayed Blast Fireball 1/day, fire shield 1/day and light 3 times per day, plus 3 powers rolled randomly from the Elemental Fire chart. Is it just me or is the Fire Heart a lot more useful than the others? The curse is a 1% cumulative chance that the user loses a point of intelligence. Once their intelligence drops to 6 or less they basically have the mind and instincts of a fire-drake, seeking out a volcano to live. Despite this they recall how to use the fire heart and will use its powers to protect themselves. *The Water Heart allows the bearer to breath underwater and act without penalty (as per helm of underwater action). They also get aquaman powers: telepathically communicating with underwater creatures who react neutrally to them. The heart also allows the user to walk on water. All of these powers are, of course, next to useless in Athas. Twice per day they can dehydrate a creature, inflicting 8d8 damage unless they are immersed in water and once per month they can create 100 gallons of fresh water. The user can also conjure a lesser elemental 1/week, cast wall of ice 1/day and reflecting pool 1/day. Plus three random powers from the Elemental Water table. The water curse is a 1% chance per use to increase the users demand for water...5 times their normal intake! They can also never regain constitution lost to dehydration. The suggested means of destruction is to cast each heart into a mass of the elemental (powerful volcano, into a hurricane, etc) and casting resurrection. The heart will disappear and a week later an ancient drake of the appropriate type will appear. Next time I'll get back into some more terrible meta-plot artifacts from the first Prism Pentad novel.
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Apr 6, 2016 04:28
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Barudak posted:At first I was going to say the Water Heart would be extremely useful on Athas what with it being a free, endless source of water but 100 gallons of fresh water a month would take approximately 10 years to fill a single above ground pool's worth of water at which point you might as well travel across the ocean, learn to surf, and fight the techno-brain suckers for all the fun roleplaying that would be. Not to mention that if you fall under the Water Heart's curse you'll end up needing to consume 150 gallons of water per month in order to avoid dehydration. Even a low-level water cleric is actually a better source of magic water.
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Apr 6, 2016 06:03
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Bieeardo posted:I've always been halfway convinced that this book is mostly scraps of paper Bill Slaviscek left in his cubicle before quitting TSR. The copy I have is rife with awful grammatical errors, 'its' transposed with 'it's', and at least one of the front sections reads like point-form notes. A significant section of the book being fairly mundane (so to speak) life-shaped grafts and gear didn't help, though at least that stuff was arguably more useful than the artifacts. It's even more obvious when you realize that many of the life-shaped items in that section also appear in Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs, but with different rules (different damage, different HD, etc) and absolutely no explanation is provided for this inconsistency. It's not clear if this book is meant to serve as an errata for the Jagged Cliffs book or what.
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Apr 6, 2016 06:05
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Young Freud posted:What if I told you that you get about 61 gallons of water from using the daily Wall Of Ice spell instead? As far as I know, melted icewater from Wall Of Ice acts like regular water, with it turning to steam if it's melted instantly. That would be about 1930 gallons per month, including the 100 gallons of fresh water. And that's not assuming the Water Heart is treated as a 7th level cleric like the Fire Heart. Actually Dark Sun is one step ahead of you. Ice-producing spells such as Wall of Ice and Ice Storm produce only magical, temporary ice, evaporating into nothingness once the spell ends. The create water spell is the most effective form of large-scale water production. It's less effective in Athas (1/2 gallon per level per casting), but if a priest focused on pretty much nothing but Create Water spells they can produce a decent amount. A 6th level water cleric using all their 1st level spells for Create Water and their 3rd level spells for Create Food and Water produce about 18 gallons per day, That's a total of 540 gallons per month. High level clerics can produce even huger amounts once they can Gate in water. A 20th level cleric can, once per day, gate in 14 cubic feet of water which is about 100 gallons, meaning 3000 gallons per month. That would be in addition to 10 gallons per casting of Create Water.
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Apr 6, 2016 18:46
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One of the many, many nails in the coffin of any claim that Maga is "feminist" is the fact that it's so freaking fetishy...everyone is basically there to serve the author's/artist's kinks and frankly the only reason it's women killing and transforming men in horrible ways rather than vice versa is just because that's how the author's tastes swing. Then we get the feminism label draped over something that is clearly just thinly disguised wank material.
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Apr 7, 2016 20:08
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 Psionic Artifacts of Athas part 2: Metaplot Devices Okay, now we've already had some metaplot artifacts, the Belt of Kings and the Dark Lens, but that's just the tip of the ice berg. Metaplot artifacts really make up the bulk of this book's non-life-shaped artifacts.  The halfling with the pink afro might be the best illustration in this book. The Heartwood Spear The Heartwood Spear is from the very first Prism Pentad book and it's the weapon that was essential to the killing of King Kalak. The Spear is formed only of a single piece of wood and is perfectly smooth (no one told the artist that apparently) coming to an extremely sharp, natural point. For some reason, the first paragraph of it's history is very vague "It is thought that this artifact was once a piece of the Last Tree, although the only person who could verify this is Nok the Halfling. However, Nok perished in the battle with Sadira while attempting to retrieve Ktando's Cane and return it to the halflings of the forest ridge." Okay, well first and foremost none of that would make any sense to someone who hadn't read at least a summary of the Prism Pentad novels...and those who have read it know very well that the spear was pulled directly from the Last Tree and given to Rikus to slay Kalak. Oh, and then the history goes on to say just that. Nok gave the spear to Rikus once the halflings learned that King Kalak was going to turn into a dragon. We then have more metaplot: Rikus returns the spear, Nok gets mad at Sardira. They fight, Sardira wins and Nok turns the spear into a tree. That's right, this artifact effectively doesn't exist anymore! Thanks for wasting the page! The entry goes on to say that a powerful halfling like Nok may be able to create a new Spear from the last tree or return the tree-spear back to its original form...but still, the entire artifact section is so bloated with Prism Pentad related artifacts that it seems like including one that the metaplot already destroyed is pretty wasteful. Anyway, who does the spear actually do. It's a +5 Spear and it can ignore all armor, magical or otherwise and if it rolls maximum damage to an armored target the armor must make a save or be destroyed. Plus the bearer of the spear is immune to all nature-based magic (presumably this means druid spells?) and all psionics. I mean, it's certainly not bad, and if used properly it could be very effective at killing a target like a Sorcerer-King (who have relatively few HP for their level being psionicist/wizards, but impressive AC due to magical defenses and natural armor). Given that it doesn't actually protect against wizard magic few would-be-assassins are likely to get very close with it (notably, in the book it originates from the Spear is specifically intended to protect against wizardry). The suggested means of destruction (although it hardly needs it considering its now a tree) are to smash the spear against the glass of the obsidian plain or it will simply rot to pieces if it draws the blood of a halfling.  Ktandeo's Cane I always want to spell this as Ktandeo's Kane. So, this artifact is a complete and total disaster, but properly understanding why requires a bit of background on the Prism Pentad series, the series whose plot completely warped the setting of Athas and whose artifacts dominate this book. It all goes back to the Verdant Passage, the first Prism Pentad novel which, I will say, isn't all that bad by the standards of cheap, licensed fantasy novels. It did a pretty good job of getting the setting right, the plot was simple but not painfully dumb or anything and the changes it introduced to the setting (the death of King Kalak and the creation of the "Free City-State" of Tyr) are minor enough to be ignored easily if you don't like them and are actually a welcome bit of variety in the standard hot bleak mess that is Athasian life. It's one of the few elements of the metaplot I have no problem with keeping in the game. There was one area where the Verdant Passage differed significantly from the standard rules of Dark Sun, and I'll go out on a limb and say I think its actually an improvement, in that it didn't present preservers and defilers as a flat either-or dichotomy. Preservers knew how to draw magic without killing living things...but they still could defile if they wanted to (for more power) or if they had to (to cast a spell of greater power than they could normally). Honestly, I'd say that's a good thing, it makes life as a preserver more interesting and keeps things in a nice, morally ambiguous area where morality comes into question. Now, here's where things get hinky. In the book Ktandeo was Sardira's teacher, a human preserver who often used magic with the aid of his cane a wooden staff topped with an obsidian orb. The cane was a gift from the halfling cheiftan Nok. The Cane allowed Ktandeo to draw life-energy from his own body rather than the environment, allowing him to cast spells much more powerfully than he could as a preserver without risking the destruction of nearby things. It also seems to have served as a general amplifier of magic as well, but that could have been because the magic in the books was decidedly not very Vancian. Now, in Psionic Arifacts of Athas Ktandeo is apparently a halfling. Being a halfling he has no magical abilities and only uses the cane to cast wizard-like spells from his own life-force. Despite this he somehow is able to teach Sardira and her fellow preservers the methods for casting wizardry spells. So not only does this not really make any sense in the context of standard D&D rules it completely contradicts the book that the whole thing is based on. It was so confusing when I re-read this that I actually looked it up and supposedly the reason for the change is that the writer of the artifact entry got confused by the art piece chosen for the entry (see above), which depicts what is clearly a young, halfling holding the cane (which makes perfect sense as the cane was a gift to Ktandeo from the halflings and their creation). Somehow, the artist got the impression that this was supposed to be sardira's elderly human mentor and due to this misinterpretation came up with an entirely different purpose for the cane, to grant the halfling the illusion of being a wizard. Oh, and guess what, following the rest of the meta-plot-laden history we find out the cane has been shattered during Nok's fight with Sardira. Yet another destroyed artifact taking up page-count. Anyway, so what can the cane do? It can cast wizard-y spells as spell-like abilities, duplicating any wizard spells of 3rd level or less that the user has seen, up to 3 times per day. it can also cast globe of invulnerability 1/day, hold monster 2/day, suffocate 1/week, and protection from evil 10' radius 5/day. Plus a selection of random abilities: two from Major Spell-like Powers, one from Offensive Powers, and one from Protections. Its curse is drawing on the user's life force, aging the caster 6 months per use, 12 months per use if you use it more than 3 times per day. This is another deviation from the book, but a more understandable one given the difference in how spellcasting works. This would normally be fairly weak for most settings (an elf could use the cane all day) but Athas doesn't really have any extremely long-lived PC races. Suggested means of destruction: broken by an item made from the Last Tree, crushed under the foot of a 20th level or higher Defiler, or broken by an elderly halfling (oh hey, that already happened).  The Last Tree Now, we've moved on from metaplot artifacts that have already been destroyed to the metaplot artifact that made them in the first place, except you probably won't be able to get it to talk to you because you're "unworthy". Judgemental racist old tree. Oh, and this racist old tree that probably won't help you have over a full page dedicated to its incredibly dull history. The Last Tree isn't obviously actually the last tree...given its located in the Forest Ridge. However, it is a survivor of the Blue Age of Athas. It stands on the top of the highest mountain in the Forest Ridge, standing over 500 feet tall and a dozen yards wide. It's very big. As the Blue Age was ending there was a battle between the "good" Nature Masters and the evil "Nature-Benders". The leader of the nature masters, a halfling named Sull was mortally wounded and dragged himself to the top of a mountain, spoke magic words and turned himself into a tree. Now, you may be wondering how. No clue. Keep in mind that lifeshaping is not a form of magic. It's explicitly a scientific (very soft science, but still) process which simply involves combining the right ingredients in the right way. It, very clearly, does not involve magic words and likewise the ancient halflings did not practice magic at all, focusing exclusively on life-shaping. Now, this might be an acceptable level of vagueness given that life-shaping rules were introduced in a separate book...except that this one has an entire section dedicated to life-shaping and life-shaped creations. It probably has more material on life-shaping than the actual Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs book itself! Anyway, Sull's mind lives in the heart of the tree and is the last, true Nature Master in the world. Around the time of the cleansing wars a badly wounded halfling hunter stumbled upon the tree and Sull decided to reach down a branch and heal him. Tired for his ordeal the halfling hunter rested at the base of the tree for a few days. Naturally the tree was fairly depressed at the quality of its descendants. After leaving the tree the hunter returned a few weeks later with his village elders, including a Rain Cleric who found the tree an object of holy awe. For the next 2000 years rain clerics (why only rain?) from throughout the forest ridge came to the tree to speak to it and learn its wisdom. The Last Tree has shared wisdom and secrets with the halflings who come to it, the most prominent was the halfling chieftan Nok who used the Tree to create the Heartwoood Spear and Ktandeo's Cane. Of course, the halflings consider the Last Tree to be the greatest and most important secret of their people. The last tree will communicate only with halflings and apparently has not actually decided to share any knowledge of life-shaping (although, presumably if it learned of the halflings of the Jagged Cliffs it would be quite eager to help them restore their dying knowledge). On the one hand I can understand the tree being worried about throwing life-shaping "out there"...on the other hand Athas is pretty much on its last legs and one thing Life-shaping is really good at is environmental manipulation and restoration. The Tree is ancient but pretty much knows only about the Blue Age and life-shaping...it hasn't exactly been roaming the world. As far as what the tree can actually do: It can all upon chain lightning (from the mist around its branches) (twice per day) and use all the powers from the Healing and Nature tables at will. The tree is immune to psionics and to magical fire, but can be burned with normal fire (and I suppose any other sort of magical damage). It can produce 20 gallons of water per day. It's branches can produce enchanted weaponry (+1 to +5) if the tree wishes. It can also grant any of its own powers to a subject for 2d10 days. The tree could be destroyed by the eruption of the mountain it sits on, or by preventing it from receiving sunlight for 72 hours.  The rest look like this, but smaller The Orbs of Kalid-ma The Orbs of Kalid-Ma are, thankfully, not related to the metaplot and are instead a set of 5 obsidian spheres created to help one of the Sorcerer-Kings to transform into a dragon extra-fast. It's a fair bet that if a sorcerer-king dies, its because they were trying to rush their dragon-transformation in some way. The city of Kalidnay (Kalid-Ma's city-state) was destroyed in the process. Although: fun fact! It's not mentioned here but neither the city-state nor the sorcerer-king are actually destroyed. They're actually in Raveloft (having transferred there when Kalid-Ma's high priestess murdered her children to keep his botched ritual from killing him). Because when you think Gothic Horror you really think Dark Sun. Fortunately, the book declines to go down that particular rabbit hole and presents an alternate history where Kalid-Ma actually succeeds in jumping up 5 levels in the Dragon transformation process but the effect is too much for his mind to handle, driving him insane and turning him into a ravening beast. He wrecks the city and is eventually killed by the combined efforts of three other sorcerer kings. The orbs survived (Kalid-ma swallowed them as part of the transformation) and the sorcerer kings powers (magical and psionic) had transferred into them. There are 5 Orbs, each with a theme. The king's mind was shattered into each one, giving each an Ego score, making them capable of dominating the bearer and if all five orbs were brought together and swallowed by a pre-dragon (defiler/psionicist of 20th level or higher) then they would reconstitute Kalid-Ma, recreating him as a 27th level Dragon, with full access to his faculties once more. Even worse, the orbs combine their Ego rating when possessed by the same person (for those not familiar: you get dominated when the artifact's Ego exceeds your combined Intelligence, Charisma and Level (so once its greater than 30 most psions or wizards are probably starting to be at risk). The orbs are: The Protector: The smallest orb. It has an Ego of 10 and grants a constant protection from normal missiles spell and a +2 to all saves and MAC. Once per day it can function as a cube of force that lasts for one turn and gives you a random "what it protects you from" roll. This is actually a really lame power as it has really only about a 1-in-3 chance of being useful any time its used and it only lasts for 1 turn. It also grants immunity to illusions and mind blank as a constant effect and it can neutralize poison 1/day. Plus two abilities from the Immunities Table and one from Protections. The curse of this orb is the possessor believes themselves to be invulnerable and must make a wisdom roll to act in any way to try and defend themselves...which really sucks since that includes activating any of the orb's non-constant abilities. Orb of Minor Magic: That's a really unimpressive name. This Orb has an Ego of 18. The orb projects a constant minor globe of invulnerability and all your 1-3rd level wizard spells last twice as long. Plus you can cast Burning Hands 5/day, dancing lights 5/day, fear 3/day, sanctuary 5/day, and free action 1/day. Plus 4 random powers from the Minor Spell-like Abilities table and 1 from the Movement table. The curse of this orb is that it pollutes all water within 30' if used. Wow, that's actually really bad in Athas. The Confronter: This one has an Ego of 18 and is focused on offensive magic. It also enhances the user's physical abilities: +4 to damage rolls and treating 19 and 20's on attack as a double-damage critical hit. In addition, when casting a spell while holding the orb in your hand the spell's range is doubled, the duration is tripled and all 1's and 2's on damage dice are treated as 3's. Three times per day the user can get +5 to hit or reduce their THACO to 2, whichever is better, for one hour. Once per week the orb can stop time within a 30 yard radius for 1d6+1 rounds. Twice per day it can reflect attacks (physical or magical). Finally it can energy drain 1/week, cast strength 3/day, call lightning 1/week, haste 1/day, flaming sphere 5/day, and shocking grasp 5/day. Plus 3 powers from the Combat table, two from Minor spell-like abilities and one from major spell-like abilities. The orb's time stop causes all dead creatures in the area to rise up and attack the nearest living being as standard zombies. Plus the spell-like abilities drain the surroundings as though cast by a defiler (aging the user a year if no plants are available). The Orb of Schools: This orb has an Ego of 22, spelling trouble for most people in combination with another orb. If the possessor of the orb is a wizard then they can choose a school of magic at the start of each day and memorize two extra spells per level for that school. It also takes 1/4th the time to memorize evocation spells but three times as long to memorize illusion spells (reflecting Kalid-Ma's preferences). Once per day the user can gain a 50% magic resistance to spells of a particular school, lasting for 12 hours. They can also pick a school and a target and twice per day inflict a -3 penalty to all the target's saves against that school, lasting until the target fails a save. It can also cast Avoidance 1/day, Merciful Shadows 7/day, aerial servant 1/week, grease 3/day, wizard eye 3/day, detect magic 3/day, charm person 2/day, wall of force 1/day, chill touch 5/day, polymorph other 3/day and weird 1/week. Plus a lot of random powers 2 from Abjurations, 2 from Conjurations, 2 from Detection, 1 from Enchantment, 1 from Major Spell-like abilities, 2 from minor spell like powers, and one from offensive powers. The curse is a cumulative 1% chance per day of the owner gaining the arrogance of a sorcerer-king, insisting on being treated as though he were one. The Mindbender: The largest orb, 24 inches (remember, these things were intended to be swallowed 0.o), with an Ego of 26. It is the entirity of Kalid-Ma's psionic abilities. It grants the possessor all 5 psionic attack and defense modes and a +4 to MAC and MTHACO. It also has 200 PSPs to draw from to fuel the user's powers or the powers of the orb. If the bearer is only a wild talent they gain the abilities of a 4th level psionicist (6th level for defilers) this is treated as dual or multi-classing depending on race and grants hit points and all the other benefits of the class levels. A psionicist gains 4 levels of experience from the orb (6 levels if they are a multi-class defiler/psionicist). All these bonuses are lost if the orb is. The possessor of the orb can choose to ignore the effect of one psionic discipline once per day for 12 hours. Twice per day the bearer can reflect a psionic attack back to the source and twice per day they can inflict -5 to someone's MTHACO which lasts until the victim succeeds at a roll. It also grants the powers of detect psionics 3/day, know direction at will, displacement for 1 hour 1/day, see magic at will, inflict pain at will, true sight for 1 turn 1/hour, life draining for 1 turn 2/day and ultrablast 1/week and a permanent mind blank effect. And of course random powers!! one from Detection, four from Psionic Devotions, three from Psionic Sciences, and one from Protections. The curse is a 1% cumulative chance per day that the bearer ignores their primary class in favor of psionics. If they are defiler this has no effect, if they are a preserver then they will turn towards defiling. They don't just neglect their current class...they lose all levels in it, becoming a pure psionicist or a multiclass psionicist/defiler. If they ever lose the orb they lose all psionic abilities it granted them...which may leave them as a 0 level character. If you have multiple orbs you get additional benefits, but they're all from random tables and I'm so tired of typing those out. Suffice it to say: more random spell-like abilities the more orbs you have. Of course once you've got 4 or more orbs the ego score is at a minimum of 68, meaning that there is no chance of a character resisting domination suggested means of destruction: shatter the orbs against the walls of the Pristine Tower, strike the orbs with Tari bone (the race kalidma was to exterminate), cover them in the blood of two sorcerer kings, drop all five into a cauldron of boiling gold. Thats it for now, next time we'll get some slightly more interesting artifacts
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Apr 9, 2016 03:16
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Angry Salami posted:So... is there any way a player (or, indeed, any character) could work out how these are meant to be used? Because, sure, maybe I just play with boring groups, but I'm pretty sure nobody I know would react to "You find a mysterious orb of unknown magical power" with "I swallow it!" The orbs only have to be eaten in order to complete the final transformation into Kalid-Ma, for ordinary use they merely need to be in the user's possession or (for some uses) held in the hand.
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Apr 9, 2016 20:05
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I assume that the entire point was that Hercules is an rear end in a top hat. That is, Heroes represent a modern version of mythological heroes such as Hercules, Perseus, Susanoo, etc. who are famous for their feats of monster slaying while the PCs are playing the Hydra, the gorgon, the manticore, etc. The idea being that the reversal of perspective shows that the monsters are the persecuted "Other" while the Heroes are bullies and brutes who are known and loved because history was written by the winners. Thus the foes of Beasts are sarcastically called by the same title. Except of course, from the sound of it, Heroes are pretty much perfectly justified in their desire to slay Beasts and apparently the only reason Beasts could even be remotely considered positive is that they serve some kind of cosmically necessary role...because the game says so.
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Apr 9, 2016 21:33
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You know, it wouldn't even take that much to "save" the Beast concept (although its still not great for traditional WOD style play), just don't completely vilify the Heroes. Both the Beast and Heroes are trapped in a cycle of reliving the old stories and legends that mankind has, essentially, left behind. The Beasts must inflict terror and horror on the helpless and the Heroes must spend their life in obsessive pursuit of their prey (ignoring things like family and friends in pursuit of their quest)...both are equally out of date: we don't need Beasts to teach us that there are dangers in the world and the problems of the modern world are too complex to be solved with a sword and a loincloth. Half the problem with Beast's tone is the eye-rolling "victimhood" of the Beasts in the face of a society that just doesn't realize that the Beast is terrorizing and hurting people "for their own good". oriongates fucked around with this message at 00:26 on Apr 11, 2016 |
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Apr 11, 2016 00:21
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Psionic Artifacts of Athas part 3: Slightly More Interesting Artifacts Now we're almost done with meta-plot junk (There's still the Scourge of Rkard but at least that's a respectable magic sword) so lets get on with the artifacts!  The Planar Gate Guess what, in this book, this is the first actual psionic artifact and it is one of only two psionic artifacts. That's right, in a book titled "Psionic Artifacts of Athas" there are only two actual psionic artifacts. There's a couple more artifacts that have psionic effects (the Dark Lens or the Mindbender Orb) but they're still explicitly magical artifacts that interact with psionics. The Planar Gate is something that wouldn't be very impressive outside of Athas. You see as the "Multiverse" of D&D became more interconnected via series like Planescape and Spelljammer the differences in Athas became a bit starker...why didn't it have any Gods when they're everywhere in the rest of the universe, why don't the Sorcerer-Kings just open up doors to nicer places and leave this ruined world behind? Why does their magic kill plants? Well, apparently not linking Athas to the rest of the multiverse was just unthinkable so the explanation became that Athas was simply cut off...its crystal sphere is completely impermeable, totally blocking Athas from Spelljamming and the Outer Planes are "insulated" from Athas by a demi-plane unique to Dark Sun called "The Black", sort of a poor-man's Plane of Shadows, and the souls of the dead in Dark Sun go to another demi-plane called The Gray, which also serves the function of the Ethereal Plane. As a result, spells that communicate with or reach out to the Outer Planes are extraordinarily difficult to pull off, to the degree that most mages, priests and psionicists don't even realize these other planes exist. The Planar Gate was designed by master psionicists of the Green Age who did learn of the Outer Planes and had a desire to learn more about them. The Gate resembles a giant mirror and was constructed by the city of Giustenal, before the city was sacked by the sorcerer-king Dregoth. When Dregoth was slain by his fellow sorcerer-kings to keep him from completing his transformation into a true dragon and returned to life as an undead, he continued to use the mirror (hidden in the caverns below Giustenal) as a research tool. Having learned about the truth of the Outer Planes and the other worlds in the Material Plane Dregoth has learned about the existence of true gods and seeks to transform himself into one (something that is fortunately impossible in Athas). The Gate is sentient, possessing an artificially created psionic intelligence to control its powers and generate its own psionic power points...well, in theory because the book never says how many PSPs the gate actually has! This is pretty important since the Gate uses up one PSP per round to keep itself focused once a destination has been "set"...so I guess the Gate can display an image for anywhere from a few minutes to....maybe an hour (assuming it has more PSPs than the Dark Lens itself). A PSP per round doesn't give you a lot of time. The Gate has an INT of 15 and can speak psionically in the languages of the ancient Green Age and the language of old Giustenal. It's not one for idle talk but it has no problem explaining its function and purpose to those who ask. The Gate is neutrally aligned and doesn't judge those who use it, as far as its concerned serving Dregoth is perfectly fine. However, it does see itself as purely a tool of learning and research and will refuse to help someone pursue acts of true evil or conquest (something Dregoth has carefully avoided). To actually get the Gate to focus you've got to use the Clairvoyance power (using your own PSPs) and maintain the power yourself until the gate successfully zeroes in on the plane you want. If its a plane the Gate knows already then you can ask the Gate to find it for you (which takes 1d6+1 rounds) but if you're trying to find a plane the Gate doesn't know about then you have to pick a number between 1 and 100 then keep rolling 1d100 each round until you hit the number you picked (paying the cost to maintain your clairvoyance power each round). Once its focused you can use the Probability Travel psionic power to use the Gate as a portal to the plane in question. Again, you pay the cost in PSPs yourself. Once you're through the gate you can see the return portal as a shimmering light that is invisible to everyone else and can use Probability Travel again to go back through. Of course, if the Planar Gate runs out of PSPs then you're effectively trapped in the other plane and probably can't get back to Athas (although odds are good you're "stranded" somewhere nicer). Which makes the fact that they completely forgot to tell us how many PSPs the gate has even more important. 100 PSPs means the gate only holds for 10 minutes...so even if the gate has twice as many PSPs at the Dark Lens it could only stay open about an hour and 40 minutes. Oh, and there are also absolutely no rules for "targeting" the Gate...considering the other Planes are infinite and all the benefits of gating back and forth are pretty limited if you can't control where you'll end up. I wouldn't be surprised if the ancient researcher notes on the Gate pretty much consist of things like "Plane # 5: looks like a nice field, I saw a rabbit." and "Plane #2: looks like a horrible place, lots of pointy things in the distance. I think I saw a bird, but you know an evil bird." The Gate has no powers or functions beyond that. The Gate is also exceptionally easy to destroy. It can simply be broken (AC 2, 100 HP) with ordinary attacks. It'll explode violently (10d10 damage within 100 yards) if targeted with an actual Gate spell, and it'll destroy itself if it finds its been used for evil or destructive purposes.  The Psionatrix The second actual psionic artifact and another creation of the Green Age. There's a line in the description claiming that it is a "fusion of magic and psionics", like the Dark Lens but not only does it have no magical abilities it also predates Rajaat, meaning magic didn't exist when it was created. The Psionatrix is pretty much exactly what you might think: it's a powerful source of psionic abilities and power points. It featured in an adventure called Dragon's Crown where a powerful psionicist amplified one of the Psionatrix's powers to suppress psionic abilities (its not clear why) and at the end the psionatrix gets destroyed by a magic item called the water hammer. Yet another wrecked artifact...at least the Psionatrix isn't completely wrecked: its largest shard retains a fraction of its former power. But still, almost half of these artifacts have already been destroyed! The original Psionatrix provides unlimited PSPs to anyone in contact with it and access to all psionic attack and defense modes. It also doubles the range of all psionic powers. and "all MAC scores are halved for chances of success" I can honestly say I have no idea what that means. I know what MAC is...but its just like normal AC in second edition ranging from 10 to -10...what does "halving" your MAC mean? Once per day it can inhibit psionic powers within 1 mile, quadrupling the cost of all psionic powers and "all MAC rolls are doubled" Again, I don't know what that means...there's no such thing as a MAC roll and even if there was how would "doubling" the roll work...that's...that's just not how any rules in D&D work. The psionic dampening effect also drives Thri-kreen into a primal state, shutting off their higher mental functions and reducing them to mindless pack hunters. The psionatrix also provides some psionic powers: all around vision constantly, blink 3/day, displacement for one hour 1/day, project force 1/day and protection from magic for one hour 1/day. Plus three random Powers from Psionic Devotions, one from Psionic Sciences and one from Protections. The lesser version contains a reservoir of 100 PSPs every day, and gets access to Ego Whip and Mind Blank. Its dampening field is much weaker, only 100 yards wide and lasting 1d2+2 minutes. It triples the cost of all psionic powers and is merely uncomfortable for thri-kreen. It still grants All-round vision, blink 3/day, displacement for one hour 1/day, and protection from magic for one hour 1/day. It gets two random powers from Devotions and one from Protections. The only way to destroy the psionatrix is with the Water Hammer (no information on what the hammer does beyond that), which will reduce the original version to the lesser version and destroy the lesser version completely.  The Scorcher And now we come to the sister blade of the (much cooler) Silencer of Bodach. Just like the Silencer the Scorcher was Rajaat as a gift to one of his Champions: Myron the Troll Scorcher. The sword is made from an unidentifiable red metal and the handle is wrapped in the hide of an ancient fire drake and a a tooth from that same drake adorns it. Black flames wrap the sword when wielded in combat. Myron, the bearer of the Scorcher apparently betrayed Rajaat, questioning his purpose in the Cleansing Wars. Rajaat discovered Myron's treachery and killed him, recruiting Hamanu to replace him. After Rajaat was killed Hamanu kept the Scorcher until Dregoth started showing signs of completing his dragon transformation. Unwilling to deal with two all powerful Dragons the lesser sorcerer-kings gathered to slay him. The Scorcher was used to strike the killing blow against Dregoth. Apparently the rest of the sorcerer-kings got worried by just how powerful the Scorcher was too so they had it cast into the Silt Sea and erased it from history. The sword stayed at the bottom of the silt sea for centuries until it was swallowed by a silt horror, which was subsequently killed and the blade retrieved by an ex-gladiator. The Scorcher isn't sentient but it is eager to serve a purpose, for good or evil. If it is in the possession of someone who doesn't have a driving purpose then it will conveniently become lost or it will call to those within 30 miles who might make use of it. The sword is a +3 longsword but if it is wielded by someone with a Strength of 17 or more it has the speed of a short sword. It also inflicts an additional 1d4 damage from the black flames if it hits its target. The bearer of the Scorcher has immunity to mind altering spells and imposes a -5 to MTHACO rolls for mind-altering psionics. It also grants immunity to fire. It also completely ignores magical defenses, which makes it (like the Heartwood Spear) one of the best tools for busting through the magical defenses of sorcerer-kings. The sword also has special powers depending on the alignment of the wielder. Lawful owners can treat the sword as a Vorpal weapon, neutral owners can treat it as a sword of wounding and chaotic owners treat it as a sword of sharpness. It also can slay living against an opponent struck 1/week, blur constantly while being held, true seeing 1/day, wall of fire 1/day, cast cure serious wounds on the wielder 3/day, and a constant protection from both good and evil. Its curse is that the wielder of the sword remains fixated on their purpose (no rules are provided for this) and each wielder is subject to a different, random curse from the Curses table. For perspective this can range from "goofy" curses like swapping gender or suffering deafness so people have to shout to be heard to awful ones like terminal diseases or progressive total amnesia. Suggested means of destruction are shattering the Scorcher against the Silencer or feeding the blade to a water drake.  Scourge of Rkard The Scourge of Rkard is the younger sibling to the Scorcher and the Silencer...and its a metaplot item! The Scourge was made for the Dragon himself, Borys of Ebe. The name came from when Borys overthrew Rkard, the last Dwarven king (and the last bearer of the Belt of Kings). Somehow Borys lost the Scourge (what the hell is with the Champions and completely forgetting they are the frigging masters of magic and not remembering how to cast a simple spell to find the all-powerful artifacts they keep misplacing?) The sword was apparently being kept by the dwarves of the village of Kemelok, who are also the keepers of the Belt of Kings. During one of the less memorable Prism Pentad books Rikus was lent the Belt of Kings and the Scourge to fight the armies of Urik. At the end of the battle he returned the belt to the dwarves but was allowed to keep the Scourge. At the climax of the Prism Pentad series Rikus is locked in battle with Borys, the Dragon. During the fight the Scourge snaps in half at which point it inexplicably begins to ooze a black substance which conveniently kills Borys. That's right, yet another god-drat artifact that is already destroyed!!! Oh well...at least this one comes with rules for actually fixing it. The Scourge is (or was I guess) a two-handed bastard sword +4 (+6 vs sorcerer-kings) which can be used one-handed if you have a Strength of 20 or higher. It can also damage creatures from the Shadow World (I guess they mean the Black, there is nothing in Athas called "the shadow world) and inflicts double damage to them. It acts as a vorpal weapon and cuts through any wood without effort and any obsidian weapon it touches will shatter (magical ones get a save). It also enhances the bearers hearing...for some reason. It gives an increase of about 100 times normal, allowing you to hear sounds up to a mile away. If the sword is broken its two pieces will leak black ichor which consumes whatever they come into contact with, it is only possible to stop this by burning the ichor away if done within a minute of exposure. If the pieces of the sword are held together for a month they'll mend themselves. The sword can be used to inspire allies, granting a +2 to hit/damage and saves for one battle or until the wielder falls in battle. This can be done once per day. It also functions as a +2 ring of protection while held and makes the wielder immune to poison. The curse of the sword is is that if the wielder ever comes into contact with any of the other sorcerer-kings they must make a Save at -5 to avoid just attacking them outright and fight them to the death (to the wielders death, since the Scourge has none of the impressive defenses or offensive abilities of the Scorcher or the Heartwood spear). Additionally if the Scourge ever is used to slay a dwarf again its original purpose: the death of dwarves, will be revived. For each dwarf the wielder slays there is a 5% cumulative chance that the wielder will start a crusade of extermination against the dwarven race. suggested means of destruction are to bathe it in the waters of Rajaat (who's water now). Place it in the bottom of the Silt Sea for a decade (that's...pretty easy) or have it melted down by a pure-hearted dwarf. And there we go that is all the full-fledged artifacts in the book! After this is an incredibly dull few pages of randomly generated Powers. I'll spare you them and instead I think I'll give a summary on some of the things the book should have included, the much better written Artifacts from the Book of Artifacts: the Silencer, the Psychometron, the Obsidian Man and the Rod of Teeth.
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Apr 11, 2016 02:50
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Nessus posted:I thought it was the other way around, that Athas was such a titanic cosmic shithole that if stuff from Athas leaked out it would be like unleashing cats and rats into the tender ecology of a Polynesian island. If people could leave Athas, they would in droves, but they'd be like the Fremen in Dune. It's really never been quite clear. Part of the answer is that the rules Dark Sun works with (different magic, different priests, etc) are just too different and no one wanted to really bother with questions like "does a defilier defile in Forgotten Realms? What if a forgotten realms character comes to Athas?" Late TSR focused really obsessively crossing over material and ensuring that you knew that everything was totally happening in the same mega-universe that totally works together under one rule system! Athas screwed with this in a bunch of annoying minor ways. But of course, one of the big themes of Athas is that it isn't a place with happy endings...and if nicer places are just a Plane Shift or a Gate spell away then your happy ending is just getting to a high enough level to cast them and get the gently caress out of dark sun. Maybe bring some friends along with you. Find a nice god who'll give you an afterlife. But really all of this could have been solved by simply saying "Dark Sun doesn't take place in the larger Great Wheel cosmology" (much like Eberron in 3rd edition) and bam...everything's fine. But nope, they had to come up with some way to tie in with the rest and therefore come up with a ridiculously elaborate mini-cosmology where in Athas technically exists alongside all other settings but its hard to leave but there's also the Black (so shadow illusions work) and the Grey (so ethereal spells work and there's a place for dead spirits to be). It was ridiculous.
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Apr 11, 2016 05:41
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Dark Sun's screwed up cosmology is given more focus in Defilers and Preservers which is definitely going to be my next F&F after I finish Psionic Artifacts of Athas.
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Apr 11, 2016 06:24
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Night10194 posted:
That's why Cabals are so important for Global or Cosmic games. I think a lot of people skip over the Cabal section and just read "Cabal" as "fancy name for a Party of PCs". But a Cabal is basically meant to be a small-scale cult or conspiracy with a single goal. Whether it's promoting their kooky religion, burning someone else's kooky religion to the ground, secretly controlling city government, turning yourself into a magickal version of the mafia, etc. It becomes easier at Cosmic level where players are aware of the Invisible Clergy and almost every Cabal is centered around promoting a candidate for Ascension, trying to take down an existing member of the Clergy or trying to block someone else's Ascension attempt. All of these things are important enough that they could pull together multiple adepts and avatars despite their eccentricities. But if you just try and do "you meet in a bar" with a group of Adepts then you should pretty much expect things to burn to the ground
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Apr 12, 2016 19:34
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Psionic Artifacts of Athas part 3: A Brief Interlude So, I mentioned at the start of the review that Psionic Artifacts of Athas is basically a setting specific version of the more general Book of Artifacts, just a bit more schizophrenic and with a lot of lamer, mostly destroyed artifacts. So in the interest of sharing some actually good artifacts of Athas, I figured I'd go ahead and include the artifacts from the Book of Artifacts that come from the Dark Sun setting.  The Obsidian Man Of Urik The Obsidian Man is a statue of pure obsidian in the shape of a man dressed like a nobleman. The statue is 12 feet tall and perfectly shaped and proportioned with no signs of chisel-marks or tools...the surface is perfectly smooth. The statue was discovered in an obsidian mine in the Smoking Crown mountains when miners came upon the figure buried in a seam of black glass. They chipped away until they managed to completely unearth the statue, under orders from the templar in charge of the mine, and loaded it up to transport to Urik and present it to king Hamanu. However, the journey would last several days and the first night they stopped and in the morning they found 13 people gruesomely crushed to death during the night. The templars were too eager to deliver the statue to the king so they decided to push on. Every night more men were murdered. Naturally the templars suspected the statue, especially since its guards were among the ones killed, but each morning it was back in its place, unmoving. Dozens of people died during the journey. Finally the Obsidian Man was brought to Hamanu who examined the figure for several hours...ultimately unable to discover anything he retired for the night in frustration, leaving 20 half giants to guard the statue and went to his library to research the matter. However, in the middle of the night he was disturbed by the sound of battle. He rushed out just in time to see the entire guard defeated and the gates of his palace smashed open. He followed the trail of the Obsidian Man, encountering it in the middle of the city where the two did battle. Eventually, badly wounded, the sorcerer-king finally defeated the Obsidian Man and created a golden circlet to bind it to his will. With experimentation Hamanu discovered the Obsidian Man had several unusual powers but he never could find any clue to its origin or nature. He also learned that daylight rendered the Man immobile and powerless. Seven years ago a young templar (for reasons unknown) removed the circlet from the Obsidian Man's brow and was immediately killed. The statue escaped the city, walking out into the desert and disappearing. Two years ago the golden circlet itself was stolen from king Hamanu's palace. The thief was never caught and no sign of the circlet has been seen since. You see, that's a good artifact background, mysterious, intriguing and not just another "Rajaat or a Sorcerer-King made this". Something even one of the sorcerer-kings finds mysterious and dangerous is a good sign as well. The Obsidian Man is mainly a kind of super-golem. It has 150 hp, AC -5, gets two attacks per round (THACO 5) and inflicts 5d12 damage per hit. It's movement rate is 15 and it has a strength of 25. It can only be harmed by metal weapons of +3 or greater enchantment. It is immune to all psionics except psychokinetics, and all magic except for cone of cold, Stone Shape(which does 1hp of damage per level), and Stone To Flesh (which sets the Man's AC to 10 for one round only). All of its saves are as a 20th level fighter. Reducing its hp to zero does not destroy it, merely making it inert until the next night at which point it reanimates with full hp. In addition it can Fly on command for one hour per day. It can also create a wall of fire once per day that lasts an hour. It can stone shape by touch and cast passwall at will. It also has a ranged attack, a beam of black fire that inflicts a flat 25 points of damage (save for half) and a 60 yard range. Finally, it can cast finger of death once per week. The curse of the obsidian man is that its a mindless killing machine who obeys no orders. The golden circlet can control it, but even with that it must be allowed to kill a sentient being every night or it will turn on its controller. It also drains the life of the user if commanded to use an invoked power, permanently draining 1 hp. suggested means of destruction are exposure to 24 hours of continuous sunlight or cutting out its heart with a +5 weapon and throwing it into the lava of the smoking crown mountains.  The Psychometron of Nerad The Psychometron is a small clear gem about an inch in diameter, mounted in a headband of gold and leather. The creator of the Psychometron is Nerad the Wise, the first preserver to attempt an Avangion transformation. Unfortunately he was not as secretive as he should have been and the Dragon hunted him down. Anticipating his defeat Nerad gave his most valuable possession, the Psychometron, to one of his retainers and instructed her to flee with it. The woman took the circlet to a community of Villichi in the Tablelands in order to seek aid and shelter. Since then the Villichi have used it to defend themselves in times of need (if you aren't familiar, the Villichi are a society of albino psychic amazons). The Psychometron grants a +2 to saves and all power scores for telepathy and metapsionics. It also contains 150 PSPs (which regenerate at 25 per hour), It also radiates nondetection and blocks all attempts to scry or locate the owner psionically or magically. If the Psychometron is within the radius of a defiling effect it sacrifices 1 PSP per yard to keep the defiler magic from destroying the area. This doesn't stop the spell, just the defiling side effect. It also includes the following psionic abilities which can be fueled by its own PSPs or the PSPs of the wearer: aura sight, aversion, awe, complete healing, contact, displacement, energy containment, mind bar, mind link, radial navigation and teleport. The curse of the Psychometron is fairly mild, it is imbued with Nerad's personality and drives, leading to artifact possession. Victims become driven to end slavery and oppression, the rule of the sorcerer-kings in particular. Suggested means of destruction are feeding it to an Earth Drake or keeping light from touching it for 99 years.  The Rod of Teeth This is a bone club studded with human teeth and covered in strange runes and symbols. It is a relatively minor, but interesting, artifact. The Rod was carved by a defiler named Atlak-Ta, the fetish keeper of Lalai-Puy, sorcerer-queen of Gulg over 600 years ago. It was passed on to his apprentice and since then has moved through the hands of several powerful defilers over the years. The rod is treated as a Rod of Absorption, able to store one spell-level per tooth in the rod (currently 33). However, whenever a charge is used there is a 10% chance a tooth falls out. It also functions as a +2 weapon (inflicting 1d8+2 damage) and grants its bearer a +2 to saves against necromancy. In addition, a wizard struck by the rod must save Vs spells or lose 1d6 spells (highest first) which are transferred to the wielder who can cast them as though they were a wizard (or if they are a wizard, they're added to their currently memorized spells). The curse of the rod is that anyone using it has their alignment eventually shifted to chaotic evil. Every time it is used there is a 5% chance that the rod actually steals the entire mind of the wizard, not just their spells. The struck wizard's mind replaces the rod-wielders and killing the original body. The new entity has the physical stats of the rod wielder and the mental traits and class abilities of the victim. leads to an interesting possibility of an evil wizard or psionicist intentionally allowing a powerful minion (like a half giant) to beat them with the rod until they mind swap. The rod becomes powerless once it loses all of its teeth or returning all the teeth to their original bodies.  The Silencer Of Bodach My personal favorite artifact, even if it is a "Rajaat made this" artifact. Also, let me say the really nice, clean black and white art of the book of artifacts really puts the wobbly, cartoony work in the Psionic Artifacts of Athas book to shame. The Silencer is a 7 foot long, 7 inch wide sword made from the same red metal as the Scorcher. During the cleansing wars the silencer was crafted for Irikos, the "left hand of Rajaat" and got it's name from the city of Bodach. Bodach was an extremely powerful "neutral city" during the Cleansing Wars. Using the sword, Irikos slew the armies of Bodach and sacked the city...however the wizards of Bodach worked together to cast a powerful spell, killing both themselves and Irikos. Only the silencer itself survived. The weapon was found in the ruins of bodach by an adventurer who used it to gather an army of raiders and bandits. However, she overstepped herself and engaged in a full-on assault of the city of Balic. The sorcerer king and his armies slaughtered the desert savages. The sword was carried away into the desert by one of her lieutenants. The Silencer is a +5 Two Handed Sword which can be used one-handed like a longsword. It also cuts through any non-metal substance without resistance, ignoring non-metal armor and even carving through solid stone at 10 feet per round. It also grants its owner a +2 AC bonus. It can be swung in huge arcs to magically attack everyone (-4 penalty) within a 10 foot radius. three times per day it can project a bolt of force which, if it strikes the ground or a building, acts as the earthquake spell. if it strikes a creature it inflicts 5d10 damage. And 3 times per day it can protect its owner with a Tower of Iron Will. Plus 3 random abilities from enchantment, and one from protection. The curse is bloodlust, every day the weilder must make a save or lose a point of wisdom. and it inflicts artifact possession, driving the wielder to acts of violence and conquest...plus a fanatical loyalty to Rajaat. That's it for this interlude, back to the main book with the next post. oriongates fucked around with this message at 21:02 on Apr 14, 2016 |
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Apr 14, 2016 20:37
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Yeah, I remember those I had them and a book of magic items which managed to be even worse because it would print a version for each magic item from every different book, magazine or setting it had been in. So you had copy after copy of the same magic items with slightly different entries. Still, gotta love the huge tables for wands of wonder or decks of many things. Because in high school I was "that guy" who always played the wild mage.
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Apr 14, 2016 22:42
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Psionic Artifacts of Athas part 5: Life Shaped Items So, as I mentioned we are at the end of the traditional artifacts in the book already (including the mere 2 actual psionic artifacts). Next we've got 15 solid pages of random artifact power charts. Because 2nd edition. I won't bother you with the details on the tables, suffice it to say that its mostly dull lists of spell-like abilities usable X times/Y. After that we reach Chapter 2: Life Shaped Items. That's Items, not artifacts. These are just standard, halfling-made life-shaped creatures (although mixed in are several of the items that were previously referred to as rhulhisti artifacts: life-shaped objects that can't be recreated). The chapter starts with a bit of a dumbed down introduction to the history of life-shaping similar to the contents of the Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs book. Really, this whole section comes off as something like errata for the rules from Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs as it doesn't mention several very unpleasant rules that came up in Windriders. For instance, life-shaped weapons and armor apparently don't suffer damage from use. Most life-shaped items now have a "dormant" stage where they can last for centuries without feeding or care. There's one big problem: at no point are these differences actually addressed. They seem unwilling to come right out and say "hey, the life-shaped items we originally made were way more trouble than they were worth, here are better rules for making them more playable." Instead they vaguely say:  The goal seems to be to create the opportunity for life-shaped items or creatures to appear as loot. On the one hand re-enacting scenes from Alien with weird, horrifying life-shaped creatures isn't a bad goal...on the other hand the idea of life-shaped "loot" is kind of laughable considering the care and feeding that they still require (including cahm-rahn for most of them). Even more laughable is the claim that life-shaped creatures have "evolved" in the wild since the Wind-riders of the Jagged Cliffs books makes it very clear that the life-shaped are completely incapable of living independent lives for a full generation, let alone actually evolving on their own. Of course, this problem could be easily solved by saying that the original life-shaped creations were capable of breeding, feeding themselves, etc and that the life-shaped of the Jagged Cliffs are inferior versions that depend on purified nutrient solution and oxygenated fluid baths because the Jagged Cliffs halflings are lovely life-shapers (or have intentionally sabotaged the process to keep the life-shaper's monopoly). But the book doesn't seem willing to address that. There's a few pages on how you can try and incorporate the life-shaped into regular Dark Sun adventures in the Tyr Region and then we get into a big list of life-shaped items. Many of them are duplicates of items from the Jagged Cliffs book but with odd differences. For instance, arm-blades do 1d6 damage instead of 1d8 (making them just short swords that are tough to put down) and has only 1 HD. In fact almost everything has 1 HD or less. Presumably they didn't feel the need to make them so tough since they won't be taking damage with every blow anymore. Of course, the "AoE vs Lifeshaped" rule has not been mentioned at all...so presumably a single area-of-effect spell is death for all lifeshaped now rather than simply most. I won't re-post every single life-shaped object, but here are some of the more interesting ones that aren't simply re-prints.  This is a parasitic life-shaped item...essentially the life-shaped equivalent of a "cursed" item. Note that although it says that the host has two rounds to try and pull it off before it burrows into his flesh...but it doesn't provide any suggestions on how that should be handled mechanically. I guess just stabbing it could work.  While most of the re-printed life-shaped items are fairly similar with a few numbers changed the Climbing Boots are very different. These boots are actual grafts that clamp onto your feet and never let go. They can only be cut off and no rules are provided for what happens if the boots die of old age, disease or some other circumstances. The upside is that they provide a much bigger climbing bonus (+25% vs +5%) and let you do things like hang upside down by your feet.  This is probably one of the worst life-shaped things ever without being an actual parasite. It takes 6 clothworms an hour of crawling over your entire body to produce a suit that (being woven directly on top of your flesh) is basically skintight and which is woven to match your current mood (generally a bad thing...why would you want clothing that tells everyone around you how you're feeling?) and decays off of your body within 24 hours. I'm not even sure how you'd be able to easily remove the clothing from your body...do you just let it rot until you're naked?  Darkboots are another parasitic life-shaped. What's ridiculous about them is after biting down on your foot they apparently attempt to flee. How? The Earial just sounds painful. And apparently wearing one costs a point of charisma...keep in mind that having a sword attached to your fore-arm, weaving grubs crawling all over you or a tail doesn't hurt your charisma...but people just can't stand weird-looking ears.  That guy seems oddly chill about it.  This is one of those cases where the writers seem to forget that life-shaping isn't actually supposed to be magical. Lifeshaping specifically predates magic and psionics...so how the hell do Farspeakers talk mind-to-mind? And why are they immune to psionic mind-reading?  The first of several stat-boosting life-shaped items. The Flexars are also another one of those "can never be removed" grafts. So get used to your seashell knuckles.  The healing pod is basically a life-shaped Bacta Tank...except you'll probably die if you have to get out early.  Another stat-booster. This time for intelligence. Honestly I can't really imagine what Ingenies look like when grafted in place...I guess like soft, weird horns sticking out of your hair? Oh, and for even more fun, if any of your ingenies die you go insane and die within 24 hours! Considering that they have only 1/2 a HD that means that if you get caught in an AOE (or if your opponent just decides to aim for the the obvious meat-horns on your head) you die. Oh, and life-shaped tissues have a .1% chance per week of catching a fatal disease and even in the best circumstances they live only 1-2 years. Hope the +1 intelligence was worth it.  Wrist vaginas are all the rage in rhul-thaun fashion these days. The klacker is another weird, pseudo-magic bit of life-shaping. At least presumably other-planar beings were around back in the Blue Age...presumably at least. The details of things like elemental magic in the Blue Age are quite vague.  The most hated life-shaped items by fans of 4th edition. The Pathfinder is one of those life-shaped items that's theoretically useful but there's tons of much more practical ways to do things (say by drawing or carving markers). For instance, the fact that the pathfinder can only follow its scent trail on the ground means that if you have to pick it up and carry it then it'll lose that trail and become useless. And considering that you have to allow it to walk along all the way through whatever maze or trail you're trying to mark and all the way back...no mention is given as to how fast the Pathfinder can travel. Considering its basically a foot-long caterpillar I can't imagine its very quick. (EDIT: Alternatively I could actually read the entry more carefully before I post and realize that I don't always know what I'm talking about. I still submit it's impractical though and that the summoner is totally broken). Anyway, that'll be all for now. I'll finish the rest of the life-shaped later. oriongates fucked around with this message at 05:22 on Apr 21, 2016 |
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Apr 21, 2016 04:46
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I need to read the things I rant about more carefully.
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Apr 21, 2016 05:21
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Psionic Artifacts of Athas part 6: More Life Shaped Items  Platons are basically a symbiotically grafted suit of plate-mail that is worse than most of the rhul-thauns existing life-shaped armor (providing AC 3 vs Half-Shell's AC 2 or Full Shell's AC 0). The upside is that presumably it has no encumbrance (at least none is mentioned) and you could probably sleep in it? Of course, the downside is that you have to sleep in it, because unlike other life-shaped armors this one cannot be removed without actually cutting it off (each segment inflicting its hit points in damage to the wearer). Again, no consideration is given to the fact that these items live 1-2 years tops.  The wisdom-boosting implant. Notably unlike the Ingenie the soolmons are removable and they don't kill you if they're damaged. Wise indeed. Also, the illustration of closed Soolmons looks kind of like angry little butts.  This goofy looking bastard could potentially be very useful for producing tissues, especially since they have such a short life-span. Of course, a lot of tissues wouldn't even fit inside it and the 25% chance of death is quite the gamble if you're short on supplies. So you might end up with absolutely nothing...or enough tissues to fit out the entire party. Who knows.  Tails! Most are actually pretty useful (the gladiator tail in particular is probably one of the best life-shaped weapons out there)...although the grasping tail does kind of look like a halfling fleshlight.  Another flesh-light tail. This one is purely cosmetic, for those halflings who want to express their fursonas.  Like a lot of the items in this book this is one of those "spoil your life in exchange for mild benefits" trade-offs. Now the paralytic toxin isn't bad, it's quite a useful trick to have...but in exchange you never get to taste food again and you look like you've got giant guinea pig testicles on your chin. I mean, who would make that trade-off normally? Theoretically an assassin or similar fanatical soldier might make that sacrifice for a powerful hidden weapon...except its not even hidden because it gives you giant frog mouth. And of course all of these problems could have been solved just by implanting the graft somewhere else on the body. But nope, got to be a tongue for some reason...except of course there's the Venom Whip, a graft that is exactly this thing except not stuck inside your face.  I find Trackboots oddly adorable. And hey, a pair of boots you can take off without literally cutting the soles of your feet off! And if you step in dogshit you can hunt down the bastard who didn't clean up after their dog.  I have no idea why an organic backpack requires six large paragraphs of explanation.  The Weeper is another lengthy one, but at least its a bit more interesting...if very unsafe. Basically it produces organic hybrid of nitroglycerine and thermite, and that's just as unsafe and unstable as it sounds. If you're carrying some there is a 1% chance per hour of an explosion, which will naturally set off any other firetears. In combat that chance rises to 20% per round if you're struck, 10% if you aren't. Oh and the weeper itself explodes on a roll of 2% or lower each month. That seems...impractical. That's it for the main chapter on life-shaped objects...but for some reason this is not the only chapter detailing them. The book has a 5-page appendix of life-shaped creatures and tools in the back. There's no clear reason why these are put somewhere else. They don't have as many illustrations but not every life-shaped object in this chapter has an illustration either. Likewise they're almost all reprints from the Jagged Cliffs book...but so are many of the items in this chapter. The appendix is terribly laid out, there's no organization so you've got a mixture of life-shaped creatures like the climbdog or the breeze sprite alongside more regular items. It also includes several life shaped weapons such as the hurling titan and the armspike...but no damage or other weapon stats. It's also clearly copy-pasted entries from Wind Riders since they often refer to lifeshaped items that aren't included in this book. For instance, Mimic skin is in the appendix and it states that it is "applied much like sheath armor"...which is not included in the book (in fact, no armor was included for some reason). I love you Dark Sun, but TSR did not treat you right. Anyway, next we'll get into "life-shaped artifacts". That's not ancient rhulhisti artifacts that can't be created anymore, but actual artifacts (with supernatural powers) that are also life-shaped beings...somehow.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:57
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Yeah, I will admit I like a lot of the art for life-shaped creatures, although not always in the way they're intended. Many of them (like the watchpack and the weeper are very goofy looking).
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Apr 22, 2016 00:15
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Sadly not nearly that badass.
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Apr 22, 2016 03:36
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Has there ever been a white wolf RPG in which the snide little "this is me smugly talking about X other being in the WOD" ever been any good?
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Apr 24, 2016 02:35
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Mors Rattus posted:Hunter. Hah! That makes a lot of sense.
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Apr 24, 2016 02:38
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Kai Tave posted:You can tell a lot about a horror setting by how it treats its monster hunters. The "Sleeping Tiger" was one of the best things about Unknown Armies. The game was very, very self-aware that all the magic tricks or self-mutilating mages in the world were not enough to save the Occult Underground from the average population if proof of the supernatural ever became public.
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Apr 25, 2016 02:37
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Psionic Artifacts of Athas part 7: Locally Grown Organic Artifacts So, now we're back into actual Artifacts...sort of. You see these are life-shaped artifacts. And they kind of highlight one of the major issues with life-shaping in Dark Sun: the writers just can't decide if its magical or not. On the one hand almost every life-shaped item presented (including ancient rhulhisti ones) falls under the category of "soft sci-fi biotech"...the sort of stuff that could be theoretically created through guided evolution and/or genetic manipulation. Then you get the weird stuff...the Pristine Tower is probably the "prime" example, especially since it has such a large role in the setting's history. How does bio-manipulation give you a device to drain and harness energy directly from the sun? Who knows? That more or less sums up the rest of these artifacts. A few kind of make sense...but part of the problem is we have very little information about what was going on in the Blue Age. We know they didn't have wizardry or psionics...the heavy implication is that clerical magic existed but was largely considered a curiosity (a little weird since a high level cleric has powers that put life-shaping to shame). Druidism is simply not mentioned. Well...did they have things like demons? Undead? supernatural creatures? No clue. The opening for the chapter claims that these artifacts are the product of the life-shapers experimenting with the creation of intelligent or free-willed creations...except that the majority of these artifacts are not intelligent. Some have curses or "built in" agendas that they force on their bearer...but they are largely not sentient beings. Even if they were, that doesn't explain how being intelligent gives them magic powers. So with that resounding  we start with the life-shaped artifacts.  The Centennial Brain Apparently called "centennial" because the brain is a melding of 101 of the greatest Rhulhisti minds (literally). The creation of a mad life-shaper who murdered them, took their brains and squashed them together. Basically its an artifact version of the Overmind from Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs and does exactly what you'd expect of a giant brain: thinks a lot. The whole thing is 8 feet in diameter and covered in glowing runes (wait...what? They really are forgetting that life-shaping isn't magic aren't they?). The brain has developed psionic powers over the millennia but it is utterly helpless without a "host" to channel its powers through. The brain has immeasurable intelligence. It can communicate telepathically with anyone touching it and knows most anything or knows how to find out anything it doesn't know. It refuses to deal with philosophical nonsense however like the meaning of life or the nature of morality. It mostly doesn't give a poo poo about people. The brain knows every psionic power there is, but can't use them itself (which is weird). Instead someone must touch the brain in order to serve as a channel for the power, using their own power points, level and ability scores. Every time you use the brain the GM rolls 1d10 in secret, once these rolls add up to 100 or more then the brain absorbs your mind, leaving you a mindless slave. The brain then uses this slave to channel its powers until their body gives out from the strain (usually a year or two). Oh, and several life-shaped artifacts don't have suggested means of destruction, they simply have their own AC and HD and presumably can simply be killed by chopping them into pieces. Given the centennial brain is a big, unmoving pile of meat I'm shocked it hasn't just been eaten by some random predator. It has AC 5 and 16 HD.  The Corundum Wormskin Why do so many life-shaped items look like horrible fleshlights? The corundum wormskin is an example of a case where the writers created something that seems like it could be a powerful life-shaped objects...but forgot that the Blue Age was called the Blue Age because the world was covered in water. The premise of the wormskin is that the halflings created sink worms (Athas's sandworm ripoff) in order to excavate and mine for gemstones...except we know from Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs that they don't mine or indeed care about mineral wealth at all. Sinkworms are also not aquatic. Anyway, the corundum sinkworm supposedly was the accidental product of this breeding program which turned on its creators. It was killed but this small piece was indestructible and retains the super-sink-worm's abilities. Basically this artifact turns you into a watered-down King Leto from Dune. The corundum wormskin is a small "sheath" of corundum (the mineral that rubies and sapphires are made from) which is conveniently just long enough to slip over a human's finger. It fuses with the skin and becomes irremovable and begins to grow to cover the entire body. Every month AC improves by one until it hits -2, along with a slower progressing charisma and dexterity penalty. After 12 months you lose your human sentience and literally become a sink-worm with a gemstone skin. At that point you must become an NPC for another two years as you grow into a full-sized worm. You will then allow the largest male sinkworm to mate with you, lay an egg and burrow into the earth, never to be seen again. The egg then hatches, revealing...you! You have your old class, level and memories back and are fully playable again. Your AC, charisma and dex have all returned to normal although you have a gemstone finger. You also have the powers of a Worm Lord now. This gives you the equivalent of Tremorsense 120' on sand so long as you don't wear shoes and lets you burrow at your movement speed through sand or silt and you don't suffocate underground. You can also phase through 90' of rock once per day and by performing a 10-round-long dance you can summon a sinkworm once per week, serving you for 24 hours so long as it remains in your presence. Plus a bunch of random abilities: one each from Detection, Divination, Elemental earth and minor spell-like powers. Oh, and there's a 1% chance whenever you summon a sinkworm that it'll be the worm you mated with (exes are always a pain) who is immune to your control and will attack you. So, put on a finger sheath, spend two years as an NPC and in return you get a modest selection of supernatural powers...the equivalent of maybe two decent mid-level magic items. That's a rip-off. Really its an item that is only interesting for an NPC and even then its hardly powerful enough to make that big a difference outside of specific circumstances. Oh, and the entry forgot to include any rules for what happens to the wormskin itself. A straight reading seems to indicate it is a one-use item as your original crystal sinkworm body disappears forever into the center of the earth and your new Worm Lord body has a solid-crystal finger but no indication that this somehow turns back into the hollow crystal tube if the Worm Lord dies. But there's indication of there being multiple corundum sinkworms, so presumably the life-cycle must continue. Nor are any guidelines provided on what would happen if the crystal sinkworm was killed before it lays an egg. The wormskin has AC of -4 and 1-20 HD depending on its life-stage.  I am Groot! The Green Rhul Despite my general critique of this book I quite like the Green Rhul. It's cool (who doesn't want to walk around in leafy power armor?) and it actually makes a fair amount of sense as a piece of life-shaped technology. The Green Rhul is a nine foot tall plant that you can wear as basically organic power-armor. This artifact is intelligent (18) and speaks the language of the ancient rhulhisti. It usually permits people to enter it (there's a seam in the back) unless it is already bearing a rider, at which point tendrils punch into your skin and bond with your nervous system. This allows the Rhul to communicate telepathically with its rider (ignoring language barriers) and the rider can share the Rhul's senses to see and hear what it does. If the Green Rhul is willing it can also follow orders or requests independently without being ridden....or not because the very next paragraph states that the rider provides the neural hook-ups it needs to operate its muscles and it cannot move without an occupant. Druids apparently have legends about the green rhul, claiming that they created it, a claim that is clearly false. They do have a legend that a druid did find the Rhul and used it to wage war against a city-state, however once the curse kicked in the druid marched into the silt-sea to die (why the rhul allowed this is unclear)...which is pretty ridiculous when you see how mild the curse is. While inside the Rhul the wearer has AC 0 and all damage goes to the Rhul and not the occupant (the Rhul has 8 HD, making this a fairly bad deal for most mid-to-high level characters) Psionics and magic could potentially bypass this protection but must be specifically targeted at the occupant. The Rhul has a strength of 24, a speed of 9. All other Attributes are as the character riding...although it apparently has a full suite of attributes itself (Dx-13, Con-24, Int-19, Wis-11, Chr-3). It's already contradicted itself with the intelligence (and the difference between 18 and 19 is pretty big in 2e) and its unclear how it can have its own Dex score if it can't move without a rider and with a rider it uses the rider's dex. The rhul is immune to poison, gasses, disease, and "any environmental effects" (what that means is unclear). The host is likewise protected and doesn't need to breath, eat or drink within the rhul. The rhul also shares its combat experience with the rider: all opponents must declare their actions for the round first then the rider can take actions based on that info. This is only presented with the assumption that a PC is riding the rhul and that the opponents are NPCs...its pretty awkward for players to have to declare their actions in advance considering they should be able to act based on previous character's actions. The rhul can also "plant" itself to feed itself. An hour of sunshine feeds it and its rider for a day, and it can't heal if it is denied sunshine. It has also developed psionic powers, it has 100 PSP,s and one random science and three random devotions. The rider can use these powers at will, drawing from the rhul's PSP supply. The Rhul's curse is that it transforms its occupant into a halfling (this is what freaked the druid out so badly that he walked the rhul into the silt sea). And it will gradually take control of its occupant to allow it to live as a free being (since it needs an occupant to allow it to move). The text provides no guidelines for this, instead using the term "artifact possession" and "artifact transformation", as though we are supposed to know what they mean. These are terms from the book of artifacts where they have very specific mechanics...which are not reprinted in the Psionic Artifacts of Athas or used in any other artifact entry in this book (even ones that possess and/or transform the user). Unlike the first two life-shaped artifacts the Rhul has the standard artifact indestructibility. Reducing it to 0 HP just renders it inactive (healing 1 HP per day). Even turning it to ash will cause one of the pieces to eventually sprout into a new Rhul. It could be permanently destroyed by the touch of the descendant of the first true druid (why?), an ancient halfling (meaning one from the blue age itself) must sacrifice itself by riding the Rhul, or it can be burned by the breath of the Dragon (who is already dead...).  The Jade Marquess The Jade Marquess is a wonderful exercise in making no loving sense. In fact, if I had to guess I'd say it's probably two artifacts awkwardly smashed together...or a more standard artifact given a "makeover" as a life-shaped object. The Marquess is a ship that was supposedly designed in the Blue Age, back when the world was covered in water, explicitly for the purpose of sailing on land. In fact it can't sail in water at all!! It also very distinctly looks like a normal ship crafted of carved wood, not a piece of life-shaped technology, which you may recall looks more like this:  Real ships have curves The history makes this even weirder: we get a single short paragraph detailing the fact that it was made in the blue age for unknown reasons. Then we get a much longer story about how the Marquess appears in elven legends where it was a gift to the elves by earth elementals (a backstory that makes a lot more sense) and how the elves became awesome land-pirates. The main function of the Marquess is that it can sail on land at a speed of 12 and on silt at a speed of 18. It can't climb inclines greater than 30 degrees or sail over large rock outcroppings. It doesn't phase through earth, it literally sails on top of the ground, carving a big trench behind her. How this works is unclear. Whoever is at the helm can control the Marquess and command all of her functions. One of the weirder aspects of the Marquess is that her size varies depending on how much food she's eaten and how many HP she has. The Marquess has 30 HD when fully fed and is 120 feet long, with three masts and four deck levels. However, when shrunk her features are reduced proportionally and at her smallest (3 HD) she is only a canoe. She can shrink if not fed properly (which is annoying but not crippling) but the big problem is that damage shrinks her. Every 5 points of damage causes her to lose a foot in length...which means even modest damage could suddenly cause you to not have enough room for your crew or cargo (something that is not addressed at all). Even worse is that the Jade Marquess's weaponry is available only at certain sizes, meaning damage could easily disable your weapons. Oh, and another weird thing. The Jade Marquess' HD are always 1/4th her size (so 30 HD when at her full 120 foot length, 3 when a 12 foot canoe). So...that means that damage reduces her HD along with her size...which means that the more damage she takes the less hit points she has (which is less of a tautology than it sounds). Again, the effects of this are not actually addressed. Indeed, no rules are provided for what happens when the Marquess is brought to 0 Hp and how fast it heals. Despite this the artifact entry grandiosely claims "No storm, spell or creature can sink the Jade Marquess" which I guess is true since it sails on land. The Marquess is immune to spells that would change her "shape or nature" (what is her nature?) and she is immune to mind control (of course at no point is there any indication that the Marquess has a personality, intelligence or desires beyond simple hunger). Plus she is immune to all psionics. The Marquess has built in weaponry depending on her size: *40 feet+: a weird thing on the front that has a random offensive power *60 feet +: a second, identical thing that fires from the rear. *80 feet +: a side-mounted weapon with another random power from the same table. *100 feet +: a second weapon on the opposite side with an identical power. Keep in mind that due to the nature of these tables each weapon can probably only fire once per day, making for an underwhelming power. The curse of the Jade Marquess is two-fold. First she has to devour living beings or she'll shrink. Growing requires she consume the appropriate number of HD worth of living creatures per week and she'll shrink if she consumes less than half her HD in creatures. It's not clear but presumably anything between half and full is sufficient for her to simply maintain her current size? This is a fairly mild requirement but it does bring up one big problem with the Marquess: its not very impressive. She moves slowly and requires regular feeding...you might as well just travel by caravan. She's not exceptionally tough or durable and while she comes with some weapons they're very limited use and not that impressive. Oh, and if she's currently shrinking she has a 25% chance to chase down and try and eat living creatures she comes across with a bite that inflicts 1d6 damage per 20 feet...something that would actually be a decent weapon at full size but there's no indication that the captain can order her to try and bite or devour enemies. The second part of the curse is that anyone who sails her becomes tied to the ship and cannot leave for more than a day without succumbing to a geas to return. When they die they rise as undead and follow in search of the marquess (as a result it has twice as many encounters with undead as normal...whatever that means. Suggested means of destruction are having the undead spirit of her first captain sail her into water where she will dissolve, an elf who is the eldest daughter of an eldest daughter unto 11 generations must willingly sacrifice themselves by being eaten...or she must be tricked into eating a moonbeam...WTF? Anyway, that's all for now. Next we'll be finishing up the living artifacts.
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Apr 29, 2016 04:29
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Count Chocula posted:A campaign based around a good landship could be fun. Indeed, and if it weren't for the annoying size-changing shenanigans the Jade Marquess could make a very interesting artifact. It has just enough durability and firepower to make it useful and its obsession curse is unpleasant but provides an interesting series of plot hooks and story potential, while at the same time giving the PCs a very cool toy. But what we got was something that, if it gets hit with a fireball, is going to poop out its cargo bay and spontaneously lose weapons. Not very user friendly. Also the whole life-shaped aspect feels extremely tacked on. A literal boat of jade gifted from a powerful Earth Elemental or Genie prince (with a hidden curse) is a cool backstory. A water-based culture building a boat that can't sail on water is just plain dumb.
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Apr 29, 2016 09:21
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WhitemageofDOOM posted:You aren't a hermetic, NMage is you are all high (omage power stat) Mage's who can dispense with the tools. It's one of most commonly forgotten things about oMage but every time you raised your powerstat involved abandoning your paradigm more and more for pure will working. You didn't dispense with the tools, you just had very specific tools that you had to use for each flavor. That was one of my turn-offs for nMage, the fact that you couldn't really come up with an interesting, thematically appropriate ritual or magical instrument. Of course, oMage's "flavor of the whatever" style magic isn't my personal favorite, I'm a mug bigger fan of GURPS Cabal which gives you an extremely flexible, but still thematic set of mystic associations that you could mix and match in a variety of very creative ways. I actually prefer it to oMage's 'chaos magic' because it didn't involve any of your beliefs about how magic works. There's a great example in the Cabal book about a guy who casts a fire spell using a chewed up lump of Big Red gum. Not because he believes that chewing gum is somehow magical, but because he knew that the color red and the spice cinnamon both resonate with the element of fire.
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May 5, 2016 18:42
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Psionic Artifacts of Athas part 7: Rhul-Tal Wrapup So, the second half of the living artifacts where we start ripping off Vecna, and body parts. Of course, its sort of understandable for bio-artifacts so I don't hold it against them.  The Ma-Kat Mannequin You know, I've noticed a tendency in this book to confuse the Rhul-Thaun's lifeshaping with more generic "nature" based effects like druids. One of the ways this manifests is in the form of things like wood or plant themes (seen before with the green rhul or the last tree). Forgetting of course that the halflings of the Blue Age lived on a world covered in water and thus weren't likely to be very interested in things like trees. Say what you like about it but Windriders of the Jagged Cliffs at least had a consistent theme and style to their life-shaped creations that is completely lacking in these life-shaped artifacts. That said, this artifact at least was clearly built with life-shaped items in mind, not just a half-assed normal artifact that's claiming to be life-shaped like the Jade Marquess. So, here we have the Ma-Kat mannequin, full-size wooden figurine of a halfling that is so lifelike it actually breathes, has a heartbeat and is warm to the touch. The mannequin has deeply carved "tattoos" that are filled with blue and green pigments and its completely indestructible. No weapons will harm it and neither magic nor psionics have any effect on it. The mannequin itself does nothing at all, but searching it (requiring a find secret doors roll) reveals a hatch in the chest which opens to reveal the mannequin's wooden heart, beating in its chest. Now, in order to get any benefit at all from the mannequin you have to go full on "Head of Vecna"...cutting out your own heart and swapping it with the mannequins. Or I guess more accurately having someone else do it because naturally you die in the process. Hope you have someone you really trust. Once the wooden heart is placed in your chest cavity it will start to beat and your gaping wound will heal over and return you to life, while your heart beats inside the mannequin's chest. Sadly, the actual benefits of the mannequin are quite lame, especially given the curse. You see, the mannequin serves as a "stand-in" for life-shaped grafts. Life-shaped grafts will "attach" themselves to the mannequin but will function for the owner. So for instance, if attach a set of platons to the mannequin you'll get the benefits of improved AC despite the fact that you still look normal. Attach an armblade and you'll have an invisible blade jutting out of your arm (useful for surprise attacks...not so much for 99% of the rest of your life where having an invisible sword that you can't remove jutting from your arm is a huge hassle). The exact details on how this works are very vague, especially given the detailed requirements of several grafts. For instance, it states that an armblade graft will produce an invisible "edge" that can be used to cut foes and so on but the graft itself or the flat of the blade cannot be felt. But what about grafts that must replace a body part such as an eyestalk or that weird frog tongue? Do grafts still drain nutrients from the host? What about things like illness. If an inginie grafted to the head of the mannequin dies does the host still go insane and die? It makes a point of mentioning that no one has any idea how this works or even how the mannequin was created, it's named for a famous owner of the mannequin but no one has any idea how it is capable of doing what it does. In addition, you get three random powers: Fate and Fortune, Immunity and personal enhancement. These are fairly lame (the example powers given are never being lost, immunity to energy drain and +1 to saves). Now, the actual benefits of the mannequin are only moderate at best (and rely on having a lot of life-shaped grafts already) but the curse is the real clincher. You see, the mannequin's heart is only on loan and it will take it back. There is a 1%, cumulative chance per month that the mannequin will rip own the wooden heart and vanish. Nothing can stop this at all. For such relatively minor benefits that is a huge curse, absolute death in a matter of years (someone better at probability than me could probably calculate when an increasing percentage is becomes near 100%, I can't imagine you'd last more than two years without a lot of luck). The mannequin will vanish and then reappear at some later point (with no life-shaped grafts) ready to go again. suggested means of destruction: a kiss from the daughter of a barren woman, burn it in the heart of the cerulean storm, throw its heart into the sun, fill in the carved tattoos with the blood of a rhulhisti (an ancient halfling, not merely a jagged cliffs halfling).  The Arm of Radu Despite the visual similarities and being another "vecna-style" artifact the Arm of Radu has no relationship with the Ma-Kat Mannequin. The Arm of Radu used to be the arm of a guy called Radu. Shocking, I know. This entry actually remembers that all Rhul-Tal are supposed to be intelligent, assigning the arm an intelligence of 15. By the way, for those keeping score there are 3 actually intelligent life-shaped artifacts (the arm of radu, the green rhul and the centennial brain) a set of artifacts that contain intelligent beings (the spirit wombs, yet to come), two artifacts that aren't intelligent but will act independently in some situations (the ma-ket mannequin and the jade marquess) and two that are basically just things (the wormskin and the tongue of glib the mad). The Arm is also not actually life-shaped (which is notable because one constant theme of life-shaping is that while the halflings may create symbiotes or servants they never alter their own being). It belonged to an Important Halfling named Radu who was a great construction genius and general smart guy but when he died he (for no particular reason) became an undead and his arm fell off, becoming the Arm of Radu. The book seems to indicate there are lots of legends about not simply the arm but Radu himself, which seems impossible considering that he lived during the Blue Age and the Rhul-thaun are so bad at record-keeping they can't even remember the name of their last High Lord and they practically worship that guy. Anyway, if you stick the arm onto an empty shoulder socket it'll seal itself in place with its tentacles and become your new arm. If you stick it on a shoulder with a living arm it'll still lock-in but both arms will be useless until your original arm falls off 1d10+10 days later. The Arm of Radu cannot be removed without killing the host. The fact that the arm belongs to a halfling is never addressed in regards to other characters using it. The arm will speak to characters in their dreams, appearing as a halfling in white robes and gives them dreams of building great wonders (it can only communicate while the host is asleep). Despite being so obsessed with building the arm does not actually grant any powers related to building! It is very strong (strength 20) and has sharp nails that function as a powerful weapon (2d6 damage). On a roll of 20 the arm grabs the neck of whoever you're attacking and starts to choke them. If you want to let someone you're choking go you've got to make a saving throw to overcome the arm. The only other powers of the arm are just a collection of random powers from different tables: Abjurations, Cataclysms, Combat, Elemental Earth, Immunity, Major spell-like power, and offensive powers. Well, we're told they're random because the entry then gives a "default" power for each table (the worst of both worlds) and we're then told that the earthquake power (the cataclysm default) activates itself at random whenever the GM wishes. It's also mentioned in the item's entry as being part of the curse. So presumably not random at all. The main curse of the artifact is that it'll get pissy if you don't build stuff. If you aren't engaged in at least one hour of construction per day and using the arms powers to do so then it will scratch you. This makes the random power selection even stupider, if you roll randomly it is very possible you end up with no powers that could be even theoretically used for construction. Even the default powers aren't helpful there's Move Earth (only usable once per week, so good luck on the other 6 days) and Telekinesis. The TK at least can be used easily, but it won't really be helpful. The scratches leave deep scars but do no damage. The scars are located on random body parts and every 3 scratches on the face drops charisma by one (up to 3 points). If the host suffers 1001 scratches the arm will fall off. Otherwise the suggested means of destruction are for the shade of Radu to break the arm over its knee or for it to be hurled into the Dark (there is not actually a dimension called "The Dark", they're probably referring to "The Black", Atha's shadowplane). Or it can be dipped into elemental air, fire, water and earth within 3 days. Despite this, it has only AC 2 and 5 HD. no indication is given as to what happens if the arm is damaged or reduced to 0 HP.     The Spirit Wombs And the prize for "stupidest-looking thing in this book" goes to the water womb! I've actually got a sneaking suspicion that the last illustration (which claims to be the water womb) was mixed up with the first one (which is meant to be the air womb) since the "water" womb has the light blue coloration you typically associate with sky and at least is somewhat streamlined looking while the air spirit has the deeper blue you'd associate with water and the serpentine shape doesn't make much sense for an air-based creature. The actual text descriptions to match however (except the part where it claims they all have "human-like faces"). Apparently each of these was actually created as a life-shaped "trap" for a Spirit of the Land (the beings that druids get power from) by an ancient, dickish life-shaper. They're apparently the reason that Spirits Of The Land are so reluctant to interact with anyone other than a Druid. As a result of course, Druids find the wombs to be an abomination. They're very big (air spirit is 30 feet long, earth womb is 12 feet in diameter, fire womb is 16 feet long and the water womb is 10 feet in diameter) but are given absolutely no combat stats, despite nothing indicating that they would be incapable of combat. They're capable of speech and feeling pain but are invulnerable. Since they apparently have the sentience of the spirits it's not actually clear how these are artifacts and not simply powerful creatures. In fact, there's no indication given as to how they would be controlled, beyond presumably torture. They're all very slow (movement of 3) unless they're traveling through their element. Air Womb The air womb flies at a speed of 24 (dropping to 12 if it flies through impure air such as rain or dust). It has the powers of an Air Spirit (gating in air, creating an hour long hurricane, and casting whispering wind) as well as four random Elemental Air powers. Earth Womb Can phase through earth and rock at a speed of 24 but drops to 12 through mud, silt and lava. Powers of the earth spirit are gating in earth, creating a big, collapsing stone wall and communicate by transmitting vibrations through the earth. Plus four random Elemental Earth powers. Fire Womb You may be starting to notice a pattern. The fire womb can travel through fire at a speed of 24 but can move at 12 in "hot air" (over 120 degrees) or smoke. It also keeps the rider from being harmed by heat (something absent from the earth spirit...can the rider breath while phasing underground?) It has the ability to cast wall of fire, create a hot wind of volcanic gasses (acts like a stinking cloud but gives no area) and can use fires to communicate. Plus four random elemental fire powers. Water Womb The water womb swims at 24, down to 12 in mud or rain. Needless to say its not much use in that department although it does allow you to breath underwater. It can gate in water, cause a pool to try and grab someone and drown them and can communicate through water. Plus the same four random powers. Each womb also has a more or less identical curse. After a month the owner will fall in love with a piece of landscape that matches the appropriate elemental theme and is compelled to visit the place at least one day out of every month and risk their life to protect it. Owning multiple wombs gives extra benefits in that part of your body turns elemental depending on which two wombs you own (they won't tolerate opposing elements, only adjacent). Part of the owner's body turns elemental, granting airy legs (fly at a speed of 3), stone fists (d8 damage and can stone shape 1/day), fire hair (affect normal fires 3/day), ice face (what? apparently lets you use telekensis to control water 3/day and heal 1d8 dehydration damage with a kiss). However, multiple wombs gives extra curses too: -4 to saves vs elements that oppose the element you're partially composed of and attacks with those elements get +4 to attack rolls. The owner also suffers a random cataclysm. Presumably you also have to visit and protect two different plots of land as well, but this is never addressed. This does bring up a big issue that is completely unaddressed: Who is the owner of the wombs? These are massive, invulnerable, intelligent creatures...how does one become the official "owner" of a womb? Does anyone riding a womb count as an owner? anyone the womb uses its powers for? Does the womb have to give permission or consent? Can there be multiple owners? How does one stop owning a womb?  The Tongue of Glib The Mad This is the last halfling fleshlight, I swear. The Tongue of Glib The Mad is more or less the same as the Arm of Radu. It's not actually a life-shaped item at all, it's just the tongue of some ancient halfling called Glib who was very persuasive and after he died apparently the life-shapers decided his tongue must be the reason he was so convincing so they had it preserved...a sort of superstition that is entirely at odds with the Blue Age culture we've been presented with so far. Apparently the tongue somehow grew a mouth and little tentacles and is totally magical (or whatever the excuse for life-shaped artifact powers are). Oh, and as the name implies, Glib was kind of crazy because he eventually started believing his own lies. But the artifact is totally safe, I promise. Of course, this requires that you replace your tongue with it, if you just stick the mouth end on your tongue it'll latch on and eat until it hits your jaw and fuses to your mouth. This is by far the most powerful life-shaped artifact, in fact other than maybe the dark lens it's probably the most powerful artifact in this book. The tongue causes everyone who hears you to believe everything that you say. there is no saving throw and the only limitation is that they must remain within range of his voice (it doesn't say he has to be speaking...they just have to be within earshot). Once per day it can also do a Mass Suggestion spell and it has three random powers from the charm table. The curse of the tongue is that there is a 5% chance whenever you tell a lie that you believe it as well, to the point of seeing a completely different version of reality from everyone else to match the lie. That's a big curse...but not nearly enough to compensate for the sheer amount of stuff you can get up to when anyone (up to and including rajaat and the sorcerer kings) takes anything you say as absolute gospel. The curse is also not very helpful if you keep lies vague or loose, like telling someone "It is very important that you do as I say" or "You should stay here". The tongue can be destroyed by burying it with Glib (who presumably died over 15,000 years ago...I don't think there's a body anymore), feeding it to someone who has never lied or its host remaining mute for 33 years. And that's it for life-shaped artifacts, and really the bulk of the book. There's a remaining chapter on magical items and a few psionically enchanted items which are certainly useful for a dark sun game but none are particularly interesting and they're all fairly well put together so they're not really interesting to critique. So, should I continue Dark Sun and tackle defilers and preservers of athas next? Or should I move on to something else (probably the Whispering Vault). oriongates fucked around with this message at 05:13 on May 6, 2016 |
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May 6, 2016 05:10
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It's too bad because there's a glimmer of a good idea in there. It'd be really interesting to play a kind of "superhero secret service" fighting to defend a former world-class superhuman who's been stripped of their powers in repayment for everything they've done for humanity...but of course that relies on not wallowing in pessimistic misanthropy.
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May 7, 2016 03:03
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So, I decided I should probably give Dark Sun revised a rest from the old beating stick and instead go to something that I've been intending to review for a while:  Ever wanted to play a cenobite super-hero? Want to play in a setting that's kind of like the baby of Clive Barker, David Cronenberg and Neil Gaimen? Well, that's the goal of Whispering Vault. Being honest, I really have no idea if the game is as awesome as I'm making it sound, it's been years since I've read it so I guess we'll find out together if it craps its pants or not. The Whispering Vault: Part 1 Whispering Vault's opening has the slight air of pretension you get with a lot of late 90's/early 00's supernatural RPGs. Not quite as bad as something like the Everlasting fortunately. It also shows off its love of extremely elaborate page decoration.  Note the standard "you are not a wizard in real life" disclaimer One of the first things that strikes you is that the book is quite well-illustrated. Almost every page has a piece of nice, clean B&W art and while the content might occasionally range outside of "surreal horror" and into goofy territory it's overall very well done. So, if nothing else it's worth looking at. The Other thing that you Notice is That there Are A Lot Of Words With capital Letters thrown Around the Place. It definitely makes the common RPG mistake of throwing a ton of unexplained jargon right at your face first thing. The very first semi-IC "character pitch" we get mentions you found out about the Unseen, but none of the Unenlightened believed you and then you learned that you lived in the Realm of Flesh but beyond the Mundane (is that not the Realm of Flesh?) there is a Realm of Essence full of Ancient Mysteries and Unseen entities called the Unbidden and their Minions who come into the Realm of Flesh through Vessels from across the Rift. Then there are the Stalkers who hunt the Unbidden at the behest of the Primal Powers and casting them into the Vault and now you have become one of their Circle. What is even The gently caress? Fortunately the next section explains some of this. Here's the breakdown. The normal, human world is the Realm of Flesh. There's the standard "safe within your comfortable lies" bullshit you get with any secret supernatural setting. Those who know the dark truths about the universe call themselves the Enlightened. The big Truth of the setting is that the world of Flesh is not all that there is. The Realm of Flesh is bound by fairly concrete physical laws that allow things like life and physics to happen (except when they don't). There is also the Realm of Essence which is a more surreal, dreamlike place which has little to no set rules. It's worth noting that the Realm of Essence does not seem to be an "afterlife" for beings from the Realm of Flesh, in fact it seems like the two are not meant to interact at all. In between the Realms is a "Neitherspace" inhabited by hordes of creatures called Shadows who are capable of interacting with both Flesh and Essence, but apparently don't merit a Realm of their own. In the next paragraph "The Rift" is mentioned which is presumably the same as the Neitherspace, but that is not clarified. The Rift separates the Realms of Flesh and Essence and some beings of Flesh are capable of catching glimpses of the Realm of Essence across the Rift. These people are called Sensitives and the things they see are called the Unseen, and form the basis of most human mythology. Then things get a little confusing, because the original implication seems to be that the Unseen are glimpses of the Realm of Essence seen across the Rift but then it starts talking about Shadows the beings in the Rift (or the Neitherspace?). You see apparently Shadows sometimes get Awakened by an experience that inspires them to try and get into the Realm of Flesh where they pose a danger to normal folks. But the biggest threat is the Unbidden, who come to the Realm of Flesh (from...?) to fulfill "inhuman passions". They Awaken Shadows, turning them into Minions by binding them to physical vessels. Humanity has protection from both of these threats from Stalkers who defend the Realm of Flesh by Hunting the Unseen (I thought the Unseen were things that only Sensitives saw?). Stalkers are Chosen for reasons unknown even to the Enlightened, but most of them are both Enlightened and Sensitive and have already fought the Unseen as a mortal. When the time is right the Stalker-to-be is Chosen and their humanity is forged into five Keys of Humanity which serve as their badge and allow them to return to the world of Flesh. So...yeah. Clarity is not one of the Whispering Vault's strong suits. The summary above covers two pages of intro text from before the first chapter even starts and we already have 20 Important Capitalized Words (assuming I didn't miss one or two in that count).  The intro isn't quite over yet, now we've got a bit more talk about what happens when you are Chosen: When you are Chosen you transcend Flesh and the true nature of the universe is revealed to you. Sort of, apparently there are very few Chosen who fully comprehend the ancient mysteries (Ancient Mysteries was capitalized before, not sure why it isn't now). But even the most ignorant Stalker has a greater comprehension than the most enlightened (also not capitalized any more for some reason) mortal scholar. Creation and Armageddon are part of a cosmic Cycle consuming and recreating both Realms forever and ever. Very few entities have what is called Persistent Essence required to survive Armageddon and live through multiple Cycles. These are called the Primal Powers. After Armageddon there is nothing but the Powers floating in the void and they invariably hunger for sensation and stimulation and think on their memories of past Cycles. This gives birth to the Aesthetics, beings of pure Essence (aren't all beings from the Realm of Essence beings of pure Essence?) whose imagination causes things to be created. Through their collective mind they Dream the Realm of Flesh. Dear god this is a loving complicated creation cycle. As a result, many Enlightened also refer to the Realm of Flesh as the Dream (oh my god! why do you have so many names for the same thing?! So far the human world has been called the Realm of Flesh, the Mundane and the Dream and I bet there's more to come) and the act of the Aesthetics creating the mortal world as Dreaming. Magic, as humans understand it, is the process of influencing the Aesthetics to cause them to Dream something different (which, I must admit, is a creative explanation for magic). Like mortal Sensitives some Aesthetics can gaze across the Rift and see the Realm of Flesh and become tempted to journey there to enjoy themselves. As Dreamers in the Realm of Flesh they see their Visions come to life but if they gaze too long at the realm of Flesh they become corrupted and develop a passion for Flesh. These perverse desires are forbidden. However, corrupted Aesthetics will eventually give in to temptation and cross the Rift in order to indulge, becoming one of the Unbidden. By the way, I should mention that despite the squicky phrasing this game does not seem to be going the Black Tokyo route, so we can all let out that collective breath we were holding. Although there's a lot of body horror on the schedule it doesn't seem like Whispering Vault is bound on the train to Rape-Town. The absence of an Aesthetic creates flaws in the Dream, called Enigmas by the Enlightened. Enigmas are basically any sort of supernatural phenomena and while they may not be physically harmful they are dangerous if they are not Mended because the Corruption will spread and threaten the Dreaming. To protect the Flesh from the Unbidden the Powers grant some mortals Essence to become Stalkers whose humanity allows them to safely travel to the Realm of Flesh and capture the Unbidden and Mend the Enigmas. Capitalized Word Count: 30  Chapter 1: Character Creation Finally things get a little bit more straightforward as we shift towards the mechanics. In case it wasn't clear (and honestly, it probably wasn't) players in the Whispering Vault take the role of the Stalkers whose job it is to hunt down and retrieve the Unbidden and clear up any messes they've left behind. You were a mortal originally and those origins probably shape how you think even now that you are no longer a being of Flesh. However, you are also an immortal weirdo now and you aren't limited by normal human biology, psychology or morality anymore. The "fluff" of character creation is handled via a series of questions: *When and where were you born? Time is an illusion of Flesh, so Stalkers can potentially come from any time period. You could be a newbie stalker freshly plucked from a tribe in 3000 BC alongside an experienced Hunter who was a 1930's gangster in life. It notes that its possible to play characters from the future but since this demands the GM creating a timeline into the future this is discouraged. *Who were you in life? The basics of your mortal life. Were you a cop? A hobo? A revolting peasant? It's generally important that you have some experience with the Unseen, making classic lovecraftian investigator-style professions (reporter, antiquarian, scholar, archeologist, etc) likely, but not necessary. *Why did you hunt the Unseen? Did they kill your dad? Eat your dog? What drove you to pursue the Unseen instead of running from them? *How were you recruited? Just what it sounds like. It does come with one of the goofier pictures in the book:  The concerned glance being shared between 2nd Head and Normal Guy is what sells it. *What does your Avatar look like? When a Stalker is Chosen and their Flesh is removed they become an expression of spirit called an Avatar. The Avatar is your Essence-form and while it is often based on your mortal life to some degree it is not limited by the laws of physics or the constraints of flesh. It is noted that your appearance is just that, you are as strong or tough or whatever as your stats say you are and a towering giant may be weaker than a tiny child. *What does your Domain look like? Your Domain is your home in the Realm of Essence and like your Avatar it is customized to suit your tastes by the Architecture of Essence. It is noted that the best Domains are outrageous and epic in theme, although rarely much bigger than a city.  Becoming a Stalker gives you the power to launch a Hand out of your Chin. After that we get to the actual mechanical bits. As beings of Essence, Stalkers don't have physical stats, only mental ones. You get 22 points to divide among 4 stats: Awareness: Perceiving things, physically and supernaturally. This stat determines the number of Disciplines (special abilities) you get. Insight: Your ability to understand things intuitively. This determines the number of Skill Bonuses you have available. Presence: Force of personality and charisma. This determines what Servitors you have access to (basically the Stalker version of Minions) Willpower: Determination and self-control. This determines how powerful your Vessel is. A 2-3 in a stat is "unremarkable" but there's not actually a maximum stat bonus listed for any of these in the rules. Reading between the lines seem to imply that an 8 is as high as things go...but its never outright stated.  Then we get into the stuff derived from your main Attributes. Disciplines are your special powers available in the world of Flesh and new PCs get one Discipline per point of Awareness, but you can also Master a Discipline allowing you to perform special moves called Inspirations. This costs twice as many Discipline points. The exact effects of Disciplines and what Inspirations do are covered elsewhere and we are provided only with this summary:  Servitors are "phantoms of Essence" which are apparently not the same thing as Shadows but are still able to appear in the Realm of Flesh with Stalkers. You can be linked to one Servitor per point of Presence (double cost to Master one). Servitors are summoned as a special action using the Evocation skill and is so difficult that it inflicts damage to your Vessel when you do so. Like Disciplines you can choose to Master a Servitor which means that you won't take damage when you successfully summon one. There is a list of Servitors who tend towards dumb names and several are notably redundant when compared to Disciplines, although we're given no hard stats to compare the two yet.  Next we talk about your Vessel. When you enter the Realm of Flesh the Weavers (wait, who?) create a Vessel by spinning matter over your Avatar. Your Vessel is your physical form and thus has only physical attributes: Dexterity, Fortitude and Strength. Unlike your Avatar's attributes your Vessels are malleable and are recreated every time you re-enter the Realm of Flesh and so you get to choose different stats every single time. You get 3 in each of the three Attributes and can add one point to any attribute of your choice for each point of Willpower that you have. Mortals max out at 5 on this scale, but there's no limitation mentioned for Stalkers. The game straight out tells you that Strength is not actually very useful as it only determines the base damage of unarmed combat (apparently armed combat doesn't use strength?)  The four-armed PI is clearly a being of great enlightenment and refined Essence Next we come to Skills, which are a little bit hinky in terms of how the points are divided: First, you pick three Primary skills which get a +4 bonus. Second, you pick a number of secondary Skills equal to your Insight. All of these have a +2 bonus. You then get a number of points equal to your Insight to divide among primary, secondary or other skills, so long as no skill goes above +6. Then we have "Focus Skills" which...I'm having trouble working out. First we're told that a Focus Skill is strongly related to a character's mortal past and should be very important to them. GMs may require all players have at least one Focus Skill and you can have up to three. I'll quote from the book here: "To buy a Focus Skill all you have to do is decide what it is called, write it on the character sheet and assign a bonus to it." So...does that mean that Focus skills can be purchased separately from your Primary, Secondary and other skills...or do you have to use those points and just declare that one of those skills is a Focus skill? And to be clear, Whispering Vault isn't a game where skills are normally player-derived like in Unknown Armies. We're then told that some Focus Skills give a bonus when using a Discipline that requires a Challenge Roll. These skills have the same name as the associated Discipline so a Focus Skill to help a Stalker use Dominate is called Dominate. I thought a Focus Skill was supposed to relate to your past? Starting PCs may only have two of their potentially three Focus Skills related to a Discipline. And that's all we're told about Skills, we aren't even given a brief list and the skills mentioned (Masking, Binding, Sensitivity, Mending) here and there are very vaguely named. So good luck in trying to understand where you should be putting those Attribute points.  Baseball pin-head is my most enduring image of Whispering Vault Next we go over your Five Keys of Humanity. The Keys are material objects even in the Realm of Essence and are the Stalker's gateway to return to the Realm of Flesh and so they're carried at all times. Everyone should decide what form their Keys take and while they're usually actual keys of some sort they can be just about anything symbolically important. They're always displayed prominently on the Avatar and Vessel. The Keys are also your defining human aspects and there are three types: Virtues, Flaws and Memories. Virtues and Flaws are purely relative, its not important whether or not they're actually good or bad but whether or not you believe that they are good or bad. Memories are life-shaping events from your mortality, such as the loss of a loved one or an amazing accomplishment. Not every Key needs to be defined at character creation, only 2-3 and the rest can be worked out in game. Although they are physical objects and thus could be taken the Stalker can summon them back at will, unless prevented by magical rituals. Being without your Keys is a big deal, you can't spend Karma (whatever that is), use Disciplines, summon Servitors or use Vitality for Strenuous Skills. You can't take any direct action against anyone holding one of your Keys and you will turn to dust and die in two days if the Key is not retrieved (the dust can be drunk, along with fresh blood, to grant a mortal longevity). So yeah, don't lose your drat Keys. Fortunately, there don't actually seem to be any rules for how a Key would be taken from you given that they can be summoned instantly and as far as I can tell Stalkers don't sleep or otherwise get themselves into a situation where a Key could be stolen surreptitiously.  The last stage of character creation is some last-minute touches. First we've got your Vitality, when you are bound by Substance in the Realm of Flesh you are vulnerable and your Vitality will suffer as you take damage or use skills that drain your Essence. Hit points. It's your hit points. You get Vitality equal to twice your Willpower, something that should have been mentioned much earlier. Next we have Karma which is the meta-currency for re-rolls or to use Inspirations. You get 5 Karma and earn more with successful Hunts. Oh, and your name, or names as the case may be. Stalkers tend to have flowery or evocative names: "The Gray Man", "Shadowjack", "Abrax", "Calaphon", etc. With that we have completed chapter one. I've lost count of the Capitalized Words but I bet we're over 40 by now. I won't say Whispering Vault is a bad game, but drat it could use some work on clarity. Still, definitely points for style and imagination so far. Next we get into the actual rules on playing the game and hopefully some things will become clearer.
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May 12, 2016 04:10
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Halloween Jack posted:One of the things I like a lot about The Whispering Vault is that while it plays up the bizarre horror angle a lot, the GMing advice is convivial and encourages a permissive attitude. Because the PCs can't be cosmic horror demigods if you're constantly nitpicking them. Indeed. Despite being mired with some of the 90's problems mentioned upthread, Whispering Vault does a good job of encouraging players and GMs to work on things together, discuss what they'd like out of the game and try and get there rather than worrying too much about the details.
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May 12, 2016 04:44
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The Whispering Vault: Part 2 Been a couple of weeks so here's a quick summary of the first chapter: You're former humans turned crazy cenobite-security guards whose job it is to ensure that the human realm doesn't get screwed up by perverted gods. Except with a lot more Capital Letters. Here's the link so you don't have to crawl back for a reminder: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3758962&pagenumber=128#post459783153 Now we're on to the actual rules.  So, the game starts with rules for resolving basic challenges, called (appropriately) Challenge Rolls. Each Challenge is based on one of your Attributes and you roll a number of dice equal to the appropriate attribute. You keep only the highest roll or the sum of the highest matching dice. The difficulty of a Challenge is either based on a set target number: Routine: 8 Easy: 10 Average: 12 Hard: 15 Very Hard: 18 Or it is based off another character's Attributes and then modified to reflect difficulty (from -4 for routine rolls to +5 for Very Hard rolls). But attributes aren't all, there are also Skills. Skills don't adjust the number of dice you roll, instead they add directly to your roll result (so effectively they reduce the target number). You may also spend Karma on a roll, which allows you to reroll as many of the dice as you witch (to increase the odds of a match). Apparently the GM is allowed to forbid the use of Karma if it seems "frivolous" which seems unnecessarily restrictive. So...you may have noticed something in the last example. I never mentioned the type of dice used in the game...that's because the rule section never actually tells you. That's right, its missing the actual central mechanic. Now, it is in the book, if you look at the "Welcome" page right after the table of contents (the page that most readers would skim or skip) you can find that the last segment on the page mentions that you'll need "a handful of six-sided dice", the fact that none of the example rolls ever go higher than a six is another clue...but it's still a massive and glaring omission in the rules. So with the die-type revealed I can honestly say that I simply can't parse the probabilities for these rolls. A 12 as an "average" difficulty seems huge to me...but I actually don't know how you'd effectively calculate the odds of rolling a 12 on 5 dice. I'm sure someone else is more willing to crunch the numbers than I am but it's still maddeningly difficult to tell how good you are as a character. Of course, the difficulties are probably set with the assumption that you'll be using your Skills to reduce the target number.  Next we have combat. First the game waxes on a bit about how "different" Whispering Vault is from other games:  The next few pages go on a bit more about how you should be flexible when adjudicating specific actions or consequences of your rolls, the importance of descriptive language, etc. It's not bad advice as such but it seems to think the advice is far more original and groundbreaking than it actually is. Even in the early 90s things like "don't just say 'I hit it with my axe' wasn't exactly cutting edge of game conception. But, as I mention its still good advice and it helps set the theme of the game a bit. Anyway, down to the actual rules. At the start of each round in combat each character makes a Dexterity Challenge and the final total is used as your Initiative score. This only applies for PCs...NPCs have a set initiative score that they always use. I'm noticing that while the game never says it outright it seems like the intent is that NPCs generally don't roll anything (with one exception being a small section on NPC v NPC actions). Actual actions in combat are divided between Significant Actions and Insignificant Actions. Significant Actions are things like making an attack or using a power and Insignificant Actions are things like moving around, talking or dropping something. You get to make one of each every round. Players make all the rolls in combat. You make an appropriate Challenge with an opponent's defense attribute serving as the target number. The same goes if you are attacked, making an appropriate Challenge against an opponent's attack attribute.  Damage is not a challenge (and its the only time the GM gets to roll). Your Damage is a collection of dice that get rolled. A Stalker's damage is either their Strength value or the Damage of whatever weapon they're using. It's confusion because they use the terms "Melee" and "Unarmed" as though they are interchangeable. But apparently weapons like swords don't actually benefit from your Strength bonus. Monsters have a Damage rating that indicates how much damage they inflict. All the dice you roll for damage are added up to determine the final damage. There's also a special rule called a "Die Cap". It's an unusually complicated system that isn't actually very worthwhile considering it only applies to Mortals fighting beings of Essence so, as far as I can tell, it will never affect the Stalkers directly. It just means that Mortals are terrible at hurting Essence-based opponents, something that it seems could have been handled in a much simpler way. But apparently the Damage Cap doesn't apply to "Masked" Stalkers (something that hasn't been explained yet). A Die Cap is a maximum amount of damage that the attacker can inflict, basically ignoring any results higher than your Damage Cap...which actually means it's possible for a really good roll to end up inflicting no damage at all because every result is above the Damage Cap. The standard Damage Cap is 5. But if you are Demoralized and Terrified (both of these are capitalized, and it is not explained whether they're simply two terms for the same thing or if they actually have different effects) then your Damage Cap drops by one. If you are Inspired (such as by a strong leader or a personal motivation) then your Damage Cap increases by one. Fighting as a group also means your Damage Cap increases by one. There is also the Law of Proximity, which actually does apply to Essence users, basically lowering Damage Cap by one for any ranged attacks made by or against a being of essence. Oh, and the other time a Die Cap affects a Stalker is when they attempt to use mortal weapons of any kind, causing them to suffer a -1 to their Die Cap...so picking up a mundane gun to shoot a mortal inflicts a -1 Die Cap (since you're attacking a mortal with a mortal weapon) but a -2 die cap if using it against another Essence being (since it's a mortal weapon and you still get hit by the Law Of Proximity). So, in short, guns kind of suck unless you're using the absolutely highest powered guns which can unload double digits in the damage dice.  I'm already getting kind of annoyed with the Damage system here, but it gets even more complicated. So, recall characters have two traits: Fortitude and Vitality. Fortitude is your damage resistance and you divide any damage you suffer by your Fortitude score, rounding down. So if you're hit with 30 Damage and have a Fortitude of 5 you lose 6 vitality. The actual effect of damage depends on the type of victim you're attacking: Shadows: An Awakened Shadow can manifest in the Realm of Flesh. If their Vitality is reduced to zero they are forced back into the Rift. It also notes that Shadows that have been Awakened by the Unbidden to serve as Minions are encased in shells of Flesh (not the shells of Flesh shadows normally use, these are other shells) called Husks which let them kind of pass as Human (yes, Human is capitalized) to enjoy the protection of the Veil (we don't know what that is) and the first time such a Minion takes damage the Husk is destroyed revealing the Shadows true (well, not true, but not human) form. Once a Shadow's physical form has been destroyed a being of Essence could choose to continue fighting them (and apparently formless Shadows can continue fighting back) but any attacks made by or against Formless Shadows suffers a -1 Die Cap. Mortals: I'm not sure why this section is more than "Mortals are defeated when their Vitality is reduced to 0" but we're also filled in on how damage overflows for a mortal (extra damage reduces Fortitude and when Fortitude is at 0 the Mortal dies) and how many weeks it takes for them to heal. The Unbidden: The Unbidden steal the body of human (not capitalized this time) Hosts in order to serve as Vessels, strengthening the Host's Flesh with their Essence. Despite being in a mortal body it is not clarified if this form is treated as mortal or not for purposes of Damage Caps. When the Host runs out of Vitality the Unbidden is forced to manifest its true form (despite being a being of Essence its true form is apparently a physical body?). In its true form the Unbidden can be Bound (we don't know what this is) otherwise it may attempt to find a new Vessel and until it does it cannot recover Vitality and is not protected by the Veil (we still don't know what this is) and it is vulnerable to Forbiddance (we also don't know what this is). When the Avatar (I guess this is the true form?) of the Unbidden loses its vitality it is helpless and can be bound. Actually killing the Unbidden is possible but is blasphemous. Stalkers: When a Stalker runs out of Vitality they begin to lose points from their Vessel's Attributes. You get to decide which Attributes are reduced and how much damage to apply to each one. Losing all Strength or Dexterity means you cannot move, losing all your Fortitude means you die. You heal automatically if you go back to the Realm of Essence (since your body is just a construct) but its only possible to heal in the Realm of Flesh if you have the Weaving Discipline.  Finally, we have weapons. A short table is provided with example weapon damage, but it points out fairly directly that using a weapon as a Stalker is kind of a bad deal, you suffer not only a -1 Die Cap but a -2 penalty to actually using any weapons (without an appropriate focus skill). Despite this the ability to simply ignore your Strength and just go with a weapon's damage die is going to be tempting depending on the quantity of weaponry available.  And that's it for the "rules" chapter. Although some of the ideas are interesting, I've got to say that the combat rules are way too elaborate, especially in comparison to the one page rule for handling everything that isn't combat.
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May 30, 2016 00:58
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The Whispering Vault: Part 3 Disciplines Now we come to Disciplines. Disciplines are Whispering Vault's collection of advantages...some are more like simple feats or edges from other games, some are more like supernatural powers. They're one of the big ways you customize a character to a different role, because while you can change your Vessel's physical stats from Hunt to Hunt, your Disciplines remain fixed and a lot of them are nigh indispensable for some character builds. This is especially true of combat, since Stalkers apparently stink when it comes to using human weapons you're going to want the appropriate Disciplines to supplement your strength or give you a ranged attack when needed. The game really plays up the nature of Disciplines, stating that they are insights into the true nature of the universe and allow the Stalkers to manipulate the Dream themselves in order to alter reality. Some of the Discplines live up to this hype, most don't. Before getting into the Disciplines themselves there are two rules the book brings up: Strenuous Use Some Disciplines take such a large amount of Essence that they will weaken your Vessel, costing Vitality. This is meant to be only the most powerful Disciplines. Mastery: At the cost of an extra Discipline "slot" you can Master one of your Disciplines to be extra awesome with it. This not only increases your bonus from the Discipline but gives you access to something called Inspirations. The idea behind Inspirations is that they're meant to be improvisational uses of your Disciplines to accomplish something that isn't normally a part of the Discipline. However, there are no guidelines provided on Inspirations with a single exception (attacks with Inspirations inflict Damage equal to your Willpower attribute). That's it. The sole example provided of an Inspiration in action is basically just a more limited version of that: using Terrify to "attack" a mortal by scaring them to death, an attack that inflicts your Willpower in damage and has no effect at all if it doesn't kill the target. Using an Inspiration costs Karma, the standard amount is 1 Karma but its noted that the cost can increase for exceptional uses of the Discipline (the one above apparently merits a 2 Karma cost). This kind of highlights part of the problem that Whispering Vault has: there are almost no rules outside of Combat...essentially they boil down to [Roll an Attribute Vs a Target Number] (with no guidelines for setting a Target Number beyond words like "easy, hard, routine, etc). This might fly in a rules light game like PDQ but Whispering Vault really doesn't qualify. There's also some of the standard mid-90s GMing advice where you show the players who's in charge:   So, lets get down to the Disciplines: Conjure: Creates a small object (small is not defined) which is normally permanent. The difficulty of the task (an Insight Challenge) is based on the complexity of the object. If you're a Master you can create several small objects at once or a single large object (which is defined as "no bigger than you can carry") which will slowly disintegrate over several hours. Despite being created magically there's no ruling on whether or not weapons created this way count as "mortal" or not for penalties like your Die-Cap. If it weren't for the frustrating ambiguity over how big a "small" object is this would probably be one of the most useful non-combat powers. The power has a lot of blind spots as well for things like grenades and c4. Delve: You can read minds. This requires physical contact and an Insight Challenge and it states that it yields "ambiguous" results, which is appropriately a very ambiguous rule. In fact I think I may have to cut myself off from using the word "ambigous" anymore because otherwise this chapter will force me to type it every paragraph at this rate. Even more ridiculous is that if you find a traumatic memory you have to make a Willpower challenge or lose "one or more" points of Vitality. That seems kind of BS doesn't it? I mean, Stalkers are supposed to be the protectors of the universe who are sent to hunt down naughty gods and they're going to fall to pieces because of something that scared a mortal? If you Master Delve you can also use it to speak with the dead, with penalties for badly decayed or destroyed corpses. Disintegrate You can destroy "small" (there's that word again) objects with a touch. If you've got plenty of time you can just do it but doing it quickly takes a Willpower challenge, based on the durability of the object. Disintegrate "cannot be used as an attack form under any circumstances" which seems to cut out a lot of possible Inspirations. Masters can disintegrate any object they can see and can even destroy larger objects like doors or cars in exchange for a Vitality point. Frankly unless you are a Master I see no point in taking Disintegrate...most Stalkers are more than capable of breaking objects if the need arises. Dissipate: Definitely one of the most useful Disciplines, Dissipate lets you pass through objects or barriers. If you do it slowly there's no roll needed but a quick phase requires a Willpower roll and a failure costs you a point of vitality. The Master version lets you take a person or "large object" (if you're going to keep using these terms then loving define them! We've had "large object" refer to anything from the size of a sack of potatoes to a car in contradictory ways) with you but this makes the process take so long its practically pointless: up to a minute or more to walk through a wall. Dominate: Your mind controlling power. This is a Presence challenge and most mortals will do whatever you want so long as you want them to (makes Delve look kind of lovely since this means you can just force mortals to tell you what they want to know and it doesn't require touch or risk damage from bad memories). If a mortal is Driven they can shake off Domination "a matter of rounds". If you fail to Dominate someone you can't try again. A Master in Dominate can attempt to control a Minion but this requires you to overcome the Resolve of the Unbidden controlling them, which is probably around 20 or so, and costs a point of vitality. Keeping control also uses up your action every round.  Foresight: I haven't even started reading this entry yet and I bet it'll be ambi...unclear. Foresight is Strenous, costing a point of vitality and requires a Challenge whose difficulty is the duration (in minutes) and granting a +1 bonus to all rolls for that duration. However, if you fail then challenge then you have lost track of "now" and the GM decides how long it will take you to return. That's....really really lovely. A point of Vitality (keep in mind that most Stalkers have around 8-10 Vitality and can't heal) for a chance to get a modest bonus for a short duration and if you fail you're stunned until the GM decides you aren't. What if you master it? You can recall some of your visions "usually dreamlike cryptic clues that may help the Stalker complete their Hunt but never give them a direct answer". Son of a bitch. Frenzy: And here we break the combat system with the multi-attack power. It lets you take two attacks (presumably only attacks, it doesn't mention other multi-action attempts) in a round in exchange for a -1 penalty to Strength and Dexterity for those actions. If you've mastered it you can up it further to 3 attacks in exchange for a -2 to Strength and Dexterity. The text suggests combining this with Savage (which boosts melee damage) but it is much better with the Rend power or a weapon since those won't be penalized by a strength reduction. With Frenzy and Rend you can pretty much set your Strength score to 1 on all your Vessels and pump up your Dex and Fortitude and just blaze away. Morph Half the description for Morph seems to be missing. It states that you spend 3 minutes reweaving your vessel with an insight challenge but if you fail there's a cost of a point of vitality. It doesn't tell you what you can change yourself to look like but it does mention you can't mimic specific forms and can "come close enough to invoke the Veil so they can pass as a wolf or a tiger, but their Vessel would be monstrous". Honestly, I'm not sure exactly what this power lets you do...can I look like an ordinary dog, or is it going to be a silent-hill esque half-dog? Can I look like a human. What good is it if I can't change quickly, look unobtrusive or imitate someone? It also notes that no matter what changes you make there are no mechanical benefits (so growing claws won't help damage and wings won't let you fly). A master can at least change shape quickly and assume a human form (this is the first time not being able to look human has been mentioned) but still can't mimic a particular person which seems like a rip-off. Inspirations are mentioned to allow you to do things like develop venom or flight or armor (none of which there are rules for). Rend This lets you make a ranged attack with Damage equal to your Willpower, but you're still penalized by the law of Proximity so it has a die-cap of 5. The attack must suit the Avatar's theme and automatically unMasks you, stripping away the Veil. A master adds +2 damage and may imitate a mundane attack form like a gun or a thrown weapon and won't be unmasked. A Master of both Rend and Frenzy is pretty much a combat monster.  Calm yourself citizen! I'm here to help! Savage This gives you a +2 bonus to damage when using your Strength. Since this relies on weapons that are a part of your Avatar (claws, razor fingers, prehensile drill penis, etc) using it causes you to become unMasked. The mastered version increases the bonus to +3 and lets you imitate a non-supernatural attack and remain masked, making this much worse than Rend already. Terrify: A Presence challenge lets you turn mortals into gibbering wrecks from fear, unless they are Inspired or Driven which makes them "hesitate" for a few rounds. No clue what that means. Of course, most any Stalker should be able to do this already by just showing off their true form and the Dominate Discipline is just as difficult and lets you take complete control over mortals. It has no apparent effect on non-mortals. If you've Mastered Terrify then you can use it against a group of mortals but the TN is the highest resolve +1 per mortal...making it kind of suck. It also won't work on a group led by someone Inspired or Driven and no we still don't know what those words mean yet. Translocate: I've noticed that quite a few Disciplines are really just shittier versions of other Disciplines: Savage is a shittier Rend, Terrify or Delve are shittier versions of Dominate. Dissipate is the shittier version of Translocate. This lets you teleport instantaneously anywhere you can see without a roll. If you can't see the destination then you must make an Awareness challenge (notably unlike Dissipate you don't take damage for failing). Master Translocation lets you take a "large object" or another character but requires 3 rounds of preparation (still faster than dissipation) and a roll which inflicts a point of Vitality damage if you fail. Ward: This lets you try and resist an attack from a mortal. Big problem here: no rules are provided for how it interacts with a normal defense roll...do you roll your defense normally and then roll Ward if that doesn't work? Does Ward replace your normal defense? Anyway, its a Willpower Challenge against a difficulty equal to the Damage...does that mean the damage dice of the attack or the actual rolled damage that's compared to your Fortitude because if its damage dice then Ward is pretty easy (since most attacks max out around 8-10 damage dice excepting the Unbidden or heavy weaponry) but if its against the rolled total then Ward is practically impossible (since that's usually 20+ when resisting a solid attack). If you succeed then you take no damage...fail and you not only suffer the normal damage but you take an extra point of Vitality damage. Yay!! Oh, and Ward uses up an insignificant action so that means you can't use it if you've moved or talked already that round and you can only do it once per round. Masters do not lose extra vitality for failing and you can try and Ward an attack from a Shadow or the Unbidden (i.e. the people you'll usually be fighting). Weave: The healing power...which is a big deal since you can't heal normally on a hunt and only get a handful of vitality but also a big problem because Weaving kind of blows. It takes a number of minutes equal to the Vitality you want to recover and reduces your Willpower by one every time you do it (which lasts until the end of the Hunt). This not only reduces your maximum Vitality by 2 but it also reduces one of your attributes by one until the Willpower is recovered. Master Weavers can heal faster and can heal other characters...but this costs both you and the person you're healing 1 Willpower. Whisper: Also apparently called a "silent scream". Whisper is one-way telepathy which works over any distance between Stalkers but only within visual contact when sending to anyone else. Masters can do two-way communication at any range but this requires a Presence challenge.  and that's it for Disciplines. Next we'll be talking about Servitors, your twisted grotesque pokemon.
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Jun 2, 2016 04:20
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Hopefully folks are enjoying the Whispering Vault review, I actually worry sometimes that I editorialize too much because when I get into the guts of a system it doesn't take too much to make me grouchy at it. But hey, the art's neat to look at, unlike the WLD or PDQ games I'm not just left with big text-dumps. The Whispering Vault: Part 4 Servitors Servitors are pokemon written by Clive Barker. Unlike Shadows they don't fully manifest in the Realm of Flesh and so they're invisible to anyone except for Sensitives and beings of Essence. They have singular roles so they're less like summoned monsters and more like spells. Summoning a Servitor is a Strenous action so attempting it costs a point of precious Vitality and the difficulty is non-trivial. There are vague guidelines: it's Easy to summon a Servitor if you can take as much time as you want and are free of distractions and it's Very Hard to summon one in a single combat round in the middle of a fight, taking two rounds reduces it to merely Hard. If you've Mastered a particular servitor you only pay the Vitality cost on a failed roll. Considering the very small Vitality pool characters have and the difficulty of summoning a Servitor it's pretty much only useful if you Master them. The book states that one of the advantages of Servitors is that they have nearly unlimited area and duration, limited only by the Forbiddance. Of course, we have no idea what the Forbiddance is so that's not particularly helpful. So, with that in mind, lets get to the servitors:  Chronovores: These are capable of "loosening the grip of the Chronosphere" on Mortals and Minions. Basically its a slow spell, which reduces the attack attribute by 1, Defend by 2 and Initiative by 3. Not bad...except that you've got to sacrifice your action, spend a point of Karma or an extra point of vitality each round. If this worked on Shadows or the Unbidden that might be worthwhile, but since it only affects Mortals it's a hefty cost. Cloudlings: Make it rain!!  This is the stupidest Servitor by far. They absorb moisture from the air and rise up to release it as rain 10-20 minutes after they're summoned. That's all. Oh, and you can dismiss them before they "burst" in order to simply leave the air dry. I suppose that secondary option might be useful for clearing some fog...but honestly I can't imagine they're very useful. This isn't a setting where rain or running water has any special properties...this just produces a moderate rainstorm with a 10-20 minute head start. Devourers: This servitor is fairly interesting and actually fairly useful (it certainly makes the Disintegrate discipline look like a chump). Devourers will consume matter, up to several tons of inanimate matter, regardless of the durability of the substance. However, barriers or objects that have been enchanted cannot be harmed and the Devourers are forbidden from consuming living flesh and the taste of fresh blood will immediately banish them. See, that's an interesting servitor, it's got flexible utility and enough weirdness to make it more than just a re-skinned disintegrate power. I wonder if any of the rest will live up to this. Dreadwyrms The servitor version of the Terrify power, less intense but broader and harder to resist...but at the cost of Vitality. It causes any Mortals who hear the Dreadwyrms telephathic whispers to become Terrified (lowering their Die Cap), unless they are Driven or Inspired. It can also cause a panic, but no rules are provided for when this happens, just saying that it might happen. Panicked mortals lash out violently and get +2 to attack but -3 to defense, fleeing immediately if injured. Ferretters: By describing something you are looking for the Ferretters will find it. They can fly and go through walls, moving 10 times faster than a human. They'll continue searching for whatever time you ask them to and return to you when they find it. They're too dumb for abstract orders however, so you can't tell them to "find Shadows" or "find the Unbidden". Flits: This is a "shield" effect where the Flits apparently bodily hurl themselves into the path of fast-moving objects. Reduces ranged damage by 1 die, 2 die for high-velocity projectiles like guns. This only affects melee attacks if you are using Frenzy, which also inflicts a -2 penalty. Not particularly impressive. Glamours: This one beats Cloudlings for the record of "stupidest Servitor". Glamours produce light-shows that can only be seen by Sensitives...so it doesn't affect normal mortals and it won't affect Shadows or the Unbidden...just Sensitive Mortals. Furthermore, only Sensitives with a Perception of 12 or higher and a Resolve of 13 or lower. That's an incredibly narrow class. All the lights do is reduce Initiative and Perceive by 2 while its going on...except there's also a 1-in-6 chance that minions will become enraged by the lights, granting a +1 bonus to attack! And like all servitors this costs a point of Vitality to accomplish.  Lets comfort ourselves with this cool looking image Glimmergaunts: The glimmergaunts produce an ethereal light visible only to beings of Essence and Sensitives with a perception of 15 or higher (by the way there are no example Sensitives in the book, so it's not clear what their stats "normally" look like). This makes physical objects transparent, allowing you to see through them. There's no limit to the depth you can set it to but it can obviously get hard to interpret stuff past a certain point. The light is also disturbing to other Servitors, driving them away unless the summoner spends a point of Karma. Gremlins: you can probably guess what these do. It only works on high-tech equipment, which may be an issue considering the Stalkers cover the entire time-stream, but given their utility any time after 1900 it's probably still worth someone getting them. Theoretically it should shut down all such devices in the area of effect...but then it says "there is always a chance a device that should be affected will work properly". Of course, no rules are provided for what that chance actually is...it's just up to the GM whether or not some important item is still working or not. Marrowdires: Wow, really stretching on the name for this one. These are parasites that feed on the Vessels of Stalkers, Shadows and Unbidden. Anyone in the area of effect (including Stalkers, so be careful) has their Fortitude reduced by 1. However, an attack that inflicts damage will drive out the parasites, resetting the Fortitude until the start of the next round (assuming you don't escape the area). Martyrs: These servitors sacrifice themselves to prevent others from feeling pain. That's sweet. It reduces all damage in the area by 1 Vitality and the cloud of Martyrs can absorb up to 9 vitality before they're all killed. Pretty effective if used wisely. Negators: These creatures eat up Essence in the area. This prevents a Sensitive from "reading" an area and blocks most form of mortal magic which requires access to this essence. Nightwings: The nightwings block out light in the area, causing anything from a dimming to pitch blackness as you wish. However, "they may linger longer than their master desires". There are no rules for what that means. I should point out that there also aren't any form of standardized "situational" modifiers so there's no actual guidelines on what penalties or bonuses darkness would provide.  Rippers: These creatures rip off skin, the little darlings. This de-husks Minions and inflicts 1 point of Vitality damage to mortals with Fortitudes of 1-2 or lower. The Unbidden can take control of these servants, turning them into a 6-die attack against the summoner. Considering that they're not very impressive to begin with, that's a pretty hefty penalty. Rotlings: 1-6 rounds after exposure mortals in the area fall ill if their Fortitude is less than 4. The illness drops attack, defense, strength and initiative by 1. Exposure can be fatal to sickly victims but otherwise it'll run its course in an hour. however, the disease can be transmissable to others, meaning a mini-plague can start. Slashers: A big area of effect attack from spinning little monsters, they are treated as a 4dice attack against everyone with a die-cap of 5 against shadows and 4 against stalkers and the unbidden. They also won't attack anyone already wounded. Spinners: These guys spin invisible webs that can only be seen by Sensitives. The webs have no effect on beings of Essence but cling to mortals (including the Husks of Minions) and "slowing them to a crawl". Unfortunately no actual rules are provided for what this means. Can they defend themselves? Can they attack? What about objects like mortal weapons? either way the webs apparently dissolve in an hour or when cut by a "living knife" or the sound of churchbells. These weird little conditions you see on some Servitors are interesting and hint at an interesting setting but since its so scattershot whether or not a particular servitor has a limitation like this then it ends up being too forgettable. Trackers: A more limited version of Ferretters. Trackers also run through walls and will find the nearest creature of Essence and then howl just loud enough to reach the summoner. Mortals cannot hear the howl but sensitives and beings of Essence can...so it's not terribly helpful when pursuing prey to alert them to the fact that you just found them. Vampires: The reverse of Martyrs. Vampires will seek out the wounds of Mortals or the Host of an Unbidden and drink from the wounds, increasing vitality damage by 1. Once they get 9 points of vitality they're sated and leave. If they are not sated within 3 rounds they will start to feed on Stalkers as well (but apparently not Shadows or the Unbidden's Avatar). Voidoids: Winner of the "stupidest name". They resemble floating jellyfish with eyeballs on their tentacles. They can mute, but not neutralize just about any sort of energy. This lets them do things like reduce fires, interfere with radio signals, dim lights etc. Definitely an interesting ability, hampered by the fact that there are no guidelines for doing things like reducing damage from energy sources or actual guidelines for how much you can reduce a signal.  So, servitors are more interesting than Disciplines but the Vitality cost renders them pretty-much a non-starter unless you're a Master and many of them are just flat-out not worth the effort. Next we'll be looking at Skills!
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Jun 4, 2016 00:56
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