Serpent, Eye, Key: A Micro-Setting

Suggested listening.

 

The land of Tinen is a land of wind and dust, of deep cloudless blue skies, of high-towering granite massifs and green-studded hills of brown earth. It is ruled by the great golden Eye of the Sun—and yet, look what gathers on the horizon, on the frontiers. From the peaks of this country, or so it is said, you could once see even to the ends of the earth. Now all that can be spied is an endless, roiling sea of gray fog. It is the great Serpent, the Enemy, the Rattler, the foe of mankind. In ages beyond the grasp of memory it descended upon the world, choking all to death and wrack and ruin. Now, in this latter age, the Four Clans of the Tinián and a tiny persistent shard of the once-great Empire of Kashkhorshid are all that remain, the Serpent and its beasts kept from their throats only by the Sun—but the Eye cannot gaze in all places at once, and the fog is cunning and insistent. 

 

Some generations ago, amidst these dire and ever-worsening circumstances, the Tinián began to draw courage from an unlikely source: tales of Heroes from some foreign and mysterious land, sold on by the River Traders, a strange and tight-lipped yet peaceful folk who safely traverse the fog via unknown means. These stories grew immensely popular, for they told of courage and love and the triumph of good over evil. Yet it availed naught. The Serpent's grasp ever tightened, until at last, in the days of our mothers' mothers, a great billow of gray roared down the river Dian-Met and forced its way over the Mother, last and greatest defense of Tinen. Those were desperate times, and still the sages sign of the heroic deeds done in hopeless defiance of mist and monster. The greatest of those acts, then, belongs to the sorcerer Sujatha, who put her trust in the Sun and attempted the impossible: to summon forth the Heroes, in whose existence none truly believed. Miraculously, it worked. Those eleven true souls strode out from that dim cave whence they were drawn into the bright light of the Eye, with Keys that are Blades shimmering forth from their breasts, and by their bravery the land was saved.

 

Now, some two hundred seasons later, eight of the eleven Heroes are dead. Their Keys have passed from their great hearts out into the world, from whence their power might be summoned by any with the will to find it. Still, as the days of glory fade, beasts stalk the borders and the fog seeps in again, tireless and unrelenting. New dangers, too, await: for a thousand seasons, the First of the Othmiani, that mighty clan, has been the King of the Tinián; the titles are synonymous. Yet now King Sriyana has suddenly sickened and lies on his deathbed—with no clear heir. The Four Clans scramble for position and great strife threatens, even as the Rattler sneaks and surges across the Mother again. Will this age bring at last the long-delayed death of the world?

 

Languages

• Tiniá: The consonant, halting, hierarchical language of the Tinián people. All player characters speak one of four mutually intelligible dialects, belonging to the Four Clans of Tinen—the imperious eastern Othmiani, the stout southern Kasihwa, the isolated western Bizhete, or the gregarious northern Nirhayeta. Taking another dialect as a language means you can speak in that dialect with an accent good enough to pass as a member of that clan.
• Peace Talk: An ancient and elegant hand language, once widely used as a lingua franca across the world. Now, there are precious few others to talk to, but Peace Talk is still used as a language of diplomacy in both Tinen and the Jashmid Valley (you can't hold a weapon and sign at the same time). It is also used as a language of ritual and tradition in Tinen. Lizards are expected to know Peace Talk. Greeting Tinián people and Kashkhorshidim in Peace Talk confers +1 reaction, even if they don't understand it.
• Kasihwa Talk: The Kasihwa Clan has a high rate of congenital deafness (~5%), so they have their own precise, delicate hand language, known by many members of the clan. It was born separately from Peace Talk, and they share few similarities. Signing to a Kasihwan in Kasihwa Talk confers +2 reaction if they also understand it.
• Kashkhorshidi: The harsh, poetic language of the Kashkhorshid Empire, or rather, what little remains of it. Its usage is strongly enforced by the Empress and proudly maintained by her people, determined to keep their culture alive in the face of all adversities. Still, Tiniá is fairly widely spoken in the Jashmid Valley, and its use slowly but inevitably grows.
• Alvarian: A secretive, closely held language spoken by the River Traders, the Blue People, who the Fog does not harm. Little is known of them, and they strive to conceal what they can from the people of the world for unknown reasons. Very few Tinián people and Kashkhorshidim speak Alvarian, but some have learned it by long effort and close contact. It is fluid and spoken very rapidly.
• Warning: The granular, sibilant speech of the Serpent and the Fog Beasts which inhabit its grey reaches. It whispers constantly and nonsensically in the ears of any who venture into those depths until it is progressively overcome by the rattling that precedes the strike of fangs and venom. Fog Beasts use it more coherently to coordinate their attacks, toy with their prey, falsely negotiate, and generally cause dismay and panic. Coyotes often learn it, that they might better understand their deadly foes. +1 reaction with Fog Beasts if you speak Warning back at them, but it only delays violence, not averts it.
• Chazet: An eons-old language, now only known from inscriptions in the ruins deep below the mountains of Tinen and high in their peaks. It is the only written script known to the people of the world, circumscribed as they are, and its spoken form is lost—no one knows how to pronounce the words. Once largely the province of scholars and sorcerers, use of the script to record Tiniá and Kashkhorshidi is spreading gradually (with invented correlation of characters to sounds).

Virtues

The Tinián value the virtues of:

• Contemplation: Think before acting, always.
• Affiliation: Clan politics and family structure are impenetrably dense. They are also all-important.
• Etiquette: Everyone must be treated as befits their station and relation. Never err.
• Saccharinity: Fog Beasts seek negative emotion. Always be positive and kind, to the point of grating.  

The Kashkorshidim value the virtues of: 

• Poesy: All things should be beautiful, always.
• Demonstrativity: Say exactly what you feel, at length, as floridly as possible.
• Conservation: The rest of the Empire may be lost, but we maintain its memory. Change nothing of the past.
• Mutability: Culture shouldn't transform, but people should. Adapt to your circumstances. 

The virtues of the River Traders and Fog Beasts are unknown. 

 

Classes

• Peccary: A fierce and mighty collectivist warrior society spanning all of Tinen, who are stronger together than they are separate. Only Tinián men may become Peccaries.
• Coyote: A secretive order of hunters, who never reveal their identities if they can avoid it and perform strange feats of endurance and speed. Tinián in origin, but now known in Kashkhorshid.
• Crow: Sorcerers, or perhaps priests, who worship and feed spirits in return for service, and transform themselves in search of power. Tinián in origin, but now known in Kashkhorshid.
• Lizard: Priests of the Sun and the River, who together are one. Lizards are initiated into an effeminate third gender, in imitation of their namesake. Only Tinián people may become Lizards.
• Paladin: Questing soldiers of the Empress, who draw might from service and courage from virtue. Only Kashkhorshidi women may become Paladins.
• Alchemist: Chemist-priests of the Sky, who brew strange broths of power and mutate themselves to match their circumstances. Kashkhorshidi in origin, but now known in Tinián.

Keys

Each player character begins play with one Key and the means to use it. Activating a Key reduces the wielder's max HP, and each Key also enables use of a specific method to restore one's own max HP.

• The Aspect of Blood is unlocked by the Key of Elissa, who lies in state in the Royal Palace—or did, before it was swallowed by the Serpent. Activated by drawing a particular sigil, and allows the wielder to physically empower themself or another: 1 max HP = +1 Str and Dex mod for 10 minutes, 1d6 max HP = +1 attack per round for 10 minutes. Max HP is restored by drinking human blood.
• The Aspect of Light is unlocked by the Key of Hanno, who lies unburied in a dry riverbed deep in the Fog. Activated by focusing on an abstract thoughtform, and allows the wielder to produce flame that burns indefinitely without heat: 1 max HP = starting a coldflame over the course of 10 minutes, 1d6 max HP = instantaneously causing whatever you touch to burst into coldflame. Max HP is restored by collecting starlight.
• The Aspect of Jade is unlocked by the Key of Jael, who is buried beneath a shrine in a remote mountain valley. Activated by using a tiny jade key (or more common in Tinen, turquoise), and allows the wielder to remove blight, illness or poison: 1 max HP = a person may save again vs an affliction, 1d6 max HP = removing a source of contamination entirely. Max HP is restored by dosing oneself with poison.
• The Aspect of Cloud is unlocked by the Key of Kabzeel, who flew into the sky and was never seen again. Activated by breathing techniques, and allows the wielder to leap as if they were a feather: 1 max HP = acrobatics and evasion, 1d6 max HP = true flight for 10 minutes. Max HP is restored by dehydration.
• The Aspect of Pebbles is unlocked by the Key of Melqart, whose bones are set in the throne of the Empress of Kashkhorshid. Activated by throwing a handful of pebbles in the air, and allows the wielder to cause devastation with rapidly accelerated tiny stones: 1 max HP = attack at +10 for 1d6 damage, 1d6 max HP = 3d6 damage save for half. Max HP is restored by descending in elevation.
• The Aspect of Knives is unlocked by the Key of Tanit, whose body was destroyed in the self-detonation which killed her and caused a mile-wide crater in the lowlands of Nirhayeta. Activated by stitching a small copper idol beneath your skin, and allows the wielder to heal wounds: 1 max HP = +1d8 HP or a minor wound healed, 1d6 max HP = a major or fatal wound healed. Max HP is restored by rapidly dumping accumulated waste heat, ideally into a heat sink of a lot of water.
• The Aspect of Roots is unlocked by the Key of Dido, whose body is used as an idol by a famous sorcerer. Activated by crushing a live insect in your palm, and allows the wielder to grow plants rapidly: 1 max HP = a dense thicket covering 300 square feet, 1d6 max HP = an impenetrable thicket covering 90,000 square feet. Max HP is restored by growing a garden.
• The Aspect of Nothing is unlocked by the Key of Batnoam, who is only remembered by his name, as all other stories and traces were removed from the world as if by a scalpel. Activated by scarring your skin with a blade, and allows the wielder to remove matter from existence: 1 max HP = remove 1 square inch of matter from existence, 1d6 max HP = a target of any size saves vs annihilation. Max HP cannot be restored, and when it is gone, you are annihilated.
• The Aspect of Bounds is unlocked by the Key of Eshmoun, who vanished without a trace sixty seasons ago, but is evidently still alive.
• The Aspect of Rods is unlocked by the Key of Arishat, who broods in her fortress at Zarihwan's Wall in the south.
• The Aspect of Crowns is unlocked by the Key of Baalat, who has not left the King's side since he fell ill, and was scarce seen without him beforehand.

This is, of course, my first entry into GLÅUGUST, for the prompt "Create Something Inspired By Kingdom Hearts Without Looking Up Anything About Kingdom Hearts." As you can tell, I know very little about Kingdom Hearts, other than that there are isekai'd Disney characters and keyblades. I interpreted these very generously. Hopefully, the remainder of my GLÅUGUST posts will be in this same setting, because that would be fun. We'll see.

XVI. The Tower (GLOG Class: Wizard)

Via Wikipedia, by Pamela Colman Smith

 

To play this class, you will need either a full physical 78-card tarot deck or a method of imitating one satisfactorily (the Dash Delta dicebot on Discord has a very nice tarot feature that includes reversed cards, an essential element of this class). You are encouraged, but not required, to play your cards with all the panache and theater you can muster and to perform normal readings in the course of the game.

 

Via Wikimedia, by Mikhail Vrubel, located by primeumaton

Class: Fortune-Teller

 

Skills: Bluffing and 1d3: 1. Shoeing Horses, 2. Storytelling, 3. Silversmithing

Starting Equipment: A 78-card tarot deck, an iridescent or otherwise colorful robe, a crystal ball (completely inert), a dagger, and a stout staff. 

A: The Tarot, Hand of Fate, Trusted Voice

B: Destiny, +1 Hand

C: Scry, +1 Hand, +1 Fate

D: Burn, +2 Hand

The Tarot: At midnight, shuffle your deck (adding any cards which were in your hand, played, or discarded back in), draw a number of cards equal to your Hand (3 at A template), and add them to your hand, which you may look at. Cards in your hand must remain in the orientation in which they were drawn (upright or reversed). You may play a card face-up to activate its effect, and you may stack additional cards from your hand face-down beneath it to enhance its power (card descriptions use the notation [stack] to represent the number of cards used, with the initial face-up card counting as 1). If a card is destroyed in-fiction, remove it from your deck and do not add it back in until you acquire a replacement. Card effects may target any contextually appropriate person, creature, or object that you can see within earshot, unless otherwise specified. In combat, playing a card in any way takes your action unless otherwise specified.

Hand of Fate: You have 1 Fate. This may be spent, at will, to discard a card from your hand and replace it with a random card drawn from the deck, or to flip a card from upright to reversed and vice versa. You may temporarily acquire more Fate from cards of the Major Arcana, as detailed below, and there is no limit to how much Fate you may have at any given point, but at midnight, no matter how much Fate remains, it is reset to 1.

Trusted Voice: Your regular readings are treated with respect by all folk, and your predictions are widely held to be trustworthy. You are under no obligation to tell the truth about your divinations, but if you acquire a reputation for dissembling within readings, you lose this ability.

 

Destiny: You may discard any number of cards from your hand to draw and play a random card from your deck sight unseen, with [stack] equaling twice the number of discards.

 

Scry: Before shuffling and dealing your deck at midnight, you may choose to search it and place one card of your choice into your hand. This reduces your Hand by one (and the chosen card still counts towards Hand) until the next time you shuffle your deck and refresh your hand.

 

Burn: Draw randomly or pick from your hand three or more cards, which must remain in the order and orientation they were drawn/picked in (you can mix and match drawing and picking). Create a reading based on this sequence of cards and negotiate an effect for it with the DM, which transpires immediately. The cards you use for this ability instantly burn to ash and may never be used again. Any replacements you acquire for them are inert and powerless, including in regular readings.

 

Suits

 

This is where I reveal I'm a coward and a rube and didn't come up with 156 bespoke effects for 78 cards in upright and reversed orientations. Sorry. Instead, each suit (including Major Arcana) has an upright and a reversed effect, and each card of the Major Arcana also has unique upright and reversed effects. DMs and players are encouraged to come up with unique abilities for each card of the Minor Arcana as they come up, or I may create an additional post with further effects if I feel up to it (no promises).

 

Swords:

• Upright: An unlikely accident befalls the target and deals [stack]d6 damage to it. You may choose whether this coincidence transpires in [stack]d6 rounds or [stack]d6 minutes.
•  Reversed: The next time the target would take damage, an unlikely coincidence intervenes, reducing the damage by [stack]d6. May be played as a reaction.

Wands:

• Upright: Target flame (open or contained) either explodes into a blinding display of fireworks (all who see it must save vs blindness until it's over, lasts [stack] rounds) or into a cloud of choking, obscuring smoke with a radius of [stack]×10 ft.
• Reversed: [stack] targets must save vs confusion, taking -1 to all rolls instead on a success. The effect lasts 1d4+1 rounds.

Cups:

• Upright: Gain an intuitive and perfectly accurate empathetic understanding of the emotions of either 1 target for [stack]d6 minutes or [stack] targets for 1d6 minutes.
• Reversed: A target becomes completely emotionally deadened (immune to fear, pain, joy, lust, etc) for [stack]d6 rounds, or [stack] targets are so affected for 1d6 rounds. 

Pentacles:

• Upright: The target heals [stack]d4 HP. If this would bring them above their max HP, they gain [stack] max HP until the next time this card is shuffled back into the deck.
• Reversed: 1d10×([stack]-1)×10 large, foreign gold coins appear in your hand and disappear a minute later, or 1d10×10 large, foreign gold coins appear in your hand and disappear a minute/hour/day/week/month/year later (increasing per [stack]).

Major Arcana:

• Upright or Reversed: Gain [stack] Fate.

Unique Card Effects

 

0. The Fool:

• Upright: All bonds (physical, mental, social) restraining [stack] targets burst asunder instantly. The targets cannot be bound, slowed, hindered, or otherwise restrained for [stack] hours thereafter.
• Reversed: [stack] targets are seized by chains restricting all their limbs (if any), which disappear after [stack]d4 rounds. Each round, they may use their action to save to escape.

I. The Magician:

• Upright: For the next [stack] minutes, either [stack]+1 human-sized (or smaller) targets or one target no bigger than ([stack]+1)×4 times larger than human-sized float up to no higher than [stack]×10 ft above the ground at your will. Each round, they may use their move to save to escape. You may end the effect at will.
• Reversed: For [stack] rounds, [stack] targets have their weight magnified, slowing them by [stack]×10 ft (or more on particularly soft ground) and causing them to take [stack]d4 damage per round as they're crushed under their own weight. Flying targets immediately plummet to the ground.

II. The High Priestess:

• Upright: For [stack] hours, you can see all magic effects and intuit their basic functions, penetrate all illusions, sense traps on a 5-in-6, and interpret all omens clearly.
• Reversed: [stack] targets are disguised as something with roughly similar shape and size for [stack] hours.

III. The Empress:

• Upright: Target living thing grows—plants, fungi, and the like grow to cover an area no more than [stack]×100 ft to a side permanently, while animals and the like grow to [stack]+1 times their original size for 10 minutes, adding +[stack] to their Strength modifier.
• Reversed: A target withers and desiccates, taking [stack]d4 damage and [stack]d4 Strength damage (save for half). If played on a plant, fungus, or the like, it and all similar living things within a radius of [stack]×50 ft instantly die with no save.
  

IV. The Emperor:

• Upright: You may speak with [stack] of the following categories for [stack] hours: animals, plants, corpses, doors, stones, weapons, clothes, and speakers of any specific language. They have personalities befitting their nature and are not automatically cooperative.
• Reversed: [stack] targets are completely silenced and unable to create noise for [stack]×10 minutes.

V. The Hierophant:

• Upright: [stack] targets must save vs charm. If charmed, they treat you like a trusted (but not boon) friend for [stack]d6 minutes.
• Reversed: Create an illusion deceiving up to [stack] senses, which you can control and move for [stack]d4 minutes, after which it disappears.

VI. The Lovers:

• Upright: Target object no larger than a cube [stack]×5 ft to a side is repaired, even if it was reduced to dust, or target heals [stack]d6 HP.
  
• Reversed: Target object no larger than a cube [stack]×5 ft to a side is shattered into a million pieces.

VII. The Chariot:

• Upright: For [stack] rounds, a target may move at [stack]+1 times their normal speed and may take an additional action every round in combat. After the effect ends, the target is lethargic (cannot move, has no action in combat) for [stack] rounds.
• Reversed: For [stack] minutes, a target must save each round or lose their action and is slowed by [stack]×10 ft.

VIII. Justice:

• Upright: Speak a proper name and pick a condition: until you reach the bearer of that name or until the bearer of that name is dead. Until the condition is fulfilled, do not reshuffle this card unto the deck; it remains in play. You know the exact direction and distance of the target constantly, no matter where it is, and all attacks made against it gain +[stack] to hit, even if you'd wish otherwise.
• Reversed: [stack] targets are concealed from [stack] senses for one hour, or one target or location is concealed from [stack] senses for [stack] hours. 

IX. The Hermit:

• Upright: After 11 minus [stack] minutes of study, you understand the literal meaning of a piece of writing or other object of art.
• Reversed: You can hear a target's thoughts as if they were your own for [stack] minutes. They may save to feel your presence in their mind.

X. The Wheel of Fortune:

• Upright: The next [stack]×2 times you blink, you instantly appear wherever you were looking before you blinked when you open your eyes.
• Reversed: Name a category. For the next [stack] minutes, everything in that category within sight approaches you—anything which can move under its own power slowly wanders towards you as if of its own accord, anything which can't floats at a sedate but inexorable 10 ft per round.

XI. Strength:

• Upright: The next [stack] attacks and harmful effects targeting a target miss or fail as if by coincidence. May be played as a reaction.
• Reversed: [stack] arrows appear from thin air and orbit you for the next hour. You may launch any number of them as an action; they cannot miss or be mitigated in any way and each deal 1d4 damage.

XII. The Hanged Man:

• Upright: For [stack] hours, everyone you meet will treat you like an exotic but important and fascinating foreign dignitary, granting +2 reaction. For this duration, you cannot be ignored and are the most interesting thing in any room you walk into.
• Reversed: For 8 hours, you gain +[stack]+1 AC if you are unarmored, as though objects which approach you suddenly slow to be easily avoided, and you are always the least interesting person in any group or crowd.

XIII. Death:

• Upright: A target rolls [stack] mutations on the DM's favorite table and heals [stack]d4 HP. These mutations last [stack] days, after which the target saves against each of them, losing them on a success.
  
• Reversed: A target becomes immobile, inactive, and completely immune to any change or harm whatsoever for [stack]d6 rounds. May be played as a reaction.
• Upright or Reversed: You may discard your entire hand and redraw back up to the number of cards that were in your hand immediately before you played this card.

XIV. Temperance:

• Upright: Within a cube no more than [stack]×5 ft to a side, all volatile materials and reactions (fire, acid, alcohol, fuel, etc) are turned to neutral salt.
  
• Reversed: Must be played at [stack] = 2 or greater with a card of the Minor Arcana, which is also turned face-up. You may, for a round, telekinetically control a cube no more than [stack]×2 ft to a side of the associated element (Swords = air, Wands = fire, Cups = water, Pentacles = earth). Attacks made thereby do not require an attack roll, but deal [stack]d6 damage to no more than [stack] targets, save for half.

XV. The Devil:

• Upright: A pit [stack]×5 ft in radius and [stack]×10 ft deep appears in the ground or floor. Anyone this pit appears beneath may save to get out of the way before falling. The pit lasts [stack] hours.
• Reversed: A rope [stack]×50' long appears, tied at one end around something or someone you can see at any distance. The rope is unbreakable and lasts [stack]×10 minutes. If tied around a creature, they may save each round to escape if it would be feasible for them to untie the knot.

XVI. The Tower:

• Upright: Curse the target with a negotiated effect that can be described in no more than [stack]×3 words. After [stack] hours, the target may save to end the effect; on a failure, it is permanent until dispelled.
• Reversed: [stack] targets receive +1 on all rolls for [stack]×10 minutes as fate seems to miraculously and inexplicably favor them.

XVII. The Star:

• Upright: An object glows with bright light in a radius of [stack]×10 ft for [stack] hours. If your foes come within the light, they lose 1 Morale permanently as the light gains a mysteriously menacing aspect.
• Reversed: Magical darkness with a radius of [stack]×10 ft appears, lasting [stack] minutes. Those within must save vs anhedonia, which lasts until they exit the darkness.

XVIII. The Moon:

• Upright: [stack] targets become mortally terrified of something or someone you name for [stack]×10 minutes. On noticing the object of their fear, they flee. Targets with HD equal to or greater than [stack] may check Morale to hold their ground, but they have -1 to hit and -1 AC while afraid.
• Reversed: A magical effect with MD less than or equal to [stack] is permanently dispelled. If the target has MD greater than [stack], it is instead suppressed for 1d6 rounds. May be played as a reaction.

XIX. The Sun:

• Upright: All impurities are removed from a specified substance within the volume of a cube no more than [stack]×5 ft to a side and are set neatly in a dried, powdered pile next to it.
• Reversed: A specified solid, liquid, or otherwise fluid substance is, within the volume of a cube no more than [stack]×5 ft to a side, transmuted to a different substance not more than [stack] steps later than it on the following list: stone, wood, water, alcohol, acid, lead, tin, iron, copper, quicksilver, silver, gold. Any substances not on the list may be placed at the same rank as another substance at the DM's discretion. Additionally, the unit used to determine the maximum volume decreases to spans if the final stage of the transmutation is acid or higher, palms at quicksilver or higher, inches at silver or higher, and fifths of an inch at gold or higher. 

XX. Judgement:

• Upright: Summon a being whose name you state. If the name belongs to a spirit, it appears immediately, but if it belongs to a fleshly being, the owner instantly knows that they were summoned and your location at the moment you played the card. The subject of the summoning is not necessarily well-disposed. If you do not state a name, a random spirit of [stack]d4 HD is summoned instead.
  
• Reversed: [stack] spirits within earshot are banished and disappear, or [stack] fleshly beings within earshot may not approach you or attack you. Targets with HD greater than [stack] may save to negate.

XXI. The World:

• Upright: A doorway-sized passage appears though a surface no thicker than [stack]×5 ft. If stack is at least 5, a doorway may instead be created out of thin air leading to a place you've been before within ([stack]-4)×10 miles.
• Reversed: A wall made of the same material as the ground or floor appears, [stack]×10 ft tall, [stack]×5 ft thick, and no more than [stack]×100 ft long; it may include corners but may not form an enclosure. If one of the cards in the stack is from a Minor Arcana, you may turn that card face-up and form the wall from the suit's associated element instead (Swords = wind, Wands = fire, Cups = ice, Pentacles = living stone).

Six Monsters

Created with Loch and Louis's d666 monster generator, put into convenient one-click format by Phlox.

 

 

FALSE GOD
HD 2
AC as concept
Attack explosion (5’ radius, save vs d6 + stun) or spells as a level 2 M-U
Morale 6
Move as will-o’-wisp
No. Occurring 1d4

False gods appear as rays of pure divine sunlight emanating from the clouds that cluster always around the spitting, roiling peak of Mount Saint Barbara. In truth, they are nothing but refracted light from the pits and streams of lava that pock the crater. False gods appear to the many would-be prophets and sages who flock to the peak in search of revelation, striving to convince them to accept warlock contracts written in blood and do the false gods’ will in the wider world. They speak with the overblown affect of gothic villains (a clue to their deception, since the wise know that God is Baroque). Ultimately, false gods seek to accrue worshipers and ascend to true divinity.

Conceptuality: False gods are immune to all damage, even from magical weapons and spells, save for dispelling, abjuring, illusions, and magical darkness, which deal d6 damage per spell level directly to their HP.

Pretender: False gods must check morale or flee when presented with a genuine holy symbol, and are instantly destroyed by Turn effects.

Contract: Characters who form a warlock contract with a false god immediately gain a level 1 spell slot and learn light and explosion, at the cost of 1 max HP per HD and an abiding obligation.

Stun: When stunned, you always act last in initiative and take a -2 penalty to all rolls. 

 

 

ANTIBANYAN
HD 8
AC as plate (made of metal)
Attack flamethrower (50’ cone, save vs 4d6 + set aflame, recharge 6 rounds) or 3x steel boughs (d6 + grapple)
Morale 11
Move no
No. Occurring 1

Antibanyans are miserable misbegotten mechanical mockeries created by a mad industrialist in his search for the enlightenment he could not attain. They take the shape of massive metal fig trees with spouts and nozzles hidden amidst a waving forest of articulated branches. Originally intended for various incenses and meditative reagents, the nozzles now spew forth the flaming effluvia of their forbidden engines—antibanyans are rooted in graveyards and burn corpses in their massive whirring belowground nirvana-engines. Antibanyans are well aware of their perverse hideousness and vent their suffering as murderous rage against any who approach, but if offered the chance for greater violence later rather than lesser violence now, they might bide their time.

Breath: Air intakes are hidden near the ground betwixt the antibanyan’s roots. Every gallon of water poured inside deals 2d6 damage as the buried engines cough and splutter.

Tactics: Grappled enemies cannot evade the antibanyan’s flamethrower or extinguish its flames (d4 damage per round until extinguished), so it will try to grab several foes before torching them all.

 

 

HYDRAL ORB
HD 3
AC as chain (agility)
Attack 2x water jet (d6, hits AC 10, range as longbow)
Morale 8
Move as swallow
No. Occurring 1d6

Hydral orbs are mysterious spherical water elementals (basketball-sized) born of pure and ignorant souls. When the innocent who has birthed them is threatened or endangered, they will phase forth from the center of the chest and silently menace the danger. Only when the situation is completely pacified (no raised voices, drawn weapons, or any displays of emotion at all) will they return to their abode. They never speak, but understand all languages without any nuance, irony, or poeticism whatsoever.

Aqueous: Immune to non-magical weapons. Takes double damage from explosions as it is blasted apart.

Tactics: Hydral orbs are highly intelligent and will unerringly target the most dangerous foes first. They prefer to fly around at long range while attacking from relative impunity, but may be forced to fight closer and less efficiently by threats to their ward. If they fail a morale check, they will not flee, but will attempt to wordlessly negotiate for the safety of their ward.

 

 

SUN BEETLE
HD 0
AC none
Attack none
Morale 1
Move as dung beetle
No. Occurring 1

Sun beetles are to G_d as dung beetles are to camels. They appear exactly as dung beetles, but are carapaced in bright metallic rhodium. Each day at sunrise they emerge from the depths and corners of the highest mountain snows (for what is closer to the sun?) and begin rolling up a ball of sunlight like yarn, and at night they roll this ball to their burrow to feed their grubs.

Yarn: If you watch a sun beetle roll its ball from dawn until dusk, roll on your friendly neighborhood Revelation table.

Valuable Prey: The intact carapace of a sun beetle is worth 100 c. If you can somehow retrieve a ball of sunlight without it burning its way through everything that touches it, it is worth 30,000 c. The mechanism by which sun beetles control sunlight safely and prevent it from melting straight down through the earth is unknown.

 

 

PAINTED ELF
HD 1
AC as leather + shield (human-leather armor and shield)
Attack elf-hair whip (+4, d4 + bleed, fumble on crit fail, reach) or saguaro-bone javelin (d6, range as javelin)
Morale 8
Move as gnome
No. Occurring 1d100

The elves of the Painted Desert are a terrifying specter, despite their appearance and mannerisms. They may stand waist-high and speak like affectionate lisping toddlers, but they are as strong as grown humans and have cruel, cunning minds. They constantly embrace, tumble, and laugh like children at play, belying their strict organization and hardy discipline. Any who venture into their lands without permission are hunted mercilessly and skinned.

Desert Instincts: In their native land, their blotchy skin and painted armor gives them 4-in-6 surprise, and they may track as rangers.

Cutting Lashes: The blows of an elf-hair whip inflict horrific gashes (1 damage per round until stemmed), and when one kills an enemy, it flays the skin from the flesh.

Organization: For every 10 elves encountered, one is a 2 HD officer with puma-bone armor (as chain).

Prey Instincts: Elves instantly break and run at the first sign of the Giant Bombardier Beetle, their ancestral predator. 

MOON-SHIP

HD 7
AC as plate (hull of lunar teak)

Attack 2x madness ray (save vs madness, range as longbow) + 2x needle-ray (+10, 1 damage + crit, range as longbow) + ram (2d10, 60' line)

Morale 7

Move as an eagle in a straight line, cannot turn while moving

No. Occurring 1d2

 

The peoples of the Moon build fearsome flying warships charmed into sentience to prosecute their countless vicious internecine wars. The peoples of the Moon are also about an inch tall, on average, so the greatest of their vaunted ships are 20 feet long or so. Sometimes these warships (a single tall lateen sail embroidered with a uniquely horrible face, a fearsome bronze ram, armored beam turrets) escape the control of their masters and flee across the æther to earth. They invariably fear recapture more than anything else and will do anything to avoid it, but otherwise, their personalities are as varied as those of any other person. However, they are created with insatiable bloodlusts to inspire them to violence, which they cannot always control.

 

Repugnant Visage: When people first see a new moon-ship, they must save or be frightened for a minute.

 

War-Beams: Madness rays inflict confusion on a failed save. After 10 minutes, save again; on a failure, it's permanent. Needle-rays normally deal very little damage, but on a critical hit they deal 1d12 damage instead.

 

Sensitive Sensors: If a moon-ship smells blood, it must save or enter a murderous rage until everything in sight is dead. However, the innocent weakness of youth calms them, and they will snap out of their rage if they attempt to harm a child of any species.

 

Suggestibility: Moon-ships always fail saves vs charm.

To Have a Share of the Earth and the Unfruitful Sea (GLOG Class: Cleric)

Artemis or Hecate, via Wikipedia

Artemis, via Wikipedia

 

 

In the base of the rocky hill on which the high citadel of the city of Orchitrave is founded, there is a cave, and that cave wends and weaves and winds its way deeper and deeper into the earth, until at last it reaches the starless grey land of the dead, where shades walk aimlessly back and forth forever. This cave is a temple of the Great Goddess. So too is the lighthouse of Balamne, which towers above all other constructions of mankind, and at whose top a great flaming beacon is lit which has burned since time immemorial and will burn evermore. So too is the vast stone circle of Nials, where women dance madly in the winter snows to bring the renewal of spring, and so are the depths of the woods, where only deer and wolf have trod since the world was young, and any place where two roads meet, and wherever the voices of children can be heard. The Great Goddess wears many faces and bears many titles, never called the same thing twice. Her name is no secret, but no man dares speak it, and the women only sing it in the most secret places for the most sacred and occulted rituals. One more thing there is that all can agree upon: in each hand she bears a torch, for she is the one who lights the way: for travelers, for seekers, for witches, for kings, for newborn babes and the shades of the dead, for hunters and hunted, for watchmen and warriors. She is alight at both ends.

Class: Amphipyros

Skills: Midwifery and 1d3: 1. Astrology, 2. Poisons, 3. Leechcraft

 

Starting Equipment: 7 torches of pitch, linen, and cypress (⅓ slots each); a bronze ritual dagger (⅓ slots, profaned by touching blood); a stone ritual dagger (⅓ slots, profaned by touching wine); a black robe (1 slot carried, 0 slots when worn, +1 stealth); a white robe (1 slot carried, 0 slots when worn, +1 save); and a loyal, intelligent dog (½ HD, 1d6 bite, excellent sense of smell).

 

A: Best and Most Beautiful, Light-Bearer, 2 Flares

B: Honor Also in Starry Heaven, +1 Flare

C: The Rotting Goddess, +1 Flare

D: Mysteries Within Mysteries, +2 Flares

 

Best and Most Beautiful: As a virgin priestess of a virgin goddess, you have +2 reaction with dogs and the god-fearing, and -1 reaction with men. If you ever enter a man's house or violate your chastity, you become ritually impure and may not use any of your abilities from this class. To purify yourself, you must sacrifice a doe, burning its fat so that it reaches the heavens, and bathe in a river under the moon. You may sacrifice an buck, pouring its blood into a pit in the earth, to learn the will of the Great Goddess. She loves cypresses, dogs, witches, and children, and hates that which all gods hate: unfaithfulness to herself and herself alone.

 

Light-Bearer: When holding a torch in your hand, you may expend a Flare to cause the torch to burst into divine flame, activating an Aura you know. The Aura lasts for as long as the torch burns (typically 6 turns/1 hour) and extends to the edge of the torchlight (typically a 30 foot radius). Only one Aura may be applied to a given torch, but after it has been activated, a torch need not be held by you or near you to apply its effect. You may prepare [templates] + 2 Auras, each of which is depleted once used (you may, of course, prepare duplicates). Flares and Auras refresh at the witching hour.

 

Honor Also in Starry Heaven: On the new moon, full moon, equinox, solstice, and when two wandering stars align, gain +1 MD for the duration of the celestial convergence. If multiple of these events coincide, the MD from each of them stack. Learn two spells, rolled on 1d8 from the list. Roll another to learn at C template, and pick one at D template. If you roll a Mishap or a Doom, the Great Goddess will decree a task for you to complete before you can draw on the heavens again.

 

The Rotting Goddess: In imitation of your goddess, you may shift your form and perception whenever it suits you. Your visage is always recognizably your own, but you might appear one moment youthful and callow, the next maidenly and fair or matronly and kind, wizened and decrepit or pallid and decaying. For extra effect, you may even bear up to three faces on one body at once, though the effort involved means that after no more than an hour of this appearance, you will revert to your original form for at least a day.

 

Mysteries Within Mysteries: You learn the deepest truths and secrets and rites of worship. If you find or commission a suitable idol and set it up in a suitable sanctuary, you may establish a temple of the Great Goddess in truth. Around it will grow up a city, and the city will prosper under her patronage and yours, for though she is a goddess of the earth, of death, of the hidden places, so too is she a goddess who stands before the gate, who protects mothers and children, who brings renewal and growth.

 

Auras:

1. That Turns Away Evil: Soft, indistinct, yet pure and all-pervading and silvery-white, like the moon on a foggy night. All spirits, shapeshifters, restless dead, and evil men must save to enter the light and have disadvantage on all saves and Morale rolls once within it. Furthermore, shapeshifters and the restless dead take 1d4 damage per round within the light and, if destroyed, have their shades put to rest and returned to whence they belong.

2. Before the Gate: Bright, cheerful, warm, and dancing to an unheard tune, like a campfire which holds the night at bay. Within the light, you and your allies have +2 to all saves, and the torch's holder may shorten the torch's life by 1 turn to reduce an instance of damage that an ally receives by 1 point.

3. Who Frequents Crossroads: Singular, precise, and distant, comforting in its solemn loneliness, like a lighthouse sighted from afar. From outside the light, its radiance is not visible, and all within the light seem but a faded grey mirage. Those within count as traveling without light for the purposes of surprising those without (5-in-6 chance of surprise), but are not so subject to surprise themselves (1-in-6 chance of surprise as normal).

4. Holding the Keys: Shimmering with brazen, silvered, gilded threads weaving and unweaving an intricate pattern, like a language that no man can speak. The first time a given lock, ward, or knot enters the light, it has a 3-in-6 chance of unlocking or unraveling. Each time a binding is so undone, the torch's life is shortened by 1 turn. If a binding is not undone, you may not attempt to burst it asunder again until you have gained a level.

5. The Best Advisor: Deep blue in the center, flaring with white pinpricks, and fading to blacker than black on the edges, like the twilit sky fading to obscure easterly night. Within the light, all magical effects are made known, twisting at the edges of vision like the shapes which dance behind your eyelids. Traps and secret doors similarly have a 4-in-6 chance to make themselves known.

6. Bowstring in Tension: Golden-bright, burning sharp in the pupil, like an arrow falling from the sun-blind sky to pierce your eye. All ranged attacks made from within the light have +1d4 to-hit, deal +1d4 damage, and have their range bands doubled.

7. Wide-Ruling: Scintillating with a thousand twinkling lights in every color imaginable, like a vast hoard of priceless jewels suddenly exposed to lamplight. Within the light, your allies have +2 Morale and are immune to fear effects so long as you stand with them.

8. Queen of the Animals: Flaring with proud green and gold like sunlight through the leaves, like wings spread wide, enfolding, protecting, taking flight. Within the light, you speak the tongue of the beasts and the birds, which also gives you +2 reaction with them. If you give them an order, they must save or obey.

9. She Who Gives Victory: Martial and proud and innumerable, like the banners of a great army marching in serried ranks to the horizon and beyond. Within the light, you and your allies have +1 AC, +1 to-hit, +1 damage, and +1 initiative.

10. Of the Wolf: Bold and crimson, hot and steaming, like entrails spilled in the snow, melting a hole in the untouched drifts with the futile strength of their will to live. Within the light, all tracks have a 10-in-10 chance to be clearly limned with intangible blood, with that chance reduced by 1 for every day since their maker left them. If the torch is totally full with life, extinguish it instantly to learn the exact direction and distance to a quarry whose name you know.

11. Singer of Divine Songs: Golden and purple and other colors not truly perceptible to the eyes of mortals, ever-shifting in realms the mind cannot comprehend, like the ichor and ambrosia and clothes and visages of the gods themselves. For every turn spent in the light, those within heal 1 HP. If accompanied by your sacred song that turn (incurring a wandering monster check), the healing increases to 1d4 HP, and each expended MD possessed by those within the light has a 1-in-6 chance of returning to their pool.

12. Bright: Brilliant beyond brilliance and clear beyond clarity, such that all who behold it are dazzled and blinded for a moment, like a star come to earth to grace us with her immortal glory. The radius of this light extends however far the wielder wishes it, even beyond the horizon should they so choose, and they may shape it into the narrowest beam or widest corona or anywhere in between. Unlike the light of any other ephemeral wavering torch, it banishes even magical darkness, and in it, all detail and color may be perceived in richness, sharpness, and clarity even greater than they might display in the most direct sunlight.

 

Spells:

1. Bestow/Remove Curse: Lay with your words a fitting curse on one who can hear you and who has done you ill. Set a just condition for its removal. If the condition is not met, the curse expires in [dice] years and [dice] days—but if cast with 4 MD or more, it is permanent. Alternatively, remove a curse from one who you touch with your bare hand. If the curse was laid by a power greater than yourself, you have a [dice]-in-6 chance of success.

2. Crown of Stars: [sum] scorching stars materialize in orbit around your head, forcing all who see you to roll Morale at -[dice] and either grovel or flee. 1 star winks out per minute since you cast the spell. At will, you may hurl any number of stars at a foe within sight, dealing 1 damage which cannot be avoided or reduced in any way.

3. Darkness: An area of your choosing, no greater than [sum] furlongs square, is instantly consumed by a cloud of utterly impenetrable blackness. Any caught within it must save vs fear or collapse to the ground wailing in despair. It lasts 1 day/1 week/1 month/1 year/forever, depending on [dice].

4. Continual Flame: Allow a flame to burn you; it will consume no fuel nor spread any further, but will cast light and heat until the end of your enchantment. It lasts 1 day/1 week/1 month/1 year/forever, depending on [dice]. This allows Auras to last far beyond their usual measure, but all Flares and prepared Auras invested in Continual Flames cannot be recovered until the flame is extinguished.

5. Speak With Dead: You may ask [sum] questions of a corpse or multiple corpses, which they will answer as truthfully as they can with what they knew in life and what little knowledge they have garnered afterwards. Alternatively, wrest control of [sum] + [dice] HD of undead with no save, for no longer than [sum] hours. If you do not return them to their rest, the Great Goddess will know, and she will punish you.

6. Lay On Hands: If used to touch someone who is about to die, they are stabilized immediately. If used to touch a permanent wound or the sufferer of an intractable disease, the wound or disease has a [dice] + 2-in-6 chance of being healed.

7. Protection from Evil: Weave a web of protection with fragrant oils and smokes costing 10 drachmae per 5 feet of circumference around a person, place, thing, or whatever else. The next [dice] times it would be crippled, destroyed, mortally wounded, invaded, or burned, it isn't.

8. Plague: Whisper horrid curses in the streets or pathways of a place where people gather. The next day, an implacable plague will strike them, killing at least [dice] × 10% of them within a fortnight.

Heavy With the Fruit of Prophetic Dreaming (GLOG Class: Bard)

Alpine forget-me-not via Wikipedia

There is no such thing as a new story. There are but endless retellings, ripped apart and sewn together again like ransom notes from a heap of unwanted magazines. Which is to say: your life is a faded diorama of a long-forgotten poem. Perhaps, if you try your very hardest, you can weave in an age-old theme which blossoms into a million tiny perfect flowers in the light of this dying age.

 

Class: Bard

 

Starting Equipment: Every song and poem and phrase and voice and word you've ever heard.

A: Clay; +1 reaction

B: Glass; +1 HP

C: Ink; +1 save

D: Ash; +1 reaction

 

Clay: Stare into the labyrinthine depths of the cruel golden Sun. He will shrive you of your innocence and your ignorance and your staring sparkling eyes that drink up light like an alcoholic drinks spirits. In return for your gift, he will place orbs of dull unseeing clay in your scarred sockets, scriven all over with writhing skeletal runes encoding beautiful secrets you can never read. Your new eyes will be blind as the dirt from which they were ripped, but they will whisper to you always, slender insinuations of the straw-bright threads which link all things. Masters and slaves, lovers and lovers, stories and themes, spells and mages, secret doors and hidden levers: you will know the tendons which weave the world. You need but ask. If you pluck a golden thread and sing to its thrumming with your sliver-sharp voice, all who hear must save or still in fascination as tears pour down their cheeks.

Glass: Stand before the vast, uncaring Sea and bare yourself utterly. Clothes, pretenses, personae, rhetoric, skin: you must shed them all to reveal the wet, pulsing flesh beneath, the veins coursing with carmine thoughts, the intestines convulsing with love and anguish. Your audience will know you, and they will love you. In return for your gift, they will lick you all over where your skin once was, your knees and thighs and wrists and shoulders and breasts and ears. Where the tongues, foaming and salty, have been, your new skin will grow. It will be hard and transparent and cool—strictly, it will not be glass but some strange unearthly metal—but when touched by aught other than yourself, it will scorch away fabric and flesh alive in a burst of heat. All the machinery that composes you will forever be exposed to the searching eye, breathing and pumping beneath your impenetrable skin. You will be immune to external physical harm, and any who lay hands on you will take 1d6 damage per round. If someone you loves cries out in pain and you can hear it, you can choose to take the damage instead of them.

Ink: Climb atop the highest peak of the land, whether it be stone or steel, and weep joyous tragic bittersweet tears from your blind clay eyes like handfuls of glittering gem-dust thrown into the laughing Wind. Tears are not all she demands; she will blend your courage and your bones and your teeth into a slurry and drink them down with a raw egg. You don't need them, after all, with your lovely corundum shell to keep you standing and protect you from harm. In return for your gift, your heart and glands and marrow will course anew with fresh fluid, their erstwhile charges replaced with black, indelible ink. Your blood will stain your veins, your saliva will stain your tongue, your lymph will stain your nodes, your tears will stain the corners of your eyes, your urine will stain your groin, your milk will stain your nipples. The very cushion in which floats your brain will stain every inch of your mind. What remains of you now but this sad muddy slime of organs in a perfect leaded-glass vase? All who look can see your dissolution—but your words can never be erased, for your ink is eternal. Put to paper the tale, heroic or tragic, of someone you love, and spread it. They may add +1 to any number they wish on their character sheet. You may not do this more than once per person, and each must choose a different number to affect. If you incite a crowd to action by invoking such a tale, they will not be quelled until their goal is achieved.

Ash: You have received many gifts, from Sun and Sea and Wind. This is not a gift. It is yours. You have learned—or perhaps created?—a new word, and this word is Truth. When you speak it, your perfect ink-stained song-singing tongue will burn to ash in an instant. Your effluvia will clear miraculously, no longer blighted by darkness. Your bones and teeth will grow again from naught in their proper places. Your skin will soften and warm and grow opaque. Your eyes will appear once again in your skull, untouched by unbearable brightness. In return for your gift, you may dictate one eternal fact, which will forever reign in heaven as on earth, carved into the firmament and the bedrock and all other stones that are and all other stones that will be. Your tongue will never return. Your new-written stories will vanish in time, as all mortal things do. But your old stories and your Truth; those will never die. 

Inspired by "Death Dance for a Poet" by Audre Lorde, which I cannot find a good transcription of online. It's in the collection The Black Unicorn (1978).

Of Him the Harpers Sadly Sing (GLOG Class: Bard)

Nu sculon heriġean    heofonriċes Weard

Now we must praise    heaven-kingdom's guardian,

Meotodes meahte    and his modġeþanc

the Measurer's might    and his mind-plans,

weorc Wuldor-Fæder    swa he wundra ġehwæs

the work of the Glory-Father,    when he of wonders every one,

eċe Drihten    or onstealde

eternal Lord,    the beginning established.

He ærest sceop    ielda bearnum

He first created    for men's sons

heofon to hrofe    haliġ Scyppend

heaven as a roof,    holy Creator;

ða middanġeard    moncynnes Weard

then middle-earth    mankind's guardian,

eċe Drihten    æfter teode

eternal Lord,    afterwards made—

firum foldan    Frea ælmihtiġ

for men earth,    Master almighty.

    – "Cædmon's Hymn", by Cædmon c. 658-680 CE

I've decided to start rewriting the Carolingia classes as part of the total reworking of the hack that I plan to do, and the old Chanter seemed like a good place to start, since I really don't like it much and I think I'm going to remove conventional GLOG spellcasters from the game entirely, or nearly so.

 

Starting Equipment: A harp or other instrument, a leather helm, a small shield, and a weapon of your choice.

Skills: Music, Poetry, and 1d3: 1. Folklore, 2. Religion, 3. History

 

Damage: 1d8

 

A: Battle Cry, Beloved Voice, Legend-Smith

B: Tales of Heroism, +1 to-hit

C: Boiled Alive, Songs of Lore, +1 Save

D: Weeping Stones, +1 to-hit

Battle Cry: If you call out a battle cry at the beginning of a fight, your allies each regain 1 hitpoint immediately and gain +1 to-hit for the rest of the battle, while your enemies take a -1 penalty to Morale for the rest of the battle. However, if in a dungeon or other dangerous area, this immediately provokes a wandering monster check. 

 

Beloved Voice: When you let it be known that you are a teller of tales and a singer of songs, you gain +1 to reaction rolls with intelligent beings. This can be accomplished by reciting a song or poem, even if the listeners do not understand the language it is in. There will always be food and space in the mead hall for you, provided you perform. 

Legend-Smith: If you compose and recite a poem or song regarding an adventure (or misadventure) that the party got into, all involved characters gain 10 XP. Yes, you must actually write it and recite it. No, it does not have to be good, or long. It just has to exist. You cannot gain this XP for multiple events that happened in the same session.

Tales of Heroism: You know two of the following tales, rolled on 1d8, and may roll another for each further template of Bard you gain. Reciting a tale takes 10 minutes, at the end of which, everyone who heard it gains the detailed benefit. No one may benefit from any particular tale more than once per day, and you may perform no more than [templates] tales per day. Bonus points if you actually recite an excerpt from the poem. At the DM's discretion, you may make a poem you composed about the game into a Tale of Heroism, with a negotiated benefit.

1. Beowulf: Gain +1d4 to-hit and +1d4 damage on the next attack you make this day.

2. Cædmon's Hymn: Regain 1d4+level hitpoints.

3. The Dream of the Rood: Reduce the damage of the next attack that hits you this day by 1d4.

4. The Wanderer: Ignore the next 1d4 obstacles that would impede your overland travel on this day.

5. Widsith: If at least one person present speaks a language, all people present are conversant in it for the next 1d6 hours.

6. The Battle of Maldon: During the next fight you participate in on this day, all retainers and levies gain +1 Morale.

7. Wulf and Eadwacer: During the next fight you participate in on this day, when you would roll Death and Dismemberment, roll twice and take the lower.

8. The Seafarer: Adverse weather conditions will not affect your sailing or put your ship in danger for the next 1d12 hours.

 

Boiled Alive: In social situations, delivering a sufficiently cutting insult (and you know the drill at this point; you have to come up with the insult yourself or crowd-source it from your fellow players) will cause the target to wake the next day with a face covered in boils.

 

Songs of Lore: You have a [templates]-in-6 chance of knowing a fact, determined by the DM, about any person, object, creature, polity, or place if you hear the name or a detailed description.

Weeping Stones: The reaction bonus from Beloved Voice increases to +2 and now applies to all creatures, not just intelligent ones, as well as inanimate objects. You gain a further +1 reaction with beasts and inanimate objects for each hour you play and sing to them. On a reaction roll of 12+, beasts will become your loyal companions and natural things will obey your orders. This may not be used to make them act against their nature or harm their kin, but you could ask a stone to split or a tree to move a root, and it would do so.

GLOG Prestige Class: Metamage

Yep, GLOG has prestige classes now.

 

You can take a template in a prestige class when you a) already have at least one template in a regular class, and b) meet all other requirements.

Requirements: At least one MD, the ability to cast spells, and 13 Intelligence (or your hack's equivalent).

A: Metamagic, +1 MD

B: Counterspell, +2 Metamagics, +1 MD

C: Editing, +2 Metamagics, +1 MD

Metamagic: You can use your magical abilities to enhance your spells in ways other than simply adding more MD to their regular effects. When you cast a spell with at least 1 MD, you may add any number of additional MD to a metamagical effect you know. MD rolled for the spell and the metamagic should remain separate, as they do not share their [dice] or [sum], but they do all count towards Mishaps and Dooms as one pool of dice. For example, if you cast a spell with 2 MD and add a metamagical effect at 2 MD, you roll 4d6. If they come out up as 2, 4, 6, and 2, the spell as a [dice] of 2 and a [sum] of 6, the metamagic has a [dice] of 2 and a [sum] of 8, and you suffer a Mishap as the class which the spell comes from. You may apply multiple metamagical effects to a spell, each of which has a separate [dice] and [sum]. Roll 3d6 on the table of Metamagics at A template to see which effects you know, then roll 2d8 at B template and 2d10 at C template.

Counterspell: When you notice a magical effect being cast, you may counter it by rolling any number of MD. Your [dice] is subtracted from the targeted effect's [dice], and the same is done with [sum], but the effect's [dice] and [sum] cannot go below 0. Additionally, your MD and the effect's MD count as being in the same pool for Mishaps and Dooms, but both you and the effect's caster suffer the effect of a Mishap or a Doom.

Editing: When you cast a spell, you may roll any number of additional MD, which do not count towards [dice] or [sum] but do count towards Mishaps and Dooms. This allows you to add a single word per MD added in this fashion anywhere in the spell's description (subject to the DM's discretion).

Metamagical Effects (d10):

1. Widen: Must be applied to a spell which affects an area. Every dimension of the area of the spell is multiplied a factor of by [dice]+1.
2. Silent: Must be applied to a spell which requires speech or other noise in order to be cast. Casting the spell is now silent.
3. Quicken: If the casting time of this spell is 1 action (if no casting time is mentioned, it's probably 1 action by default), it no longer takes an action to cast. If the casting time is longer than 1 action, it is divided by a factor of [dice]+1.
4. Extend: Must be applied to a spell which has a duration longer than 0/negligible. If the spell's duration scales with [dice] or [sum], it counts as though the [dice] or [sum] of this metamagic are added to its own [dice] or [sum], but only for calculating duration. The duration of the spell is multiplied by a factor of [dice]+1.
5. Enlarge: Must be applied to a spell which has a singular target. The range of the spell becomes [dice] miles. If the target is not within line of sight, you must know the precise location you are targeting relative to your own location, or, if the target is a location, you must be holding an item which comes from the location, or, if the target is a creature, you must be holding a piece of that creature's bodily matter. 
6. Twin: Must be applied to a spell which has only one target. The number of targets increases by [dice].
7. Still: Casting of spell is now completely imperceptible, even by magical means.
   
8. Heighten: Must be applied to a spell which only affect beings of a certain HD or below, creatures making up no more than a certain number of HD, or to spells which only affect magical effects of a certain MD or below. The HD or MD affected by the spell is increased by [sum]+[dice].
9. Empower: Increase the [dice] of the spell by [dice]*3.
10. Maximize: The [sum] of the spell now includes the [sum] of this metamagic, and all MD rolled count as if they rolled a 6 for purposes of calculating [sum] and determining expenditure.