Saturday, August 8, 2015

3 Weird Wizard Whatsits

Magic is really weird and inconsistent. That's the only thing consistent about it. So here's some strange stuff involving sorcerers (also maybe clerics).

Random Magical Mishaps
Sometimes something bad happens when a wizard is around. Maybe their spell misfired, or you disrupted their weird arcane dreams, or the fabric of space-time or occult hoo-ha is just weird and broken when they are around. Whatever the reason, simply roll 1d30 on the following table.
Magical Mishaps

  1. Everybody switches teeth (they fall out and are replaced by the teeth of one other creature)
  2. A flash of light of some bright color (usually purple or orange) blinds everyone in the vicinity
  3. Someone is replaced by a shape-shifter (50% chance of not having knowledge of being a shape-shifter)
  4. The room smells disgusting. It has become filled with the powerful pheromone of some random monster, and there is a high chance that large amounts of that monster will appear.
  5. Someone loses their voice. They regain it after a few days, but cannot speak in any languages they knew originally ever again. They can still read those languages.
  6. The wizard's spellbook grows legs or wings or a foot and crawls/flies/hops away (if they are a natural magic-user (such as an elf or sorcerer), then one of their organs does this (90% chance of being non-vital)
  7. One random spell known by the wizard occurs, but at double effect
  8. Someone vomits up a black slug and loses all memories except for basic knowledge (such as how to speak and write). If someone eats the slug, they gain all of that person's memories.
  9. A mouth appears in the air, demanding it be fed. You must either feed it 1d4 magic items or 4d6x10 sp (or gp is using gold standard) worth of items or coinage
  10. The area becomes overrun with ants
  11. One random spell known by the wizard occurs, but at double effect
  12. Someone dies. A baby version of themselves crawls out of the corpse, with lesser physical capabilities but identical mental capabilities
  13. Any unintelligent animals in the area become intelligent
  14. Something crawls out of space-time, in addition to the spell. Generate a random monster (the LotFP summon spell is pretty good)
  15. Anything that is a specific color stops existing, and never has. Only the party knows that it ever existed (alternatively, only the wizard)
  16. One random creature around gets the ability to cast one of the wizard's spells once per day. The wizard loses it
  17. Lightning strikes (even if indoors or underground). The wizard has been split in two, but will regenerate into two new identical wizards in a few days
  18. All clothing in the area becomes mobile and sentient
  19. The area is now an opposite magic area. All magical effects have the opposite effect now
  20. All of your food spoils. You can still eat it, but it tastes horrible
  21. One random town or settlement nearby becomes a ghost-town. People will talk about things that happened there as if they were ages ago
  22. Someone's hand falls off and crawls away
  23. The next time you go to sleep, a huge rainbow centipede will crawl from the nearest window. It is your servant, but only while you cannot see it
  24. The sun stops rising
  25. You are all teleported to somewhere random (alternatively, only one person is teleported, or everyone is teleported somewhere different)
  26. Game jumps ahead to d10 hours from now. You will have no memory, but stuff will still have happened (players have done stuff, but they do not remember it)
  27. It rains some unnatural fluid (usually blood or bile, sometimes tears, sometimes something really weird)
  28. Someone begins to turn into a tree
  29. Whatever spell you tried to cast, or the last spell that you casted, now does not exist at all. Only a few people, such as fourth-wall breakers or certain gods will be able to cast it.
  30. Some powerful demon appears. It is your servant, but it hates you and is always trying to kill you

The Failed Wizard
A magic-using class for Lamentations of the Flame Princess

Hit Dice: d4
Attack Bonus: 1/2 level, rounded down
Saving Throws: as Magic-User
Experience to Level 2: 2,200

This is a class that uses and abuses the magical mishap table above. They are those students of the arcane arts that never quite got it, or didn't study enough, or didn't get enough sleep. They can't cast spells per se, but they are almost able to.
Failed Wizards have the following class features:
  • Beginning at level 1, you can roll on the magical mishaps table, or any other magical mishaps table, once per day. Every level, the number of times you can roll on the table increases by 1.
  • At level 1, you roll 1d4 on the table. At levels 3, 5, 7, 9, etc., you can increase the die size used by 1 (d4 to d6, d6 to d8, d8 to d10, d10 to d12, d12 to d14, etc.)
  • Alternatively, you can learn a spell of a level that an MU of a level 4 levels below yours can know (level 1 at level 5, level 2 at level 7, level 3 at level 9, etc.) The number of times these can be cast is always static, remaining at one per day.
  • If you wish, you can apply your level to the magical mishap roll.
  • Failed Wizards do not use material components for spells, and are always considered natural magic-users
This class is probably very unbalanced, simply because the magical mishap table is very unbalanced, but who cares? If you like very balanced and ordered classes, do not use this class.

The Witch Watcher
An anti-wizard monster made by wizards, to catch wizards

HD: 1-1
AC: 18 (can only be attacked by non-magical weapons)
Attacks: 0
Damage: n/a
Movement: 100'
Intellect: 8-15
Morale: 12
Witch watchers are floating monstrosities created by royal magicians to assist in the witch hunts done by knights. They will be usually be found in the company of knights, but there are plenty who have become lost and wander the wilderness. They look like huge floating jellyfish, but they are always decked out with strong silver armor, decorated with leering faces and anti-magic sigils. If a witch watcher is ever found without its armor, then its AC is 13 and it can be effected by magic and magical weapons. When a witch watcher sees someone or something that has used magic of any sort within the last week, it will float to them and issue forth loud noises that sound like screams, alerting any knights in the vicinity. They do detect clerical miracles, and so licenses are issued to priests so as to not be imprisoned. If they are without a knight, then monsters in the vicinity will be alerted. Any magic used in their presence fizzles away (MU spells are automatically replaced with magical mishaps, and clerical miracles are made at -6 penalty).

No comments:

Post a Comment