Blog Archives
Loot 4 Less for Pathfinder 2nd Edition?
I’ve been considering what a Loot 4 Less line of books for the 2nd edition of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game would look like. Of course the price point would be insanely different– 2,000 gp is a LOT more money is 2nd ed than 1st ed. But if I decided to limit myself to 200 gp, is that too high and easy, or about right?
Anyway, here are a couple of items that evolved just from the thought experiment.
Able Armor Seal Item 6
Abjuration Invested Magical
Price 200 gp
Usage affixed to armor
Activate Single Action; Bulk L
This cast iron seal has a depiction of two hands clasped in friendship. Armor with this affixed can be donned in half the normal time. With a successfully use of the Armor Assist feat, it takes only 1/3 the normal time.
Silver Serpent Item 5
Divination Invested Magical
Price 175 gp
Usage worn earing; Bulk L
This small silver serpent is a piece of jewelry that sits wrapped around your ear, molding itself to match the size and shape of your ear and holding itself firmly in place until intentionally removed. Each silver serpent is attuned to a single Lore skill, and whisper information about that Lore in your ear as it become relevant. You treat your proficiency rank in the related Lore skill as one degree better while wearing the silver serpent. If you are already Legendary in that Lore, you instead gain Assurance with that Lore.
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Putting the Use of Critical Hit/Fumble Decks in Player’s Hands
Lots of game systems have Critical Hit and Critical Fumble decks. Pathfinder 1e and Starfinder are two well-known examples (and, full disclosure, I wrote the ones for Starfinder).
Many groups find them hysterical, chaotic fun, Others find them hateful, swingy, and absolutely no fun at all.
But what if the PLAYERS got to decide when they came into play? That introduces the rules and their funny, unexpected effects into a game, but doesn’t force them on anyone who doesn’t want to deal with them.
Here’s a simple set of example rules for doing that.
When an attack against a PC is a success, the player can earn one Crit Point by deciding the attack draws from the Critical Hit Deck.
When an attack by a PC is a failure , the player can earn one Crit Point by deciding the attack draws from the Critical Failure Deck.
When an attack by PC is a success, the player can spend two Crit Points to cause the attack to draw from the Critical Hit Deck. If the player has 3 or more Crit Points, they can spend additional Crit Points before any cards are drawn to increase the number of cards they draw on a 1-1 basis (spending 4 extra Crit Points means you draw 4 extra Critical Hit cards). You select one Critical hit effect from one drawn card to apply to the attack.
(As an alternate rule, you can also allow a player to earn Crit Points when they use these rules, by having GM draw 3 critical hit cards for an attack against the PC, or by drawing 3 Critical Failure cards for an attack made by the PC).
All Crit Points are reset to 0 at the end of each game session.
The reason a PC has to suffer more card effects than they get to inflict is that players can be quite cunning about timing and resources, accepting critical hits and critical failures that go against them when they can afford the hit and saving up the Crit Points to turn the tides when they need it. However, by making it a 2-1 ratio, and not letting players save points between games, this tactical use of the rules is balanced out.
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PF2 Alchemical Items: Emetics
Yep, I’m writing about the power of puke. For the 2nd edition Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.
EMETIC Item 1+
Alchemical Consumable Elixir Healing
Usage held in 1 hand; Bulk L
Activate Single Action [Interact]
An emetic makes you nauseous. Drinking a dose when not sickened gives you the sickened condition with a value equal to the emetic’s potency. When you are sickened, a successful DC 15 Fortitude save allows you to imbibe the emetic despite the sickened condition. Rather than increase your sickened value, this gives you a bonus to Fortitude saves to recover from being sickened when you choose to retch. This bonus to equal to the emetic’s potency.
Emetic (Lesser) Item 1
Price 2 gp
Bulk L
This emetic has a potency of 4.
Emetic (Moderate) Item 6
Price 20 gp
Bulk L
This emetic has a potency of 5.
Emetic (Greater) Item 10
Price 110 gp
Bulk L
This emetic has a potency of 6.
Emetic (Major) Item 14
Price 455 gp
Bulk L
This emetic has a potency of 6. Additionally when you successfully retch to reduce the value of your sickened condition, you reduce it by 1 more than normal.
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Koufrawraiths – A simple d20 monster template
This is designed as a simple template for monsters in a wide range of d20 games. It has a horror/mystery theme, and the GM should consider its use carefully. Certainly it’s going to be as dangerous as a creature 1 level or CR higher, and if PCs do not yet know how to deal with it, it may be much more dangerous. On the other hand, a group could walk right past one and never know it, so it needs to be used in an intentional way with forethought, rather than as a random encounter.
Koufrawraith
A koufrawraith is a creature that exists in the dim fog between the waking world and the Plane of Dreams. They cannot be encountered by anyone fully in either realm, but do cross into any other reality where creatures able to sleep exist. Despite the name koufrawraiths are not necessarily undead, though undead koufrawraiths do exist. Many are hags, fey, monstrous beasts,and rarer examples exist as constructs, dragons, and oozes.
A koufrawraith’s existence can only be experienced by those who are fatigued or exhausted, but conscious. For any other creature, they cannot be perceived or effected, and the koufrawraith similarly cannot directly effect those who are ineligible to perceive it. It does perceive waking and sleeping creatures, but no action it takes (including things like casting spells that leave lasting effects, such as a wall of stone) can be perceived by, effect, or be effected by such creatures. Secondary effects can be–if a koufrawraith damages an exhausted person, the damage is visible and can be healed, but there is no evidence of how it was caused. Any effort to identify a koufrawriath from secondary observation or description suffers a -10 penalty.
Also known as sleepgaunts, koufrawraiths often prey upon lone insomniacs and those suffering great loss or toil. If feeds on the suffering of the tired, and prefers to hurt and frighten its food source, rather than kill them.
The ancient order of the Wearied Guard once drove koufrawraiths to near extinction, but once they were no longer a common threat, societies stopped supporting, or even believing, those who claimed their crucial work had to be done in the still of night, while bleary-eyed and staggering from fatigue.
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The Gelatinous Cylinder, Part 3
Yep, yet more abilities for Gelatinous Cylinders, to round out the holiday week. Add them to the gelatinous foe of choice in your favorite d20 game. Each gelatinous cylinder can have just 1-2 abilities from this series, or you can mix and match up to all 6.
Goes Great With: Gelatinous cylinders with this ability have formed a symbiotic relationship with some other creature. The how and why of such bonding it not well understood, and even creatures that benefit from such partnering have no idea why the cylinder came to accompany them.
A gelatinous cylinder does no harm to the creature it goes great with, and can even provide air and water if the creature is within the cylinder. Additionally, the accompanying partner gets to roll all attack rolls, saving throws, and skill checks twice and take the best result when within 30 feet of the gelatinous cylinder.
Old-Fashioned: A gelatinous cylinder with this power has two forms–one the standard cylinder (which emulates the stats of a gelatinous cube), and one a more lumpy, spread-out jelly. While still bright red, in this form the gelatinous cylinder emulates the stat block of one slime, jelly, or mold selected when this ability is picked. The gelatinous cylinder can switch back and forth between the two forms at the beginning of each round as part of the first action it takes that round.
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The Gelatinous Cylinder, Part 2
Yep, more abilities for Gelatinous Cylinders, the bright red, reshaped gelatinous cube variant. Add then to the gelatinous foe of choice in your favorite d20 game.
Phantom Faces: Though gelatinous cylinders are no more intelligent than other forms of gelatinous monster, some can form a face, generally locked into one or two expressions, and repeat overheard phrases. They often repeat things said by those they consume, from prior to the victim realizing they are in trouble. This mimicry is mindless, but the sound is so perfect it cannot be distinguished form the original voices.
Tantalizingly Preserved: Gelatinous cylinders with this ability stop the passage of time for any nonliving material stuck within them, and do not dissolve items that were not living when they entered the gel. Thus they often have foodstuffs, valuables, and even high-end clothing preserved and visible, juuuuust out of reach unless you want to plunge a hand into the cylinder…
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The Gelatinous Cylinder, Part 1
Yeah, it’s themed and silly. But there are some ideas here you can apply to gelatinous foes in your d20 game of choice.
There are more abilities in Part Two.
And even more in Part Three.
The Gelatinous Cylinder
Gelatinous Cylinders are a reshaped, deeply-red-colored offshoot of gelatinous cubes. While sages agree they are magically created rather than naturally occurring mutations, and it’s generally accepted the cylinders aren’t the desired end result, there are numerous competing theories as to what the creators were trying to do.
It’s often suggested their coloration was either an attempt to make sewer-cleaning creature that was more easily spotted by repair workers, or to make gelatinous foes more frightening by seeming to be soaked in blood. The cylinder-shape is also often held up as proof these were custom-built sewer cleaners, designed to fit through pipes. Others theorize are that they were literally made to be festive and silly-looking, possibly to serve as court jesters for the Oozing Empire of sentient slimes.
Gelatinous Cylinders can have a variety of strange powers. You can emulate a gelatinous cylinder by adding one of more of these abilities to your gelatinous cube state block of choice.
Sliceable: A gelatinous cylinder with this ability takes no damage from slashing weapons. However, when a slashing attack hits it, the gelatinous cylinder has a “slice” taken off. This slice is a gelatinous cylinder one size category smaller than the original and has the same stats, but with 20% of the original’s max hit points. The original loses 10% of its max hit points each time is spawns a slice. Slices cannot themselves form slices.
Small and Innocent Looking: A gelatinous cylinder with this ability can shrink down at rest, compressing itself to Tiny size. While in this reduced form and motionless, any ability or skill check to identify it as anything more than an innocent bit of edible food takes a -15 penalty. Once touched, the gelatinous cylinder explodes out to its full size and begins attacking.
We’ll do more gelatinous cylinder abelites tomorrow and Friday!
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d20 Spotlight Tokens
d20 Spotlight Tokens are an optional rule for most d20-rule based (or “T20”) games. The tokens are designed to give players a concrete way to grab some spotlight time (real-world time where they are getting the most done, being the most impressive, and having the most attention paid to them). These are absolutely a power-up in terms of what a group of PCs can handle, and that’s both intentional and, in my opinion, a good thing. It’s not an increase in what characters can do all the time, but it is a way for a player to decide to have remarkable success when the going gets tough… or when the player just wants that to be the way the story goes.
These are a mechanical solution to spotlight time. A player can’t help but be the focus of attention when one is spent, even if they are shy or not big talkers.
Once you have played with d20 Spotlight Tokens for a few game sessions, it should be obvious how to adjust for them as a GM. It may be the players simply choose to take on more encounters in a row, taking overnight rests or breaks to recharge abilities less often, in which case no adjustment may be needed. Or it may be appropriate to treat the characters as being one or two levels higher, so they face more dangerous opponents that require them to expend some tokens to succeed.
Spotlight Token Rules
You get one token per session, plus one per 5 full character levels. If no other player takes the same spotlight token as you, you gain 1 extra token per session.
Select one of the following tokens. This should be done, together, as a group. If two players choose the same token, they can decide if they want to overlap, or one or both of them change their choice. Once this choice is settled, it cannot be changed until you gain a level or another player selects the same Spotlight Token you already have (in which case, again, you discuss it and one, both, or neither of you can change your choice).
You can spend a Spotlight Token immediately any time the relevant game event occurs, even if the action has already been resolved. For example, if you select the Attack Token, you can spend it after an attack misses, or after it hits but does less damage than you want. When you spend a spotlight token, you also get one additional full round of actions you get to take immediately. This additional round of actions does not benefit from the powers of the Spotlight Token–for example if using the Assault token attacks you make as part of your bonus round of action do not also automatically hit.
Currently, here are the token choices. They are designed to lean into common character focuses, and to have more than one options for each broad focus.
ARMOR – You take no damage until the end of your next turn.
ATTACK – Your attack (anything requiring an attack roll) hits and does 150% its max damage.
ASSAULT — Your attack (anything requiring an attack roll), and all attacks you make before the beginning of your next round, hit.
CRITICAL — Your attack, effect, or spell (anything requiring an attack roll) is a critical hit, if it has rules for being so (for example of a spell does not require an attack roll and has no rules for being a critical hit, it does not benefit from this token).
DEFENSE – An attack misses you, as do all other attacks from the same source until the beginning of your next turn.
EFFECT – One foe fails a saving throw against a spell or effect of yours. If there are degrees of failing a saving throw (such as an additional penalty if the save is failed by 5 or more), it takes the worst effect.
MANA — You activate one spell or ability you can use at least once per day without it counting against your normal uses per day.
OVERCOME — You get to take a single action that can be performed in one round or less, that you would be able to take if your character was not suffering any damage, penalties or effects, and without applying any penalties for current damage, penalties, or effects. Yes, even if you are dead.
RESIST — You succeed at a saving throw, and at all other saving throws from the exact same effect (such as all saves against a poison, or against one ongoing spell).
SKILL — You may choose for one skill check (regardless of how much time it represents), or all skill checks you make in a single round, to be treated as if you had rolled a 20 and the d20 roll.
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Role Relics, Pt. 2
Role relics are magic items designed to encourage specific roles or playstyles (perhaps given to children who enter a fantasy world on a roller coaster and each are given a single relic to help them out). I did two already in Part One.
Since these are designed to be character-defining relics that stand outside normal rules, I’ve written only sketches of how they work, so they are compatible with most d20-evolved RPGs. A GM who wants to fill out details like item level and school of magic are free to do so, but the core idea here is to offer legendary items that make it easier for a character to fulfill one classic heroic role.
Cloak of Stealth
Once activated (which can be done as part of any other action taken on the wearer’s turn), as long as the character wearing the cloak takes no actions other than movement, they can make a Stealth check against all senses and detection abilities of any creature. For these Stealth checks, the wearer rolls twice and takes the best result. Each activation lasts no more than one minute, and the cloak then cannot be used again for ten minutes.
Energy Bow
The energy bow automatically creates magic arrows when used for attacks, and does not require any ammunition. These arrows are Force effects, and do untyped pure magic damage. They ignore false images of a target, and any magic or technological effect that creates a flat chance of missing even if a an attack roll is successful.
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Role Relics, Pt. 1
I’ve just been thinking about what magic items designed to encourage specific roles or playstyles (perhaps given to children who enter a fantasy world on a roller coaster and each are given a single relic to help them out) might look like.
Two came to mind immediately. I’m vague on details like cost and such, because these are designed to be character-defining relics that stand outside normal rules. And these should work for most d20-evolved RPGs.
Shield of Tanking
While you have this shield equipped, any foe that can see you and has line of effect to you, but has not attacked you in this combat or forced you to make a saving throw, takes a -2 penalty to attacks and against anyone else and the save DC of effects against others is reduced by 2. The first time a foe attacks you, if they do damage, you take half damage. If a foe’s first attack against you also attacks other targets or forces them to make saving throws, the foe does not take the shield of tanking’s penalties against those targets.
Staff of Acrobatics
Any round in which you make no attack rolls and do not force anyone to make a saving throw, you roll twice and take the better result on all Strength- and Dexterity-based skills based on movement or maneuvering (such as Acrobatics, Athletics, Balance, Climb, Escape Artist, Swim, and so on), and gain a +4 bonus to your AC and all saving throws. If you fail such a check, and it was to get you to some location you could have arrived at through flight, the check is treated as a success, but your turn ends.
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