Wednesday, August 29, 2018

More Angels, I guess

Average the above three pictures

Selenite Angels

Stats: as a powerful skeleton or weak nymph. Weakness to bludgeoning and slashing, but treat slashing as though it had +3 AC. Resistance to radiant (see below) Attacks: Glowing Beauty

These are the nobles of the heavens. They are physically weak, but they are beautiful. They can only see what they are actively touching. They often carry a light source, not to see, but to glow for others. If you can get them to make a deal with the devil (you), they make excellent lantern bearers and are knowledgeable in many things. They live in both the silver sands and the forest of the night
  • Fiber-optics: radiant damage deals half damage to them. They can redirect the other half towards whoever, but do so as though blind, unless they are touching the target.
  • Glowing Beauty: As long as they hold or are near a light source, they are filled with light. Creatures who appreciate light, like most humans, will think twice about attacking them, and may fall under their metaphorical spell.
Tactics: Befriend players (and backstab them if the reaction roll went poorly), Stockpile pyrotechnic angel bodyguards, live in beautiful slug-gardens or silver castles.

Sand Angels

but with more sand and silver
Stats: as water weirds or water elementals. Weakness to thunder, lightning, and piercing weapons with reach. Resistance to bludgeoning. Attacks: special

These don't serve as much of a purpose in heaven. They can serve as leaders to communities of human souls in the absence of other angels, and they are the main inhabitants of the solar reach, the area on the lunar sphere closest to the sun. They are shape-shifters with a literal heart of silver, which contains their soul, and it is what must break in order to kill them. Reducing them to 0 hp means they have lost the energy to continue fighting.
  • Silver Sand: While sand angels are touching sand, they can change size at will. Most only get up to large, while the most powerful can become huge. When in a humanoid form, they can make 2 weapon attacks each round. A less humanoid form can perform 1 weapon attack and one Sand-Swipe attack (see below). A huge form can use three sand swipes, but must use flip a coin when they land the attack. If it lands tails, they must use the second effect of the sand-swipe
  • Sand-Swipe: The Sand angel uses it's sand to attack, rather than an object. On contact, it deals damage equal to a club. If the sand angel has dealt more than twenty of this damage in total, the target must save or fall asleep (If the character already had damage from the blissed, this attack counts towards that instead. The physical damage is still preserved). Alternatively, the sand angel can make a sandy grab, immobilizing the opponent and preventing the sand angel from making another attack next round. This is the secondary effect listed above, and the character must make a strength/breath save or fall asleep before they can escape. If the Sand angel cannot make 2 sand attacks next round, it reverts back to medium size. If the Sand Angel cannot make any sand attacks, it reverts back to it's humanoid form.
Tactics: be a revered presence (even among these filthy devils), grow enormous if you're not taken seriously, only fight in the silvery sands.

Abyss Angels


Stats: as Giant, Sea serpent, Whale, Kraken, or Solar Angel (basically, whatever is big fuck-off powerful). Weaknesses: Harpoons, sometimes. Resistance: Bludgeoning, Slashing, Fire, Acid.

These are akin to the gods of the heavens. If you want to fight something near to Selene herself, fight one of these. Composed almost entirely of the water of life, They can produce amazing magical effects (Not gonna put a spell list here, because they are basically miracles). They have control over the seas, and can call forth tidal waves and create amazing things from water.

Like Sand Angels, they are shapeshifters. In their core is a sphere of semi-solid sand, silver, and glass containing 4 sand angel cores and the soul of the abyss angel encased in solid palladium. This space exists almost independently of the angel itself. It can be as large or as small as the angel wishes, regardless of the outside size of the angel. Some Abyss angel choose to create multiple manifestations of the same core. These manifestations appear in a more medium sized, humanoid form (solar angel).

I will now stop talking about all the things it can do and instead talk about the things it will probably do. If it creates multiple manifestations, it will probably house an entire dungeon at it's core as a defense. At the center of the dungeon will likely be the 4 sand angels. As the sand angels are defeated, the angel loses it's ability to control it's external form. This results in the forms of the angel becoming larger and larger, but also more erratic.

I won't discuss it's actual stats because it is unlikely to ever be fought, at least in it's larger forms. It's basically an aquatic tarrasque. It's more of a hazard than anything.

Does this all even make any sense?

Star-Speaker Angels


from angelarium

From Rupted on Tumble

These guys aren't so much angels as they are generic spirits. All the spheres have them, but they don't actually appear on their home sphere. They only manifest corporeally when in other spheres. When Star-speakers from the lunar sphere come to earth, they appear as blindingly white figures shrouded almost entirely with cloud and night. This shroud is basically their hazmat/space/fire suit. Like the lower spheres are caustic, boiling, suffocating places to humans, such is earth to the dwellers of the heavens. Thus, this bubble protects the angel's soul from the spirit-meltingly awful fumes and heat of earth. They mainly serve as messengers (in this sense, they are more angelic than all the other angels I have listed), and they parley with the powers and principalities of the earth. They vary greatly in terms of power. When you cast the spells Message or Contact Other Plane, you are summoning one of these, except you summon it from your own plane. Summon Star-Speaker is also probably a spell.
No stats, it's basically just a talking cloud.

If this is bad, tell me.


Tuesday, August 28, 2018

The Fates of Men

What path has been set for your souls? Roll below:

  1. Destined to die. Roll on the deaths table
  2. Destined to do. Roll on the quest table
  3. Undestined. Fateless. Any high, any low, anything may befall you. Tread carefully.

Death shall come for you:
  1. By the Sword
  2. From the Sky
  3. In the Cold
  4. On the Water
  5. By your Child
  6. On a Flame
Disadvantage on death saving throws made when under the rolled circumstances. Cannot die otherwise. The disadvantage only counts if you are actively avoiding your rolled circumstances. A pirate with a waterborne death won't incur any disadvantage. If you have done something drastic to avoid this death (e.g. tried kill your kid), when the circumstances arrive, it's instant death.
Let it be known that this child shall:
  1. build a great kingdom/marry a beautiful prince(ss)/gain fame and glory in the land of ____
  2. find secrets lost to time/learn an undeniable truth/have great wisdom and understanding
  3. wage war and win/fight the enemy of his time/bring honor to his family 
  4. bring peace that shall last until the end of time
  5. achieve greatness if they sacrifice/honor/do ____. roll a d4 on this table to see what greatness they will achieve.
  6. Fail when most needed. Roll a d4 on this table to see what they shall fail to do.
This character cannot die before their fate is completed. They automatically succeed at rolls that advance their fate, though this is at the DM's discretion. If their fate is ignored for a year, a great personal tragedy befalls them. If no tragedy can befall them, they take disadvantage on all rolls that clearly don't advance their fate, And they die as soon as possible after their fate is completed. Also, if 6 is rolled, treat it as if they had rolled 1-4 except at the end they fail. This means you have to Try to fulfill a destiny you know you will fail on. Sucks for you, but if you do well you might live.

Application

Players get to choose if they have a destiny, or it can be rolled randomly with a d4 (treat results of 4 as a 3). Beyond the choice of if they have a destiny, they have no control over what their destiny is. Think of it as a choice of going to the oracle or not. The DM may roll for their destiny, or may choose it at their discretion. Also, the DM may make it as specific or vague as they want. 

I would recommend 0-2 fated characters if you have 3 or more people in you party. At three people, 1-2. At 2 people, both of them probably should be fated. A 1 person party should definitely be fated. The reason for this is that beyond three fates, it gets hard to juggle all the quests, and with a smaller number of people, fates keep those people important and makes for a better story (can I say that and still be OSR? Am I a Heretic? Yes). If you play with one or two people, and one of them gets killed, then you basically/literally have a whole new party. Fating those characters keeps the story moving and gives more reason that they keep adventuring if one of the two of them dies.  Though, in those cases, you should probably allow the players to roll or decide their fates.

Also, if you want to use this with that death fight system I made a while back (which, fyi, I just read for the first time in a year and it's actually really good? Like, the writing sounds like English is my second language, but over all it might be one of my best works. I don't know, analyzing yourself is a bit hard), Death is aware of the fates of the characters and will react accordingly (e.g. he won't actually attack if the fate has yet to be accomplished, he reminds the characters to get on with their quests, etc.). Death is twice as strong when the death fate is upon you (with the exception stated above). If you trigger an insta-kill, death is twice as strong, uses can rend body and soul as a multi-attack, and probably has a sick fucking sword.

Also, if you use something that changes the soul (besides replacing a soul lost to death), truename, or use some fate destruction thing like fate-fire (have I written about this yet? it's in my drafts), your fate is changed or destroyed accordingly.

Note

Somehow I have different rule systems for Fates, Horoscopes, and Prophecies? Ask me about those if you want. I'm super open to requests.