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Monday, August 31, 2020
Wednesday, August 26, 2020
Class: Jongleur
GLoG style
- Really Good Juggling, "Leap, Whistle, and Fart"
- Magic for Some Reason
- Wondrous Catch, Mimic
- Contortion, Buffoun
- Really Good Juggling, "Leap, Whistle, and Fart"
- Magic for Some Reason
- Mimic
- Wondrous Catch
- Contortion
- Buffoun
Tumblr |
Class Feature: Really Good Juggling
Given 1 round of preparations, you may juggle [Level+4] handheld items. As long as the ceiling is high enough, you may throw them high enough that they only touch your hands once every two rounds. You may also juggle [Level-1] items with limbs which aren't your hands. When juggling different objects, note down the order in which you juggle them. You may throw up to half (rounded down) of the items juggled with one action, though items thrown in the same round must follow the looping order of your juggling. These items function as improvised (or unimprovised) thrown weapons.
If the number of items juggled is greater than quadruple the HD/Level of an enemy present, that enemy must make a morale check, either regarding you as harmless or fleeing in terror on a failure. This only affects a given enemy once.
Class Feature: Leap, Whistle, and Fart
By making a fool of yourself, you may evoke a jovial response from otherwise hostile enemies. This requires one round of breathing, mental, and abdominal exercises, after which you may perform [Level] rounds of stupid slapstick. Enemies of anything other than the iciest temperaments will pause to chuckle, and more sanguine enemies will break down laughing for a few rounds. Allies must save to remain unaffected.
Kate Beaton, of course |
Class Feature: Magic, for Some Reason
When you gain this feature, and every time you level up thereafter, roll a d6. On a six, gain one magic token* and one random spell from the following list:
- Speak with the Dead
- Find Familiar
- ESP
- Illusion
- Hex
- Color Spray
These spells are not obviously identifiable as spells when you cast them (appearing to be slight of hand or other tricks). They are still magical in nature.
Regardless of whether you actually gain a spell, you detect as a magic-user and are considered on par with a witch or necromancer by any priests or other religious officials (this doesn't affect how laypeople view you. Probably they will react with utter confusion if they witness and recognize you doing magic).
Class Feature: Mimic
You may impersonate the voice and mannerisms of a being you have seen or heard. This is a non-magical effect and thus cannot effect the physical appearance. However, if physical appearance is ignored or disguised, you are at once indistinguishable from the being you are impersonating and a hilarious caricature of that same being. Overly serious close relations might be able to tell, but most people would simply think their acquaintance is more funny and/or self-aware than usual.
If performed in front of the individual in question, the individual either finds it hilarious or enraging (50/50).
Class Feature: Wondrous Catch
You may catch thrown objects, as long as the attack roll was less than [level*2]. These objects may automatically be added to your juggling if you are juggling when it was thrown. You may also catch magical attacks if the spell attack was less than [level]. The magical attack vanishes if you stop juggling it.
Class Feature: Contortion
You may perform superhuman feats of flexibility. You may fit through any hole larger than your head. As well you may cartwheel and somersault to halve fall damage (space permitting). You can walk on your hands as easily as you walk on your feet.
Class Feature: Bouffon
Your lungs store a surprising amount of air (and other things too). You may use your breath to create a powerful air current. As well, you may breath fire as long as you have fuel and a source to light it. This fire breath acts as a young red dragon's breath.
Mechanical Notes
Powerful early game, eh late game. The Bard without the Bard, the Rogue without the Rogue. The jongleur has the ability to "end" a reasonable amount of early encounters (maybe not as good as a well placed Sleep, but with the ability to take out a lot of those who weren't affected), and then a lot of situational abilities, and one ability which is almost only a downside. The enterprising Glogger could probably crib this for their custom modular rogue class. Probably the level effects need to be rescaled for six level progression. Still, enemy of the church at level 2 is a pretty bad downside in most GLoG settings.
I don't think it would be hard to make a Kagura dancer, Dionysia actor, or other holy entertainer by just swapping out the arcane spells for divine.
* Magic Token is approximately 1d2 spells slots or 1 magic dice. I'm going to use this from now on, because I do not like to write "spell slots/magic dice/etc."; maybe I should just call it a Thaum and be done.
Thursday, August 13, 2020
Exhortations to the Bloggers
Exhortations to the Bloggers, which may be an Accompaniment to Arnold K., Taken mostly from Clement of Alexandria
The Seven Ways of "Introducing Deception and of Procuring Gods"
- "Some men were deceived from the first about the spectacle of the heavens.Trusting solely to sight, they gazed at the movements of the heavenly bodies, and in wonder deified them, giving them the name of gods"
- "Others, when gathering the cultivated fruits of plants that spring from the earth, called the corn Demeter"
- "Others, after reflecting upon the punishments of evil-doing, make gods out of their experiences of retribution, worshipping the very calamities"
- "Even certain of the philosophers themselves, following the men of poetry, came to represent as deities the types of your emotions, such as Fear, Love, Joy, Hope; just as, of course, Epimenides did of old, when he set up altars in Athens to Insolence and Shamelessness."
- "Some gods arise from the mere circumstances of life deified in men’s eyes and fashioned in bodily form" (meaning death and fate and so on)
- "There is a sixth way... according to which men reckon them to be twelve in number" (i.e. Top-down, genealogy and mythology)
- "Finally... there remains that which arises from the divine beneficence shown towards men; for, since men did not understand it was God who benefited them, they invented certain saviours" (Mistake a real god for a fake one)
"Do not therefore seek diligently after godless sanctuaries, nor after mouths of caverns full of jugglery", a list of shrines:
- the Thesprotian caldron
- the Cirrhaean tripod
- the Dodonian copper
- the old stump honoured by the desert sands
- The Castalian spring
- the spring of Colophon
Exhortation to the Greeks, by Clement of Alexandria (or pseudo-Clement) is a (very funny) polemic written telling Christians not to participate in mystery cults, and, to a lesser degree, telling the pagans that they should stop being fools and become Christians. It provides a biased, but very useful, humorous, and short look at the workings of greek religion and of pagan religions in general, and I think it is a good accompaniment to Arnold K.'s post on religions as a primary/secondary source.