GLOG Class: Ranger

I've been watching Lord of the Rings again.

GLOG Class: the Ranger

A: Whisperer, Parts Unknown, Wild Ways

B: Be Silent That You May Hear, Old Bones

C: Uncanny Instinct, Walk Unseen

D: Folk Unknown, Voices Forgotten

Starting skills [d3]: 1 = child of a woods-witch, 2 = (in)famous outlaw, 3 = latent elf or fae blood

Starting equipment: a hooded cloak in a subtle color & style, well-worn boots, a brace of knives, a sturdy backpack, and a weapon of your choice. 

(A) Whisperer

Animals always react better to you: you know how to soothe them, how to guide them, and how to frighten them. You can tell what an animal wants by examining it for a few moments, and what it very much doesn't want by studying it for a few moments more. You're also preternaturally good at picking out the tracks, markings, and remains of animals, and can always tell when you've entered one's territory.

You can also talk to certain animals. Roll 2d6 and pick one:

1. Cats (and a few other felines)
2. Crows (and most other corvids)
3. Horses (and most other equines)
4. Moths (and a few other lepidopterans)
5. Mice (and a few other rodents)
6. Snakes (and no other reptiles)

You can speak to these animals and be spoken to in turn. Animals don't speak like humans, they're less grammatical and structured, but you can understand them nonetheless. (Bear in mind, however, that most animals, even ones that can talk, don't usually want much to do with humans.)

Every time you finish an adventure/arc/chapter, roll another 2d6 and pick another animal.

(A) Parts Unknown

You know the path to all the major locations in the world: huge cities, mighty rivers, vast deserts, mountain ranges—all of the large and important and exciting places. You may or may not have been there before, but you know the way there regardless.

You know the path to about half the medium-sized locations in the world: forests, lakes, towns, ruins, bogs—places that are important to the regions around them, but perhaps less known on a worldly scale.

You know the path to 2d4 minor locations: individual hills, clearings, ponds, trails, villages, caves—all of the oddball random locations that make up an actual tract of land. Every template, you learn the way to another 2d4 minor locations—maybe ones you've visited as part of the campaign, maybe not.

Once you've been to a place in-session, you know the path back (unless, perhaps, it's a location that magically moves, like a flying castle or lake-that-crawls). 

If you know the path to a location, there's a [templates]-in-6 chance that you know of a secret entrance, hidden pathway, or other means of ingress, egress, or traversal through the location. Sewers, goat-trails, trapdoors, tunnels, and so on. 

For medium locations, I'd just assign a 50% chance to any given location the Ranger actively wants to go to. For minor locations, I'd make the Ranger choose the first handful with the GM's help at chargen, and then let the rest be retroactively declared as needed. The GM basically always has veto power over this if it really comes down to it, but be generous.

(A) Wild Ways

Every template, roll 1d12 and gain that associated way. If you roll a repeat, take your choice of the one above or below it.

(B) Be Silent That You May Hear

If you stand silent and still for a moment, you can hear everything within a hundred feet of you, down to noises as quiet as a whisper. If you stand silent and still for an entire minute, you can hear the difference between a dark room that is silent and a dark room where someone is not making a sound. 

If you press your ear to the earth for a minute or two without speaking, you can hear anything the earth feels within [templates] miles of you. The earth feels things like the hammer of footfalls, the dance of a stream, the gnawing of roots, the creak of a glacier, or the rattle of bones coming alive; it usually doesn't feel the drone of voices. 

(B) Old Bones

Once per day, if you rub shoulders and stamp your feet while ruefully gazing at the sky, you can ask the GM what the weather will be for the next [templates] days; the GM will answer you truthfully.

Alternatively, you can ask when the next occurrence of a given weather pattern (rain, fog, snow, a cloudless hot day, etc.) will occur; the GM will answer you truthfully. 

Alternatively alternatively, you can ask what the weather is at any point in the world right this instant; the GM will answer you truthfully. 

(C) Uncanny Instinct

You know wizards, witches, spirits, faeries, and shapeshifters (like werewolves) on sight, no matter what form they take.

If you stop and smell the air, you can pick out the distinct scents of: curses, blessings, illusions, death, madness, and gold. How far away this works from is based on the intensity and the wind, as with any other smell.

If you taste the blood of a creature, you can tell its broad type (say, an undead from a dragon, but not a zombie from a revenant). You can also tell how long the blood has been there, and whether it was spilled by accident or in earnest.

(C) Walk Unseen

If you draw up the hood of your cloak, you can move without being spotted. Choose [templates] of the following that are true:

• You won't be seen
• You won't be heard
• You won't leave tracks, scent, or trail
• You can move at a full pace
• You can do it with your weapons out and ready
• Your comrades can still see and hear you

Whichever ones you don't choose aren't true, so you will leave a trail or you can be seen or you have to stow your weapons, or whatever. 

(D) Folk Unknown

You know the path to people in the same way you know the way to locations. If you set out to find someone whose path you know, you'll always find them eventually. 

That said, the major-to-minor ratio of people you know the path to is reversed: that is, you know the way to every minor individual, about half of the medium-importance people, and 2d4 major people.

Every time you finish an adventure/arc/chapter, add another 2d4 major people you know the path to.

As with locations, if you know someone's path, there's a 4-in-6 chance that you know a secret about them—but people and locations have different secrets.

As with locations, knowing the way to someone doesn't mean you always know where they are, or that you could draw a map to their location—just that if you set out to find them, you will. If you need some secrets for people to have, use the Middleman's list.

(D) Voices Forgotten

You can talk to non-animal things as if they were animals. Roll 2d6 and pick one:

1. Stones (and most other minerals)
2. Trees (and a few other plants)
3. Rivers (and most other flowing bodies of water)
4. The wind (and a few other weather patterns)
5. Roads (and most other established pathways)
6. Fire (and no other chemical processes)

You can speak to these things and be spoken to in turn. The secret language of things is even stranger and less human than the words of animals, but you can still understand their voices.

Every time you finish an adventure/arc/chapter, roll another 2d6 and pick another thing.

A quick note on speaking with animals and things: pay attention to how exactly that speaking process works, and consult with your GM. Maybe you mimic the call of crows and the whistling of the wind; maybe the elves taught the world to speak, and so you speak elvish; maybe when you speak it takes the form of prayers, and the G_ds bless you that you might be understood. Whatever it is, speaking to non-human things is important, and you should put some thought into how you do so.

Wild Ways

Rangers know things about the world, things that other folk simply don't. Maybe it's smoke and mirrors, maybe it's genuine magic, maybe it's just being lightning quick.

Every level, roll 1d12 and gain the associated way. If you roll a repeat, take your choice of the one above or below it. 

1. Walks-Upon-Winter
   You don't sink in snow, regardless of your weight; you simply walk across the top of it as if it was solid earth.
2. Skin-As-a-Snake
   In a minute, you can change your appearance to be as dirty or as clean as you please. Mosquitoes, fleas, ticks, and other such pests will never bother you, unless you want them to.
3. Friend-to-Fair-Folk
   Faeries and spirits take a liking to you; this means they're flirty and charming and happy to please you, but also take insults and offense far more seriously.
4. Breathes-Without-Air
   You can hold your breath for [templates] × 3 minutes. If you need to, you can take a breath only once per minute and still act normally.
5. Slumbers-On-Foot
   For [templates] hours per day, you can walk while you sleep. You still won't hear or see anything, and someone will need to hold your hand to get around corners, but you can sleep while walking.
6. Speaks-Many-Tongues
   You know a dozen words in a dozen languages; if you try your hardest to be understood in foreign lands but still can't, folk tend to take pity on you.
7. Remains-Always-Ready
   If you take a minute to hide a knife on your person, it cannot be found by anyone you don't want it to be.
8. Sees-No-Sunlight
   If you draw your hood up, you can hide your face from unfriendly eyes: they still see you, it's not as if you are actively hiding your face, but they can't get any clear details or distinctive features.
9. Drinks-As-a-Camel
   You can go three times as long without water as a regular person, but have to drink three times as much water beforehand and afterwards. 
10. Keeps-Many-Secrets
    If you encounter tracks or remains (fur, feathers, scales, etc.) from one of the animals you can Whisper to, you can ask those tracks a single question as you were speaking to the animal directly.
11. Heeds-Not-the-Bounds
    You can swim and climb as quickly and easily as you run. If underwater or hanging vertically (from, say, a tree or cliffside) any abilities that take a minute or more only take half as long.
12. Bears-the-Wilds
    When you walk into town while visibly wearing your cloak and bearing arms, folk will give you a free meal, a mug of beer, a corner to sleep in, and take care to be genial and courteous or to leave you alone entirely (your choice).

--

"Aragorn-the-class," basically, to go with the Sage as Gandalf-the-class. Things that this class doesn't do but I kind of wish it did, but it's already long as hell:

• Heal people in witch-y natural ways (the hands of a healer are the hands of a king, etc., etc.)
• Fight good
• The thing where Aragorn does CSI: Middle-Earth outside of Fangorn
• Probably some other cool ranger stuff I'm forgetting

Anyway, yeah. There's like a billion ranger classes out there anyway, and I couldn't think of a good name for this one other than "ranger."

Oh yeah, and the empty room/room that is silent is ripped straight out of deus' Zouave. It's just too good to pass up.

Let me know if you get a chance to test it out.

GLOG Class: Xeromancer Wizard

"Inhuman solitude made of sand and G_d."

GLOG Class: Xeromancer

Art by Ikarus, as it says, but I can't find any reference or links to them.

The desert draws magicians like moths to a flame, and xeromancers are no exception. These are magicians who strive for mastery over the physical elements of the desert: heat, sand, water, wind. They are strange, reclusive magicians, ones more at home on the endless dunes than in cities or academies. That said, xeromancers are highly sought-after as ship's canters, and can always find work out on the Seas.

Perk: messages-in-a-bottle that you send will always reach their recipient, but it will take 1d100 days. Messages-in-a-bottle sent to you will always reach you, though they too take 1d100 days.

Drawback: you cannot bathe in water, cross running water, or set foot in the ocean. If you do, your flesh will wash off like so much sand.

Starting skill [d3]: 1 = outcast prophet; 2 = child stolen by a psammead; 3 = genuine desert sorcerer

Starting gear: a scarf to hide your face and eyes, two skins, two random xeromancer items, and a long twisty ragged cloak bleached to the color of sand.

SPELLS

Roll 1d10 twice at level 1, then once every additional level; if you get repeats, roll again. At level 4 (D Templates), you get to pick spell #11 or #12. You can find more spells via scrolls, tablets, etc.

1. Siphon
   R: touch; T: [sum] × 5' radius of sand; D: [dice] hours
   You can instantly shift the temperature of a circle of sand by up to [sum] × 10 degrees, up or down. This will have different effects based on the sand you're on.
2. Hollow-Heft
   R: shouting distance; T: [dice] creatures; D: [sum] minutes
   The target's weight increases by either 10x or is reduced to 1/10th. Hostile creatures can make a save against this effect.
3. Zephyr
   R: [sum] ×10'; T: a line, starting from you; D: [dice] × 10 minutes
   When you open your mouth, a blast of high-speed wind comes out in a line [dice] × 2' wide. Any creature caught in the blast of wind can make a save to not be hurled backwards.
4. Forecast
   R: sight; T: the sky; D: [dice] days
   You know what the weather will be up to 24 hours from now. You can shift the daily d100 weather table roll up to [sum] amount during the duration.
5. Well
   R: touch; T: a container, like a barrel or skin; D: instantaneous
   All water within a [sum] × 100' radius is instantly drawn into the container you touch (potentially overflowing). 
6. Geyser
   R: shouting distance; T: a spot in the sea; D: [dice] rounds
   A geyser of sand bursts from the surface, [sum]' wide and [sum] × 10' high, launching anything beneath it upwards.
7. Sculpt
   R: touch; T: a bunch of sand; D: [sum] minutes
   You sculpt a bunch of sand into a structure no larger than a [dice] × 10' cube. For the duration, the sand is magically held together; after the duration expires, gravity takes effect, and the sculpture will endure only as well as it naturally would.
8. Endure
   R: touch; T: [dice] people; D: [sum] hours
   The targets do not need to drink, eat, or sleep (and are unaffected by having already not done so); they are immune to heatstroke and exhaustion; their speed is not halved when travelling by sandshoe.
9. Dive
   R: touch; T: self + [dice-1] people; D: [sum] × 10 minutes
   You gain psammitic gills (so you can breathe sand); you can swim in any sand at standard speed; you gain sandsense out to [dice] × 100'; you are immune to the extreme heat of the depths of the sandy seas.
10. Glide
    R: self; T: self; D: [sum] minutes
    You can glide along the surface of the sand at [dice] times normal speed. Anyone within [dice] × 10' on either side of you must save or be blinded for 1d6 rounds as you spray sand at them.
11. Storm
    R: [sum] miles; T: self; D: [sum] hours
    You conjure a huge sandstorm: you yourself are immune to its effects (but not your ship or crew). The sandstorm stays centered on you, and allows you to fly at double speed. Sandstorms will vary based on the kind of sand they are composed of, but are always exceedingly dangerous.
12. Transmute
    R: self; T: sand, earth, or water; D: permanent
    Within a [sum]-mile radius, you transmute the terrain around you into: any of the seven sands, solid earth, or pure fresh water. 

Xeromancer Mishaps:

1: you spend 1d6 rounds vomiting sand, a couple cubic feet of it per round—it's not the kind of sand you're currently on, though, roll 1d6 to see what it is.

2: for (secretly rolled) 1d6 days, you count as weighing 5x for the purposes of determining whether you sink in sand.

3: you and anyone (but not anything) inside a 10' radius burst into flame; you suffer 1d6 damage per round until you extinguish yourself.

4: you attract the attention of the desert: roll on the phenomena encounter chart.

5: for 24 hours, you cannot see, hear, or speak unless you are actively touching sand.

6: for 24 hours, any water you touch turns to sand; you must pass a save vs. curse to drink a skin.

Xeromancer Dooms:

1: The Seas swallow you for a time. You sink into the sand and are buffeted around its swirling depths for 24 hours, at which point you are spat back up 1d6-1 miles away, in a random direction.

2: The Seas demand you take no sustenance other than from them. All water within 1 mile instantly evaporates.

3: The Seas claim you as their own. A sandstorm immediately rises, centered on you, and you transformed into a being of pure sand. If the wind blows at you at any time from this day forth, you will simply crumble away.

Xeromancer Items:

1. Vial of holy water. Doubly impactful in the desert.
2. Red silk sash. Worn by merchant-princes and high priests; quite valuable.
3. String of shark teeth. Each has a little rune carved into it. Quite deadly if used as a garotte.
4. A live cobra. Kept inside a clay pot; not particularly friendly. HD1, 1d8 venom damage. 2 slots.
5. Dual scimitars. Light & elegant, matched to fit into a single sheath. 1d6 damage, 1 slot each.
6. A gnarled wooden staff. Quite rare for the Seas, given the wood scarcity. 1d8 damage, 2 slots.
7. Philosophical texts. Ascetism, theogony, divine geometry. Probably worth something to the right person.
8. Flask of tequila. It's good tequila, too, the kind that's hard to find these days.
9. Pair of sandproof goggles. Made of crystal, leather, and glass. Fits easily into your scarf.
10. Wavy-bladed sword. Finely-crafted of steel and brass. 1d8 damage, 2 slots.
11. A vulture. Not a pet, exactly, but it sort of follows you around and keeps an eye out for interesting sights.
12. Coracle. A round little one-person rowboat, nimble but not very fast. 6 slots if you want to portage it.
13. Vial of centipede venom. Target has to save vs. anaphylactic shock or be paralyzed. 3 doses.
14. Pair of sandshoes. These ones are made of camel leather and papyrus, the old way. 2 slots.
15. Handheld mirror. Burnished, silvery steel; highly reflective. 1 slot.
16. Brass whistle. The cylindrical mountaineer kind.
17. Bone flute. Beautifully carved; you know how to play some basic tunes. 1 slot.
18. 50' of hempen rope. Sailor's choice. 1 slot.
19. Pack of tarot cards. Both the major and the minor arcana. 
20. A strange and unusual artifact [1d6]:
1. A strange sandstone brick. It hums and shimmers sometimes, and will move of its own accord in your backpack. 1 slot.
2. A maze of twisty indigo tattoos across your back and shoulders. A map? A diagram? A text?
3. A fossil in a lump of kiln sand. Some kind of scuttling thing, all shell and legs and razor wings. 
4. A shimmering, incandescent scarab beetle. Inside a little glass jar. Always tries to walk in one direction.
5. A bronze tablet, covered in strange runes. You can't read it. Seemingly no one else can, either.
6. An ordinary human skull, but made of hardened sand. There are legends of skeletons turned to sand; this may be proof.

--

Yeah. Sandy wizard. At some point I might get around to the "day-night-dreams-mirages desert wizard," but that's a big TBD.

Let me know what you think, or if you get a chance to use it.

d100 Seas of Sand tattoos & trinkets

 I'm running another Seas campaign shortly, so I made another couple d100 trinkets and d100 tattoos tables. Here they are:

d100 TRINKETS

1. set of matched jokers
2. clay smoking pipe
3. sharktooth necklace
4. wide-brim rawhide hat
5. camel’s lower jawbone
6. manual on snake handling
7. vial of bone sand
8. four strips of fish jerky
9. neck kerchief, blue
10. brass bangles
11. golden front tooth
12. studded nose ring
13. bells meant to be sewn into a braid of hair
14. tiny prayer wheel
15. foreign coin on a string
16. silver thimble
17. tin of beard & mustache wax made from snake oil
18. geometric-patterned sash
19. high-grade eyeliner
20. green silk scarf
21. veneered, gilt dagger
22. random major arcana
23. sealed jar of honey
24. two hand-rolled cigarettes
25. nip of scorpion tequila
26. steel trident
27. red fez, gold tassels
28. curved pointy shoes
29. big hoop earrings
30. huge baggy pants
31. inlaid drinking horn
32. set of bone pipes
33. scrapwood fiddle
34. live tarantula in a glass jar
35. carved dice & cups
36. vial of antivenom
37. huge silver belt buckle
38. pamphlet-sized starmap
39. soft camelskin jacket
40. “legitimate” war medal
41. a blue glass eye
42. lobster claw on a string
43. old copper pentagram necklace, verdigris-y
44. letter from a former captain
45. a working music box
46. shed cobra’s skin
47. shrunken human skull
48. a golden sewing needle
49. a broken scimitar
50. feathered tricorn hat
51. black leather eyepatch
52. wooden peg leg carved to resemble an eagle’s talon
53. bottle of rum, near empty
54. seax knife, still sharp
55. animal mask
56. mummified cat
57. a pair of old socks
58. collection of shiny beads
59. 10 ft. of silken rope
60. a locket with a cameo of a lover inside
61. three wedding rings
62. an old papyrus manuscript
63. pamphlet on the very graphic dangers of STDs
64. a fancy curly wig
65. crocodile-leather sandals
66. a cracked, busted compass
67. arrowhead, unknown metal
68. tattoo needle & ink
69. camel-hair monk’s habit
70. a pair of sandproof goggles
71. bouncy camel-bladder ball
72. clay tablet covered in esoteric runes & glyphs
73. broken brass pocketwatch
74. half of a sailor’s astrolabe
75. dried-out husk of a tentacle
76. a cluster of ripe bananas
77. a flask of pirate’s grog
78. straight razor & towel
79. seven different fancy colored leather belts
80. false nose, wood & bronze
81. a nautical chart from some distant far-off watery sea
82. a round leather drum
83. a key carved out of bone
84. a large, strange egg
85. finger-sized oilskin pouch
86. diver’s helmet (no suit)
87. pair of silver shackles
88. monstrous claw preserved in embalming fluid
89. an actual bar of soap
90. ancient bronze sickle
91. bottle of luxury perfume
92. snuffbag full of rare salts
93. two dried peppers, extremely spicy
94. deed to unknown land
95. pouch full of crop seeds
96. saucy pin-up star calendar
97. pack of dog-eared cards
98. set of crytalline marbles
99. brass knuckles
100. one-eyed ship’s cat

d100 TATTOOS

1. random scribblings
2. ring of roses
3. geometric glyph
4. dice showing snake eyes
5. line of crawling insects
6. smiling drunk camel
7. gatehouse & portcullis
8. the letter “P,” “S,” or “W”
9. a lighthouse
10. “Eat Me Last”
11. collection of black dots
12. thunderbolt
13. cobra head, leering
14. crossed harpoons
15. perfect shiny diamond
16. “R.I.P.” + name
17. “Mother” +  heart
18. pair of swallows
19. 1d10 anchors
20. queen of hearts
21. 1d4 of the four card suits
22. vulture with a black halo
23. crescent moon
24. bone structure diagram
25. lion print tracks
26. paper lantern
27. line of stitches
28. grinning skull
29. “Eight Lives Left” & a cat
30. Lucky #13
31. “Real Flesh & Blood”
32. lemon slice
33. constellation
34. full-body squid
35. seven-pointed star
36. dead man’s hand
37. rat king of 2d10 rats
38. two sandships crashing into each other
39. fishbones
40. swarm of locusts
41. angel with a burning sword
42. grappling hook & rope
43. big pile of golden coins
44. series of musical notes
45. perfect equilateral triangle
46. seahorse unicorn
47. pineapple
48. supine, nude figure
49. eyeball, on the eyelid
50. burning book
51. flickering candle
52. 1d20 random playing cards
53. “Vox Clamantis in Deserto”
54. 1d10 words in foreign script
55. “Upstanding Citizen of” + random city
56. cow skull
57. swordfish
58. “Pillage, then Burn”
59. random set of 1d4+1 initials
60. 1d20 bands
61. unbalanced scales
62. sunburst
63. ourobouros serpent
64. empty grave
65. halbear, the halbeard bear
66. fully-rigged sailing ship
67. broken heart + name
68. “Keep Well Lubricated” + drop of water
69. coil of rope
70. exotic dancer
71. “Hold Fast”
72. compass rose
73. twisting glass dragon
74. matched palm trees
75. spider crab
76. all-seeing eye
77. checkered grid, 2d20 × 2d20
78. ship’s wheel
79. rooster
80. “Memento Mori”
81. “Water is Gold”
82. empty waterskin
83. chain, 2d20 links
84. “Silence”
85. skittering centipede
86. spyglass
87. “F.U.B.A.R.”
88. tornado
89. cluster of ripe bananas
90. “Too Pretty to Die”
91. spitting camel
92. meat cleaver
93. 1d100 tally marks
94. snail on the edge of a knife
95. treasure map
96. crown split in half
97. salt cube
98. mushrooms
99. crate + weight in lbs.
100. just a big glob of indigo ink

I might also be putting out another set of Seas rules sometime in the future. TBD. 

Big Wet Three: d100 Trinkets, Yes-Sir-ee!

I love trinkets lists. This one's for the Big Wet. 

1. Tin of spam
2. "Flooding Procedures and You" government pamphlet
3. Old-fashioned spyglass
4. Disposable camera and enough film for 25 photos
5. High-grade nautical chart, now 100% useless
6. Manual of sailor tattoos
7. A cool geode
8. Four caffeine tablets
9. Half-dozen glo-sticks
10. Bandana
11. Rubber duck
12. A single glow-in-the-dark condom
13. Denim jacket, sleeves optional
14. Barber's razor, battery-powered
15. Tourniquet
16. Nose ring
17. Tattoo gun, no ink
18. Doc Martens
19. Wallet full of mostly-useless cash
20. One wedding ring for each finger
21. Excised tumor in a little jar
22. Bright blue jerry can, reads "potable water"
23. Spare tire
24. Fingerless black leather gloves
25. Matched spiked bracelets
26. Twister, but missing the spinner
27. Pack of cigarettes
28. Dog tags
29. Pack of balloons
30. Surfboard, tie-dye colors
31. A hefty canoe oar
32. 12 oz can of Coca-Cola
33. Bottle of extremely old codeine
34. Ice axe
35. Chocolate bar
36. Set of allen wrenches, missing two
37. Palm-sized wad of sticky-tack
38. CD jukebox, battery-powered
39. Shemagh scarf, like the cool military bros have
40. A bullet with "BASTERD" poorly carved into it
41. Diver's wristwatch
42. Wraparound shades
43. Four-pack of twinkies
44. Complete Yahtzee! set, no scorecards
45. Basic travel-sized makeup kit
46. Male enhancement pills, questionable efficacy
47. Trusty beanie, slouch-able or ear-covering as needs be
48. Sharktooth necklace
49. Inner tube
50. Staple gun, no staples
51. Roll of scotch tape
52. MRE: fettuccini alfredo
53. A weird scary bug in a jar
54. Acoustic guitar, missing a string
55. BB Gun
56. Matched shot glasses
57. Super high-end hydroflask
58. A pouchful of dry earth
59. Rubik's cube
60. A packet of Lisa Frank stickers
61. Nokia phone, still working, no signal
62. Baseball cap, Boston Red Sox
63. Cowboy hat
64. Growler of moonshine, mostly empty
65. Lobster cage
66. 10' of barbed wire in a little sack
67. Rubber-band ball, 6" across
68. Hard hat with "expendable" stamped across it
69. Snorkel
70. Really fancy switchblade with an in-laid handle and everything
71. Lock of red hair
72. Bowling ball
73. 6-months sober token
74. A random major arcana card
75. Ushanka
76. Compass
77. Bundle of coat hangers
78. Dozen permanent markers, in full rainbow bright colors
79. Bottle of hand sanitizer
80. Raggedy-Anne doll
81. Big, powerful magnet
82. Harmonica
83. Stack of Playboys, waterlogged and blurry
84. Black eyepatch, medical-grade
85. Super high-grade tactical cargo pants
86. Roll of paper towels, dry
87. A weird skull
88. Love letter
89. Windchimes
90. Pack of poker cards
91. REI gift card, $100
92. Six feet of 0.75" PVC pipe
93. Crucifix on a necklace
94. Sixer of light beer
95. Three $10,000 poker chips on a string
96. Small desk fan
97. A fucking sword
98. Athletic elbow- and knee-guards
99. A dozen granola bars
100. A strange radio that beeps out a single Morse code letter every dawn

Some entries (lovingly) stolen from Mothership, KISHU, and the Face gang. 

Taxonomy of Powered by the Apocalypse Games, some flawed-but-still-cool research

I turned this in as a final for art-history-of-games-ish class this semester, so I thought I'd put it up here for shits and giggles as well. 

This is a somewhat-exhaustive taxonomy of PbtA games, tracking ten different systemic mechanical elements in each, and a loose kind of succession between them. It's not perfect, in that my methodology is sort of flawed and there are definitely errors and omissions floating around, but it's a useful visual nonetheless, I think.

Here's the PDF. You'll want Acrobat for this, since it's dependent on the different layers. If you don't have Acrobat or otherwise don't have access to the layers feature, here's a .zip file of all of the graphs as images.

And just to show the mild absurdity of this whole thing, here's what the graph looks like with every single layer turned on simultaneously: 

Anyway, let me know if you have any questions or want to give me grant money to do more of this research or whatever. 

Big Wet Two: Equipment Boogaloo

 Continued from the first post.

This post is about stuff. Mostly gear. 

Remember that bullets are currency. I'll do an actual inventory rules-post at some point, but for now, assume the standard 10-12ish slots per person.

GIANT LIST OF WET WEAPONS

As we all know, blogger hates tables, so here's the table instead:

Here's the link to the PDF.

If you're unfamiliar with Mothership, here's a brief overview of the bits you might not understand:

• Underlined numbers are multiplied by 10. 2d10 has a range between 20 and 200. 
• Short range suffers no ill effects; medium range imposes a -10 penalty; long range imposes disadvantage
• [+] means advantage, [-] means disadvantage
• Crits are any double (11, 22, etc.)
• Automatic weapons fire in bursts. If you're trained in firearms, you get to use the (parenthesized) number, otherwise it's spray and pray. 
• An average person has about 60 health, give or take. That might go down for Big Wet.

Everything else on this table should be relatively self-explanatory. 

Some rules and stuff about guns:

1. Shooting a gun is a regular combat action.
2. Reloading is a regular combat action.
3. If you spend 30 seconds lying or kneeling down with your gun braced on something, taking careful aim, you can give yourself advantage on the next shot you take.
4. As established previously, guns generally don't mind getting wet, but firing underwater is essentially impossible.
5. Remember that bullets are currency, so all the costs listed are in bullets.

Some notes and thoughts about this table:

• Melee weapons are very cheap, and deliberately so. Fighting in melee is a messy, dangerous gamble, and in the Big Wet, there's no guarantee you can make it to your opponents without having to swim or wade through muck. 
• It lacks a lot of the common "improvised weapons" you see in apocalyptic settings (bricks, screwdrivers, bicycle chains, etc.), mostly because there are too many to list. If you need rules for those, I'd have them deal 1d10 by default, +1d10 if they take two hands, +1d10 if they have sharp or exposed edges. 
• Guns get pricey fast. This is also deliberate: post-apocalyptic settings don't often have much to work towards, and so I think having some visible-but-not-available rewards for players is a good thing. Also, they can just fucking shred people (and things...?), so they shouldn't be cheap.

GIANT LIST OF WET GEAR

And here's a big list of gear and equipment that you might use:

This is only the first page!

Most of this gear should be pretty self-explanatory. 

Tracking bullets, batteries, and slots I realize is extremely fiddly, but at the same time, this is a survival game: those kinds of small details really, really matter. You could maybe hack in Usage Dice (a la the Black Hack) for batteries and gasoline and stuff, but because bullets are currency, you really do have to track them. (On the flipside, you'll never have that many, so there's isn't much to track anyway!)

BIG WET FUTURE II

That's all I've got for now. Next time, I'll hopefully get to vehicles, food, and armor, all of which I have a few ideas for, but nothing 100% certain yet. 

Also, if there's interest, I might outsource some of this, and run a Big Wet Challenge for the good folks over on the spillway, in true GLOG style. 

Let me know, in any case. 

The Big Wet, a (post?) apocalyptic hack setting thing

Inspired by STALKER, Metro, Waterworld, that one BehindTheScreen post, some discussions on #glog-spillway, and a handful of other post-apocalyptic media. The phrase "the Big Wet" comes from the Wasteland graphic novel, which I know almost nothing about otherwise. The official soundtrack is anything by Protomartyr.

Also, I'm writing this on my old laptop, which likes to skip H's and add extra S's. So forgive that, please.

"Strange Places" by Artem Chebokha

THE BIG WET

About ten years ago, maybe fifteen or twenty, the world went to shit. Temperatures climbed higher, the ice caps melted, the sea levels, and the weather lost its head. Crops failed, coastlines flooded, cities were abandoned. At some point, the US of A invaded some country less than half its size, a missile or two got fired, and well, you know how that goes.

The important takeaways are this: most governments and nations are fragmented and gone. Lots and lots of valuable stuff is half-submerged in the ruins of the coastal cities. It never stops raining, and everything is always very wet.

WET WORLD

I'm working off of the rough assumption that the global average temperature rose about 4° C (which, relatively speaking, is a shitton), and essentially all of the ice caps have melted. Water levels rose about 30 meters, give or take. Plug that into floodmap.net, and choose a favorite coastal city: that's the main setting of your game. Use google maps to fill in the details.

There are still people around. Lots of them died, from dehydration or filthy water or being killed, but lots of them are still alive. They live in inland communes, overcrowded and more than a little lawless, but still very much kicking. Most towns and villages have kept their names; lots of infrastructure has failed (power grid, internet, most indoor plumbing), but the buildings are still there. Most cities are ruled by a combination of their pre-apocalyptic administrators, newly-risen leaders, and good old-fashioned warlords. 

(Way, way inland, up in the mountains, there are whole cities, fueled with coal and dams. They're where new manufactured goods come from, and it's where lucky people end up. You aren't one of those lucky ones, though, so those distant mountain cities are mere backdrop to the main game.)

Most crops do not very grow when it's raining all the time; all bodies of water have grown, reducing available arable land significantly. Fungi, insects, fruit that grow in wetlands, weird trash-fish—all staples of the modern diet. Water is harder to come by; most reservoirs are contaminated, and most rainfall is toxic. Communes either keep purifiers running around the clock, hoard well-water carefully and ration it, or risk disease and drink from the poisoned seas.

GETTIN' WET

(I'm hacking Mothership here; it's my go-to for more modern/non-fantasy systems, it's free, and I like the d100 for some of the stuff here. Most of these rules should translate relatively cleanly over to other OSR stuff, though.)

You have the same stats as normal. Roll-under. 

When you get wet, you add to your Wet score. When you roll the dice, you want to roll under your stat, but over your Wet score. If, say, your Strength is 35 and your Wet is (currently) 7, you would need to roll between an 8 and a 34 to succeed. Roll a 35 or higher and you fail, or roll a 7 lower and you fail. 

There are three basic states of "wetness:" damp, dripping, and drenched, from least-wet to most-wet. 

Being damp is just a little wet: standing in a drizzle with no overcoat, brushing across some waterlogged plants, getting sprayed with mist.

Being dripping is rather wet: falling into a puddle, standing in the rain in just your shirt and pants, getting water poured on you, catching some spray from a hose.

Being drenched is quite wet: swimming underwater, getting caught naked in a downpour, having a bucket of water dumped onto you, lying facedown in a deep puddle.

(You can also use these as a rough percentage: if your boots are full of water but the rest of you is dry, call that damp. If you wade waist-deep but your arms, head, and shoulders are totally dry, called that dripping. These are flexible categories.)

You don't need to track your gear to the same level of detail, but consider: if you spend several hours handling wet bags, rope, guns, and gear, you're going to get at least a bit damp yourself. Keeping your gear as dry as possible is important.

To add to your Wet score:

• For every hour spent damp, add +1 Wet
• For every hour spent dripping, add +2 Wet
• For every hour spent drenched, add +3 Wet

For every hour you spend completely, entirely dry, subtract 3 Wet. 

Generally speaking, clothes take about an hour per level of Wet to dry: damp takes an hour to dry, dripping takes two hours, drenched takes three. The exceptions to this are shoes, boots, and socks, which take two or three times that long (unless you take them off and let them hang, when socks go a bit quicker). If you strip down, you'll dry off in about half an hour. If you have a heat source, it takes ten minutes or less.

(If you're on a d20 system, gain Wet every 4-hour watch or maybe every day, rather than every hour. Everything else should carry over fine.)

WET GUNS, WET BULLETS

Bullets are currency. Paper money has long since rotted away, and you can't eat or drink with gold or jewels. The old world left behind lots of guns and plenty of bullets, though, so they have become the new de facto currency. 

All bullets, regardless of caliber or make, are worth the same. The deadlier bullets might seem more valuable, but A) their guns are rarer and harder to use, and B) deadlier isn't always more useful.

Exactly how into-detail you want to get with tracking and comparing calibers is up to you. If you want total realism you can use the big list; I personally will probably track 5-8 of the most common calibers and call it a day. You honestly don't even have to track caliber, if you don't want, and just hand-wave it to say that bullets are universal. This system will work fine regardless.

Point is, every shot counts. If you get in a gunfight, you're burning cash—both your own and your enemies'. Bullets are currency.

As for actual, like, gun stats, I'd just steal them from Mothership. Add in some more, if you need them, but they provide a good enough framework to be going on. (If you're on a d20, use Vayra's, or whatever else you want.)

Do guns work underwater? No, not really. It's not that the guns themselves don't work, just that the water resistance is too high. You can stick a gun in water and pull it out again and it will shoot fine, but literally shooting underwater is basically impossible.

BIG WET FUTURE

For the time being, that's everything I've got. In later installments (which are hopefully forthcoming), I'll dig into wet gear, wet vehicles, swimming wet, skills for wetness, and maybe some wet classes or strange wet artifacts.

If you were part of the discussions when I first was talking about this—or if it's caught your attention—feel free to come up with your own stuff.  

"Post-apocalyptic River" by Leo Nuutinen

GLOG Class: Stretch Thompson

Today's been weird. 

GLOG Class: Stretch Thompson

A: Alter Size
B: Variable Specificity, Explosive Expansion

C: Gastronomic Scaling

D: Adjustable Density, Independent Dimensionality

Background: [1d3] 1 = giant-kin, 2 = witch's child, 3 = severe pituitary malfunction

Starting items: an exceedingly large lightweight robe,  (if regular nudity is embarrassing for your table, you also get a set of magic underwear that changes to fit you no matter what, but comes only in a drab color)

You gain +1 HP per template. 

(A) Alter Size

You can increase and decrease your own size; this takes about 5 seconds. None of your items or gear transform with you. Your HP doesn't change; any damage scales accordingly, so if you get a small cut while small, it'll become a big cut when you get big.

There's no equation that feels as good as these numbers, so:

Here is the table of the maximum and minimum sizes you can reach by height, per template:

• A: max of 8 ft., min of 3 ft.
• B: max of 12 ft., min of 1.5 ft.
• C: max of 20 ft., min of 6 inches
• D: max of 36 ft., min of 1 inch

You can increase or decrease to any given size within the maximum and minimum. 

When you transform, in addition to height, you change your weight accordingly. The equation to calculate weight is as follows: [current height / standard height]³ * standard weight. That's a scary-looking equation if you're like me, so here's some fast references, assuming you're 6 ft. tall and weigh 200 lbs.:

• 36 ft = 43,200 lbs. (a grey whale)
• 20 ft = 7,407.41 lbs. (a medium elephant)
• 12 ft = 1600 lbs. (a large polar bear)
• 8 ft = 474.07 lbs. (a big lion)
• 6 ft = 200 lbs. 
• 3 ft. = 25 lbs. (a beagle)
• 1.5 ft = 3.125 lbs. (a rabbit, ish)
• 0.5 ft. = 0.11 lbs. (a very long mouse)
• 1 inch = 0.0005 lbs. (about 10 grains of rice)

Roughly speaking. Most adventurers are not precisely 6 ft. tall and exactly 200 lbs., but this is a good chart for estimation.

When you transform, your Strength score increases or decreases accordingly, equal to +/- [templates * 2] per size shift: at 8 ft., you'd have +2 STR, at 12 ft. +4, and so on. At 3 ft. you'd have -2 STR, at 1.5 ft. -4 STR, and so on. There's no real basis for this, it's just what feels reasonable.

(B) Variable Specificity

You can alter the sizes of each of your body parts individually: you can increase your hands while decreasing your head, say. 

Internal organs match their closest exterior counterparts, and your circulatory system (heart, lungs, veins, etc.) can account for any such discrepancies as if you were one evenly-ratio-size person.

(B) Explosive Expansion

If you expand while inside of another creature (like, say, you crawled down their throat), that is smaller than the size to which you are currently growing, make an STR check. On a success, they rupture at the seams and suffer catastrophic damage. On a failure, they manage to force you out of themselves before reaching the critical point: they take no damage. 

(C) Gastronomic Scaling

Any objects wholly contained within your stomach transform in size with you, maintaining their exact relative dimensions. Their density doesn't change; just volume and mass.

This means, for example, that you could swallow a toothpick, grow to 20 ft. high, hork it back up again, and have an ordinary-sized baton.

(D) Adjustable Density

In addition to your general size, you can choose to either have your own weight fit according to your size, or you have it remain at 200. This rapidly changes your density: a regular 6 ft. 200 lbs. human, blended down, is about 2 cubic feet, giving you a density of roughly 100 lb/ft³ (extremely rough, I'm not a physicist).

For reference, here are some common densities:

• Water: 62.25 lb/ft³
• Air: 0.0765 lb/ft³
• Feather: 0.156 lb/ft³
• Iron: 491.5 lb/ft³
• Oak wood: 45.57 lb/ft³
• Granite: 103 lb/ft³
• Gold: 1204.86 lb/ft³
• Osmium, the densest element: 1410.24 lb/ft³

And here are some densities you might want to know:

• At 36 ft. tall while weighing 200 lbs.: 0.46 lb/ft³: a large sail, essentially, able to be pulled by the air
• At 1 inch tall while weighing 200 lbs.: 74 million lb/ft³: a super-ultra-turbo heavy bullet

(D) Independent Dimensionality

Rather than change size, you can now change a single dimension: length, width, or height. Thus, you could: change solely height and transform into Slenderman; change solely width and become Flat Stanley; change solely length and you become the best goalie in the world. 

Rather than cubing weight, you now just multiply it once (since it's only one dimension). 

Anything you swallow keeps the same relative dimension.

--

This one's a real wild one. There's a lot of math involved, so decide upfront how in-depth you want to get with the number-crunching. 

If anyone asks where the extra mass goes or comes from, say it's the Astral Plane.

Let me know how it goes.

Using Δ Templates

I've seen a few questions, so I figured I'd just make a big post.

WHAT ARE Δ TEMPLATES?

Δ templates are template features that only come into effect after a specific condition has been fulfilled. 

(They're pronounced as "delta templates," and sometimes written that way, too, if you don't want to wrangle with unusual keyboard inputs.)

There are three basic parts to a Δ template:

1. The name. All templates get a cool feature name, like "Blade-Monger" or "Smite the Unworthy." Δ templates are the same (though it helps to link the name of the Δ template to the specific action associated with it).
2. The trigger. This is the necessary condition you have to fulfill in order to gain the associated benefits. 
3. The effects. These are the perks, benefits, abilities, bonuses, and other associated effects tied to the template as a whole.

Written, out a Δ template looks like this:

(Δ) Covenantor

Δ: enter into a formal, binding covenant with an extra-planar patron, such as a demon prince or lesser deity.

You can recognize other servants of your patron on sight as well as their sworn enemies. You gain 1 MD to channel your patron's energy.

I like to use the bold / standard / italics format, just for ease of reading (especially in a big list), but that's not necessary if you don't want it to be.  

That's it, really. They might seem scary, but really, Δ templates are pretty straightforward.

WHY USE Δ TEMPLATES?

I have two answers to this: first, they build objectives and goals straight into a class from the get-go; second, they allow you as GM-designer to directly link player advancement to specific diegetic actions.

First, Δ templates build objectives and goals straight into a class. Ordinarily, a player has to wait for the campaign to get started and get used to the world to start pursuing their goals—which might not even have rewards associated, necessarily. Usually, a player's goals will be their GM's goals for their players, not necessarily what a player might want to be doing otherwise (this isn't bad, usually, but it is restrictive in a way that's always felt oddly antithetical to the old-school ethos).

With Δ templates, the second a player reads their class, they can instantly see the new shiny toys they get to play with, and the exact tasks they have to achieve to earn those shiny new toys. It gives them motivation, drive, and a clear objective—exactly what players just starting new characters will need.

For the GM, Δ templates are a way to do a little backdoor adventure-planning: because you know what classes your players are using (and thus know what Δ templates they want to unlock), you should have a good idea of what goals your players will have before the game even begins. Obviously, Δ templates are not the end-all be-all of player rewards, but in terms of building content that your players will be interested in, having an easily-referenceable list of goals your players will be hunting is exceedingly useful.

Second, Δ templates are a way to directly tie mechanical, systemic advancement to specific narrative moments and beats. 

Think about the ordinary XP-level loop (regardless of how you earn XP): you start at level 1, you earn some XP, and eventually you hit level 2, which comes with new benefits, based on your class (or whatever else you're using). The actions you take to level up—acquiring gold, beating monsters, exploring regions, completing objectives, following your beliefs, whatever you do—are almost never directly correlated, on a diegetic level, to the benefits you gain. It's an odd dissonance that most players have just gotten used to overlooking, but it's still there.

Δ templates avoid this dissonance: there are specific goals that you have to achieve to gain specific benefits. The designer can decide precisely which achievements and goals they want linked to according benefits; Δ templates remove the otherwise-dissonant abstraction so common in RPGs.

That's a lot of lofty words, but basically: Δ templates mean you can give your players goals that make sense, and then they get benefits according to those goals.

HOW DO I DESIGN Δ TEMPLATES?

A bunch of ways. Go wild.

Here are some of the more common methods for designing triggers:

1. Single Achievement. This is the most standard, basic way of doing it: the player completes some specific objective ("slay a dragon" "win a game of chess against a wizard") and gains an according benefit. Those are very boring examples, but you get the idea.
2. Big List of Stuff. This is the same thing, but instead of a single achievement, it's a laundry list of small goals ("kill 100 undead" "earn 10,000 gold" "survive three blizzards"). The advantage of these is that players can make slow progress on them over the course of a campaign, rather than being one-and-done. The downside is they take a lot of tracking.
3. Odd Conditionals. More of a modifier than a pure trigger unto itself, but these are highly specific requirements attached to more mundane tasks ("kill 100 undead using a spoon" "win a game of chess against a wizard while blindfolded"). Fun and interesting, especially in a more sandbox campaign.
4. Narrative Beats. If you're writing more structured, story-progression-oriented classes (like my Heresiarch or Rightful Heir), you can make triggers be narrative beats that fit the common story arcs of your class ("meet a master who will teach you fire magic" "get exiled from your homeland").

With those in mind, there are four basic kinds of benefits you can gain from Δ templates:

1. Basic Power Features. These are, essentially, the same kinds of perks you'd see on any other class ("you now critically hit on a 19 or 20" "you can run along walls as if they were flat"). Those are both boring examples, but you know how to write these.
2. Scaling Power Features. Also known as "Notches clones," since the Notches feature fighters get in the original Goblin Guts is the prime example of these. Basically, as you hit a list trigger, you get increasing benefits ("for every 10 undead slain, gain +1 save against necromancy spells" "for every blizzard survived, you can travel 1 hour further without exhaustion"). These have the advantage of being nifty substitutes for ordinary class benefits, but have the downside of needing to be easily-quantifiable. 
3. Boosting Current Features. If you have some regular feature you got from levelling up the normal way ("you have a 2-in-6 chance of turning invisible in darkness"), a Δ template can increase that ranking further ("after eating a giant demon bat, your chances of turning invisible increase by an additional 2-in-6"). Alternatively, it can modify an existing feature ("you can smell gold from up 100 ft. away") to something slightly different ("you can smell gold, silver, gemstones, and nervous merchants from up to 100 ft. away").
4. Narrative Perks. Rather than attaching a specific mechanical benefit to hitting a trigger, it might just be something narrative-y and more situational/less crunchy ("you gain access to all Academy libraries" "trainee monks will begin to follow you as disciples"). These ones can be finicky, but can be a ton of fun.

Mixing and matching all of those together can be fun and interesting, and will serve you well for quite a while.

Here's some less-conventional ways you might not have thought of to use Δ templates, just because I'm on a roll here:

1. Consumable, Repeatable Benefits. A list that scales, but instead of scaling, you use up temporary perks ("get struck by lightning" to "gain 3 MD to use on your storm magic"). Basically a class resource that has narrative triggers. You can also do this where instead of gaining a repeating feature, it gains you another entry on a list (like my Sage's Wizardly Tricks, or Lexi's Thief Guild ability ranks).
2. On/off Triggers. Basically, there's a trigger to gain a benefit ("marry into royalty" to "gain +2-in-6 chance of commanding lesser nobility"), and then an associated trigger to lose that benefit ("if you get divorced or your spouse has a public affair"). 
3. Bad Effects. Instead of giving you benefits, the trigger gives you penalties ("pass out due to drunkenness" means "to not a take drink when offered, you must first pass a save vs. addiction"). Very fun if you're making a class that deals with dangerous forces (like, say, any magic-user). Anti-goals are less conducive to player progression and goal-setting, but do make for hella tense moments.
1. Combining These. Take a trigger ("seal one of your eyes shut with goat's blood"), give it both good and bad benefits ("you can read demonic text and spot hidden demons, but witch-hunters can smell the foul magic on you and will hunt you"), and then have a way a player can get rid of it later ("bathe your eye in a mix of absinthe and maiden's tears").
4. Gated Templates. In order to hit one trigger ("swear a Brass Oath" "slay an executor angel") you must first hit a different, previous trigger ("forge your own brass gauntlets" "slay a dozen praetor angels"). You can also gate the trigger behind other stuff, like level or wealth or whatever. 
5. Exclusive Triggers. In short, if you do one trigger, the other locks itself out ("sign a contract with a demon" OR "slay a demon who offers you a contract") to gain opposing benefits. 
1. Combining These. Multiple gated triggers that branch can be used to essentially allow a class to split into subclasses. A bucket of work, and some tables might hate it, but it can be a ton of fun if your players are into it.
6. Campaign Templates. Rather than tie Δ templates to one specific class, make them just a big list of things that any character can do (here's a big list of those). Achievements with mechanical benefits, basically. You can also have them be party-wide triggers that are completed as a group (you can even make the reward for a party-wide trigger be that the whole party levels up, if you're feeling clever).

I am absolutely 100% sure that if you spend some time mucking around with Δ templates, you will come up with more interesting variations and tweaks and adjustments than I have here. Like I said, go wild!

DID YOU COME UP WITH THESE?

No. Well, not really.

Δ templates are a fancy name I came up with for a system of hit-the-trigger-to-get-the-benefit that tons and tons of other people have been doing for a long time. 

Here's a non-exhaustive list of games and systems that do something similar that I took inspiration from:

• Keys from Lady Blackbird, by John Harper (which in turn come from Clinton R. Nixon's Shadow of Yesterday). These influence the on/off ideas and hitting them more than once.
  
• Beliefs, Instincts, and Traits from Burning Wheel by Luke Crane—more systematized and less case-by-case, but Crane's system is the granddaddy of "do what your character would to earn stuff."
• Pasts & Traumas from Zombie World, by Mark Diaz Truman and Brendan Conway. Like, almost beat-for-beat.
• Notches, from the Fighter from Goblin Guts, by Arnold K. I mentioned them earlier, but they're the basis for basically all the big-list-of-stuff-that-scales triggers.
• Basically any OSR system that doesn't follow quite the standard gold-or-monsters-for-XP. There's a bunch of these, so I won't list them all. 

I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting. 

FINAL THOUGHTS

I hope you feel a little more informed and comfortable on how Δ templates work. 

You can and should put them in the stuff you make. If you need help with brainstorming or design or writing, hit me up (here, @HeadOfTheGoat on Twitter, or SquigBoss#1353 on discord) and I'll do what I can to help you.

Honestly, this is not that innovative of a system, it's just a cute name for them (it's a delta! because change!) that I hope will catch on in my little corner of the GLOG scene.

Let me know how it all goes. 

 

 

 

Retrofitting the Zouave: a List of Achievements

So we all know and love deus's Zouave, the grizzled old fighter that's seen too much. It's signature "thing" is that it randomly gets three Tall Tales, which are maybe-true stories that the Zouave claims to have done, which in turn gets it mechanical bonuses. It gives the feeling of the Zouave having been around the block, like an old soldier should.

In this post, I'm going to retrofit all 32 Zouave Tales (plus a few of my own) using delta templates. The idea here is to have fairly specific mechanical tasks that, if done, grant you a mechanical bonus.

Any player of any class should be able to earn these. Some of them can be earned by the whole party at once, theoretically. Benefits kick in more or less immediately.

1. Cross the Deserts Bare
   Δ: complete a month-long (or longer) journey through a desert (hot or cold) without footwear, proper warm- or cold-weather clothing, or socks of any variety. 
   You and the party travel at full speed over rough terrain.
   
   
2. Breathe the Mountain Air
   Δ: spend at least a month at an elevation higher than one mile, survive at least three rockslides or avalanches, and travel at least 100 miles off-trail.
   You and your party travel over impassable terrain as if it were merely rough.
   
   
3. Travel Every Road
   Δ: visit at least 10 cities, 15 distinct regions, 20 villages, and pass through 30 different cross-roads. To count as visiting, you have to spend at least a night there.
   You can read road-signs in any language, and you and your party move 1.5x as fast when on actual roads. You know how to say "hello," "good-bye," "where is the privy," "hands up," and "fuck your mother" in a dozen languages.
   
   
4. Lose an Eye
   Δ: in combat or through treachery, have one (or both) of your eyes gouged out.
   You cannot be surprised. If you lift your eyepatch to show the hole, you can really spook someone.
   
   
5. Hunt the Dead in the Hills
   Δ: kill 100 undead, delve into at least a dozen infested crypts/barrows/mausoleums/cellars, spend a night on desecrated ground, and almost die to at least two of those things.
   You can smell a human corpse from 200 feet. If you stand completely still for a full minute, you can hear the difference between a dark room which is silent and a dark room in which someone is not making a sound. 
   
   
6. Get Caught Unawares
   Δ: survive a night-time ambush when you were totally unprepared, without armor or weapons ready.
   Unless strip-searched, you always have 1d4 knives hidden somewhere about your person.
   
   
7. Ford the Great River in Flood
   Δ: before dawn, cross a huge river during the wet season—when it rushes the fastest and its banks overflow—and almost drown. If more than 75% of your group makes it through this challenge alive, none of you get the perk.
   You have a +4 bonus against being unwillingly moved.
   
   
8. Kill an Evil Wizard With Your Bare Hands
   Δ: kill an evil wizard with your bare hands. No weapons, no tools, no magic.
   You can tell the difference between magical and non-magical items by licking them; you have advantage against any command/mind-control spell.
   
   
9. Laugh in the Face of G_d
   Δ: be struck by lightning, and live.
   One time, if you take enough damage to instantly die, you instead take that much damage minus 1, thus barely surviving. If you get struck by lightning again afterwards, this ability resets.
   
   
10. Wade Ankle-Deep in Blood
    Δ: participate in and then survive a six-month (or longer) siege, and the ensuing brutal massacre and sack of the city (from either side).
    You can identify the value of a mundane item in a real damn hurry, as a first-level thief.
    
    
11. Dance the Finger-Dance
    Δ: play at least a dozen rounds of the knife-game. Keep both thumbs and at least four fingers.
    When wielding a bladed weapon, you can never fumble. If you would ever lose more fingers from a death & dismemberment roll (or similar), ignore those results.
    
    
12. Ride Beside a Hero
    Δ: spend at least a month riding alongside an attractive young person with a strange birthmark, a mysterious weapon, and an odd sort of air about them. Help them rescue at least one person in daring, reckless mission. Later, find out they fulfilled some prophecy.
    Maybe worth a free drink or two? Until you find that kid again, though, it'll be hard to actually make this particular achievement worth anything.
    
    
13. Stroll Through a Blockade
    Δ: while in the middle of a siege lasting at least one month, slip out a postern gate and walk through the enemy line. No combat, no challenges, no getting caught.
    Outside of combat, everybody just assumes you are where you belong, unless you give them a compelling reason not to.
    
    
14. Listen to the Good Word
    Δ: unironically take up religion. Go to church, say your prayers, and try to be better. If you ever give up on faith, you lose this perk.
    You gain one knowledge of one holy book. If you hear a prayer, even in a language you don't know, you can piece together its basic meaning.
    
    
15. Kill Three Foes With One Shot
    Δ: with a single regular projectile (i.e. not a cannonball or ballista bolt), somehow cause the death of three enemies. 
    If you roll a critical hit with a ranged weapon, the target you hit can move up to 10 feet in any direction you choose.
    
    
16. Win a Game of Riddles With a Giant
    Δ: win a game of riddles (at least three rounds, each) with a giant, or giant-ish creature. Ogres and trolls do not count.
    NPCs take your riddles very, very seriously. This probably won't stop them from trying to kill you.
    
    
17. Narrowly Evade an Angry Spouse
    Δ: after bedding a married person, escape their armed and angry spouse by leaping from a window that is at least three stories high—then, survive and escape.
    You treat every fall as if it were 10 feet lower.
    
    
18. Complete an Anabasis
    Δ: cross a hundred miles of wilderness to reach the coast, with armed foes behind you, without stopping for food or rest—then escape.
    You are not exhausted by forced marches, and your comrades are not affected by exhaustion until it kills them.
    
    
19. Fall Deep in Love
    Δ: fall hard and fast for someone, and spend at least a month together in romantic delight. If you fall out of love, you still have this perk.
    You have advantage on saves against charms, hypnotism, and magical enthrallments.
    
    
20. Escape a Cave of Treasures
    Δ: when faced with the classic "take the money and die, or leave the money and live" dungeon scenario, do both: take the money, then survive.
    Your carrying capacity is doubled if you dump all of your useful gear first.
    
    
21. Sleep Through the Falling of the Gates
    Δ: intentionally or not, completely miss a dangerous event by sleeping. If all of your comrades, survive, you do not gain this perk.
    You can fall asleep at will; if you spend a moment setting your mind to your wake-up time, you'll wake up then, perfectly. You have advantage against magical sleeping effects.
    
    
22. Survive a Hanging
    Δ: survive a hanging through means other than being rescued by your friends in the nick of time. Lead pipes, unfriendly rescues, magic crows—all fair and valid.
    You can hold your breath for thrice as long. If something would break your neck instantly, you miraculously survive instead.
    
    
23. Live Among the Wild Hill-Folk
    Δ: after narrowly surviving something extremely dangerous and being separated from the main force, spend at least a month among the "barbaric" peoples that live in places the ordinary maps deem as wilderness. 
    You have a huge horrible scar somewhere on your body, and you gain one barbaric advantage.
    
    
24. Pursue the Piper
    Δ: give in to the piper's tune, the nymph's laughter, the siren's song. Travel to their strange domain, lose yourself for a span or three, and somehow return to the mortal world.
    NPCs who could plausibly be attracted to you will ignore their daily tasks to chat. In every language you speak (and some you don't), you can fake the most posh accent.
    
    
25. Outlast the Court-Martial
    Δ: get court-martialed, and then manage to avoid punishment not because you weren't guilty but either because: A) there was some absurd technicality in the handbook that meant you technically didn't qualify, or B) the camp was attacked and they needed every body they could get, and then nobody bothered afterwards.
    If you spend a day in deep study with proper legal resources at hand, you can come up with enough bluster, legalistic bullshit, and jury-splitting arguments to evade punishments for most lesser crimes. For bigger crimes, if you can somehow avoid sentencing for 1d6 days (rolled secretly), something more important will come along and the trial will have to be delayed.
    
    
26. Languish in the Leviathan's Belly
    Δ: after having your entire ship and crew swallowed whole by some gigantic hideous monster, spend three days in its belly, have some kind of revelation or change of heart, then escape.
    You know one priestly miracle-spell, which you can cast once per week at 1 MD.
    
    
27. Earn Your Stripes
    Δ: go unconscious 10 times, get critically hit 10 times, have at least 10 suitably gruesome scars, have at least one permanent wound that's never healed all the way.
    Soldiers, fighters, and warriors inherently respect you. If you show someone your scars, you can intimidate them into free drinks, letting you into a fancy club, or not trying anything stupid.
    
    
28. Go By a Terrible Name
    Δ: spend at least six months acting under some terrible name, like Sue, Eugene, Tabitha, or Herbert. Maybe it's your own name you were born with, maybe it's just a name you had to assume.
    Once per day, if the name's mentioned, you can enter a rage, as a first-level barbarian. You gain three levels of exhaustion when you do so.
    
    
29. Study in the Ancient Libraries
    Δ: spend at least a month in some ancient place of learning, like a magic academy or ruined sanctum. Read at least one book cover-to-cover, and dabble in at least a dozen more.
    You learn a single wizardly trick (or two). You can kind-of-sort-of figure out what written spells do, as on a scroll or in a wizard's grimoire.
    
    
30. Get Rich
    Δ: acquire a big fat pile of gold, then buy at least three of: a big house in town, a handful of servants, luxurious clothing, beautiful people to hang on your arms, a dancing bear. Then, in less than a week, lose it all.
    You technically own a mansion, but it is in a city at least 500 miles away and is currently occupied by a gang of usurers and their pet bear. 
    
    
31. Crawl Through the Black Mud of Spring
    Δ: travel five miles on your belly, without ever walking on your own two legs. Get utterly filthy in the process.
    You crawl twice as fast as normal. With a waterskin and a rag, you can take yourself from covered in shit to clean as a whistle in less than a minute.
    
    
32. Meet Your Double
    Δ: meet your strange counterpart: looks like you, talks like you, smells like you, with all your scars and tics and tones and gaits. Maybe it's a demon, maybe it's your twin separated at birth, maybe it's just dumb luck.
    Somewhere, there is another person that people always mistake for you. When you're accused of a crime, there's a 2-in-6 chance that you can blame it on your double. When you enter town, there's a 2-in-6 chance that the law shows up with a fistful of unpaid fines and a big stick.
    
    
33. Rival the Mad Monk
    Δ: survive being shot, stabbed, drowned, poisoned, and burned alive.
    Royalty will find you irresistibly attractive. Your children will tame lions. When you die, your genitalia will be pickled and displayed. 
    
    
34. Save the Royal Issue
    Δ: when the castle gates come crashing down and enemies swarm, escape with some member of the royal family (or equivalently powerful position) on your shoulders. If they could have survived without you being there, you don't get this perk.
    If a party member is unconscious or dying, you make every attack with advantage.
    
    
35. Walk After Bedwyr
    Δ: return a long-lost artifact to its rightful location, like a sword to a lake or a ring to a volcano.
    You gain a ghostly, spectral limb to replace one you've lost. It can do everything a regular arm can, but can also become incorporeal at your will.
    
    
36. Survive an Infamous Massacre
    Δ: survive a massacre of at least 500 people by seeming dead (intentionally or not).
    If given a minute to find a hiding place, you are as difficult to find as a secret door.
    
    
37. [REDACTED]
    Δ: Perform a... "favor" for someone or some... "organization." Get... "well-compensated." If you tell anyone about this and don't immediately kill them, you lose the perk.
    You can always tell when another person is being uncannily manipulated, or if they've been replaced by Someone Else. You can tell when you're being followed. You can tell when the birds are spying on you.
    
    
38. Find the Dark Tower
    Δ: have dreams of an ancient, accursed site, all black rock and carved runes; then, find it.
    When you die, you cannot be resurrected and you will never rise as an undead. You are invisible to all forms of supernatural detection.
    
    
39. Commit Regicide
    Δ: assassinate a monarch, or someone of greater power (like an emperor).
    When you deal damage, you deal +1 damage per 10 followers/minions/underlings the target has.
    
    
40. Earn a Wish
    Δ: save the life of a strange, supernatural creature, who in turn offers you any one wish.
    You can make a single Wish.
    
    
41. Bareknuckle Box a Brown Bear
    Δ: get into a boxing match with a bear (of at least three one-minute rounds). You don't have to win, necessarily, but you do have to not die.
    Bears will never attack you unprovoked. Your unarmed attacks deal 1d3 damage. 
    
    
42. Gamble with a Devil
    Δ: play at least ten-minute game of luck (cards, dice, knucklebones, etc.) with a devil. Survive with your soul intact.
    When you roll a die and the result is a 7, immediately roll another die of the same size and add its value to the total.
    
    
43. Drop Out of the Sky
    Δ: survive a fall of at least 1,000 feet. Maybe that's in a falling balloon, maybe it's using some kind of fancy parachute, maybe it's pure luck. If you ever get that high off the ground again, you lose this perk.
    You can always retrace your steps, even in darkness or in a panic, and you can't get lost in a place you've had a good view of (like, say, from a balloon or mountaintop).
    
    
44. Take Part in a Doomed Expedition
    Δ: at the last second, turn back from an expedition that will never return. Beg at least two of them to turn back with you.
    Once per day, your GM will warn you if you're about to do something truly, monumentally stupid.
    
    
45. "Commit No War Crimes"
    Δ: loot 50 dead bodies, rob 20 people, rifle through 10 wealthy locales (manors, temples, guild-houses, etc.) and smuggle out at least half the proceeds.
    You can nick things as a first-level Scavver.
    
    
46. Wander the Labyrinthine Wastes
    Δ: after boldly proclaiming that you definitely know where to go, spend at least a month lost in a single region or location, then eventually find your way out.
    You always know which way is north, even deep underground and blindfolded. If someone gives you false directions, you know it.
    
    
47. Lynch a Sorcerer
    Δ: at the urging of at least a dozen other people, lead an expedition to the residence of a nearby magic-user, break down the doors, kill everyone inside, then burn & bury the bodies.
    You are cursed. You are immune to healing spells and your blood glows in the dark. You are also immune to all other magical effects, and have advantage against damaging spells that call for a save. 
    
    
48. Out-Drink a Dwarf
    Δ: win a drinking contest with a dwarf, and stay conscious for at least ten minutes afterwards.
    When you drink, you decide how drunk you want to get: one drink can get you buzzed for the evening, or you can put down ten shots and walk in a straight line.
    
    
49. Catch a Big Fish
    Δ: catch a fish of any size, and then convince at least one person that you actually caught an enormous fish, as long as your wingspan is wide.
    As long as you can't be immediately disproven, you can lie through your teeth and be believed for 1d6 minutes. Afterwards, whoever you lied to will likely be furious.
    
    
50. Garner a Reputation
    Δ: earn at least 10 other achievements.
    When you meet a stranger, there's a X-in-6 chance that they've heard of you; X is equal to the number of achievements earned divided by 10, rounded down. On a 1, they've actually met you before, though you may or may not remember them.  

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While a lot of these are kind of goofy, this kind of thing could potentially serve as the template for a classless OSR system using exclusively delta templates. 

Let me know what you think.