Thanks to @Kharrak on the mothership discord for the idea to make this.
The guard walks down the corridor as it begins to get dimmer. Dimmier and dimmer, until it is pitch black. The guard fumbles for the torch on his belt and lights it. The darkness retreats, scurrying under containers and into holes. The guard doesn't hear a scream, but they sense a sudden burst of frustration, anger, and malevolence. The darkness is alive, and it is hungry.
- Unseen, Unheard, Unspoken: When players or characters acknowledge that the darkness is alive they must make a sanity save, gaining 1d10 stress on a failure and 1 stress on a success.
- The Dying of the Light: Batteries and other light sources seem to break/run out faster when the darkness is around. System powered lights will stop working after 4d5 minutes, although they will be much dimmer for all time before that. Batteries for lights such as ones in flashlights will last for 2d5 minutes. Flames will be blown out within 3d10 seconds.
- Draining Touch: When a character is entirely immersed in darkness they start to feel drained. Each round they spend here they take Xd10 damage. Where X is the number of consecutive rounds they have spent in darkness. They must also make a body save at disadvantage, if they fail they may only make a single action next round.
What made the darkness act like this?
(Roll 1d5 (This also gives it an additional ability))
1. Some Eldritch influences are leaking into this world. There might be a rift or ritual around which is causing this.
- Abomination: Anything that dies in the darkness becomes an abomination that seeks to drag other living things into the darkness.
2. Chemicals/Disease/Insanity: It isn't actually acting like this, you just think it is.
- All in your Head: You cannot heal any damage caused by the darkness, they don't exist (But your mind sure thinks they do).
4. Some tech gone wrong, or horribly right. Maybe you can fix it? Who made it?
- Lightless Radiation: The closer you are to the source of the disturbance the more damage being in darkness does to you (+10d10 base, -1d10 for every 30m away from the source).
5. A nearby Psychic. Are they aware that their fear of the dark is leaking out into the world?
- Psychic Blackout: Psychic powers do not allow you to see in the dark, and neither does any source of light created by psychic powers. Using psychic powers in any way to create light or see is impossible.
6. Nothing, the darkness was always like this, it just decided now was the time to start consuming.
- The Light Never Did Anything: While your lights may be on and working, the darkness does not care. Your lights never stopped the darkness, it just plays with you by pretending that they do.
Runic Hashmaps and Computational Spells
February 19, 2020
February 17, 2020
Cores of Magic
A core of magic is a powerful thing. Created by ancient artificers to power their most power-hungry devices, these basketball-sized glass spheres with the essence of magic writhing inside them emit powerful energies if harnessed correctly. Enough cores of magic created in the same place can cause the magic in that area to become permanently weakened.
The giant war machines of old decimated each other and were quickly resigned to history. At some point, a crafty artificer managed to harness a core of magic into a smaller construct. A human-sized construct powered by a core of magic will roll 1d10 per turn (or equivalent short period of time) to determine what additional power the core of magic energies have granted it.
1. Blue - The construct teleports a short distance (15ft) as the core warps the world around them with a pulse of blue light.
2. Red - The constructs attack is more powerful (+3 damage) as its swing moves faster than anyone can think.
3. Yellow - The construct is surrounded by a yellow barrier of force, blocking the next attack.
4. Green - Any defeated constructs nearby are rebuilt, although still heavily damaged (Returned to life at 1/4 health), as green energy tentacles reach out from the core.
5. Purple - The core fires out bolts made of force, hitting every enemy for light damage (1d4+1 damage per target).
6. Gold - The construct glows gold, repairing some of the damage it has sustained (Heals 1d10 damage).
7. Silver - The construct glows silver, then two more do as they flicker into existence. There are 3 versions of this construct until the core changes color (They act at the same time, and all take the same damage).
8. Black - The world turns dark. No light can pierce the absolute darkness in the vicinity.
9. White - Time stops allowing the construct to take two turns (or equivalent) in the time it takes you to blink.
10. None - The core seems empty. No spells can be cast in the vicinity until it changes color.
When the core is shattered the magical effects burst into the world, being absorbed into objects nearby and giving them a minor magical property.
The giant war machines of old decimated each other and were quickly resigned to history. At some point, a crafty artificer managed to harness a core of magic into a smaller construct. A human-sized construct powered by a core of magic will roll 1d10 per turn (or equivalent short period of time) to determine what additional power the core of magic energies have granted it.
1. Blue - The construct teleports a short distance (15ft) as the core warps the world around them with a pulse of blue light.
2. Red - The constructs attack is more powerful (+3 damage) as its swing moves faster than anyone can think.
3. Yellow - The construct is surrounded by a yellow barrier of force, blocking the next attack.
4. Green - Any defeated constructs nearby are rebuilt, although still heavily damaged (Returned to life at 1/4 health), as green energy tentacles reach out from the core.
5. Purple - The core fires out bolts made of force, hitting every enemy for light damage (1d4+1 damage per target).
6. Gold - The construct glows gold, repairing some of the damage it has sustained (Heals 1d10 damage).
7. Silver - The construct glows silver, then two more do as they flicker into existence. There are 3 versions of this construct until the core changes color (They act at the same time, and all take the same damage).
8. Black - The world turns dark. No light can pierce the absolute darkness in the vicinity.
9. White - Time stops allowing the construct to take two turns (or equivalent) in the time it takes you to blink.
10. None - The core seems empty. No spells can be cast in the vicinity until it changes color.
When the core is shattered the magical effects burst into the world, being absorbed into objects nearby and giving them a minor magical property.
February 16, 2020
Fated Enhancements
WITCH: Fated Souls by Angry Hamster Publishing is a TTRPG in which you play Fated, people that have, for some reason or other, sold their soul to a demon. As I didn't feel some of the Fates had enough "punchiness" straight out of character creation. So I decided to give each of them a bonus of varying usefulness.
- Djinn: You can grant wishes to people as long as someone has told them the rules. Not just you. By default, there is a 1 in 20 chance that they have heard them in a large city, and a 1 in 100 in a place with very few fated.
- Djinn: You can grant wishes to people as long as someone has told them the rules. Not just you. By default, there is a 1 in 20 chance that they have heard them in a large city, and a 1 in 100 in a place with very few fated.
- Heks: When you word a curse in a way that relates to a personal reason you cursed them (They touched you, so "Everything you touch will feel like broken glass"), you gain 2 additional points to spend on the curse.
- Seer: The memories your new soul gives you sometimes have useful information, although accessing them intentionally is hard to do without inducing the effects of having a vision. You may take a -4 to the Difficulty of any roll your memories (From the early medieval period) might help you on, but you must roll a d10. If you roll over your spell level you fall into whatever disables you when you have a vision (Without the vision).
- Litch: You collect knowledge. You may choose a second focus to gain the Litch specific bonus from.
- Druid: Choose if you're part of a Family or a Loner (You can still be part of a family if you choose loner, although you're more disconnected from them). If you are part of a family you gain 2 familial contacts, tell me who they are. If you are a Loner you gain -2 difficulty to casting a specific canto of your choice (You can change this choice when you learn a new canto).
- Sosye: You are prone to "Sparrow Chases". When you are leading people in a course of action you botch on a 2-5. If you Botch like this there is a 50% chance you will lead them wildly off course and a 50% chance that you will lead them to a "pot of gold."
- Yokai: You can choose 1 additional Canto in character creation.
February 15, 2020
Drugs for the Biologicals
Future drugs can have all sorts of effects, so let's make a system for making them.
Drugs are made of Ingredients. Ingredients have Aspects which tell you what they do. When you create a Drug select a number of Ingredients and add all their Aspects into the final product.
Then make a chemistry roll, if you are successful you make the roll/10 (round up) uses of that Drug. If you critically succeed you may choose to remove 1 Aspect from the Drug, and make 1d10 extra uses. Making a Drug takes 1d10 hours.
All Drugs (Unless you take an Aspect that removes that) are addictive.
Drugs are made of Ingredients. Ingredients have Aspects which tell you what they do. When you create a Drug select a number of Ingredients and add all their Aspects into the final product.
Then make a chemistry roll, if you are successful you make the roll/10 (round up) uses of that Drug. If you critically succeed you may choose to remove 1 Aspect from the Drug, and make 1d10 extra uses. Making a Drug takes 1d10 hours.
All Drugs (Unless you take an Aspect that removes that) are addictive.
Aspects
There are a few types of Aspects separated into categories, Healing, Attributes, Duration, and Misc.
Healing (Most healing effects are unaffected by duration):
1. Relieving - Heal 1d10 health and lower stress by 1.
2. Regenerative - Heal 2d10 health.
3. Calming - Lower stress by 2.
4. Migraine - Deals 1d10 damage and increase stress by 1.
5. Necrotizing - Deals 2d10 damage.
6. Destabilizing - Increase stress by 2.
7. Placebo - Heal 3d10 health, after duration runs out, take that much damage.
8. Deadly - Take 1dx10 damage.
8. Deadly - Take 1dx10 damage.
Attributes:
Each attribute affecting aspect is written in a specific format:
[A number of - or +][Attribute effected]
e.g. -Intellect
e.g. -Intellect
The number of - or + symbols are the number of d10s to take away or add to the Attribute respectively.
E.g. -Intellect means you roll 1d10 and take that much away from intellect.
E.g. -Intellect means you roll 1d10 and take that much away from intellect.
Duration:
Duration is a special aspect that is present on all Ingredients. It is simply written as Duration-[A number between 0 and 10]. 0 means that it is instantaneous and any numbers above that is the number of d10 minutes the effects of the Drug last. When combining Ingredients take the average duration (Round up).
Misc:
1. Hallucinatory - Take disadvantage on anything involving the senses.
2. Vomiting - Make a Body Save every minute, if you fail you start vomiting, take disadvantage on all rolls for the next minute.
3. Jumpy - Every time you roll speed roll 1d10, if it's 1-5 you get a +10% to speed, if it's a 6-10 you get a -10% to speed.
4. Deep - Gain 2d10% to your psychic power rolls. If you are not psychic, this does nothing.
5. Backlash - If you are psychic, you take 3d10 damage. If you are not psychic, this does nothing.
6. Aftereffect - When you create the Drug choose a number of Aspects to take effect after the duration for 1.5x the duration.
7. Advancing - Choose an order for all the Aspects of the Drug when you create it. It starts with the first aspect and after 1d10 minutes adds the next aspect until all Aspects are added, then it has the normal duration.
8. Metaspacial-infusion - Take 1dx10 damage, if you are psychic roll 1d5+1, if you are not psychic roll 1d5-1. It has an additional effect based on your roll: 0: Nothing 1: You see your doom, take 1d10 stress 2: A Metaspacial portal opens in your gut, take 3d10 more damage 3: Time and space opens to you, roll 1d100 twice and record the results, you can use this result in place of any roll (before rolling, once per result, you may use this to give others the results). 4: Your mind and body sharpens, choose one skill to gain a permanent +1d10% in 5: The Metaspacial energy flows through you, any psychic power rolls made while under the effect of this Drug are rolled twice, you may choose to take either one 5: A Metaspacial rift opens in your mind, once, before this Drug wears off, you may automatically critically succeed at a psychic power roll.
9. Plentiful - When you create a Drug with this Aspect you make 1d10 more uses of it.
10. Reactive - When you create a Drug with this Aspect roll 1d10, on a 10 you take 1d10 damage and this batch of Drugs blows up in your face.
11. Rare - When you create a Drug with this Aspect you make only 1 use of it.
12. Paranoid - You gain a random phobia.
13. Dissociative - You start to dissociate with your body. Whenever you roll 1d100, you may take 1 stress to flip the result (E.g. 32 -> 23).
14. Lengthy - When you create a Drug with this Aspect it now has a duration of duration number d10 hours rather than duration number d10 minutes.
15. Non-Addictive - A Drug made with this Aspect does not run the risk of addiction.
5. Backlash - If you are psychic, you take 3d10 damage. If you are not psychic, this does nothing.
6. Aftereffect - When you create the Drug choose a number of Aspects to take effect after the duration for 1.5x the duration.
7. Advancing - Choose an order for all the Aspects of the Drug when you create it. It starts with the first aspect and after 1d10 minutes adds the next aspect until all Aspects are added, then it has the normal duration.
8. Metaspacial-infusion - Take 1dx10 damage, if you are psychic roll 1d5+1, if you are not psychic roll 1d5-1. It has an additional effect based on your roll: 0: Nothing 1: You see your doom, take 1d10 stress 2: A Metaspacial portal opens in your gut, take 3d10 more damage 3: Time and space opens to you, roll 1d100 twice and record the results, you can use this result in place of any roll (before rolling, once per result, you may use this to give others the results). 4: Your mind and body sharpens, choose one skill to gain a permanent +1d10% in 5: The Metaspacial energy flows through you, any psychic power rolls made while under the effect of this Drug are rolled twice, you may choose to take either one 5: A Metaspacial rift opens in your mind, once, before this Drug wears off, you may automatically critically succeed at a psychic power roll.
9. Plentiful - When you create a Drug with this Aspect you make 1d10 more uses of it.
10. Reactive - When you create a Drug with this Aspect roll 1d10, on a 10 you take 1d10 damage and this batch of Drugs blows up in your face.
11. Rare - When you create a Drug with this Aspect you make only 1 use of it.
12. Paranoid - You gain a random phobia.
13. Dissociative - You start to dissociate with your body. Whenever you roll 1d100, you may take 1 stress to flip the result (E.g. 32 -> 23).
14. Lengthy - When you create a Drug with this Aspect it now has a duration of duration number d10 hours rather than duration number d10 minutes.
15. Non-Addictive - A Drug made with this Aspect does not run the risk of addiction.
Ingredients
I'll leave most of these up to you to create, although here are a few examples. If you want to experiment, roll a 1d10/2 for the number of Aspects the Ingredient has, then randomly roll for each Aspect (Or pick what makes sense). I might make another post later with more Ingredient examples.
- Gaunt Blood - Necrotizing, Deep, ++Strength, -Intelect, Duration-3.
- Adrenaline - ++Strength, ++Combat, Duration-1
- Medi-gel - Regenerative, Lengthy, Duration-1
- Medi-gel - Regenerative, Lengthy, Duration-1
- Ibuprofen - Relieving, Duration-0
- Nightshade - Deadly, Vomiting, Duration-5
- Psychic powder - Deep, Metaspacial-infusion, Aftereffect, Rare, Duration-8
- Nano-Disassemblers - Deadly, Necrotizing, Migraine, ---Strength, ---Combat, ---Speed, Advancing, Duration-1
And that's my rules for making drugs in Mothership.
Ibuprofen on its own can be made into pain-pills. Medi-gel and Adrenaline mixed become Stim-Packs.
And that's my rules for making drugs in Mothership.
Ibuprofen on its own can be made into pain-pills. Medi-gel and Adrenaline mixed become Stim-Packs.
January 27, 2020
Master of Many Minds: Burning
This is an expansion to the 3rd version of psychic rules set out in The Many Minded Beast. Are you ready to burn up your psyche and body to power your psionic abilities? No? Well here we go anyway.
You may burn to create one of a few effects:
1. Exert Control - Auto succeed a Psychic power, use before rolling.
2. By Will Alone - Use a Psychic power you don't have access to, use before rolling.
3. Mental Multi-processing - Make 2 uses of Psychic power(s) that take 1 action, use before rolling. It can be two uses of the same, or two different ones.
4. Mental Thread Construct - Sustain the ability to use a Psychic power (With the same roll) for up to 2d10 hours, use after rolling.
5. Metadimensional Fold - Fold metadimentional space around you, this breaks through metadimensional block, and gives you a +20 to Psychic power use until you move.
6. Eternity Chasm - Take 4d10 damage (In addition to burning) to create an Eternity Chasm at your location. An Eternity Chasm is a rift in space which leads to a weird reality. Maybe it's full of custard, or clones of you, or an endless amount of blood, or maybe there's nothing there.
7. Horror - Each category of Psychic skills has a horror power. Only available if you have a Vast power in that category. To use a Horror power you must burn twice, then take 2d10 damage.
Using a Horror power causes a ripple in Metadimensional space so powerful that anyone, or any Thing, looking for it knows exactly where to find you. Having the ability to harness these abilities is immeasurably invaluable and dangerous.
- Telepathy: Consume Mind - Instantly kill a sentient target, their mind is torn out of their body and consumed with no mark on the body. You reduce stress to 1.
- Telekinesis: Avatar - Create a shell of telekinetic energy that transforms you into an 8ft tall version of yourself with an entire telekinetic armory. While in this form you have +40 to armour saves, and may auto succeed at attacks, which deal 1d100 damage more than they do normally.
- Biokinesis: Autopsy - Instantly kill a biological target and separate their body into component parts, all usable. You may replace anyone else's body parts with these ones instantly, without a test. They work as perfectly as if they where meant to be there.
- Pyrokinesis: Extinction - Engulf the next thing you touch in fiery doom.
- Electrokinesis: Console - Take control of all tech nearby, you have complete control over it.
- Meta-Psionics: Root-Access - You gain root access to the universe. Be careful, you might make gravity purple instead of attracty.
- Teleportation: Warp Gate - Create a permanent link between any two places in space-time.
- Summoning: Rupture - Rupture reality, creating many copies of your reality which you can swap to at will. For the next 2d10 minutes you can choose to reroll any roll (once), made by you or any other character (Including random table rolls, although you must tell the Warden you are swapping reality before they tell you the results).
- Cognition: The Watching - You see everything. Make a sanity save or take 1d10 stress. You may ask 3 questions about what is happening, what has happened, or what might happen to the Warden.
Well, there are a few ways to burn:
1. Burn Blood - Not actually blood, but more like years of your life. You roll 4d5 and reduce your max health by that much.
2. Burn Body - Your body withers as you use it to fuel your mind. Lose 1d5+3 off your Body save.
3. Burn Mind - You creep ever closer to the oblivion of madness. Lose 1d5+3 off your Sanity save.
4. Burn Stability - Destabilizing your mind is a dangerous idea, paranoia quickly follows. Lose 1d5+3 off your Fear save.
5. Burn Focus - Thinking about a lot at once means you inevitably think about everything that could go wrong. Roll 1d5 and add that to your anxiety (Starts at 0). You may never have stress lower than your anxiety.
Telepathy - Telepathy
Telekinesis - Telekinesis
Biokinesis - Sustain
Pyrokinesis - Pyrokinesis
Electrokinesis - Electrokinesis
Meta-Psionics - Detect Psi, Psi-Trap
Summoning - Summoning
Cognition - Post-Cognition, Thing-Speak, Pre-action
You may burn to create one of a few effects:
1. Exert Control - Auto succeed a Psychic power, use before rolling.
2. By Will Alone - Use a Psychic power you don't have access to, use before rolling.
3. Mental Multi-processing - Make 2 uses of Psychic power(s) that take 1 action, use before rolling. It can be two uses of the same, or two different ones.
4. Mental Thread Construct - Sustain the ability to use a Psychic power (With the same roll) for up to 2d10 hours, use after rolling.
5. Metadimensional Fold - Fold metadimentional space around you, this breaks through metadimensional block, and gives you a +20 to Psychic power use until you move.
6. Eternity Chasm - Take 4d10 damage (In addition to burning) to create an Eternity Chasm at your location. An Eternity Chasm is a rift in space which leads to a weird reality. Maybe it's full of custard, or clones of you, or an endless amount of blood, or maybe there's nothing there.
7. Horror - Each category of Psychic skills has a horror power. Only available if you have a Vast power in that category. To use a Horror power you must burn twice, then take 2d10 damage.
Using a Horror power causes a ripple in Metadimensional space so powerful that anyone, or any Thing, looking for it knows exactly where to find you. Having the ability to harness these abilities is immeasurably invaluable and dangerous.
- Telepathy: Consume Mind - Instantly kill a sentient target, their mind is torn out of their body and consumed with no mark on the body. You reduce stress to 1.
- Telekinesis: Avatar - Create a shell of telekinetic energy that transforms you into an 8ft tall version of yourself with an entire telekinetic armory. While in this form you have +40 to armour saves, and may auto succeed at attacks, which deal 1d100 damage more than they do normally.
- Biokinesis: Autopsy - Instantly kill a biological target and separate their body into component parts, all usable. You may replace anyone else's body parts with these ones instantly, without a test. They work as perfectly as if they where meant to be there.
- Pyrokinesis: Extinction - Engulf the next thing you touch in fiery doom.
- Electrokinesis: Console - Take control of all tech nearby, you have complete control over it.
- Meta-Psionics: Root-Access - You gain root access to the universe. Be careful, you might make gravity purple instead of attracty.
- Teleportation: Warp Gate - Create a permanent link between any two places in space-time.
- Summoning: Rupture - Rupture reality, creating many copies of your reality which you can swap to at will. For the next 2d10 minutes you can choose to reroll any roll (once), made by you or any other character (Including random table rolls, although you must tell the Warden you are swapping reality before they tell you the results).
- Cognition: The Watching - You see everything. Make a sanity save or take 1d10 stress. You may ask 3 questions about what is happening, what has happened, or what might happen to the Warden.
Burning
Finally, onto the good stuff. How do you permanently maim yourself to access these powers?Well, there are a few ways to burn:
1. Burn Blood - Not actually blood, but more like years of your life. You roll 4d5 and reduce your max health by that much.
2. Burn Body - Your body withers as you use it to fuel your mind. Lose 1d5+3 off your Body save.
3. Burn Mind - You creep ever closer to the oblivion of madness. Lose 1d5+3 off your Sanity save.
4. Burn Stability - Destabilizing your mind is a dangerous idea, paranoia quickly follows. Lose 1d5+3 off your Fear save.
5. Burn Focus - Thinking about a lot at once means you inevitably think about everything that could go wrong. Roll 1d5 and add that to your anxiety (Starts at 0). You may never have stress lower than your anxiety.
Power Categories
Each power has a category. The category is based on where it stems from, for instance. Mind control is a Telepathy power because it stems from Telepathy. The power categories are as follows:Telepathy - Telepathy
Telekinesis - Telekinesis
Biokinesis - Sustain
Pyrokinesis - Pyrokinesis
Electrokinesis - Electrokinesis
Meta-Psionics - Detect Psi, Psi-Trap
Summoning - Summoning
Cognition - Post-Cognition, Thing-Speak, Pre-action
January 1, 2020
Location, Location, Location
Another post on this blog deals with hacking the ROOT RPG war system to fit into a more open setting (Although leaning towards Sci-Fi). @Kharrak on the Mothership discord server mentioned that it might be nice to port the random tables for names and notable features, buildings, and NPCs. So here's my version of that.
Colony Names
Because there’s no specific setting, here’s a good colony name generator with way more names than I would be able to reasonably create.
Important NPCs
Important Buildings
Important Landscape Features
Problems
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