The Overbright

 See this post by Skerples because it's really cool.

 Also this flash game.

Basically my first introduction to fantasy (Beyond a book of Greek Myths my mother read to me,) was the Dark Elf trilogy by R.A. Salvatore, so I love the Underdark as a concept. 

But what about the Overbright?

 

First off, put on your cartoon logic hat. You can walk on clouds, mine them and juice them with your hands for water. Cloud-soil can take seeds like dirt and grow vines and trees. There are grazing herds of pegasi in elysian cloud meadows miles above the land's surface. The centers of clouds become denser, solidifying into striated marble, which is just as heavy as the land-bound stuff, but hangs in the air all the same.

The Overbright is Isolated yet interconnected. Islands drift together, conjoin or split into smaller cloud islands. Birds and floating souls can cross easily, but clod-footed ground-dwellers need lighter-than-air sky canoes and pegasi driven chariots to get around. This leads to extreme isolation- the denizens of most islands seldom leave, but they are not in danger of starving or stagnating, since migratory birds and sky-bound nomads bring trade and food. Sunlight is abundant in the Overbright, making agriculture and photosynthesis a viable form of subsistence. A good many wizards travel to the Overbright to build their towers- the solitude works wonders for their research.

But don't expect the Overbright to be all sunshine and rainbows, though those certainly do figure in. Just because it's in the sky doesn't mean that it's a paradise. You think the underdark invented danger? The Night Below was a crack in the burning Earth when the Overbright was a storm as tall as the horizon, formed from the oceans turned to steam hotter than flame. It's like they say; as above, so below.

The interplay of distance and gravity have a strong affect on Overbright navigation. You can see the lands below, but going down there is almost impossible, since doing so would break every bone in your body. Therefore it's fun to play with that "so close, so far" relationship. Imagine mile long fishing lines reeling up catches from oceans below. The peaks of great mountains brush past as sky-goats disembark, having traveled the whole of the world atop their temporary cloud pasture.

The Overbright is Formless and Ancient. The shifting nature of cloud-islands means that it is impossible to chart the distances between them. Imagine trying to map a three-dimensional ocean of ice bergs that keep smashing into each other. Individual mountain sized clouds become shifting labyrinths, the surfaces on the outside remain, but the geography churns with the wind. All the same, the contents of the islands are ancient.

Due to the difficulty of getting around, when an island becomes abandoned it could be centuries before it is discovered by an explorer. There are ancient crystal sarcophagi held suspended at the peaks of white cloud mountains, marble coliseums of the cyclopes manned by the floating spirits of their long dead slaves, titanic forests held within the hollow pillars of the sky; all of these places untread by mortal feet in centuries.

This makes the Overbright genuinely alien. There are creatures up there that have been extinct for millennia on the surface. There are creatures made for grand cosmic plans for the surface that never panned out: the work of dead gods who never returned home to their private skybound workshops. There are ancient empires and hidden sky kingdoms and wild offshoot tribes of people that genuinely don't know that there's a whole world down there, just like most people don't know that there's a tyrannical dystopia in "that cloud over there that looks like a shoe."

Metal is rare, any bronze or steel in the Overbright came from the surface at some point. Without magma, the largest cloud islands instead churn with unshed lightning, which boils cloudsoil into metamorphic sky-marble, or crystallizes it into igneous fulgurite. Most material crafting in the Overbright must therefore be done with bone, cloudstone, and wood.

 

 

The Overbright is Big. It stretches from about a mile away from the surface to the edge of space. That's a whole lot of sky.

So how do I get there?

1. Climbing. Tall enough towers, giant beanstalks, mountains.

2. Divine Benediction. Sometimes the angels painted on chapel ceilings reach down and pull you up.

3. Tornadoes. If you survive getting sucked up into the sky, you might just realize you're not in Kansas anymore.

4. Invitation. Sometimes, somebody lowers a rope. If they're nice, it's got a basket big enough for you and your friends attached.

5. Fog. A fog bank is just a cloud that fell down from the Overbright. Sometimes they rise back up with you on them, sometimes you can find a staircase made out of cloudstuff. 

6. Riding something with wings. Dragons, Megaravens, helicopters. If it can fly, it can probably land you on a sky island.

 

(2) The Stone of Caliber

Terrain- Rocky, Wet, highland, A river runs southward through the hex, shallow enough to ford where it meets a lake in the center. 

The Lake: Shallow and silty water, lily-pads and humming skeeters and water striding spiders. Long legged birds stalk the thrushes.

Odd effects/ bodies left in the water here do not rot or degrade. The bottom of the pool is littered with corpses in blankets and tapestries weighed down by smoothed stones. The nearby town of Omadien buries their dead here. The pond's ecosystem treats the corpses as any other stone, and does not eat of their flesh. The same applies to wild animals that fall in and drown, but anything native to the ecosystem such as moss or fish is fair game.

The island// center of the lake. There is a large stone that rises from the green, and an anvil on top. There is a Riftsabre thrust through the anvil and into the stone. The Sabre looks to be made from gold wires woven together and burnished, and is as tall as a man. The flat of the blade on either side is woven into the glyphs "Cherish" and "Abandon." Excavation would reveal the stone to be perfectly spherical deposit of alternating granite and basalt. Caliber cannot be pulled free by any means, unless the challenge bears the mark of conquest upon their skin.

Stuff:

2. A historian from a noble house and a coterie of scribes  and servants. Examining Caliber and noting its markings and shape for posterity.

3. A handful of Falconer hunters are letting their birds drink from the river.

4. Pallblood Knight taking a rest. They hold their boots in one hand and stroll across the water.

5. Village folk harvesting water lilies from the lake.

6. Gaggle of foolish youths forded the river in a lily-fishing boat, are taking turns trying to pull Caliber from the anvil.

7. Village folk fetching water.

8. A giant dog is drinking from the river.

9. Recurring NPC.

10. Outlaws in a flat canoe creep along the river, trying to hide corpses that they've fetched from the lake beneath a tarp. Headed downriver to sell the bodies to necrophages.

11. Sentient pod of dolphins. Very lost. Speak by psychically vibrating your inner ear.

12. The elder of Omadien and some priests are blessing Caliber with rosewater and rice.

Riftsabre: A sword from an older time when men were more knowledgeable of Divine Alchemy. They are typically the size of a Zweihander and made of unknown materials. They are harder than any mundane material, and thus cannot be sampled for experimentation. Riftsabres are rarely all one piece, rather woven from multiple threads like wicker, often into the shape of glyphs and pictures. No two Riftsabres are alike. Their shapes are fanciful, but due to their attributes this ornamentation does not affect their use. Despite being held like any other sword, the weight of the weapon falls onto the wielder's center of mass. (Though Riftsabres are separated into "male" and "female" categories, men have difficulty using women's Riftsabres, though women have less difficulty using men's. Thus the use of counterweight belts is common among Rift-Duelists.) Whatever causes this odd weight distribution also provides perfect leverage- Riftsabres face almost no resistance against their cutting edge from any position. They can be used mid-air, underwater, and are almost impossible to remove from another's hand against their will. Since the knowledge of their construction is lost to all but the most powerful cults, they are incredibly valuable. They're magic super-swords, you get it.

Rift - Sabre

(Rift- Both in the otherworldly sense and the Breaking sense. The blades are the provenance of angels, and their capacity for destruction is infamous.) (Sabre- in the sense of dueling. Often the only method of defeating a Rift-Duelist is by single combat. The length and power of a Riftsabre allow them to decimate halberdiers and even pikemen on a field. Sabre also bring to mind the role of cavalry lancers.)

Metabolist

 

Through strict breeding, surgical alteration, or intense meditation, your body has been molded into a living crucible. You practice the primordial art which precedes all others; biochemistry. All arts, sciences, philosophies and moralities collapse towards a singular point, towards the slavish desires of the gastrointestinal tract. The body is merely a mechanism for the ingestion of organic matter, and the mind is merely the body's operator. Thus, mastery of the self does not revolve around discipline of the body or mind, but of mastery over Metabolism.

Skills: 1. Cooking, 2. Philosophy, 3. Anatomy.

Never fumble with knives or axes, can wear up to 4 slots worth of armor.

Starting Equipment: Apron (1 slot of armor, emblazoned with your guild mandala,) Cleaver (Functions as a hand axe, can be thrown,) Cannibalism License (1 Slot worth of paperwork in a fire/waterproof envelope.)

A. Crop, Catabolism +1 MD
B. Internal Alchemy +1 MD
C. Twin Minds +1 MD
D. The Body Electric +1 MD

(A) Crop: You have the uncanny ability to eat things without digesting them. Gain [Template] inventory slots inside your stomach. You cannot store anything poisonous or sharp in them. Acidic is fine though, since that's what your stomach is for. You can store liquids and organic material without soiling, damaging, or mixing them.

(A) Catabolism: Roll MD to break chemical bonds within your body and release it as bio-electricity through the following effects. Your hands are always warm, and you can survive exposure to elements as if your were wearing a full fur coat, even if you're naked.

• Burning Hands: Deal [sum] burning damage to a creature or object you touch. Roll to attack a creature, no damage on a miss.
  
• Mage Hand: Pull a small (1 slot or fewer) object within [sum]x5' towards you. If the object is held, the creature gets a save vs. wands.
  
• Magic Missile: Launch a piece of ammunition or thrown weapon as if it were fired normally, dealing +1 damage.
• Shove: Shove a creature the same size as you or smaller back [dice]x5'

(B) Internal Alchemy: Blood, Bile, and Fat are the primary ingredients of alchemy. Your body produces them in surplus. Roll MD to create materials within your guts and expel them from your hands. There may be further techniques to learn from tomes and experimentation, seek them out to gain new abilities. You may also give yourself kidney stones and ulcers at will.

• Acid Spray: Deal 2d4 damage to things within a [sum]x5' cone of you. Creatures save vs. wands to avoid damage. You can also simply create [dice] slots of acid within your stomach inventory.
• Web: Launch a net of woven collagen, creatures within a [sum]x5' cone of you must save vs. wands or be webbed. Creatures trapped in the web may move half their speed or act on each of their turns, but not both. The web is flammable, if any webbed creature is struck by fire, all webbed creatures take [dice] fire damage and are freed from the web.
• Fog Cloud: Spray greasy smoke from your hands, creating a cloud of fog with a diameter of [sum]x5'. Any attack made through the smoke takes a -2 penalty for blindness, if appropriate.
• Create Food: Spray milk everywhere within a [sum]x5' cone of you. Doesn't deal any damage, but thoroughly soaks everything in its radius. You ca also simply create [dice] slots of cheese within your stomach inventory, which work as rations. The party will not thank you.

(C) Twin Minds: Your stomach has a mind of its own. If you are mind controlled, unconscious, or otherwise no longer in control of your actions, you still control the use of your spells. Decapitation is no longer lethal to you, you must be beheaded and disemboweled before you will die.

(D) The Body Electric: Fire runs through your veins. Expend 1 MD without rolling it to take an extra turn in combat, this can be done at any time, even interrupting an enemy's attack.

TOOLS OF THE TRADE

1. War Shears (2 slots:) A pair of serrated scissors as tall as a man. The outside edge is also sharpened. It has been engraved with a map of the digestive system. Damage as a great-sword.
2. Destrier (3 HD creature:) A black horse with the wrong kind of hooves. Its guts are boiling hot. Can be ridden or used as a pack beast. Cowardly and proud, it refuses to engage in a fight where it could be injured.
   
3. Candied Durian: A black goat's horn hollowed out and filled with its own whipped fat and slices of durian. Decadent and sweet. 3 doses.
4. Salt (2 slots:) A sack filled with salt.
5. Gelatine: A tin of powdered gelatin. Turns 1 slot worth of water into 4 slots worth of translucent, jiggling, jelly. 6 doses.
6. Ammo case: A rectangular box of brass, engraved with a picture of a rib cage filled with blackbirds. Inside there are 12 lead bullets inscribed with the picture of a bird, fit for a sling or pistol.
7. Metal Dentures (no slots worn, 1 slot in inventory:) Replaces your teeth, sometimes with an ivory veneer to disguise their nature. You can chew anything that used to be alive, and they can be removed to be used as bullets for a sling or pistol.
8. Sack of Mice: A snack for the road. 2d6 inside.
   

Propaganda

1. A waterlogged poster that peeled off of a wall. The poster depicts a scene from a point of view in a post modern "pop" style; vibrant colors and unblemished subjects lacking the bite of modernism or the surreality of impressionism. PROSTITUTION DIABOLIK, say bold red and yellow letters above an attractive naked woman with horns, cloven hooves and a forked tail squatting at the end of a bed. Her vagina has teeth and a pair of hands belonging to the POV character are raised in a defensive posture towards her, indicating fear or distress. Smaller letters at the bottom rail against the use of Nocturnal Biomechanica as sex workers, citing Nationalist rhetoric as reasoning to avoid copulation with them. This line of posters was swiftly discontinued by the Bureau Dei Poliscie Dei Moralitie after it became associated with pornography, particularly for it's popularity among those with a fetish for humanoid Nocturnal Biomechanica.
2. An invasive aura-spike construct that produces the grating mental message: DRINK THE POTION [IMBIBE//LIQUID]: IMMEDIACY! Followed by the faint taste of Gambeton brand Cola and the activation of the salivary gland. Produced several Thousand Sange lawsuits against Gambeton Recreational Fluids which ultimately drove the company to bankruptcy. Due to embezzlement and governmental incompetence,  residents of Ystopl-West still report frequent encounters with this obnoxious mental advertisement, despite apparent attempts to hunt them down and scrub them from the collective unconscious. (Aura-spike constructs are externalized thoughts made out of "thought stuff" that can forcefully implant images and sensations into the minds of others without consent. Their use in advertisement is legal, but regulated. This one in particular has a shape like an invisible sea urchin the size of an apple.)
3. A strutting man with diaphanous skin, bones warped into whirlpools and branches, and three eyes. "It's free!" He says, 'So long as you get this written on your chest!" The blinking patches of bio-luminescence on his chest read: "Uderbrau Cosmetik Re-Configurations- West Reeve Street Apt. 56, call or appointment. Skeletal, Muscular, Integuementary, and Sexual Organ!!"
4. A plain yellowing flier, crumpled from being stuffed into pockets and used as a bookmark. Donate Blood; Church of Djarkine, it says at the top, followed by a list of local locations and phone numbers, and the bold print: DO IT FOR THE CHILDREN. The fine print admits that all proceeds from selling your blood to the local depository will go to buying back the skull of a saint that they pawned.
5. A newspaper clipping with a heliotype of an elegant woman, dressed in a fine pelerine and weighed down by several silver chains draped around her neck and wrists. Though the heliotype is in black and white, the alchemical denotation AU is written in her lipstick and eyeshadow. She's holding a pair of black engraved pistols and smiling. The column is titled "Eleanora's Arms Exquisite- Nothung's Liquid Coldfire Action Revolvers, the modern housewife's firearm?" The review is favorable, and there's a number at the end to call Nothung Firearms and place an order; the listed price is 20,000 Sange.
6. A cheaply produced pamphlet titled: THE TRUTH ABOUT THE CHOTUV DEEP WELL. The ensuing sixteen pages of insanity detail the anonymous author's belief that the world is not flat, but rather an octagonal polyhedron untouched by gravity. The illusion of flatness is given by the fact that each face of the polyhedron is flat, and the Fade Miasma is an artificial phenomenon maintained by the powers that be. The Chotuv Deep Well connection appears to be an attempt at relevancy, given the recent leak of the autopsy heliotypes, rather than a legitimate belief that the deep well somehow went sideways and breached into another facet of the octagonal earth. Reputable among the circles of the conspiratorially minded, but easily debunked by the recordings of the Abyssal Expeditions and the Trans-Miasma heliotypes of the sun passing beneath the ocean and into the underworld through the Maw.
7. A "comic book" featuring several popular publications, issue #432, called Serial Comedy Weekly. Features Tomas Bhekin's famous talking rat Sylvester.
8. A bronze statue of a proud Armiger wearing Carapace armor and bearing a three pronged lance. He has a sword belted to his side, and his helmet has an anachronistic plume. The plaque reads: "Behold the thin barrier which stands valiantly between your unworthy self and the rapacious hordes of the third world! Will you continue to cower like a woman while the very spine of our civilization is at risk, or will you stand proudly like a man, and enlist today?" There's a piece of graffiti on the statue's base which reads "I'm going to fuck your wife like a woman while you're busy killing strikers in Kvalte."
   

Axionic Theory Part 1

    In 103 P.A. a philosopher named Philethone described the smallest piece of material; a mote of which there could be no division, a fundamental unit of matter which came to be called the atom. [1] Things have gotten more complicated since then. See appended document 23-A for a primer on currently understood atomic alchemy and a chart of all currently derived elemental atoms. Philethone had more to say, of course. Namely that women were a separate parasitic breed of creature created by a second god that lived beneath the world, a claim which is currently unsubstantiated by the bureau, and largely conflicts with the universe's current cosmotheology. [2] [3] See appended document 24-A for a brief primer on classical Philethonian philosophies on gender, and appended document 24-B for Anaya Dknurr's 'Modern Gender Politik and the Shadow of Philethonic Misogyny.' Philethone had one other, vital theory, written upon fourty-eight mirror-polished sheets of silver flattened from his reward in denari for designing the Prison of Glass. This was the last work he ever published before being killed and eaten by his long time rival and castigator, Mastigione, and it may be the most important alchemical text ever created. [4]

    Philethone's Axionic theory is thus; Atoms are the smallest division of physical matter, Axions are the smallest unit of Law. Furthermore, using a telescope, Kamera Obscure, and a weighted token (often translated as denari, but was more likely a special carving of wood or bone used for gambling,) [17] Philethon determined that sunlight was capable of altering probability. Or rather, that a lack of sunlight altered the properties of the unobserved in significant ways. [18] See Figure 19 for a graphical depiction of this experiment.

    Modern Axionic theory is far removed from the primitive chance-based haruspicy that Philethone engaged in. The Langley-Shoru experiment (More commonly called Langley device, accounting for Tepelev Shoru's arrest following the hallmark 1548 Federal Tribunal case criminalizing "Hunter-Killer cannibalism,") first implemented the "candle in a dark room effect" to empirically observe Axions and their properties directly. The results were historic. [35] While the Axionic sciences are still in their infancy, their use has become an indespensible component in modern industrial alchemy. Indeed, the formation of the Southern Antrpol Commercial Agglomerate, its eventual collapse to Communist barbarism, and forceful reformation into the Dhristvailian Annex can all be directly attributed to putting Axionic theory to practice. [36]

    In broad terms, Modern Axionic Theory states that the Sun, which is held within the rails placed for it by the Archons, is the source of all Law, which manifests as a particle called an Axion. Axions emit a field of law, a particle interaction similar to magnetism which causes moderates the actions of all objects within. Speaking colloquially; Sunlight enforces the laws of creation. This can be easily observed in the "Chotuv Deep Well Incident." See appended document 47-A for a copy of the Antrpol Tribunal dedicated to the grisly accident, and appended documents 47-B, C and D for the autopsy heliotypes of the three resulting bodies. See appended documents 47-E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, and N for dental records and personality profiles of the original ten engineers. This Interaction can be seen in the (depreciated) [48] Saburov equation. Note that while modern Alchemists prefer the [49] Leinski-Sacches equation for industrial applications, the Saburov equation with experimental constants is fully sufficient for engineering operations, hazard assessment protocols, and legal deniability. [50]

    The modern Langley device uses a triplicate extrusion chamber created of shaldqin [54] though the prototype revealed at the 1647 World's Fair included a "deep layer internal focus chamber" created solely from Nocturnal materials. [55] This design would allow for theoretically impossible internal alchemical manufacturing; which Osmund Bertajii described as "The key to the Architect's prison; the philosopher's stone at last realized. Langley's sublime genius finally given manifest form." [56] The Bureau has extended lines of communication to the three living Langley Khaibit, which have unfortunately proven unproductive. While modern Langley devices use a baseline of 1.83*10^-13 ꙮ, [57] the prototype could reach the theoretical minimum of 6.66*10^-27 ꙮ, provided the outer shell were built in a sub-marine Stelle along the Kuvaddich coastline- the Ultima Thule of Axionic pollution. See appended document 50 for calculations. A modern Langley device uses Axionic stimulation via controlled coldfire-sunstone detonation on a diaphenous internal shaldqin-2 membrane while the internal environment is regulated by a series of pumps which removed the humourous media and filter it through another shaldqin membrane to remove axionic media. [58] Precipitation and manipulation of quasi-nocturnal chemicals is done through use of tertiary internal chambers- though the necessity of using real materials is a potential limiter, requiring a minimal axionic threshold to maintain physical identity. [59] Separation of axionic media and quasi-nocturnal product is crucial, an axionic contamination could render the final product useless or worse. See appended document 51-A for a comprehensive list of all documented Langley device axiom contamination pseudo-material disasters.

    Shoru Tepelev's comments on the device were recorded, but not published, by the Alchemia Regalia journal, which they were willing to share with the bureau when requested. See appended document 51-A for public response to the device during the fair, and 52-B for response afterwards by alchemical journals. On review, it seems the Tepelev's comments were simply not incendiary enough for tabloid publishing; "It's a good idea. Every factory in Qolnorra should buy one."

    

NECROMANCER

Death is a natural mass spectrometer. When a living thing dies, its soul splits by weight; the higher parts are stripped away while the the base and vulgar somatic portions of the soul persist for a while longer. Those integrated into the mysteries of Necromancy are capable of speaking to these pieces. Without a higher authority, the remnants of a life are eager to obey.

An MD is a d6. It is expended on a 4 5 or 6. Invested MD don't come back when you rest, and can be left in a spell as long as you like. You can roll as many MD as you like when you cast a spell.

 

Skills: 1. Grave Robbing, 2. Surgery, 3. Poetry

A. Render Corpse, Speak With Dead +1 MD
B. Create Undead +1 MD
C. Corpse Explosion +1 MD
D. Life After Life +1 MD

(A) Render Corpse: Invest MD to transform [Dice] HD worth of dead flesh into a more useful form. Dice are invested until consciously removed, at which point the materials rot to nothing.

• Grave Wax: A pale greasy wax that can be shaped into a candle whose light is only visible to the one who lit it. When formed into a talisman of a small person, it drives nearby domestic creatures into a frenzy of fear.
• Corpse Salts: A crystalline dust that contains the information of the dead. No matter the size of the corpse, a handful of grave dust is all that is required to cast Speak With Dead.
• Skin: Slough the skin off a corpse, so long as you got all of it, you can wear it like a mask. This disguise is almost impenetrable in the dark or candlelight, but daylight will immediately mark you as uncanny.
• Marrow Thorns: Just jagged bones, can be whittled down to make 12 darts per HD, or 6 crossbow bolts per HD. +1 to hit against living creatures of the same type.
  

(A) Speak With Dead: Roll MD and call up the spirits of the departed. You can do this so long as one of the following applies.

• You currently own the dead creature's skull or a handful of their corpse salts
• The creature died in the last [sum] days
• You are standing in the dead creature's home

The spirit will answer any questions to the best of its ability but is still possessed of free will. It may ask for favors in return for information, and an enemy will not be willing to speak to the creature that killed it. Summoned spirits will answer [Dice] questions, and stay for [Sum] minutes. A creature's soul cannot be summoned twice in the same day.

(B) Create Undead: Invest MD to revive [Dice] HD worth of dead creatures in a horrific parody of life. These creatures lack their original minds and skills with weapons and tools, but keep their HP and physical statistics, as well as any biological abilities they had in life like poison or flight.

(C) Corpse Explosion: An extension of the Art of Rendering. Roll MD to explode [Dice] HD worth of dead flesh within 50', dealing [sum] damage within a 10' radius of the flesh exploded. Can be used on undead creatures you control, in which case add the dice invested in the creature to your roll. 

(D) Life After Life: You can restore the intelligence of the creatures you revive, if you do so, you no longer directly control them, and do not have to invest the dice you roll to resurrect them. After you die, provided you have all four MD remaining, you resurrect yourself in 1d4 days. The only intelligent undead you can create are sentient zombies, but there exist greater rituals and spells that can create intelligent ghouls, vampires, death knights, and zombies.

Tools of the Trade...

1. Pickling Jar: Grave materials placed into this jar don't rot when their MD are removed. They can be reinvested and removed safely. Filled with disgusting brine drained from the stomach of a dead whale.
2. Skeleton with Knife arms- 1 HD: A skeleton with knife arms. Technically a sentient undead. Comes with a disguise so that it doesn't alert the local guards.
3. Bag of Dead rats: 2d6 mummified rats. Each rat counts as 1/2 HD.
4. Dart Launcher: Fires bone darts.
5. Stonebow (2 slots): A crossbow that fires sling bullets. Load in chunks of dead meat and explode them with your magic. Or load in zombie heads and fire them to scare the living shit out of people.
6. Shovel: A shovel. Dig dig dig.
   

 

INFLICT SCIENCE

A wizard. The Science wizard. An MD is a d6, it is expended on a 4-6. You can roll as many of your MD as you want when you cast a spell.

Compatible with GLOG I guess.

(MATERIALS) SCIENCE WIZARD. Science loves you so much.

You can do science as much as you like. Your dedication to the scientific method has become something beyond mere academic rigor. You've begun to understand the concepts you employ on a fundamental level. You understand them so well, it's almost like you can reach out and touch them... Now the laws of reality bend over backwards in service of your quest for knowledge.

Skills: 1. Alcoholism, 2. Facts about Rocks, 3. Functioning without Sleep.

You never fumble with knives or pistols, and can wear up to 3 slots of armor.

Starting Equipment: Lab coat (2 slots of armor, +1 save vs fire and acid,) Goggles (immunity to being blinded by acid and shrapnel,) Combat Slide ruler (As dagger or shortsword, can be reconfigured.)

A. Query, Lab Procedure +1 MD
B. Bootstrap Paradox, Substitution +1 MD
C. Broken Heart +1 MD
D. The Left Hand +1 MD


(A) Query: Telescopic or Microscopic. If you can see something in the distance and hold up your slide ruler and squint at it, you know either; how far away it is, how big it is, whether or not it’s moving. When you are within arm’s reach of something, you know (roughly) what it’s made out of and whether or not it is explosive or corrosive without having to touch it. Expend 1 MD without rolling it to ask a simple question of cause and effect about an object. IE, what will happen if this object gets wet? The DM must answer truthfully.


(A) Lab Procedure: Roll your MD and cause effects.

• Desiccate a [sum]x5’ diameter patch of ground, removing all water and turning sloppy mud to stable ground. Impure solutions like blood and acid leave a horrible mess of stains behind.
• Blow a gust of fresh, breathable air with enough force to clear a cloud of smoke or fog. Clears a persistent effect for [dice] rounds. Blasts unattended small objects [sum] feet.
• Sweep a [sum]x5’ diameter patch of debris into a neat pile or dustbin.
• Gently spray a stream of [dice] liters of deionized water out of your fingertip.

(B) Bootstrap Paradox: Roll your MD and be launched [sum]x10’ in any direction of your choosing. Save vs wands or take the [sum] bashing damage from whiplash, in addition to any falling damage from your bad decisions. Anybody you hit takes the same damage.


(B) Substitution: Science lets you fudge the numbers. When you expend 1 MD without bothering to roll it, you cause one of the following effects:

• Cause a nearby roll that failed or succeeded to instead succeed or fail.
• Swap an item in your inventory with something similar. Wrenches into crowbars, bows into crossbows, water into wine. If the difference in price between the two items is greater than 1 gold, then the substitution only lasts for 1 round before swapping back.
• Swap the position of two allies or two enemies within 30’ of one another. You cannot swap an ally for an enemy or an enemy for an ally.
• Instantly kill a living cat, or revive a dead one. This only works when nobody's looking.

(C) Broken Heart: Make something more or less dense. If something is more dense, it drops a size category and becomes much more heavy. This does not affect the number of slots an item takes up, because it is now less convenient to carry in either case. If something is less dense, it increases a size category and becomes lighter. Dense items sink in water no matter what, and buoyant items always float. Hostile creatures may save vs wands against having their body or items affected. Range: [dice]x10’ Duration: [dice] rounds.


(D) The Left Hand: Roll MD, and progress a process within [sum] feet by [Dice] rounds. An arrow in flight reaches its destination by ignoring all obstacles that might have blocked it, falling objects harmlessly appear on the ground, bleeding creatures die. The process is entirely internal, and none of the effects of the process can affect anything during the skipped time, or be affected by anything. That said, it does affect spell and potion duration, bug your DM.

SCIENCE EQUIPMENT

1. Sturdy boots: a pair of good boots. +1 armor, immunity to stepping in chemical spills and electrified floors.
2. Flask full of acid, ⅓ slot: Melts through 1 slot of metal or flesh.
3. Erlenmeyer flask: A conical flask used to mix potions. Lets you safely mix any two potions you pour into it into one.
4. Relative watch: Tells you the time. Will tell you the time at specific locations if you ask nicely.
5. A lead box. 2 slots. Has a chunk of uranium inside.
6. Syringe, ⅓ slot. Lets you Suck up small amounts of liquid and inject it.
7. Graduate student, person sized. A Grad student. They do what you tell them and take up a hireling slot. If they die you can mail the university and get a replacement in 1d6 days. Mediocre stats, mediocre grades.
8. Weight sets and scale, 2 slots. Let me tell you exactly how heavy things are.
9. Bag of mice. Animal testing is perfectly ethical. 2d6 mice inside.
10. Name placard. Let everyone know that you are Dr. Coomer.