Feats & Blessed Items

I have a love hate relationship with Feats. On one hand they are kind of fun little skills for characters to have. Something that makes them special. On the other hand their mere existence creates a mini-power game of picking the right ones and planning out a characters entire future that I don't like. Also they are sort of magical super-powers which bugs me as I like characters to be more human and less super-heroes.

My solution for my own Fantasy Heartbreaker is to use Feats to create somewhat colorful low-level magical items. So Feats can be gained if can acquire them, which allows the GM to control the Feats, to give them out temporarily for an adventure if necessary, or to even have them taken away or limited in number of something.

I've taken the list of Feats and updated the more interesting ones for Black Hack, but they should work just as well for most OSR games that don't use Feats.

I call them Blessed Items because I see them as religious in nature and 'artifacts' should be more powerful.  I restrict them to Law Aligned folks, at least for now. A number of the items are named after Gods, Prophets, Martyr's or Saints which I feel is a nice way to provide details to a religions mythology. These names can/should be updated for the local campaign of course. For the curious Daend is pronounced D-on-D.

The first are the Blessed Stones. The blessed stones are simple smooth stones the size of a thumb or palm with a  blessing carved on one face. Typically such stones are kept in a small sack hung around the neck. Blessed Stones are generally found at Temples of Law. It is considered ill luck to keep a stone for over a month.

1d10	Blessed Stone
01	The Agility Stone - Possessor gains a +2 bonus on all Sleight of Hand checks and Reflex saves.
02	The Animal Affinity Stone - The possessor gains +2 bonus on all Handle Animal checks and Ride checks.
03	The Investigator Stone - Possessor gains a +2 bonus on all Gather Information checks and Search checks.
04	The Iron Will Stone  - Possessor gains a +2 bonus on all WIS saving throws.
05	The Linguist Stone - Possessor can communicate in any language fluently. Does not enable reading in other languages.
06	The Negotiator Stone - Possessor gains +2 bonus on all Diplomacy checks and Sense Motive checks or Intimidate checks.
07	The Nimble Fingers Stone - Possessor gains a +2 bonus on all Disable Device checks and Open Lock checks.
08	The Self-Sufficient Stone - Possessor gains a +2 bonus on all Heal checks and Survival checks.
09	The Stealthy Stone - Possessor gains a +2 bonus on all Hide checks and Move Silently checks.
10	The Tough Stone - Possessor gain +3 hit points.

And next a series of Weapons, because that's what people want. 

1d10	Blessed Weapons
01	Arrows of Daend - 6 black arrows that never break or get lost. The arrows are very precise and can  be used to attack a target in melee combat with no additional penalty.
02	Axe of Cleaving - If the wielder deals enough damage to drop a target they get an extra melee attack another target within range immediately. The extra attack is at the same bonus as the attack that dropped the previous creature.
03	Blade of Daend - A longsword with runes along the fuller. The sword allows the wielder to go into a battle fury for a number of rounds equal to the wielders CON. While in the battle fury, the following effects take place: STR is considered to be 5 points higher for the purposes of Damage Modifier. Melee attacks are at Advantage.
04	Bow of St Kaye the Martyr - A bow made of living wood (with leaves on one end). Using this bow has the following effects: Missile weapon attacks are Advantaged Range increased by 50%. Damage increased by +2
05	Bow of Saint Troy - A short bow that can fire very rapidly.  Archer gets one extra attack per round but that attack is at a –2 penalty.
06	Crossbow of Reloading - A heavy crossbow that can be reloaded in a single round.
07	Dagger of Saint Douglas - Quickdraw dagger. The dagger is very plane in appearance. It can be drawn and thrown in the same action. Additionally if used asa melee weapon the wieider can take a number of additional attacks equal to their DEX modifier.
08	Falchion of Decapitation - A black bladed Falchion. When the wielder declares a Decapitating Swing, A critical hit results in the targets decapitation. The target must be humanoid in size.
09	Glaive of St Erik - Aka the Glaive of Blind Fighting. When attacking a concealed or invisible opponent the wielder takes normal penalties but also attacks with Advantage.
10	Sword of Defense - Wielder can take a penalty of as much as –5 on their attack roll and add that same amount to their Armor Class. The changes to attack rolls and Armor Class last the entire round.

And the last group are interesting items that have been blessed.

1d10	Blessed Items
01	Boots of Lexor the Trixster -  Wearer can move four times their normal speed. If they make a running jump they gain a +4 bonus on the Jump test.
02	Boots of Nimbleness - Leather hobnail boots that provide an extra +1 dodge bonus to Armor Class. Any condition that makes one lose DEX bonus to AC also makes them lose the dodge bonus.
03	Clogs of the spider - Shoes carved out of wood. They are more comfortable than they sound. The clogs allow the wearer to move along a vertical surface as long as they return to the ground at the end of the round.
04	Dagger of St Eric - All allies within the bearers CHA in yards gain the bearers CHA bonus as a bonus to any Saves. Also any allied NPCs need not make moral rolls while in your presence.
05	Gloves of Daenda - The wearer may transfer a companions injuries to themself. Empathic Wound is incapable of re-growing or re-attaching severed limbs or resurrecting the dead.
06	Horn of St Eric - A drinking horn the provides immunity to all natural poisons and all saves versus magical poisons are rolled as Advantaged. If a poisoned drink is placed within it is converted into a very nice and recognizable ale
07	Saddle of Ton Reming - The saddle creates the following effects: Ride skill tests are Advantaged Rider may use 2H Weapon while mounted All animals that wear the saddle can be considered to be trained for combat
08	Scarf of Daenda - Provides immunity to all natural diseases and all saves versus magical diseases are rolled as Advantaged.
09	Skin of the Blessed Bear - A cloak made of bear skin that provides +1 AC. This stacks with equipped armour.
10	Silver Holy Symbol - Anyone possessing this Holy Symbol can turn the dead as if they were a Cleric.

Best of the Web - Mid to High Level Spending

After the last series of Encounters post I dug deep in d4 Caltrops site and found another series of thought provoking posts. Another one he seems to have abandoned too soon. In this one it was about mid-level play and spending. Specifically Clerics purchasing Shrines.

• Spending: Part I: Clerics and Other Pious Types
• Spending: Clerics, Shrine Preamble
• Spending: Clerics, First Level Shrines
• Spending, Clerics: Second Level Shrines
• Spending, Clerics: Third Level Shrines

To me a good post is one that gets my creativity flowing and this serious really did that. I may end up taking up the challenge and writing up something similar. We know a bit about Fighters being able to set up strongholds at certain levels, Wizards can set up towers, etc, but the details. 

First I'm not a big believer in the level limits for this sort of thing. A proper game a Thief with a ton of money should find little encouragements to building a Thieves Guild, or a Cleric to building shrines. Some in game benefits maybe (imagine a Cleric needs to return to the big city to get 3rd or higher level spells filled, but if they build a shrine near the borderlands they only need to return to that Shrine) or a Wizard who builds a Wizarding tower might get some free spells from the Wizards he allows to stay in that tower researching on their own projects, a sort of paying the rent with low level spells sort of thing). 

But beyond that the nitty gritty of setting up these things could be adventures. A thieves guild would require buying property for the headquarters, some safe houses, establishing and securing territory (which would probably be an ongoing project) dealing with the government with bribes and such. In exchange the Thief can get a monthly profit and perhaps a low level magic item that was too hot and sold to one of their fences. An adventuring group might purchase a ship to get from place to place without hiking or riding everywhere with sacks of gold on their backs. Such a ship might be a money-pit but grand adventure.

All of this could be an incredible amount of fun and as far as I know nobody has really gotten into detailing much of it yet.

Found in a Box Part 10: Some Maps

I don't have much context for these maps. I don't think I ever used them for RPG although I've outlined novels and short stories and all sorts of that type of thing taking place in the area. The first map I recognize from some earlier Found in a Box posts, this was clearly going to be the main campaign area. The next two Match up to the East of the first to form a set of three. The last, the only one I'd properly inked, was a prototype of the first I think, but I'm not sure.

I like the look of them and may do another version at some point.

Found in a Box Part 9: Dwarves

Again, not actually in a Box, but still old stuff.

Dwarves
There are two basic types of Dwarves. They are the same physiologically, the differences are cultural. Grooming, clothes, & accent make it easy to tell one from the other.

• Mountain Dwarves - They could best be described as unsophisticated. They live higher in the mountains and they 've learned to dislike Elves. Most stories of Elf Dwarf conflicts involve Mountain Dwarves. They braid and die their beards in ways that are both humorous and amazing. 
• Hill Dwarves - Hill Dwarves that are more social which is a good thing now that Mountain Dwarf and the occasional Elf refugee have started filling up their cities. Still, the increased pace of war against the horde, and increased contact with the Elves, has increased Dwarven vs Elf resentment.

Roughly 75% of all Dwarves are born male but the constant wars have evened the numbers to 60%/40% male to female ratio. This imbalance colors the Dwarves view of the world driving most of them towards a life of hard work hoping to prove themselves enough to attract a mate. Dwarves are embarrassingly chivalrous as well regrading the ladies, of all races/species.

Female Dwarves are put on a pedestal and protected to a level that most consider stifling.

Dwarves marry only once. This cultural trait is strong and inflexible, which has caused havoc in their society as Vaults have fallen and widows are everywhere. Many widows have joined military bands seeking revenge and purpose in their lives.

Dwarven House

Mountain Dwarf	Hill Dwarf	House Size
01-04	01	Great House
--	02	Minor House
--	03-04	Common House
01-05	05-07	Fallen Great House
06-10	08-10	Fallen Lesser House
11-20	11-20	Fallen Common

Why Fallen?

Mountain Dwarf	Hill Dwarf	House Size
01-02	01-02	Over time House fortunes faded
--	03-10	Slaughtered in the fall of Aald Osst Ar
--	11	House Leaders were dishonored in the fall of Aald Osst Ar
03-10	12-18	Slaughtered in the fall of Aald Veztr Ar
11	19	Slaughtered in the fall of Morni Torak
12-20	20	House Leaders were dishonored in the fall of Morni Torak

House Unity

Mountain Dwarf	Hill Dwarf	Unity
01	01-02	Very close. Character lives at home
02	03-04	Reasonably close. Everyone gets together occasionally
03-04	05-07	House is more like a dozen different houses really
05-15	08-10	House has been decimated in numbers
16-20	11-20	Character is an orphan (possibly kicked out)

Rational for Adventure

Mountain Dwarf	Hill Dwarf	Rational
01-09	--	Suicidal Rage
10-17	01-02	Cold burning revenge
18	03-04	Restore House Glory
19	05-10	Recover House Artifacts
--	11-12	Earn enough to raise house/Start vault
--	13-18	Earn enough to attract love and settle down
20	19-20	Other

Scars & Wounds

Mountain Dwarf	Hill Dwarf	Scar
01-02	01	Limb hurts when its cold out
03-04	02	Missing 1d6 fingers or toes
05-06	03	1d6 scars on the face and neck
07-08	04	Burns along the b
09	05	Missing an eye or ear
10	06	Part of the scalp is a mass of scar tissue
11-13	07	Numerous teeth were knocked out, wooden teeth are adequate
14	--	Developed a drink now for tomorrow we may die personality
15	--	Agoraphobic, can't go outdoors for more than a few minutes without strong booze
16	--	Darkphobia, freaks out of the lights go out
17	--	Mumbler, tends to have unintelligible conversations with self
18	13	Psycho, only good Orc is a Dead Orc!
19	14	Multiple wounds, roll again
20	15-20	No wounds

Gained the Scars where?

Mountain Dwarf	Hill Dwarf	Scar
--	01-05	Fall of Vault Aald Veztr Ar (Old West Gold, a Hill Dwarf Vault)
01-02	06-10	Battle of Khaz Morni Rukh (Dead orc)
03-04	11	Battle of Khaz Valaz Dueger (Cowardly Duegar)
05-14	12	Fall of Vault Morni Torak (Dead Soul a Mountain Dwarf Vault)
15-15	13	Battle of Khaz of Burk Torak (Axe Soul)
17-19	14	Battle of Khaz Khazdul Heus (Dwarven Hammer)
20	15-20	Fall of Vault Aald Osst Ar (Old East Gold a Hill Dwarf Vault)

* Note the name Aald (Old) is a recent addition to the names of vaults that have fellen to Orcs.

Character Traits

1d6	Character Trait
1	Agoraphobic - Hate the outdoors. Must make a WIS save any time you go outside during the day and every day afterwards. Any fail means you'll try to return to the underground (cave, cavern, dungeon, basement, etc) the quickest way possible.
2	Besotten - Must make a WIS save or fall in love with an individual of the opposite sex. Save lasts 1d6 weeks per individual. When the save fails you will agree to whatever the individual says or does.
3	Drunkard - Love the drink, and must make a WIS save to decline a drink and tend to stop drinking only when blackout drunk.
4	Greedy - Accumulation of wealth is your goal, not for yourself mind you but to improve the lot of your clan and Vault.
5	One-upper - Dwarven pride causes you to provide examples of how Dwarves do something better, even if that something is a bit of a lie.
6	Rage-a-holic - Life is unfair and it makes you angry. You tend to go berserk when threatened.

Found in a Box Part 8: Elves

Actually not in a Box but on my hard drive from back in the day when I was planning to set up a campaign about recapturing Dwarven Vaults that had been overwhelmed by the Horde of Chaos Worshiping Orcs and Goblins.

Elves

Elves are one of the ancient races. They are great and they know it. They opened up dimensional gates and colonized thousands of worlds and brought Halflings, Dwarves, and Humans along for the ride. They developed the Common tongue to allow everyone to communicate. Then the Orcs came and started attacking through the gates. The Elves decided they had to close the gates, and isolated all of the worlds, without consulting with anyone.

Elves tend to be elitist, emotionally cold, vegetarian, androgynous, loners with a fine fashion sense.  Elves have a female dominated society with a male/female/other ratio of 15%/50%/35%. The other are asexual and/or gender-fluid. They don't define the terms to non-elves and feel they are above labels.

There are three main types of Elves. They are all physiologically the same, the differences are cultural.

• Grey Elves - Sophisticated city dwellers. They all live in "Foreign" compounds adjacent to Hill Dwarf Vaults. Most Grey Elves specialize in magic and moodiness. 
• Sea Elves - Merchants and traders. Their large colorful ships are recognizable by the hydroponic gardens hanging along the sides of the main deck. Unlike other Elves the Sea Elves get along with everyone. 
• Wood Elves - Semi-nomadic, insular, wild folk Their wardrobes are dominated by green and brown robes. Each large group of Wood Elves has a dozen 'cities' they travel between depending upon the seasons (leaving small communities of Halflings behind to keep the places up). These cities are built beneath large mounds in the forest, protected by thick hedges and ha-ha walls.

Size of Elven House

Grey Elf	Sea Elf	Wood Elf	House
01-02	--	01	Great House
03-07	01-02	02	Minor House
08-20	03-20	03-20	Common

Unity of Elven House

Grey Elf	Sea Elf	Wood Elf	Unity
01-02	01-14	01-10	Reasonably close. Everyone gets together occasionally
03-14	15-19	11-20	House is more like a dozen different houses really
15-20	20	--	House in name only

Rational For Adventure

Grey Elf	Sea Elf	Wood Elf	Rational
--	01-04	01-19	Fight Chaos
01-10	--	--	Recover lost artifacts
11-19	--	--	Recover lost knowledge
--	15-19	--	Accumulate wealth
20	20	20	Other

Pieces of Flair

Grey Elf	Sea Elf	Wood Elf	Pieces of Flair
01-03	01-02	--	Stylish boots made of the finest material
04-05	03-04	--	A hat that others would kill for
--	05	--	Stylish costume jewelry
06	--	01-05	Face paint (could be War Paint or Marilyn Manson)
07-10	07-10	--	Excessive piercings. Mostly on ears and/or nose
11	11-14	--	Tattoos on the left side of the body
12-15	--	--	Fancy and expensive hair style
16-18	--	--	Colorful and useful scarf/towel
19-20	--	--	Multiple Pieces of Flair, roll again
--	15-20	06-20	No Pieces of Flair

Character Traits

1d6	Character Trait
1	Asexual - Lost interest in sex long ago, there are far more important things in life to think about. It's amusing and a bit disgusting to see how obsessed others are with all that.
2	Claustrophobic - Buildings are fine but being inside of caves and dungeons and such with metric tons of rock overhead waiting to crush you, and unable to even see the stars freaks you out. Must make a WIS save any time you attempt to go underground and every day below ground afterwards. Any fail means you'll try to return to the surface the quickest way possible.
3	Elitist - Other races just aren't as good as Elves, and a lot of other Elves aren't so hot either. They are uneducated, boorish, and violent. They are worthy only as fodder to stop worse creatures it seems.
4	Helpless - Having lived a spoiled magical life many simple tasks (such as cleaning) are beyond you.
5	Moody - Long life has given you deep perspective on mortality. Thinking about it can put you into a funk or into a whimsical joyous mood depending upon the situation.
6	Patronizing - You tend to treat other races as you would a puppy. This comes off as aloof but there is no malice, it is just that other races don't live all that long so there is no point being super-attached.

New Head of D&D RPG Team?

According to Nerd Immersion WoTC now has put Ray Winninger in charge of the D&D design team. As far as I can tell nobody else is reporting this so who knows. Anyway Ray Winninger is the guy that did the Dungeoncraft essays for Dragon Magazine. I don't remember being blown away with anything unique or creative in those essays. I'll have to reread I guess.

Nerd Immersion would create a 5.5 version of the game repackaging class and monsters into a new players handbook and a new monster book. Not a bad idea to tidy up the product line but it makes me think of Avalon Hill's RuneQuest in which they repackaged RuneQuest products from just a year before and it felt like they had nothing new for a year or two. They lost momentum. Still the idea isn't bad if it didn't take to long or too many resources but I'd keep that on the back burner.

So what would I do? Nothing extreme. 5e is popular, don't fix what isn't broken but two ideas do pop into my head.

1. I'd move heaven and Earth to make a 5E version of Greyhawk and that Greyhawk would be far more Gonzo Sci-fi fantasy to differentiate it from Forgotten Realms or whatever worlds WoTC is selling now. I'd create scenario packs for that setting. Combinations of old modules sold under one title the way they are doing it now, but I'd put them together sandbox style. Start with the Keep as a base of operations and drop a dozen modules (with backstories rewritten as necessary) within range and include notes on how to properly use story hooks and let the players have some agency in selecting where they want to adventure. This would hopefully set it off from the pseudo-adventure paths they've been doing and really show a different style of play. Oh, and I'd get Errol Otus as the lead artist to ensure Greyhawk visually stood out from the vanilla Realms.
2. I'd put together a book on House Rules, Reskinning, and DIY advice. This really is the heart of D&D to many and I don't think TSR or Wizards has ever directly addressed it. They should encourage DIY. I don' think it'll rob sales, in fact it might do the opposite. Right now you don't buy this or that because you'll never use it, but with a DIY attitude you might buy it knowing you can pick it apart to get interesting NPC, borrow the map for something else, and borrow bits of that backstory. DMs pick this up on their own, it's somewhat natural if you've got a long campaign campaign and you have to feed the creativity but Im sure the designers at Wizards have ideas that might be worthwhile.

Beyond that I don't know.

Best of the Web - Monsters With No HP, Campaign Bibles, and Leveling up Monsters

Evlyn Moreau of Le Chaudron Chromatique has a post titled Monsters with no HP in which she throws out a few tables on creature reactions when hit, instead of using hit points. She admits the idea isn't fully formed but it looks to me as if the idea has some nice potential. Not as a full replacement for HP, but as a supplement. I mean most combatants aren't gonna just keep swinging away as their HP drop, these tables could be used to provide actions for a Morale table customized by beast. You could also combine the tables into one big one and use the amount of damage as the determining factor, when they've lost 5 HPs this is what they do, when they've lost 12 this... Lots of potential but possibly too much overhead in use. It is an intriguing idea though.

The Angry GM has a post called the Campaign Bible which is about the sloppy book of notes most GMs build up over the years describing their campain area.  James W West at Doomslakers has a response post called The DM's Notebook vs. The Campaign Bible in which he discusses the idea and brings up the TSR World Builder's Guidebook which seems to be the only TSR product that talks about the idea. If I ever finish my fantasy Heartbreaker I think the GMs book will probably have a bit about it because organization, and having a Swipe file seem excellent ways to juice the creativity on those days its lacking.

Over at DELTA'S D&D HOTSPOT he's got a post called Gygax on Leveling Up Monsters in which he talks about Gygax discussing giving frequently encountered Kobolds in Castle Greyhaw perks whenever they won a combat. This concept should be a staple of Megadungeons. Anything living near to a frequent entrance will be encountered again and again and will likely get boring if not improved. Again, another thing to add to that GMs Book someday.