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Sunday, March 24, 2024

d100 - So You’ve Been Brought Back From The Dead...

Certain magnificent Magics and marvelous Miracles make it possible to return a dead Character to Play in these games. In some games, this process is pretty perfunctory: Simply locate your Local Lama and acquire a casting of Raise Dead within the Time Limit. Then after a mandatory two-week recuperation period (during which the Character is hardly in a state for Adventure: with only a solitary Hit Point, half movement, no carrying capacity, they cannot attack, and are unable to use Spells or other Class Abilities) the revivified is right as rain.

Later, when the Players gain access to these Spells through their own Resources, it tends to further emphasize that this Death is merely a speed bump, a temporary set-back with a well-earned vacation perhaps, but the Character will be back in no time.

I have always thought it might be more interesting if the process left a little mark here and there on those who underwent something so significant, so here is a table of one hundred potentially interesting concomitants for that process. These might work a little like Curses (and this could even work alongside that dreaded Energy Drain as well, q.v. my Rumored Cures for more on this) and have their own Durations or Required Deeds to overcome, or they could become a permanent part of the Character in a way (some more of that lovely “Foreground Growth.”) I think in creative hands, a few of these could even be spun into Boons with the right application or in certain situations. I tend to prefer that sort of “Drawback” after all.

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

d100 - Vernacular Coinage & Specialized Specie

Most of the time, the kinds of coins the Players end up stuffing in their Pouches and Pockets might be a little uninspiring with just their two-letter abbreviation to differentiate them. Sure, we’re always quite careful to enumerate the type/metal composition for value purposes, but what other things can these coins tell us?

Here is a table with some ideas. These could serve as “Common Names” for coinage in a region, decorations for Heads and Tails, or also potentially a window into the culture that minted them in the first place. What people put on their money usually tends to align with other values that they want to extol or claim to possess. Vernacular names could come up during transactions when the Party travels to a new Region with its own types of currency, and sometimes the “motifs” and decorations themselves end up deliciously muddled through trade. Ancient Coins retrieved from forgotten Hoards might provide a window to those who traded with them. I suppose one might find this table useful for embellishing various other things in need of a little more specificity on demand (constellations, heraldry, artwork, etc.)

Friday, March 8, 2024

d100 - Magical Spears

Here are a hundred more ways to flavor some of those Magical Weapons that might end up in those Happy Hoards or the Hungry Hands of Plucky Players: Magic Spears!