Author: Sean Fager

Rocket Boots!

…. they’re rocket boots.  Boots you wear, with rockets on the bottom of them. 

When you engage the rockets and fly off into the wild blue yonder, Roll +DEX. 

On a 10+ take all three.  On a 7-9 choose two.  On a miss, choose one.

* You end up where you wanted to go (within a few miles)… or at least somewhere not horrible.

* You land in a way that is neither embarrassing nor dangerous.

* The boots are not damaged beyond hope of re-use.

“No greater love”

Ngu Bolonge, prophetic monk of the Peaceful Skytop, was killed for his ‘heretical’ preaching in a Theocratic nation.  His sons, borne of different mothers under the same moon, appearing to all the word to be twins, grew strong together.  When they reached manhood they made a pilgrimage to dig up their father, who they never knew, and told the skeleton the tale of their lives and their dreams.  Each heard the other’s there in the ancient graveyard, a mirror to their own desires.  They took their father’s belt, which he was buried with : twin straps of leather interwoven, one raven black, one snow white.   Separating those strands, and wearing them as headbands, they swore oaths to each other which only the moon knows now.

Along with five other heroic figures of their age, the ‘brothers’ fell defending a nameless town from the raiding bandit army of the Silken Woods.  The stories say they fought off dozens of raiders, resorting to barehanded strikes after their weapons broke, until a single spear thrust penetrated both their chests and laid them low.

Their headbands were kept by the townsfolk and held in sacred memory.  When their children come of age, they must venture into the Silken Woods in pairs, bearing the bands, for a night.  All have returned, bearing stories of danger and comradery.

WHEN YOU WEAR ONE OF THE HEADBANDS OF THE NGU BROTHERS AND SOMEONE ELSE WEARING THE OTHER MEETS DEATH, you take their place under it’s hungry sight.  Roll Last Breath + any bond(s) you have with the other headband wearer and abide by the results.  They live, whatever the outcome.

Pliamus’s Peculiar Percolator

The wizard Pliamus once made a magical percolator so he could have coffee whenever he liked without having to stop and make a fire.  When the trigger word was spoken (“Percolate!”) any water within the percolator begins to boil. 

Pliamus didn’t bother to tie down the magic on the device too tightly, as it was a simple container and unlikely to cause any serious trouble if it malfunctioned. 

After dropping it on a fishing trip and accidentally turning the Lake of Novel Flumes into the Mourning Dust Bowl, Pliamus decided to ditch the thing.  He chucked it in a volcano, which we all know messes up magic, and went home.

The percolator was magic-tough though, and  is now lodged partway up the side of the volcano, half submerged in obsidian.  The lid, tube and ground-holding apparatus are lost for all time, leaving what looks like an ordinary but strangely tall pot. 

I like this one.  Without an indication of what it’s for, but BEAMING out magical energies, a party could misuse it for all kinds of things.  Or figure it out and use it when making camp as a pot.  Or chuck it in a small lake or river to create enough fog to conceal an advancing army.  Or fight water elementals with it.  Or….

The Purifier

The Purifier is a sentient, mildly telepathic weapon oil.  It comes in a small, flawless crystal bottle with a flawless crystal stopper which refuses to open for anyone who has not agreed to use it as follows :

The weapon to be coated, whether metal or otherwise, must have all of the oil poured over it’s entirety while being held by it’s owner.  The oil must be allowed to cover both the weapon and the wielder’s bare hand(s).  If The Purifier is tricked into opening and used in any other fashion it dies shortly thereafter, taking it’s boons with it.

The weapon thus coated becomes enchanted, capable of striking even insubstantial or magical foes.  It glows with a warm blue radiance when drawn and held aloft.  Those seeking to harm or deceive the wielder take on a green, sickly pallor under such light.  Any non-sentient undead struck with the weapon are dispatched immediately. 

The Purifier will make a demand of the wielder, framed thusly :

You must never _(something dishonorable)___

You should give all you do not need to survive to the poor!

You should help anyone who requests your aid.

You should hunt (the undead, demons, devils, agents of chaos) whenever the chance arises!

Or another noble-but-tiring demand of the GM’s choosing.

The character bound to and wielding The Purity may at any time, including after rolling the dice, declare an attack roll made with the weapon to be a twelve.  If they do so they become bound to The Purity’s latest demand, forever.  It will quickly make another.

If the wielder breaks an oath they have made to The Purity they become wracked with a supernatural illness and begin to waste away, an unnatural starvation, until they take steps to rectify their “transgression.”  Whether this can be ended by shattering the bound weapon or whether it is a burden to be borne for their lifetimes is up to the GM.

The Dark One’s Dice

After Humpabulup the Lanky Devourer was slain, the people busted into the once-impregnable fortress of the Dark Summoner Kiddeth.  He was bound, dragged into the local hamlet, and burned at the stake as was fitting one of his villainy.  During the next new moon his surviving manservant retrieved his body from it’s hidden, unsanctified grave. 

There is a gap in the story here, but the skeleton next appeared in the hands of a small troupe of ogres.  Finding the bones too moldy to their pallets, they carved them into dice instead.  Counting being too slow, they used letters instead of pips/dots on the dice.  They would use the skull as a cup to shake up the dice before rolling.

After a group of sellswords slew the ogre menace in a mighty battle they found the skull, drenched in blood from the conflict, the dice still inside it, floating in red ogre blood…. spelling out W-E-L-L-H-E-L-L-O-T-H-E-R-E

When you hold the Dark Skull in your lap, pour a quart of your own blood into it straight from a vein, and cast the dice therein, ask a question and roll + CON.

On a 10+ the dice will spell out a truly helpful message or answer.  Anyone acting on it takes +1 forward.

On a 7-9 the dice will spell out something true but manipulative, or a technical truth lacking an important bit of information.  Anyone acting on it takes +1 forward.

On a miss you drop the skull, scattering the dice and blood, and pass out for a short time.  Take a debility (GM’s choice) when you awaken.

The dice refuse any question about who or what they are.  They do know, or can discover, most secrets of the mortal and supernatural realms. 

Magic Item (almost) Monday

Peg-leg Pete’s Peg Leg

Peg-leg Pete had an island shaman make this enchanted artificial leg from a shaft of corewood out of the island chain’s most holy grove.  Then he snagged it and ran without paying.  A few weeks later he fell overboard during the recovery of a skiff and was crushed between the vessels. 

When Peg-leg Pete’s Peg Leg is submerged in water, all wood within a few dozens meters is drawn towards it.  This pull is fairly weak… usually… and was used by Pete to pull in driftwood or use the ‘tug’ to find submerged barrels or chests.  It exerts about twenty pounds of pressure and acts almost identical to a “wood magnet”