Sleestak Mafia Capital City

Just to make sure I don't get too good of a reputation, here's this:

SLEESPORT
The Big City. A den of villainy. A hive of magical research. Inequality. Larceny. Gambling. Robo-sorcery. 

Obvious facts:
Kobold ghetto
Huge casinos, Sleestak managers, human and kobold workers
Sleestak overseers, with robot servants 
Visiting dwarf merchants, buttoned down, loathing the whole place
Visiting dwarf merchants, cutting loose

Rumors:  (roll D30.  Most of these are true, but that's up to the DM)
1There is a robot underground movement, robots who have shed there Sleesy schackles and escaped and now plot against their former masters
2 There are pylons in the desert, remnants of ancient Sleestak techno-magic 
3 The Sleestaks have secret research facilities in the desert.
4 There is a pylon hidden in Sleesport
5 The Sleestaks can see into the future
6 There is going to be a massive shipment out of the Sleestak treasury soon
7 There are strange lights in the Desert at night
8 The visions you see while on Kobold psychedelics are true
9 the Sleestak treasury is guarded by a pair of giant robots and a squad of some of the toughest members of the Sleestak Mafia
10 the Sleestak Mafia is hiring outsiders for a secret mission (capture escaped robot wizard who can cast Detect Sleestaks at will)
11 The gladiator pits are a good way to make some quick dough (this rumor will come from a kobold, the gladiator pits are the only gambling facility the kobolds are allowed to control)
12 weird strangers are in town (giant intelligent cats, plant people riding rhinos, blue people, a flying squid, etc) are they here on business with the Sleestaks?
13 there's a big reward for a human princess last seen in one of the opium dens
14 the latest fashion craze is growing an eyeball on your chest by swallowing a pill. 
15 giant monsters attack Sleesport every 100 years. The last attack was about 100 years ago.
16 Sleestaks all share the same memories
17 the latest fashion craze is dressing like a dwarf (heavy blue and grey wool) and wearing stilts
18 a human wizard has figured out how to crack the anti magic shell around all of the Sleestak casinos
19 no one is ever seen coming or going out of the Romulon warrior temple
20 a secret treaty between the Sleestaks and the Romulons just went south
21 the latest fashion craze is wearing a tiny robot on your shoulder
22 the latest fashion craze is already passé
23 the latest fashion craze is pretending to be your future self who has traveled back in time to the present
24 some of the dwarf merchant houses of Foulcrest hire bandits to steal their own trade shipments because they have a great insurance policy 
25 the flying ships seen landing in and leaving the Sleestak imperial citadel are diplomats from other worlds
26 the Sleestak Mafia's secret technology comes from a place called Illinois
27 purple camels are highly intelligent, they only pretend to be dumb animals
28 somebody in the caravanserai is hiring thieves to break into the Sleestak imperial citadel
29 there is a beast in the sewers giving the kobolds all kinds of grief, killing and maiming, they need help
30 the guy who runs the giraffe stables is selling a map to treasure in the desert.

Sleestak Mafia Amulet
works like a mystical cellphone.

Sleestak Mafia Tommygun
Once per day, can shoot a ray that turns the target into a robot. It's possible but difficult to save or dodge.  Any character hit, in addition to being a robot, will be under the control of the Shooter.  Over the course of days, weeks or months it's possible for some to resist the Sleestak's control, but they're still robots.  This is where the robot underground comes from.

Otherwise the tommygun shoots lazers that don't have to go in a straight line and do as much damage as a pole arm.   

Ninja vs. Aerobics and Make Game Stuff Right Now

Last night I watched Ninja III: the Domination and this gem of 80's cinema validates completely my notion of Cursed Blades at least if you equate demons with ninjas, let's not worry too much about the details.  Ninja III also validates the writer/directors opinion regarding the erotic possibilities of V8 juice, but that's also a detail we shouldn't worry too much about.  Anyway I recommend the film, though my girlfriend would not.  

Let's change the subject.

Sometimes I'll be thinking about D&D and I'll obsess over something stupid like saving throws or thieves skills or how much damage two-handed swords should do, when what I should be thinking about is how to make my next game more awesome.  I mean I love thinking about saving throws or thieves skills or how much damage two-handed swords should do and we should all do that, we really should but then it'll be game night and I'll have half a map so we'll play Cataan and that's fine and great but not what this blog is about it's about actual D&D-type gaming.  That stuff is like, "Hi my name is Steve and I'll be your server for the evening" and what I need is the stuff cookin up in the kitchen. (more back of house and less front of house)   

So what I'm going to start doing is pretending like the time that I have to noodle over D&D is all I have before the next game. Today I did and this is what I came up with:


Wizard Wastes Encounter Table:
1 wyvern
2 humanoid scouts 
3 merg band (merg are running bird riding mongols, great riders and archers)
4 caravan beleaguered and off route, will pay for guidance, replace with another human group from civilization after this is rolled
5 dinosaur, lone carnivore 
6 dinosaur, group of herbivores
7 Cactus treants, replace with another plant thing after rolled
8 Giant centipedes
9 pteradactyls
10 giant undead spider, weirdly friendly humanoid shaman riding/living inside, replace with another weird thing after rolled


Events Table
Sandstorm: this doesn't happen randomly, it happens when the ruined city is fleshed out by DM, storm exposes city under the dunes

Rumors: beginning players hear all of these, work them into an intro monologue, tales of the crusty hermit style:
1 Ruined structures, ancient carved stones buried in the dunes
2 spending night under temple will turn humans into ghouls, some say ghouls are doomed forever, some say they can be changed back to humans 
3 demon city full of powerful magic is under temple
4 other wizards manses dot the rim of the wastes, some ancient, some new

Some things in the Wizard Wastes:
Oasis: mud, water, bamboo, some trees, likely to encounter
Obelisk: very weathered ancient obelisks dot the desert
Ruin: very weathered stone buildings, a few walls only



Encounters below the Temple:
1 Ghouls
2 giant centipedes
3 toad men subteranean desert dwellers
4 MU and mercs
5 

Toad men traps, involve sandbag weights, stone slabs, random scavenged sharp things, fiber chords, pits, meant to trap ghouls mostly, they'll dig a smooth pit, cover it with weak wood, and cover the whole path with sand.

Toad men holds defended well against ghouls, they tunnel themselves. 
Toadmen weapons are dried root clubs w shards of sharp stone, cactus spine blowgun darts, slow if hit (half move, -2 to hit, effects ghouls)
Toad men go to surface at night only, to hunt desert owls, forage cactus...
Toadmen chief is corrupt, maybe possessed, Maybe has a cursed blade.

Clawblobs: gross oozes with many claws, climb as high as they can. (Put one or two in the roof of the temple) they are dimly intelligent, attack from above by falling on victim, clawing, clinging and enveloping in ooze. Absorb everything but stone, Get bigger when they feed and split. They smell like rotting meat.


Kinds of Monsters:
Monsters that move in from the desert (toadmen)
Monsters that spawn from chaos below (claw blobs)
Monsters from surface that make forrays below (humanoids, other MUs)Monsters originally from surface, corrupted by chaos below (Ghouls) 



This is certainly incomplete, but it came together very fast and it goes a long way towards filling in the most recent map I have started and the area around it.  My advice: Make Game Stuff Now!

Zabel's Return... with tentacles

 Recently I found this painting:

 Zabel's Return by Vardiges Sureniants

It's a nice painting, right?  Queen Isabela of Armenia is returning to the throne.  But wait a minute, what is that guy on the far left looking at?  It really looks like he's staring with a shocked look on his face at something over her head.  It must be that he's supposed to be looking at the crown, but not to disparage mister Sureniants at all, it really looks like he's looking above the crown to me.  is somebody waving at him?  did he spy an assassin?  What's going on?

The only conclusion I've come up with is that there's actually supposed to be cthulhoid tentacles reaching from behind the curtains, and the guy on the left is the only one who made his initiative/surprise roll.  So, I've fixed the painting:

I haven't been able to figure out what the rules are regarding modifying public domain art.  If this isn't legal maybe somebody let me know.

What Happens When a Wizard Dies

When a Magic-User croaks roll a d6:

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN A WIZARD DIES
1	The Magic-User's spirit may take one action per level as if a 20 were rolled for each action. Possible actions are anything a human could be able to perform including speak. Spell casting is not possible. The spirit of the Magic-User appears ghostly and is as intangible as desired.
2	The place of the Magic-User's death is imbued with Mana* equal to the M-U's level x d6. This Mana will manifest gradually over d6X weeks. Manifestations may include:   (d6X=exploding d6, reroll and add if a 6 is rolled)	1	fungi
		2	crystals
		3	stones
		4	man-made objects left in the area
		5	slime
		6	animals in the area
3	The killers hand warps, atrophies and falls off causing d4 damage per level of the M-U. The hand, if not destroyed with a ritual will:	1	Turn to stone and in d6 hours will grow into a:	1	Troll
				2	Gargoyle
				3	Gorgon
				4	Basilisk
				5	Demon
				6	Earth Elemental
		2	Come alive imbued with the M-U's spirit
		3	Fall to the earth and sprout a Creep Tree**
		4	Crystallize, and crystals spread in all directions 100' per day. Max days=M-U's level
		5	Turn into an Imp and serve the nearest evil M-U.
		6	Fall to the earth and spread an undead plague in all directions 100' per day. Max days=M-U's level
4	Every one within 10' per level of the M-U are consumed in ghostly fire. (d6 damage per M-U's level. Save for half damage.)
5	The M-U remains linked to one of his personal possessions the way a Demon is linked to a Cursed Blade.
6	The place of the M-U's death is haunted by their spirit forever.

* Mana can be used in the following ways:

1  Burned up by a M-U to cast a spell.  One Mana is equivalent to a spell slot of the highest level spell the M-U may cast.

2  It can be burned when researching a new spell, one Mana is equal to d12x1000 GP for this purpose.

3  If a Magic-User gives it to a non-Magic-User to consume, the non-Magic-User can cast a single spell of the Magic-User's choice that is in the Magic-Users spell book.

** A Creep Tree is like an evil Ent with twisty ropey roots.  They are really sneaky, surprising 4/6, and they can move really fast in short bursts. They are intelligent and obsessed with ruining cities and civilization.  They will find the biggest and best city and climb the highest building like King Kong or the tree in the courthouse roof in Greensburg Indiana and from there whisper evil things into the dreams of everyone who sleeps in the city.

  

Wyverns are what happens when a Medusa attempts to turn a Werewolf into a Gargoyle and fails.

I started off thinking about my own version of Brendan's differentiating weapon with properties other than how much damage they do  and then I started thinking about pikes and how cool it would be if PCs hired a bunch of pikemen to travel around with them but then I thought pikes are a lousy weapon in a dungeon, you're better off with a shortsword in those tight spaces then I was wondering about what kinds of foes or situations would it make sense for the PCs to hire a bunch of pikemen if not dungeon crawling and the answer to that is wide open spaces and enemies that are something like cavalry since historically that's what pikes were good against so that means beasts, animals, humanoids I suppose too but I like the idea of big scary beasts being fended off by a handful of guys getting paid like 5 gold a day and they're all scared shitless but their wizard boss is like "it'll be fine boys, just jab him if he gets any closer."

Dragons are a big beast but their fire breathing would render pikes useless, so it's gotta be a big beast with no ranged attack, how about wyverns?  Then I remembered how I want to link Lycanthropes with Medusas via Gargoyles like this: Medusa/Gorgon type creatures are really intelligent and really old and for whatever reason their turn to stone effect doesn't work against Lycanthropes the same way it does against every other kind of creature, instead of turning to stone they turn to stone but are able to move and think and they are forced to serve the Medusas who make them.  Maybe the ancient Medusa language Gorgole has a magic effect on them.  Then I think maybe some were creatures turn into something other than Gargoyles maybe their mutants, maybe they look away at the last minute maybe they drank an anti turn-to-stone potion made by a werewolf alchemist I don't know.  The whole Medusa/Gargoyle/Lycanthrope relationship will have to be explored another time, here's the sketch that resulted from the above silliness:

Sentient Spells

Sometimes through accident or strange purpose, a spell acquires sentience, personality and it's own goals or desires. A sentient spell can be scribed into a Magic-User's spell book. (it may already be there when it becomes sentient)  When the Magic-User attempts to cast the spell he or she must convince the spell to create it's effect. This will generally require the M-U to acquiesce to the Spell's requests. When a Sentient spell is encountered or created it's desires/goals should be determined. It will take at least one round to discuss the casting with the spell. The following modifiers should be applied to the reaction roll:

Roll 3d6 Take Highest 2 dice	If the M-U provides the spell with it's desires.*
+1/level lower	If the spell is lower than the highest level that the M-U can cast.
Roll 3d6 Take Lowest 2 dice	If the spell is greater than that which the M-U could normally cast.*

SENTIENT SPELL REACTION TABLE
2d6	Reaction:
2	Refuse and demand
3-5	Argue and request
6-8	Debate or concede 1/2 spell effect
9-11	Concede spell effect
12	Spell effect x2

1d6	Spell's Appearance:	Spell's Initial Method of Arguement/Debate:	Spell's Desire:
1	invisible	Charm	Freedom. If granted the spell may be erased from the caster's spellbook.
2	warm glow	Con
3	shadow	Sulk/Complain	Life Energy. If granted decrease caster's or victim's Hit Points.
4	crackle of electricity	Blame
5	vague, ghostly animal	Veiled Intimidation	Magic. If granted delete magic items (permanent) or spell slots (temporary).
6	inhuman, alien creature	Open Threats

*If a Magic-User attempts to cast a sentient spell that is of a greater level than he could normally cast and he provides the spell with it's desire, then roll 2d6 as normal.

I have not used this at the table yet.  It will probably change a bit when I do.  The above is what I would tell/show the Players. What I wouldn't say (at least not at first) is that stringing the spell along is kind of what this is all about.  Saying you'll give it what it wants, but putting it off.  Also the degree of freedom/amount of HP, magic items or spell slots is deliberately vague.  What ever the spell can convince the M-U to give it is what it gets! 

HUMANOIDS Remix

I've completed another one in my series of Monsters Remixed:

This preview looks all weird and crappy, but the pdf looks good.  In fact, it looks better than some of the previous Monster Remixes because I learned how to convert text to a table in Open Office Writer instead of forcing excel into being a graphics program when it's not.

Humanoids Remixed takes the basic attributes of the humanoid races in ODnD: goblins, kobolds, orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls, ogres, trolls, and giants and mixes them up.  The idea is that instead of just rolling "orc" on a table, or having to make up from scratch something that is more interesting than orcs, the DM rolls one of each die and looks at this page to make a new type of humanoid.  I've rolled up some of these, and it all seems to work, but they need some kind of name I think so something like this should be added:

HUMANOID NAMES
1	Grom-	-ling
2	Dreg-	-lin
3	Trog-	-ek
4	Hob-	-bold
5	Gno-	-erk
6	Ko-	-dob
7	Org-	-s
8	Kil-	-dog
9	Blud-	-rok
10	Krag-	-bones

For example:

DREGDOGS

Fat, three foot tall, 1 HD, nomadic humanoids 200 strong who ride about in their walking castle and wear leather armor.  Their leader is a Lvl 3 fighter and he's got 8 guards with 2 HD.  They keep as a pet a scorpion tailed, winged, headless goat thing with a voracious appetite and 4 HD.  In the lair they've got 2000 cp and 3000gp worth of gems.

In the example above I combined the Nomadic attribute with the result rolled for Lair: Castle.

KILERKS

Gaunt, five foot tall, 1 HD, regenerating cave-dwellers, 60 of em. Lead by one of their own with 5 HD with 10 guards at 2 HD and 40 giant bats.  5000 cp, 1000 sp and a scroll of snake control.

Now all I have left are the humans, undead, save vs. stoners and animals.  

Here's a link to the pdf:

HUMANOIDS Remixed

There's more in the free loot links to the right.