Showing posts with label magic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label magic. Show all posts

1d30 Magical Tattoos



Every tattoo is a ritual in its own way. Each has its unique meaning, purpose, and circumstances that make it important to the person carrying them. They all have an effect on their wearer, but sometimes they have an effect on the world too.

Making a magical tattoo isn't as easy as inking the image on your skin. Depending on what it'll do you may need specific additives for the ink, to tattoo it at a certain time, specific tools, and someone with the skill and knowledge to do it at all. Each has different requirements but if you do your homework and hunt down all the supplies they're possible.

Some you may have seen in the wild (and not recognized) are:

1 Waves on the soles of the feet. Lets you walk on liquids. Usually used for water, but also works on acid, lava, oils, or any other fluid. Doesn't protect against anything but sinking though.

2 Tramp stamp of a bedroll and pillows. Creates a soft force field that supports you 6" above the ground to let you sleep comfortably on any surface.

3 Spiderwebs around the wrists and down the backs of the hands. Lets you draw silk from your hands as if you had spinnerets. You have to eat extra protein to replace what you use, double the mass of the silk you make on top of your normal diet. Or just eat the silk once you're done with it.

4 Gills, arcing behind both ears for freshwater or as slits running down the neck for saltwater. You can only have one type. Lets you breathe underwater, but you can't breathe air while it's active.

5 Hyena jaws stretching ear to ear around the mouth and across the chin. Lets you eat anything organic without trouble.

6 Ship's anchors on the back of each calf. You can't be moved against your will.

7 Moth wing eyespots on both palms. Cause terror in whoever sees them both at once.

8 Full back piece of intertwined snakes. You can shed your skin to heal wounds and regrow lost body parts. Have to eat only raw meat for a month after using it.

9 Tombstone over the heart, inscribed with your full real name and a date. You'll die at midnight on that date and not a second before no matter what happens to you.

10 Half of a chalice on the back of each hand. When you cup your hands they'll start to fill with water. It's as clean as your hands are. If you're drunk they'll fill with wine.

11 Crown of lit candles across the forehead. Glows softly, gives just enough light to see by and can't be turned off.

12 Tiny lockpicks and keys along the sides of the fingers. Lets you open locks by touch, but if you slip in a way that would break a pick it breaks your fingers.

13 Shoulder piece and upper sleeve of leaves blown on the wind. Deflects flying objects, creatures, and other projectiles away from you.

14 Circle of yew trees with gnarled roots between the shoulder blades. Tethers your soul to your body so it can't be stolen, drained, forced out, or slip away when you die.

15 Three concentric circles at the base of the skull. Negates all defenses against possession.

16 Fine chains wrapped around the throat. You can only speak the truth. Everyone recognizes what this tattoo means.

17 Fine chains wrapped around the tongue and across the inside of the mouth. What you say becomes the truth.

18 Stream of sudsy water and bubbles spiraling down the forearm. Your skin repels dirt, grime, and other filth.

19 Roaring bonfire with smoke curling around the calf. You can easily light fires using anything, no matter how wet or hard to start it should be.

20 Butterfly on the ankle. You can't become intoxicated.

21 Bouquet of yarrow and ferns on the thigh. You don't bleed when you're cut.

22 Constellations of tiny stars and suns around the eyes and across the eyelids. Lets you see lies and through illusions.

23 Burning incense at the base of the throat and plumes of smoke wrapping around the neck. Lets you speak any language but not understand them.

24 Coin purse on the hip. You can put small objects and coins inside for safekeeping. There's no way to see what's already inside and you have to root around to retrieve items.

25 Lines of stitching running over and around the entire body at the joints, separating it into discrete segments. You can detach parts of yourself along each line and rejoin them at will.

26 Two roses twined in briars on the sternum. Always inked in pairs. Lets you know if the other wearer's alive, where they are, and how they're feeling at all times.

27 An eye on the inside of each wrist, one open and one closed. Uncover the open eye and all attention is drawn to you, uncover the closed eye and people's awareness slides right past you.

28 Tally marks, always in a highly visible place. Starts with just one and others appear each time you do a specific action or task. The parameters are set by the tattooer and can be anything you've done once before. There's no way to tell what it is just from the marks.

29 Pi symbol on the bottom of the big toe. If you die there's a 6-in-10 chance it was a doppelganger who died, not you.

30 Ring of mushrooms around the waist. You can leave faerie at any time.



1d30 Obscure Power Words



1 Vogue

2 Scrunch

3 Wiggle

4 Invert

5 Geld

6 Shimmy

7 Finagle

8 Mosey

9 Citation

10 Siphon

11 Krill

12 Itch

13 Authenticate

14 Rotate

15 Flex

16 Shuffle

17 Snack

18 Kvetch

19 Schedule

20 Orifice

21 Leak

22 Launch

23 Yodel

24 Saute

25 Baste

26 Slop

27 Encrust

28 Depilate

29 Mambo

30 Puppies

1d66 False Eyes




Should your character lose an eye, they have options. (These ocular prostheses don't restore sight in the missing eye unless noted.)


11 Normal glass. A perfectly serviceable prosthetic that fits comfortably and looks good.

12 Exquisite glass. An absolute masterpiece of glassblowing that perfectly replicates the original eye. Undetectable even up close and indispensable for pranks.

13 Custom glass. Handblown and designed to look like anything except a natural eye. The whole piece is uniformly patterned without a discernable sclera or iris and is (d12):

1 Solid black
2 Robin's egg blue
3 Rust red
4 Milky white
5 Iridescent violet
6 Metallic silver
7 Dichroic foil
8 Marigold millefiori
9 Spiraling canework
10 Ultra-fine multicolored concentric circles
11 Compound eye
12 Uranium glass

14 Prism. Internally faceted crystal backed with platinum foil. Sparkles and casts rainbows in natural daylight.

15 Flashy. Gold inlaid with precious gems in a stylized eye motif. Opal for the sclera, delicate spinal veins, a heliotrope and peridot iris, and black tourmaline pupil. Expensive, gorgeous, and an excellent target for thieves.

16 Livery. An unambiguous sign of friendship, allegiance, or favor with a specific faction or figure. Usually are fine porcelain glazed in the giver's colors and bearing their emblem. Wearing one is an obvious declaration of mutual loyalty and support. Wearing one falsely will get you killed.

21 Cache. A hollow enameled silver sphere that can be removed and opened. Able to securely and discreetly store small items.

22 Locator. Simple acrylic made to match the remaining eye and be supremely unobtrusive. Contains an embedded long-range transponder that lets the wearer be tracked and act as a homing beacon. Can't be turned off but can be shielded.

23 Camera. Black acrylic with a waterproof dataport on the back and a front that matches the wearer's remaining eye. Can covertly record video and still images. Must be removed and physically connected to another system to display or print the captured images. Has macro and telephoto modes, the wearer can't close their eye while using the telephoto function.

24 Radiator. A sturdy aluminum shell containing yards of hair-thin copper wire wrapped around pressed asbestos wafers and joined into a circuit by a tiny ruby. Keeps the wearer comfortably warm and prevents death or injury from cold exposure. Doesn't protect against overheating or burning.

25 Viper. A white ceramic sphere molded with dozens of deep pits encased in dark tinted glass. Lets the wearer see infrared light and heat signatures within their missing eye's field of vision.

26 Scanner. A translucent black acrylic sphere with a glowing blood red LED pupil. Grants lightly pixelated monochrome vision in red. Scans and analyzes the wearer's surroundings, highlighting items of interest and threats with a scrolling text summary of the data. Occasionally attempts to phone home.

31 Familiar. Translucent milky-white acrylic with a transparent lavender star-shaped iris and no pupil. Shows the wearer a cute cartoony creature that acts like a real flesh-and-blood pet, demanding care and attention. Might be real. Doesn't disappear when the eye is removed. Invisible to others.

32 Sentient. A polished dark bronze sphere full of clockwork ticking just on the edge of hearing. Can see and hear what happens around it unimpeded by the wearer's skull and talk to its wearer through bone conduction. Highly opinionated. Will act as an advisor if treated with respect.

33 Quartermaster's. Polished and waxed rosewood inlaid with a gold ring. Lets the wearer accurately count, inventory, and appraise items at a glance.

34 Surveyor's. A hollow high-vis orange enameled steel sphere with a clear crystal lens. Five tiny lead weights hang on fine chains inside and can swing freely. Lets the wearer instinctively measure distances, angles, and dimensions by sight with pinpoint precision.

35 Archeologist's. Half white-veined black marble, half blue lace agate. Lets the wearer see through earth and stone to spot tunnels, halls, chambers, and other buried things. Takes practice to learn to focus beyond the surface of objects instead of on them.

36 Hunter's. Translucent prehnite with an inlaid vertical oval obsidian pupil. Lets the wearer see normally in the dark and in grayscale in absolute darknesPermanently alters the wearer's visual processing to prioritize movement and causes eyeshine in both the remaining eye and prosthetic.

41 Occultist's. Wafers of baleen and narwhal ivory riveted together with electrum pins. Lets the wearer see arcane energy fields, thaumaturgic residue, and ionizing radiation.

42 Vital. Polished ironwood decorated with a fine network of pyrographic veins. Lets the wearer see souls and other electromagnetic fields associated with living things within their missing eye's field of vision.

43 Discerning. Ivory set with a horizontal pupil of polished horn. Lets the wearer see truth and lies as illusory clouds of smoke and flying embers.

44 Voyeur. Carnelian with an inlaid smoky quartz iris. Lets the wearer see through a target's eyes. A target can be anything with eyes that they know exists.

45 Mariner's. Polished red coral set with a pale orange horizontal oval pupil of conch pearl. Prevents the wearer from drowning but doesn't make breathing water hurt any less.

46 Endless. Amber glass holding suspended gold flakes and a skull-shaped bubble in the center. Prevents the wearer from dying but doesn't protect them from injury. Can't be removed by the wearer.

51 Grave. An embalmed eye taken from a raised corpse at least three months dead, packed with a mix of powdered frankincense and cedar sawdust then coated in clear lacquer. Causes the dead and undead to treat the wearer as one of their own.

52 Incorruptible. Tannin-blackened bog oak inlaid with radiating dendritic veins of partially polished bog iron. Protects the wearer from aging and decay as long as they fully submerge themselves in a wetland for a day every year.

53 Frogspawn. A gelatinous mass of thousands of minuscule clear eggs. Produces 1 adult poison dart frog each day. Requires eye drops to keep moist.

54 Milk. A flexible casein shell half-filled with fresh milk, sloshes quietly as it moves. Can provide 1 person with rations for 3 days or feed an unweaned baby or animal indefinitely.

55 Basilisk. Crackled celadon porcelain with a verdegris-coated copper iris and cast iron pupil. Causes anything the wearer stares at to start degrading at an accelerated rate until it ignites or crumbles to dust. The larger an item is the longer it takes to destroy. Small items take about a minute to crumble. Blinking or looking away halts the effect permanently.

56 Evil. A delicate cobalt blown glass bubble with a web of fine glass filaments strung across the inside and a nazar motif decorating the front. Absorbs and contains curses directed at the wearer and lets them lay stored curses on others. Doesn't let the wearer know what the curses are. Shatters if used too strenuously.

61 Hospitable. A hollow electrum sphere scribed inside and out with runes of corporeal and spiritual dissolution, absorption, and containment. The pupil is a pierced hole covered by irising plates of obsidian that the wearer can open and close at will. 2-in-6 chance the eye is empty, otherwise it contains a supernatural entity that's:

Power (d10):
1 Attenuated
2-3 Weak
4-6 Modest
7-8 Strong
9 Legendary
10 Godlike

Temperament (d20, roll twice on odds):
1 Benevolent
2 Charismatic
3 Kind/caring
4 A liar
5 Omnicidal
6 Patient
7 Conniving
8 Chill
9 Straightforward
10 Formal
11 Unhinged
12 Melancholy
13 Selfish
14 Vain
15 Bloodthirsty
16 Protective
17 Possessive
18 Greedy
19 Lazy
20 Proud

Make a reaction roll on first contact.

62 Seer's. A simple crystal quartz ball. Shows the most likely consequences of the wearer's next decision. Needs to be consciously focused on to activate. The harder the wearer concentrates, the farther into the future the vision reveals.

63 Mirror. Nine lightweight silvered glass spheres nested inside each other and held apart by tiny diamond posts. Lets the wearer see out of any reflective surface. Difficult to maintain focus. Do not look directly at self while in operation.

64 Transferal. Blackened iridium set with a triangular aquamarine iris. Lets the wearer transport a target in their line of sight to any location they've seen before.

65 Rewind. Nephrite jade carved with a shallow organic unicursal meander pattern. Lets the wearer reverse the flow of time for a creature or object in their line of sight, sending the target up to 30 seconds back down their causal path and undoing any events that occurred in the rewound interval. Gets hot enough to burn if used too many times in quick succession. Melts if pushed to rewind a target past 30 seconds.

66 Transplanted. A healthy intact eye from an organ donor. Requires surgery to implant and likely won't match the recipient's remaining eye, but fully restores sight. Carries a risk of infection, rejection, haunting, inadvertent acceptance of a pre-existing pact, itching, dryness, and headaches.


Emergency Blanket


A thin sheet of aluminum-coated mylar folded into a light compact package. Produces an item immediately useful to the situation at hand if unfolded during a crisis (ex: a first aid kit, survival shelter, dry fuel, provisions, flare gun, gas mask, oxygen tank, etc.). Otherwise just waterproof, highly reflective, and really warm.

1d40 Magic Pools



(To roll d40 roll a d20 and d6 together. If the d6 is even, take the value on the d20 as-is. If the d6 is odd, add 20 to the d20's value.)

The pool is a...

1 Natural spring 10' deep, brilliant emerald, and perfectly clear. Breaks curses, lifts enchantments, and physically restores anyone who drink or bathes in it. Undead can't come within 30's of its edge.

2 6' wide man-made well bored 30' into the living rock. The virulently cursed jet black water is perfectly level with the stone rim. Grants immortality to anyone who drinks or bathes in it, but makes them count as undead to magic and anyone they meet. Grants wishes that mostly turn out okay if offered a coin. 13' deep layer of coins at the bottom.

3 Six separate wells carved in a circle, each 7' wide and 11' deep. Full of murky pale green mineral water, blood-warm and breathable. Complete prolonged immersion heals spiritual damage and lifts curses. 1 hour submerged restores 1 point of lost INT, WIS, or CHA. 1 day submerged restores 1 lost level.

4 Perfectly smooth undisturbed pool of violet and black water. Superheated and steaming if you're outside but immediately cool and brisk once you're fully submerged. Portal to hell. Climbing out is a bitch.

5 Shallow 20' square basin of quartz quicksand, each grain a perfectly spherical bead. Moves and ripples on its own. Stills and acts as a scrying mirror when a thinking being touches it. No limit on range.

6 Cement pond choked with royal purple waterlilies. Smell wonderful, have hallucinogenic and euphoric pollen. Swarming with magenta fireflies that sequester arcane power in their bodies. Eating them restores magic but makes your mouth glow neon pink.

7 Muddy pool with irregular banks, full of rust-orange water that smells like iron. Erupts in a geyser every 20 minutes. Turns anything that touches the water inside-out.

8 Convoluted metallic clockwork basin full of light machine oil. Restores anything placed in it by rewinding time. (Has settings to accelerate time too, it's just in reverse gear at the moment.)

9 Five-tiered fountain of faceted crystal running with streams of glowing water. Throws off thousands of tiny rainbows. Water can be bottled and carried as a light source, counts as daylight.

10 10' x 20' rectangular reflecting pool fed by a semi-circular basin fountain mounted on the wall. The sides and bottom are decorated with complex mosaics in all shades of gray. Randomly changes the color of anything that touches it. Leaches all color from items submerged more than 3 times.

11 20' circular well of dressed sandstone blocks full of faintly luminous champagne-colored water. A golden statue of a kneeling man with cupped hands raised to his mouth lies on its side at the bottom. The water turns whatever touches it to solid gold.

12 Deep 40' square pool of viscous wine-red liquid at the bottom of a stepwell. Drinking it has no immediate effect. Resurrects you the next time you die. If there's not enough of your body left to salvage, you're reconstituted in the pool.

13 Small round well of clear cerulean water 20' deep with spools of silver thread lying on the bottom. Contains an underwater labyrinth. You can breathe inside as long as you're holding a spool, but all movement is at underwater speed.

14 Tranquil cattail marsh, knee deep and 150' across full of arrowroot, orchids, and sturdy logs. Home to thousands of tiny wish-granting frogs.

15 Flooded impact scar of a meteor, lined with cracked plates of fused glass and surrounded by gem-quality tektites. The water's contaminated with an extraterrestrial virus that absorbs anyone touching it into a hivemind and dries their blood to powder in a week. Apologetic about it.

16 Average suburban swimming pool with a diving board and robo-skimmer. Strips the magic and enchantments from anything dipped in it, making the object the most mundane and unremarkable version of itself possible. Works on normal decorative details and people's charisma too.

17 Turbid charcoal gray lake, its shores covered in smooth fist-sized stones. Small boats, rafts, and floats rest half-beached at the water's edge. Touching or crossing over the water tears your soul from your body and incarnates it in the form of a symbolically appropriate animal. The change is permanent.

18 Hexagonal pool tiled in mica-flecked black marble with steps leading down into the water. Complete immersion binds a victim's soul inside their body, rendering them unable to die no matter how severe their injuries are.

19 Upwards-pointed parabolic dish of pink granite with a series of tiny mouths carved around the rim. The surface is raised in the concentric circles of a standing wave. Absorbs and records everything said within 100 miles of it. You can hear the recordings clearly if you dunk your head under, just indistinct whispers above the surface.

20 15' wide octagonal pool of crystal clear water decorated with colorful geometric mosaics along the sides and bottom. Looks shallow but is infinitely deep. You can see the bottom perfectly but never reach it.

21 12' long kidney-shaped basin of smooth white porcelain filled with a warm thick sterile saline solution. The sides are gently curved and rise a few feet above the liquid's surface, making it hard to climb out. Increases the size of living things. The effect is more powerful the smaller a creature is. Humans might only grow a few inches while microorganisms become giant.

22 Sandy-bottomed cenote of brackish sea green water thick with bioluminescent kelp that grows back instantly when cut. It's delicious, nutritious, and keeps for months when dried.

23 Plunge pool of a 50' tall waterfall that flows in reverse. Water from the pool reduces gravity's pull on the drinker by half, samples taken from higher in the falls are more powerful. Water from the very top of the falls completely negates gravity.

24 45' wide semicircular wading pool of opaque bubblegum pink serum fed by a rusty pipe coming out of the wall. Turns anything that touches it into stuffed animal version of themselves.

25 Circular bowl-shaped glass font 12' across with waist-high walls full of slowly-churning maple syrup. Occasionally visited by giant ants.

26 Jagged flooded crevasse of dark indigo-black water. The water's alive, actually an elemental in the form of a giant moray eel.

27 Gigantic white marble bathtub with gold faucets and drain plug. Can easily fit 20 people. When full lets you travel to any other body of water. If you have a portion of the tub water kept separate and protected in a container you can return to the tub but otherwise it's a one-way trip.

28 15' x 30' rectangular pool 50' deep and glowing with Cherenkov radiation. The gently-circulating water was originally mundane but has become magical, having been irradiated for centuries by the dozens of magic swords embedded in the pool bottom like spent fuel rods.

29 Natural ground-fed spring of frigid sky-blue water, sand and sediment roiling at the bottom. Occasionally bubbles up random toys.

30 Irregular stone pool of liquid amber with a convoluted bottom of glacier-scoured grooves. Hundreds of prehistoric creatures are suspended inside, held in stasis. They wake within minutes of being pulled from the amber.

31 Septagonal quartzite pool 10' on a side and encrusted with clusters of glittering crystal points. Converts non-mineral material into gem quality crystals of random minerals.

32 Steaming hot spring of milky white water with a metallic sheen. Lets you speak with the dead when the surface is completely still.

33 15' deep crater flooded with luminous silvery water. Curses whoever touches it with lycanthropy. If they've been bitten by something since the last moonrise they become a were-[that creature] instead.

34 Deep cold natural spring festooned with stalactites and stalagmites feeding a subterranean river. Home to a giant catfish named Clement who causes earthquakes when he's upset and accurately predicts the future when he's happy. Will do just about anything for processed fish food pellets and junk food.

35 Round cast iron basin 13' across and 5' deep, coated with an iridescent layer of oil and full of cobalt-tinged flames. Surrounded by neatly tended rows of popcorn.

36 Star-shaped pond full of pearlescent lilac oil that randomly swirls, stops, and reverses direction under its own power. Anything that touches it becomes unstuck in time. No control over the effect at first.

37 Massive 11-sided oak vat made of interlocking staves taken from used barrels and casks. Full of dark beer, the bottom layered with rose gold votive figurines of bundled wheat sheaves. Overpowering smell of baking bread. Home to a displaced harvest goddess.

38 Triangular well 8' on a side with midnight blue water full of floating silver flakes. Transforms the drinker's body into living liquid silver that can shapeshift into any form.

39 Waist-deep white-tiled channel 5' wide cut in a complex meandering loop that covers a 70' x 40' area. The refrigerated opalescent coral fluid circulates through the course in a gentle current. It's a liquid computer that holds massive archives of data from multiple worlds and across millennia. Intelligent, with a true AI and a verbal/holographic interface. Heartbreakingly lonely.

40 Ostentatious multi-tiered platinum fountain with dozens of jets shooting interlacing laminar arcs of water, glittering with threads of shifting color like wisps of ink that never disperse. Reads as extremely magical and makes anything that touches the water also appear to be magic, but doesn't actually do anything. Looks impressive though.












Delver's Tools



Crash Bar
3' long solid metal push bar painted bright red. Heavy. Turns one door into a portal out to a safe space, lasts for 5 minutes then melts. Has to be solidly bolted onto the door.

Spotlight
A flexible 10" wide film disc that floats and shines with sunlight when unrolled. Almost always points where you want, 1-in-8 chance it shines directly in your eyes.

Wall-In-A-Can
Metal canisters of compressed quick-curing epoxy. Pull pin, throw, and take cover. Explodes into a polymer net that expands and hardens into a 5" thick solid wall. Airtight and granite hard when fully cured, 3 minutes working time. Can completely seal off a 15'x15' area.

Smartpole
A 10' pole with built-in sensors to read air quality, electromagnetic and arcane fields, temporal distortions, physical force, temperature, and detect metal within a 30' range. Wirelessly relays data to a convenient wrist-mounted display.

Doorknockers
Shaped charges designed to neatly but firmly disagree with locks. Come in different sizes: Tiny (suitable for chests and padlocks), small (for single doors), and large (for vaults, city gates, and blast doors). Self-adhering and silent.

Plover(tm) Microscout
A tiny quadcopter with cameras mounted on the top and underside. Painted matte bubblegum pink to foil monsters' color vision. Has a remote control mode (range 150') and autonomous mode with a simple AI to guide it (600' range, no video stream past 150' but still records). Completely silent running.

Traveler's Tools



Packed Animals
A baggie of bright colored capsules that expand into life-sized animated foam sponge animals when soaked in water. Each can carry up to 200lbs of cargo or pull 400lbs. They shrink back down and go dormant if they dry out completely. Do not tolerate riders. A bag contains 3 mules, 2 donkeys, 1 ox, 1 camel, 1 draft horse, 1 llama, and 1 elephant.

Tourist's Map
A pamphlet-sized glossy folding map that shows local spots of interest and hidden gems within a 2-hour trip. Focuses on places to eat, shopping, entertainment, natural beauty, and cultural and historical attractions. Updates itself as you move. Occasionally reveals dark and terrible secrets. Doesn't work in places you're familiar with.

Trekking Pole
Sturdy ironwood walking stick with a 5" titanium spike on the end and a chime bell tied to the grip with a worn friendship bracelet. Gives its bearer unfailingly good morale and immunity to mind and emotion-affecting influences.

Money Belt
A nondescript black leather belt with a zippered compartment hidden on the inner surface. Chance it creates enough money to cover 1 day worth of basic living expenses each dawn.
Roll d20:
1-9 Nothing
10-13 Coins
14-15 Paper bills
16 Promissory note (legit)
17 Gems
18 Unusual/obscure currency
19 Foreign currency
20 Counterfeit [roll d10+9]

Sunhat
Wide-brimmed gray straw hat with a brass star medallion on a black silk hatband and black glass beads stitched around the brim's edge. Collects light during the day and releases it at night. Tapping the medallion turns it on and off. Also has strobe, emergency SOS, and cycling RGB modes.

Multifunction Compass
A clear octahedral crystal set in a stainless steel frame hanging from a steel snake chain. The fluorescent green indicator needle floating inside can swing freely to point in any direction on the X, Y, and Z axes. A button on the frame cycles the compass between modes to let it detect and lead to magnetic north, food, water, shelter, danger, treasure, or friends.

Miscreant's Tools



Crowdcaller
A painfully shrill brass whistle on a ball chain necklace. Summons a group of unrelated people to the area it's blown. Takes 2 minutes to gather enough bodies to cause a distraction or cover an escape. The assembled crowd doesn't know why they're there, they just felt compelled to show up.

Crowd's temper/behavior (d10)
1 Confused
2 Restless
3 Quickly disperse
4 Social and cheerful
5 Block party
6 Flash mob
7 Street brawl
8 Riot
9 Angry mob
10 Angry mob chasing you

Peephole
Tiny glass marble set in the middle of a 1" wide steel disc. Push it against a solid surface and it shows you what's on the other side with a fisheye distortion. Takes a few second to sink in and activate and to pry back out.

Granny Cart
A two-wheeled collapsible wire shopping basket with a long handle and cute floral-print canvas liner. Can hold up to 500lbs of stuff but never weighs more than 40lbs. Anyone looking in only sees groceries or thrift store and flea market finds.

Undercity Map
Pocket-sized folding map of thick waterproof paper. Shows the city's sewers, maintenance and utility tunnels, and service corridors in minute detail. Automatically redraws itself to show structural changes and current hazards, including guards and other people.

Anonymizer
An officious-looking matte black clipboard with a random assortment of forms. Blurs your image on live CCTVs and surveillance footage leaving only a pixelated mess. People can see you face to face but have trouble describing you or even remembering you were there once you're out of sight.

Payphone
A bright blue handset ripped from a public phone and trailing 2' of metal-sheathed cable. Can make calls anywhere no matter what signal's like for other phones. Completely untraceable. To make a call touch a coin to the exposed wires at the end of its cable. Each coin buys 3 minutes of call regardless of denomination. You can't use the same coin twice.

Caver's Tools



Canary Torch
A lightweight knurled metal tube with a domed crystal lens on one end. Glows in the presence of breathable air.

Walking Cam
A spider-legged automaton that can climb any surface. Strong enough to tow an attached person up a sheer wall. Can climb by itself to a specific location and set pitons for others to follow. Collapses into a 7" diameter orb.

Autocaisson
A heavy iron belt of sealed boxes 3" on a side. Explosively deploys in a cave-in or flood to form an interlinked spherical metal shell around the wearer and hold back fallen rubble or water.

Airbag
A light silk vest with padding along the spine and collar. Explosively inflates into a protective cocoon if the wearer falls, is thrown, or suffers an impact.

Glowstick
A four-color paint pen that writes on any surface and never runs out. The ink glows and self-erases by sublimation on command. Shake before using, makes a chiming noise.

Shrieker Box
A handheld rectangular device with a screen and dials on the front and a cone-shaped emitter on the top. Uses sonar to measure the thickness and depth of surrounding material when pointed at a solid surface. Can measure from 1/2" to 2 miles. Dials control the signal's strength and sensitivity. Works best on stone, do not operate on living tissue.

1d30 Distinctive Rocks



Notable monoliths, landmarks, and geological formations.

1 Good Old Eddie. A cluster of ridges and chunks of sandstone about 40' up the side of a cliff, eroded in a way that kind of looks like a human face in profile in viewed from the right angle.

2 A single massive menhir, 6' wide at the base and 42' tall. Stands alone in the middle of a pasture. Called the Cowstone by locals and the Fieldstone by folks in the next town over.

3 The Rolling Stone. A house-sized granite boulder balanced on a smaller partially buried boulder. Rocks at the slightest touch but never enough to fall. Covered in moss and lichen.

4 Proclamation Rock. An ancient black marble stele set at the crossroads. Inscribed with the same decree translated into several languages, damaged by the elements and "scholars."

5 The Steps. A small conical hill of hexagonal basalt columns weathered into easily climbable 'steps.' A favorite playground for the local kids.

6 The Lady. A partially-buried monumental statue of a matronly woman carved from dovetailed blocks of basalt. Only her face is uncovered, smiling serenely up at the sky. Locals call her Mama.

7 King's Cairns. A series of five fieldstone cairns stacked into precise pentagonal pyramids each 15' tall. Said to glow green-gold on Midsummer's Eve. Can't be knocked over.

8 An ancient stone wall built with cyclopean masonry. Has an open arch door at the north end. Can't be disassembled, locals don't talk about it.

9 A huge carved stone jar, big enough to hold a cow. It's traditional to put a rock on top when you pass to help weigh down the lid. No one knows what's inside.

10 The Dancers. A 60' wide circle of 18 slender white stones set on a hilltop overlooking three towns. Locals are physically unable to agree on how the stones got their name. Nothing will grow inside the circle except unusually lush clover.

11 Giant's Table. A huge slab of pale green dolomite 7' wide, 16' long, and 4' tall. Every side's carved with itchingly familiar spiral petraglyphs. Said to be an ancient altar.

12 Boundary stones. Chest-high pillars of mica-flecked gray stone set in a row stretching for miles, marking the border of a country that disappeared centuries ago.

13 An eroded outcrop that looks like a standing bear. Offerings are given for protection from actual bears, luck in hunting and fishing, and as thanks after killing a bear.

14 A boulder naturally eroded into a skull. A little spooky but mostly just neat.

15 Bell stones. A blockfield of smooth pink-striped boulders that ring in pure musical notes when struck. Some ring in ultra- and infrasonic ranges, marked with X's and avoided.

16 The Hermitage. A weathered granite dome hundreds of feet tall, standing alone over low forested hills. Said to be home to the spirit of an exiled priest.

17 A cluster of small granite domes with sheer sides and rounded tops, making a range of knobby hills. Locals say they're actually sealed tombs, alternately full of treasure or haunted by the forgotten dead.

18 The Platter. A shallowly dished surface of seamless black stone interrupting the meadow wildflowers. Reptiles flock to it to bask. Covered in medicinal lichen.

19 Witches' Tower. A narrow basalt butte hundreds of feet high, weathered into hexagonal columns. Has a tiny cabin on top, rumored to be inhabited but the climb is too difficult to check. Sometimes there are lights at the summit.

20 A wide canyon filled with wind-sculpted sandstone spires, arches, and pedestals. Home to several species of psychoactive arachnids.

21 A slender natural stone bridge a quarter mile long and wide enough for one person at a time, arching high over a river gorge. Walking across alone by the light of a waxing moon is a rite of passage among locals.

22 Devil's Mouth. A fin of rock high up the mountain with an oval hole bored through it to show the sky on the other side. Much, much larger than it looks from the ground.

23 A mile-long ridge of marble plates and spikes, arranged in a way that resembles an exposed spine. Thought to be bad luck to talk or make noise near them.

24 Petrified forest. Acres of fossilized wood preserved as brilliant agate and sparkling quartz. Some of the trees are still standing. What people think are trunks are just the branches and upper twigs of the massive still-buried trees.

25 The Fingers. Two linked rings of delicate sea stacks rising from the waves. Said to imprison the storm that will end the world. The water within the rings is always violently churning.

26 A massive rust-orange sandstone monolith that glows blood red at sunrise and sunset. According to legends it's sleeping. Offerings of liquor and grain are given to keep it that way.

27 God's Palette. A sheer cliff of pure salt banded and swirled with vivid rainbow hues. High concentrations of heavy metals. Wildlife and locals know better than to quarry or eat it.

28 The Fault. A sheer cliff revealed after an earthquake split the mountain in half. Rows of human silhouettes seared across the entire face.

29 Burning Mountain. A giant dome of clear quartz, frosted white by wind and weathering. The name refers back to generations ago when it was pristine and caught the sun like a lens.

30 The Drifter. A 12' tall oblong menhir of smoothed obsidian, translucent around the edges. Looks vaguely humanoid like it may have once been a rough statue. Moves under its own power within the 16-mile circle of its territory. Never seen moving. Considered a guardian and good luck by the locals. Feels like it's watching you.

True Name Variations

The idea of names having power is ancient and mythic and practically universal across cultures. A magical name that describes the essence of a thing and gives the Namer control over it is a classic, and of course it seems like hubris when the Namee is more powerful than the Namer. I love it and thought I'd play around with some twists on the old mainstay:

0) If you know something's True Name you don't gain power over it. It gains awareness of you and starts taking an interest.
Whatever primal force you're trying to contact goes "Hey, who are you and how do you know my name?" Like if a frog suddenly called you by name you would probably pay attention and engage with it at least a little, even if you could just walk away.

1) A True Name is accumulated, not a single thing.
You're not born with a True Name and not everybody has one. You end up with one as you gain nicknames, epithets, aliases, and titles throughout your life. Once you hit a threshold of Names the collection of all of them becomes your True Name. Reciting all of someone's Names in sequence is what has power, and it does require all of the Names, including private pet names and what their parents called them when they were little.

2) True Names change frequently depending on where someone is and what they're doing at the moment.
Only one Name out of an entity's collection is the True Name, but which one it is changes with the aspect of their persona they're expressing. If you want to get the attention of The Charnel-Daubed Lady of War when she's at home with her family, you need to summon "Mom." 

3) There's only one True Name out of an entity's collection of Names, and it's the one they like best and think describes them the most accurately.
Their True Name will change over time. To summon them you need to know them well enough to correctly choose the current True Name from their entire collection of Names.

* Giving people and entities new Names can alter them, but also protect them by increasing the size of their collection of names. While they don't have any power to control, Names definitely have the ability to influence their bearers.


Making Magic Items


Creating new magic items is easy. Would one of your players like something specific for their character? Do you just want to make something new and fun? Go for it. Magic items are an exercise in creativity more than anything else. Ignore balance and write something cool. (Seriously, don't waste time worrying about whether an item will be overpowered or game-breaking. That's not actually an issue and if you do run into a problem, talk to your friends and sort it out like adults.)

Magic items all have three basic parts: What it is, what it does, and a name.

What it is

The physical description of the item. The materials, quality and workmanship, design, decorative features, and what type of object it is (a hat, weapon, scepter, etc).

There are endless options here. Literally. The only limit on what form an item takes is your imagination.

A few considerations while writing:
  • Do you want it to be flashy and ostentatious or misleadingly mundane-looking? Some magic items obviously look magic, ornate and impressive in a form of arcane aposematism, but simple enchanted items are a staple of folklore and fairy tales. A worn cloak, old boots, a simple wooden staff, or bone flute; things that don't look impressive but are powerful nonetheless.
  • Do you want it to be thematically appropriate? Since the item can be made of any material and crafted in any shape, do you want it to have symbolic references to what it does worked into the design? Puns or ironic references too. Shoes of Waterwalking that are cement clogs would be hilarious and you know it.
  • Do you want form to be related to function? What the item is doesn't have to reflect what it does at all. This is related to how much symbolism is in an item, but more prosaic. It's the choice between earrings that let you eavesdrop, a drinking glass that does the same thing when its mouth is pressed to a solid surface, or a silk shirt with a gaudy ear pattern that lets you hear better. They all technically do the same thing, and all have related symbolism, but are each increasingly removed from the actual ears they augment. This is magic, form doesn't have to follow function if you don't want it to.

The description is the most important of the three parts because it's what makes the item memorable. With the description to bring it to life it's a magical item of power. Without that description to highlight it in the player's minds it's just another line on the character sheet and might as well be a feat instead of a distinct object existing on its own.

What it does

The item's power and anything special it grants the user. Also curses.

Magic items have traditionally been a form of horizontal character advancement and growth. A way for characters to gain abilities that are unrelated to their classes, like a feat but transferable to whoever holds the item (unless it's cursed). Also a way for characters to get better at what they already do of course, but the weird abilities are more fun.

Some considerations:
  • How strong is it? Is this the magical equivalent of a disposable lighter, useful in several small ways but mostly a convenience, or is it a significant and extremely potent object? This isn't a question of whether the item is overpowered, it's the decision of where it lies along the spectrum of "trinket" to "reality-ending folly."
  • Are there any requirements or consequences to using it? You might want to make it consumable or only usable at certain times or under specific conditions. Maybe there's a terrible side effect or cumulative cost. If you add restrictions do it in a way that enhances the flavor of the item. That makes it feel more like a real, organic creation than if you only try to constrain it out of fear that it's OP.
  • How closely does it interact with the rules of the game? Do you want the item to do something directly related to the rules like giving bonuses to rolls or extra attacks in combat, or do you want its powers to be more freeform and able to be used creatively. Where does it fall on the scale from a +1 sword (rule-affecting) to spiderclimb boots (freeform)?

A name

A distinctive name is almost as important as a good description. You want the magic item to be special and stand out from the character's mundane equipment, and a name that sparks the players' imaginations will do that. Your players don't need to know the name as soon as they find the item, but you should know it and they should find out eventually.

Some considerations:
  • How much do you want the name to reveal about the item? You could choose a descriptive name like the classic [Item] of [Effect] formula that reveals its function or be more circumspect. Give a name that describes the physical properties of the item or is an oblique reference to what it does. What are Moonsilk Gloves? Who knows! Your players will want to find out though. (They let the wearer phase their hands through solid objects and are invisible except under moonlight. You don't want to meet the spiders the silk comes from or the witches who knit it.)
  • How much does the name reveal about the game's world? Names referring to an item's place of origin, past owners, and notable events they were involved in (ex: dragonslaying) reveal as much about the setting as they do about the item itself.
  • How much do you want to reference real-world mythology? Including items from or inspired by mythology is an RPG staple, but think carefully about how common you make them and how you present them. Are they the literal tools and gifts of the gods lying around in the mortal realm? Is it just a name that a mortal creator bestowed on the item because they were feeling inspired? A coincidence? There are plenty of ways to work mythology in. (I like the idea of an Excalibur that has nothing to do with kingship and whose only special ability is that it always cuts cheese into exactly equal portions.)

That's all there is to making magic items. Be creative, write something you think would be fun, and run with it. I believe in you.



The Triple Door




Made of solid oak with birdseye maple veneer and patinated copper hardware, the Triple Door is a tasteful addition to any dungeon and the ultimate in discontinuous dimensional transportation. The top and bottom halves of this spatially untethered dutch door open onto different places, and lead to a third location when opened together as a unit.

Call 1-800-FUN-HOUS today to discuss financing and schedule your installation!

Two-Part Potions


Most potions are pre-mixed concoctions with an indefinite shelf life. These ones are extremely volatile and have to be stored as separate reagents until they're ready to be used, then you mix them together and stand back. They're perfectly safe if you follow the directions and are careful. Really. Don't worry about it.

Casting Putty (Copy Paste)
Comes in a kit containing: 1 mixing cup, 1 stir stick, 1 gallon jug of liquid putty precursor (Cherenkov blue), 1 eyedropper bottle of curing reagent.
Fill the mixing cup with liquid putty to the fill line and add exactly 7 drops of curing reagent. Stir until the mixture becomes thick and gray, then pour over the item you want to make a mold of. The putty will spread itself evenly over the object and harden into a thin, translucent shell before cracking away in neat sections.
To create your castings remove the original object and reassemble the shell sections. The empty mold-shell will create a superficially perfect duplicate of the original object in any material you request. It cannot reproduce internal structures or moving parts. One mold-shell can produce 1d12 duplicates before crumbling to dust. Each kit has material to create 6 mold-shells.

Onmihesive
Packaged in metal boxes with hinged lids and two compartments. One holds a screw-lid can of glue and the other a small atomizer bottle of catalyst.
Coat the surfaces you want to bond with a thin layer of glue using the brush on the inside of the can's lid. Spray the surfaces with catalyst, then press together and hold in place until cured.
Omnihesive creates a literally unbreakable bond, gloves are highly recommended. Open time is 6 seconds.

Hypermelt
Distributed in flexible plastic tubes protected inside a heavy-duty metal outer tube with a screw-off top. The inner tube contains a soup of reagents and sealed glass ampules of catalyst. One end is prominently marked with arrows, indicating the plastic there is thinner, designed to dissolve first so you can direct the acid spray.
Remove the inner tube from the outer metal casing and activate it by bending it until the glass ampules crack. (Be sure to break them all for best results.) Shake until warm, then point the end marked with arrows at the object you want to destroy. If the tube doesn't start spraying acid within 10 seconds or becomes uncomfortably hot, drop it and run.
Hypermelt is an aggressive, explosive acid that will dissolve practically anything, even magic, and the few things it can't destroy it corrodes into ruin. Don't touch the residue, don't breathe the fumes. Gloves are useful for moral support, but functionally useless. One tube can dissolve up to 100 cubic feet of material.

Mixtanium (Viridian Stuff)
Packaged as two sticks of clay, 1 yellow (2lb) and 1 blue (1lb), wrapped in resealable plastic film inside a plastic tube.
Mix 1 part blue to 2 parts yellow until soft and evenly green. Apply to the item you want to mend and/or sculpt as desired and allow to cure.
Mixtanium is a space-filling adhesive putty that can be easily shaped and is indestructible once cured. The cured putty isn't magical, but reacts to detection spells as if it were. Curing time is 12 minutes. Harmful if swallowed.

Orange Stuff (Liquid Dragon)
Comes in a sturdy cardboard box. Two bricks of firm clay, 1 red (12oz) and 1 yellow (12oz), individually wrapped in reusable metal foil.
Mix equal amounts of red and yellow until evenly orange and warm. Apply to the surfaces you want to weld, press together (clamp if necessary), and retreat to a safe distance.
Orange Stuff is a self-igniting pyrotechnic compound used for welding in remote locations. It burns hot as dragonfire and will weld any metal (or slag anything else). It works underwater and cannot be smothered. Do not use in enclosed spaces. Wash hands thoroughly after use. Working time from activation to ignition is 6 minutes.

Guardian Trees


The Coin Tree

A holy cypress, the eldest tree in a sacred grove, stands a short walk off the road. Over the centuries generations of travelers and locals have driven a fortune of coins into the trunk and lower branches for luck. Its bole glimmers in the sunlight that filters through the canopy, more metal than wood. Below the soil its roots are carved with sigils that can still be made out, if the leaf litter is cleared away and one takes the time to decipher the healed scars left on the bark.

The coin tree is studded with 7000 GP worth of coins in mixed currencies. They can be retrieved if you spend a month prying them out of the wood, or the raw metal can be collected from the ashes if you cut the tree down and burn it.

The tree is a fairly famous shrine. Locals and travelers passing by will attack anyone defacing it.

Killing the tree will wake and free the malicious entity it was imprisoning. The entity will feel indebted to whoever releases it and will try to fulfill one minor wish. If you don't use the wish immediately, it will follow you until you do. If you don't use the wish within a month, the entity will become aggressive and start trying to force you to wish so it can discharge its debt.

The wish will be fulfilled in the spirit it's intended, no monkey's paws.

Once the wish is granted and the entity is completely freed it will roam, spreading chaos and indiscriminately slaughtering anything in its path. There's a good chance it will come after the ones who released it because they know what it is and where it came from.

The Entity

Amorphous shadow form. 8 HD, gains 1 HD with each kill. Fear gaze attack, grappling tentacles, 1d12 slashing attack. 3 attacks per turn, +5 to hit, move 50'.

The entity can be sealed away by creating a new holy tree. The party must discover the sigils carved into the roots of the original tree, replicate them on another living tree, and force (or trick) the entity to touch it. As soon as the entity touches the holy tree it will be safely imprisoned again.


The Rag Tree

A gnarled, knotty hawthorn growing on the shore of a perfectly clear spring. Its branches are tied with bright ribbons and strips of cloth, left as offerings for healing or charms against misfortune.

Once a month you can cure a wound or lift a curse by leaving an offering on the tree. Tie a piece of cloth onto a branch and prick a finger on one of the thorns (1d4 damage). By the end of the next day you'll be healed.

If you can remove one of the cloths without being pricked by any thorns (DEX save), it will act as an amulet against whatever misery it was offered to cure. Its power lasts for a month once removed from the tree and will protect its bearer three times. It visibly wears and becomes tattered as it ages or is used.

Protects Against:

  1. Poison
  2. Harm (wounds)
  3. Sickness
  4. Paralysis
  5. Ambush
  6. Death
  7. Theft
  8. Curses
  9. Haunting (incorporeal things)
  10. Fear
  11. Scrying
  12. Possession (and mind control)

Damaging the tree in any way will unleash the stored curses on the vandals, one after another. Gain a new random curse each month. The curses stack and cannot be removed with offerings to the tree.


The Iron-Bound Oak

A massive hollow oak bound in iron bands and chains to keep the sundered trunk from splitting further and falling to pieces. A thick ring of black iron is set in the earth five feet out from the trunk and supports a simple iron post and chain fence that circles the tree to keep people back. The townsfolk have many conflicting stories about the tree but they all agree that you don't go there at night, don't touch the iron, and if something calls to you from within the hollow, don't answer.

The grove where the iron-bound oak grows is an hour walk outside of town. It and the surrounding woods are peaceful, but subtly wrong. There are no wild animals within a quarter mile of the tree. Domesticated animals will refuse to go beneath the oak's branches.

Passing beyond the iron chain and going into the trunk has a chance of transporting you to another plane or an alternate reality.


Time Entering Trunk Transported Elsewhere (roll d% under)

Day                  36

Night              51

Dusk or Dawn          76

Full or New moon         100 (Bon voyage!)

Returning through the tree is possible only on the full and new moons. (Roll d% under 3 to return.)

Sometimes things emerge from the tree and are trapped inside the circle of the chain fence. They will ask anyone present to help them get out. Mortals who answer or speak to them are enthralled (WIS save) and forced to switch places with them inside the tree.

Maintaining the iron bands and fence circle is a traditional part of the town's summer festival. The ritual work is done at high noon on the solstice and has been performed faithfully every year for as long as anyone can remember. The idea of not inspecting the tree or even delaying the festival by a day is horrifying to the townsfolk, though none of them are able to explain exactly why.


Thinking About Wards

Warding is one of my favorite types of magic. It's extremely flexible and there are so many flavors that it's easy to work into just about anything. I'm always disappointed when games reduce warding to basic shields and 'protection from'-type spells, or ignore it in favor of flashy destructive magic. Immolating your foes at will isn't always the answer. It's practically boring compared to setting guardian spirits behind you to tear apart your pursuers.

I boiled down the different variations of wards I've seen and came up with six general types that spells tend to resemble. Description and flavor-wise a spell could be anything, but the effects and power sources usually fall into at least one of these main categories:

1) Creates a physical barrier that intruders can't pass. This is stuff like magic circles and boundary stones that exclude or contain entities. Anything trying to get into or escape the warded area runs into a solid wall of force that keeps them from entering or leaving the space.

2) Repels intruders with the sight or physical properties of an object. This is "garlic repels vampires" and "fae can't touch iron"-type stuff. There's not a physical force keeping intruders out, but they're blocked by the properties of whatever's set out along the boundary. It might have an actual effect or the intruder might just believe it does, but it's more applied folklore than magic.

3) Repels intruders by invoking a Power to protect the space. This is when the warded area is guarded by a god or guardian spirit that the caster has politely asked to help. Anything that tries to get in either can't, gets thrown out, or has to fight the guardian entity. The key thing is that the guardian is helping because of an entreaty from the caster, not compulsion.

4) Tethers a force to guard a space. This is stuff like the spirits of ancient warriors bound to statues in a tomb to guard it forever. It's the same as 3, except the guardian(s) is there and acting the way they are because of a compulsion from the ward's magic.

5) Makes an area actively hostile to intruders. Things like holy ground or threshold magic, where an intruder either can't enter at all without an invitation or are severely weakened while inside the bounds of the ward. May also burst into flames.

6) Acts as an alarm. Intruders can pass across freely, but it pings the caster or otherwise records their presence. Sometimes acts as a trigger for other spells.

That's it. There are your archetypes. You can break down most types of protective magic and they'll fit into one or more of them. Try it out.

I also thought about why warding regularly gets downplayed or entirely overlooked in games and settled on two main reasons:

First, cowardice. Like I said before, warding is extremely flexible. Your options for using it change with each new space you visit. Codifying how the magic could potentially interact with different architectural elements vs things inside rooms vs open space in a way that produces satisfying rules would be an effort. So designers don't and we end up with boring and generic protection spells. Cowardice. There's no need for that level of exactness and specificity in rules, just give the players things and trust them to have fun.

Second, flavor. Warding is usually complex, static magic with (by definition) sharply marked boundaries. Making wards takes careful planning, time, and precise spellwork because they're supposed to be major enduring pieces of protection. It gives you things like castle cities where the wards have been active for centuries, family homesteads protected over generations, and magic barriers in the far-off wilderness that have barred monsters since before living memory.

It's good stuff and works great for locations the players might visit, but not so well for the players themselves while they're on the road adventuring. Any wards players might use in the field would have to be made fast. Improvised work cobbled together from whatever was lying around or in their pockets. Protections that would serve to secure a campsite for a few days or seal an area of the dungeon so nothing can sneak up on them, but that wouldn't last long after the party leaves.

In that spirit, here are some ephemeral wards made from basic supplies that can be easily carted around and deployed as needed.


1d12 Ephemeral Wards
1) Water from a holy lake or well. Works until it evaporates.
2) Blessed bones. Animal? Human? Something else? Yes! Each have a spirit bound to it that awakens and attacks when an intruder comes within range.
3) A stone. Seal evil entities by way of plonking a big rock on them.
4) Teeth. Summons a ghostly maw to devour unwelcome visitors.
5) Smoke. Creates solid walls of haze between fires burning at the edges of the safe zone.
6) Carved pebbles. Put them in conspicuous places around the area, the sigils on them repel interlopers.
7) A design of footprints pressed into the dirt by dance. Creates a palisade of invisible spikes from each print.
8) Sootblack collected from a sacred fire. A figure made of greasy lampblack tirelessly pursues anyone who crosses the ward's perimeter.
9) Fallen leaves arranged in careful patterns and drifts. Forcefully imparts the idea of gravity to pin anyone who enters the space uninvited.
10) Chunks of empty honeycomb. Houses a swarm of spectral bees. If anything passes by they fly to warn the caster with a waggle dance.
11) Holy texts. Stack them like bricks into a solid wall that'll seal doors and portals.
12) Braided cord made of hair. Delicate and so fine it's almost invisible. If anything breaks it, it starts screaming and won't stop.


(If you'd like more stuff in this vein, Luke Gearing's created a magnificent batch of wards that I absolutely love.)


Message for you

Message is a classic spell, one of the oldest and most useful out there. Here are some variations on it for when you want to play with magical telephony.


Black Fax
Duration:  3*[caster's level] minutes
Components: Your best imitation of a dial tone

Instead of conveying information this spell fills the target's head with darkness and static. Thought and movement is impossible for the duration of the spell while they receive the warped message. When it ends the target knows exactly who cast the spell. The target can't respond to anything happening around them, but can choose to make an INT or WIS save. On a success the spell only lasts half its normal duration, on a fail the duration doubles.


Spam
Components: A list of strangers' names and a shard of your soul

Sends an identical message to every intelligent creature within 1000'. They can't respond or tell who sent it. The spam message preempts or interrupts any other communication a target might receive. Spam can be cast as a cantrip to send 1 message, or with a spell slot to send [spell level] messages in sequence.

The message's subject is:

  1. Advertisements
  2. Unsound medical advice
  3. Sketchy pharmaceuticals 
  4. Celebrity gossip
  5. Risky financial advice
  6. Thinly-veiled wire fraud
  7. Opinion poll
  8. Gambling
  9. Religious screed
  10. Vampire transformation testimonials


Party Wire
Components: 1 SP

Sends the same message to up to 10 targets the caster chooses. Each recipient can respond, but their return messages will get garbled if they try to reply at the same time and talk over each other. After the caster sends their message and hears all the responses roll even or odd. On even only the chosen targets got the message. Odd, the caster accidentally connected another person into the spell and they heard everything. GM decides who the extra person is.


Landline
Duration: Up to 10 minutes
Components: A little bit of your dignity

Lay face-down on the ground with your forehead pressed into bare soil. While in that position you can speak to 1 target and carry on a normal two-way conversation with them no matter where they are as long as their feet are touching the ground.

Spell Reeds


Magic is inimical to human life. It consumes the unwary and eventually burns out even the most judicious mage. If overused or worked without proper shielding raw magic will taint its surroundings, rendering the land toxic and unusable for generations. There are several species of plant known to withstand the noxious effects of magic-poisoned soil. Some, such as common spell reed (Phragmites incantus), even thrive and can be employed to reclaim land in the wake of magical disasters or pollution from long-term arcane discharge.

Spell reed is a hyperaccumulator that, when planted in tainted soil, absorbs and condenses any magical residue present. Research shows they are effective in mitigating all forms of arcane phenomena, including even well-contained spellwork such as ancestral curses or enchantments that some may consider beneficial. The condensed mystic power is sequestered within the plant's tissues and may be harvested for proper containment and disposal. As with any such project, the speed at which territory can be rendered safe for habitation varies depending on the severity of the contamination and the number of reeds planted. If following best practices, it is usually possible to reclaim up to an acre of land within 1 to 2 months, though heavily tainted soil may require years of effort.

It is possible to use specially processed spell reed in crafting magical objects or to augment spellwork, but such practices are dangerous and release the concentrated magical energy stored inside the plant. As such, they negate the environmental benefits of cultivating spell reed and are not advised.

-------------------------

Spell reeds:

  • Absorb and condense the latent magic in the soil they're planted in.
  • Process absorbed magic into pure arcane power regardless of what the original flavor was. (Ex: necromantic, illusion, transmutation, etc.)
  • Take 1 to 2 months to grow to maturity and be ready to harvest. (1d30+30 days)
  • Will absorb any magic. Can be used to break enchantments and curses on land. Takes 1 crop of 1000 reeds per level of the spell being broken. (Ex: a 7th level spell can be broken in 1 to 2 months by raising a crop of 7000 reeds, and be broken in 7 to 14 months by raising 7 crops of 1000 reeds)


The refined ashes can be:

  • Used as a power source when enchanting normal items or crafting magical ones. Cut crafting time by 1/2 for every 100 reeds worth of ashes used. (200 reeds cuts time to 1/4, 300 reeds cuts to 1/8, etc.)
  • Ingested, usually as a pill or snorted, to restore expended spells once per day. (Requires 25 reeds worth of ash/level)

Ash abuse is dangerous. If you consume ash more than once a day, for each extra use roll over 50+(# of extra uses * 10) on a d%. On a fail cast fireball on yourself as the stored magical energy breaks free.


If planted in a dead wizard's skull or brain, it will absorb the spells they had memorized at the moment of their death.

  • Slit the harvested reed open, press it flat, and dry it to make a papyrus-like strip with the spell encoded in the ridges of pith. It can be used like a scroll but not copied.
  • Burn the dried reed and consume the ashes to gain the spell directly. It can be copied into a spellbook, but has a 30% chance of being involuntarily cast immediately.


Midwestern Magic

The midwest is goofy. I won't deny it. Revel in it instead. Here are a few midwestern stereotypes and customs boiled down into magic items and a spell.

Bag of Bags
A plastic shopping bag that's always half-full of something you can't quite see. Incredibly lightweight. Anyone can reach into the bag and pull out another plastic shopping bag. The bags are always intact, clean, and from a local store. When a bag is pulled out it might be rolled into a ball, folded into a neat geometric packet, or just kinda wadded up. There are always bags ready to be reused.

Road Map
A detailed map of the local counties printed on durable waterproof paper and folded haphazardly. The locations and roads on it are positioned to show how much time it takes to travel between them instead of accurate distances. It the travel time changes (due to weather, traffic, or other obstacles) the map updates itself to show the new estimates.

Ice Scraper
A 3' long metal handle with a heavy-duty plastic blade set on one end and a combination plastic brush and squeegee attached perpendicularly at the other. Lets the wielder effortlessly clear away ice and snow. Using the scraper for any length of time makes your hands go numb, even if you wore gloves.

Ope!
A versatile spell. It can only be cast as a reaction to something else and the caster has to say "Ope!" out loud for it to work. When you cast it choose one:

  • Smooth over a faux pas. Any rolls related to apologizing get +5 and advantage as you try to excuse yourself.
  • Undo a mistake. Restore an item you broke, un-press a button, un-stub your toe, etc. Only fixes problems the caster caused.
  • Move freely across an area. For one turn get unlimited movement through any type of terrain and occupied spaces without slowing or provoking attacks. To use this effect you have to say "Lemme slip on by ya there." along with the "Ope!" when you cast.

Anyone can learn Ope!

d60 Mundane Magical Bindings


A list of everyday household things that might be incorporated into magic circles, bindings, and wards.

Some of the items on the list are traditionally associated with magic, like chalk and mirrors, but most aren't. The idea is that all the items listed could reasonably be found inside an average modern household or be obtained without any raised eyebrows from the neighbors or local authorities. What the DIY mage does with them will probably need to be hidden, or at least camouflaged, but they're not trying to get questionable or illicit magical materials on Craigslist.

The resulting wards/circles/bindings/whatnot also have the potential to be delightfully creepy.

Imagine walking into a room lined floor to ceiling with dolls, their eyes all fixed on the center of the floor where a hopscotch grid is drawn in brightly-colored sidewalk chalk. Each of the grid's cells is labeled with a scrawled prime number and contains a shot glass full of something opaque and unidentifiable. The middle cell's glass contains a single hand-forged nail wrapped in thin copper wire and dark green silk thread.

What does this binding do? Don't know, don't want to. Get the hell out and forget you saw it.


It's a d60 list because the d60 is a shamefully unloved and underused die. If you don't have a d60, roll a d30 and a d6. If the d6 is odd, take the result of the d30 as usual. If the d6 is even, add 30 to the d30's value.

If you don't have a d30, maybe you should.

Roll as many times as you like.


(Note: I wrote this to use with modern settings, mostly Hunter, but over 2/3 of the stuff could probably fit in just about any time period where the concept of a household exists. Like bricks. Bricks are old. If you use it for a different time period and roll an anachronism, follow your heart.)


d60 Mundane Magical Bindings

1) Twist ties
2) A doll set on guard (1 more than one, 2 non-doll classic toy (teddy bear, rocking horse, toy soldier, sprung jack-in-the-box), 3 modern toy (Barbie, ninja turtle, transformer, troll doll), 4 is pristine, 5 is dirty, broken, or mutilated, 6 has ritual markings or strange parts)
3) Non-figure toy (1 marbles, 2 jacks, 3 dice, 4 dominoes, 5 pogs, 6 trading cards, 7 cars, 8 plastic animals)
4) Tacky Souvenirs (1 somewhere you've been, 2 somewhere you've not been, 3 somewhere famous (ex: Vegas), 4 somewhere obscure (ex: Pope Lick, TN))
5) Lawn ornaments
6) VHS tapes ( 1 intact, 2 unspooled, 3 cassette tape, 4 Betamax)
7) Buttons
8) Old clothes (1 rags, 2 casual, 3 formal, 4 vintage, 5 kids, 6 national costume)
9) Old electronics (1 last model, 2 last year's model, 3-4 decades old, 5 retro/vintage, 6 antique)
10) Outdated electronic cords and charge cables
11) Books (1 children's, 2 novels, 3 biographies, 4 repair manuals, 5 text books, 6 cook books, 7 field guides, 8 holy)
12) Bubble Wrap
13) Keys
14) Plastic bags
15) DVDs/CDs
16) Magazines (1 tabloid, 2 popular-vapid, 3 popular-educational, 4 trade publication, 5 scholarly journal, 6 kid's)
17) Broken components (1 appliance, 2 vehicle, 3 computer, 4 other electronic, 5 scientific, 6 industrial)
18) Holiday decorations (1 garlands, 2 ornaments, 3 jack-o-lanterns, 4 decorated eggs, 5 bead necklaces, 6 buntings/swags, 7 nutcracker, 8 fake webbing)
19) Paperweights
20) Confetti
21) Newspapers
22) Film canisters
23) Sheets
24) Light fixtures (1 floor lamp, 2 stained lass shade, 3 night light, 4 desk lamp, 5 goose neck, 6 vintage, 7 tacky, 8 lava lamp)
25) Cans (1 soup, 2 pop, 3 other food, 4 open, 5 sealed, 6 empty)
26) Eating utensils
27) Dishes/china (1 intact, 2 chipped, 3 dirty, 4 bowl(s) full of something)
28) Pots and Pans
29) Bottles (1 full, 2 empty, 3 colored/opaque glass, 4 hanging, 5 tiny, 6 holds something odd/alive)
30) Salt and pepper shakers (1 ornate/valuable material, 2 industrial, 3 kitschy, 4 mismatched, 5 spilled, 6 full of something else)
31) Glassware (1 shot glass, 2 tumbler, 3 goblet/wineglass, 4 stein, 5 colored-matching, 6 colored-eclectic, 7 full of something, 8 novelty shape)
32) Nails (1 pounded in a pattern, 2 laying loose, scattered or arranged, 3 rusty, 4 giant/railroad spikes, 5 hand forged, 6 securing… something)
33) Random hardware (1 screws, 2 eye bolts, 3 hooks, 4 hinges, 5 doorknobs, 6 drawer pulls)
34) Pipe (1 lead, 2 copper, 3 PVC, 4 aluminum, 5 steel, 6 garden hose)
35) Bricks
36) Cinder blocks
37) Bathroom tiles (1 square, 2 rectangle, 3 hexagon, 4 octagon, 5 tiny, 6 large)
38) Sharpie/paint pen (1 mundane text, 2 arcane text, 3 warnings, 4 complex diagrams, 5 crudely-done drawings, 6 nauseating patterns, 7 repeating shapes, 8 tally marks, 9 some kind of code…, 10 roll 2d10 and use both)
39) Paint (Roll on the sharpie (38) sub-table plus: 11 one wall a solid color with evidence of being painted again and again, 12 an incredible mural)
40) Crayon (Roll on the sharpie (38) sub-table plus: 11 children's drawings, 12 piles of melted crayons)
41) Chalk (Roll on the sharpie (38) sub-table plus: 11 a brightly-colored hopscotch court with only prime numbers, 1 a loosely-sketched labyrinth)
42) String (1 circle, 2 staked between points (in shapes, lines, figures, at different heights), 3 wrapped around objects, 4 in knots, 5 hanging loose or draped around, 6 soaked in glue and formed into 3D shapes, 7 wound into balls, 8 hanging with weights or supporting random junk)
43) Rope (1 natural fiber, 2 synthetic, 3 twist, 4 braided)
44) Chain (1 fine, 2 medium, 3 heavy-duty, 4 rusty, 5 unusual material, 6 covered in locks)
45) Thread (Roll on the string (42) sub-table plus: 9 looped into a web, 10 silk, 11 difficult to see, 12 in 1d30 different colors)
46) Tape (1 scotch, 2 masking, 3 painter's, 4 duct, 5 electrical, 6 packing, 7 surgical, 8 old and brittle)
47) Wire (1 thin gauge, 2 heavy gauge, 3 copper, 4 silver, 5 steel, 6 bare, 7 coated, 8 multi-strand, 9 anodized, 10 kinked and twisted)
48) Bungee cords
49) Mirrors
50) Wood (1 sticks, 2 logs, 3 split firewood, 4 untreated lumber, 5 furniture fragments, 6 whole dead sapling)
51) Shells (1 clam, 2 snail, 3 zebra mussel/razor clam, 4 tropical/saltwater shell)
52) Piles of small objects (1 beans, 2 beads, 3 rice, 4 hex nuts, 5 bottle caps, 6 chicken bones)
53) Rocks
54) Meat
55) Broken glass (1 from bottles/glassware, 2 safety glass cubes, 3 long shards, 4 colored/stained)
56) Shredded paper (1 hand-torn, 2 strips, 3 cross-cut, 4 could be pieced back together)
57) Sawdust (1 common wood, 2 exotic wood, 3 from a local tree, 4 fresh)
58) Tea (1 loose leaves, 2 bagged, 3 in containers, 4 the brewed drink)
59) Coffee (1 whole bean, 2 fresh ground, 3 used grounds, 4 instant crystals)
60) Cardboard (1 tubes, 2 boxes, 3 large sheets, 4 made into something structural)