Spes Magna Games

Merry Christmas!

First up, as promises a few days ago, there’s trouble in Schuhdorf! An evil noble lady with magic powers has polymorphed Schuhdorf’s leaders into goats and stolen them before flying off in her giant shoe. Later that night, eerie singing from the woods lured away several of the village’s children. Can the heroes track the children and rescue them? The Lady in the Shoe is a 5E D&D adventure for five 2nd-level characters includes details about how to scale the dangers for weaker or stronger parties. It’s pay-what-you-want with a recommended price of $1.

In other news, I purchased a virtual treasure chest of stock art from Aegis Studios, one of which is Jack Badashski’s burbling Skull Ooze, which appears below as a new monster.

Nota Bene: That last link is an affiliate link.

Ooze, Skull

The skull ooze is one of the more insidious fragments of Juiblex that has squirmed its away from the Abyss to the Material Plane. This blob of inky viscosity hides within a skull, waiting for something living to stray too close. Don’t let the skull ooze’s tiny size fool you into thinking it’s a small threat.

Tiny ooze, unaligned

Armor Class 13
Hit Points 7 (2d4+2)
Speed 20 ft., climb 20 ft.

STR 5 (-3), DEX 16 (+3), CON 12 (+1), INT 1 (-5), WIS 6 (-2), CHA 1 (-5)

Damage Immunities acid, cold, lightning, slashing
Condition Immunities blinded, charmed, deafened, exhaustion, frightened, prone
Senses blindsight 60 ft. (blind beyond this radius), passive Perception 8
Languages —
Challenge 1/4 (50 XP)

Amorphous. The skull ooze can move through a space as narrow as 1 inch without squeezing, although it has to leave its skull behind.

Corrosive Form. A creature that touches the skull ooze or hits it with a melee attack while within 5 feet of it takes 2 (1d4) acid damage. Any nonmagical weapon made of metal or wood that hits the skull ooze corrodes. After dealing damage, the weapon takes a permanent and cumulative -1 penalty to damage rolls. If its penalty drops to -5, the weapon is destroyed. Nonmagical ammunition made of metal or wood that hits the skull ooze is destroyed after dealing damage.

The skull ooze can eat through 2-inch-thick, nonmagical wood or metal in 1 round.

Spider Climb. The skull ooze can climb difficult surfaces, including upside down on ceilings, without needing to make an ability check.

Actions

Pseudopod. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 2 (1d4) acid damage, and the skull ooze attaches to the target. While attached, the skull ooze doesn’t attack. Instead, at the start of each of the skull ooze’s turns, the target takes 2 (1d4) acid damage. In addition, nonmagical armor worn by the target is partly dissolved and takes a permanent and cumulative -1 penalty to the AC it offers. The armor is destroyed if the penalty reduces its AC to 10.

The skull ooze can detach itself by spending 5 feet of its movement. A creature, including the target, can use its action to detach the skull ooze, but this subjects the target to the skull ooze’s corrosive form.

Tags: 5E D&D, monsters

Merry Christmas!

Over at DriveThruRPG, you can find Santa’s Holiday Bag of PDFs. This bundle includes ten PDFs for 5E D&D that are full of monsters, magic items, character options, maps, and more. The normal cost for all ten PDFs together is almost four bits over $14, but Santa has slashed prices by about 50%, making the bundle’s cost $7. Appropriately, the bundle remains available through all twelve days of Christmas.

And here’s a new magic item!

The Golden Crozier
Staff, very rare (requires attunement by a cleric)

This powerful magic item functions just like a staff of the python, and it has further powers as well.

The crozier has 10 charges for the following properties. It regains 1d6+4 expended charges daily at dawn. If you expend the last charge, roll a d20. On a 1, the crozier thereafter functions only as a staff of the python.

Magic Weapon. You can use an action to expend 1 charge, which lets you wield the crozier as a magic quarterstaff that grants a +3 bonus to attack and damage rolls. This effect lasts for 1 minute.

Spells. You can use an action to expend 1 or more of the crozier’s charges to cast one of the following spells from it, using your spell save DC: aid (2 charges), control water (4 charges), create food and water (3 charges), create or destroy water (1 charge), dispel evil and good (5 charges), guiding bolt (1 charge), hold person (2 charges), and magic circle (3 charges).

With aid, create or destroy water, guiding bolt, hold person, and magic circle, you can expend more than the requires number of charges. Each additional charge expended for one of those spells count as if you had cast the spell using a higher spell slot.

Tags: 5E D&D, Christmas, magic items

This Christmas Eve, don’t forget the tomte’s bowl of porridge topped with a buttery pat.

Tomte

This fey creature appears as an elderly man the size of a young child. It wears simple albeit often brightly colored clothing. One seldom encounters a tomte, and this encounter most often occurs on or near a farm or perhaps in a barn or livestock pen.

A farmer who believes a tomte resides on his property enjoys a mixed blessing. If the tomte is treated well, it helps protect the farm and its creatures from harm. Unfortunately, the tomte has a short temper and is easily offended. An angry tomte may pull pranks on the farm’s residents, break farm equipment, or even harm livestock.

Small fey, neutral

Armor Class 12 (16 with barkskin)
Hit Points 18 (4d6+4)
Speed 25 ft.

STR 16 (+3), DEX 14 (+2), CON 13 (+1), INT 11 (+0), WIS 13 (+1), CHA 12 (+1)

Saving Throws STR +5
Skills Athletics +5, Perception +3, Stealth +4
Damage Immunities cold
Condition Immunities charmed
Senses passive Perception 13
Languages Common, Sylvan
Challenge 1 (200 XP)

Great Strength. The tomte possesses supernatural strength. It counts as one size larger when determining its carrying capacity and the weight it can push, drag, or lift. The tomte makes Strength checks and Strength saving throws with advantage.

Innate Spellcasting. The tomte’s innate spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 11). The tomte can innately cast the following spells, requiring no components:

At will: barkskin, druidcraft, light, mending, shillelagh, speak with animals
3/day each: animal friendship, cure wounds, expeditious retreat, silent image
2/day each: animal messenger, enlarge/reduce (self only), invisibility
1/day each: bestow curse, plant growth

Actions

Club. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6+3) bludgeoning damage, or 7 (1d8+3) bludgeoning with shillelagh

Tags: 5E D&D, Christmas, monsters

So, I’m on holiday until a bit after the new year. At least for now, I’m pretty much done with my Tanelorn Keep Player’s Guide. I’m thinking about starting up a meet-online game to run some players through some of the dangers of the Tanelorn Keep’s environs. Not sure I really have the time for that, so I must mull.

Whilst shifting some of the debris in my library, I stumbled across a few maps I drew on index cards. For example, see the shoe map to the right of this paragraph. I like my shoe map. It’s not great art, to be sure, but it makes me giggle a little, and that can’t be a bad thing. The original shoe map did not include location numbers. The one to the right does.

“Why?” you ask.

Well, when I’m not working on curriculum maps or gracing the family with my presence, I’m working on a short 5E D&D adventure titled The Lady in the Shoe. When done, it’ll be intended for five 2nd-level heroes, but I’ll include notes about how to scale it for weaker or stronger parties.

“So, what’s it about?” you ask.

Well, not to give too much away, but the adventure starts when the heroes return to Schuhdorf to discover that a beautiful but cruel woman has polymorphed the village’s key leaders into goats and flew away with them in a giant shoe. To make matters worse, later that same night eerie music lured several children away from their beds and into Flussenke, the nearby wooded river valley.

Schuhdorf stands in dire straits. Their spiritual leader is a kidnapped goat. The knight who oversees the village’s defenses is a kidnapped goat. Several children have vanished into the woods. Now is the time for heroes!

I hope to have the adventure ready before this coming weekend ends.

Tags: 5E D&D, adventure design, maps

In my Tanelorn Keep Player’s Guide, I briefly describe five different pantheons common to the Western Lands. These pantheons each make their own ontological and theological claims. Side by side, these claims contradict each other, but few persons living in the Western Lands seem to care much about those contradictions.

The observant reader notices a couple of interesting facts about the available cleric spheres. One is that no deity grants major access to the Necromantic sphere. Raise dead, reincarnate, and resurrection are the stuff of legends in the Western Lands. The second fact is that no deity grants access to the Astral sphere at all. Planar travel is not impossible, but it is almost always the province of wizards.

Moradin Forge-Lord

Moradin Forge-Lord is the creator and chief deity of the dwarves. Almost all of his clerics are dwarves, although a smattering of humans and halflings pay homage to Moradin. Most of Moradin’s clerics are lawful good. Smaller numbers of them are neutral good or lawful neutral.

Ability Score Requirements: Con 13, Wis 9
NWP Requirements: Read/Write Dwarven, Speak Dwarven
Major Spheres: All, Combat, Creation, Elemental (earth and fire), Guardian, Healing, Protection
Minor Spheres: Charm, Divination, Elemental (air and water), Necromantic, Summoning
Weapons Allowed: Bludgeoning weapons plus battle axe, light crossbow, and arquebus

Granted Powers

Earth Sense: Information from your dwarven mining skills may simply spring to mind unbidden. When rolling 1d6 to determine success, add 1 to the roll, which means you are less likely to succeed. This does not apply to determining approximately depth underground, which still requires deliberate effort, but succeeds 4 times in 6 (see PH 21 for more information).

Smite Enemies: Once per day per cleric level, you may smite an orc, half-orc, goblin, ogre, troll, ogre mage, giant, or titan. Add one-half your cleric level (round up) to your attack roll. Add your cleric level to your damage roll if your attack succeeds.

Twin Hammers: You may simultaneously wield two warhammers in melee combat. You incur half the normal penalties for attacking with two weapons when using Twin Hammers (PH 96).

Deep Sashelas

Deep Sashelas is the creator and chief deity of the elves. Almost all of his clerics are elves, although a smattering of humans and halflings pay homage to Deep Sashelas. Many of Deep Sashelas’s priest are chaotic good, but substantial numbers of them are neutral good or chaotic neutral.

Ability Score Requirements: Dex 13, Wis 9
NWP Requirements: Read/Write Elven, Speak Elven
Major Spheres: All, Charm, Divination, Elemental (air and water), Healing, Protection, Sun, Weather
Minor Spheres: Animal, Creation, Elemental (earth and fire), Guardian, Necromantic, Summoning
Weapons Allowed: Bludgeoning weapons plus long sword, short sword, longbow, and shortbow

Granted Powers

Blood Frenzy: When you injure a living enemy with a successful weapon attack, you get a +2 bonus to your next attack roll against that enemy. This granted power does not function against targets that do not bleed.

Sailor’s Lore: You get a +1 check modifier to NWP related to water or shipboard life.

Water’s Embrace: When you become submerged in water, you immediately become affected by water breathing with a duration equal to one melee round per priest level.

Baravar Cloakshadow

Baravar Cloakshadow created the gnomes. Druids form the core of Baravar’s clergy. Except for the granted power described below, Baravar’s druids conform to the rules found in the PH, pages 35-38.

Granted Powers

Baravar’s Veil: Baravar’s druids do not receive a +2 bonus to all saving throws versus fire and electrical attacks. Baravar gifts his druids with the power to cast illusion/phantasm spells found on the wizard spell lists. Treat this ability as if your druid has minor access to an Illusion sphere, meaning your druid can cast illusion/phantasm wizard spells that are no higher than 3rd level.

The Nornir

The Nornir are three goddesses who control the forces of fate. They are served by druids, almost all of them human. Except as noted below, the Nornir’s druids follow the normal rules for that class.

Spells Allowed: Your druid serving the Nornir has All, Animal, Divination, Elemental, Healing, and Plant as major spheres. He has Weather as a minor sphere.

Via Lux

The Via Lux, the Way of Light, is the religion brought to the Western Lands by halfling tribes fleeing the collapse of civilization in the distant east. The leaders of the Via Lux are clerics who conform to that class’s description (PH 33-34) except as noted below. Unlike the other pantheons, the Via Lux welcomes all, regardless of race. Among its clergy can be found all of the PC races, although halflings and humans are the most common. Most clerics of the Via Lux are neutral good, but chaotic good and lawful good clerics are found among the Divine Light’s ranks.

Spells Allowed: A Via Lux cleric has no access to the Astral sphere. He has minor access to the Animal, Charm, Elemental, Necromantic, and Plant spheres. He has major access to the remaining spheres: All, Combat, Creation, Divination, Guardian, Healing, Protection, Summoning, Sun, and Weather.

Tags: AD&D, fantasy pantheon, Tanelorn