Spes Magna Games

Introducing Amok for The Four Color Hack. Amok is one of the Sinisters, a villain group I originally called the Sinister Six. Back then, Amok was known as Ogre.

Amok
Level 6 Villain

Quote: “Amok smash!”
Real Name: Ian Caldwell
Identity: Public
Place of Birth: Los Alamos, New Mexico
Height: 7 ft.
Weight: 650 lb.
Eyes: Glowing yellow
Hair: None

Hit Points: 38 (6 Vigor)
Base Damage: 2d8
Powers: Atomic-Powered Body d10 (6 protection), Devotion to Volt d10, Super-Strength d12

Young Ian Caldwell, up-and-coming high-school football player, always seemed to have more muscle than brains, but he had a good heart. His father, Sean, had been a constable until his death in the line of duty, and Regina, Ian’s widowed mother, did her best for her son. Ian understood loyalty, whether to his mother, to his team, to his friends. After his junior year at Los Alamos High School, Ian got a summer job driving a truck for Clean Sands, a company that handled waste transport and disposal. The money was good, and Ian was so proud to be able to help his mother.

Unfortunately, Clean Sands fell short of the up-and-up. A blown tire put Ian’s truck in a ditch, and drums full of illegal toxic waste ruptured. Ian crawled through this waste, dragging his co-driver away from the wreck. Both men suffered terrible chemical burns atop the injuries suffered in the crash. Worst of all, the toxic waste interacted with latent, mutated genes in Ian’s DNA.

Ian Caldwell, loving and loyal, transformed into a hulking brute driven by fear and rage. He tore his way free from the military hospital into which he been admitted after his body had started to change. During his rampage across the military base, the military police vehicle transporting Regina to Ian’s location in the hope that Ian’s mother could calm him down got too close. Without realizing Regina was in the vehicle, Ian lashed out. The vehicle was destroyed, and all of its occupants died. Ian escaped into the New Mexico wilderness.

Volt, leader of the Sinisters, found Amok some time later. The tortured youth responded to Volt’s calm, subtle manipulation. Now known as Amok, Ian serves Volt and the Sinisters with the same devotion he once served his family and football team.

Amok possesses immense strength. He can lift 25 tons, and his physical attacks are devastating (2d8+1d12). His Atomic-Powered Body is highly resistant to injury, and Amok never seems to get tired. He also recovers from injury at an accelerated rate. Amok has a child-like intelligence, but his intense Devotion to Volt makes him difficult to manipulate.

Tags: supervillains, TFCH

This morning on FaceBook, Scott Denman asked, “Can a devil and modron have offspring??”

The answer is, of course, “Yes.”

Theirs was a forbidden union, an erinyes and a rogue pentadrone, and Pentastrife, their only child, is a fearsome creature. Pentastrife resembles a tall human of indeterminate gender. It has five arms, five legs, and five great fleshy wings. It has five eyes, five mouths, and ten each nostrils and ears, arranged in rings around its bald head.

Frequency: Unique
No. Appearing: 1
Armor Class: 2
Move: 12″/15″
Hit Dice: 60 hit points
% in Lair: 20%
Treasure Type: R
No. of Attacks: 5
Damage/Attack: By weapon (x5)
Special Attacks: See below
Special Defenses: See below
Magic Resistance: 15%
Intelligence: Very
Alignment: Lawful evil (neutral tendencies)
Size: M (6-1/2′ tall)
Psionic Ability: Nil
Attack/Defens Modes: Nil
Level/XP Value: IX/7,610

Pentastrife fights with all five arms at once, wielding whatever combination of weapons it has available. For example, it might wield a longbow with two arms and three long swords with its other limbs. Regardless, Pentastrife always makes five attacks per round, whether wielding one weapon or five. It is also quite strong, possessing an 18/51 strength (apply +2 to-hit and +3 damage bonuses where appropriate). Instead of its weapon attacks, Pentastrife may spew a stream of paralyzing gas from one of its five mouths, doing so no more than once every 5 turns up to 5 times per day. The gas forms a cloud 3″ long, 2″ wide, and 1″ high. Any creature caught in the cloud must make a save versus paralysis or remain immobile for 5 rounds.

Pentastrife cannot be affected by illusions or magic that affects the mind (beguilement, charm, domination, hold, hypnosis, sleep, et cetera). Fear and other emotion spells have no affect, nor do attacks based in the Positive or Negative Planes (including life-draining or life-stealing). Cold, gas, and acid attacks against Pentastrife are always at -2 per die of damage. It cannot be harmed by nonmagical weapons, fire attacks, or by iron weapons (even magical ones). Pentastrife has potent magical powers, usable at will, once per round: animate dead, cause fear, charm person, detect invisible, illusion, invisibility, know alignment, locate object, polymorph self, produce flame, suggestion, and teleport (no error).

Pentastrife has double human senses and double normal infravision and ultravision (180 feet and 200 yards, respectively). It cannot be surprised by visible creatures.

Tags: 1E AD&D, monsters

Presenting the Snail Monster for both Mutant Future and the third edition of RuneQuest.

The dreaded snail monster is a monstrous mollusk, easily twice the size of an adult African elephant. It fleshy body is not especially resistant to harm (AC 7), but is covered with a viscous slime that acts as a Class 6 poison (6d6 damage but save for half). An attacker seeking to avoid contact with this toxic goo must either use a weapon or else attack the shell. The spiked shell (AC 3) lacks pain sensors, blood vessels, et cetera. Non-energy Attacks against the shell inflict only half damage. The shell is impervious to poison.

If provoked, the snail monster attacks twice per round, using some combination of its powerful bite, its blinding eye beams, or a project shellspike. The eye beams project out to 30 feet and blind for 1d4 rounds. A shellspike has a maximum range of 1,500 feet. Shellspikes regenerate with remarkable speed.

Alignment: Neutral
Movement: 45′ (15′)
Armor Class: 7 (3 for shell)
Hit Dice: 12
Attacks: 2 (bite and/or eye beams and/or shellspike)
Damage: 2d8 (bite), blindness (eye beams), 1d12 (shellspike)
Save: L6
Morale: 10
Hoard Class: None
XP: 4,400

Mutations: Dermal Poison Slime (Class 6), Gigantism, Optic Emissions (bright eyes), Spiked Shell

———

STR 8D6+32 (60)
CON 4D6+20 (34)
SIZ 6D6+24 (45)
INT 5
POW 2D6+6 (13)
DEX 2D6+3 (10)
Move 2
Hit Points 53
Fatigue 94

Hit Location (d20/Armor/Hit Points) Left Eye Stalk (1-2/3/9), Right Eye Stalk (3-4/3/9), Head (5-7/3/9), Upper Body (8-10/3/14), Lower Body (11-13/3/18), Shell (14-20/8/22)

Weapon (SR/Attack%/Damage)
Bite (9/45%/2D8+5d6
Eye Beam (6/75%/blindness)
Shellspike (6/35%/1d8+3d6)

Notes The snail monster may fire its eye beams or a shellspike and bite in the same round, against one or two opponents. The attacks take place 3 strike ranks apart. Creatures hitting the snail monster with a natural weapon (such as a claw or fist) somewhere other than the shell take dose of POT 10 poison. A target hit by the snail monster’s eye beams is blinded for 1d4 rounds. A shellspike as has the same range as a heavy crossbow (55/300).

Skills Listen 35%, Scan 65%

———

In other news, there’s about a week left in the 25th Wedding Anniversary Spes Magna Games Sale.

In bigger news, I’m also, I hope, not much more than two or so weeks away from bringing The Four Color Hack to print-on-demand. I’m working on a final edit and adding some more content. I’m not sure how much the POD version will sell for, but it will include the PDF as part of the purchase, and I’m certainly planning to send out a discount code to people who’ve already purchased the PDF version. Stay tuned. The Four Color Hack will be the first POD Spes Magna Games publication ever.

Huzzah.

Tags: monsters, Mutant Future, RuneQuest, TFCH

What follows is a short speech I gave at my the party celebrating my 25th wedding anniversary. The picture embiggens if clicked.

As you know, Trina and I celebrate our 25th anniversary with you here today. As we prepared for today’s festivities, I had cause to reflect on life and love. Trina is certainly the love of my life, but she was not my first love. I saw my first love in a movie theater way back in 1977. We didn’t get a chance to speak, although I would later imagine what we would have talked about. I still smile when I remember her, this first love of mine.

And she still impresses me, a bit more than 40 years later. Of course, she was beautiful. But, more importantly, she was brave. She was forthright. She was committed to making the world a better in place, but not in some grandiose way. She was no utopian dreamer. Instead, she was practical. She saw a problem, and she did not hesitate to be the one to stand up say, “This is wrong. I’ll fix it.”

There are many reasons why my first love remained unrequited. First, I was 10. Also, her love belonged to another. For a long time, I couldn’t understand what she saw in him, this Bernard. He was a bumbler. He was a bit of a coward. He was kind of dull.

But, as I watched and learned, I saw that my first love’s love for that dull bumbler had an amazing effect. Her love for him made him a better person. He bumbled less. He acted with bravery and honor. His dullness transformed into a sharpness of character.

Part of me still loves my first love. Part of me will always love her. By now, you’re all wondering, who was this remarkable lady? Trina is wondering as well, because I forbade her to read this little speech.

So, I’ll tell you. My first love was none other than Miss Bianca, the Hungarian representative to the Rescue Aid Society, that remarkable organization of mice featured in Disney’s The Rescuers and The Rescuers Down Under.

At age 10, I was in love with a cartoon mouse. It was a relationship doomed before it could ever start. But don’t be sad. I found my Miss Bianca, and she is everything that cartoon mouse was and more.

The Church teaches us that marriage is a channel by which God’s grace works the lives of the family. How true this is. Without Trina playing Miss Bianca to my Bernard, voiced by the legendary Bob Newhart, I would not be the man I am today. I’m convinced that whatever man I might have been would be both a sad and a poor man.

Tags: Catholic, Not Gaming Related

Some of the time, I think I’m in the wrong line of work. I mean, I can write, maybe not well, but certainly well enough to, say, churn out a remake of 1981’s laughably bad Blood Beach. What that’s, you say? Who in their right mind would remark Blood Beach? Well, you’ll have to ask Alex Greenfield and Ben Powell that question. My guess is that they wrote the laughably bad The Sand for the money, which presumably means there’s money to be made writing horrible movies. I wonder if The Asylum is hiring?

Presenting the Sand Monster for both Mutant Future and AD&D.

Alignment: Neutral
Movement: 45′ (15′), burrow 30′ (10′), swim 120′ (40′)
Armor Class: 9
Hit Dice: 18
Attacks: 1 (tendrils) or 4 (tentacles)
Damage: Paralysis or 2d6
Save: L9
Morale: 9
Hoard Class: None
XP: 9,000

Mutations: Burrowing, Gigantism, Unique Sense (vibrations)

The sand monster is an enormous mutant jellyfish that has adapted to life underground as well as in the water. Predatory and voracious, the sand monster burrows under a beach, lurking a few feet beneath the sand. It then spreads out its tentacles and tendrils, covering a 45-foot radius. Then, it lurks out of sight, using its highly attuned ability to sense vibrations to target its prey, which it tries to ambush. It prefers to attack with its tendrils, dozens of slender extensions that are covered with stinging cells that deliver a Class 11 poison (failed save causes 2d6 rounds of paralysis while a successful save results in half movement for 1d6 rounds). Against a helpless target, these tendrils shred flesh, killing the helpless victim in 1 round. If the sand monster abandons its subsurface position, it attacks with its powerful tentacles. These supple limbs can reach up to 30 feet, and they are also covered with the same type of stinging cells found on the tendrils.

Frequency: Very rare
No. Appearing: 1
Armor Class: 9
Move: 3″//12″ (3″)
Hit Dice: 18
% in Lair: 85%
Treasure Type: Nil
No. of Attacks: 1 or 4
Damage/Attack: Paralysis or 2-12
Special Attacks: Paralyzation
Special Defenses: Nil
Magic Resistance: Standard
Intelligence: Non-
Alignment: Neutral
Size: L (15′ long with 30′ long tentacles)
Psionic Ability: Nil
Attack/Defens Modes: Nil
Level/XP Value: IX/6,550 + 25/hp

The sand monster is a strange sort of giant jellyfish adapted to life beneath the sands of beaches. This monster burrows a few feet beneath the sand and then spreads out, covering about a 45-foot radius. It senses vibrations within this radius and uses those vibrations to target its prey. The sand monster usually attacks with its tendrils, the sting of which force a saving throw against poison to avoid 2-12 rounds of paralysis. Even if the saving throw is successful, the victim is slowed for 1-6 rounds. If the sand monster leaves its hiding place beneath the sand, it attacks with four powerful tentacles, each of which can reach up to 30 feet. A tentacle inflicts 2-12 points of damage and also carries the same poison as the tendrils.

Tags: 1E AD&D, monsters, Mutant Future