jacinto clerics, delving deeper, rituals, san serafín

here in the house of death

a few gods with a focus on the way they interact with people and the way their worshipers perceive them. also, a demihuman race-as-species you should be able to slot in to most nearly any game. i tried to make it play distinctly from human characters without demanding a lot of buy in from players. borrowed some of the d&d language as word game rules in this dungeon of signs post.

Heche Ke Eche
Mama Muerte, The Sheikha of the Dead

The first of the living to die, and the first of the dead to return to the Lands of the living. Pray to Heche Ke Eche to raise the dead, speak with the deceased, or save someone from death’s door. She is cruel, wise, patient, a friend to the dispossessed and an enemy of the arrogant. She likes rum, cash, cigars, and prefers her shrines and temples gaudy and personal.

Worshipers of Heche Ke Eche pray like this: “Oye mama, I have a favor to ask you…” Praying to Heche Ke Eche is like asking your mom for money. Her most devout followers are scrupulously casual and try to never be impressed with anything. If they do not bow and scrape to their own goddess, why should they worry too much about you?
El Grangúl
Papa Fin, the Sheikh of the Dead

Built the wall between the Lands of the Living and the Lands of the Dead. Pray to El Grangúl to exorcise ghosts, keep the dead in their graves, and your ancestors out of your business. He is orderly, condescending, charitable, and an enemy to liars. He likes sacramental wine (you can sometimes get him to bend the laws of nature if he’s drunk enough), golden doubloons, flowers, and prefers his shrines and temples symmetrical and carefully tended.

Worshipers of El Grangúl pray like this: “Permiso, padre, I have something to ask you…” Praying to El Grangúl is like admitting to your dad you did something stupid. His most devout followers keep records of their prayers in black-bound ledgers, so that they always remember what their patron has done for them.

The Gunsaints
Sabata, Sartana, & Django; the Calamity Three; Pistoleros Santos

The three best sharpshooters in the history of Labyrinthium; they killed each other in a three-way standoff and then banded together in a mythical shootout with Death itself. Now they are a tripartite demidivinity with power over Gunmetal, Gunpowder, and Lead. Pray to the Gunsaints to see your bullets fly true, to ruin the weapons of your enemy, and to successfully complete a mission of vengeance. The Gunsaints like bullets, antique guns, and personal mementos, and prefer shrines constructed in moments of desperation.
Worshipers of the Gunsaints pray like this: “I swear by the three I’ll kill this motherfucker dead.” Praying to the Gunsaints makes you feel fierce and sick and angry. Their most devout followers carry three guns, one for each saint, so that they can better understand the act of murder.

Other gods: Hatüey No-saint, Caracaracol, Shams del Sur, Al-Ra’ad al-Kasif, The Queen of Sheba

The Cats of New Barbary
A race for old school Dungeons and Dragons

The Cats of New Barbary are not cats at all, but something like a leopard, something like an Old Barbary macaque, with clever clawed hands and yellow lamplike eyes. They stand three feet tall when crouched on all fours, and can walk on two, though they don’t like to. They aren’t quite as intelligent as humans, and they struggle to speak. The Cats of New Barbary often live in ruins claimed by the jungle, but they can integrate into human society surprisingly well–several regional saints are Cats, and an infamous New Barbary crime boss is one as well.

Cats of New Barbary can be clerics, thieves, or fighters. They cannot be magic-users.

  • The Cats of New Barbary cannot wear armor heavier than leather regardless of class, and it costs twice as much to fit their inhuman frames. They cannot wield weapons, but their unarmed attacks deal d6 damage.
  • They cannot use scrolls or magic items, regardless of class, but there are a few methods for making their claws bypass supernatural immunities.
  • They can climb any surface a human could conceivably scale, and they do not need equipment or a skill check to do it.
  • They can run twice as fast when on all fours, but they can’t carry anything in their hands when doing so.
  • The Cats of New Barbary have a powerful sense of smell, and can track a scent they know as a bloodhound (4 in 6 chance of success).
  • Outside of New Barbary, the Cats do not enjoy the same legal rights as humans, and Cats unaccompanied by humans are frequently kidnapped, bought, sold, murdered, and chased away without repercussion.
  • The Cats of New Barbary can understand language as well as any human, but a Cat can only speak a number of words equal to its Intelligence score. These are chosen at character creation, and can be from any language. All Cats of New Barbary know sign language, which lets them communicate more freely with anyone who knows it, but their capacity for self-expression is limited–they cannot use any word with more than two syllables when communicating this way.
jacinto dark souls, delving deeper, san serafín, wonders and wickedness

contrarian alignment and extra spell schools

New schools for Brendan’s spells without levels. (Spell duration is caster’s level by default.) It’s more Dark Souls-inspired stuff.

I’ve been wanting to play around a little bit with subclasses and Spells Without Levels (or Wonders and Wickedness, the quite good book complication). Gating certain spell schools behind alignment seems like a good and simple start, but requiring a sorcerer to learn from an NPC is another good option.

This post largely assumes you’re using Original Dungeons and Dragons or Delving Deeper, but it shouldn’t be too hard to adapt to another ruleset.

Contrarian Alignment
Lawful is primordial darkness, an awful and immaculate stillness, the deceased Titan-esque old order of gods, the undead. It is the nature of Dark and Law to be changeless, unending, antithetical to mortals.

Chaos is light and day, the fire of the Sun but also Hell. The new order of gods, as well as demons, are Chaotic; It is the nature of Chaos and Light to be vital, changing, but also temporal. Chaotic creatures might be extremely long lived, but none of them are immortal.

Hexes
A strange and profane school of magic draw from the primordial dark that covered the Earth before time began. Only Lawful sorcerers can learn and cast hexes.

by inoue takehiko
  1. Anaesthesia: one creature must save or lose the use of one of its senses (touch, taste, sight, smell, hearing), chosen by the sorcerer, for the duration of the spell.
  2. Darkness: the sorcerer screams, and all ordinary sources of light (torches, bonfires, lamps, lightbulbs) in earshot immediately extinguish and cannot be relit for the duration of the spell.
  3. Become Hexbeast: a sorcerer twists into a vaguely anthropomorphic and ivory-masked version of one of the following creatures, their face concealed behind an ivory mask. A sorcerer rolls randomly the first time they cast this spell, but afterwards turn into the same hexbeast every time. There is a way to make this spell permanent, at terrible cost. Sorcerers can still cast spells while a hexbeast, and retain their HP and HD.
    1. Ape
    2. Crocodile
    3. Giant Bat
    4. Giant Spider
    5. Wolf
    6. Young Roc
  4. Howl: the sorcerer howls, and all living creatures in earshot must make a Morale check
  5. Summon Phantom: the sorcerer calls forth the ghost of a dead humanoid. This hex requires that the sorcerer know the phantom’s name or have one of their dear possessions. The phantom has the same abilities and attributes as they did in life. If the sorcerer has more HD than the phantom, it will serve them loyally for the hex’s duration; otherwise, it must be convinced to take a particular course of action.
  6. Elegy: causes an immortal or inhuman being (such as an elf, djinni, vampire, or demon) to save or become mortal for the duration of the hex. They lose all intrinsic supernatural abilities and weaknesses (including damage immunity) and gain all of the advantages and disadvantages of being human.
  7. Excruciate: this hex takes a full round to cast; if the sorcerer takes damage while casting, the spell fails. Upon completion of this hex, all creatures within the sorcerer’s line of sight take damage equal to the sorcerer’s level in dice.
  8. Ruin: breaks a non-magical and inanimate object that can fit inside a number of cubic feet equal to the sorcerer’s level, such as door, sword, statue, piece of armor, or chain link. The nature of the break is up to the sorcerer; the object can fracture, break cleanly as if sliced, or collapse into dust.

Hieromancy
A school of magic taught in temples and churches that calls upon the refulgent power of Heaven.. Only Chaotic sorcerers can learn and cast hieromantic spells.

  1. Command: a number of HD of creatures obey a one word command shouted by the sorcerer. Can be cast upon a single creature with more HD than the sorcerer, but it is entitled to a save.
  2. Taboo: a number of HD of creatures are incapable of performing a one word ban shouted by the sorcerer. Can be cast upon a single creature with more HD than the sorcerer, but it is entitled to a save.
  3. Light: the sorcerer conjures a golden light that illuminates as a torch. It can be directed to float above the palm, head, or weapon of a willing creature. 
  4. Second Chance: rerolls the HD of a single creature. Unwilling targets may make a saving throw to resist.
  5. Creation: conjures an item with a value equal to or less than 100×caster’s level, which lasts for the duration of this spell.
  6. Panacea: cures a creature of a poison or disease afflicting them. If the poison or disease is magical, they must succeed a saving throw to recover.
  7.  Prophecy: determines if a particular course of action will lead to Weal, Woe, or Neither within a number of turns equal to the sorcerer’s level.
  8. Banish: all creatures of sorcererous, demonic, dark, or generally unholy nature must make a Morale check. If they do not have a Morale check generally, it is equal to 6+half their level.

Pyromancy
Only pyromancers can use pyromancy. Pyromancers have a number of Fire dice equal to half their level, rounded up. This represents the size of their internal Fire.

Each time a pyromancer casts a pyromantic spell, they roll a number of Fire dice corresponding with the size of the flame they are creating or manipulating (e.g. if you are conjuring a torchflame in your hand, roll 1d6. If you are hurling a bonfire-sized flame at a monster, roll 3d6). If any of the dice come up 6, the pyromancer removes them from their pool of Fire dice, and note that their internal Fire has shrunk by a corresponding amount. If their are using fire as a weapon, they also use this roll to determine damage. Enemies may Save vs Breath for half damage.

Level 1: (1d6) torchflame: can fit in the palm of their hand.
Level 3: (2d6) campfire: can fit in a bucket
Level 5: (3d6) bonfire: can fit in the bed of a pickup truck, requires two hands to hold
Level 7: (4d6) pyre: can fit in a bedroom, requires two hands to hold
Level 9: (5d6) conflagration: can fit in a barn, requires two hands to hold

Pyromancers recover all of their Fire dice by resting in a warm, safe place. They can never have more Fire dice than the limit indicated by their level.

Pyromancers can learn the following spells.

1. Bolt: hurl a flame equal to or less than the size of your internal Fire.
2. Extinguish: Put out a flame equal to or less than the size of your internal Fire.
3. Enkindle: make a flame grow up to the size of your internal Fire.
4. Remand: cause a flame up to the size of your internal Fire to unburn something it has consumed.
5. Conflagration: conjure a burst of flame equal to or less than the size of your internal Fire
6. Ancient Flame: cast upon ashes to determine what they were before they were burnt. The size of your internal Fire determines how old the ashes can be:

(1d6) torchflame: a week
(2d6) campfire: a year
(3d6) bonfire: a decade
(4d6) pyre: a century
(5d6) conflagration: an epoch or more

7. Transference: move a flame equal to or less than the size of your internal Fire
8. Black Flame: cause a flame equal to or smaller than your internal Fire to stop shedding heat or light. 

jacinto amateur hour, delving deeper, dungeon, san serafín

mischief afoot


There is a city where nobody goes,
a city of sepulchers, a city by the sea.
It is ruled by a Sleeping King, bound deep inside the earth. 
He dreams of a great dark kingdom, 
he dreams the dead to life, 
he dreams his people into monsters 
and the day into endless night. 
You have awoken on a beach of black sand. 
The sun sits too red and too heavy on the western horizon, and the waters are cold and dark.
You are in the city where nobody goes, 
you are in the Dream of the Sleeping King.
This place will not abide you, but how will you get out?

LABYRINTHIUM: SAN SERAFIN
The First Stratum
 (an old-school dark fantasy role-playing game setting featuring masked devils, mummified saints, jaguar witches, sybaritic assassin-surgeons, a looming apocalypse, Borgesian horror, and procedures for generating the seven levels of the worst city on earth.)
San Serafín is a procedural urban point-crawl set in a Latin American necropolis, and includes 
  • several Original Dungeons and Dragons-friendly classes, such as animist-priest Mediums and crudely powerful Pyromancers
  • a setting-specific equipment list that assumes newly created characters start out marooned on a desert island
  • rules for salvaging and scavenging with little hope of finding civilization
  • a large cast of eccentric NPCs and unsettling monsters
  • other stuff



Here’s a sample spread:

jacinto classes, delving deeper, LotFP, san serafín

pyromancer class

A simple shooty-blasty magic class suitable for old school games. Intended to approximate Dark Souls pyromancy without getting too caught up in the specific mechanics of it.

Pyromancer
HP, XP, Saving Throws, and Combat Abilities as a Cleric.

from dark souls

Also called Fire Witches, Children of Chaos

Every pyromancer has a piece of Fire in them. Not fire, but primordial Fire, the bright, smokeless flame from which the djinn were made, a spark of the flame that ignited the Sun.

Pyromancers are invulnerable to ordinary fire and receive a +2 bonus to saving throws versus magical fire and dragon breath. When they do take fire damage, they subtract 1 from each die of damage. they take.

Pyromancers have a number of Fire dice equal to half their level, rounded up. This represents the size of their internal Fire.

Level 1: (1d6) torchflame: can fit in the palm of their hand.
Level 3: (2d6) campfire: can fit in a bucket
Level 5: (3d6) bonfire: can fit in the bed of a pickup truck, requires two hands to hold
Level 7: (4d6) pyre: can fit in a bedroom, requires two hands to hold
Level 9: (5d6) conflagration: can fit in a barn, requires two hands to hold

Pyromancer can use pyromancy to do the following within 40 ft/sling range:

  • conjure a flame the size of their Fire or smaller in the palm of their hand for 1 Turn.
  • hurl a flame the size of their Fire or smaller.
  • extinguish a flame the size of their Fire or smaller.
  • move an existing flame the size of their Fire or smaller to any other spot in range

When a pyromancer uses pyromancy, they roll a number of Fire dice corresponding with the size of the flame they are creating or manipulating (e.g. if you are conjuring a torchflame in your hand, roll 1d6. If you are hurling a bonfire-sized flame at a monster, roll 3d6). If any of the dice come up 6, the pyromancer removes them from their pool of Fire dice, and note that their internal Fire has shrunk by a corresponding amount. If their are using fire as a weapon, they also use this roll to determine damage. Enemies may Save vs Breath for half damage.

A pyromancer can recover 1 Fire die by drinking a flask of oil. Pyromancers recover all of their Fire dice by resting in a warm, safe place. They can never have more Fire dice than the limit indicated by their level.

But What About Fireball?
Magic as practiced by wizards is fundamentally antithetical to fire. Spells like Fireball, Wall of Fire, and so on produces actinic wer-light that burns without heat and smells like burning metal. There is a piece of forbidden war magic known as False Sun that can create true fire, but only the most unsavory of sorcerers speak of it, and even then quietly.

jacinto clerics, delving deeper, elves, original dungeons and dragons

OD&D Gods

Lawful Clerics draw on the (ostensibly) benevolent power of Heaven. The Synod is an ancient group of such clerics that administers to laypeople, collects tithes, patrols the wilderness, excises heresies from the body politic, and hunts demons. Not all Lawful Clerics belong to the Synod, and the Synod generally respects those who do not, but anyone who acts directly against it finds themselves branded outlaws or blasphemers.

Though the Synod recognizes only the godhead of Heaven, they acknowledge the existence of an assortment of holy entities. The Synod teaches that they are heavenly spirits, angels, and saints, but heathens and elves claim that they are simply nature spirits, monsters, and powerful magic-users that have bowed to the Synod’s will. Sigrid, for example, is the Saint of Truth to believers and the Lightning Witch to infidels. Lawful Clerics can choose to affiliate with a particular patron:

  • Hvitr, Divine Spirit of Storms
  • Sigrid. Saint of Truth
  • RATHMA, Angel of Dreams
  • Tzepesh, Saint of War

Chaotic Clerics worship ancient spirits. The Synod call these beings devils and monsters. She Dances Fire, for example, is known as the Flame Demon Gildarthe to the village of Meervold. Since the End, the Synod has with considerable success bound or banished many of the old gods and killed or converted their followers. Nevertheless, cults persist, and the elves and worshipers work endlessly to release their deities.

  • He Walks In The Woods
  • The Night Is Now
  • She Dances Fire
  • Her Children Are Many
  • No Breath In Her Palace
  • The Waves Will Be Here

All elves are descended from these gods and claim to be minor divinities themselves. Known tribes of elves include:

  • pale blue elves of the Salt House, who breathe water as easily as air
  • red-fleshed elves of the Basalt House, who stand in flame unburned
  • empty-eyed elves of the Bone House, who neither breathe nor dream

Elf names include

    1. The Sea Is A Lie
    2. Where Nobody Goes
    3. His Black Feather Crown
    4. The Sun Is Not
    5. Stirring In The Hills
    6. The Salt Bites
    7. He Sings Moonlight
    8. It Will Be Still
    9. Her Blood Is Fire
    10. There Never Was
    11. He Sleeps In The Depths
    12. His Hour Is Midnight