Entities, an elaboration

These notes are a followup to the class document I put together yesterday, and try to bring together some thought on how the magic system presented there (basically a summoning system) would work in play. 

Planning to come up with a list of examples eventually, but didn't like my attempts today so will come back to it. The material takeaway is that intelligent entities are NPCs with magic abilities that have relationships with your character, and non intelligent ones are bestiary entries that will need some management. You should approach their design as a collaboration with your DM, who will play them, like a more hands-on warlock patron. Your access to pattern languages gates what it is possible for you to say and do with them.

The killers in Giallo films would make great entities. So would Pyramid Head.

ENTITIES

Entities are strange things that inhabit the world along with humans. They are called the first, the nobility, or the good neighbours by most people— there is a superstitious belief that praising them will ward off their interest. This is not always true, entities have differing temperaments and different ideas about humans. Many of them are indifferent to human society, just as many are frightened or wary. But they are odd enough that most people desire not to be perceived by them at all.

There are very few entities in the towns and cities. They are by nature difficult things to incorporate into legal and policing structures, and so they are generally hunted and driven off or destroyed in organised efforts. Entities are often individually powerful, but only very rarely organised, so these hunts and purges are usually successful. There are exceptions to this. Very intelligent entities can more easily coexist with humans— either hidden or tolerated. Angels are a whole family of entities aligned with God and the church, and are openly worshipped by religious people and lauded by the state. There are also the Academies, institutions with long histories, dedicated to learning the strange ‘pattern languages’ that the entities use to communicate with one another, and also to conceive of and instantiate themselves.

Common heresy: God is an entity like the others, maybe the first among angels, maybe something else. Angels will kill you out of hand if you try this one with them. Slightly less common heresy: humans are a type of entity, maybe the original type, whose intelligence has somehow drawn out the others— entities are in some sense automatic or procedural, a process of the will or intelligence elaborating itself in space and time. 

Strange things about entities: many of them, notably both angels (if they really like or trust you) and demons (while pulling your arms and legs off, or strapping you to the wall of a torture cellar), will tell you that they are from the future. There are long standing debates and positions among the learned academics as to whether this is literally true, or if they have confused the human idea of linear time with simply coming from some ‘elsewhere’ that would otherwise be difficult to conceptualise. Another strange thing: most entities have some revulsion or difficulty with jointed and articulated limbs, even those that usually appear in a nominally human form. Possession by all but the most intelligent entities will result in an instantly recognisable stiff, awkward, lock-limbed gait and movement style. It is known that most entities view those that do not share these issues as deviants or perverts of some kind. Angels and demons both fall into this category, and have no issues inhabiting human bodies.

There are always the classics. 

HOW TO PLAY THEM

The thing to remember is that entities are basically NPCs, and that pattern languages are literally languages. The more specialised your pattern language is, the more fluently you can communicate. Entities are not attack animals, and they do not owe you their loyalty. They can be very powerful (entities with human-like intelligence are always reality-warpers to some extent), but you are unlikely to be able to get them to use that power on your behalf. If someone you didn’t know, who spoke maybe four words of your language, pointed at someone you didn’t know and said ‘kill’, it probably wouldn’t stick. If you’d known them for years, and they’d helped you out, and they were in danger, and you were holding a pistol, and they said they’d take care of the body and give you ten thousand dollars to kill someone, you might think differently about it. You may also enjoy killing. 

So if you know the one who is called, in the vulgar tongue, The Queen of Ice and Air, and you can speak with her in a sophisticated way, she might agree to do you a favour. Maybe she will lend you her Black Light Blade for three days if you burn down a building that she hates, or kill a priest, or deliver her a kiss without any guile in it. It will be a negotiation with someone who is clever and extremely dangerous, but who probably likes you (because you’re one of like five people who has ever put the effort in to learn how to really speak with her). This has the effect that less intelligent entities are far, far less dangerous to work with, and far easier to ‘train’ and get results with. You speak Enochian, so you can talk to zombies. They usually need pretty minimal convincing to go and try to kill people. However zombies are entirely physical, and have no powers of instantiation, so you actually need to go physically to where they are and talk to them face to face, and then they will need to walk to wherever they’re going. A wisp is a common Academic companion, because they are about as clever as dogs, can be dangerous to whatever they’re pointed at, are incorporeal and capable of instantiating, and won’t ask for much more than blood, sugar, iron, days of your life, the memories of the things they kill for you, the fingers of artisans, or whatever it is that this particular one eats.

All academics know that if you allow an unintelligent entity to possess your body you can more or less expect to die. You might not, but this would be like giving a wild dog full manual control, and you would have to be an idiot to expect it to work out well. Some academics do it anyway, usually in desperation when trapped or otherwise close to death, and you will sometimes find feral humans with strange magic and the minds of insects ‘living’ in the black spaces deep beneath the earth. Entities that are entirely physical are rare, but do exist. They cannot possess a human body, although will sometimes attempt to mimic the process by manually puppeting the limbs in various ways. It is thought that non-physical is in some sense the ‘natural’ state for entities (and that possession of human bodies comes instinctively), and that those trapped in physical form are aware of it as something like a disability. 

Most academics end up with one or two generalist languages (Enochian is nearly universal with academics, like Latin once was in the church, and allows for communication with both angels and demons), and one or two specialist languages that give them a personal connection with a couple of entities. The general ones will allow them to make very basic three or four word phrases (which will work fine with dumb entities, and might piss off intelligent ones), and the specific languages will allow for formal, sophisticated communication with strange and inhuman things.

There are some entities whose minds are really, really alien. There is conjecture in the academies, amongst those who believe that all entities originated in the minds of humans, that this happens naturally over time, as the particular being ages further and further away from the memory of human existence. It is well known that these things are very dangerous to talk to, and that insanity often follows from attempts at communication, and especially from possession. 

Angels and demons, (and fairies, to a lesser extent) are conceptually stable enough to enter into formal relations with human societies. They are have states, institutions, and hierarchies, although these often ‘more’ than their human equivalents, more just, more sadistic, more, more, more… The non-sociopathic ones make good, stable, intelligent allies for academics.

The entities that come into being when artists are born are almost always intelligent, and the very rare exceptions to this tend to produce art that is deeply instinctual and hostile to interpretation.

Some of them are cute! All of them are dangerous!

Class List as Setting Document

One of the things that genre does is define a field within which the artist or writer can work. This can lead to work that is formulaic and bad, but it can also be a productive restraint, often (although not always) when the artist has things to say about the genre itself (deconstruction). 

I was recently chatting about the core classes of dnd with a few people in Phlox's discord server, namely the fighting man, thief, and magic user. They are by now archetypal, crucial genre pillars to what a role playing game like dnd is. Since they are completely crucial, a given writer's take on the classics does a lot of work defining their ideas about the genre as a whole. 

That was the idea anyway. In an effort to overcome crippling jetlag, I decided to put some of these ideas into practice and write up a sort of baseline, ultracore class list for the setting that most of my writing and games take place in. It is presented here. I plan to make it look nice in the coming days with some art, and also include notes on the world it takes place in, and some fragments of fiction to get the vibe across. 

My thanks to Vivanter, Loch, Cyberspace, and Hawkbeetlette for their fun/productive discussion around this in recent days. 

Cunning Folk GLOG Class

Cunning Folk

Cunning Folk are always part of a community, be it a single village or an ethnic diaspora, and hold considerable respect within that community. They have practical wisdom, herb lore, and history, and will generally be literate in a context where this is not common. They are often relied on to settle disputes within the community, and their advice is sought after and taken seriously.

It is rare, but not unheard of, for one of the cunning folk to leave their community behind. Perhaps your law demands it (think the voluntary exile scene in Princess Mononoke), perhaps you are fleeing persecution, perhaps you have grown bored of your station and responsibilities.  

Starting Skills:

Midwifery, Herb Lore, Jurisprudence (you will know your community's laws, but will also have some understanding of how the legal systems of the societies that surround you operate. The operation of the law is a kind of magic).  

Starting Equipment: 

Traveller's clothing, dagger, sickle, hunting bow and 20 arrows, quill pen, ink, 15 sheets of cheap parchment.

A: One of the People, Look Me in the Eye, Researcher

B: Curse, Hotpot

C: Curse Breaking, The Next Generation

D: True Seeing, Valuation

One of the People: If you wish to make yourself known you will always be recognised by members of your community. They will give you and your companions shelter and aid, and will take anything that you say seriously. You will be given audience with the heads of the community, and can make and witness binding contracts. If you give obviously bad or malicious advice, these benefits will be formally withdrawn. 

Look Me in the Eye: You can tell infallibly when someone is lying. You need to close enough to that person to reasonably look them in the eyes while they are talking, and it doesn't work if they don't have eyes. It also doesn't work on anyone who has a higher charisma score than you. 

Researcher: If there is a specific piece of information in an archive, and you are looking for it, you can reliably access it in the shortest time that this would be practically possible. Examples: How did the Baron acquire his title? How do you kill the Questing Beast? What do angels want? This skill is limited by what is actually in the archive and can lead you astray if the person recording the information got it wrong in the first place. 

Evil Eye: You gain the power of the evil eye. By meeting someone's gaze you can curse them with one of the effects listed below, which will last for one year. You can use this power once per week, and in most settled places the penalty for getting caught doing it is death.

- Nightmares. The target has a 50 percent chance of not getting a restful night's sleep.

- Rot. The target finds that their food and drink spoils much too quickly. They must expend twice as many rations as usual to keep fed/spend twice as much money on food if settled. 

- Doom. Either by fire, water, or darkness - your choice. For fire, they take double damage from fire of all kinds. For water, they sink instead of floating. For darkness, all hits bypass HP and roll directly on the death and dismemberment table while the target is in total darkness. Someone who is doomed develops a crippling phobia of their corresponding doom. Dooming someone weakens your soul: you lose 1 charisma for every doom that is active. 

Hotpot: Your cooking, always excellent, is now nourishing in a way that most people associate with their most intimate childhood memories. If you have access to good quality ingredients (worth 5s), and an hour of preparation time you can serve a meal that will give one point of non-magical healing to everyone who eats it, or provide half damage from fear attacks for the next eight hours. This meal can feed up to 15 people. 

Curse Breaking: You can recognise curses in others by observing them. With study and questioning you understand what the curse is and the steps required to break it, if it can be broken (Lycanthropy cannot, for instance). If the curse can be broken, you can perform a ritual to break it outside of its usual requirements. This takes a night without rest for both you and the curse victim, and requires regents worth 50s. The negative energies need to ground themselves somewhere - one of you will lose 1 max HP, and the other will lose d4+1 max HP. You choose which party takes which penalty before rolling. You can also now remove the effects of evil eye with a touch, your own and others'.

The Next Generation: You gain a follower from your people, provided that your station remains intact. They are a young and inexperienced fighter or thief with basic equipment, and are very loyal. They will travel the world with you until they consider themselves a man or woman grown, and seasoned enough to return home and marry. 

True Seeing: You can see invisible and hidden things. You lose 1d6 Charisma, 1d6 Wisdom, or 1d6 max HP in exchange, your pick. 

Valuation: You know the precise value of things. This has many mundane uses, but also extends into the metaphysical: you know the value of a demon's contract, you know the value of a regent's promise, you know the value of an oral tradition, etc. By speaking with someone on the topic, you can intuit what people really want (even is this is not something that they fully understand themselves). 

Design Notes

I wanted the class to be focussed on social power and their community, and not so much on combat or magic. Being learned, practical, and intelligent, with clear utility to the people that they associate with. From the beginning they get a powerful social tool, a reliable lie detector, which is a kind of 'cheat' in negotiations, but which becomes less useful in openly confrontational situations. The knights of the realm who are here to forcibly acquire your land don't care that you know that they're lying, etc. They also get social bonds they can rely on, and a powerful intel gathering mechanic that they can use to get specific information from the DM. 

Level two gives them a useful semi-magical meal (eating together is an important bonding ritual), and the ability to lay frightening curses. Curses are a key part of the witch flavour, and an important reason why they were feared, and you can absolutely see why the penalty for throwing them around would be death. I wanted to strike a balance between combat effective and more nebulous, long-term effects that erode quality of life and good health. 

Three gives them a unique ability to break curses, but at a steep cost to max HP. There is a player choice between taking more HP from the target, or from the player character, which codifies selfish/selfless styles of play. You also gain a squire type follower, which helps to enforce the position of mentor in the social group. A quest to proves oneself before marriage is a staple of these types of characters, and I thought it would be cool to include a young, brash, optimistic hopeful that isn't your player character. 

Last level gets into properly mystical stuff, ancient crone lore and deep understanding of people and things. Also includes a variant on Goblin Punch's original wizard vision, because the mechanic is great and elegant, and fits the theme perfectly. 

Dramatis Personae + Perfect Mimic GLOG class

I have recently joined an OSR Discord, which seems to be where the diaspora hangs out these days. There, in jolly cooperation, I have been writing ups bits and pieces of characters and adventuring parties that can be easily slotted into a game or setting. To wit:

The Lady Garamond and Times the Wolf

Lady Garamond, of the Secret Hidden Masters of All, and her companion Times the Wolf.

Lady Garamond is a member of the gnostic order the Secret Hidden Masters of All, who are actually very well known. They are like the freemasons, and their ranks are mostly made up of nobility and rich merchants and artisans. They are interested in cataloguing and natural philosophy, intent on showing that the ‘mysteries’ of the world, magic included, can be rationally and systemically described. They are technically heretics, but are tolerated by the church because they are socially well-ensconced and not particularly dangerous to the powers that be. Law enforcement usually hates them because they often take on a self important and context-blind superhero role, dispensing their own ideas of justice.

Lady Garamond is on a mission to find and interview a powerful, regional magical being (it needs to be intelligent, she wants to talk with it and gets its side of the story). This could be Strahd, a Djinn, a Fey princess, the Questing Beast. She will ask the players if they have seen or encountered this being, and if the answer is yes will excitedly take the details in a ledger. If she thinks that there is a chance that they will encounter the object of her fascination then she will offer to travel with them.

She has expensive plate armour, an expensive horse, an expensive (magical) rapier, and an expensive steel shield with an eye and pyramid device embossed into its surface. Her helmet features a stylised third eye in the centre of her forehead. She has a light brown page cut, nice jewellery, excellent posture, and looks a bit like Virginia Woolf.

Times the Wolf is her most trusted companion. He is a huge (bear-like and shaggy) and very intelligent wolf, and he wears a set of customised spectacles for his near-sightedness (-2 to hit and poor eyesight if these are knocked off, removed, or destroyed). He understands common but cannot speak it, being a wolf. He is ferociously loyal to his mistress, and will try to retrieve her body and guard it if she goes down in combat.

Stat Lady Garamond as a powerful Paladin with top-quality gear. Stat Times the Wolf as a Really Good Dog. 

A writer dear to my heart

Rose and Charlie

Rosemary and Charlie are Baronial Agents (think X Files, Mulder and Scully), essentially fantasy FBI, deeply committed to one another but not romantically involved. They have good-quality gear, and wear the bright red armour that signifies their station.

Rose is volatile, intelligent, acerbic, good humoured, and mildly sadistic - she enjoys hurting people. She fights with a long parrying knife and knows some rudimentary ritual magic. As a young woman she studied as a librarian; she knows a lot about history and magic, and has excellent researcher skills. Her clothing is fitted and stylish.

Charlie is a young man with an earnest face and a short black beard. He is an excellent swordsman and acts as a sort of 2IC for Rose, although this relationship is not official and they have equivalent ranks. He is quiet, and generally pleasant and obliging. If he fights you he will try to kill you quickly and without fuss - he kills a lot of people and doesn't let it get to him. He wears a brightly coloured (harlequin styled) half cape to hide to motion of his sword arm, and fights with a sword and buckler.

Rose and Charlie will be collecting intelligence on regional threats to your town, and investigating mundane local crimes. They are competent, methodical, and patient - if a crime is solvable, they will eventually solve it. They are also deputies, and will defend the community with their lives if necessary. If the players help them undertake their duties they will probably offer rewards and/or further employment.

They are professionals and will not attack anyone without a good reason to do so. They are used to people respecting their authority. They are not nice people, although both are courteous and superficially friendly. They are professional killers and investigators. If you are stupid enough to kill one and let the other live, they will do literally everything in their power to make you suffer for it.

Stat Rose as a thief/rogue equivalent with one or two basic spells and fighter manoeuvres. Charlie is your quintessential sword and board fighter. Both have very high investigation, and carry writs from the regional authority that will be honoured by legitimate business.

A cop show dear to my heart

The Games House

A crime family in a medium-sized regional town, operating out of a games house. They are inspired by my love of the Sekiro conceit that all of the most dangerous people in the fiction are 70+ years old. Eupraxia and Geryon are both around 75, and should each be a dangerous physical threat on their own. The whole gang of them are a boss battle, and the gaming house is their lair. The players can also gamble money in their establishment, and the family may have jobs for players willing to do criminal work - ordinary racketeering and debt collection.

Eupraxia, The Old Woman, Fighter

1. Runs the house in close association with her husband Geryon. She is a powerful fighter and owns many magical artefacts from her youthful days as a wandering hero. She is physically large, broad, and imposing, although now slightly stooped with age, and has long, snow-white hair gathered into two thick braids. She dresses in expensive clothing and wears expensive jewellery. She is distant and reserved in all communication, preferring to leave discussion and negotiation to Geryon, but in battle she loses her inhibitions and sings various (very sweet) love songs in a clear and musical voice.
2. • Bell of Freedom. Small silver hand bell. Ring once per turn as a free action. Any who can hear the bell are immediately freed from any restraints, mundane or magical.
   • Rod of Command. 2 charges per day.
   • Sacred Coordinates. Has on her person a map to the celestial house of her patron deity, a gift bequeathed to her by the god when she was young and beautiful. She intends to use it to leave her husband and go seeking the love of her patron, but has been putting this off for years for fear that he will no longer love her as an old woman. No-one else knows that she has this.
   • Cutter of Spines. Short, broad-bladed spear with a white steel head and an evil reputation for slaughter. Gives +2 to hit and damage rolls, and increases critical range by two points (to 18-20 if you are using a D20)
3. 
   

Geryon, The Old Man, Thief

Geryon is the husband of Eupraxia, second in command at the gambling house, and the one who takes care of day to day management on the floor, as well as any exterior extortion, intimidation, or other relationship management with the Head of Security. He and Eupraxia journeyed together as heroes before getting married later in life, and he is completely devoted to her. He is loud, crude, boisterous, and unpredictable, capable of shocking acts of violence. The employees at the house are terrified of him. Very tall, muscular, and broad, with long white hair and a full beard. He dresses very simply, and carries his long, notched sword with him everywhere. Fights as dirty as possible. Often drunk, casually cruel. The kind of guy who would kill you for insulting his wife or daughter and not think twice about it.

• Clear Water. A leather and steel headband, like the one in Seven Samurai. It makes him immune to magical compulsion and sleep.
• Cloak of the Heroes. A rough shoulder cloak of reeds and lambswool, slightly too small for his massive frame. Wearing this cloak makes you invisible to the gods, and to their descendants. It was a gift from a city that he and Eupraxia saved from foreign invaders in their youth. The two infamously betrayed the city to its enemies after accepting their gifts.
• Potion of Invulnerability. Renders the drinker immune to all damage for 6 seconds.
• Humble Man’s Succour. A crude beaten iron ring. While wearing it, all magical methods of detecting truth or falsehood will give results favourable to the wearer. The ring also blocks all magical effects that magically track or pinpoint the wearer.

Metrodora, 'The Beloved', Thief

Metrodora is the adopted daughter of Eupraxia and Geryon. She is a thief and fighter of surpassing skill, and has been told by her mother that she is beloved by their patron deity. She has never had any contact with the god herself, and this makes her insecure. Metrodora is basically a Mafia princess; beautiful, confident, sociopathic, and covered in outrageously expensive jewellery and makeup. She fights with a steel small sword and is wickedly good with it.

Metrodora owns two sacred aurochs, who she fights with in battle. The aurochs are trained like dogs, and are supernaturally strong and tough; stat them as bears with +2 HD to represent their divine vitality. Each is covered in charms of magical suppression. When within 20ft of one of the aurochs, magic users have a 50 percent chance of their spells failing. When within 20ft of both, using magic becomes impossible.

• The Favoured Harness. A suit of exquisite lamellar armour covering the entire body. Protects as plate, but without any penalties to stealth, movement, swimming, or climbing.
• Transparency. An iron collar which Metrodora wears on her belt. It glows white hot if its wearer tells a lie, as Heat Metal. Used to execute cheats in the gambling house.
• Bow of Fortune. An ash short bow. The first time someone is hit by it, they are cursed with ill fortune. All of their d20 rolls of 20 count as 10 instead. The second time they are hit, d20 rolls of 19 and 20 count as ten, the third time 18 - 20, and so on. The effects last for an hour.

Nikon, The Haruspex, Magic User (Divination)

Nikon is a young man who reads entrails and can compel people to speak the truth. He ensures fair play in the gambling house, and interrogates suspected cheats with security. He is dour, introverted, and wild looking, with staring eyes and (more often than not) bloody hands. He wears a red cloak over a butchers apron, which incorporates a harness for his skinning and paring knives.

Long ago he used his divination magic to locate the sentient sword Bringer of Change. The sword is chaotic and impulsive, capable of speech but not very intelligent, and has, over the years, subtly influenced the generally reserved Nikon into acting with fewer inhibitions. You can mark this change in character by watching his face— as the sword begins to exert its influence his eyes grow wide and his expression fixed, and his normally prceise demeanour turns jerky and intense. He stopped responding to the sword long ago, but will not willingly part with it.

He is in love with the Metrodora, but cannot express this in any straightforward way, so sublimates his emotions into hatred of Hypatia the Captain. Even at his most impulsive, egged on and encouraged by Bringer of Change (who finds his timidity deeply irritating), he cannot spit this out.

• Bringer of Change. +2 Longsword. Sentient, earnest, but not very bright. Talks telepathically with its wielder, and mostly gives basic self-help advice on ‘listening to your gut’ and ‘not trying to control things that are outside of your control’.

Hypatia, The Captain, Fighter

Hypatia is a young woman who runs the gambling house’s hired muscle, a contingent of 15 thugs. She used to lead these men as a mercenary captain before they found steady employment with the house. Hypatia is friendly, loud, and straight forward.

She commands 10 - 15 human bandits. She fights with a spear, shield, and net and is completely fearless. She is also in love with Metrodora, but unlike Nikon has no problem expressing this loudly and often. She is very earnest and tries hard to be sweet— Metrodora has no interest at all. Hypatia is not aware that Nikon hates her, and tries hard to be a friend to him and ‘bring him out of himself’. If Geryon is drunk then she will be too, the two are infamous for their benders.

A game (and boss fight) dear to my heart

Bonus GLOG Class - Perfect Mimic

This is my attempt at something like a changeling. I've never liked the classic 'permanent shapeshifting' conceit; far too frictionless for me. That's high-level Fey magic, not PC stuff.

You are a naked commoner and can take on a single template from a being with templates that you a) observe from an intimate distance for a week (your party members of course, but also maybe your boyfriend in town, your colleagues at the municipal office/temple/local inn), or b) consume the brain of.

To gain a template via brain eating you have to first prepare the brain with expensive and hard-to-find ingredients. This is a cooking minigame, and gets more difficult and involved as you try to acquire higher level templates. An A template might be ok cooked in garlic and thyme, while D templates could involve manticore steaks or spices lifted from the local wizard's tower.

Templates gained via observation fade over a couple of days without access to the original subject; templates gained via brain eating are permanent until you undergo a similarly expensive purgation ritual to lose the template. You can choose which template you want to mimic, but each being can only give you one at a time and you can only have one A, one B, one C, one D.

Every template you gain comes with a HP boost, and you lose the HP when you shed the template. When you have no templates you are very, very inconspicuous to most people.  

A foundational piece of horror media dear to my heart