Generic Universal Eggplant: 2025

Monday, 28 July 2025

Braunstein AAR: Lanosh

It's time. I bit the bullet and ran my first Braunstein, and I would like to tell you how I organized it, how it went, what went well, and what could've gone better.

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells IV

There is no end in sight - the spell chapter of this book is huge.

Drug Resistance temporarily prevents the subject from getting addicted to drugs.

Ectoplasmic Enhancement is a buff that makes a ghost or a very similar creature more difficult to injure.

Evil Weather is a divine spell that creates vile weather effects that I wrote up in a very old post of mine.

Extract Drug lets the caster create drugs from mundane materials.

Eyes of the Zombie is a very cool possession spell.

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells III

Darklight almost broke me. The phrasing in the original source is incredibly confusing, and despite the simple-looking build, it took me a long while to arrive to it. Yeah, this is a 60-point spell while the original is a 1st-level spell, but effectively this is a limited Invisibility Sphere that also negates darkness penalties in an area. Also, it can be cast on both creatures and objects, and takes only one second. What a weird spell.

Death Grimace is a rather flavorful spell that is merely a perk in GURPS.

Demon Wings is a divine spell that gives the caster demonic wings.

Demonflesh is a rather boring divine buff, but one that various demon lord cultist would appreciate.

Despoil is another divine spell that makes a huge area of land barren.

Devil's Tail is another divine spell that grants the caster a spiked tail. Again, good stuff for all those hostile cultists, not so much for your typical player characters.

Devil's Tongue gives the caster another "arm."

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells II

Call Dretch Horde summons 3d dretches in exchange for a soul.

Call Lemure Horde does the same, but with lemures.

Call Nightmare uses a soul to summon a nightmare.

Charnel Fire completely destroys a corpse. I had to come up with a new modifier because building this ability by RAW results in a point cost so high that the spell just isn't worth it. I have no shame.

Clutch of Orcus is a very cool divine spell that incapacitates or maybe even kills the target.

Consume Likeness lets you shapeshift into a creature by eating a portion of its flesh.

Crushing Fist of Spite feels like something Bigby came up with when other wizards laughed at his invented spells.

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells I

The Book of Vile Darkness (for D&D 3.0) is a rather infamous book. I recall writing a review of it a year ago or so, pointing out its shortcomings and praising certain parts. But that aside, let's focus on the chapter with spells. The book has a surprising amount of pretty damn cool spells (and some of them aren't vile at all). However, I will say that the author was quite lazy here. There are many spells that are simply duplicates of innate abilities of fiends (for example, Dance of Ruin is based on the vrock's ability, Dancing Chain is based on the kyton's ability, etc.) Some spells wouldn't be out of place in any other book if you ignore material components, such as a heart of a dwarven child, or a bone of a small child that still lives. These components feel like something tacked on just to make the spell edgy.

Also, the book introduces a whole bunch of new "components" for spells. There are some spells that are limited to demons, devils, fiends, or undead. There are also spells that require the caster to be suffering from a specific disease, which sounds really hard to pull off (especially when 99% of GMs ignore disease rules). Spells that can be cast only under the influence of a specific drug are easier. There are also spells that require the caster to be in a specific evil location - also fine. Certain spells require a captured soul as a component - nothing against this. Finally, there are "Corrupt" spells that deal ability score damage to the caster. In GURPS, you could represent that with the Corrupting, -20% limitation, but I'm not a big fan of that. Instead, I will use a massively extended Backlash, even though that won't be RAW.

Now to the spells themselves:

Absorb Mind is an interesting spell. If one were to translate it 1-to-1 from the original source (like I initially did), one would arrive at a more expensive and limited form of Speak with Dead. Thus, I had to step away and make it work slightly differently. I didn't want to skip this spell, because the fluff is cool.

Addiction is a vile spell with a catch - the caster must be drugged too. Addiction can be either a physical or mental disadvantage, so by RAW, you can only use Mind Control to impose addictions to drugs with a psychological dependency. I decided to ignore this fact as a special feature.

Angry Ache is a simple pain debuff.

Befoul poisons water in a large area.

Wizardry: Races of Eberron Spells

I've never been a big fan of Eberron. Sure, there were some interesting parts, but the setting itself just didn't grip me. However, the races that are usually associated with this setting are pretty cool. The warforged are... surprisingly difficult to stat up in GURPS (you can see the entry in the Monstrous Compendium) but also interesting in terms of flavor. Changelings, shifters, and kalashtar also are pretty neat. I appreciate the existence of the artificer class and its psionic variant, and the setting giving the deathless some extra attention.

But who cares? I'm here for the spells. Races of Eberron has a quite hefty spell chapter that is about 10 pages long, but most of the spells are either rather bland, redundant, or lame. The common gimmick is that many spells are restricted to certain races and enhance their racial abilities. I actually like that, but these specific spells just don't work that well in GURPS. There also are Mindset spells that give you a bonus as long as the spell is prepared. If we cut all that, we get only a handful of spells worth adapting.

Force Shapechange is a spell against werewolves, shifters, doppelgangers, and other shapeshifters. By RAW, I was supposed to link a Neutralize with Derange to the Affliction, but that would be wonky and expensive. Instead, I decided to introduce the Force Shapechange, +20% enhancement that feels right. Also, I arbitrarily increased the duration from 9 seconds to 10 seconds because Alternate Form and Morph take 10 seconds to use by default.

Inflict Damage is the same as Inflict Wounds, but only works against constructs. Taking into account that many constructs have very high DR, this may be useful.

Mass True Seeing is a mass version of True Seeing.

Misrepresent Alignment is a clerical spell that changes the target's alignment for the purpose of detection spells.

Scorpion Tail is another clerical spell that gives you a poisonous stinger.

Unseen Crafter is a spell that lets you set up a crafting process and go out for a week or so.

Random Generation: Cleric

You can generate a cleric character using the following procedure:
1. Take the base template (below), rolling attributes as shown in the template.
2. Roll 1d3 twice on Table 1 to determine your alignment. If you prefer the classic law-chaos axis, just roll 1d3 once, ignoring the good-evil axis.
3. Roll on Table 2 to determine your pact disadvantage(s) for your divine abilities.
4. Determine an archetype by rolling on Table 3.
            4.1. Choose an appropriate patron deity or determine it randomly
            4.2. Roll 1d3 – this is the number of spells known at the start. Pick a domain from the list of domains of your patron deity, note down spells that cost 20 points or less, and determine a spell from them randomly. Continue until you have all the spells.
5. Roll 3dx40 to determine your extra money in $.
            5.1. Optionally, purchase a delver kit (DF13, pp. 5-6).
6. Roll 3 times on Table 3 to determine extra advantages.
7. Roll 3 times on Table 4 to determine extra disadvantages.
8. Roll 5 times on Table 5 to determine secondary skills.
9. Roll 6 times on Table 6 to determine background skills.
10. Roll 1d-2 times on Table 7 to determine languages.
11. Roll on Table 8 to determine appearance.
12. Roll 17 + 1d to determine the starting age.

Random Generation: Ranger

You can generate a ranger character using the following procedure:
1. Take the base template (below), rolling attributes as shown in the template.
2. Determine an armor loadout by rolling on Table 1.
3. Determine a weapon loadout by rolling on Table 2.
4. Roll 3dx40 to determine your extra money in $.
4.1. Optionally, purchase a delver kit (DF13, pp. 5-6).
5. Roll 3 times on Table 3 to determine extra advantages.
6. Roll 3 times on Table 4 to determine extra disadvantages.
7. Roll 4 times on Table 5 to determine secondary skills.
8. Roll 6 times on Table 6 to determine background skills.
9. Roll 1d-2 times on Table 7 to determine languages.
10. Roll on Table 8 to determine appearance.
11. Roll 17 + 1d to determine the starting age.

Random Generation: Sorcerer

You can generate a sorcerer character using the following procedure:
1. Take the base template (below), rolling attributes as shown in the template.
2. Determine an armor loadout by rolling on Table 1.
3. Determine a weapon loadout by rolling on Table 2.
4. Roll 3dx40 to determine your extra money in $.
4.1. Optionally, purchase a delver kit (DF13, pp. 5-6).
5. Roll once on Table 3 to determine sorcerer bloodline.
6. Your bloodline will have college or theme-based scope limitations. For each scope or theme that has its own table, roll on the Starting Spells table 1d4-2 (minimum 1) times and take these spells as alternative abilities. Then roll 1d6; on 1-2, take a number of levels of Sorcerous Empowerment limited with your bloodline scope limitation enough to take the most expensive spell rolled as an alternative ability.
7. Roll 3 times on Table 4 to determine extra advantages.
8. Roll 3 times on Table 5 to determine extra disadvantages.
9. Roll 4 times on Table 6 to determine secondary skills.
10. Roll 4 times on Table 7 to determine background skills.
11. Roll 1d-2 times on Table 8 to determine languages.
12. Roll on Table 9 to determine appearance.
13. Roll 17 + 1d to determine the starting age.

Please note that some steps may refer to not-yet-existent tables, such as the Expert Skill table.

Random Generation: Starting Spells

So far I’ve made two sets of tables for random character generation – for fighters and bards. Next up in the queue is the sorcerer, but the sorcerer is a spellcaster. Not only is he a sorcerer, but also one whose scope of powers depends on the bloodline, and there are hundreds of them (yes, the table will be comically large). How do you determine the starting spells then? I do not want to make hundreds of bloodline-specific tables – that’s too much even for me. I’m going to make things easy for myself and instead make random tables for colleges and themes – after all, almost all bloodlines have their scope defined as 1-4 colleges or themes. These tables will also be useful for other spellcasters, such as wizards.

Wizardry: Legacy Underdark Spells

Usually, I determine books from which to convert spells randomly, and this is one of such cases. I rolled Weapons of Legacy. Does anyone even remember this book? Back in the day, I remember it being not well received and almost forgotten. I actually like the concept of the book, even if the execution wasn't very good (allegedly, because I've never used it myself). The gist of it is that you get a unique weapon that gains new abilities as you level up. GURPS actually has this as the Named Possession perk. Weapons of Legacy has only a few spells, and only one of them is worth even looking at when it comes to adapting to wizardry.

Sever Legacy doesn't simply remove the Named Possession perk, but also all the similar [X] Bond perks. You may notice that the duration is Truly Permanent even though the statblock has Extended Duration, Permanent, +150%. Why? Because look at the spell. Do you think it is worth 32-40 points? Would it be better if it were 15 points more expensive? "Permanent" by default must include a dispel clause, and "spend 1 point to buy the perk again" is probably enough. This is mostly a spell for NPCs to use against the PCs. I can imagine it being more useful in Oriental settings, with all the samurai and ancestral swords.

All right, but a post with a single spell would be lame, so I rolled another book and got Underdark. Now that's a good one. Some of the spells already were adapted, but there are some interesting ones left. Perfect.

Amorphous Form is a spell that turns you into an ooze. Perfect for assassins and other infiltrators.

Blindsight adds a new sense to the subject. I changed the wording of the Vibration Sense advantage somewhat to make it more clear what it does.

Burrow gives the subject tough claws that can be used as weapons or shovels.

Clarity of Mind is a rather boring buff spell that is nonetheless useful.

Drown is a save-or-die spell that I didn't build via Choking, +100%, because the suffocation rules in GURPS are... all over the place. I'm paying for effect, so this is a variant of Heart Attack here.

Locate Node is the first of the spells that deal with "earth nodes." The earth nodes are very similar to the ley line nodes in GURPS, so I decided to make this spell more generic and treat earth nodes as ley line nodes with flavored mana.

Mass Burrow is a mass version of Burrow for situations when you really need to do some digging done quick.

Node Door is a teleportation spell that only works between ley line nodes.

Node Genesis creates a new ley line node.

Node Lock hides the ley line node from others and penalizes attempts to use/affect it. I made it with Obscure because... because I did, okay?

Portal Barricade temporarily closes a portal.

Portal Stabilization temporarily increases the Malfunction number of a portal.

Portal-to-Portal Redirect allows you to change the destination of a portal.

Portal Reformat adds or removes keys to a portal (this is related to D&D portal metaphysics).

Portal View makes a portal transparent from one side.

Stick is a perk-level spell that affixes one object to another.

Stone Metamorphosis lets you transmute rock.

Stone Sphere allows you to play bowling in the dungeon.

Tremorsense adds a new sense to the subject. I remember that in the past I used to build it as Vibration Sense with Environmental, Ground, -20%, but Subsonic Hearing is a more appropriate option, according to GURPS Powers: Enhanced Senses.

Viscid Glob is a rather powerful spell that engulfs creatures in sticky goo.

Wall of Dispel Magic is self-explanatory.

Random Generation: Bard

Back in the day, I wrote a post with some random tables that would let you quickly generate a fighter. Now, here's another set of tables that will let you generate a bard.

Low-Tech Musical Instrument Costs and Weights

Bard is my least favorite "core" class. Despite that, I've been a bit frustrated because GURPS doesn't have that many low-tech musical instruments detailed. There are several on page 49 of GURPS Low-Tech, a few in DF1 and DF8, and a whole bunch of skill specialties in LTC1 with examples, but without costs and weights. I have no idea what 90% of these instruments even are. I found people asking about this on the forums and getting "it's too difficult to research" in response. If even GURPS authors found it too difficult to research, then I will not even try. I decided to look into D&D books (Song & Silence, The Quintessential Bard I and II), but found only lists of instruments with no costs and weights. Thus, I fed the data from GURPS Low-Tech into Deepseek and told it to extrapolate/interpolate the values. So, here's the slop.

Training Rules

Most of the core concepts that are required for an AD&D-style game in GURPS are done, and one of the few things left to think about is training. AD&D is a class-and-level-based system, and advancement is done in levels, obviously. GURPS is a wildly different beast, with advancement rules being different as well. As a rule, the GM gives players some character points at the end of the session, and the players improve their characters using them. Sounds simple, right? On one hand – yes, it is simple. On the other hand, is it really that simple and do I want it this simple?

How Does Injury Tolerance (Diffuse) Even Work?

I've been working on the four basic elementals to add them to Monstrous Compendium II. I really want to get them right, because elementals are quite important - they can be enemies, they are the most frequently summoned creatures, they can be used as allies or shapeshifting forms, etc. Three of the four elementals (air, fire, and water) are diffuse beings. So, let's take a look at Injury Tolerance (Diffuse) in more detail.

Wizardry: Complete Mage Spells III

All right, that's the final post with spells from this book. As you can see, there are only three posts compared to nine for Complete Arcane. I threw out plenty of spells indeed.

Rebirth of Iron is a very limited spell that removes HT and DR penalties caused by rust and corrosion. Can be very useful if you lack bronze gear when delving into an underwater dungeon.

Repelling Shield is a more expensive, but more fun version of Shield. This one may knock the attacker's weapon on a shield hit.

Resinous Tar is the opposite of Grease.

Steal Summoning is a spell that lets you control a summoned being.

Storm of Needles is a simple piercing cone spell.

Summon Weapon would've been incredibly expensive if built via Snatcher, so I had to ignore RAW and use Create to get a reasonable point cost.

Touch of Years is the first spell that ages the subject, making Extended Lifespan and Unaging slightly more important.

Toxic Tongue lets you spit contact poison.

Vigilant Slumber lets you wake up when a specific condition is met.

Replacing Resistance with Active Defense

If you're reading this, you probably know by know that I love writing up abilities using the advantage/modifier framework of GURPS. However, it isn't perfect, and some abilities are either very difficult or impossible to stat up properly in GURPS. One of such cases is Affliction without a resistance roll. People who do not read the rules tend to parrot other people who do not read the rules and say "uuuuuhhhhh, you just add Cosmic, Irresistible Attack, +300%." I usually try to avoid tampering with the fundamental aspects of the rules, but I've had enough after an arguement with a friend about Otiluke's Resilient Sphere and how a Quick Contest of Will vs. DX doesn't make much sense. If you'd like other examples of such abilities, you can check out Glitterdust or, if you prefer canonical examples, look no further than the skunk spray from page 27 of GURPS Furries. "Okay, the skunk sprays you, but since you rolled HT good enough, it doesn't smell." Nonsense, am I right?

So, what I want to do is have an Affliction that has no roll to resist, but allows an active defense even if it's a Malediction.

Wizardry: Complete Mage Spells II

We're nowhere near done with Complete Mage.

Endless Slumber is a permanent version of Sleep. I kept the value of Sleep at +150% because the fact that the subject doesn't need to eat or drink is counterbalanced by injury waking the subject up. Somewhat.

Finger of Agony is an expensive, but debilitating spell.

Flaying Tendrils gives you four tentacles of a mind flayer.

Genius Loci is a super-flavorful spell that no player character probably will take.

Jet of Steam is Gust of Wind with an additional burninng damage.

Melf's Slumber Arrow imbues an arrow with the power of sleep.

Otiluke's Suppressing Field is a cheaper alternative to Antimagic Field that suppresses only one college and also allows to "burn through" the ward with enough skill.

Otto's Imperative Ambulation forces the subject to move around.

Painful Echoes causes pain and makes the subject more vulnerable to sonic attacks.

Wizardry: Complete Mage Spells I

Let's switch gears and instead of adapting difficult and important concepts make some filler content. Yet again, I determined a D&D book randomly from which to convert spells and got Complete Mage. This is a late 3.5 book that suffers from some late 3.5-isms, but its selection of spells is rather large. I expect to throw many of them out. Let's see how it goes.

Allied Footsteps is actually a pretty cool spell that lets an ally know where you are at all times.

Animate Weapon lets you attack with your weapon at range, but requires you to touch the weapon first and maintain constant concentration.

Arcane Turmoil is what I call a late-3.5 spell. You have an existing main effect plus something minor and often barely related. In this case, the main effect is, surprisingly, not damage, and both effects make sense together thematically. It's not a very practical spell to learn with points, but I can see it being useful against undead spellcasters, such as liches and deathlocks who rely on ER and buffs. In any case, my standard cope when it comes to very situational spells is "some spells were invented not to be learned, but to be enchanted."

Boiling Blood actually was converted before as a blood magic spell, but now there's a generic arcane version.

Cacophonous Alarm is another variant of Alarm that is restricted to the audible version. I really do not mind this variation - it is a little bit cheaper, but also fits into the College of Sound.

Catsfeet is a "swift" spell that improves your balance.

Caustic Mire is a spell that I wanted to skip at first, but then thought that the College of Acid really could use another spell, especially since it is something more interesting that just corrosion damage. While this spell is expensive, the bad terrain penalties are quite harsh, and the flammable fumes effect is interesting. The statblock, however, is huge and convoluted.

Treasure Type in GURPS

There is one major thing left to do to enable BrOSR-style games in GURPS, and that is treasure assignment/generation. This post on the Axioms of the Addled Antillectual blog worked out the $-to-CP progression based on the ACKS II assumptions. While it does indeed allow us to simply use treasure tables from ACKS, I'm not completely satisfied with this approach, and I decided to write this post to organize my thought process and, hopefully, devise a solution.

GURPS BrOSR Progress Update

You may know that my current project is to make GURPS compatible with the BrOSR playstyle. It may seem like a fool’s errand to some, but it isn’t to me. I haven’t posted anything in a relatively long while, mostly due to life getting busy, but that doesn’t mean that I’ve been idling on this front. I’d like to tell you about what’s been done and what still needs to be done. So, here’s my progress report.

Abstract Fast Combat System for GURPS

As was outlined several posts ago, GURPS lacks an abstract fast combat system that can be used to resolve engagements, especially ones that have a scale between individual combat and mass combat. I thought about it, and I believe that the best option would be to combine parts of GURPS Mass Combat with the mass combat from ACKS II RR / Domains at War: Campaigns. For that, we will have to calculate the BR (Battle Rating) values for each combatant, which isn't actually that difficult.

The design goal of this system is to have a way to resolve combat quickly between almost any numbers of combatants. While I absolutely adore the nitty-gritty detailed combat system of GURPS, I realize the need for abstraction because resolving, for example, a random encounter between 5 PCs and 20 mercenaries on one side and 60 orcs on the other side is practically impossible on the standard GURPS scale. Let's see if I manage to write something that makes sense.

Wizardry: Lightning Spells II

I got a request to create some lightning spells because the College of Lightning is very small. I looked through some D&D spells (I try to see if there are any existing spells that can be adapted before I plug holes with GURPS or original spells).

Forked Lightning is a lightning version of Burning Hands.

Lightning Bug is a lightning version of Magic Missile.

Lightning Curtain creates a wall of lightning.

Lightning Lash borrows the name from a D&D spell, but the effects from a GURPS Magic spell.

Lightning Reflection lets you bounce lightning attacks back at the attacker.

Lightning Rod is an interesting spell that turns a metal object into a single-use lightning rod against electrical attacks.

Lightning Shield is one of my favorite defensive spells (used to be called Lightning Armor in GURPS). The original D&D spell for some reason incorporates an acidic version because... I don't know. Electric erosion?

Lightning Storm creates a spherical spark storm.

Sea Voyage Procedure

ACKS II Judges Journal has three exploration procedures to make gameplay smoother and/or serve as checklists to the referees (you know, I find myself use "referee" instead of "GM" more and more often nowadays). Since I've already adapted wilderness and dungeon exploration procedures, let's adapt the one for sea voyages - something that, I believe, never came up in my games before. I'm a landlubber.

Blood Magic: Fiendish Codex II Spells

As promised, here are the fiendish spells from the previous post adapted to the blood magic framework.

Wizardry: Fiendish Codex II Spells

Both Fiendish Codices are pretty damn good books for D&D 3.5. The first one is about demons, and the second one is about devils. I wish there were another volume that would cover other fiends, such as yugoloths, demodands, hordelings, etc., but alas it never happened. The dice roller told me to convert spells from Fiendish Codex II: Tyrants of the Nine Hells. There aren't many of them, and most of them belong to a new spell category - "investiture spells". They are not full-on polymorph spells, but spells that infuse the subject with fiendish essence, granting some qualities of a specific kind of devil. They also have a side effect of fatiguing the subject, which is accomplishable in GURPS. Since these spells are very fiendish, I will also make versions for blood magic in the next post.

Devil's Ego is a divine spell that imbues you with devilish charisma and good looks.

Devil's Eye is a self-only variant of Darkvision that has a much shorter duration and a minor negative side effect.

Investiture of [X] spells imbue the subject with essence of a devil. All such spells provide minor DR against fire, but make the subject vulnerable to silver and holy weapons, and make the subject lose 4 FP when the spell ends. In addition, each spell grants extra effects that depend on the devil in question. Overall, these spells are flavorful, but not very optimal in terms of character optimization. However, they allow wizards who specialize in the Gate college to gain some traits usually not associated with gates. Also, these are ranged buffs, which is a rare thing. Statblocks look disgusting.

Review: Brozer - Island of War and Winter

In the online TTRPG discussion circles, you may hear the term “Braunstein” being thrown around. You may have heard that Braunstein was the precursor to D&D and tabletop RPGs in general, and that Blackmoor was first labeled “a fantasy Braunstein.” However, it’s much more difficult to understand what it is and how to run one. At least, it was until last year there was a very important release – Brozer: Island of War and Winter. I believe that it deserves much more publicity than it did, so I’d like to give you a quick rundown and review. For the most part, my ramblings are pointless because Brozer is free, and you can simply download it and read it yourself.

Food and Supplies in GURPS and ACKS

Before a party of adventurers sets out to clear out a wilderness area or dungeon, they have to buy enough supplies for the trip. The same thing is required when an army marches to war, but on a larger scale. How much do supplies cost in GURPS? This is actually a surprisingly difficult question despite resource management being such an important part of the game. I’m doing this topic for two reasons. First, I ran into this when calculating ACKS Battle Ratings for GURPS creatures, so it needs to be settled. Second, in my current game, one of the player characters is a food mage, and the question of supplies has arisen multiple times.

Abstract Combat Statistics: Heroes on the Mass Scale and ACKS

Not long ago, I was thinking about the necessity of abstracted combat resolution and remembered that GURPS Mass Combat exists, and that it probably can be applied to small-scale combat with some minor adjustments. However, one of the questions remains - how do you derive abstract combat statistics from the non-abstract combat characteristics of a creature? In my GURPS Monstrous Compendium, I calculated the Combat Effectiveness Ratings for all creatures but for a slightly different reason. And now I remembered about the existence of Heroes on the Mass Scale from Pyramid #3-84 that is... basically 90% the same thing, but I believe that these 10% of difference make it much better. I've already dabbled with this article in the past, but I had much less experience back then, so now let's revisit it.

Wizardry: Magic of Incarnum Spells

The almighty random number generator told me to take a look at the spells from Magic of Incarnum. Not that long ago (not even two years), I reworked the way incarnum works in my games, because my first attempt was... the first attempt indeed. The Incarnum power modifier includes the existence of anti-powers, and magic spells are one of them. Thus, we will have spells that can counteract soulmelds. However, the book also has a bunch of spells that are incarnum-themed. Some of them allow the caster to spend essentia or HP for additional effects, some do some other soul-related stuff. For the most part, these spells will go into the Spirit college - a variant Necromantic college that is less about death and undeath, but more about spirits. Their presence on the list will make these two colleges feel more different from each other. I introduced a new keyword - Incarnum - that indicates that the spell can be enhanced by spending essentia/HP. This is also reflected in the Components line with a (E).

Adept Spirit is a delayed buff that temporarily improves some of your magical skills.

Animal Spirit is another delayed buff that temporarily increases Per and grants Night Vision. While normally I'd assign it to the Animal college that is inaccessible to arcane spellcasters, I decided to make an exception here due to thematic reasons.

Channel the Mishtai is a flavorful buff spell with semi-random effects.

Conjure Midnight Construct is a very cheap summoning spell that nonetheless can create a very useful ally. The duration is short, and it always costs HP or essentia.

Detect Incarnum is just a detection spell.

Essentia Lock is a spell that prevents the victim from using incarnum abilities.

Guardian Spirit is another delayed buff that temporarily boosts defenses.

Incarnum Arc is an interesting spell that deals toxic damage in a line between you and a mobile "lightning rod."

Incarnum Bladestorm creates soul-infused ephemeral blades that cut through material and immaterial victims.

Open Chakra has nothing to do with the original series of Open [x] Chakra. Now, this is a spell that grants chi talents, which seems appropriate to me because chakras are mostly a chi concept now, and incarnum's theme is that it can be used to boost abilities of other power sources.

Protection from Incarnum creates an ablative barrier that stops incarnum-based attacks, but prevents the subject from gaining essentia.

Rend Essentia is an attack that targets ER (Incarnum).

Soul Blight is the same as Rend Essentia, but in addition deals toxic damage equal to ER burned.

Soul Boon makes it difficult to harm your soul and dispel your soulmelds.

Soulbanned Zone is a very situational spell that probably is never worth learning (unless you're in an area where enemies often use incarnum). However, it could be a nice situationally useful scroll, couldn't it?

Soulbleed makes a weapon deal follow-up essentia and toxic damage.

Soulmeld Disjunction dispels all active soulmelds on the target creature and prevents their reactivation for a short time.

Steal Incarnum is an ER (Incarnum) variant of Energy Drain.

Suppress Magic lost its ability to affect soulmelds and now is a spell that temporarily suppresses magic items.

Valiant Spirit is the final delayed buff spell that increases DX and resistance to fear temporarily.

GURPS Monstrous Compendium II WIP

Remember my Monstrous Compendium? Not long ago, I started another volume, and now you can check out the first WIP version here.

Friday, 4 April 2025

"GM, I don't know what to spend money on"

“I don’t know what to spend money on.” How many times have you heard this complaint from players? How many times have you seen GMs asking for advice on how to deprive the player characters from money? How many times have you seen the game devolve into the characters scrounging for copper coins just because otherwise they would have no motivation to adventure, because once they get rich and have nothing to spend money on, there is no reason for them to go out into the wilds? I’ve seen plenty of that and, to be honest, I’m guilty of some of that too.

A Thorough Look at Bards in D&D and GURPS

Bard is one of the core D&D classes that has been present in every edition since AD&D 1e. The D&D community sure likes its bard memes about seducing dragons that totally didn’t get old twenty years ago. My personal D&D experience begins with 3.0 and I have to say that I’ve never seen a bard PC or even NPC. Nobody was interested in this class, and even I never liked it much. Something always felt off about the bard. About a month ago, when I was reworking my GURPS implementation of D&D classes, I decided to take a good look at the bard to understand what’s the reason for my distaste and what can be done with it.

Blood Magic: More Spells

It's time to expand the spell repertoire of the blood mages. In this post, I will list all already existing spells that are appropriate to the blood magic tradition, adjusted accordingly.

Is Sorcery even a system?

In the comments, I've been asked why I dislike Sorcery despite having written hundreds of spells for it, and it made me realize that I forgot to post a transcript of one of my videos here on this topic. Here's my rant about why I think Sorcery isn't a system and isn't good, and I don't even talk about people ignoring or misunderstanding rules and then blaming Sorcery for it - this is not my problem, but their problem.

Wizardry: Tome and Blood Spells

Complete Arcane is widely considered to be Tome and Blood (a 3.0 book) updated to 3.5, but people who claim that haven't read the books or have only read the game mechanical parts and did that poorly as well. Aside from lots of different non-mechanical information, Tome and Blood has some spells and prestige classes that didn't make it into the 3.5 edition. I have converted all the Complete Arcane spells that I wanted, but some of these "missing" ones are pretty cool, so let's convert them.

Choke should be a simple spell, right? Just use Affliction with Choking, +100%, right? If you read the rules carefully, you will see that rules for suffocation (when you, for example, run out of air when diving), rules for choking and strangling (p. B370), Choke Hold technique (p. MA69), and the afflicted choking condition (p. B428) all use different rules. And then there's Fatigue Attack with Suffocation. The Choking affliction is something of a save-or-die where you cannot do anything. Why can you resist and act semi-normally when you're being choked normally then? Here, I decided to go a different way and stat this spell up as a limited form of TK. It may seem like the most convoluted option, but in reality it's done for the sake of streamlining the rules. Now, you get a proper choking attempt that can be resisted, and the spell is quite cheap too. So, if you see a chicken, cast Choke on it.

Feign Death is another interesting one. On the surface, it looks similar to Hibernate, but the devil is in the details. Feign Death is a buff, so it can only be used on willing creatures. The duration is limited, but there's another important difference - the subject still can hear and smell the surroundings, and the subject is the one who decides when he wakes up. This greatly expands the spell's utility.

Hide Life is a very cheap spell in terms of character points, but the casting cost is very high. The effects, however, turn you into something of a lich, making you unable to die, unless the body part where your life is hidden is found and destroyed.

Indifference is a spell that drains emotions. The subject becomes immune to fear and influence, but becomes socially inept.

Negative Energy Burst and Negative Energy Ray are simple attack spells that deal toxic damage. If I recall things correctly, these spells were later reprinted in Magic of Faerun, but I am too lazy to check the book right now.

Wizardry: Miscellaneous Spells III

Initially, I was planning to make a post with some cheap spells, but then I thought that I'd rather adapt some spells from the Lords of Darkness book, but then I found that there are too few of them there and opened the Wizard's Spell Compendium for 2e and found some interesting spells. So, this post is a mishmash of multiple ideas.

Acid Bolt is an acidic variant of Magic Missile.

Agitate Wounds is a cheap spell that reopens wounds.

Afterclap is a time spell that duplicates an injury that the target has recently received.

Alter Instrument is a spell for bards to save backpack space and money.

Handfang is a cheap spell that temporarily creates a fanged mouth on your palm.

Night's Mantle is mostly an NPC spell that lets wraiths, vampires, and other sun-repelled undead to operate normally in sunlight. This is a very expensive spell, but I don't mind that - it is supposed to be available only to very powerful undead spellcasters. Otherwise, wouldn't all vampires learn this spell and make their Weakness useless?

Phantom Plow plows the land quickly, but also is useful in combat. By RAW, this spell isn't supposed to work, because Side Effect depends on injury and not damage, but I don't care.

Stasis Clone is a more powerful variant of Clone that allows creating multiple clones that do not rot.

Massive Setting Document Update

The last couple of months were almost completely devoted to reworking my own setting documents (link). While the setting itself is something few people will care about, the Races of Karilan and Powers of Karilan documents may be more widely useful. The way I do races, monsters, powers, and magic in my games often isn't the same as you can see it on the blog here (aside from all the Wizardry-related stuff - it is the same). The updated documents now have clickable tables of contents, which makes navigation so much easier. The Powers of Karilan document lost a lot of weight, as I cut down and reorganized the material. I have to say that it feels nice to select several pages worth of text and hit "Delete" because now you know better. Now, I can finally move on to something else - I have so many ideas! And none of them are original, of course.

Wednesday, 12 March 2025

Combat Scaling and Abstraction

Back in the day, I made a video about why I love crunchy tabletop RPG systems, where I explained why I enjoy such intricacies as weapon composition, partial armor coverage, optional hit locations, one-second turns, and other game mechanical intricacies that make GURPS so fun for me. However, I do understand that, in certain ways, granularity can limit you and sometimes even produce quite strange results that do not make much sense.

Wizardry: Clerical Spellcasting

Wizardry is my labor of love. However, clerics deserve some love too. A few months ago, I wrote a long post where I divulged my thoughts about clerical magic and even worked out a mechanical framework. However, the framework in question saw some minor changes, and I was told that this long thing looks cumbersome in my setting document, so I moved it here and just replaced it with a link.

Wizardry: Wu Jen Plant Spells

I find wu jen to be a fascinating D&D class, but my first GURPS reimagining of it was very poor. Now that I know better, I've reworked it, and because of this, I have to un-clericify and wujen-ify Plant spells.

Wizardry: Blood Mage Spell List

Here's a spell list for the blood mage. It's very short right now, but it will be expanded in the future. No cost adjustments are required - use them as is.

Blood Magic: Basic Spells

Back in the day, I made a sorcery-based subsystem for Blood Magic. It even saw play a couple of times, and the results were satisfying. While it isn't really intended for PCs, the rules must exist for NPCs as well. Now that I'm touching up all the spellcasting traditions in my setting, I reached blood magic, and I left the mechanics intact, but I had to tweak the existing spells a bit. Unlike shadow magic and all the previous spellcasting traditions that now have separate spell list posts, this one not only will have a spell list, but also its own spells that are not tied to Wizardry. This post has some basic spells that were part of the original post.

Wizardry: Shadowcaster Spell List

There is another spellcaster that requires its own spell list along with an alternative college structure. I decided against writing up unique shadowcaster spells because they usually are more or less just renames wizard spells. The prices listed below are NOT adjusted (at least not yet) - these are wizard spell point costs. To derive the shadowcaster spell cost, do the following:

o Remove Requires Magic Words, -10%.

o Replace Requires IQ Roll, -10% with Requires DX Roll, -10%.

o Replace Based on IQ, Own Roll, +20% with Based on DX, Own Roll, +20%.

The Wizardry GCS library will get new tags just so that the spells could be easily filtered.

Wizardry: Hexblade Spell List

There is another spellcaster that requires its own spell list, because its scope of powers doesn't really fit into the GURPS college structure. Thus, here's a quite short list of spells appropriate for hexblades. The prices listed below are NOT adjusted (at least not yet) - these are wizard spell point costs. To derive the hexblade spell cost, do the following:

o Remove Requires Gestures, -10% and Requires Magic Words, -10%.

o Remove Based on IQ, Own Roll, +20%, Requires IQ Roll, -10% or, in case of self-only buff spells, replace it with Requires Will Roll, -5%.

The Wizardry GCS library will get a new tag - Hexblade, just so that the spells could be easily filtered.

Gatekeeping Problem #1

As a fun exercise, I wrote a problem. Using only rules from GURPS Basic Set, how many mistakes can you find here?

D&D Taint/Corruption Revisited

A long time ago, I tried to adapt the D&D Taint/Corruption system from Heroes of Horror and Oriental Adventures based on the corruption system from GURPS Horror, but it didn't really work well in practice. The rate of corruption accumulation was too slow, and the countermeasures were absolute and relatively cheap, making the entire system questionable. However, doesn't GURPS have something that ruins your characters gradually, depending on exposure time, rarely has absolute countermeasures, plays well with powers, and isn't really used in fantasy games? Yes, I'm talking about radiation. That framework seems perfect - you'd just have to adjust the effects.

Morale Rules in GURPS

As I’ve been on an AD&D and ACKS binge lately, I noticed some mechanics that rarely are present in the more modern systems. Well, ACKS is modern, but you get my point. One of such mechanics is morale. Not long ago, I wrote a post about Fright Checks where I actually managed to miss something important from DFRPG, and fear is somewhat related to morale. Generally speaking, one of the complaints about combat being too long in any system is that many GMs seem to insist that all fights must be fights to the death, and that NPCs or monsters never flee or surrender. PCs never fleeing also is a thing. Thus, I would like to explore the morale rules in GURPS.

Wizardry: Warmage Spell List

I'm currently reworking my "Powers of Karilan" setting document and encountered the issue of certain spellcasting traditions having vaguely defined scopes of powers. Thus, to fix the issue, I will have to write down separate spell lists for them. This one is for the warmage. The prices listed below are NOT adjusted (at least not yet) - these are wizard spell point costs. To derive the warmage spell cost, do the following:

o Remove Requires Gestures, -10% and Requires Magic Words, -10%.

o Add Accessibility, Requires simple ritual, -5%.

The Wizardry GCS library will get a new tag - Warmage, just so that the spells could be easily filtered.

Wizardry: Scribe Spells

I got a simple request - write a spell that creates a writing of whatever the caster dictates. However, D&D has some spells of a similar nature, so I will convert them too.

Amanuensis animates a quill pen to transcribe an existing text, providing its own ink.

Copy instantly copies a writing without needing a quill pen or ink.

Write writes whatever the caster dictates without needing a quill pen or ink.

Musical Scribe is a musical version of Write.

Rule Zero, RAW, and GURPS

In the past couple of weeks, the online RPG discussion was focused on a contentious topic – Rule Zero and playing RAW. Walls of text were written, videos recorded, feelings hurt, etc. Even Rob Kuntz got involved. From observing it all, I found out that people have very strong opinions about Rule Zero and playing RAW, that many people are incapable of logic reasoning, and that there is a lot of dishonesty and arguing in bad faith. However, the discussion was mostly in the context of D&D, and when it comes to GURPS, things works slightly differently. That’s why I’d like to explore the gamemastering chapter of GURPS Basic Set and some other GURPS books to show you what the books say on this topic, and, of course, provide my own opinion.

GCS Libraries and Compilation Documents

In the sidebar on the right side of the page, you can see the link to my Boosty page where you could subscribe for an exorbitant sum of money to gain access to compilation documents of Sorcery spells, GCS libraries of Sorcery spells, Wizardry spells, psionics, and some other stuff.

Today, I thought "why?" First of all, I want to do something positive for the hobby, and hiding this stuff behind a paywall is not positive at all. Second, I don't really like sorcery, I think it's a bad system, I discourage its use, and I'm not planning to work on it ever again, then why am I paywalling the libraries? So, everything is free now. The page remains as a repository for the files just so I can update them more conveniently. For those who supported me, I appreciate your support!

Monday, 17 February 2025

Random GURPS Weather Generator

Remember my post in random weather generation? Now it's automated. You can download it here.

Changelog:

v1.1 - I messed up badly and all the temperatures were wrong due to mixing up "less or equal" and "equal or higher". It's fixed now.

Sunday, 16 February 2025

Wizardry: Magic of Eberron Spells

The next book to inspect for spells for my games is Magic of Eberron (yes, I'm determining them randomly). To my surprise, the spells section of this book is relatively short when compared to, for example, Magic of Faerun. Most of the spells are highly setting-specific, so I will only borrow several more generic ones.

Control Elemental allows you to command an elemental creature of a specific type.

Hidden Ward conceals magic auras on an object.

Leap into Animal lets you physically and mentally possess a willing animal.

Leech Undeath lets you drain HP from an undead creature, but the healing is temporary.

Legion's Magic Weapon is a mass version of Magic Weapon.

Mindburn is a mental attack that deals damage and possibly lowers IQ.

Orb of Dancing Death is an interesting spell that creates a mobile orb that enervates living creatures around it.

Reinforce Construct is a simple buff that makes a construct tougher.

Scry Trap is a protective spell that injures and blinds whoever tries to scry the subject.

Speaking Stones creates a single-use phone.

Wizardry: Miscellaneous Spells II

While I do have plans for converting spells from other D&D books, I'd like to add some miscellaneous spells to my collection, including some Making and Breaking spells from GURPS Magic.

Create Implausible Material creates things like solid lightning, frozen flame, etc.

Dye is a more powerful version of Color. This one is limited by area as for gases and energy and not by mass because... just because, okay? It's already expensive enough.

Lichcraft is a spell that is used to become a lich.

Mana Burn attacks the subject's ER (Magic) and also deals damage if it does burn some ER.

Mana Leak causes the subject's spells to become more expensive.

Soilproof prevents the subject from getting dirty.

Waterproof prevers the subject from getting wet.

Market Class and Equipment Availability

One concept from ACKS II that I really like is the Market Class – each settlement is classified as one of six market classes, depending on the population. Market class defines how many goods of different price categories can be bought or sold at this market, among some other things. This is something like the GP Limit for settlements from D&D 3.0, but expanded and perfected. In GURPS, there are some rules for equipment availability in GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Setting: Caverntown (you wouldn’t think to look for them there, would you?), but they are quite barebones and not generic. Surprisingly, GURPS City Stats has nothing about it. Thus, it is time to adapt the ACKS rules. To be honest, there’s barely any adaptation needed, and I really hope I’m not stretching the limits of fair use.

Dungeon Delving Procedure

I've already adapted the wilderness exploration procedure from ACKS II to GURPS (although I still have to adjust it a bit). Now, one of the other important procedures is the dungeon delving one. It shouldn't be difficult now that I've got Dungeon Exploration Turns down. Yet again, this is more of a checklist than a procedure you should strictly adhere to at all times.

Wilderness Random Encounter Distance

When a random encounter happens, be it in a dungeon or wilderness, how far apart are the party and the monsters? GURPS Dungeon Fantasy 16: Wilderness Adventures is the only book that has something on this topic – the ambush rules. However, they are limited to, well, ambushes and the maximum encounter distance is only 15 yards. This is not generic at all. Let’s expand the surprise rules from DFRPG Exploits with the concept of encounter distance from ACKS II and Terrain Rating from GURPS Mass Combat. I think these rules work, but I may adjust them in the future if I find something off.

Review: How to Be a GURPS GM: Improvising

Since I haven’t been following the GURPS news and upcoming releases in quite a while, the new book caught me by surprise. Yesterday, How to be a GURPS GM: Improvising got released, written by Sean Punch a.k.a. Dr. Kromm. The How to be a GURPS GM series of books is a mixed bag with some good ones and some not so good ones, so I decided to check this one out. After all, improvisation is indeed a skill and I wondered how one could even explain in text how to improvise better. These days, when many players seem to try their hardest to avoid reading the rulebooks and GMs learn how to GM from questionable actual plays and numerous even more questionable YouTube videos, there is a shortage of good written material to learn the art of being a GM from. And then people complain about the GM shortage!

Dungeon Exploration Turns

In my effort to bring various rules and procedures from ACKS and AD&D over to GURPS, I reached the dungeon exploration procedure. However, it hinges on two other sets of rules that are barely present in GURPS - encounter distance and dungeon exploration rate. How fast do you move in a dungeon? And why is this important?

In GURPS, a typical human has Move 5, which means that he can move 5 yards per second. This is not his maximum speed, however, as sprinting would allow him to move 6 yards per second. Now, do you walk at the highest speed possible without breaking into a run? There are people who actually do, but most people walk much more slowly (sometimes too slowly, especially in hallways, stairwells, or other narrow passages). Your Basic Move is your running speed as per p. B17 and p. B354. Per p. B354, paced running is half your sprinting speed. For a regular human described above, this is 3 yards per second. Even paced running drains your FP, so your normal movment rate is probably below that.

The hiking rules (p. B351) are generally considered way too optimistic, and it is preferred to use the rules from GURPS Dungeon Fantasy 16: Wilderness Adventures. These say that under ideal circumstances, your hiking speed is your Move / 4. For a regular human, this is about 1.25 yards per second. If we google real world walking speed values, we'll see that the norm is about 1.42 meters per second or 1.55 yards per second, which is pretty close.

So, where am I even going with this? When the player characters are exploring a dungeon, they are usually running around at maximum Move without running out of FP. As a result, when they leave the dungeon, you may realize that only a few in-game minutes have passed. This is quite similar to a conventional D&D adventure that takes 3-4 in-game days and sees the characters advance from level 1 to level 7 in that timeframe. You'd think that GURPS Dungeon Fantasy or Dungeon Fantasy RPG would have more information about movement rates in the dungeon, but they don't (or I'm blind). This is doubly funny considering that they do talk about one of the character being a mapper. Imagine drawing a map while running.

However, there is the Tactical Looting article from Pyramid #4-1. It says that if you're actively searching for traps and concealed or secret doors, you move at Move 1. If you're passively searching for all of the above (your rolls are at -2), you move at Move 2. Paced running is impossible in a dungeon, but normal running is. To maintain group cohesion, running is done at the sprinting rate of the slowest member, and every 15 seconds you must roll against HT or Running to avoid losing 1 FP. You still can spot traps while running, but at -5.

In AD&D, dungeon exploration uses 10-minute turns and 1-minute rounds, with movement rate being 5 times greater than usual when following a known route or map, or 10 times greater when the party is fleeing from a danger. I'll be honest - the first time I was introduced to the concept of a "dungeon exploration turn" was the playtest of D&D 5e, back then known as D&D Next. I read that and thought that it's a great idea, but in the final version, it got dumbed down and reduced to a single sentence saying that in a dungeon environment movement happens on a scale of minutes. It was exactly the same in D&D 3.0/3.5 - the 1-minute movement was mentioned but nothing else.

So, why am I still going on about this inconsequential thing? Because, in my opinion, it isn't inconsequential. Using set time intervals, such as 10-minute turns and 1-minute rounds, makes timekeeping much easier, and keeping strict time records is important. For example, a torch burns for one hour, but do you really count the number of seconds your combat took and subtract it from every torch? Most buff spells and potions last either 3 minutes or 30 minutes. More often than not, it means that timekeeping is a chore and most GMs just handwave durations of spells and light sources, making them meaningless and/or arbitrary, and that takes away from one of the most important aspects of dungeon delving - resource management. How can you manage your resources if their expenditure is arbitrary?

Would introducing dungeon turns and rounds solve this? For example, ACKS II also uses 10-minute turns and 1-minute rounds for dungeon exploration. Most dungeon activities can be done either hastily in a single round or methodically in a single turn. This made me realize that GURPS supports this too. Everybody knows the Time Spent modifiers from p. B346. The only problem is that taking 8x the usual time gives a +3 bonus and the next step is taking 15x the usual time for a +4 bonus. This doesn't mesh well with transforming a one-minute action into a ten-minute action, but you can just round it up and say that taking 10x the usual time gives you a +3 bonus. Thus, instead of different activities taking different amounts of time, you can devise how big of a bonus or penalty a roll should have if performed in one minute or ten minutes. This would make the system less discrete, but in this situation it's for the best, in my opinion.

You can also see that this turn structure also would dovetail nicely with existing durations. Torches burn for 1 hour, and that's 6 turns. Most spells last for 3 minutes or 30 minutes - and that's 3 rounds or 3 turns. Lockpicking takes 1 minute without a penalty or at +3 if you take 10 minutes. Each turn of rest lets you recover 1 FP. Random encounter checks are done once every X turns. When the combat ends, you just round it up to a minute. Doesn't it all just make sense now? In other words, you have to start thinking not "how long does this activity take?" but "how much of this activity can be performed in 1 or 10 minutes?" Honestly, it feels like I'm reinventing the wheel and that this should've been the standard that for some reason isn't followed nowadays. Maybe I'm missing something - a couple of important but not obvious moments, or a couple of braincells. I'll have to try it out.

Monday, 27 January 2025

Monster: Svathurim

A simple Pathfinder monster that was requested. Basically, a frost giant centaur with some additionalbits.

Random Generation: Weather

As I mentioned in some of my previous posts, I was positively impressed by the weather generation rules from ACKS II. Thus, here is my adaptation of these rules to GURPS. It may look intimidating and complex, but it's actually pretty damn simple. However, I probably will make an automation program to make it even easier in the future.

Wizardry: Dragons of Faerun Spells

Dragons of Faerun is a setting-specific book that has some nice stuff despite that. The section with new spells isn't long, but it's full of spells that are either highly setting-specific (such as all the Dracorage stuff) or plain weird. Let's see if I can borrow something for my games.

Blunt Natural Weapons either removes or downgrades all piercing/cutting/impaling natural weapons.

Compel Breath is the reverse of Suppress Breath Weapon.

Dragonblood Spell-Pact is more of a unique new mechanic than a spell. At first, I wanted to simply assign an arbitrary point cost to it, but then decided to make at least a vague approximation. Still, this is a complete asspull.

Dragoncall is a cool spell that only dragons can cast. It compels the nearest sapient creature to come to the dragon.

Gaze Screen is a spell that protects against gaze attacks.

Revelation creates an area where magically hidden objects and creatures are revealed for a short time.

Wizardry: Races of Destiny Spells

Races of Destiny is one of four "Races of [X]" D&D 3.5 books that provide detailed information about some of the core races and introduce new ones. I actually like these books a lot. Races of Destiny is a book about humans, half-elves, and half-orcs. The newly introduced race is the illumians, who also are very interesting, in my opinion. However, it seems that my opinion wasn't shared by the majority of players (or by WotC), because the illumians seem to have no presence post-3.5. I decided to see what people say about the book online and found only people saying that it sucks. But anyway, spells!

Bestow Greater Curse applies a variable curse with a variable conditions for its removal. Remove Curse doesn't work here.

City Lights uses ambient artificial light sources to produce a blinding flash.

City Stride is an interesting variation of the Town Portal spell.

Commune with City allows you to find out certain information about the city you're in.

Delay Death gives the subject Unkillable 1.

Friendly Face is a cheap spell that makes you look friendlier.

Insignia of Alarm sends a mental ping to wearers of a specific insignia.

Locate City is a rather infamous spell that allowed some ridiculous metamagic cheese. In GURPS, however, it works normally.

Omen of Peril tells you about how dangerous your next hour is likely to be.

Phantom Guardians is an illusion of guardians with a long duration and no need for concentration.

Rooftop Strider is a spell that lets you move unimpeded on uneven surfaces and enhances your sense of balance.

Scholar's Touch lets you read a book almost instantaneously.

Skyline Runner is a variant of Spider Climb.

Random Generation: Fighter

In one of my previous posts, I boldly declared that I'm going to make random "class"-based character generation tables. But as always, I didn't think it through before saying. GURPS may make such tables more difficult. For example, do you roll your attributes randomly or do you choose your class first and then roll attributes on a table for that class? In any case, let's say that you are rolling up a fighter and got, for example, ST 11. However, when you are rolling for gear, you get a maul that requires ST 13? And what if you rolled your combat skills and didn't even get Two-Handed Axe/Mace, but got Smallsword instead? This makes me think of just how granular such tables should be, because even the seemingly simple fighter has many complications along the way, and I haven't even started about, for example, getting a maul-wielding elf fighter instead of something more elvish. So, how do I do it?

Fear in GURPS

Adventurers often encounter things and situations that would terrify a regular person. The rules for fear in GURPS are quite interesting, but at the same time questionable. I would like to discuss this topic in more detail to make sure I understand everything correctly.

Wizardry: Draconomicon Spells II

And now let's do the second half of the Draconomicon spells. These ones are intended for dragons, but they can be used by other spellcasters if they meet the prerequisites. The book introduces metabreath feats and also metabreath spells that significantly alter the dragon's breath weapon. And I will simply skip them!

Aura of Terror isn't really a spell for most dragons, because they already have a fear aura, but a spell modeled after dragons. At least that's how I cope with being unable to elegantly build a spell that gives you an aura or expands the existing aura.

Hiss of Sleep is a mass version of Sleep that doesn't require a somatic component, but also only works against those who cannot see the caster.

Maddening Whispers is a similar spell, but with hallucinations instead of sleep.

Mesmerizing Glare fascinates creatures in an area.

Razorfangs gives an armor divisor to your claws or bite.

And that's it. That's all the spells I wanted from the book.

Wizardry: Draconomicon Spells I

Draconomicon is one of my favorite D&D 3.5 books, so let's convert some of the spells from it to wizardry. After glancing through the list, I know that I'll have to skip many of them because they just either don't make sense in GURPS or would be inappropriate in my setting. Also, you have to keep in mind that spells in that book are split into two sections - one for player characters, and one for dragons. Let's do the character spells first.

Antimagic Ray is a short-duration spell that dispels ongoing effects, makes the target immune to magic, and suppresses magical abilities. This is a double-edged sword, I like this one.

Cheat is a cantrip based on a Probability Alteration perk from GURPS Psionic Powers.

Cloak of Bravery is, I believe, the first "aura" type effect.

Contingent Energy Resistance gives you DR against the first energy type you are attacked with.

Dragonsight is a buff spell that gives you Infravision and Night Vision 7.

Earthbind is a spell that disables the target's ability to fly. That's actually a very powerful effect.

Entice Gift is a cool spell that forces the subject to give you whatever it is holding.

Flight of the Dragon is cheaper and faster to cast than Overland Flight, but has more limitations.

Hide from Dragons is an expensive spell that is nonetheless powerful in highly specific situations.

Lower Spell Resistance lowers Magic Resistance. The original spell ignores SR, but doing that in GURPS would've made this spell way too expensive to be worth it.

Miser's Envy is another interesting mind control spell that compels the subject to obtain a certain object.

Scale Weakening is a specialized, but reasonably powerful and cheap spell that lowers DR.

Shield of Warding is a very useful spell that uses rules from Shields Up!

Suppress Breath Weapon mentally compels a creature to avoid using its breath weapon.

Monday, 28 July 2025

Braunstein AAR: Lanosh

Saturday, 26 July 2025

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells IV

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells III

Monday, 21 July 2025

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells II

Saturday, 19 July 2025

Wizardry: Book of Vile Darkness Spells I

Sunday, 22 June 2025

Wizardry: Races of Eberron Spells

Monday, 16 June 2025

Random Generation: Cleric

Sunday, 15 June 2025

Random Generation: Ranger

Friday, 13 June 2025

Random Generation: Sorcerer

Sunday, 8 June 2025

Random Generation: Starting Spells

Friday, 6 June 2025

Wizardry: Legacy Underdark Spells

Monday, 2 June 2025

Random Generation: Bard

Saturday, 31 May 2025

Low-Tech Musical Instrument Costs and Weights

Thursday, 29 May 2025

Training Rules

Monday, 26 May 2025

How Does Injury Tolerance (Diffuse) Even Work?

Sunday, 18 May 2025

Wizardry: Complete Mage Spells III

Friday, 16 May 2025

Replacing Resistance with Active Defense

Wednesday, 14 May 2025

Wizardry: Complete Mage Spells II

Monday, 12 May 2025

Wizardry: Complete Mage Spells I

Saturday, 10 May 2025

Treasure Type in GURPS

Saturday, 3 May 2025

GURPS BrOSR Progress Update

Monday, 28 April 2025

Abstract Fast Combat System for GURPS

Sunday, 27 April 2025

Wizardry: Lightning Spells II

Saturday, 26 April 2025

Sea Voyage Procedure

Blood Magic: Fiendish Codex II Spells

Friday, 25 April 2025

Wizardry: Fiendish Codex II Spells

Monday, 14 April 2025

Review: Brozer - Island of War and Winter

Sunday, 13 April 2025

Food and Supplies in GURPS and ACKS

Wednesday, 9 April 2025

Abstract Combat Statistics: Heroes on the Mass Scale and ACKS

Sunday, 6 April 2025

Wizardry: Magic of Incarnum Spells

Saturday, 5 April 2025

GURPS Monstrous Compendium II WIP

Friday, 4 April 2025

"GM, I don't know what to spend money on"

Friday, 21 March 2025

A Thorough Look at Bards in D&D and GURPS

Thursday, 20 March 2025

Blood Magic: More Spells

Is Sorcery even a system?

Wednesday, 19 March 2025

Wizardry: Tome and Blood Spells

Tuesday, 18 March 2025