#Homebrew Spotlight

[thearcadearchives1981]

HOMEBREW SPOTLIGHT- DONKEY KONG FOR ATARI 7800!

  Hey Arcaders! The Atari 7800 Prosystem was a great machine- that never saw it’s full potential. The system was slated to come out in 1984- where it would have been promptly been a hit. With GCC ( A company we have talked about in a earlier post ) working on the system specs and most of the original lineup- the machine boasted updated graphics, as well as Atari 2600 compatibility, it could have…

[theunwellkingdom]

Lore Spotlight #12: Bran Bramble

Long ago, town of Bran Bramble was isolated from the rest of Lyrea, tucked away behind thorn-laden walls and ruled by a selfish lord. However, with the help of the new Queen's Royal Guard, he was overthrown, and felled by his own son, Gin!

Afterward, Gin took a vow of pacifism and left to travel Lyrea. He hoped to atone for his deed by helping others.

His brother Tomas stayed behind as Bran Bramble's steward. He believed he could make it a more welcoming place. But the following decades would prove more challenging than he could have imagined...

Tomas's approach was simple. His father had closed the town off from the world, so he would open it to all. Criminals, outcasts, and Resistance soldiers mingled among growing ranks of Royal Guard sent by the Queen.

Tensions hit a fever pitch when the Blind Berserker cleaved a path of ruin through the center of town. Our heroes, including Gin returning at last, arrived just in time to help Tomas and his local deputies fight back against the combatants on both sides of the smoldering crater!

After the conflict was settled, Fable, the catfolk cleric, cast Create Water to fill in the crater and extinguish the flames. And so Kittypaw Lake was formed!

Later on, Bran Bramble became a sanctuary for displaced wizards from the Painted Wastes, and finally began to rebuild into the town Tomas and Gin always hoped it could be.

[monstersdownthepath]

Scourge Spotlight: Oitos

CR 11

Lawful Evil Medium Outsider

Complete Book of the Damned, pg. 249

While most velstrac believe in the beauty of mutilated flesh and twisted muscle, for the Oitos, such beauty is only skin deep. These gilded fiends eschew tinkering with flesh in its entirely, believing in the perfection of bone, despite how inflexible it is when compared to the myriad of shapes helpless flesh can be molded into. Rather than be discouraged by the restrictions placed upon themselves, Oitos take the challenge in stride, representing the fiends of greed among the velstrac race, decorating themselves and the exposed bones of their victims with elaborate scrimshaw, gilding with precious metals, and gemstones gruesomely embedded in the surfaces.

Mortals enticed by the idea of wealth are the primary victims of the Oitos who, like other “ambassador”-type velstrac, can use Plane Shift not only to move themselves around the universe, but take other Lawful-aligned creatures along with them. Whenever an Oitos uses its Plane Shift to travel to the Plane of Shadow or any Evil-aligned plane, it arrives at its desired location with perfect accuracy thanks to them being skilled Dark Travelers. Dark Traveler also doubles the speed at which an Oitos travels with its 3/day Shadow Walk, letting it cover preposterous amounts of distance in incredibly short amounts of time. If, for whatever reason, it needs to travel to one of the transitive planes or the Negative Energy Plane, Shadow Walk allows it--and any passengers it’s carrying--to reach such destinations in just a few hours. They even have Deeper Darkness at will to always assure they have an entry point/escape route!

With Charm Monster available to it 3/day, an Oitos can easily kidnap someone who’d otherwise wise up to the fact that this talking golden skeleton might not want what’s best for them, inviting them into a life of wealth and splendor only for them to find out it literally costs them (all the skin off) an arm and a leg. Oitos don’t actually need to install the gold manually, mind--though they often do--they just need to score a critical hit with any one of their three natural attacks to afflict someone with Golden Bones. This curse permanently transforms the victim’s skeleton into radiant gold, lowering their Con score by 4, afflicting them with a Faerie Fire aura that can’t be dispelled, and potentially burning out their eyes from the inside to blind them if they fail a DC 21 Fortitude save that they must make every round.

Luckily, they must first fail a DC 21 Fortitude save after being critically struck by the Oitos to suffer this cursed transformation in the first place, but as previously mentioned, they can attempt three times a round to afflict an unwilling creature with this splendor. Two claws (1d6+11 +2d6 Cold) are their primary means of offense, but they also have a Lash on hand made up of the leather and skin of past victims that deals 2d4+11 +2d6 Cold damage. While flesh is discarded, skin is kept to be made into fashionable accessories and even weapons by the depraved fiends, their curse of Golden Bones transferring through any such leather weapon they field.

Side note: the book says the cleaned skeleton of someone afflicted with Golden Bones is worth about 1,000gp, but I find that figure insultingly low. Yes, if you melted them down you’d get about 1,000gp worth of ingots, but I bet if you really looked around in any large enough fantasy town you’d be able to find a real weirdo who’d pay top dollar for a solid gold skull. Like, perhaps, a devotee to Raetorgash...

Second side note: Because they have Fabricate available 3/day, Oitos can and will reshape the bones of unworthy victims into jewelry and decorations for themselves or their more worthy victims.

While potentially damaging all the gilding they worked so hard to apply makes Oitos hesitant to actually engage in a combat they could reasonably be damaged in, if victims have no weapons that can bypass their DR 10 (bludgeoning weapons that are silver or Good-aligned), they’ll at least stick around enough to try and get some licks in before they attempt a hasty escape. In battles where they need to stick around, they can make sure EVERYONE stays where they are with a 3/day DImensional Anchor, which is especially useful when hunting down fellow Outsiders and their nasty tendency to Dimension Door or Teleport away.

Their DR isn’t where their defenses end, though. Their Unnerving Gaze can cause nausea in any creature that fails its save, preventing them from fighting back as they’re peeled by the skeletal fiend, and they have Eyebite available 1/day to sicken and panic lesser beings with a single glance. Eyebite can also render a target comatose for two hours if they have 4 or less HD, making the Oitos terrifyingly efficient kidnappers and slavers... and excellent at churning out gold in exchange for sacrifices. The Golden Bones curse only works if the victim is critically struck, but a helpless or willing target can allow the Oitos to coup de grace them, which is always a critical hit.

You can read more about them here.

[if-whats-new]

What's New In IF? Issue 30 (2024)

By Aj, Dion, Briar, Jen and Peter

Now Available!

Itch.io - Keep Reading below

If you read the zine, consider liking the post: it helps us see how many people see it! And sharing is caring! <3

~ EDITORIAL ~

Event Highlight!

In this Issue we take a quick look at the Videotome Jam hosted by Freya, the dev behind all the Videotome game engines!

Continue reading to find out more!

We want some feedback!

As we’re starting to get a hand of things, we would love some feedback from you guys! What you enjoy, want more or less off, how we could improve... Anything goes! We even have a nifty form.

We hope you enjoy this new issue!

AJ, DION, BRIAR, JEN AND PETER

~ BE A PART OF THE ZINE ~

THIS ZINE ONLY HAPPENS WITH YOU!

Want to write 1-2 pages about a neat topic, or deep-dive into a game and review it in details? Share personal experiences or get all academic?

WRITE FOR THE COLUMN!

Prefer to be more low-key but still have something to share? Send us a Zine Letter or share a game title for Highlight on…!

WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!

Came across something interesting? Know a release or an update announced? Saw an event happening? Whether it's a game, an article, a podcast… Add any IF-related content to our mini-database!

EVERY LITTLE BIT COUNTS!

Contact us through Tumblr asks, Forum DMs, or even by email! And thank you for your help!!

~ EVENT SPOTLIGHT : Videotome Jam - "Waiting" ~

November 16th to December 1st 2024

Videotome Jam is a two-week-long game jam for games made in any of the Videotome engines with the optional theme of "Waiting".

What is Videotome?

Videotome is a series of small homebrew IF/VN engines made by Freya Campbell (communistsister), an indie game developer focusing on narrative games that are usually:

science fiction, horror, &/or romance

close to 100% LGBTQ characters

free/PWYW with low tech requirements

liable to make players keysmash due to feelings

Videotome was first released in April 2022 as a part of a game entry for the Domino Club collective. The initial idea for the engine was to make writing text-heavy games as hassle-free as possible, focusing not that much on the visual presentation format, but more on the writer's experience. It would allow writers to write in a notepad and then it would somehow grab the .txt file and parse the lines into an array, spitting them out one line at a time as a kinetic novel.

At the moment there are four engines available:

Videotome, for linear, no frills text / images / music;

Videotome ADV, adding a more conventional layout with ignorable choices and branching;

Super Videotome, for more fully featured and freeform image/canvas use;

Videotome Heartbreak, adding a stat raising dating sim & storylets structure to the above.

If you're more interested in the process of making these engines, check out the devs blog post - Words, Friction, Syntax: Stuff I thought about when making Videotome. (The post also includes a very interesting case study concerning other game engines Freya has experience with.)

If you want to check out some examples of projects made with Videotome, take a look at this collection. It includes games made by both Freya and other devs.

~ ONGOING (VOTING) ~

The voting for ECTOCOMP 2024 has officially started! To vote and participate as a jury, you must do so by giving between 1 to 5 stars on each entry page of the jam. The voting period ends on November 30.

~ ONGOING (SUBMITTING) ~

A Hallmark movie is a feel-good, family-friendly film, often centered around romance, personal growth, or holiday themes. A Very Hallmark Game Jam with a theme of “Charming Love Interest with a Secret” is also all about that!

Are you a fan of Videotome games? Then the Videotome Jam with an optional theme “Waiting” is for you!

This year’s Yuri Game Jam is in full progress. The devs have until December 2nd to submit their projects.

The Educational Jam is a perfect place to learn something new. Discuss some obscure tidbit. Showcase your insight about a specific thing, your pub trivia skills, or that Wikipedia rabbit hole you went down last time.

Disabled Rep VN Jam has a very simple premise but a very important message.

Once upon a time, a game jam was held to create stories around the theme of fairy tales… and that game jam is the Once Upon A Time VN Jam. It’s running from October 1st to January 31st.

Concours de Fiction Interactive Francophone 2025 is for all French-speaking enthusiasts. Submissions are accepted March 3rd 2025.

Are you perhaps a fan of more somber, melancholic themes? Then check out the Dying Year - Visual Novel Jam! You have until the end of the year to participate.

The Black Visual Novel Jam is all about working with creative professional developers who work in visual novels to bring more Black stories to life. The goal is to create a space where Black creators can show their unique storytelling through visual novels.

~ OTHER ~

PIZZAPRANKS is accepting submissions for their Indiepocalypse Issue #61. If you’re a dev and would like to try out your luck, definitely check it out! Any game is welcomed, not only IF.

~ NEW RELEASE ~

In Arctic Adventure unearth forgotten journals, repair malfunctioning equipment, and solve puzzles to piece together the station’s dark past. But beware—some secrets are better left buried in the ice.

You are a dragon - huge, winged, flying and even capable of magic. Only here, in a system of caves created by your magic, you can be yourself. But the time has come for you to leave your home. The old map, that you've been keeping since times immemorial, is now ready to unravel it's secrets in A Dragon and the Tower.

You’ve spent your whole life visiting the majestic Hotel Lexington, and now you’ve inherited it! The once-grand building is in disrepair, and rumored to be haunted! You’re the only one who can restore its former glory before it’s lost forever. Check in to your hotel, and check out the ghosts in Haunted Hearts Hotel.

As always, don't forget to check out the submitted entries to the events mentioned in the previous pages. They deserve some love too!

~ NEW RELEASE (WIP) ~

You are a key member of "The Constellation Club," a close-knit group of friends brought together by your shared love for music and dreams. Over time, the club members drifted apart, but a mystery brings you all back together. Reunite with your friends, uncover secrets, and chase the dreams that first united you in The Constellation Club (Twine).

Have you enjoyed the first Volume of Oblivious Melodies? Then be sure to check out Chapter 1 of Volume 2 (Twine)! You play as the Horne siblings, navigating their emergence into gentry society. You will delve into a country divided by class, religious dissent, political factionalism, and the ever-encroaching interests of empire. @oblivious-melodies

In Ashenmaw - Dragons of Marrowoods (CScript) you play as a freshly hatched dragon whelp, navigating the odds and ends of the politics and mysteries of the five flights. Intermingle with the younger races, and jump headfirst into uncovering the secrets of Ashenmaw and the Marrowoods. @ashenmaw-if

Aydan joins his husband Leo in this important family reunion that takes place 2 months after his father’s death. Suddenly, they are all trapped in the house for 3 days and the lawyer states that one of the siblings is the murderer of their own father! Find out who the real culprit is in Guilty at 5PM (Ren’Py).

In a realm of forgotten tales, you emerge as a ghost to yourself. Stranded in a land where memories fear to tread, the icy breath of solitude kisses your bare flesh, a chilling reminder of your forsaken existence. In this realm where salvation dances with oblivion, Snowborn (CScript), awaken to tread the treacherous path through a world steeped in sorcery and demise.

You are a young nobleman, in a stagnating empire, either on the verge of resurgence, or it’s final demise. An Empire held together by fragile institutions, led by ego-driven men. And here you are, in the middle of it all. As this den of vipers strike, where will you fall? Find out in Scion of the Alason (CScript).

You wake up suddenly with a system telling you that you are occupying the body of a green tea b!tch! The spy of the fearsome overlord, Hasthael who betrayed him for the male hero, resulting in the death of his beloved lightning hound. Avoid the fate of dying and accomplish the missions given by two of the available systems in Project Dominion (CScript).

You are the Aeon, an omniscient entity as old as time. When your powers begin to malfunction and the source of an incoming threat is unbeknownst to you, how will you protect the fabric of the universe? Abandon your omnipresent form for the first time in millennia and craft an identity as a demon to infiltrate the Ethereal Plane in The Time Keeper (CScript).

~ UPDATES ~

Aesemyr: The Withering (CScript) released 3/4 of the "university gathering" path of Chapter 3.

After Dark (CScript) released the last part of the fifth day of the journey.

Eldritch Tales: Inheritance (CScript) released part one of Chapter 3. @darielivalyen

Honor Amongst Thieves (CScript) updated their public demo. @leoneliterary

Oh Mother, Where Art Thou? (CScript) started Act 2 of Chapter 1.

Our Life: Now and Forever (Ren’Py) added extra content to their Patreon demo. @gb-patch

The Abyssal Song (Twine) released Chapter 5. @ri-writes-if

Virtue’s End (CScript) has updated their Patreon demo. @virtues-end

When Life Gives You Lemons (CScript) updated their public demo. @when-life-gives-you-lemons-if

~ OTHER ~

Is playtesting something that interests you? Check out part one of Drew Cook’s let’s TEST IF #1: being a playtester. @golmac

GlasswingGames is currently running a giveaway! You can enter to win either a chibi or emote of a character of your choice! @glasswinggames

~

As always, we apologize in advance for missing any update or release from the past week. We are only volunteers using their limited free time to find as much as we can - but sometimes things pass through the cracks.

If you think something should have been included in this week's zine but did not appear, please shoot us a message! We'll do our best to add it next week! And if you know oncoming news, add it here!

~ MAYBE YOU NEXT? ~

We did not get a submission this week. But if you have an idea for a short essay, or would like a special space to share your thoughts about IF and the community...

Shoot us an email!

~ HIGHLIGHT ON ~

A couple of games that we thought were cool.

God-Cursed by @wings-of-ink (Twine)

I think this game is fantastic. Plot, ROs, writing, everything. Deserves thousands of reads and compliments!

//recommended by Briar [Team]//

Your favourite game here?

Do you have a favourite game that deserves some highlighting?

An old or recent game that wowed you so much you spam it to everyone?

Tell us about it! And it might appear here!

Hello! I appreciate what you all do. As a living thing with a 9-5 job, I couldn't regularly check updates from existing WIPs, especially the ones I really like. I also tend to be the last person to know new IFs with lots of potential. So, I'm glad that with your zine, I get weekly updates from everyone in one place. Thank you, thank you so much!

- a very mysterious anon

WE LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU ALL! WHETHER IT'S GOOD OR BAD, OR EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN...

Have something to say? Send us a message titled: Zine Letter!

As we end this issue, we would like to thank:

our awesome mysterious anon!

For a very encouraging message!

As always, huge thanks to all you readers who liked, shared, and commented on the last issue!

What might be tiny actions are huge support and motivators to us!

Thank you for cheering us on this journey!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

We actually have a separate Zine for all our individual Interviews!

Last Issue’s Interview with Leia Talon will be added this upcoming week.

And see you again next week!

AJ, DION, BRIAR, JEN AND PETER

WHAT'S NEW IN IF? 2024-ISSUE 30

[dungeonofthedragon]

It's Disability Pride Month! I've already made a post spotlighting disabled creators. Now, let's have a post of accessibility aids for use within your gaming worlds!

Blades in the Dark: Mobility Equipment by Aurelia

Cost: PWYW

A collection of mobility items for Blades in the Dark, from a disabled creator. Two items for every playbook- well worth checking out!

Combat Wheelchair (5E) by Mark Thompson

Cost: free! Link is to google drive.

Here it is- the by now famous Combat Wheelchair! One of the best known mobility aids created for 5th edition Dungeons and Dragons.

Fate Accessibility Toolkit by Evil Hat

Cost: $7.50

This toolkit provides tools for representing disabilities within Fate games, as well as advice for supporting players with disabilities at your table. It was put together by a team of disabled creatives, so you know this was made with love and from real people's experiences.

Homebrew Disability Systems for 5E by harpoon_gun

Cost: PWYW

Highly rated set of mechanics for 5th edition Dungeons and Dragons, brought to you by a disabled creator. Useful for both NPCs and player characters.

Service Monsters (5E) by PsychHound

Cost: PWYW

Service monsters to aid your disabled characters in 5th edition Dungeons and Dragons! There are multiple options to choose from (including guide, medical alert and autism support monsters), each with unique traits supporting their role. There are also a bunch of backstory ideas, to inspire the story of how your service monster came to be in your service!

(PsychHound has also created trauma mechanics and mechanics for autism and ADHD! The latter is informed by his own experiences as an autistic social worker.)

We Are Still Here by Ennis Rook Bashe

Cost: PWYW

Mobility aids and medications suitable for use in Apocalypse World and many other Powered by the Apocalypse games. Very highly rated by the Itch community!

[psychhound]

5e homebrew for disability pride month

hey yall :D since it's disability pride month and i am a Local Disabled TM i wanted to spotlight the d&d 5e homebrew i've done featuring disability mechanics!! they're all FREE / PWYW and available on itch!!

autism & adhd mechanics

traits for mechanically emphasizing a character's autism and/or adhd!! there's 11 traits total, with 5 shared between them, and 3 each that are specific to autism and adhd. the traits are beneficial, detrimental, and a mix of both, intended for 1-3 to be chosen for a single character. includes traits like sensory processing disorder, time blindness, and rejection sensitive dysphoria

service monsters

service animals - monster edition! you choose a customizable base for your monster, a statblock, and origin, and then get to choose your service type: guiding, hearing, mobility, medical alert, trauma, schizophrenia, or autism! each service type has a unique monster with different abilities, strengths, and magic. service monsters can't be used in combat but they have resistance to all damage and go to a pocket dimension upon dropping to 0hp

trauma mechanics

10 traits for panic disorder, ptsd, and cptsd, with an included definitions section and suggestions for trait application. includes mechanics for triggers, as well as for traits like panic attacks, insomnia, hypervigilance, and trust issues. the traits include different outcomes for meeting the dc or failing by different margins, and the aftereffects of failing a save, as well as ways that allies can help

my inspiration for making these was that i'm an autistic, mentally ill, traumatized disabled person who's been an active and leading disability advocate for the last 9 years and a disability-specialist social worker for 2.5 of those. definitely still room for improvement with my homebrew but i think there always will be when trying to put the incredibly varied human experience of disability into a crunchy numbers&rules format :o)

if you liked them please consider throwing some dollars my way either on itch or on my kofi as i get ready to head to grad school to study gamification in the mental health & disability space!! you can also check out the rest of my 5e homebrew here!

happy disability pride month to all, go run over some toes

[dailyadventureprompts]

Homebrew Mechanic: Earlybird Initiative

Because folks seemed to like my last write up for a combat systems, I figure I'd share one of my most enduring game mods.

I've tried SO MANY different initiative systems over the years, enough that I have pretty strong opinions on what makes a good one. My primary goal was to cut down on time that players spend waiting for their turns, as slow combat is one of the primary things that bleeds fun out of the sessions: Players who are bored waiting for their turn check out, which makes them slower and less decisive when the spotlight swings back around to them, this makes it longer for imitative to circle around and creates a feedback loop where player's attention becomes further and further taxed. I needed a system that did the opposite, kept everyone on their toes, engaged, and cooperative, as well as something that was exceptionally light weight.

Step 1: DM says "roll initiative", all players roll as normal, add their modifiers, but keep the number to themselves.

Step 2: The DM Calls out " twenty and above", and then every player who got 20 or above in imitative can take their turn in whatever order they wish, splitting up actions however they wish around each other in order to coordinate.

Step 3: Enemies who got 20 or above on their initiative go. Lair actions trigger.

Sep 4: DM says "Ten and Above", Repeat steps 2 and 3 with players followed by monsters, then again saying " Everyone else" for everyone who hasn't gone.

Step 5: If combat is still going DM says "Initiative resets" and everyone rolls their initiative shuffling combat positions , repeat until "how do you want to do this?" moment.

That's pretty much it. There's a bunch of little things you can do to speed things up (like only rolling initiative for important enemies while the rank and file have static initiative based on whether they're fast, medium, or slow) but largely this simplifies the logistics of having to keep up with combat to a few lighting fast beats. Everyone's engaged because they know their turn is only one or two steps away rather than forgetting where they sit in an ever shifting round-robin.

Literally every group I've introduced this to over the past three years has loved it to the point where they find combat run by other DMs painfully slow by comparison. I don't know what's a greater endorsement than that.

Art

[campaign-spotlight]

Episode 1: Worldbuilding with Mike

In our very first episode of Campaign Spotlight, we chat with Mike (tumblr's very own @mikerickson!) about building a vibrant and realistic world for your campaign, NPCs who just want to be messy, and the importance of learning AutoCAD. Spoiler warning - especially for Annihiliation but also for 3:10 to Yuma and maybe Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Does Jake's mic discipline get any better as the season goes on? Stay tuned to find out.

Here's the WorldAnvil page for Mike's campaign. Click through to zoom in and pan around on the world map we discuss in the episode.

Here's the Planet Map Generator that Mike used to build the world. On next week's Flashlight, we'll be talking about a very different tabletop game that's all about worldbuilding.

For more on the show, including links to all our social media, visit our website.

Do you run your own home game? Tell us about a cool homebrew item and we might feature it in an upcoming episode. Give us a call and tell us about it at 724 320 2020.

[unvale-io]

✨ Explore the Worlds of UnVale ✨

Last month, we released a new feature that allows you to check out worlds from the explore page! To celebrate this, we wanted to show you some of the neat worlds you could stumble on 👀

Worlds Spotlight

Wonderboy's TIMEWAVE

"2 Young scientists and their friend travel to the past with a cobbled together time-machine made from a Microwave."

TheLoreKeeper's Escape From Reality

solarsunrise's Teyvat Armoury Gallery

Jest's Servants of Death

" Servants of Death is not just a D&D homebrew that tries to expand and personalize the shadarkai elves but an attempt at depicting creatures that despite having limited will on the realm of the living, can understand the living very well to the point that they realize they're not that different, leaving some wondering if life is worth defying their goddess, while others are fully committed to find that out. "

RottenAubergine's Will-o-love

Baest's Exploring the Fabeled

Birdae's Dreamer Lucid

yvoi's Alma

Be sure to check out all the awesome worlds on UnVale right now!

[transbookoftheday]

Chef’s Kiss by TJ Alexander

A high-strung pastry chef’s professional goals are interrupted by an unexpected career transition and the introduction of her wildly attractive nonbinary kitchen manager in this deliciously fresh and witty queer rom-com.

Simone Larkspur is a perfectionist pastry expert with a dream job at The Discerning Chef, a venerable cookbook publisher in New York City. All she wants to do is create the perfect loaf of sourdough and develop recipes, but when The Discerning Chef decides to bring their brand into the 21st century by pivoting to video, Simone is thrust into the spotlight and finds herself failing at something for the first time in her life.

To make matters worse, Simone has to deal with Ray Lyton, the new test kitchen manager, whose obnoxious cheer and outgoing personality are like oil to Simone’s water. When Ray accidentally becomes a viral YouTube sensation with a series of homebrewing videos, their eccentric editor in chief forces Simone to work alongside the chipper upstart or else risk her beloved job. But the more they work together, the more Simone realizes her heart may be softening like butter for Ray.

Things get even more complicated when Ray comes out at work as nonbinary to mixed reactions—and Simone must choose between the career she fought so hard for and the person who just might take the cake (and her heart).

[dailycharacteroption]

Prestige Class Spotlight 14: Chevalier

(art by Lord-of-the-slugs on DeviantArt)

Sometimes when you look through the early days of a gaming system, you see ideas that clearly formed the bones of ideas that would come later, but it makes you wonder why they themselves were left behind? Well, today’s subject is like that.

Today’s subject is a prestige class from the early 3.5 days of the Pathfinder setting, from the back matter of one of the Second Darkness AP books. Essentially, it served as a way to inject a little bit of paladin into characters that don’t fulfill the alignment requirement to actually BE paladins, even if they are otherwise good.

Indeed, this archetype is most commonly associated with the adventuring god Cayden Cailean, and like him they firmly believe in protecting all that is good in this world, but aren’t too hung up on rules and restrictions. While many have the trappings of knights, theirs is an informal order that accepts anyone with desire to do good and the courage to stand up towards the most fearsome of threats without backing down. Beyond that, anything goes, from backstabbing the bad guy to breaking the law to simply just enjoying life with no moral restrictions beyond what they view as right.

Now, you can see why this would have been a big thing back in those days because, outside of homebrews and obscure Dragon and Dungeon magazine articles, the notion of folks getting paladin (or blackguard)-like powers outside of two classes was practically unheard of. Aura of Courage and Smite Evil were a paladin thing.

It only made sense that eventually, with Pathfinder Second Edition fully divesting itself of many old assumptions, that we would see the Paladin transform into the Champion class, with much more flexible sets of morals and whatnot.

But what bugs me is that Chevalier never came back as a name for either of the non-paladin goodly variants of the class. Which sucks because Chevalier is a much more fun than Liberator, even if it isn’t as descriptive. It would have been such a good callback though.

Eh, but I digress. In any case, this prestige class is definitely a contender for prestige class with the fewest actual levels, only having 3. This makes sense though, as it really does just exist to do one thing and one thing only, so let’s talk about what that is.

The requirements for this prestige class include being of goodly nature, having decent social skills and fighting skill, as well as having faced a very strong threat, making the minimum possible level to start taking it be 6th. However, the low number of levels in the prestige class means it could reasonably be taken by any class, even at later levels.

These warriors exude fearlessness, warding them against fear as well as doing the same to nearby allies to a lesser extent.

They also, however, exude recklessness, and whenever they join combat their hastiness lends them a measure of deadly sureness to their attacks during those first few critical moments.

They learn to offset some of this, however, keeping their guard up when charging at foes.

A headstrong nature also helps them when it comes to fighting off hostile enchantments, sometimes allowing them to shake them off moments later if they initially succumb.

Perhaps as a reflection of the Drunken God’s own alcohol tolerance, or merely because the divine forces find the idea of such daring heroes falling to something as base as poison abhorrent, but these warriors are blessed with total immunity to toxins as a result.

Finally, They also are blessed with enough divine power to smite the wicked as if they were a true paladin.

This prestige class of course needs a slight bit of conversion work because it’s technically a 3.5 creation, but it overall represents a fun little idea and a minor dip that may be worth it to some characters. One level is enough to make even casters happy what with fear immunity and a buff to attack rolls and damage that includes spells, while more martial characters will enjoy the better charges, protection for one of their weaker saves, and their own special way to smite… and many of these abilities scale to your total character level, not just levels in this prestige class!

I can imagine that many of these characters are somewhat lackadaisical when it comes to their daily lives unlike some paladins, causing them to sometimes come into contention with others that have certain expectations for what a paladin or other holy warrior has to be. Even still, when the chips are down, these warriors are fully capable of getting serious, though they likely still have plenty of quips for their foes.

A terrible rash of murders have been occurring in the farmlands of the Eastern Province, and a band of adventurers led by a brave chevalier arrive to investigate. In doing so, the party discovers that the murders are the work of the largest infestation of monstrous Jack-o’-Lanterns ever seen, leading to the question of what could have given rise to such an army of autumnal adversaries.

They say that the only true law of the sea are the oceans whim, and yet there are still those that seek to bring joy and peace, such as the wandering Depthwards, a group of aquatic beings, mostly cecaelians, that travel between oceanic communities writing wrongs and living free.

Cast out from the order for failing to live up to their standards, Vilga was delighted to see that she still retained enough of her god’s favor to receive a trace of divine power. Now she fights for justice on her own terms, though some hardliners in the order brand her a heretic.

[thearcadearchives1981]

Homebrew Spotlight- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles The Arcade Game for the Sega Master System!

Homebrew Spotlight- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles The Arcade Game for the Sega Master System!

[theunwellkingdom]

Lore Spotlight #13: The Haunting of Contraption!

Contraption is a goblin city on wheels, a hulking steel behemoth that roams the plains of Lyrea. Garp Garp grew up there, riding around and raiding the outskirts of Crestfall for food, until one day he ran away to become a bard.

This was no small decision. He knew if he left his clan, he would be shunned as an exile.

Years later, Garp Garp returned with his new friends, only to find that Contraption was under attack! And the threat was coming from within!

Scraps of metal from Contraption itself had started coming to life and attacking the goblin families who lived there! While Garp Garp's father, Blargg Blargg, wasn't eager to welcome him back after all this time, he reluctantly asked our heroes for help. At this rate, Contraption would soon be destroyed unless someone could get to the bottom of the mystery!

As the party navigated grimy corridors and precariously stacked homes in search of clues, the scrap monsters they encountered got bigger and more elaborate -- from formless balls of shrapnel, to fierce serpents that grew as they churned through steel walls, to the absolutely massive scrap baby which thrashed the city's engine room!

In their fight against the scrap baby, they finally discovered the true source of the attacks. The scrap monsters were being animated by a vengeful spirit, the ghost of a young girl who had been captured and eaten by the goblins!

Gin, the party's monk, spent his turns dodging the baby's attacks and calmly talking to the ghost. After considerable persuasion, she calmed down enough to lead the party to the goblins' storeroom, where they found a few other shivering kids.

Garp Garp negotiated with Contraption's elder, Queen Gnarlnash, to prevent future hauntings. She agreed that the goblins would no longer take townsfolk for food -- the city would instead transition to a pescatarian diet thanks to the abundance of nearby rivers and lakes. Gin was especially happy to hear this, as the news of missing children in Crestfall had weighed on him for some time. He ensured the surviving children were returned to their homes, and just like that, Contraption wheeled off into the sunset!

[monstersdownthepath]

Monster Spotlight: Heikegani

CR 4

Neutral Evil Small Aberration

Bestiary 5, pg. 141

Easily among the most bizarre creatures found in Paizo's later Bestiaries, the Heikegani (which I'll be calling "Heike" from now on) are based on a real world crab with a much less berserk backstory than the ones on Golarion; on Earth, the shell of the Heikegani merely look like faces through sheer serendipity. On Golarion? They're one step away from being Undead, because they're inhabited by the ghosts of warriors who died at sea but who have refused to actually become Undead due to the disgrace such a transformation would bring them. So, instead, their soul seeks a suitable host to inhabit, and what's more suitable than the pinnacle of evolution?

Now, let's address the crab-that-used-to-be-an-elephant in the room: the bonkers lore. While the book itself states ALL Heikegani are born from the souls of, very specifically, samurai who died from a magical catastrophe near a crab breeding ground, that's... More than a little goofy, if I'm being honest. Now, I'm normally all for ludicrous backstories for a monster species, but the idea that there's enough samurai dying in magical explosions around newborn crabs that their restless souls create a noteworthy population of murderous crustaceans (which can travel in groups of up to seven!) is too much, even for me. If you've seen my more ridiculous homebrews, you'll know that the bar for the lunacy I can tolerate in lore is embedded four feet in bedrock, so this should REALLY tell you how silly I find the idea! So, in my own take on the lore, Heike are born from any sufficiently motivated warrior perishing at sea whose soul refuses to give in to the temptation of undeath, and multiple Heike showing up means the warrior had an especially powerful soul, so much so that it couldn't be contained in a single crustacean body. If you want to go in a different direction, Heike could be born from fragments of the soul rather than the entire thing, much like how a ghost is just the negativity left over by the true soul, its presence weighing the rest down like an anchor. They do, after all, carry little else but hatred for the living and a need to fight greater and greater foes until they can finally die an honorable death... or kill everyone else trying.

The first sign that the party is dealing with something far more than just a common crab that happened to pick up a dagger is the Unnatural Aura cascading off the thing, the Heike's aberrant nature causing common wildlife to tremble in their presence. No animals willingly travel within 30ft of a Heike, leading to the amusing possibility of a party's horses suddenly flinging their riders from their backs because a big crab reared up at them. Less amusing is the possibility of it terrifying the party by rearing up, because it can use Intimidating Glare as a full-round action to make an Intimidate check (+9) against everyone within 30ft of it, potentially shaking up the entire party for multiple rounds in a single move. It doesn't even suffer from the normal penalty it'd take by being Small-sized!

Once the party is debuffed, the Heike can issue a Challenge to a foe it wishes to slay as a swift action, making it more vulnerable to the attacks of other creatures (its AC goes from 18 to 16 vs anything but its target) but vastly more dangerous against its victim, not only gaining insurmountable DR 2, but +4 damage. Its twin claws already deal 1d3+4 damage each, but with +4 damage on top of it and the threat of Power Attack looming in the wings, suddenly the encounter is no longer a joke... Not that battles against crabs should ever be treated as a joke. Giant Crabs only seem silly until they're tearing the Rogue in half after drowning the party Wizard, and the Heike's damage output vastly eclipses its un-possessed kin while giving up none of the crab's normal tricks. Despite being Small, its Grab attack can latch onto Medium targets without needing to do anything special, and it's got a +10 to grapple checks--enough to cancel out the penalty it would normally take for grappling larger targets--AND it constricts its grappled victim for 1d3+4 additional damage each round... which is also augmented by Challenge, as the damage boost applies to all damage rolls it makes. One round of being grappled by a Heike could mean taking upwards to 30 damage, or even higher if it Power Attacks! Really, the fact they can wield a dagger almost feels like a waste when their normal claws are powerful enough weapons, but a Heike will always choose to wield the weapons it did in life... and if the DM is feeling mean, this means they have permission to have the things armed with whatever magic items they've scavenged from the sea floor.

About the only mercy granted here is that a Heike's size means it cannot easily drag victims into the water to drown them, as normal Giant Crabs are infamous for (their grapple modifiers aren't quite unbreakable in Pathfinder, but they're still high, people!). They're also less inclined to do so thanks to their obsession with honorable combat (which is why they prefer weapons), but going full dishonorable is the best way to beat them; unlike a Giant Crab (a Vermin), Heike are vulnerable to mind-affecting effects. Unfortunately, the aforementioned obsession with honor allows them to tap into their Memories of Honor 1/day to grant themselves a +4 bonus to any saving throw they make, something they normally reserve for a battle-ending ability like the Slumber Hex or Color Spray, the latter of which they're still vulnerable to at only 5 HD.

The problem is that fighting dishonorably will cause it to fight dishonorably in turn, abandoning its weapon in favor of its (normally) vastly more dangerous claws. Whatever spell or ability you try and end the combat with had better end it, or you're likely end up as just another tallymark scratched into its blade.

You can read more about them here.

[that-house]

Hi ! I was wondering something about your 216-position D&D module : would having a negative CON modifier invert the HP restoration mechanic, and "reward" the player for a very mobile style ?

Combining a lot of running around with aggressive postures (maybe going so far as to taunt ?), with the main tradeoff being low maximum health and dying slowly when cornered/without momentum ? That’d make an interesting berserker but gaining health every 5-feet is a problem for long distances (unless you specify it’s 5 feet towards the enemy)

This was designed for a table where the magic items say things like “pick one of your abilities and increase every number in its text by 1,” not for 5e games with delusions of balance or reason. My DM allows just about anything, and just makes the encounters nightmarishly hard proportional to the shit we pull

Frankly this thing isn’t a “class” or a mechanic aimed at public release. It’s designed to be used with a single character and is so colossally broken as to likely be unnecessarily spotlight-hogging in a campaign full of broken homebrew characters. It’s complicated enough that I can’t really map out what “optimal play” looks like but I feel safe to say it can easily do 200+ damage in a single turn from level 1 onwards.

Making it any better or minmaxing the mechanic is not a concern of mine, the same way making it balanced isn’t really a concern of mine. One of the other Posture benefits does in fact heal you, so with the right stance setup you could heal 2x proficiency bonus every 5 feet you move even with a positive CON modifier. Which is crazy, sure, but literally who gives a shit

Odds are this thing never actually sees play, because to do so my current character would need to die, and her custom mechanics make her perhaps the single tankiest motherfucker to ever grace a 5e table. This thing is a sword of damocles hanging over my DMs head saying “kill her. i dare you” and the funny part is that i’m not sure if he can without killing everyone else first

[dice-wizard]

HEY EXALTED NERDS

Join the IRON CHARMS COMPETITION!

This will be a three-round homebrew competition using Exalted: Essence's ruleset over the next few weeks! The Iron Charms competitors will write their best Charms according to our prompts. You'll have a limited amount of time to submit and must include our secret ingredients. Bring your best Charm-writing skills and pit yourself against other fans in this high stakes technical competition. The submission will then be judged by a panel of our developers, and the winners will see their work put together in a pdf for all to enjoy! The winner of the entire competition will win the coveted Iron Charm Winner role, a spotlight in the pdf, and our undying admiration.

Anyone can submit, but will you survive the qualifying round? Only the top 15 submissions will move on and battle for the right to become the Iron Charms Champion.

The submission form will be posted on the Onyx Path Discord ( https://discord.gg/3e9TKgWhKb ) in the Iron-Charms channel on Monday, 10/9, so get ready!