The Wonderful World Of Symbotic Armour, Fungus

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Cédric Plante drew this amazing pictures for this post!

and a follow up here


Lack of home gaming and disorganization in playing anything regularly like online , plus the bizarre swellings of on-going projects have left me feeling pretty hesitate to just pour stuff on here like I have being doing.

But in the interest of maintaining the current inertia , I asked on g+ for some ideas for a blog post.

The one I choose was  Tom Middlemurk's Jeremy Duncan's one for more species of symbiotic armours. This might be a series, because I have more notes.

FUNGUS:
okay I have already done this one, but I still like it and you should go and look at it again, because I'm referring to it below

Advantages: Self Repairing, protection from physical attacks, hitpoint "loans"

Possible enhancements: Spore Weapons (poison, percussive, choking), regeneration, breathing filters, autopilot in the case of extreme mental/physical distress or subjugation

Disadvantages: risk of being usurped , might be a strain that has a "take control of nervous system and make body climb as high as possible before rupturing it with spore delivering stalks" cycle of life. Or a stage of life that involves being eaten by something, and will effect your behaviour to make that happen.

Who can hook a girl up? Myconids, Fungal Cultists, Fungus elementals, wind blown infections, previous owners  now deceased, worryingly evangelical current owners sharing starter kits (in the style of  Kombucha teas)

Specific Strains:
The Destroying Angel:
Spores on the wind make contact physical and psychic with the dying and vengeful.
Destroying Angel will bond with the willing and give regeneration , weird slabby mushroom plate, and make them count as a fungus for mind effecting effects.

In exchange after the mission is complete it will ask to go to somewhere high where it can convert  the bearer into a large fruiting structure and disperse its spores.

The Candle-Snuff :
Sometimes found in the wild. Appear as over-lapping  black and grey circles on the hosts skin with fine translucent hairs . Anti-photosynthesizes converting both the darkness and the psychic energy in the straining to perceive something in the darkness into fuel/food for both it and the host. Feeding too long on one patch of darkness will convert it to another type of darkness
 
The Amethyst Deceiver:
Carefully grown by myconists of slippery characters. Purple, fuzzy matts. Could be mistaken for woolen vests. Interlacing spiracles of keratin mean it counts as leather. The real power of this is a constant release of hallucinogens  that mean the host is remembered differently by everyone they met and everytime they meet.

The Glutinous Gomphidius :
The host will look like a michelin man. Extra 10 hitpoints. Need to eat 4 times as much.

DISPLACERKLAUS: AFTERBIRTH

Print PDF Picking through  the debris of DISPLACERKLAUS :

Plot Bombs: On further thought , the talk of narrative was misdirective and I should of mention how my idea of a "plot bomb" also includes "stuff that the g.m should be lenient with when your character tries this", like if you play a thief , you expect that if you are trying to find a dodgy contact in the bar , you are going to be better at it than the knight, or if you are fighter and you are directing the massive stake trap to blind the cyclops, that is going work out better because that is like a fighter thing.

Basically there is stuff that each class has that is might be too broad or vague to put a exact mechanic on, but if you are writing up a new class or re-writing the intro to an old one, it's nice to put some thought into what the players can expect from each class. Like if I am a wizard and I start mixing random magical fluids stuff I find , am I just as clueless as the guy on the street or will I know when to duck a split second earlier?

This is also a wider thing to reflect on with setting , style and g.m-ness, ie
How much resistance will your players get from you when they try different things?

e.g How Hong Kong can stunts in combat be? How technically do explanations of crafting have to get? How favorable is physics  to your plan? How magic is your rope? Does fighter mean "goon with a stick" or "plausible action hero"?

And how well is that communicated? Or needed to be? Try stuff and see if you die seems to work out okay for most people.


 Kicks: I really get my g.m kicks from communicating a distinct feel about what the players are exploring. Like I'm only having a great time (as opposed to a good time as you generally do when you are co-engaged on an activity with friends) if I feel that some gestalt with the setting came across. Generally achieved if the players start doing stuff just for the purpose of learning about something or effected something that doesn't directly result in numbers increasing.

It's something to be mindful of when I'm prepping stuff, as in the players might be needing other things, like a chance to meaningfully interact with the stuff, or a certain level of challenge.
None of this is particularly at counter-purposes though, in fact overlaps are heaps.
Like if you want people to "experience" the setting make sure you lather in on the moving parts, ie moving parts: stuff that the players can immediately interact with and the consequences  can matter in all kinds of ways.

Like no-one cares what the king is wearing unless than dictates what monster pelts are valuable   , what you can bribe the guards with or how easy it is to trigger open revolt.

Murderhoboism: No idea why this is so interesting to people. Like in it's purest state, like you find stuff and kill it and get treasure. Like if the stuff doesn't do anything if it lives or dies and the treasure is just a way for numbers on character sheet to get bigger, who gives a shit?
I know basically everyone does stuff more complicated than this, but some times I read some post or blog and it's like "hey we killed something for treasure, so crazy".
and I have communicated my dissonance with this right now

 THAT SURE WAS INTERESTING BY THAT I MEAN I WILL TALK OVER THE TOP OF YOU BECAUSE IT WASN'T


oh DISPLACERKLAUS I do cherish and actively conspire against yoTALKING I AM NOW NOW NOWu

Magical tattoo effects!

Any other bearer of this tattoo is an effortless organ donor for all bearers of this particular design. Like literally just cut out their hearts with a knife and shove them in and it will immediately attach and start working 


(certain) Ghosts and Spirits can't see you

Attempts to age or change your form instead effect the depiction of the tattoo

The mouth of its gurning face vomit up any poisons and intoxicates currently in your system if you tickle its belly

People will remember the tattoo but nothing else about you

This depiction of an item or personage will draw you to them through the actions of cruel fates

THE FINAL CASE OF DISPLACERKLAUS

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ONE LAST THING!!! SOMETHING NO ONE WANTED AN AW HACK

oh fuck you. Okay I will do the rest of this post so you don't have to deal with all that red and shouting.






So this thing , where you roll 2d6 and add an attribute and then:


"


7-9 is a partial success; you do it, but there’s


some cost, compromise, retribution, harm, etc.


A total of 10 or more is a full success; you do


it without complication and a total of 12 or


more is a critical success; you do it perfectly


to some extra benefit or advantage.

"


Actually makes for comedy gold. Like whatever dumb thing the players suggest actually has a decent chance of working but just with unintended consequences. Maybe it's like ouja board and with some players it drives it towards tense drama and with everyone I play with the spirits of violent slapstick start ectoting up the place.










But anyway I have sometimes/always impulses to play strange one off sessions of some particular thing and thought I could make something to use for when that strikes.




Okay so I have an idea for a game. I think about what everyone is going to be most grandular interested in , like how strong or faster they are the each other. Or how witty or whatever.




Write down 4 or 5 of them. Those are the stats. Either random or point buy , which either seems to make the most sense.

Should range about -3 to +3.

Those add to that 2d6 roll.


If I decide to use classes each class has a talent. Which is something everyone can do but that class has an edge at doing it.





Talent: SOmething you get a to roll the lowest dice again for. Like fighters doing damage (or attacking?) or rogues sneaking







and the class has a schtick.


Schtick: something you can attempt others cannot, like animal befriending or magic.




Also I like plot bombs. Which is a limited resource that can be exchanged for adding something to the campaign world. Pretty much it something to do with the character though, like representing a shady underworld figures range of contacts or a rangers obscure knowledge of mushrooms. Might still require a roll for success or complications


Plot BOmbs


: 1 point that you spent to get something relevant happening in the game, like having a contact in town or having just the right gadget on you.Also can be thought of formal mechanic for when a player declares they are trying something and you didn't realize that is something people could even try in your campaign until now. More narrative games would have it more "plot twisty" and less "Schrodinger character abilities"


Now the hitpoints or mental health or whatever. Some games might just have one circumstance.





Circumstances: This might be health, wealth ,magicness, mental stability or social standing


. MAYbe a game that was a CAR RACING would have the position race as a form of hitpoints. So taking damage means you just would move from 1st to 3rd or whatever.


Some games would have simple damage others dice rolls or whatever.





when zero some stats are at a disadvantage, (roll the highest die again) and each negative you need to roll something (con or willpower check or ass-kissing) or be out of the game (temp or permanent)




HEre is examples of this. I'm is explaining all this badly because I have distracting with the housing and the giving up caffeine again, and I might be coming round to some of those wacky anarcho-primitivist ideas, so if this blog goes dark for a couple of months I'm prob killing and eating people or painting pagan runes on a sub-station.











Example:


Capcom dungeon fighter


STATS


str: (muscling stuff)


dex: (dodging and throwing stuff)


con: (a formal declaration of rights health and wellbeing)


wits: (perception and reactions and mental audacity)


knowledge (for when your character has being paying attention but you have not)




THIS IS CLASS GAME SO CHOOSE YOUR CLASS oh race well america has a black president so that doesn't matter anymore hahaha no it's race as class


Warrior:


Knack: Violence (to hit rolls.. and maybe damage)


Schtick: Can use all weapons and armour. Especially extremely implausible big or batshit ones


Plot Bombs: armour / weapon crafting. With the right equipment you can make all kinds of booby traps , skin armours and jawbone clubs.





NInja:


Knack: Ninjitsu (acrobatics and hidings)


Schtick: cloud foot stance. All that running along rooftops and up walls shit.


Plot Bomb: Suddenly revealed to be actually hiding or disguise as ____:





Sniper:


Knack: ranged attacks


Schtick:absurd shots


Plot Bombs: Trick arrows





Thief:


Knack: Tampering (pick pockets, sneaking , open locks)


Schtick: in combat thief skills


Plot Bomb:retroactive theft (you can declare you have stolen something that you had the opportunity to steal, but didn't declare you were stealing it at the time)





Wizard:


Knack: obscure knowings


Schtick: Can use spells via scrolls and tomes


Plot Bomb: rare and dangerous experimental wizarding/drug usage ("I will cure my mummy rot by eating this salamander heart" "I will replace my eyes with this basilisks eyes because I am a wizard!")






Dwarf


Knack: Obstinance (against everything from booze to reasonable arguments to head injurys)


Schtick: Stoneken (My dwarven sense is tingling! This is no normal igneous rock! )


Plot Bomb: ancient dwarven grudges ("I am spending a plot bomb point to declare my clan has an ancient dwarven grudge against the forest gnomes of lesser dunwichen")





Elf


Knack: forestken


Schtick:doing everything anyone else can do but in a shite elven way aka mary sue race


Plot Bomb: obscure elven resistances and talents





Cleric


Knack:Morale


Schtick:Healing and wardings


Plot Bomb: Minor Divine interventions and guidance





Gadgeteer


Knack:engineering


Schtick: Useful devices


Plot Bomb: mcgyvering





Barbarain


Knack::Violence (as Fighter)


Schtickliving without pants


PlotBomb:Epic Flip outs





CIRCUMSTANCES:


Health (hitpoints )


Soul (spend to power spells , magic items and attacked by certain creatures)


Money (used to buy stuff and sleeping elsewhere from the gutter. Reducing by day to day life, legal problems, social assassinations and spending it on stuff)



WELL THIS IS FUN NOW FOR ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF SOMETHING WITHOUT CLASSES AND EVEN LESS EXPLANS BECAUSE NO ONE CARES ALSO WHAT HAPPENED TO THE SYSTEM YOU WROTE FOR THIS ALREADY?


Dunno, I can't remember it all off by heart so it can't be that good right? Also making definite statements about the future is stressful.






MERMAID PROM

stats:

Callousness (how not to care about open wounds and lost friendships)

Underhandedness (petty theft , grand larceny , and casual deceit )

Nastiness (knowing how to hurt people both verbally and physically)

Talent (knowing how to make bombs and outfits and where to buy ingredients for both)

Sexitude (how to use what mother spawned on you)


No classes just pick on of each, so these are things everyone can do , but you get an edge at doing it





Knacks:


reading


stealing


destruction


booby traps


shopping


flirting


threats


empathy


cruelty


arson


deviance


poisonings


Advanced Outfit Repair


Schticks allow you to do things or do things in ways that no-one else can:





Rich


Bat shit


Mutant


Heart Destroyer


Bullet proof naivety


Thug


Does Not Give A Shit


and choose a plot bomb


Plot Bombs:


Gadgets


Extensive and sordid past


Big family


Crazy Prepared


Imposter!


Black Mail Dossier


Faustian Pacts


Drama Maelstrom


Chaos Magnet


All the Drugs




Circumstances are:

health, social standing ,and self esteem

Being reduced to zero in any of them means you can't act that session.




Okay well I hoped no-one enjoyed that. I don't know when I will use this. Lack of play and ongoing projects have made feel even more burned out than usual. Dissatisfied with everything etc. That bird is loud and looking at me funny. Atleast it has stopped raining. I kicked a hedgehog last night. Not on purpose. It was a dark and I did not see it. We have bumble bees , hedgehogs , possums and rabbits here because some thought this should be the beatrix potter colony. In another 100 year feral cats will be as big as panthers in australia. If I start making hedgehogs swim will they become pufferfish?IT IS THE SEASON

DISPLACERKLAUS IN THE MYSTERY OF THE DISPLACERKLAUS

Print PDF THWUMP. OH LOOK AT THAT IT IS A D104 TABLE OF POCKET CONTENTS, EXPLANATIONS, PLOT DEVICES, CLUES, LANDMARKS AND SETPIECES
If the first roll doesn't make sense just keep rolling and combining the results until an ungodly mess results?  TIS THE SEASON FOR UNGODLY MESSES! 

1. Upside down castle 
2. Bowl of brains 
3. Rogue Glacier 
4. Oversized key 
5. Crude desperate map 
6. Candles 
7. Shark's teeth 
8. Wooden sword 
9. Ghosts 
10. Frozen lake 
11. Old Coins 
12. String 
13. Cup of wine 
14. Manta rays 
15. Barbed leather 
16. Clock tower 
17. Melted Sand Dunes 
18. Misshapen faces 
19. Owls 
20. Lists 
21. Whispering poison 
22. Implausible pits 
23. Firetraps 
24. Bee people 
25. Hungry Streets 
26. Wind machine 
27. Dark engine 
28. Very old people 
29. Ill stars 
30. Slime Princess 
31. Child gangs 
32. Vomiting statues 
33. Bored angels 
34. Boiling water 
35. Boar 
36. Tiny wings 
37. Bag of soot 
38. Shallow pools 
39. The moon 
40. Very new blood 
41. Hollow trees 
42. Barking men 
43. Needles 
44. Crone's eyes 
45. Bronze Tortoise 
46. A great drill 
47. Tar 
48. Half a mouse 
49. Gut strung harp 
50. Dried frogs 
51. Angry mob 
52. Strange Lights 
53. Tradition 
54. Strays 
55. Widows 
56. Razor Webs 
57. Directions 
58. The Tanner 
59. Snakes 
60. Snail shell 
61. Obsidian mirror 
62. Bitter seeds 
63. Bone chair 
64. Scraps of a dress 
65. Titan Arch 
66. White Coral 
67. Mud 
68. Mockery Jungle 
69. Plague House 
70. The End 
71. Withered plains 
72. Silver Road 
73. Red Sign 
74. Black Rainbow 
75. StormClouds 
76. Chain 
77. Heart 
78. Flies 
79. Bakers 
80. King's Grave 
81. Golem's script 
82. Pig's tail 
83. Tin Crown 
84. Echo 
85. Knapped Flint 
86. Spices 
87. Squid Beak 
88. Cage Door 
89. Lilies 
90. Coal 
91. Spider Milk 
92. Bog Whistle 
93. Finger nails 
94. Penny Dreadful 
95. Urn 
96. Talisman 
97. Game Piece 
98. Forgotten ring 
99. Pearls 
100. Careful remembrance 
101. Mourning 
102. Pins 
103. Bells 
104. Cord 

RETURN OF DISPLACERKLAUS

Print PDF HO HO HO HO
I BROUGHT YOU SOME MAGIC WEAPONS

1.Hammer Of Solutions +2 , this +2 bonus only applies when used on skill checks where a hammer is a completely daft thing to use

2.Sword of the North. Always points north

3.Handaxe of wood, chopping. It's made of wood but can still be used for chopping as a normal axe

Oh fuck are all these going to be lame punnish eye rolling garbage that used to pad up dragon and every other substandard tstr publication ?

SHHHH CHRISTMAS IS HAPPENING LITTLE ONE
I will suplex you

4.Tome Of War: it's a book on strategy that when a lever on its spine is pulled it extends a chain and teeth and then becomes pretty much a bear-trap / flail hybrid

5. Tongue gun: It's a fleshly looking tube that can be surgeryed  into your tongue so you can shoot poison darts (actually teeth that start growing in your tongue) from your mouth and suck up poison for the darts. With extreme care, because if the poison goes anywhere other than the tube, it's still poison

6. Arrows, Piscine Doom: These arrows turn into sharks a moment before impact

Sharks are not fish. YES BUT THEY ARE DOOM TO FISH okay yeah point HO H O HO

7. Crawling dagger: This dagger is alive and its trust and love must be earned like that of a pet. It will become soft like a large slug and crawl rapidly along your body, thus eluding any search for weapons. Also if it has tasted someone's blood and you know their name you can send it after them to crawl down their throat and cause vast internal ruin

8. Morning Star, Luciferous: This is made of some kind of fantasy magnesium that acts like steel except  you can light the head of it and it burns really hot and bright but will be consumed after 3d6 rounds.
Pretty sure that is a tautology . And do you mean ball and chain morning star or a spikey mace morning star . THE BALL AND CHAIN ONE BECAUSE THOSE ARE GRAND AND DON'T PRETEND YOU CARE ABOUT TAUTOLOGY 
9.Pestle of Gore: This is large pestle that can be used as a tetsubo. As a coup de grace action you can reduce any corpse within reach into a conventionally necromatically unusable paste 

Down From The Chimney His Sack Burst Forth

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Manticore is nearly here. Manticore brings people the things they dare ask for. DISPLACERKLAUS  however just brings shit no-one asked for.

no but seriously I'm doing this thing and I hate it and I'm not allowed to go on rambling incursions of pure bullshiting campaign speculation until I finish this thing. I fucking hate this thing. I have included pangolins so it's getting better.

For now DISPLACERKLAUS will fill in for me

H O HO HO I AM  DISPLACERKLAUS AND I'M NOT QUITE WHERE YOU THINK I AM 

HERE IS SOME VERY GOOD 

RPG TITLES

INFINITY PIG

Rod-Harvest

Melancholy in Sodom

Japes and Jackalweres

ManyGnome

The Bright Beast That Was

Devil's Bigness

Acclaims and Adverses 

Bogs and Bogs and Mud

Tome of Feuds

Ripe Tower

Hellbard

DIRTYPOOR

Night's Black Bosom 

Zharkz

Unbounded

Special Lady of War

Woeful Pits

Squalid Depths

Mad Giants Of Galaxy

REEKS OF MARS

PlagueWulves of the Unearth 

The Humongous 

what else do you have DISPLACERKLAUS?

RHYMING STUFF WITH ANIMAL NAMES TO MAKE MONSTERS!

A RANDOM TABLE

wow that is truly unwanted

1 Pikepike!

that is the first one and already it doesn't rhyme and some else made that joke

H O H O HO HO I STEAL AND LIE

2 Spear Bear!

3 Fog Frog!

4 Road Toad!

5 Mat Cat!

none of these deserve exclamation marks DISPLACERKLAUS

6 Mocktopus!

that's more of a punning word substitution  

7.Door Boar!

8.Chisel Horse!

9. Grappling Chicken!

10. A Bag of Wet Mice!

11. 2d6 goblins

12. flour

13. Hawk Stork!

this is going well DISPLACERKLAUS, so well. What else do you have?

THIS SOCIETY MAKES THE FOLLOWING ITEMS FROM BREAD!!

1.shoes.

2.doors

3.guard dogs

4. books

5. sling stones

6. hats

7. spouse lures

8. lower intestines

9. pauldrons

10.economic system

why all these tables are fucking stupid DISPLACERKLAUS

H O H O HO HO IM REALLY SLIGHT BESIDE WHERE YOU THINK I AM

REASONS THIS GHOST IS A GHOST

1. Ironic Suicide Pact Wager Contract

2. Murdered while impersonating a corpse

3. Drunk themselves to death. Literally, stuck a straw in a vein and slurped their way to death

4. The priest gave them shit directions to the afterlife

5. Actually an animated snowman made of ectoplasm

6. Legs fell off

7. Allergic to own skin

8. Shat heart out

9. Flying machine

10. Internal burial

11. bard

that's kind of an improvement

MUSIC!

WEAPONIZED INSTRUMENTS!

fuck you

1. Tuba launches squids

2. Organ fires blazing souls

3. Violin lacerates random target when played hard enough to break strings

4. Drums that explode

5. Flute that shoot poison needles

6. Piano that has extendable hammers when keys are pressed

BUUUH I'M ALREADY SICK OF THAT

NOW FOR A MECHANIC TO RESOLVE SEX IN RPG...

HAHAHHA HAA NO, EVEN I CAN'T GIVE A PRESENT THAT UNWANTED

POINTLESS ISLANDS!

1. The island of Crying Ducks

2.  The island of spare legs

3. The island of hot snow

4. The island with an ecosystem entirely made from centipedes

5. The island of geological unlikely rocks

6. The island of the pretend wizard

7. The island of miniature brontosaurus 

8. The island with low cloud cover

9. The island with the small volcano

10. The island where people bury their shadows

11. The island with upside down trees

12. The island that rains diamond

13. The island that smells like gas

14. The island that is entirely edible

15. The island that follows you

WELLL I'M NEARLY DONE FOR THE NIGHT JUST GOT THIS MONSTER LEFT:

CIMIM :

THEY ARE  LIKE MIMICS BUT THEY ALWAYS  TURN INTO SOMETHING REALLY UNLIKELY TO BE IN THE ENVIRONMENT 

I coulda sworn Cimim's already showed up in a post. Where did you get them from DISPLACERKLAUS?

H O H O HO HO I'LL JUST SEE MYSELF OUT OR WILL I BECAUSE I'M 3 FEET TO WHERE I THINK I AM?!?!

get out

Lakes?

Print PDF Big hated things that Sunk Cost Fallacy keeps me plugging away at how I loathe thee.

Much decent ideage goes off into that dark realm.

Meanwhile y'all get this crap:

This Lake Seems Fine to me:
BUT

1. No surface tension in the water. Nothing can float or swim in it.
2.Once a week it releases a killing invisible cloud of carbon monoxide
3.It connects up to a vast underground sea. Surprisingly large things can find their way into this lake
4. A Turlough lake with a ruin at the bottom. Drains and floods suddenly like the cruelest of water levels though.
5.A nearby civilization has covered up a genocide by concealing the evidence at the bottom of this lake
6. The crabs here seek out human bones to make flutes with. If they do not play these flutes , something worse rises out of the lake and rampages.
7.Evil horse live at the bottom of this lake. They can see you from the very bottom of the dark waters.
8. The touch of the waters causes monstrosity and when the moon is full a great wooden cube rises from the waters. Inside is a labyrinth, with treasure apparently, but mostly monsterized former treasures seekers who failed to make it out again before the labyrinth sank.
9.Those ducks. Actually lures on the noses of horrible frog beasts
10.Big snapper turtles with the 7 seven words that can unravel the world carved on their shells
11. Drinking of these water is the equivalent to the signing of a contract in the understanding of eldritch elemental powers. This means you have agreed use of your body by the them for a certain amount of time at a unspecified date.
12. This is where you go when you die. It's cold and it's dark and nothing happens. Everyone who has died is at the bottom of this lake.
13.This lake is where the night is kept when not in use
14.There is one giant eye at the bottom of this lake. Someone is looking for it.
15.The mouth that will swallow the sun is swimming up from the bottom of the lake. The lake is always stretching its depths so the mouth will never arrive but the lake will tire one day and become finite and the mouth will arrive
16. The only innocent things in this world are the stingless jellyfish that swim in this lake and now you have found them who else will too?