Thursday 14 August 2014

SHAMAN Class

SHAMAN Class

HD: 1d6

WEAPONS: Any Wood, Bone, Teeth., Stone. No metallic. (Including arrow tips.)

Saves: INT, WIS;

Skills: 2 from: Survival, Nature, Insight, Performance, Medicine, Animal Handling

Equipment:
(a) a Jawbone Club or (b) a Flint Knife;
(a) a Component pouch or (b) An Enemies Shrunken Head (Arcane Focus); 
(a) Crazy Piercings or (b) Tricked out Mad Tattoos or (c) Disturbing Scarification


SPELLCASTING

When you sleep you go to where the spells are, you hunt the spells. The spells try to get away but you catch them pretty easily becasue you are a SHAMAN. Finding the right ones can be hard though. The longer you sleep the more spells you can hunt. The higher your level the deeper into that place you can go.





When you sleep or meditate to get spells, roll a d6. Go to that number at the bottom of the chart, this is where you start. A cantrip will be here with you. You can catch the catrip if you want, put it in your head, write it on your spell sheet.

For every hour you meditate or sleep, you can travel along one black dotted line to a place where a new spell is. Whenever you reach a new spell, you can put it in your head and write it on your sheet. When you wake up, you can use that spell whenever you want, then its gone back to the hunting ground. When you sleep, all of your spells escape and you have to look for more.

So if you sleep for eight hours, you can hunt eight spells.

BUT. There is a catch. Some spells don't like each other. If you have two spells in your head connected by a dotted line, thats right next to each other, then you have to roll on the Shaman Madness Table once for each line.

So if you go to sleep as a level one Shaman for eight hours and hunt eight spells, then you will have seven madnesses the next day. This is why Shamans are so crazy. You can avoid madneses by not having spells that are connected by dotted lines in your head at the same time. But this means you get less spells.

As you get better as a Shaman you can go deeper into the dream lands to hunt more powerful spells.

From levels 1-4 you hunt in the Plains. From level 5 you can also hunt in the Forest, at level 11 you can also hunt in the Hills and at level 17 you can visit the Mountain for the most powerful spells.

You always start at the bottom though, with a d6 roll.


Lvl 2: A number of times per day equal to your level, any spell you have caught may be cast as an illusiory version of itself.
Lvl 3: ---
Lvl 4: Ability Score Improvement.
Lvl 5: You may now hunt in the Forest.
Lvl 6: Your cantrips deal half Damage even on a Save.
Lvl 7: ---
Lvl 8: Ability Score Improvement
Lvl 9: ---
Lvl 10: add your Int Mod to your Evocation Spells'Damage.
Lvl 11: You may now hunt in the Hills.
Lvl 12: Ability Score Improvement
Lvl 13: ---
Lvl 14: You may halve the number of madnesses (rounding up) that you must take after hunting spells.
Lvl 15: ---
Lvl 16: Ability Score Improvement
Lvl 17: You may now hunt on the Mountain
Lvl 18: You can choose where you begin your hunt on the bottom row.
Lvl 19: Ability Score Improvement
Lvl 20: Instead of beginning on the bottom row, you may drop a d4 on the chart and begin where it lands.




14 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    1. Yeah, I deleted my comment because I noticed that and realize I was was being a moron.

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    2. No, you were right, I added Stone after your comment.

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    3. Other than that (very) minor oversight, I agree it is brilliant :D

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  2. I could see the grounds as rings on a cipher disc, rotating due to portents or pc actions/rituals.

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  3. The coolest implementation of spells as spirits I've run ever run into. Not overwrought or complicated. Great meshing of flavour and mechanics.

    What do you recommend for the Shaman Madness Table? Or maybe I just have reading comprehension issues and it's in there somewhere.

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    1. I will probably end up knocking together one from bits and pieces of other OSR stuff out there. I will put one up if i get it done.

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  4. I may steal this idea for some magic items or a mini-game to keep control over the villains doom machine while they seek to destroy it. Like they can avert symptoms of the doom machine but it costs them more and more, who is going to hold the ring? Do you take turns with the madness?

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  5. This is perfectly serendipitous... exactly the sort of alternate spell acquiring system I've been mulling over myself. Thanks for posting.

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  6. I'm a little late to the party, but thanks for this. An excellent version of the shaman class with intriguing spell options. Great stuff!

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