Chasing the muse, here are 4 classes made to be useful for domain play heavy campaigns. I have TBD-like games in mind, but it should be usable for more traditional domain games as well. Much thanks to the GLoG community for myriad advice and inspiration, in particular Locheil (for the Shepherd, Sacred One, and Ashes to Ashes) and Phlox (for OSR Advancement, lots of cool classes, and Ten Blade Demigod).
THE GOD KING
Self-styled, but not unreal.
Each Template, +1 save
Starting Assets: A temple dedicated to you, a scepter, a sword, a weighty amulet
A: +1 MD, Taboos, Honor, +3 God-King spells
B: +1 MD, Bloodless, Totem
C: +1 MD, Counter Spell, Stone Lips
D: +1 MD, Immune to mundane weapons
Taboos: All God Kings start with a taboo against wearing armor. You may choose to take up additional taboos. If you break a taboo, you lose all God King class features until you can complete a week long ceremony of sanctification. On high holy days, you may set aside a taboo, but this permanently counts as having -1 taboo for Honor purposes.
Taboo Examples:
-Forbidden to talk
-Must bathe for an hour each day
-Can only eat at dawn and dusk
-Illiteracy
-Forgoes slashing and piercing weapons
-Forbidden to touch another person
-Cannot harm unaware or helpless creatures
-Must obey the laws of any country you are present in
-Must wear a blindfold
-Never allow an insult to go unanswered with violence
-Must not allow your skin to be seen by another person
-Forbidden from using facial expression or voice to emote.
Honor: Elementals and talking beasts know you by name and treat you as a major figure. While wearing kingly or priestly garments, symbols of authority (crowns, scepters, orbs, broaches, etc) grant bonus AC equal to the slots they take up, up to a maximum equal to the number of Taboos you have taken up.
Bloodless: The Universe forgets you are mortal, until reminded. As long as you have not taken damage today, +2 AC and DR 2.
Totem: You have an idol, a symbolic representation of your divinity. As long as it is in your temple you can see and hear through it. Lovingly record how you ornament your totem, and carefully record how much you spend to do so. 1/year, summon an angelic servant to perform a favor with HD = 1% of your totem’s value. Spells cast by God Kings with cheaper idols cannot touch you unless you let them. If you retrieve the idols of other gods and reconsecrate them at the base of your idol, their value is added to your own,
Counterspell: You may react to spells being cast in your presence by countering them, rolling MD and reducing the spell’s [dice] and [sum] by that amount.
Stone Lips: You may cast spells through your idols, both the major idol you keep in your temple and any images of you.
God King Spell List
KNEEL. Target must save or kneel for [dice] rounds, remaining rooted in place and suffering -[highest] to any rolls.
FILL MY HAND. The earth supplies you with a stone item of up to [dice] slots. After [sum] hours, the item crumbles into dust.
COME SERVE. You invite a vital spirit to occupy an item, allowing it to move on its own. The spirit has [dice] of the following qualities: fast, strong, intelligible, serious, or subtle. Otherwise, it is meandering, as weak as a child, inscrutable, puckish, and obvious. The effect fades after [highest] hours.
TARRY ME NOT. Like Iron Heart Surge, of legend. [Dice] times in the next [sum] hours, ignore something that is stopping your movement. This could be binding ropes or a grappling opponent, but it could also be gravity or a stone wall.
SPEAK. Ask [sum] + [dice] questions of worked stone, brick, silver, or gold. -1 die to compel honesty.
SEIZE THEM. Plants and rocks entangle everyone within [sum]* 10 feet of you except [dice] people you select.
THIS I SWEAR. Make a covenant with another. If either ever breaks the covenant, that person takes [sum+highest] damage.
KEEP WATCH. Set spirits to guard an area. If an intruder attempts to enter the area within the next [sum] hours, agitated pipes play from thin air and the intruder is pushed back 10 feet. This happens up to [dice] times before the spirits depart.
HELLO AGAIN. Summon a totemic spirit guide, a religiously appropriate being in an animal form. It has [sum] hp and will accompany you for at least [dice] hours, though its temperament may not be prone to combat. It acts with a peculiar wisdom and inhuman intelligence. If cast with
-2 or more MD, you and the creature have an empathic link.
-3 or more MD, you may cast spells through the creature and it can pass through walls.
-4 or more MD, and the creature will let you ride it. If you cast this on a totemic animal you find in the wild rather than one you summon, if will continue to be your mount for [sum] months before departing.
STAY: [Dice] times in the next [sum] hours, an object you handle becomes immovable for [sum] hours.
Merchant Lord by Vaggelis Manousakas
THE PLUTARCH
The kind of thief you can’t convince the law to arrest.
Each template, +1 inventory slot
Starting Equipment: Merchant’s Robe, Switchblade, Ostentatious Hat, 25 gold coins
A: Price of Butter, Social Climber, Quick Reactions
B: High and Low Places, Protected Market
C: Reverse Surprise, Filthy Rich
D: Honor Among Thieves, Commandant of Crime
Price of Butter: You always know the fair market value of strange goods, and whether it would be more valuable to a particular kind of client.
Social Climber: +3 to rolls to climb scalable surfaces and run like hell. When you offer an appropriate bribe, the bonus to a reaction roll increases by 1.
Quick Reactions: When you trigger a trap that would affect you, you get some omen of coming misfortune if plausible (a dry click, the rushing of air, etc). You may describe how you react to that omen, potentially reducing or avoiding the trap.
High and Low Places: You have become a known party to unsavory dealings. Thieves treat you with +1 reaction. Your winning smile means polite society will treat you without a reaction penalty even if they know who you are, unless you push it.
Protected Market: With a season of effort and 25 gold, you can set up a criminal syndicate in a settlement. For each syndicate you maintain, gain a 5% discount on mundane purchases.
Reverse Surprise: If a stranger would surprise you in combat, you surprise them instead. If you are surprised in a social encounter, you may call a 5 minute time out once per session to think it out. Other players can give OOC suggestions.
Filthy Rich: During tax season you may direct your criminal syndicates to rob from the Crown, local potentates, and/or the People. You gain gold equal to 10% of the tax revenue for each of these groups you rob.
Honor Among Thieves: criminals in your syndicate never betray you or their fellows to outsiders.
Commandant of Crime: gain a nigh unfindable hidden sanctum. Spread three rumors about yourself and have them be believed. You can seamlessly blend into crowds. After completing a conversation with an unsuspecting target, you may declare that you’ve picked their pocket
THE ARCHON
“So great are the majesty and the reverence that accompany the presence of a prince that it is an easy thing for them either to soften or to terrify an executor… If this power is in a man bound and a prisoner, and drowned in bad fortune, how much greater can it be held to be in an unshackled prince with the majesty of his ornaments, pomp and retinue!” -Nicollo Machiavelli, Discourses on Titus Livy, Book III, Chapter VI
The Archon, for purposes of this class, is a citizen of high enough birth to qualify to become a magistrate. A matriarch/patriarch, they develop a well equipped retinue and try to find a use for their misbegotten nephews.
Each template, +1 language
Starting Assets: An Exquisite short sword and either (silk robes, a bag of 15 gold coins, and the skill Law), or (a captain’s helmet, trusty boots, and a heavy shield)
A: Political Instincts, Pomp and Ornaments
B: Magnificence, +1 Retinue
C: Command, MSCL
D: March On, +1 Retinue
Political Instincts: You are trained from birth to survive the often literally cutthroat world of politics. 4 in 6 chance to resist surprise. When poisoned, there is a [Templates] in 6 chance you have already given yourself an immunity through a regimen of micro dosing.
Pomp and Ornaments: You always have access to the best and the finest of everything. By paying double the cost, goods can be purchased at Exquisite quality. Exquisite arms gain +1 to hit. Exquisite fine clothing provides +1 to reaction rolls in refined settings if you are unarmored.
Retinue: Personal retainers, loyal but not slavish, brave but not suicidal. They start with 4 hp, +1 to the virtue of your choice and +0 to the others, and expertise in a narrow field. You may choose if they take a share of XP when they accompany you on adventures. If they gain 50 XP, they level up (to 1), gaining the first level of a class.
Magnificence: Foes struggle to bring themselves to attack you, who in every manner and style seem to be more than mortal. Each time they attack you, foes must save or hesitate and waste their attack. The DC is 10. For each principality under your dominion, to a maximum equal to [Templates], increase this DC by 2.
MSCL: Choose Might, Stewardship, Cunning, or Learning.
-Might. Hirelings and soldiers you lead have +2 Morale.
-Stewardship. Principalities you administer produce +20% tax revenue.
-Cunning. Brutes, Thugs, and Spies are half cost to hire. 4 in 6 chance to hear someone being silent.
-Learning. +3 languages. Gain a skill. Learn the location of a powerful relic.
March On: If your hirelings or soldiers would mutiny, supply a meal break then reroll the morale check.
Command: As your move, pick an ally that can hear you to make a free attack.
THE WARLORD
For the ruler of a place where kung fu is a necessary prerequisite for the confidence of the people.
+1 Unarmed Attack per Template.
Starting Assets: Heavy tasseled spear, lamellar breastplate, personal banner
A - Palace Economy, unarmed attacks count as light weapons
B - Civic Hero, Grab
C - Mountain of Duty
D - Drill, Avatar of a Nation
Palace Economy: You stand at the middle of a system of patronage, favors, levied service and obligation. Each season you get a 20 gold discount on any realm expenses (Like improving a holding or maintaining troops)
Civic Hero: When you settle or conquer a settlement, it gains a level 1 law holding under your control. If it already had one, you have a 100 gold discount to the next holding you upgrade there
Grab: When you hit with an unarmed attack, you may hold your foe in place instead of dealing damage. If you Grab a foe you have already held, you may give them -2 to rolls involving physical or spiritual movement
Mountain of Duty: You are your people’s hopes and icon. Their obedience to you is the glue of society, and you can’t afford to let them down.
You have a pool of [1/thousand subjects you rule +1/holding levell] points, that you can add to:
Attack rolls.
Damage rolls
Defense against a single attack
And you can spend to reduce the sum from hostile spells that target you on a 1:1 basis
You regain 1d4 points when you win a fight, and all of your points when you defeat a ruler, punish a lawbreaker or save your community from harm. If you do all three at once, permanently increase your pool of points by 1.
Drill: Units of soldiers from your domain gain +1 hp, or +2 if you are their unit commander.
Avatar of a Nation: When you kill a great foe or route a unit, allies fleeing within 50 ft rally. You may ignore damage from a grievous blow by destroying one holding level. If your bones are interred with honor in a settlement after you die, the province instantly gains a level.
Reflections
-To add to the two fighter types, thief type, and priest type, I might try to make a more wizardly spell caster.
-I’m not totally convinced the Plutarch is in its final form, maybe it needs more pizzazz?
-Overall, I’m pleased with the classes. It’s fun to imagine God Kings fighting back and forth over hordes of captured idols, and the bones of Warlord Saints being dug up and reburied time and again.
-The hope for each class was to give each an obvious hook for advancement extending beyond their character sheet, with God Kings building better idols, Plutarchs building a criminal empire, Archons recruiting and equipping a retinue, and Warlords going a conquerin’.
-My domain game assumptions are that it will be something like Phlox’s The Realm, but it should be easy enough to adapt.
